Rebels of Babylon (26 page)

“You’ve single-handedly driven this city to the brink of insurrection,” he continued. Thumping down his fist, he made the steel pens jingle on his desk. A pitcher of water threatened an inundation. “Do you understand what it means when a Union officer
in
uniform is found dead in the most notoriously Confederate square in this damned disloyal pile of Rebel bricks? Right in front of the Catholic cathedral? With Federal currency stuffed down his throat? And all those Frenched-up bastards snickering away behind their perfumed whiskers?”

Unsettled by my presence, General Banks looked elsewhere as he spoke. “Colonel Feiger deserved better than that. A dog deserves better than that. They killed a decent man, insulted his
uniform, and threw our national currency back in our faces. It’s sedition, and it’s murder.” He returned his reluctant, disdainful eyes to me. “And I want to know what you had to do with it.”

Now, I am one who respects rank and good order. I am the least rebellious man I know. But I do not like to be accused of murder, or the least complicity therein. And my jaw was still sufficiently pained to push me to temper’s edge.

“Look you, General Banks. I did not even know your paymaster’s name, not until you spoke it. I wished to speak to the fellow, there is true. And I made it known to your watchdog, Captain Bolt.” I tapped my cane on the floor, demanding attention. “Perhaps you should ask young Bolt if he has been bragging? To killers who let an ass bray all he wants? The lad is a fool, and clear that is to anyone.”

“The little you know,” Banks snorted.

I took a breath so deep it was almost a growl. “As for my Christian self, General Banks, I cannot see much order in your city when a man to whom I wished to speak is slain as soon as I whisper my inclination.” Shaking my head with Methodist solemnity, I declared, “Something is rotten, sir, and closer it is to us than the state of Denmark.”

The general folded his arms again, smirking. “Jones, you don’t know your backside from a wagon wheel. And you don’t know me. I’m not going to let you twist this all up the way your Washington friends do. We’re talking about a murdered Union officer. Of field rank.” He gave the air a slap. “What gives you the right to annoy my pay department, anyway? What the hell and damnation would my paymaster have to do with this dead do-gooder of yours? What on earth could you have wanted from poor Feiger?”

“Someone in your pay office may have been tied to the murder of Susan Peabody.” I considered things for a moment. “That same person may bear the responsibility for the death of your Colonel Feiger. If the colonel himself bore no blame.”

“Don’t talk in riddles.”

“Well, riddles there are in plenty, General Banks. But I am not speaking in them. The fact is only this, see. Not long before her death, Miss Peabody received a sum from her father. Or perhaps from her own funds back in New York. I cannot say. But it is enough that the money arrived in this city. Because the New Orleans banks are in disarray, she entrusted the sum to your paymaster. Or, perhaps, to one of his subordinates. For safekeeping.”

“You’re blaming that woman’s murder on one of my officers?”

“Perhaps other murders, as well. I cannot say that, either. Nothing is proven, not yet. I give you that. And I note that the person involved, officer or not, first acted while General Butler was in command. You yourself bear no responsibility for this business of the money. Or for the girl’s death.”

That calmed the fellow slightly, though not much.

“And where exactly did you come by all your intelligence? From that pot-bellied bummer who’s been hanging on to you like a leech? A man with known Confederate sympathies?”

“If you speak of Mr. Barnaby, I do not believe him to hold Confederate sympathies. I should think the contrary true. Although he does have friends who are with the Rebels.” I looked at the general. “As do many of our leading officers, if I do not mistake me.”

“Then where
did
you get your information, damn it? This tall tale about money deposited with the paymaster. Which would contravene War Department regulations.”

“I believe that General Butler’s administration was less strict than your own about regulations. Any irregularities would have occurred before you took command.”

“You don’t have to repeat yourself. I understand what you’re telling me. But I won’t blame Ben Butler for every pile of slops in the streets. I still want to know where you got your information.”

“Perhaps you might ask Bolt?”

He grimaced. “Captain Bolt doesn’t have the least idea. Or I’d know it. And you know that I would.” Bending toward me slightly, he said, “I should lock you up and see how long it takes for your cronies in Washington to realize you’re absent from duty.”

“Locking me up will not stop the killings.”

“Who told you that the paymaster took the girl’s money for safekeeping?”

“It does not signify. The person from whom I heard the report may be dead.”

“That’s convenient.”

“Not for her, I do not think.”

“You had it from a woman?” he said dismissively.

“I do not see that it matters. Especially if she was important enough to be murdered. Or kidnapped. Under Captain Bolt’s nose.”

“Forget Bolt.”

“Well, whether or not the captain is forgotten, I should like to know what happened to the money.”

“How much was it?”

“That I cannot say.”

He picked up the cigar he had thrown down and lit it, making faces and smacking his lips as he puffed the weeds to life. “There’s a lot you ‘cannot say.’ Isn’t there, Jones? You don’t really know much at all.”

“I know more than I knew yesterday.”

“Presumably, the sum of money was a large one?”

“Enough to charter a ship, or ships, to carry freed slaves to Africa.”

He laughed, but the sound was dry. “Oh, yes. The Peabody girl’s fantasy.”

“She subscribed to the effort. It was the scheme of a colored fellow. Who was murdered last evening.”

“The one skinned alive?”

“For dreaming of taking his people to their homeland.
Or
because there was a great sum involved.”

“All these murders … may just come down to money? Is that what you’re saying now?”

“Much comes down to money, General Banks. Especially in a commercial city bankrupted by war. But no matter how much money Susan Peabody imported from New York, it would not have been enough to satisfy every party who learned of it. And greed is greed. Those who knew of the money are killing each other. So that the funds need not be shared among them. That is at least part of the wicked story.”

He gazed at me through a pall of tobacco. “So the last one on his feet … would be the man behind all of your murders.”

“It is too soon to say. So many parties are engaged in the affair and have taken so many risks that I cannot judge whether Miss Peabody’s money is the cause or merely one factor of several.” I transferred more of my weight to my cane, as if it might help me think. “To kill so blithely …”

His lips expelled a muzzle-load of smoke. “ … in a bankrupt city …”

“There is another side to things that gnaws me,” I resumed. “Logical enough it would be to look at the matter simply, to say that, because Miss Peabody deposited the money with the paymaster, he had her murdered in order to rob her funds. But that would be a foolish approach, and the colonel in charge of the pay chest is rarely a fool. Even the greedy are wary of the gallows. The guilty would have to summon another reason for Susan Peabody’s murder. To divert us. To mask the simple greed.”

“Maybe he was just stupid? Whoever killed her?”

I waved the thought away. “Unless we are speaking of Captain Bolt, I would leave stupidity out of the matter. No, the question must be asked as to how many people knew of the money, if money was the cause of Miss Peabody’s murder. I know of at least four parties who had such knowledge. Two are dead. Another is either dead herself, or wickedly harmed and missing.”

“And the fourth?”

“An old widow. With whom I mean to have another visit.”

The remark refreshed his skepticism. “You’re suggesting that an old woman killed everybody?”

“She may prove a victim herself, and not a criminal. That we shall see. But this much I will tell you. Black men and white men, Union men and Southrons, males and females, and every mongrel mix this city has to offer, Christian and otherwise, have their fingers in this affair. And I am not too proud a man to admit that I remain baffled.” I looked at the spittoon next to his desk. Neither the general nor his guests had taken careful aim. “Even Miss Peabody is something of a riddle.”

“Well, solve it and go back to Washington. I’ve got a campaign to fight up-river, trouble in the bayous, and a truculent city on my hands. And now a dead paymaster.”

“Here is the matter of it,” I went on, thinking aloud. “A charitable plan was formed to send negroes back to Africa. But several of those involved in the scheme were killed. There was a sum of money in question, although that might only mislead our thinking. Negroes began to disappear from the streets, as if their freedom ships were sailing constantly. But everyone with a skin darker than yours or mine goes about in fear of being kidnapped. Or worse. And no one hints about a voyage to Africa any longer. Instead, there is talk of voodoo and
‘zombis’
and such. Of pirates. And all I can draw from anyone is a muttered ‘Fishers of Men.’ ”

Banks shrugged. “Frankly, I’m not concerned about scared darkies. If they’re scared enough, they might stay out of trouble.”

“Or will they create trouble? To fight against the object of their fears?”

“We can take care of any negroes who get themselves into an uproar. And the truth is, Jones, that I don’t care a damn about the Peabody girl. Never did. There’s a war on. I just want to know who murdered Colonel Feiger. And why.” He folded his arms yet again, tucking his shrunken cigar behind an elbow. “Based upon your conspicuous successes so far, I’m not sure you’re the man to find that out.”

“I need to review the ledgers in the paymaster’s office.”

He smirked again. “If half of what you suspect is true, you wouldn’t find the girl’s money on the books. Couldn’t be mixed in with Federal funds, anyway.”

“But whoever accepted the money from Miss Peabody must have made a show of entering the funds into one record or another. To content her. Even if that record has been destroyed, my appearance will trouble the thoughts of the guilty person. And then we will see what happens.”

A look of discomfort spread from the general’s face to his bearing entire. I knew what he was going to say before he parted his lips.

I spoke first. “If your colonel bore any guilt, then we will uncover it. And if he was an innocent victim, we will learn that, too, and protect his reputation.”

His eyes searched the ceiling. “Oh, go down and look at the ledgers. Look all you want. Go ahead. Make a pantomime of doing something, even if you’re not accomplishing one damned thing. Peek in every slops bucket in New Orleans, for all I care. Just get on with your damned investigation and finish it. So this city and I can see the last of you.” He shifted his posture. He might have been holding a musket with bayonet fixed. “And don’t blame Bolt for your own mistakes. I’ve got to have somebody keeping an eye on you. Since you don’t seem to feel any obligation to keep the general commanding informed.” He crossed his arms again. “Besides, you should be damned glad he dragged you out of that tomb the other night. Sounds to me like you’re in the captain’s debt.”

“And if I am grateful, the lad is still a fool. And an annoyance.”

“Tell that to his father, when you go back North. Old man Bolt controls more than his fair share of land, money and votes out West. And, from what I hear, half the shipping upriver of St. Louis. I’m just trying to keep the boy half-employed while he’s playing soldier. And don’t make that self-righteous face at me. It’s your friends in Washington who gave young Bolt his commission, then made damned certain he isn’t sent anywhere near
the fighting. I have less control over him than I do over you. I’m just trying to get a little work out of him.”

The general stubbed out his cigar and bellowed, “Crandall? Crandall, get in here. Bring the orders and those damned shoulder-boards.”

“Then we are finished, General Banks?”

“I wish to Hell we were.”

An adjutant tumbled into the room, bearing folded papers and a pair of lieutenant-colonel’s epaulettes.

“I’ve received an order. From Stanton,” the general said, with no pretence at satisfaction. “To promote you without delay. Your commission’s signed by Lincoln himself, ‘Lieutenant-colonel’ Jones.” His mouth writhed as if he had tasted something foul. “I’d call that fairly special treatment. For a volunteer officer who doesn’t hold a command. Seems to me that you and Captain Bolt have a great deal in common.” His distaste yielded to necessity. “Read the orders, Crandall. We’ll get this over with.”

“No,” I said.

The two men looked at me.

“No,” I repeated. “I do not accept the promotion. I do not want it.”

“You—”

“I will not accept it, see. I will not be promoted.”

I understood, of course. This was John Nicolay’s doing. And Mr. Lincoln’s canniness at work. It was an attempt to flatter me. To bribe me, to say things plainly. So that I would discard my intention to resign my commission and leave the Union Army.

“You don’t want a promotion?” Banks asked, incredulously. “I would have thought that a man like you—”

“You would have thought incorrectly, General Banks. It is my intention to resign the commission I already hold, as soon as this Peabody matter is resolved. I intend to return to my family and my business. And I will not be lured into changing my mind.”

A different sort of smile crept over his face. Twas small and hard. “Had enough of war, have you?” His voice was ice, but his eyes were colder still. He thrust a fresh cigar between his lips.

I understood what the fellow meant. He did not know my history, that I had seen more of war than a man should witness. He simply thought me a coward who, even kept at a distance from the battlefield, could not bear the danger, or even the inconvenience, of wearing a uniform. He thought me the same as countless others who had failed our country as the war dragged on.