The Spymistress (45 page)

It was a beautiful day, warm and gentle and sunny, with daffodils blooming and trees unfurling a fresh, green canopy of leaves overhead. As they crossed the street to Saint John’s church, Lizzie took it all in gratefully, glimpsing God’s benevolence in the natural beauty of her beleaguered city, but as she escorted her mother and nieces into the family pew, her attention was riveted by the hushed, worried murmurs all around her. General Pickett had met a fearful loss near Petersburg, some said. Veteran troops manning Richmond’s defenses had been hurriedly marched away to reinforce divisions elsewhere, and barely trained reserves had taken their places. The battle was still ongoing, but some trick of the wind carried the sounds of warfare away from Richmond so it was impossible to tell whether the armies clashed nearby or far away, whether they were approaching or retreating.

Lizzie tried to forget her earthly cares in the familiar, soothing rhythms of worship. The minister was reading from Zechariah when Lizzie heard footsteps coming up the center aisle behind her. When the footsteps suddenly halted and a flurry of murmurs and shifting began, Lizzie glanced over her shoulder and discovered a messenger standing at the end of a pew five rows back, handing a folded paper to—Lizzie gave a start—to Colonel Trinidad Martinez, whom she had not seen in ages. She had not known he was back in Richmond, but when he read the note, supported himself with a cane as he rose, and followed the messenger from the church, she realized that he must have been recently wounded, and was recovering in one of the many hospitals scattered throughout the city. If she had known, she would have invited him to move into the Van Lew mansion while he recuperated—but, of course, that would have put her clandestine activities in jeopardy, so it was just as well he had not sent word.

The disruption over, the minister resumed his homily, and Lizzie struggled to return her attention to his words of faith and redemption. He had nearly finished when another messenger hurried up the side aisle and bent to whisper in the ear of a gray-bearded man Lizzie recognized as a member of President Davis’s cabinet. The secretary strode from the church, mouth set in a grim line, and the door had scarcely closed behind him when yet another messenger entered, middle-aged and portly and huffing from exertion. The distracted worshipers’ murmurs swelled with curiosity and alarm as he hurried past the pews and halted at the pulpit. There he stood at attention and held out a folded piece of paper to the minister, who stared at him a moment before accepting the note. As the minister read in silence, the furrows in his brow deepened and his shoulders slumped. He bowed his head on the lectern for a long moment, then straightened, looked out upon the congregation gravely, and said, “Brethren, trying times are before us. General Lee has been defeated, but remember that God is with us in the storm as well as in the calm.”

A woman moaned with such unearthly despair that Lizzie felt chills prickle up and down her spine from her neck to the small of her back.

“We may never meet again,” the minister intoned. “Go quietly to your homes, and whatever may be in store for us, let us not forget that we are Christian men and women, and may the protection and blessing of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost be with you all.”

Lizzie seized little Eliza’s hand, Mother took Annie’s, and they joined the flow of worshipers as they swiftly fled the church, some weeping openly, others grimacing in anguish. Outside, songbirds chirped merrily in the sunshine beneath a blue, cloudless sky, but the residents of Church Hill were insensible to their song as they rushed to and fro seeking information, reassurance, the comfort of a friend’s embrace. As Lizzie quickly ushered her little family across the street, she observed men striding off toward Capitol Square and black-clad women gathering up their skirts and fleeing for home. So many women were dressed in mourning, Lizzie thought as she gazed back upon the scene from the safety of her own front portico. In the grayness of winter, it had been easier not to notice how nearly every woman of her acquaintance was mourning a husband, a son, a brother, a father, but against the pastel hues of springtime, their black attire stood out in contrast as stark as their grief.

While she stood watching, a dowager making her way stiffly down Grace Street waved frantically to a pair of younger women passing on the opposite side. “Oh, Alice, Martha, have you heard the dreadful news?” she called out, her voice shrill with terror. “The city is to be evacuated immediately, and the Yankees will be here before morning! What can it all mean? And what is to become of us poor defenseless women? God only knows!”

“Don’t despair,” the younger of the two ladies called back. “I don’t believe they’re going to evacuate. That has been the false report so often, it can be nothing more than another of the usual Sunday rumors.”

But her voice quavered as she spoke, and after bowing her head in farewell, she linked her arm through her companion’s and they hurried off together at a much brisker pace.

Lizzie followed her family inside, and when she summoned Peter she was relieved when Louisa reported that he had anticipated her request—or had wanted to satisfy his own burning curiosity—and had already gone to Capitol Square for the news. Impatiently she waited, wondering whether her time would be better spent sending General Grant information or asking for it.

She had her answer when Peter came back with observations and rumors in abundance. Apparently a messenger had come to Mr. Davis as he attended services at Saint Paul’s earlier that morning, and his face had gone gray as he read the note. Without a word, he had risen with singular gravity and determination and had quietly left the church, his hat in his hand. Colored folks whose ministers had announced the news from the pulpit had emerged from their African churches beaming and glancing with great anticipation toward the James and down the road to the east as if they expected Yankees to storm the city at any moment. Citizens spotting officials on the street had watched them as if trying to determine from their behavior what they themselves ought to be doing—packing their belongings, hiding their valuables, destroying incriminating wartime journals, or grabbing their loved ones and fleeing for their lives. Increasingly frantic crowds had gathered at the Spotswood Hotel and clustered around the bulletin boards outside the telegraph and newspaper offices, desperate for news from Petersburg and the battlefields. Government clerks loaded boxes of documents and kegs full of gold onto wagons, carts, and any other wheeled conveyance they could lay their hands upon. Peter happened to run into Mr. Ruth, who told him that the quartermaster had been organizing trains to carry officials, documents, and treasure south into exile on the Richmond & Danville Railroad, and Mr. Ruth was doing his very best to keep the RF&P train cars out of his desperate grasp.

The evacuation of the government, though not yet formally announced, was clearly well under way.

At two o’clock, though it was a Sunday, the banks unlocked their doors and instructed customers to claim their deposits. Two hours later, Mayor Mayo confirmed to the City Council that the Confederate government was leaving the city. The City Council, fearful of what triumphant Yankee invaders might do if alcohol were poured upon the flames of their vengeance, appointed men to destroy all liquor supplies in Richmond. When Peter heard that the mayor had authorized a citizens’ committee to meet the federal army and arrange the peaceful surrender of the city, he decided he had learned enough. He had hurried home, pushing his way through crowds of people rushing toward the city’s bridges on foot, carriages and wagons rumbling away stuffed full of trunks and luggage, scrawny horses and mules carrying lone riders into the countryside to the west, and weary and wary servants hauling parcels and bundles to the train station, their eyes burning with expectation in their dark, carefully expressionless faces.

Lizzie had summoned her most reliable young messenger hours ago, and while Caroline kept the lad occupied in the kitchen with biscuits and simple chores, Lizzie swiftly compiled Peter’s observations into a dispatch. Sealing it, she sat back in her chair, light-headed and overcome with emotion.

This could very well be her last dispatch. General Grant might enter the city before he could receive it.

She sent it off immediately anyway, just in case it contained even a single necessary detail that would hasten the liberation of Richmond.

Soon after her messenger raced off to carry her dispatch to a Unionist compatriot who would convey it to General Grant’s camp, a knock sounded on the front door. It was a neighbor, a quiet silver-haired widower who resided with his three widowed daughters on the next block, carrying what looked to be a large box of silverware. “Will you hide this for us?” he asked urgently, glancing nervously over his shoulder. “The Yankee soldiers will not molest you, but my daughters’ husbands fought them, and they will tear our place apart.”

Speechless with astonishment, Lizzie could only nod and hold out her arms for the box. William quickly carried it off to a safe hiding place in a closet, but he had not yet returned from the errand when another neighbor called, pushing a wheelbarrow full of valuables—silver candlesticks, a portrait of a venerable ancestor on horseback in Revolutionary War costume, hatboxes stuffed with papers, and jewelry cases tied shut with twine. He too begged her to keep his family’s treasure safe from the Yankees, and this time she found her voice and promised him she would.

As the frantic day drew to a close, Lizzie observed young soldiers on horseback and on foot bidding hasty farewells to their friends and loved ones before they raced off to what could be their final battle. Some looked resolute, others pale and terrified, and one, a lad Lizzie had known since he was Annie’s age, confessed that he dreaded to report but must obey his orders.

Lizzie walked with him back to his parents’ home, hoping to persuade him to desert now that all seemed lost, but he said he would rather be shot by the Yankees for fulfilling his duty than by the Confederates for abandoning it. Lizzie would rather he not be shot at all, a sentiment she imagine he shared, but he was resolute, so she bade him a sad farewell and turned toward home.

Church Hill was in a frenzy, and from the sound of it the downtown was in an even more frantic state, so Lizzie was almost too distracted to notice the woman in the worn brown dress sitting on her front porch steps within a fenced yard, a plaid wool shawl wrapped tightly around her shoulders. Her gaze was fixed upon the west, her expression so fiercely melancholy that for a moment in the deepening twilight, Lizzie did not recognize her and almost passed by with nothing more than a polite nod. Then, suddenly, the mousy, pinched face and the brown hair thinning along the center part and pulled back tightly into a broad bun evoked a flash of memory, and she stopped short. “Why, Mrs. Lodge,” she gasped. “You’re still here.”

Mrs. Lodge eyed her distastefully. “Of course I am. Where would I go?”

“I certainly wouldn’t know,” Lizzie managed to reply. “It seems that half the city has taken flight.”

“Well, not us, and apparently not you either. How is your sister-in-law?”

“Mary?” Lizzie was again taken aback, and she wished she had not lingered. “She is as fine as she can be, I suppose, given the circumstances.” She would leave it to Mrs. Lodge to puzzle out what that meant.

“She stopped coming to our sewing circle.”

“Well—” Lizzie was struck by the utter ridiculousness of the exchange, chatting banalities as if the city weren’t going mad with panic all around them. “You know how difficult it can be to keep up acquaintances after one moves away.”

“They moved across town, not across the sea,” Mrs. Lodge retorted, but then a disconsolate shadow came into her eyes. “I wonder how many friends I will never hear from again after this night.”

Somehow, the irritating woman’s melancholy touched Lizzie’s heart. “They’ll return,” she said. “When the panic is over, they’ll see there’s nothing to fear and they’ll come home.”

“Nothing to fear?” Mrs. Lodge echoed.

“Of course not,” said Lizzie. “It might not seem so at the moment, but this is a good day. The war will end now. The young men’s lives will be saved.”

“I have a son in the army outside Petersburg,” she said flatly.

Something in her tone made Lizzie hesitate before she replied. “You must be very proud of him—and very worried for him. I am sorry, and I hope you see him soon. You must hope for his life. All that talk about fighting to the last man—it is simply that, just talk.”

Mrs. Lodge fixed her with a cryptic stare. “Death would be better, anything would be better, than to fall under the tyrannical power of the United States government.”

It was useless to talk to her. “Good night, Mrs. Lodge,” Lizzie said gently, and turned away.

She was almost home when she heard swift footfalls and glanced up to see Louisa hurrying toward her. “Miss Lizzie, come quick,” she cried. “They’re going to set fire to the house!”

Lizzie went cold, but she froze only for the length of a heartbeat. As she gathered up her skirts and broke into a run, vivid memories flashed in her mind’s eye: the threatening note from the White Caps, and the red-faced, irate man who had shaken his fist at her the night Union troops had been attacked in Baltimore. That fine house of yours can burn! he had shouted. She had almost forgotten him until the note had been slipped beneath her front door, with the scrawled skull and crossbones and the gleefully malicious warning, Your house is going at last. FIRE.

When they reached home, they slipped through the garden gate and entered the mansion unseen from the rear piazza. “Where are Mother and the girls?” Lizzie asked Louisa as they hurried from room to hall to foyer.

“In the library with Judy and Hannah and the others.”

But not all the servants were hiding inside, Lizzie realized when she tore open the front door and strode out onto the portico. William, Peter, and even the aged Nelson stood there, feet planted firmly, hefting shovels and axes and her father’s ancient flintlock, which was usually displayed on the mantel above the library fireplace. They glared with firm resolve and defiance at a small cluster of men milling about on the sidewalk on the other side of the fence. Lizzie had expected a mob hundreds strong brandishing torches and pitchforks, not a handful of disgruntled fools, and relief sent courage surging through her.