just out of arm’s reach.
Jack pulled a splinter or two from his side and stood next to me. “Boys,” he said, “I believe this man to be the toughest son’bitch ever to set foot in New Salem. Any man’s got a quarrel with him’s got a quarrel with Jack Armstrong.”
It was perhaps the most important battle of Abe’s early life, for word quickly spread from one end of Sangamon County to the other: here was a young man possessed of strong mind and body. A man they could be proud of. Their inauspicious introduction aside, the Clary’s Grove Boys quickly became some of Abe’s staunchest supporters, and would prove invaluable political assets in the years to come. Some of them even became his close friends, though none so close as Jack Armstrong himself.
I regretted losing my temper and embarrassing him in front of his relations. So, on the evening after our match, I invited him to share a drink at the store.
Abe and Jack shared a small bottle of peach brandy in the store’s back room, the sky still slightly blue even though it was approaching nine o’clock. Abe sat on the end of his bed, having offered the room’s sole chair to his guest.
I was surprised to find in this burly Armstrong a quiet, thoughtful man. Though four years my junior, he had a maturity surpassing that of many men twice his age, and an ease of conversation that one would not expect given his appearance. On seeing my copy of Kirkham’s Grammar, he spoke of the value of reading and writing, and bemoaned his shortcomings in both.
“Truth is, it was more important to be rough,” said Jack. “This is rough country, and it takes a rough man.”
“Must you choose one or the other?” asked Abe. “I’ve always found time for books, and I know something of rough country.”
Jack smiled. “Not Illinois rough.”
Abe asked what he meant.
“You ever seen somebody you love tore up and scattered all over the ground?”
Abe had not, and was clearly surprised by the answer. Jack fidgeted a little; looked at the floor.
“I gone walkin’ with a friend one night,” he said. “We was both nine, and the two of us was headed home from throwin’ rocks at flatboats, twistin’ down a trail we knew by heart. One minute he was right there next to me, chatterin’ away in the dark. Next minute he’d been pull’t up by a bear’s claws—pull’t into a tree by his head and drug clear to the top. I couldn’t see nothin’ up there in the dark. I could only hear him screamin’. Feel the warm drops on my head… on my lips. I ran and fetched help, and the men came runnin’ with their flintlocks. But there was nothin’ for ’em to kill. We spent half the morning pickin’ him up off the ground. Jared. Jared Linder was his name.”
There was silence now, and Abe knew he mustn’t be the first to fill it.
“Folks live ’round here know there’s somethin’ about these woods,” said Jack. “They know a man who don’t have his wits about him—a man who ain’t strong enough to take all comers—well, they know that’s a man liable to get himself killed walking one place to the next. People say us Boys stick close on account of our being kin. ’Cause we like raisin’ a ruckus. The truth of it is, we stick close ’cause that’s the only chance we got at growin’ old. Truth is, we act rough ’cause a weak man’s a dead man.”
“And you’re certain?” asked Abe. “I mean, you’re absolutely certain it was a bear?”
“Well, it sure as hell weren’t no tree-climbin’ horse.”
“I mean… might it have been something a bit more… unusual?”
“Oh,” said Jack, beginning to laugh. “You mean was it somethin’ like out of a story? Some kind a ghost?”
“Yes.”
“Hell, those stories’ve been goin’ up and down the river for years. Wild stories. People talking about witches, and devils, and—”
“Vampires?”
All trace of humor left Jack’s face at the mention of the word.
“People talking nonsense. Just scared is all.”
Maybe it was the half a bottle of peach brandy in his blood, or the feeling that he’d found a kindred spirit. Maybe he just couldn’t stand to keep all those secrets to himself anymore. Whatever the reason, Abe made a very sudden, very risky decision.
“Jack… if I tell you something incredible, will you promise to hear me fairly?”
III
Abe paced back and forth… back and forth over the soft dirt of the street, throwing the occasional glance toward the newly finished courthouse on the other side of the square and at the second floor of the saloon across the street, where a light still burned behind the curtained window of a whore. The late-summer weather was much more agreeable this time around. So was the company.
It had taken no small amount of persuasion, but Jack had at last agreed to come to Springfield. At first, he had refused to believe a word of it—going so far as to call me a “damned liar” and threatening to “thrash” me for thinking him a fool. I begged his patience, however, and promised that I would either prove every word true, or pack my things and leave New Salem forever. I made this promise with every expectation of success, for that very morning a letter had at long last arrived.
The letter was addressed exactly as Abe had instructed above Henry’s fireplace:
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
WEST OF DECATUR, ILLINOIS
CARE OF MR. JOHN HANKS
It had been delivered to his relatives two weeks earlier, and forwarded to New Salem. Abe had torn it open upon seeing the familiar handwriting, and read it a dozen times at the counter throughout the day.
Abraham,
My apologies for not having written these many months. Vanishing is, I regret, a necessary part of my existence from time to time. I will write more often when I have settled into a more permanent home. In the interim, I hope you have settled into yours happily, and remain in good spirits and health. If you remain agreeable, you may visit upon the individual named below at your leisure. I believe him only a short ride from where you are now. I must warn you, however—he is quite a bit cleverer than those you have visited on in the past. You may well mistake him for one of your own kind.
Timothy Douglas.
The tavern near the square.
Calhoun.
Ever,
—H
Abe knew the tavern well. It was, after all, the site of his greatest vampire-hunting embarrassment.
We walked in, plainly dressed (my long coat stored in my saddlebag outside). I took in the faces at each table, half expecting to see the curly-haired gentleman glaring back in his snow-covered long shirt. Would he run at the sight of me? Would his vampire nature compel him to attack? But I saw him not. Jack and I made to the counter, where the aproned barkeep busied himself polishing a whiskey glass.
“Pardon me, sir. My friend and I are looking for a Mr. Douglas.”
“Tim Douglas?” asked the barkeep, his eyes fixed on his work.
“The same.”
