Arrangements were made to transport Willie’s body to Springfield, where it would be buried near the Lincolns’ permanent home. But Abe couldn’t bear the idea of having his little boy so far away, and at the last minute it was decided that Willie would lie in a Washington crypt until the end of his father’s presidency. Two days after the funeral (which Mary, overcome with grief, could not attend), Abe returned to the crypt and ordered his son’s casket opened.
I sat beside him, as I had on so many nights during his brief life; half expecting him to wake and embrace me—for such was the skill of his embalmer, that he seemed merely asleep. I stayed with him an hour or more, speaking to him tenderly. Laughing as I told him stories of his earliest mischief… his first steps… his peculiar laugh. Telling him how very loved he would always be. When our time was through, and the lid again affixed to his coffin, I began to weep. I could not bear the thought of his being alone in that cold, dark box. Alone where I could not comfort him.
With Mary confined to bed, Abe sought refuge behind his closed office door in the week after Willie’s death. Fearing for his health, Nicolay and Hay canceled all of his meetings indefinitely, and Lamon and the trinity guarded his door at all hours. Dozens of well-wishers came to offer the president their sympathies that week. All were thanked and politely turned away—until the night of February 28th, when one man was ushered directly into his office.
He’d given the name that could never be refused.
IV
“I cannot imagine the burden you bear,” said Henry. “The weight of a nation on your shoulders… of a war. And now, the weight of another son buried.”
Abe sat in the light of the fireplace, his old ax hanging above its mantle. “Is this why you come, Henry? To remind me of my miseries? If that be the case, then I assure you—I am too aware of them already.”
“I come to offer my sympathies to an old friend… and to offer you a choi—”
“No!” Abe choked up at once. “I will not hear it! I will not be tormented with this again!”
“It is not my wish to torment.”
“Then what is it, Henry? Tell me—what is your wish? To see me suffer? To see the tears run freely down my cheeks? Here—does this face satisfy you?”
“Abraham…”
Abe rose from his chair. “The whole of my life has been spent on your errands, Henry! The whole of my life! And to what end? To what happiness of my own? All that I have ever loved has fallen prey to your kind! I have given you everything. What have you given me in return?”
“I have given you my everlasting loyalty; my protection from the—”
“Death!” said Abe. “You have given me death!”
Abe looked at the ax over his mantle.
“Abraham… do not give in to this despair. Remember your mother—remember what she whispered with her dying breath.”
“Do not try to manipulate me, Henry! And do not pretend to care that I suffer! You care only for your own gains! For your war! You know nothing of loss!”
Now Henry rose to his feet. “I have spent these three hundred years mourning a wife and child, Abraham! Mourning the life that was stolen from me; a thousand loves lost to time! You know nothing of the lengths I have gone to protect you! Nothing of that which I have suff—”
Henry composed himself.
“No,” he said. “No… it mustn’t be this way. We have come too far for this.” He grabbed his coat and hat. “You have my respects, and you have my offer. If you choose to leave Willie buried, so be it.”
The sound of Willie’s name roused such wildness in me—Henry’s callous tone such rage that I grabbed the ax from its perch and swung at his head with a scream, missing him by less than an inch, and shattering the clock on the mantle. I recovered and swung again, but Henry leapt over my blade. The office door now flew open behind us, and two of the trinity rushed in. On seeing us, they froze—unsure of where their loyalties lay. Lamon, however, was plagued by no such uncertainty. On entering, he drew his revolver and aimed it at Henry—only to have it taken by one of the vampires before he could fire.
Henry stood in the center of the room, arms at his sides. I charged again—raising my ax as I ran. Henry didn’t so much as blink as I came. Rather, he grabbed the handle as I brought it down on his head, took it from me, and snapped it in two, throwing the pieces on the floor. I came at him with my fists, but these he caught as well, twisting them around and forcing me to my knees. Holding me thus, he knelt behind me and brought his fangs to my neck. “No!” cried Lamon, rushing forward. The others held him back. I felt the tips of those twin razors against my flesh.
“Do it!” I cried.
“Do it, I beg you!”
I felt the tiny trickles of blood run down my neck as his fangs broke through my skin. I closed my eyes and prepared to meet the unknown; to see my beloved boys once more… but it was not to be.
Henry withdrew his fangs and let me go.
“Some people are just too interesting to kill, Abraham,” he said, rising to his feet. He gathered his coat and hat again and walked to the door, toward the three anxious guards whose hearts were racing faster than my own.
“Henry…”
He turned back.
“I will see this war to its end… but I do not care to see another vampire so long as I live.”
Henry offered a slight bow. “Mr. President…”
With that, he disappeared.
Abe wouldn’t see him for the rest of his life.
TWELVE
“Starve the Devils”
Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue… until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.”
I
Washington, D.C., was under attack, and Abe wasn’t about to miss his chance to see the fighting up close.
On July 11th, 1864, ignoring the pleas of his personal guard, he rode alone on horseback to Fort Stevens, * where Confederate General Jubal A. Early was leading 17,000 rebels in a brazen assault on Washington’s northern defenses. The president was greeted by Union officers and whisked directly into the fort, where he would be able to relax and enjoy a cool drink behind the safety of its thick stone walls.
