Shooting For Justice by G. Tilman (top 100 novels txt) 📗

try to tie those Senators and Representatives back to the railroads and any other more covert financial supporters they have.”

“Sounds like a fine plan to me! Safer than your last trip, too.”

“I don’t know. The gnome-like little man seems to have taken a fancy to me.”

“Probably heard about your plan to turn the president into a gelding…”

“There is a remote possibility of it happening. It’s made more remote by your increased security.”

“Lincoln told me some interesting history the other day and this is the first time I have had a chance to share it with you,” Pope began.

“It seems a house painter was mad with Andrew Jackson about fifty years ago and shot at him point blank on the Capitol steps. His gun misfired. The old president began beating the living hell out of him with his cane. The man pulled another pistol and it misfired too. Fully enraged, Jackson was beating him senseless until some congressmen pulled him off.”

“My kind of president!” Sarah said.

“There’s another story more germane to our situation. It seems a number of people suspected Conkling was behind the assassination of Garfield at the train station where we arrived in Washington.”

“I thought Charles Guiteau was a deranged job seeker acting alone,” Sarah said.

“The job seeker version was the official story. Apparently either Conkling got the version with him in it stifled, there was not sufficient evidence for a grand jury, or all of the above. Lincoln told me the story whispering as if he was afraid to say the words.”

“I don’t think he is the rough and ready fighter his father was,” Sarah said, adding, “or as crazy as his mother was. Or is.”

“She is dead. Almost a year ago to the day. I gather she may have had an unpopular personality but was beside Abe Lincoln until the night he died. There is some question about the truth of her being crazy. Our friend Robert had his mother committed to an insane asylum. She was released several months later and deemed sane. A number of people do not respect him because of how he treated his mother. Maybe he was trying to save his political career from embarrassment and, in turn, embarrassed himself more? I do not know.

“I do know this is an odd lot we have fallen into,” Pope said.

“You have amassed a lot of information. Have you been doing research?” Sarah asked, thinking she had the research abilities of the pair.

“A small bit, mainly by listening and asking vague but carefully pointed questions,” he said.

“Let’s go back to the Chinese and overall immigration matter as a possible cause for the threats. I will ask both of our contact secretaries for as much as they will, or can, share on the subject and try to get a feel for how the railroad tycoons may play in this,” Pope said.

They retired early and were awakened by a tapping on the hotel room door at two in the morning. Both had guns in their hands before the covers were down.

“Yes?” Pope called from beside the closed door.

“Bellman with a message we got at the front desk telephone, Mr. Pope.”

Pope eased the door open and found it was, indeed, a bellman. He took the message and closed the door. Sarah raised the gaslight’s brightness and they read it. It was from the desk soldier at the President’s House security room. They had a suspect in custody and asked him to come over and interview him.

Pope dressed quickly and trotted over to the President’s House. He saw the policeman and soldier on their rounds. He found from them the man had been apprehended only fifteen minutes ago. The subject was trying to get in the front door of the President’s House.

The two said they approached him with their revolvers drawn, so the man was unable to put his own into action before being disarmed. Pope thanked them and proceeded to the security room.

An unshaven man was sitting handcuffed at the worktable. The duty soldier was watching him carefully.

“I understand this man was apprehended trying to get in the front door. He was armed and the patrol took his weapon away. Has he made any statements?” Pope asked the man, Corporal Smythe.

“He started babbling and I told him to shut up until the provost marshal got here. He did.”

“Good work by all three of you, Corporal. Let’s see what we can learn from this gentleman,” Pope said.

He picked up a notebook and pencil and sat across from the man.

“Who are you?” the man asked.

“I am the Provost Marshal for the secretary of war’s office. You will not be allowed any more questions until I tell you. What is your full name?”

The man’s response was as profane as could be imagined. Pope’s response was to backhand the man across the jaw and send him toppling onto the floor. Before he could get up, Pope was around the table and grabbed him at the collar and lifted him back onto his chair.

“You will answer me in a civil and truthful manner, or I will see you tried by a court-martial for coming here to shoot the president. You will be hung at the Washington Arsenal just like the Lincoln conspirators were. Do you understand me?” Pope asked with a growl.

“Go to hell!”

Pope got up and walked around the table, fists balled up ready to knock the man unconscious. For the first time, Pope saw actual fear in the man’s eyes.

He grabbed the man by the collar once again and leaned in, inches from his face.

“You aren’t helping yourself. I can and will get a lot rougher. You will be in a world of pain before I have you taken to the brig at the Arsenal. You will be hidden away there for a long time before anyone remembers to try your butt in court and hang you.”

“Oren Baker,” the man said.

Pope walked back around the table and sat down across from Baker.

“Where do you live?”

“Why do you care?”

Pope got up again