Fates and Traitors Read Free Page A

every political matter but loved him still—she knew not what he had entrusted to her,but news of his demise would remind her of the thick envelope locked away in her husband’s safe. Asia would find his last great written work, his apologia, as well as documents and deeds and a letter for their mother.
    Their mother. How grateful he was that she could not see how he suffered.
    He realized he had fallen unconscious when he woke to the touch of calloused hands bathing his wounds. He had been pondering something . . . yes, his last words. In Asia’s safe, in the home she shared with her husband and children. A sudden worry seized him. Would she burn the papers, fearing they would implicate her, endanger her family? No, not loyal Asia, not the family historian who had begged their mother not to destroy their father’s letters as she had fed them into the flames. Asia would spare his writings, and far from implicating her, they would exonerate her. He would have abandoned his mission rather than bring suspicion down upon any member of his family or upon any lady—even one such as Mrs. Surratt, who had lent her tacit support to the plot by harboring many of the conspirators in her boardinghouse, by giving them an inconspicuous place to meet. But none would condemn her for that, a respectable, devout widow unaware of John’s true intentions. Of all the women who loved him—and Mrs. Surratt did love him, as one loved a comrade in arms—she alone shared his devotion to the South.
    Fluid filled his throat; he choked, gasped, grew dizzy—and rallied, somehow. He wished he had not.
    His thoughts turned to Lucy. If only he could retrieve his diary from his coat pocket and gaze upon her portrait before the light faded from his eyes. He could imagine the shock and reproach in hers. She would mourn him, but in silence, lest his notoriety ruin her. He could not blame her for that. Few knew of their secret engagement, so Lucy would grieve, but in time her heart would heal, and with her ties to the assassin forgotten, she would eventually marry someone else. Someone safe, someone her parents could accept. That dull security would be John’s last bequest to her.
    The sky was softening in the east when a physician came to examine him, a South Carolinian from the sound of it, unsettled by the sight of so many armed Yankees but determined to do his duty. John foughtto stay conscious throughout the examination, and was rewarded with one last comedic jest when the doctor announced that he was badly injured but would survive.
    If not for the smothering thickness in his chest John would have derided the fool.
Throw physic to the dogs; I’ll none of it.
    â€œBut the ball passed clean through the neck,” said Baker, incredulous. “How can he live?”
    Sighing in consternation, the doctor cleaned his spectacles, replaced them, bent over his patient again, and peered at the holes on either side of John’s neck. Then, straightening, he declared that closer scrutiny revealed that the shot had severed the assassin’s spinal cord. His organs were failing, one by one, and if he did not drown in his own blood and sputum first, he would slowly suffocate.
    â€œWell,” the slim man said, “that’s it, then.”
    John was powerless to resist as the slim man bent over him and briskly searched his pockets, taking from him a candle, his compass, and his diary, in which John had placed Lucy’s photograph. Before he could beg the man to let him gaze upon her image one last time, the officer was gone, taking John’s belongings with him. But would he carry John’s last message for his mother?
    Agitated, John coughed and spat blood, gurgling in lieu of speech, desperate.
    He thought he would suffocate before anyone responded, but then the lieutenant was at his side, frowning intently down upon him. John jerked his head twice to beckon the officer closer, and though his