Fates and Traitors Read Free Page B

mouth twisted in revulsion, Baker complied, bending over and placing his ear close to John’s lips.
    â€œTell my mother—” He could scarce draw breath. “Tell my mother that I did it for my country—” He could not fill his lungs; his throat constricted ever tighter. “That I die for my country.”
    The sun had risen above the distant hills, harsh and unnaturally warm. He clenched his teeth, his eyes tearing against the glare until some pitying soul draped a shirt over a chair to shield his face.
    He was John Wilkes Booth. If he had done wrong in ridding the world of the man who would declare himself king of America, let God, not man, judge him.
    Out, out, brief candle!
    Did he not have a candle in his pocket? No, the lieutenant had taken it, and Lucy’s portrait, and his diary, his apologia. But he should need no candle to see by, with the sun so hot upon his face.
    Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more.
    Yes, and so he should remind the good women who had loved him, to give them some measure of peace. If he could but find pen and paper and ink, and light his candle to see by, for it had grown so dark so suddenly. . . . He strained to pat his pockets but was surprised to discover he could not move, and surprised again that he could have forgotten something so important.
    Lieutenant Baker peered curiously down at him. “You want to see your hands?”
    He wanted the use of them, but since he could not speak to clarify, he could only lie passively, unresisting, as the lieutenant lifted his hands up and into his line of sight. He glimpsed the tattoo he had given himself as a child, his initials etched upon the back of his left hand between his thumb and forefinger, his defiant, indelible rebuttal to all those who would deny his right to bear the proud name of Booth.
    He gazed upon his hands, as limp and insensible as those of a corpse.
    â€œUseless,” he croaked. “Useless.”
    All that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity.
    The world would not look upon his like again.

CHAPTER ONE
MARY ANN
1838–1851

    Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest, but yet I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me.
    â€”William Shakespeare,
Hamlet
, Act 3, Scene 1
    O n a beautiful spring morning in early May, Mary Ann was safely delivered of a healthy son, and the sight of him swaddled in the soft blue-and-white quilt she had lovingly sewn for him—so perfect, so pure, so full of promise—took her breath away. His hair was dark and silky, his eyes deep blue, his skin blushing roses on porcelain. In the exhilaration and exhaustion that followed her ten-hour labor, it seemed to her that he possessed the best qualities of the precious elder siblings who had passed on before he entered the world. It was almost as if a merciful God had returned them to her in the person of this one perfect child.
    As soon as Mary Ann had felt her labor pains come on, she had sent word to Junius, the eager expectant father, at the Holliday Street Theatre in Baltimore twenty-fives miles to the southwest, where he had been thrilling audiences with his masterful portrayals of Othello and Pescara. He had raced home to her at The Farm—their rustic countryretreat, one hundred and fifty sublime forested acres in Harford County, Maryland—just in time to witness the birth. The experience filled him with wonder and awe, and as he cradled his newborn in his arms for the first time, Junius suggested that they give his father the honor of naming the baby.
    Richard, an Englishman born and bred but a fervent admirer of George Washington nonetheless, proudly selected the name of a distant relative on his mother’s side, a courageous and honorable member of the British Parliament who had ardently defended the right of the American