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Secretary of War was to be thrown into a cell. There would be no prospect of
getting out any time soon.
Habeas corpus had been suspended for several years now, and the leaders of
Lincoln's administration seldom hesitated to jail suspected traitors and
subversives first and investigate them later. At best, Jerry would certainly
be prevented from stationing himself inside Ford's Theater on Friday evening,
three days from now.
"Getting off the train is not enough," said Jerry presently, casting a look
back to see if they were being followed. "We're going to split up here."
Colleen was taken aback for a moment; this was the first time since she had
met Jim Lockwood that he was making a serious effort to
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Saberhagen, Fred - After the Fact take charge. But her male partner's
assertion of authority really came as no surprise. She only looked at her
companion thoughtfully and did not argue.
Jerry, who had his own argument ready, brought it forth anyway:
"Baker's people know the two of us are traveling as husband and wife. Don't
they?"
Colleen, still thoughtful, nodded.
"Then it makes sense for us to split up. You go on ahead as fast as you can,
in the first wagon we can hire, and make your report to
Stanton. I can give you some money for traveling expenses if you need it. I'll
get to the War Department my own way, in good time."
"Traveling expenses? I could walk there from here in three hours.
And why don't you go first?"
"I may get there first." Jerry, walking quickly, looked back again over his
shoulder toward the train. A couple of the leg-stretching passengers were
looking after the two deserters but so far no one appeared inclined to follow
them. "But I want you to start ahead of me."
"All right." But Colleen was plainly somewhat puzzled and reluctant.
The second of the local houses that they tried proved to have a well-
equipped stable, as well as a man eager to carry passengers into the city for
a fee. Presently Jerry was waving Colleen on her way.
Now, he thought, would be the ideal time for him to hire a horse, as she had
suggested before they parted. If he only knew how to ride one.
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Saberhagen, Fred - After the Fact
Rather than take that risk Jerry walked on, along the road Colleen's driver
had taken. Luck was with him; in about ten minutes he overtook a wagonload of
produce whose driver had stopped at roadside to mend a broken harness. For a
few coins Jerry bought passage, and climbed into the rear of the wagon, where
he would be able to lie almost concealed among the burlap bundles of early
asparagus, the crates of eggs and chickens. He gave his destination as
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somewhere near Pennsylvania Avenue from his schoolboy visit to the modern city
he remembered enough of the geography to know that White House and Capitol
would both be in that area. That meant that necessarily there would be crowds
into which an alien visitor might safely blend.
He could remember someone, somewhere aboard the roaring confusion of trains
between here and Chicago, claiming that there were two hundred thousand people
in the city of Washington now.
The listeners on the train, Jerry remembered now, had seemed impressed by that
number.
When the wagon had jolted on for a while in blessed lack of soot, and relative
silence Jerry raised his head to look about him. And sure enough, there in the
hazed distance was the dome of the
Capitol at last. For a moment he could almost believe it was the modern city
that lay before him.
During the long hours spent staring out the windows of one jolting railroad
car after another, Jerry had considered that once he had escaped from Colleen
he might hide out in the suburbs until Friday.
Either in the actual suburbs of Washington they had to exist in some form, he
thought or on some nearby farm. But he had never
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Saberhagen, Fred - After the Fact been satisfied with that idea. A stranger
who didn't know his way around, particularly one who behaved in any way oddly,
would be bound to be conspicuous anywhere in countrified surroundings. In the
center of the city, though, say between the White House and
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