Lincoln in the Bardo(33)

LVIII.

Mary Lincoln’s mental health had never been good, and the loss of young Willie ended her life as a functional wife and mother.

In “A Mother’s Trial: Mary Lincoln and the Civil War,” by Jayne Coster.

Around two in the afternoon I heard a terrible commotion from the part of the house where the sick child lay. It appeared the moment had come. Mrs Lincoln rushed past me, head lowered, making a sound I have never heard emitted from human throat, before or since.

Hilyard, op. cit., account of Sophie Lenox, maid.

While the president’s outburst allowed for depiction, his wife’s did not.

Epstein, op. cit.

The pale face of her dead boy threw her into convulsions.

Keckley, op. cit.

Mary Lincoln collapsed into her bed.

Von Drehle, op. cit.

An altered woman.

Keckley, op. cit.



Laudanum being administered, even this powerful concoction could not suppress her cries of agony or subdue her disbelieving outrage.

Coster, op. cit.

Mrs. Lincoln was too ill to attend the funeral services.

Leech, op. cit.

Mary Lincoln stayed abed for a full ten days following the funeral.

In “A Belle Remade: The Journey of Mary Lincoln,” by Kevin Swarney.

Mrs. Lincoln was unable to leave her room or rise from bed for many weeks after the tragedy.

Sloane, op. cit.

When she finally emerged a month later, she moved about mechanically, gazing at us as if we were strangers.

Hilyard, op. cit., account of D. Strumphort, butler.

Some blows fall too heavy upon those too fragile.

Coster, op. cit.

There she lay, longing that the thing should not be so; now disbelieving that it had occurred, now convinced anew that it had. Always the same walls, bed-things, cup, ceiling, windows. She could not rise and leave—the world outside too terrible now. She sipped of the drugged drink that was her only hope for peace.

Swarney, op. cit.

Where was her boy? she kept asking. Where was he? Couldn’t someone find him, bring him to her at once? Mustn’t he yet be somewhere?

Hilyard, op. cit., account of Sophie Lenox, maid.





LIX.

All still quiet, dear Brother—Only the fire popping & dear Grace snoring from your old room, where I have put her, so she may more easily attend me on these difficult nights—The moonlight shows the premises across the way littered far & wide with the detritus of yesterday’s great storm—Mighty tree-limbs lay against crypts & across graves—You may recall a certain statue of a bald man in Roman garb (whom we used to call “Morty”), standing with one foot on the neck of a snake, & that once a certain mischievous young fellow threw his sweater up there many times, until “Morty” might catch it upon the end of his sword—Well, “Morty” is no more—Or at least is not the man he once was—A falling limb hit that brave Roman at the arm, & off it came, sword & all, taking off the head of the snake on its way down—Now arm & sword & snakehead lie in a heap—& Morty himself, as if shaken by this proof of his mortality, stands a bit askew on his base.

Must have dozed a bit just now—Yes it is nearly four—There is a horse over there, across the way, tied to the cemetery fence—A calm & exhausted fellow, nodding as if to say: Well, though I find myself at the yard of the Dead in the dark of night, I am Horse, & must obey.

So now I have a mystery to distract me—Who could be over there at such a late hour?—Some young gentleman, I hope, paying homage to a true love lost.

The light burns in Manders’s little guardhouse and he paces back & forth before the window, as is his habit—You may recall that it was he who mounted a ladder to retrieve the afore-mentioned sweater from Morty’s sword—He is older now & looks it, burdened, I think, with many family concerns—And now leaves the guardhouse—His lantern-light receding—He is seeking, I imagine, our “midnight visitor”—All very intriguing—Whoever might think that an impairment such as mine disallows excitement, I wish that individual could sit here beside me at this window tonight—I will stay awake, I think, & see if I may glimpse the face of our visitor once Manders retrieves the fellow.



Perkins, op. cit.





LX.

Left behind on the roof of the white stone home, I resolved to make one final attempt to talk sense to the boy, who lay nearly insensate at my feet, like a dazed and fallen Pasha-prince.

My feelings had been hurt by the juvenile, deceptive actions of Mr. Bevins and Mr. Vollman, who, in their rush to chase after the slightest amusement, had left me in a very bad position indeed. Like some sort of primitive gardener I worked, bent at the waist, seizing at tendrils with both hands. I must continually be deciding whether to attack the several already attached, or take on their new-arising brethren. In truth, it mattered not what I did: the boy’s time was not long.

An opportunity soon presented for a frank moment with him.

Scanning the horizon for the feckless Bevins and Vollman, I saw instead, creeping out of the woods, the Crutcher brothers, accompanied, as usual, by Mr. and Mrs. Reedy, the four of them comprising the core group of that depraved orgiastic cohort that resided near the flagpole.

We come to watch, said Matt Crutcher.