CHAPTER 7
SUNDAY IS NOT THE BEST TIME
"I had to throw John Breckinridge off the Military Affairs Committee to-
day."
Rose Greenhow steadily poured the tea into the cup held out by Senator
Henry Wilson. The cup shook slightly; the senator was nervous. Rose knew
just what was bothering him and offered no assistance.
"After that speech he made about Lincoln being a despot," the senator
added, "I had to. Frankly, we were prepared to arrest Breck if he said any-
thing outright treasonable, but he held back just short of that. Enough tea,
Rose. You know I hate the stuff."
Rose had been told of the plan to arrest Breckinridge, if he went too far, by
several of the abolitionists. She had warned her Kentucky friend of his peril,
and he said he would reword his speech with that in mind; evidently he had,
and the Republican radicals were foiled. "I thought that Breck was one of the
few senators with military experience," she allowed, deliberately filling the
cup to the brim, "as a major leading the Kentuckians in the Mexican War."
"Can't take a chance," said Wilson. "He's a risk to go South. He could
reveal all our plans."
"I'm glad we have plans, Henry." She plopped a lump of sugar into his
teacup, causing the liquid to spill into the saucer. She knew that in his agi-
tated state, he would put up with anything. "I was beginning to think this war
is all pronouncements and parades."
He slurped at the tea to stop it from spilling as his hand shook. "Our
troops under McDowell will be on the move one of these days. They'll smash
the rebel army in Virginia."
That vague "one-of-these-days" was not good enough. She raised her hand
with what she felt was the appropriate languor. "Please, no military secrets,
Henry. You tell me what everybody in our set in Washington knows already,
and you act as if you were confiding the most sensitive information in the
Republic. Spare me."
"Rose, do you suppose we can go upstairs now?"
The poor fellow was in a state; Rose concealed her contempt, shaking her
head as if sorry not to be able to accommodate his passion. "You are begin-
ning to treat me as your plaything, Senator. I am nobody's plaything. I am
more of a lady than anyone you know."
She let him assure her of his abiding respect, and confess to her his terrible
weakness. This was their routine; he liked to be treated shabbily, and she was
experienced in taking a man much farther down that demeaning road.
As the wife of a State Department librarian, Rose had been denied the
social distinction she craved. Defeated, the Greenhows moved to San Fran-
cisco where Rose had an incredible run of luck: when her husband was killed
by a fall into an open sewer, she sued the city and was awarded a large sum
from an amorous judge. She had been able to return to Washington on her
own terms: a woman of wealth and independence, with still enough good
looks and charm to establish a salon of the powerful.
Mrs. Greenhow now traveled in the incestuous circle of political privilege,
more sought-after than seeking. Political figures, men of wealth, and now
high military officers came to her fine brick home for social or political con-
nection. She knew that she retained much of her beauty, and knew how to use
all that was left of it; more than that, she understood how certain men in
positions of power needed to be dominated by a woman. For nearly twenty
years, she had savored the underlife of this Southern city, and now that she
had been recruited by the Confederacy as a spy, she felt fulfilled as never
before. Her breeding, her inclinations and her hatreds came together in this
time of war to give her life purpose. The woman once known merely as the
Wild Rose gloried in having a mission at last: to conspire against and to crush
the men and women she had come to despise.
Rose nodded coldly at Henry Wilson's long apology, calculating the possi-
bility of getting one useful fact out of him. Despite his tendency to turn into
sexual jelly, the man was no fool and was reluctant to pass along what he
knew. She used him mainly for confirmation of what she gleaned elsewhere.
Rose had established a sexual liaison with a clerk on the Military Affairs
Committee who probably knew more of the detail of the strength of
McDowell's forces than the committee chairman knew. She had already ar-
ranged with a colonel on Confederate general Beauregard's staff a simple
code and method of delivering messages across the lines. The general had
been informed, by a message wrapped in the tresses of a young woman who
worked for Rose, that the likely direction of the Federal attack would be from
Arlington Heights to Centreville and on to Manassas. She was certain, from
her infatuated clerk and two other sources, that McDowell had thirty-five
thousand men in his command, almost double the Beauregard strength.
One fact she had not yet been able to send through to Confederate head-
quarters: the timing of the Yankee attack. Her contact on Beauregard's staff,
an attractive young colonel who went by the name of Jordan, had pleaded for
this specific information: it was vital because a Confederate force of twelve
thousand under Joe Johnston was protecting the entrance to the Shenandoah
Valley, a possible Yankee route to Richmond. If the South could find out
what day the Federal movement was to begin toward Bull Run Creek, John-
ston's force could quietly disengage and slip through the Manassas Gap,
without concern about leaving the valley undefended, and consolidate with
Beauregard in time to meet the Union advance into Virginia.
When would McDowell move? Johnston's Army of the Shenandoah could
not pull out of position defending the valley until the Federals committed
themselves to an assault toward Manassas. If McDowell had the benefit of
surprise in his timing, the Confederates could not unite forces in time for the
battle and could be beaten in detail.
"When, Rose?" That startled her; the word "when" had been in her mind.
"When can we go upstairs? It's been a week."
She breathed deeply and let her stern face appear to soften. "I'm still in
mourning, you know." Her older daughter had died months ago; she was
alone in the world with her eight-year-old now. Rose wore black, and draped
a few of the windows suitably, but did not ache for her long-sickly elder
daughter; she had been like her late husband. The eight-year-old, Little Rose,
was more her mother's daughter.
Henry Wilson's expression was a cross between sympathy and frustration,
an odd mixture of passion and compassion that did not suit him. Rose did not
have much time for subtlety in questioning; the courier was in the basement
and had to leave before nightfall to get across the Long Bridge. Perhaps she
could find out in the unguarded moments after sex.
She relieved the senator of the teacup and took his hand. They would
dispense with the elaborate preliminaries.
Rose led the way downstairs, disappointed and irritated. She had probed
indirectly at first, using his opening about keeping information from the likes
of Breckinridge; nothing there. At one point, both staring at ceiling, she
wondered directly about when the city would be stripped of its defenders. His
only reply had been deep, satisfied breathing. She had rolled him out of bed
and handed him his pants, saying something about expecting visitors.
"Who's coming over now?" he wanted to know, following her down the
staircase.
"My other friendships are no business of yours, Henry," she snapped,
adding, "actually, it's just my cook. I'm planning a reception here Sunday."
"In competition with the one at the Biairs'?"
She had forgotten about the Biairs. "It's just a whim of mine, to have an
intimate party on a moment's notice. Not everybody will want to get in that
crush at Monty Biair's. Perhaps General McDowell will prefer a visit here."
The senator hesitated and she said nothing. At the door, he took his hat
and kissed her cheek, telling her he adored her.
"You're invited," she said. "I'll have Addie Douglas over. She's sick of
being in mourning, and so am 1."
"Look, Rose, I can't say why, but this Sunday is not the best time for a
party. As of tomorrow morning, McDowell will be gone. And on Sunday,
some of us are planning a carriage ride over the bridge to watch the end of the
war." A worried look crossed his face. "I only hope the Lord does not chas-
tise us for fighting on the Sabbath."
"It wouldn't be much of a reception without the general," she said, trying
to look stupid.
"He'll have his hands full cutting the Manassas Gap railroad," the senator
blurted, halfway out the door. "Postpone it a week and make it a victory
celebration. Your Southern friends will be upset, but they'll need you to
intercede on their behalf with a lot of angry Lincoln men."
"That's a good idea," she said, waving. "I'll wait a week."
She slowly closed the front door, then rushed down to the courier in the
basement. They coded a message: "Order issued for McDowell to move on to
Manassas tonight. Intend to cut Manassas Gap railroad to prevent Johnston
joining Beauregard. R.O.G."
The man slipped out the back. Rose went to the upstairs bedroom window,
looking west into the sunset across the Potomac, her heart pounding. All the
Yankees who had used her and insulted her through the years would pay. She
told herself that the surge of emotion she felt was neither hatred nor ven-
geance but only the purest patriotism.