Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker (14 page)

“Perhaps he’ll turn the corner soon,” said Mr. Lincoln, but his eyes did not brighten as they would have had he felt true hope.

Elizabeth managed what she hoped was an encouraging smile. “I’ve seen sick little boys recover from much worse.”

“I should cancel the ball,” Mrs. Lincoln fretted. “It’s ridiculous to think of hosting such an event with our boy in his sickbed. I can recall the invitations, postpone it until after he recovers.”

“No, the reception should go on,” said Mr. Lincoln. “You’ve already gone to too much trouble and expense to cancel now.”

“I don’t mind the trouble.” Mrs. Lincoln’s voice carried an edge. “Surely our guests will understand, and if I send word to the caterers immediately, they shouldn’t have any difficulty accommodating a delay of a week or two.”

The president fell into a thoughtful silence for a moment and then said, “Why don’t we consult Dr. Stone first?”

His wife agreed, so the Lincoln family physician was sent for, and in due time he arrived to examine his patient. “Your son is much improved,” Dr. Stone announced after checking the boy’s pulse, listening to his breathing, and questioning him about his symptoms. “There is every reason to expect a full recovery soon.”

“Oh, thank heavens,” said Mrs. Lincoln fervently. “And—what do you think about the reception?”

“I see no reason why it shouldn’t go on as planned,” the doctor replied,
packing his instruments into his bag. “I assure you, Mr. President, madam, your son is in no immediate danger.”

Mrs. Lincoln clasped her hands together as if in prayer and thanked Dr. Stone profusely, but after he left, her momentary brightness faded. “As glad as I am with this good news, I don’t feel like dancing with Willie suffering so.”

“If you don’t feel like dancing, we won’t have dancing,” Mr. Lincoln replied. “Come now, Mother. We won’t be far away. We can come upstairs and look in on him as much as you like, and I’m sure we can rely upon Madam Keckley to nurse him in our absence, can we not?”

“Certainly,” said Elizabeth. “I’ll stay the night too, if you like.”

Thus reassured, Mrs. Lincoln agreed to the arrangements, and so plans for the reception continued. Even after Tad too fell ill, the Lincolns reminded themselves of Dr. Stone’s diagnosis and carried on, hopeful that their boys would be up and around soon.

On the evening of the reception, Elizabeth arrived early to dress Mrs. Lincoln and found her sitting at Willie’s bedside, drawn and pensive, holding his small hand in hers. “His fever worsened overnight,” she told Elizabeth softly. “The doctor insists he is in no danger, but I believe he’s taken a turn for the worse.”

The boy’s sweet face did appear more flushed than Elizabeth had yet seen it, and his breathing seemed labored. “How is Tad?”

“Not well, but he’s faring better than his brother.” Mrs. Lincoln sighed and rose, pressing the back of her hand to her forehead. “I’d better dress for the ball. To think, at one time I had been so looking forward to it.”

Mrs. Lincoln summoned a servant to sit with Willie until Elizabeth could return after helping her prepare for the evening. In the boudoir, Elizabeth helped the First Lady don the white satin gown with its long train and black and white embellishments, and then arranged her hair in a headdress of black and white flowers. Mrs. Lincoln wore more flowers on her bosom, a half-mourning bouquet of crepe myrtle in honor of the recently widowed Queen Victoria.

Mr. Lincoln came in to escort his wife downstairs to the reception before she was quite ready, and while he waited for them to finish, he stood with his back to the fireplace, his hands clasped behind him. His expression was solemn, and although his gaze was fixed on the carpet, his thoughts seemed very far away.

When Mrs. Lincoln was dressed, she admired herself in the mirror, her long train sweeping the floor. The rustle of satin roused Mr. Lincoln from his reverie, and he regarded his wife for a moment before the barest of smiles touched his lips. “Whew! Our cat has a long tail tonight.”

Mrs. Lincoln raised her eyebrows at him but otherwise made no reply.

“Mother,” he said, taking in her bare arms and neck, “it is my opinion that, if some of that tail was nearer the head, it would be in better style.”

Elizabeth did not often disagree with the president, but in this case, she did not share his opinion in the slightest. Mrs. Lincoln’s beautifully formed shoulders and neck were her best features, and the gown’s low neckline set them off to great advantage. Mrs. Lincoln turned away from her husband with a look of offended dignity, but before long she consented to take his arm, and together they went downstairs to welcome their guests.

Elizabeth returned to the sickroom, where Willie languished in a fitful, sweaty doze. Before long she heard the Marine Band begin to play in the reception halls below, their music drifting through the ceiling and down the halls like the low, muted whispers of grieving spirits.

Throughout the evening, Mrs. Lincoln frequently left the party to come upstairs and look in on her darling boy, sometimes with her husband by her side. Anxiously she would ask Elizabeth if there had been any change, but each time Elizabeth could only shake her head. Shortly before the ball ended, Willie seemed to struggle for breath, but after a worrisome hour, his breathing eased. The moment her guests departed, Mrs. Lincoln joined Elizabeth at Willie’s bedside, and together they kept vigil until the first light of dawn crept above the horizon.

“You should rest, Elizabeth,” Mrs. Lincoln told her in a voice raspy from exhaustion and worry.

“I’m fine, Mrs. Lincoln,” she replied gently. “Why don’t you go to bed instead?”

“It would be no use. I couldn’t sleep. No, Elizabeth; you’ve been keeping watch over Willie longer than I. I must insist that you rest.”

Elizabeth knew that it would do her no good to argue. “Very well, Mrs. Lincoln.” She rose wearily, arching her back to relieve the stiffness. “I’ll sleep for a time, but I’ll be back down as soon as I wake so you can take a turn.”

Mrs. Lincoln nodded distractedly, her gaze fixed on her suffering child.

Elizabeth found the bed that had been made up for her in the servants’ quarters, undressed to her chemise, and lay down with the quilt pulled up to her chin. She slept restlessly and woke shortly before noon with vague memories of foreboding dreams. Someone had kindly left a full pitcher beside the washbasin, and after making a quick toilet she hurried downstairs to relieve Mrs. Lincoln, only to discover that Willie had not rallied during her absence.

Over the next few days, Willie declined, steadily and inexorably, while his parents watched and waited and prayed. The president canceled a cabinet meeting and Mrs. Lincoln a levee rather than stray too far from their son’s sickbed. Willie’s best friend, Bud Taft, visited, and fell asleep on the floor, so determined was he not to leave his favorite companion’s side. Elizabeth attended them all, not neglecting little Tad, who was not as seriously ill as his brother and had been confined to a separate bedroom. She stayed overnight at the White House when she was needed, and hurried away to her own home for rest and a change of clothes when she could be spared. All the while, Mrs. Lincoln kept vigil at Willie’s bedside, surely haunted by memories of the long, sorrowful days more than a dozen years earlier when she had watched her son Eddie slip away.

On February 20, a mild, sunny day, Willie finally breathed his last. For all the long hours Elizabeth had spent at his sickbed, when he
passed away she happened to be at home, where a messenger immediately summoned her. She hurried to the White House, and once there she asked to see Mrs. Lincoln, but the First Lady had been taken to her bed, inconsolable and keening. Elizabeth paused to check in on Tad—the poor child was feverish, grief stricken, and terrified—before she went to assist in washing and dressing Willie, laying him out upon the bed in the Green Room, and covering his face gently with a white cloth.

Elizabeth was keeping vigil alone when Mr. Lincoln entered the room, his face ashen and haggard, his eyes red and tormented. Elizabeth was too shocked and sorrowful to address him, so she nodded respectfully and stepped aside to the foot of the bed as he approached. She had never seen a man so bowed with grief, and she had seen many, far more than she could ever bring herself to count.

He lifted the sheet from his son’s face and gazed at him long and tenderly. “My poor boy, he was too good for this earth,” he murmured. “God has called him home. I know that he is much better off in heaven, but then we loved him so. It is hard, hard to have him die!”

Great, heaving sobs choked off his words. Tears filled Elizabeth’s eyes as she watched the anguished father bury his head in his hands, his angular frame shaking with grief. She wanted more than anything to offer words of comfort, but she knew none would suffice, and she found herself unable to speak.

Later Elizabeth sat with Mrs. Lincoln in her rooms, where the curtains were drawn and the mirrors covered. She came again the next day and found Mrs. Lincoln wild with lamentations and sorrow. She was inconsolable, shattered by loss, unable to rise from her bed even to care for Tad, who was still struggling to recover from his illness. As the White House was draped in the black crepe of mourning, she collapsed in paroxysms of grief, shrieking and wailing, frightening Tad and worrying Elizabeth, who could do nothing to help her. Dr. Stone prescribed laudanum, but whenever the stupor of a dose lifted, Mrs. Lincoln seemed worse off than before. Elizabeth had nursed many people through illnesses, but she had never faced anything like Mrs. Lincoln’s hysteria and felt powerless to help her. To her relief, Mr. Lincoln quickly understood
that she was out of her depth and arranged for Rebecca Pomroy, a nurse who had been working in a military hospital, to be reassigned to the White House so she could look after Mrs. Lincoln and Tad.

Under Nurse Pomroy’s care, Mrs. Lincoln regained the presence of mind to write to Mrs. Taft, begging her to keep her boys at home during the funeral because the sight of the children with whom her son had passed so many happy hours would devastate her. Elizabeth never told Mrs. Lincoln that her husband had secretly allowed Bud to come to the White House to see Willie one last time before he was placed in his casket. Shortly thereafter, Mrs. Lincoln managed to leave her bed for a final, private farewell with her husband and two surviving sons in the East Room, where the public services would be held later that day. Mrs. Lincoln was too distressed to endure the rituals of grief, so she retreated to her rooms while members of Congress, cabinet secretaries, diplomats, generals, and dignitaries filed in to pay their respects and offer condolences.

On the one-week anniversary of Willie’s death, the president locked himself in the Green Room for a time—Elizabeth did not know but could well imagine—to be alone with his thoughts, to remember his beloved son, to pray. He observed the private mourning ritual every Thursday for several weeks thereafter, and it seemed to offer him solace. Tad improved day by day under the watchful eye of Nurse Pomroy, but as he would take his medicine from no one but his father, the president was frequently called out of meetings to administer the dose. Robert grieved the loss of his young brother, but he endeavored to maintain a brave, manly front, and the effort seemed to sustain him. Of the survivors, Mrs. Lincoln alone found no lessening of her grief. She was alternately paralyzed by sorrow or frantic with despair, and her sudden bouts of keening frightened Tad and alarmed the entire household.

Elizabeth was present the day Mr. Lincoln inadvertently revealed that he feared his wife’s nerves would never recover. Once, when Mrs. Lincoln was caught up in one of her spells of unmitigated anguish, Mr. Lincoln took her gently by the arm, led her to the window, and solemnly pointed to St. Elizabeths Hospital in the distance.

“Mother,” he said, “do you see that large white building on the hill yonder?”

Mrs. Lincoln nodded, her eyes widening. Everyone in Washington recognized the lunatic asylum, an imposing landmark on the city skyline.

“Try and control your grief,” the president continued steadily, “or it will drive you mad, and we may have to send you there.”

Elizabeth muffled a gasp of horror. That this might be Mrs. Lincoln’s fate was an idea too terrible to contemplate, and she was shocked that Mr. Lincoln would speak so to his grieving wife. And yet, in the days that followed, it seemed that the warning alone had compelled her to try to regain control of her nerves. Even so, Robert was so concerned by his mother’s slow progress that he implored for his aunt Elizabeth Edwards to return to the White House, hoping that she would be able to comfort his mother even though the sisters had had a falling out the previous autumn. When she arrived, she discovered her younger sister bedridden with grief and her nephew Tad sobbing that he would never see his brother again. But Elizabeth observed that Mrs. Edward’s presence brought an immediate sense of relief to the family. It was she who was able to persuade Mrs. Lincoln to leave her bed and dress, and later, to venture out to attend church services.

But despite these incremental improvements, Mrs. Lincoln was often overcome and overwhelmed by sorrow and spent most of the next month in seclusion within the White House. Elizabeth was often with her, sewing her mourning wardrobe, offering whatever comfort she could. Once, when Mrs. Edwards was not with them, Mrs. Lincoln suddenly said, “If Willie had lived, he would have been the hope and stay of my old age.” Her voice was quiet, her thoughts faraway. “But Providence did not spare him.”

Elizabeth understood, perhaps as only another grieving mother could. She had hoped that George would go far in life and that she would be able to rely upon him in her later years, but Providence had not spared her son either.

In the same distant voice, Mrs. Lincoln added, “I believe Willie’s
death is God’s punishment for my sins, for my vanity and self-indulgence.”

“What?” exclaimed Elizabeth. “You cannot mean that.”

“His decline began on the night of my lavish reception,” she said bitterly. “What clearer sign do I need of God’s judgment than that?”