The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln (3 page)

Abigail ignored them, too.

She found the address at the corner of G Street. A policeman patrolled out front, resplendent and shivering in blue serge and brass buttons. The policeman was an unexpected obstacle, but Abigail chose to deal with him the way her late mother had taught her to deal with most barriers. She walked straight past him, head held high.

He scarcely gave her a glance.

The narrow lobby was dark after the glare of the snow. She took the creaking stairs to the second floor, where the bronze plaque read
DENNARD & MCSHANE
, and knocked on the door. Waiting, she was surprised to find herself nervous. She hated uneasiness as she hated most
signs of human weakness, most of all in herself. Fear is a test, her late mother used to say. Fear is how God challenges us.

Accepting the challenge, she knocked again.

The door swung open, and there stood a gangly young man in high-collared shirt and black necktie. He was missing the jacket that doubtless completed his working attire. Straw-colored hair was pressed back in fashionable waves against a long, slim head. Even standing still, he displayed an economy of movement that implied a life lived without challenges. He was white, of course, and about her age, and Abigail could tell at once that he was ill at ease around women. Nevertheless, he found an awkward smile somewhere, and glanced, she noted, at her hands. Perhaps he thought she was carrying a delivery.

“May I help you?” the young man said.

“My name is Abigail Canner,” she said. “I have an appointment.” The man said nothing, so she tried again. “About the job.”

“Job?” he repeated doubtfully, as if she were speaking Greek. In his shy earnestness, he gave the impression of a man trying desperately to live up to something terribly difficult.

“The job as a law clerk.” She tilted her head toward the plaque. “For Dennard & McShane.”

“Ah.” Nodding firmly, more sure of his ground. “That would be Mr. Dennard. His clerk left. I’m Hilliman. I’m Mr. McShane’s clerk. The partners are out just now, but if you would leave your employer’s card, one of the messengers will be round to set up an appointment.” When she said nothing, his smile began to fade. He gestured, vaguely. Peering past him, Abigail saw a long, narrow room dominated by a heavy wooden table heaped with papers and books. Shelves lined every wall, and the heavy volumes looked well used. In one corner, numbers were scribbled on a blackboard. In another, an elderly colored man tended a weak coal fire. “I’m afraid we are rather busy right now—”

“I imagine you are, Mr. Hilliman. Preparing for the impeachment trial.”

“Well, yes.” He looked at her with new respect, or at least growing curiosity, perhaps because she did not speak in the manner of the colored people to whom he was accustomed. Abigail Canner had provoked this reaction in others. She worked at it. “That’s right. The trial. I’m sorry,” he added, although, as yet, he had done nothing to apologize for.

Almost nothing.

“I find it most intriguing,” said Abigail, “that the Congress would attempt such a thing.”

“Yes, well, if you would just—”

“The committee has proposed four counts of impeachment, has it not? Half relating to the conduct of the war, and half relating to events since the war ended.”

“How do you know that?” His tone suggested that she could not possibly have read a newspaper. He caught her expression, and realized his error. “I mean—well, that is very impressive.”

“I try to be prepared,” she said, unable to keep the sarcasm from her voice. She had faced silly boys like this at college, too, unable to believe the evidence of their eyes and ears. No colored girl could possibly be their equal. “Do you know yet whether the House will adopt all four counts?”

“There has been no vote as yet—”

“They will vote in two weeks.” A prim smile. “I am here,” she said, “to help.”

“To help what?”

“Help you, Mr. Hilliman. With the impeachment trial.”

“I beg your pardon.”

“I am the new law clerk.” She drew the letter confirming her employment from her commonplace book. “Mr. Dennard hired me.”

III

There are in life moments that are irretrievable, and one opportunity fate never grants twice is making a first impression. Jonathan Hilliman, confronted with the least likely of all the possible explanations for this peculiar woman’s presence at Dennard & McShane, spoke out of utter confusion, and therefore from the heart:

“That is not possible,” he said, jaw agape.

Abigail’s eyes went very wide. They were wide enough already, gray and flecked and watchful, eyes that neither overlooked nor forgot. But, as Jonathan would come to learn, when Abigail was angry, those eyes could grow wide enough to swallow a room. Now, as he fumbled for the words to repair his mistake, Abigail, unbidden, stepped past him into the foyer. A long sooty window dominated one wall. Four inner doors
were closed, two presumably leading to the partners’ offices. The old colored man got to his feet, bowed, touched his cap.

“My name is Little,” he said, with an affecting grin. He was nearly toothless. “I’se been with the Dennards going on sixty years now.”

“A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Little,” she said, extending a hand.

He hesitated, then shook. “Just Little, miss.”

“I’m sorry?”

“My name is Little, miss. Just Little.”

“Excuse me,” said Mr. Hilliman, having recovered his composure. “Perhaps I could see that letter.”

The black woman smiled blandly, the way Jonathan’s mother smiled at the servants when about to berate them. “Of course, Mr. Hilliman.”

He took the page in his hands and read it slowly, then again, mouthing the words as if reading were new to him. At last he raised his eyes. “You are the new clerk.”

“I believe I told you that.”

“You are Miss Abigail Canner.”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry.” He glanced around the messy room. It was obvious to them both what he wanted to say and could not. Instead, he retreated into a show of confusion. “I understood that Mr. Dennard was planning to hire a new clerk. I had no idea that he had—I mean, that he—that you were—um, that you were coming today.”

“I understand, Mr. Hilliman,” said Abigail, standing there with bag in hand. There were, as yet, fewer than a dozen lawyers of African descent practicing in American courts. There were no women of any color. The Supreme Court had admitted the first colored attorney to its bar only a year and a half ago, and he had promptly gone into a wasting decline, from which he was not expected to recover. The wags said the Court’s members knew of his illness in advance, and wanted the credit for having admitted him without ever having to allow him to argue before them. “But I assume that there is plenty of work to do.”

“Well, yes—”

The door burst open, and in swept Arthur McShane, Jonathan’s boss, accompanied by a tough-looking man Jonathan did not recognize.

“We’re thirteen votes down,” McShane growled, unwrapping himself. He was a diminutive man, small and trim and almost boyish except for the weathered face, all hollows and valleys. He handed his scarf to Little. “Thirteen votes. I don’t believe it. If the vote were held today, it
would be fourteen for acquittal, twenty-seven for conviction. The rest are undecided so far—”

“That’s still short of two-thirds,” soothed the stranger. He was paunchy and confident, and sported a magnificent black beard. He had just laid his coat across Little’s waiting arms. “They need two-thirds.”

McShane ignored him. “One bit of good news”—eyeing Abigail suddenly, obviously not sure who she might be, but, after a moment’s hesitation, plunging on—“good news, that is, for our side. They won’t vote on admitting Nebraska to the Union until after the trial. You remember what happened with Nevada last year. The price of statehood was sending two anti-Lincoln men to the Senate, bound to vote for conviction. Well, that bit of skulduggery embarrassed the Radicals, so they’ve agreed not to admit Nebraska just yet. This is Mr. Baker.”

“Jonathan Hilliman.” He thrust out a hand, which Baker seemed to examine for traps before grabbing. The stranger’s shake was perfunctory, an unappealing duty to be gotten over with. “And this”—Jonathan hesitated; names had never been his forte. “This is, um, Mr. Dennard’s new clerk—”

“Abigail Canner,” she said, lifting a white-gloved hand. Baker barely bowed his head, but McShane took her fingers as he would do for any lady, and lightly kissed her knuckles.

“Welcome, Miss Canner,” said the lawyer. He smiled. He was shorter than Abigail, and so was smiling up at her. He said, innocently, what Jonathan had been afraid of saying awkwardly. “Dennard did tell me that he had hired a woman. He made no mention of your race. He says that Dr. Charles Finney wrote him on your behalf. Dr. Finney still running things at Oberlin, is he?”

“He is on in years, sir, but in spirit he is strong.”

“I believe Dennard and Finney knew each other in the old days, at the Broadway Tabernacle. Well, never mind. Little, clear a space at the table. Jonathan, I’m afraid there is a bit of a crisis. You will come with me to see the President.”

Abigail said, “What should I—”

McShane continued to smile. “You should wait here until Mr. Dennard returns.” Jonathan had stepped to the blackboard and was using a cloth to wipe off the numbers inscribed there. He wrote:
14–27–11
. Abigail realized that he was recording the likely votes in the Senate for acquittal and conviction and those undecided. Now, hearing his employer’s comment, Jonathan turned and was about to speak,
but the lawyer silenced him with a look. “Wait. Let me see your letter.”

She handed it over. The lawyer took it in at a glance. “This says you are a clerk. Not a law clerk.”

“Is there a difference, Mr. McShane?”

His face remained gentle but his voice hardened. “You have never met Dennard, have you?”

“No, sir. Our interview was entirely via correspondence.”

“Did you inform him that you are colored?”

Abigail began to feel as if she had somehow wandered in the wrong door. The way Finney had explained things, it all seemed so simple. “The issue never arose.”

“I suspected as much.” McShane nodded, evidently in confirmation of a private theory. “A law clerk,” he explained, “is a young man who works in an attorney’s office while studying the law, in the hope of being called to the bar. A clerk, on the other hand—not a law clerk, just a plain clerk—is a sort of an assistant. A secretary. To take notes, as it were. Do filing. Make deliveries. Copy out documents. Answer correspondence.” He could not possibly miss the mortification on her face. Yet his smile actually broadened. “You should be proud of yourself, Miss Canner. I do not believe that there are five female clerks in the entire city working for lawyers. And none of them are colored.”

“But it is 1867!”

“Perhaps in 1967 things will be different. What I have told you is the way things are now.”

“Mr. McShane,” she managed, surprised to find herself fighting tears, “I—I want to read law.”

The lawyer was crisp. “That is not the purpose for which you were hired.”

“Yes, but—but surely we could arrange—”

“You are of course free to discuss the matter with Mr. Dennard when he returns. You seem a fairly intelligent young woman. I am sure you know how to bargain. Perhaps you and Dennard can reach some arrangement.”

The lasciviousness in his voice was impossible to miss; and impossible to prove.

Abigail swallowed. Her brother always said that even the most liberal of white folks gave only when the giving benefitted them. She had lived her young life in the teeth of that dictum, but now, in this room
thick with coal smoke, she stood face-to-face with the evidence of its truth. “When will Mr. Dennard be returning?”

“A week from now,” said McShane, with satisfaction. Baker looked on in amusement. “He is in California. Until that time, you will work for me. You may start by helping Little with his chores.” Nodding toward the old man. “Is that clear?”

“But, sir! I am a graduate of Oberlin!”

“I have told you the way things are. If you wish to work for the firm of Dennard & McShane, you will be a clerk and a copyist. You will not train as a lawyer.”

Abigail calculated fast. “Perhaps I can do both—”

“We will keep you busy, I assure you.”

“I am willing to work as late as necessary.”

McShane was exasperated. “Fine. You want to read law? There are books everywhere.” His hand swept the room. “Read as many as you like, as long as you do your chores. You can start with Blackstone. Over there—the brown one, see?
Commentaries on the Laws of England
. Four volumes. Start at page one of volume one, and read all four. When you are through, we can discuss your further ambitions.”

Jonathan had found his voice. “Sir, that is nearly three thousand pages.”

“So what? The young lady is a graduate of Oberlin. Presumably, she can read. Little, show her where to sit.”

Abigail made one final try, even though her voice wavered in a way that she hated. “Sir, if I am to work as a—a secretary—well, then, perhaps I should come to the White House with you. To—to take notes.”

McShane was aghast. “Under no circumstances. You are Dennard’s clerk, not mine. You will not be working on the impeachment at all.” He nodded toward her hand, where she still clutched her commonplace book. “I see you have a diary. So have I. So has Mr. Hilliman. Every lawyer keeps one. But I doubt you shall be needing yours. Little, I told you to show her where to sit. Hilliman, come.”

“What about Mr. Baker?” the young man asked.

“He can talk to Miss Canner.”

They were out the door.

As they descended the stair, McShane shook his head. “Unbelievable,” he muttered. “The man is unbelievable. Hiring that woman without telling me. I am going to strangle him.”

Jonathan said nothing, and was annoyed with himself for this failure;
but a part of him was also amused, because Dennard, although on in years, was a heavy, powerful man, and McShane’s tiny hands could not possibly have reached around his neck.

They exited onto Fourteenth Street, and the lawyer let out a purr of pleasure at the sight of his waiting horses. McShane could have had a driver but preferred to hold the reins of his own carriage, a very beautiful rig of dark polished wood with gleaming brass highlights. They climbed up for the short ride to the Executive Mansion, and a porter borrowed from the Willard handed the lawyer the reins.