The Lost Order (Cotton Malone 12)

“Yes, sir. It’s me. Captain Adams.”

The door creaked open.

“Come in. You shouldn’t be out there in the open. There are Federal eyes and ears everywhere here in the capital.”

He stepped inside and Breckinridge poked his head out, listening, waiting for something.

“It seems okay,” the old man said. “I think you made it without being followed.”

He was unsure where the old man’s mind had settled and was a little perturbed that no one had mentioned any impairment—maybe Weston had not known—which called into question whether he should waste any more time. But he decided to give it a few minutes.

“Come in,” Breckinridge said, motioning with a bony hand and stepping across the squeaky floorboards.

He followed his host into a small den.

“Sit down, Captain. Please. Take a load off your feet. I’m sure you’re tired from the journey.”

“I did travel a long way.”

“From Richmond?”

“That’s right.”

The old man eased himself into an upholstered recliner. Cotton chose another chair. He’d expected a musty, olden waft. But everything was surprisingly clean and tidy. So he asked, “Do you live here alone?”

“No, my wife’s around here somewhere. Julie. Julie. We have a visitor. Make some coffee.”

Stamm had told him that Breckinridge’s wife died years ago, not long after he retired. There was one child. A boy. Grown by now, and Stamm knew nothing about him.

“Is your son around?” he asked.

“Gosh, no. He’s off teaching somewhere. Left this house long before the war. Tell me, Captain. How is the fight going out there? We get told only what the Yankee newspapers want us to hear.”

His dilemma rose. The answer to the question depended on timing. If Breckinridge was living prior to early 1863, the South was doing okay. Winning battles, driving hard north and west. But all that changed with Gettysburg and Vicksburg. Those defeats doomed the Confederacy.

He decided on a middle ground. “We’re making good progress. Things are working out.”

“I want to know. Is it true about your name? Did you really hide in a mattress, beneath a sick man, to escape the Yankees?”

“I did. It seemed the only way, and it worked.”

Breckinridge laughed. “Damn ingenious. Well done. We need more cleverness like that. So what brings you back to the capital. Are you on another assignment?”

He nodded. “We have a problem and need your help. Do you remember the Heart Stone?”

The narrow head nodded. “Oh, yes. Definitely. I saved it, you know.”

“I do know. That’s why I’m here. We need its location.”

“Who’s we?”

“President Davis sent me.”

He was hoping that lie would add importance.

But Breckinridge spat on the floor.

“Damn fool. That’s what he is. He’s going to cost us everything. The man worries about stupid details and won’t delegate a thing. The people loathe him and why he fights with the state governors I’ll never know. That’s just asking for trouble.”

Interesting how the sick mind remained sharp for detail, since everything he’d just heard was historical fact. “You keep up with things.”

“I hear stuff. There are spies, like you, all around us here. I want to know, did Joseph Henry send you my way?”

He nodded and said, “The secretary said you knew everything.”

“Did you give him the key?”

The ceremonial key? He’d have to wing it. “I did.”

“You were there when the Castle burned, weren’t you? What was it like?”

The man’s knowledge was impressive. “Quite a sight, and sad, too.”

“I bet it was. But it worked to your advantage. You did good, Captain. And your journal is safe. I hid it away, too.”

He recalled what he’d been told about Angus Adams’ involvement in the 1854 southwest expedition and what Weston said about the journal.

Gone for a long time.

“Between you and me,” Breckinridge said, “I don’t trust the people over there in the Smithsonian Castle. I think the Federals are onto them.”

He decided to push. “President Davis wants my journal, too.”

The oily eyes narrowed. “How do I know I can trust you?”

“You don’t.”

The old man chuckled. “You’re a sly one, Captain.” Then a gleam filled the eyes. “Are you up for a little test?”

Not really, but he had no choice. “Fire away.”

“Name the stones.”

That he could answer. “Witch’s, Horse, Trail, Heart, and Alpha.”

“Damn good, Captain. Will you be wanting to see the knights’ commander while you’re here?”

Something new. The commander? “Definitely.”

“I can arrange a meeting. Good and private, not to worry.”

“Where could that be arranged?”

“In that damn Temple of Justice of his. He rarely leaves it, anyway.” The older man sat forward. “Between you and me, Captain, I don’t trust the commander. He says he’s one of us, but I’m not sure. That hair around his bald head makes him look too much like a priest to me. We have to be careful. Real careful. Let’s face reality, the war is lost. We both know it. There was no need for the whole damn thing in the first place. We could have done this another way. Hell, the South had the Supreme Court. Look at Dred Scott, they ruled 100 percent for us. Slaves aren’t people. They’re property. Even Lincoln told us, when they swore him in the first time, that we could keep slavery. Just leave the Union intact. But no. Hotheads and fools wanted war.”

“Was there another way?” he decided to ask.

Breckinridge pointed a finger. “You’re damn right there was, and if that moron Jeff Davis had listened we could have done things within the law. But no one would listen. Jeff Davis sho

ws too much favoritism toward his friends. He can’t get along with people who disagree with him, and he doesn’t know beans about leading an army. It pains me to say, but Lincoln is a much better war leader.”

All facts, too.

“The fight is about over,” Breckinridge said. “When that happens, it’ll be up to us to keep things going, but I doubt the commander’s dedication. Like I said, I don’t trust him.”

All of which was irrelevant, so he decided to stick with urgency. “Everything you’ve said is true, and it’s why I’m here. The war is lost. But before it’s too late, I have to locate the Heart Stone and my journal.”

* * *

Grant made his way toward the back of his father’s house. On approach he’d seen a car nestled at the curb. Nothing unusual. A lot of people in the neighborhood left cars on the street. What piqued his interest was the Smithsonian permit affixed to the windshield. So he’d rounded the block, parked, then hustled back, finding the narrow alley that ran between his father’s house and a neighbor.

He crept up the stoop.

* * *

Cotton waited for Breckinridge to answer him.

“The Heart Stone is safe, and has been for a long time. So is your journal. I personally handled both. There were problems, you know. People wanted to use them to find the vault. Federals after our gold, but I stopped ’em. You can tell Jeff Davis he has nothing to worry about.”

“I need details. That’s why I’m here.”

The old man sat ramrod-straight, elbows on the armrests, as if waiting for the executioner to switch on the electricity.

“Why does Jeff Davis care?”

“It’s not for me to question my president.”

“Why not? Davis had the five stones made, then ordered them hidden away. The whole crazy thing was his idea.”

“Now he wants them back.”

Another finger was pointed his way. “You lie, Captain.”

He wondered how much this old man’s sick brain knew about Angus Adams. Enough, apparently, to connect Cotton to the surname. Warren Weston certainly knew a lot, too. Perhaps they’d both learned from the same source.

The Smithsonian archives.

He decided indignation, and a slightly thicker southern accent, might work. “Sir, I resent your implications. I am an officer in the Confederate army and I do not lie to a fellow gentleman. I’ve been sent by the president of the Confederate States to retrieve my journal and the Heart Stone. You are ordered to give me their location.”