[CHAPTER XIV]
Tom Hunts Wilkes Booth—The End of the Murderer—Andrew Johnson, President of the United States—Tom and Towser Go Home.
The assassination of Lincoln was not the only crime that stained that memorable night. Secretary-of-State Seward was stabbed in his sick-bed by one of Booth's co-conspirators. Attempts were made upon the lives of other Cabinet ministers. Many arbitrary arrests had been made during the war by Secretary Stanton. It had been said that whenever Stanton's little bell rang, somebody went to prison. That little bell had little rest this Saturday. Wholesale arrests were made of suspected Southern sympathizers who might have known something of the hideous conspiracy of murder. Stanton put all the grim energy of him into the pursuit of the leading criminals. He was said never to forget anything. One of the things he had not forgotten was that Tom Strong knew Wilkes Booth by sight. He sent him from Lincoln's bedside, hours before Lincoln died, to join a troop of cavalry that was to pursue Booth. The road by which the murderer had left Washington was known. Hard upon his heels rode the avengers of crime. Wherever there was a light in one of the few houses along the lonely road, often where there was no light, the occupants were seized, questioned, sometimes sent to Washington under guard, sometimes released and sternly bidden to say nothing of the midnight ride. Piecing together scraps of information gathered here and there, studying every crossroad for possible hoof-marks of flight, the silent commander of the cavalrymen at last convinced himself that he was on the trail of the quarry. The troops broke into full gallop. A few minutes before dawn they reached a small village on the bank of the Potomac, where the fires of a smithy gleamed. They pulled up short as the startled blacksmith came out of his sooty shed.
"What are you doing here?" demanded the captain.
"I've been—I've been—putting on a horseshoe, sir."
"For what kind of a looking man?"
"He said his name was Barnard."
"I beg your pardon, sir," said Tom from his saddle, "but Barnard was the name Wilkes Booth once gave me for his own." At the beginning of the ride, Tom had described Booth's appearance to the captain.