Peggy O'Neal

by Alfred Henry Lewis

“A horse dead,” I replied. This was so far true as a word that the letter telling me thereof had but just arrived, and lay open on my table. “Only that a favorite horse has died,” I replied. “But he was one of the General's Truxton colts, and I but loth to lose him.”

It was a soon day thereafter, and we yet waiting for word of Noah, when the General re-opened the affair of the Ely letter.

“The man Ely,” said he, thoughtfully, “has been practiced upon. The Calhoun interest it was which stirred him to this. He would be clay easily moulded for such a purpose, and peculiarly when the potters employed upon him might promise somewhat for his ambition. As against Eaton and Peg, the fellow would needs lack personal motive, since he knows them not at all. He might find in his bosom, truly, a part willingness to disturb me, because I broke the heart of his hope for a Florida exaltation. Yet even with that to train his malignancy upon the Eatons, it is clear he must be loaded, primed, and aimed by other hands. Thus do I make the story of it: if Clay be out, as you declare, who is there save Calhoun to put this Ely forward? Then, too, there is the coincidence of method. Ely does there what the Calhoun folk do here.”

“Still,” I returned, for I believed in justice though to an enemy, and would not condemn the Vice-President without some open sureness of proof; “still, as Noah explained, these villainies might find act and parcel in Calhoun's interests, and that gentleman be as innocent of personal part as next year's babes.”

“Be that as it may,” retorted the General, “a man is responsible for his dogs. Besides, it is too much to believe that Calhoun has no notice of this war on the Eatons.”

“Oh, as to that,” I replied, “I think there is scant doubt. An important movement in his destinies is not to continue for long in the dark, to a keen sight like Calhoun's. However, he might miss details.”

“He knows of these tales against Peg,” declared the General firmly, and as though the question were solved and settled. “Also, by lifting his finger he could end them in the mouths that give them words. When one can do a thing and doesn't do it, that is because one doesn't want to do it, but prefers things as they are. And there you have it. In the mean courses against Peg your Vice-President is accessory. By the Eternal!” swore the General abruptly, beginning to walk about the floor, “but such perfidy makes me to loathe the man! I should hate all that comes from him, whether of policy or plan. For where a source is foul, the stream will be unclean.”

There was now to enter upon the stage one who wrought strongly for Peg's defence. But he toiled better for himself, for at last he took the White House by it; the General in a gust of kindness for what he did in Peg's pure favor making him his heir of politics and laying the presidency in his hands with the death of his own second term. This personage, to be so much the ally of Peg, and so fortunate for his own future, was none other than that Van Buren who resigned his Governorship and traveled the long way from Albany to become the General's Secretary of State.

Heretofore I've made suggestion that the General's knowledge of Van Buren was nothing deep, but only narrow and of a surface sort. More; the truth was that now when the General stood in the midst of this Eaton trouble and saw a long strife ahead, he was by no sense secure for the coming attitude of his premier, and went doubt-pricked as to whether or no it would turn to be a friendly one. I could discern some feather of these misgivings when one evening over our pipes we dwelt on Marcy and Van Buren, these two being topmost spirits of our party in their state.

Marcy was a bold man, and strong with a burly force; as frank and without fear too, as a soldier, and less the hypocrite than any of his day. He had yet to say, from his seat in the Senate, “The politicians of my state wear no masks of superior goodness and make no pretences. They are content to preach what they practice. If they be defeated, they expect to step down and out; if they triumph, they look to enjoy the fruits of their victory. They see no harm in the aphorism, 'To the victor belongs the spoil of the enemy.'” Marcy, I say, had not yet uttered these words in the Senate; but they dwelt with him as a sentiment; he had given them expression in Duff Green's paper; and, since the General said nothing in negation, they were held to declare the feelings of the administration.