The Secretary of War invited Socola to join him at the White House after the Cabinet meeting which President Buchanan had called at the unusual hour of ten at night. He had waited for more than two hours in the anteroom and still the Cabinet was in session. Without show of impatience he smoked cigar after cigar, flicked their ashes into the fireplace and listened with an expression of quiet amus.e.m.e.nt to the storm raging within while the sleet of a January blizzard rattled against the windows with increasing fury.
Once more the question of the little fort in the harbor of Charleston had plunged the discordant Cabinet of the dying administration into the convulsions of a miniature war.
The feeble old President, overwhelmed by the gathering storm, crouched in the corner by the fire. His emaciated figure was shrouded in a ridiculous old dressing-gown. Mentally and physically prostrate he sat shivering while his ministers wrangled.
He rose at last, shambled to the Cabinet table, and leaned his trembling hands on it for support.
"What can I do, gentlemen--what can I do? If Anderson hadn"t gone into that fort at night, the State of South Carolina might not have seceded--"
Stanton shook his ma.s.sive head with an expression of uncontrollable rage.
"Great G.o.d!"
The President continued in feeble, pleading tones:
"Now they tell me that unless Anderson withdraws his troops their presence will provoke bloodshed--"
"Let them fire on him if they dare!" shouted Stanton.
"I cannot plunge my country into fratricidal war. My sands are nearly run. I only ask of G.o.d that my sun may not set in a sea of blood--"
He paused and lifted his thin hands, trembling like two withered leaves of aspen in the winter"s blast.
"What can I do?"
Stanton suddenly sprang from his seat and confronted the shivering old man.
"I"ll tell you what you can _not_ do!"
The President gasped for breath and listened helplessly.
"You can"t yield that fort to the conspirators who demand it. Dare to do it, and I tell you, as the Attorney General of the United States, you are guilty of high treason--and by the living G.o.d you should be hung!"
The venerable Secretary of the Navy, Isaac Toucey, lifted his hand in protest. Stanton merely threw him a look of scorn, and shouted into the President"s face:
"Your act could no more be defended than Benedict Arnold"s!"
"And what say you, Holt?" the President asked, turning to his heavy-jawed Secretary of War.
"Send a ship to the relief of Sumter within twenty-four hours, and let South Carolina take the consequences--"
"Good!" Stanton cried.
Holt"s crooked mouth was drawn in grim lines, and the left-hand corner was twisted into a still lower knot of ugly muscles. His furtive eyes beneath their s.h.a.ggy brows glanced quickly around the table to see the effect of his patriotic stand.
The President turned to the white-haired Secretary of the Navy:
"And you, General Toucey?"
The venerable statesman from Connecticut bowed gravely to his Chief and spoke with quiet dignity.
"I would order Anderson to return at once to Fort Moultrie--"
Stanton smashed the table with his big fist.
"And you know that the State of South Carolina has dismantled Fort Moultrie?"
Toucey answered Stanton"s bl.u.s.ter with quiet emphasis.
"I"m aware of that fact, sir!"
"And it makes no difference?"
"None whatever. Anderson left Fort Moultrie and moved into Fort Sumter without orders--"
A faint smile flickered about the drooping corners of Holt"s mouth--
The speaker turned to Holt:
"As a matter of fact, he moved into that fort against the positive orders of your predecessor, James B. Floyd, the Secretary of War. As he went there without orders, and against orders, he should be ordered back forthwith--"
"With the look of a maddened tiger Stanton flew at him.
"And you expect to go back to Connecticut after making that statement?"
"I do, sir--"
"I couldn"t believe it."
"And why, pray?"
"I asked the question in good faith, that I might know the character of the people of Connecticut, or your estimate of them."
The old man drew himself up with cold dignity.
"I have served the people of my State for over forty years--their Congressman, their Attorney General, their Governor, their Senator. I consult no upstart of your feeble record, sir, on any question of principle or policy!"
Stanton quailed a moment beneath the cold scorn of his antagonist, surprised that another man should dare to use his methods of invective.
He lifted his hands with a gesture of contempt.
"All I can say is, that if I should dare take that position and return to the State of Pennsylvania, I should expect to be stoned the moment I set foot on her soil, stoned through the State and flung into the river at Pittsburg with a stone around my neck--"
Toucey stared at his opponent.
"And in my opinion they would deserve well of their country for the performance!"