May 8, 1861, Washington D.C.,
United States Capitol Building
He was shaking, and he didn't think he'd be able to stop. He knew he'd let it go to far. He'd been trying to tell someone, anyone, for weeks, but no matter who he spoke to, the words choked in his throat and what came out made no sense. He didn't understand what was happening to himself, how was he meant to describe it to others? To humans?
Alfred took off his glasses and pretended not to notice how the frames quivered because of his shaking hands. He folded them up and slid them into his breast pocket. He leaned over his lap and brought his hands up behind his head so he could pull at his short hair until his fingertips went numb. Face into elbows, elbows into knees, he wished for the world to return to normal. There were a dozen armed men surrounding him on all sides, but none of them seemed to affected by his distress. They'd been ordered to keep him away from others, in case it happened again. If it did, all twelve of them had been given permission to shoot him.
"It can't happen again," Hamlin had barked to the men before he'd left. "It won't happen again, gentlemen."
In the privacy of his hunched pose, Alfred's face crumpled in overwhelming shame. Lincoln had only been in office for a few months. Unlike many fresh presidents, Buchanan among them, Lincoln had taken to Alfred almost immediately. Alfred in turn had taken to Lincoln immediately, and by the end his first week in office was fully prepared to entrust this man with his people, his armies, and his very life.
Alfred had tried to tell Lincoln about The Other multiple times, but the young president was so overwhelmed with the inauguration, then the war, the mustering of troops, there was never a moment where they could speak alone. March had become April, and April had become May. Finally, they'd been allowed to meet on May 8th, over lunch. Alfred had been let in to Lincoln's office.
He'd seen Lincoln's face, and something had snapped. 400,000 troops, The Other's voice had rung in his head. He'd watched himself move towards Lincoln's desk with rising horror. His left hand had seized the president by the lapels, while his right hand had snatched the knife off his plate. Then, Alfred's vision had gone dark.
He'd woken up in handcuffs some time later in a room he didn't recognize, with angry men standing all around, most of them holding guns.
"What did I do?" He asked them. He was not confused over how he'd ended up here. "Please, please, God tell me I didn't do what I think I did." The men stayed silent, eyeing each other and shifting uncomfortably foot to foot.
While he was still blabbering and wringing his hands, Hannibal Hamlin had arrived and told him that he'd tried to kill his own President. Lincoln was alive and unscathed, but apparently, it'd taken six of the White House's largest staff to subdue Alfred and drag him out of the office.
Alfred had cried and cried. Then, under the weight of the Vice President's furious glare, he'd explained through tears what he'd been trying to tell someone for months: that he wasn't himself anymore, and he had no idea what to do. Hamlin had listened. He'd asked questions. When had it started? December. How many times had this happened? A dozen or so. Could he tell when a fit was coming on? Only seconds before. Eventually, apparently satisfied, Hamlin had stood and turned to leave.
"What are you going to do with me?" Alfred had asked, voice choked and congested from crying. It'd taken the Vice President a long moment to answer.
"Congress will decide, Mister Jones."
So here he was, holed away in the Statuary Hall with a small army standing watch over him while across the Capitol, fifty senators contemplated what to do with him. The House had already passed the resolution—which no one would let Alfred read—and now it was down to the Senate's vote.
A skittish aide appeared at the door. He glanced at Alfred, and then to the armed men all around him.
"You can lead him this way, gentlemen."
Alfred stood and fished out his glasses, just in time to be gestured forward down the hall. His heart was beating hard and fast, and he clenched his hands into fists to hide how much he continued to shake. They'd let him go without handcuffs as a courtesy, but he knew they were all afraid. They crossed the Rotunda. The Supreme Court Chamber. Halls. Offices. Scurrying aides and staff. At last, they let him into the Senate Chamber, and pulled out a chair for him to take a seat. He sat under the weight of attention, and wondered absently if there would be a noose somewhere waiting for him. Hamlin brought the room to order.
"Mister Alfred Franklin Jones," He said, and Alfred flinched at the sound of the seldom-used middle name he'd adopted some years ago. It'd started as a pseudonym, a tongue-in-cheek jab at Benjamin Franklin, who'd often pressured him into hiding his identity in letters. Christ, if Ben could see me now. Alfred tried to sit up straight and not cower like he wanted to.
"All those assembled here know you, and know there is no one in Heaven or on Earth who's life depends so desperately on the health of this Union, or its head of state. It is for this reason that Congress must consider your case in the most severe gravity. You have attempted to take the President's life." Alfred's face crumpled again, though he tried to keep it from happening. "The facts surrounding these events are incontrovertable and have multiple witnesses. You yourself have offered no contrary evidence to dispute the crime. However," Hamlin was attempting to make eye contact, Alfred could tell, but he couldn't do it. He couldn't look at him, at any of them, or he'd fall apart. "Your motivations and your very mind were not your own. Upon this conclusion, all of Congress is agreed, and it is upon this consensus that we have founded our votes. Just as you, sir, embody the United States of America in every fibre and sinew, so too you now appear to hold within yourself the lifeblood of the rebellious Confederate States. In such grave times, this represents a danger not only to the President, to the Union, but to yourself. Would you not agree, Mister Jones?" Hamlin was speaking with a great deal of charity. No one here had to give Alfred an explanation, the Vice President was being pointedly kindto him, and it made Alfred feel even worse.
Alfred nodded.
"Then before I proceed to read the decision of Congress, I want to impress upon you and upon every man in this room the deep care and compassion I harbor for you, Mister Jones." For a moment, it looked as though Hamlin might say something else, but then he closed his mouth and turned his attention to the paper sat in front of him. He began to read.
"Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled in the year one thousand, eight hundred and sixty-one, that the Nation Embodied (hereafter known as Alfred F. Jones) is to be taken into the direct custody of the United States Senate and thereafter imprisoned for the full duration of the present war with the rebellious Confederate States, unless and until Congress amends this Resolution; and in said imprisonment, Alfred F. Jones is to be given whatever just, fair, and equitable rights and privileges afforded to him by firstly by the Senate, and secondly by the Office of the President; and that Alfred F. Jones' imprisonment is to be regarded as a State Secret, and not shared with any man, woman, child, or other entity who is not a sworn officer of these United States unless and until Congress…" Hamlin continued, but Alfred was no longer listening.
He knew why they were doing it. Given a year to think, he would not have arrived at any other solution given the desperation of their situation. Tears streamed down his face even as he sat, expressionless, while Hamlin concluded the resolution. They led him back to the Statuary Hall, where he'd stay under guard until Lincoln could sign the Resolution.
He wished he could have been allowed to see Lincoln, to apologize, to replace the haunting memory of the President's face contorted in surprise and sudden fear.
They took him into custody just after midnight. It was anticlimactic and sudden. Alfred was confused when they led him not outside to a prisoner's cart, but down the stairs to the catacombs of the Capitol. He'd been too overwhelmed to pay attention to the latter half of the Resolution, so he'd missed the part where they'd detailed where he'd be imprisoned. He saw it up ahead of him, gate already open, candles lit and a bed hastily crammed into one of the three alcoves of the cross-shaped room. Sadness and surprise mingled in the pit of his stomach.
They'd built this place as a tomb for Washington, but his dearest General's bones were across the river in Mount Vernon, buried well behind enemy lines. So this will be my tomb instead, the macabre thought sprouted in Alfred's head before he could stop it. They led him into the tomb-turned-cell and swung the gate closed after him.
"Is there anything we might fetch to make you more comfortable, Mister Jones?" It was the first time any of the guards had spoken to him. Alfred toed the five-pointed-star enlaid in the center of the grey-tiled floor. Deep below ground, there were of course no windows.
"If I'd known it was going to be in here, I would've liked to looked outside again before…" but there was nothing for it. He looked up at the guards.
"I have some books in my house, if I gave you a list, would you be able to bring them to me?"
"Of course, sir."
"And a writing desk, paper, pens?"
"Yes, sir." Alfred looked around himself and shuffled. The noise echoed horribly in the makeshift cell.
"That's all for now," he said.
They left him alone, their footsteps echoing into silence as they roamed the empty catacomb halls. Alfred fell into the small bed and thought of George Washington. He thought of Martha, and her children, and the starry skies under which they'd celebrated a new government. The thought crossed his mind: I want go home.
But therein lay the deepest wound: He was home. He was in the heart of his Capitol building, in his Capital city, and he'd never felt so alone in his life.
Historical Notes:
1. Hannibal Hamlin was a senator from Maine who became Lincoln's first Vice President. He was extremely outspoken against slavery and one of the early members of the Republican party. He was dropped off the ticket and replaced by Andrew Johnson as Lincoln's VP pick for his re-election campaign because Lincoln feared that Hamlin's northern-ness might cost him valuable votes from former-Confederate southern states, while Johnson (who was from Tennessee) would appeal to that crowd.
2. On May 8, 1861, Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederate States of America, authorized 400,000 volunteer troops for the Confederate Army.
3. The details of the layout of the Capitol building are based on my own memory of its interior and maps, which you can find online.
4. They really did build a tomb for Washington beneath the Capitol! It is in the basement of the building, directly in the center of the building beneath the Rotunda, and is the reason why the area is referred to as the catacombs. It was never used by Washington, who wrote a provision into his Will that he be buried at Mount Vernon. Congress fought the Washington family for many years in an attempt to move his body to D.C. The tomb remains empty, but for quite some time, it housed Lincoln's Catafalque when it was not in use (a catafalque is a raised dias covered in fabric, in this case black, used to display a coffin at a funeral). The catafalque was built when Lincoln's body was set to lay in state in the Capitol. The same catafalque is used today whenever late Presidents or congresspeople are set to lie in state in the Capitol.