The President gave his arm to Mrs. Livingston and led the company into the dining-room. I noticed that he moves slowly, as if in pain. The dead-white face combined with the white plume-like hair gives him the look of an attenuated snow-man, diminishing in summer sun. It is a miracle he has lived this long into his second term.
At table the President ate only rice, and touched no wine. The rest of us gorged ourselves. How avoid it? I have never dined so well or eaten so much.
The lady on my left was so engrossed with the senator on her left that I talked to her not at all, but the wife of a western congressman (who told me her name twice and I have twice forgot it) was more than kind. “I think the General does wonderfully well with no wife to help him. Of course his girl was sweet when she was here but it’s not the same thing as a wife, is it? But he does know about food. Why, I have never had such good meals in this house as since he’s been here. The Adamses gave you boiled beef and a very frosty time.”
Everywhere in Washington it is whispered that the President is ruined financially; and goes home tomorrow to try to save his estate. If he is bankrupt, I can see why. He is much too generous with his guests.
We sat at a long table with tall lamps at regular intervals. We were attended by some twenty waiters in livery. At each place was a napkin, folded to resemble a four-leaf clover. In the centre of the napkin was a slice of light bread, a relief from the corn-bread that is usually served in the south. To the right of each plate was a forest of crystal glasses of different sizes for the different wines. I counted nine glasses.
Parallel to the table where we sat was a second table of equal length covered with elaborate dishes hot and cold. From this table the waiters selected the courses and passed them from guest to guest, murmuring in one’s ear, “Beef, Sir? Pheasant, Sir?”
The first course was a fish chowder served with a plate of boned fish. Sherry was poured.
My companion praised the chowder. “Maryland crab!” she exclaimed, dipping her spoon happily into the steaming contents. “Crab is one of the few pleasures of this place.” I found that to a man (and woman) those whose lives have been spent trying to get to Washington City in order to live at the public’s expense spend the days of their glory in lamenting their lot. To hear them tell it Detroit, Cincinnati, Memphis are far more brilliant than the capital.
After the fish course (the crab was the best I’ve ever tasted), canvas-back duck and pheasants were brought round. I watched with wonder as my companion seized upon a drumstick of duck and a quarter-pheasant. “You know, my husband—he’s so full of fun!—he shoots these ducks from our hotel window. You see, we’re at the other end of K Street where the marshes begin. So there’s such excitement when he takes to picking off the birds, even if some of your mean old Yankees in the hotel do complain about the racket.”
I don’t care for duck; could learn to like pheasant if it is not tough. Mine was. Just as well. The next course was an entire ham and an entire turkey on the same vast platter; they rose like twin mountains from alternating foot-hills of mutton chops, sweetbreads and partridges.
My companion smacked her lips. Yes, she was very fat. I’m afraid Old Patroon is not doing his duty. This description is coming out in bits and pieces, the way the President’s dinner finally came up. I am ill. “Oh, that’s one of the hams from the other side of the river, close by Alexandria. What a smoke-house this old Negro man has! We all go to him.” She took ham and turkey (but not a drumstick); she took a chop (her fork hesitated over a second chop then fell upon the sweetbreads). I did my best to keep pace with her.
“You write about politics, Mr. Schuyler?” My connection with the radical, disgraceful (she giggled to show that she was serious) Evening Post had been established early.
“Not very often. I describe things. Like old New York and the theatre and …” What does Old Patroon do? Denounce all things modern in order to please those elderly readers who are—or were—displeased by Leggett.
The side-dishes were now being passed about. My companion tried each one. I tried every other one. There was macaroni and oyster pie (which I can still taste), spinach, sassafras, cauliflower, braised celery … and all the while our glasses were filled with nine different foreign wines.
We were two and a half hours at table; I saw the President’s wisdom in eating only rice. Was he bored with us? It is hard to say. Mrs. Livingston on his left looked to be vivacious company while a foreign lady on his right was very handsome. Occasionally he would speak across the ladies to this man or that but I could not hear a word he said. His voice is high-pitched but not unpleasant; certainly it is not loud. The imitation everyone does of him shrieking “by the Eternal!” like some demented old rooster seems far from the fact. He is the soul of dignity and elaborately courteous, rather like Colonel Burr and the other relics of the Revolution. If Van Buren is elected in November, he will be the first of our presidents not born a subject of the English king.
I stare at Andrew Jackson, thinking Old Patroonish thoughts but despite the splendour of the setting I am mostly aware that the pale old man at the head of the table is in physical pain and that his false teeth do not fit; one can see them shifting about in his mouth as he purses his thin lips trying vainly to make himself comfortable.
“Gracious!” My companion spit—there is no other verb—a mouthful of bird-shot into her plate. “This poor partridge was in a war, not a hunt!”
Duly warned I ate turkey; drank Madeira. The lady from the west was full of praise for Mr. Van Buren who sat opposite us, smiling benignly and hardly speaking to anyone beyond a polite phrase or two. “We call him ‘the little magician’ here in Washington. And he is! He is! Why, the way he gets things done politically! Well, you know, my husband says Matty Van moves like a tiger in the night his object to achieve!” Liking the phrase, she repeated it so that I would be sure to ascribe it to the congressman from Ohio (I recall now that their home is Toledo).
“Naturally we are happy … thrilled he’s going to be the president no matter what Mr. Clay thinks—who is the nicest man in the Senate in spite of all the spirits he drinks, all the gambling he does. I am temperance.”
Old Patroon gave her some interesting statistics on the number of drunkards in the United States. She was not interested.
“But again we shall miss the lady’s gentle touch. Mr. Van Buren is not only a widower but there aren’t even any daughters or daughters-in-law. So we shall just have to make do with another bachelor in this lovely house. Of course a wife can sometimes be a trial. I am told that Mrs. Monroe was so stuck-up that she had a platform built in the East Room where she used to sit on a throne and receive the hoi polloi like she was a queen.”
I told her about Dolley Madison and Don Quixote. I must have got the story slightly wrong for she saw nothing droll in my version.
Ice-cream moulded into fantastic shapes made the rounds, accompanied by blancmange, cakes and custards. Next we were offered pyramids of fruit. I thought I would die. I was also drunk, as was most of the company. But then Washington City is a southern town governed by westerners. This means that although people drink a good deal more than they do in New York, they seldom appear drunk in public.
Toasts were proposed in champagne. We all drank the President’s health. He drank ours. Mr. Van Buren proposed a toast to the President’s safe—and successful—journey tomorrow. The President proposed a toast to the Van Buren administration. And so on.
Then the President rose and led the company into a reception room where waiters stood about with dishes of coffee.
Mr. Van Buren asked me if I had enjoyed myself.
“Yes, Sir, only I have never seen so much food. I could not do it justice.”
“Come now, I am sure that Old Patroon can keep pace with these Yankees any day.” Most comically, he said not “Yankees” but “Jankes,” the Dutch word for a barking dog. Then he was taken from me by others with a greater claim on the future source of honour.
I talked fo
r a time with Edward Livingston who was most amiable and wanted to be remembered to the Colonel. With drunken courage, I mentioned the election of 1800.
Livingston was not unwilling to discuss “a most trying time. Most dangerous, too. For a time it looked like we might never elect a president.”
“But you supported Jefferson through every ballot.”
“Oh, yes. Despite temptation.”
“From the Colonel?”
Livingston was cryptic. “Colonel Burr wanted very much to be elected president.”
I could not believe it; said as much: “After all, if he had wanted the election, he had only to say the word to Mr. Bayard of Delaware.”
Livingston smiled. “He could not say the word because he meant to come into the presidency as a Republican. Besides he had all the Federalists anyway. What he needed was for me and Lyon and Claiborne and one or two other Republicans to change our votes.”
“Did he ask you to change your vote?”
Livingston affected not to hear the question. “Colonel Burr was a very poor adventurer, and I told him as much when he came to see me in New Orleans. But he would have made a better president than Mr. Jefferson because he was in every way the nobler man. We made a mistake, I fear. And everyone has suffered.”
I cannot wait to ask the Colonel whether or not there is any truth to what Livingston says. The Colonel has always maintained the Livingstons were bribed by Jefferson. Did he mean that they were bribed away from him? A mystery.
I got as near as I could to where the President was standing. Only to find—to my discomfort—that he was discussing the death of Colonel Crockett in Texas.
“Over the years I had my differences with the Colonel. But I confess that he made a fine and manly end.” The President looked solemn. A westerner then gave us the latest and most heroic version of how Colonel Crockett and a handful of Texans were slaughtered by the Mexican Santa Anna who was then himself taken captive by Sam Houston. Ironic that what was treason in Aaron Burr thirty years ago is now, according to the press, “The Hand of Providence Pointing the Union’s Necessary Way Westward.”
“What’s your view of Colonel Crockett, Matty?” a heavy-drinking westerner teased the Vice-President.
“I agree entirely with the President. He made a fine and manly end.” The little magician waved his hand over the scene. “Of course I, too, had my differences with him.”
“Yes, Sir,” said the President, suddenly grim, “and Davy put those differences in a book which I would not have in this house.” There was the beginning of colour in Jackson’s face. There was, doubtless, none in mine.
“I have not read the book but I am told Davy’s treatment of me was most … most humorous.” Discord was swept away, to my relief. So far no one has connected me with Colonel Crockett’s book. But then hardly anyone has read the book, including me. The author’s marvellous death has quite obliterated his foray into political libel. The world much prefers to recall Davy Crockett as a legendary hero fighting hordes of Mexicans with his bare hands until at last he falls in the ruins of the Alamo, by Mexicans overwhelmed … cornholed?
Ten
MR. BRYANT WAS PLEASED with my description of “A Dinner at the White House” and helped me add a political detail or two.
“You stand well with Mr. Van Buren,” he assured me.
“I have no way of knowing. He said nothing.”
“When does he ever? But he will be elected in November, and you are sure to get an appointment. Now let me give you a small European itinerary.” And for an hour the busy editor of the Evening Post wrote me out a list of places I must visit. Curious how many of America’s writers are drawn to the Mediterranean: Irving to Granada, Cooper to Sorrento, Bryant to Rome; not to mention all those like me who would live in that part of the world if they had the money.
I left the office in Pine Street and started toward Broadway when I heard a woman’s voice call—no, bellow—“Charlot!” I turned and there behind me was the golden pumpkin of a coach containing Madame.
“Get in, get in!” I did as directed. Who does not?
I had not seen Madame for two years but she is unchanged. “I have been to Saratoga Springs, pour la santé. To the Battery!” she shouted to the coachman, adding with a ghoulish smile, “Through the ruins!” She turned her bloodshot gaze upon me. “I confess to a certain frisson when I look at what the fire has done to so many wicked worshippers of the dollar.” I had never thought to hear Madame criticise the source of her distinction, as well as her abiding passion. “Why is it I have not seen you, Charlot? Why have you deserted me?”
“I have been so busy.”
“I know. J’ai lu vos pièces! What talent! You must write about my house. It is the last of New York. Now tell me. Tell me the truth. How is he?” Last things obviously come together in her mind.
“I’ve not seen the Colonel since July when he was very weak. He hardly spoke.”
“Oh, poor man! Do I dare see him before the divorce is granted? That will be middle of September.” Suddenly she frowned. “Mon Dieu! When I divorce him, will I have to change my coat of arms?”
I stared at her stupidly.
“And I thought Old Patroon notices everything.” Apparently the doors of Madame’s coach are decorated with both the seal of the vice-president of the United States and the Burr family crest.
“You will,” I said firmly and with pleasure, “have to paint them over.”
Madame sighed. The world was continuing to use her ill, but a glance at the charred buildings in William Street did her good. Beggars are still digging among the ruins despite numerous signs threatening scavengers with punishment. The entire lower part of Manhattan Island will now be occupied by commercial buildings. The former residents are moving up-town to Fourth Street and even farther. I am moving out.
On the Battery the carriage stopped; we remained inside, watching the usual parade. Just opposite a man selling buckwheat cakes reminded me that I had eaten nothing all day. “I have never known—sauf l’Empereur—such a man.” Madame sniffed suddenly. Tears? No, catarrh.
“You should visit him.”
“Is he comfortable?”
“I think so. Judge Edwards looks after him and everyone goes to see him.” Yet I have not seen him since I got back from Washington City. I did write him a note but got no answer. I shall see him in the next few days to report on President Jackson’s insolvency: the thought of any president dying in penury revives the Colonel marvellously.
“Our love has always been a tempest, Charlot.” Madame gazed with longing across the North River, as though half-expecting to see her ancient lover roll toward us like a storm from Staten Island. “From the beginning when I was a jeune fille en fleur and we met at the French confectioner’s and the Colonel was the handsomest man I have ever seen and adored by every lady in New York—from that very first moment he vowed and I vowed one day we would be together. And we were! That summer night we married when he held me in his arms for the first time,” I could not believe my ears, “I thought—enfin I am home. But, no, I was too trusting, too romantic. I did not realize—how could I?—that it was too late for me, for him, for us. Because his character was entirely formed and it was not possible for him to break all the selfish habits of bachelorhood. The day I learned of his Jersey City garçonnière and Mrs. McManus, that slut, I knew the love I had dreamed of all my life—the totalness of it—was pas possible! ‘C’est ça,’ I said to myself and instructed Mr. Alexander Hamilton to file for divorce.”
“So it was not the way he spent your money that disturbed you?”
“Who gave you that idea?” said the one who had. “Money exists to be spent, n’est-çe pas?” Madame’s tune has entirely changed. “No, I am a woman, Charlot, of passionate nature, and of total—total …” She stopped, sought the word. So many words occurred to each of us that I was silent for fear that I might let slip a fatal one.
“I wanted a hero, a man. He was both. But he was never e
ntirely mine. Even so …” In one eye a whiskey-tear tried to fall. “Tell him that I remember him daily in my prayers.”
“I shall.”
Madame blew her nose softly, wetly. “I shall go see him once the decree is final.”
Madame ordered the coachman to take us up-town to Leggett’s house. “Since you will see my beloved Aaron before I do, tell him that my heart is his forever. Also, tell him that if he has a receipt for the sale of the horses and carriage I would appreciate a copy, for my records. He will understand.”
Eleven
September 14, 1836
AT 2:00 P.M. THIS AFTERNOON, Aaron Burr died; aged eighty years and seven months.
I was at Leggett’s house working on the first issue of the new paper when word was delivered me by a messenger from Mr. Bryant.
“You will write the obituary for us?” Leggett was cool.
“No, no. I must go see him.” I was in an odd state of confusion.
“But he is not there,” said Leggett, “to be seen. Your old friend is gone.”
“Even so, I have to go where he is.” And I went across to Staten Island; found the parlour of Winant’s Hotel crowded with friends and relations.
“You will want to go up,” said Mr. Davis when he saw me. “I’ll take you.” Together we climbed the narrow stairs. “It was an easy death. He was conscious almost to the end. His last word was ‘Madame.’ ”
I was startled. “His wife?”
Mr. Davis shrugged. “We don’t know. I suspect it was addressed to the lady who was sitting with him, a Mrs. Keese. She is still with him.”
In the pale evening light Mrs. Keese wept into both hands, making a silhouette framed by the sea-view. Beside her, head bowed, the Reverend Van Pelt prayed.