How Few Remain by Harry Turtledove

Author:Harry Turtledove
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: War stories, Alternative histories (Fiction), Science Fiction, United States - History - 1865-1898 - Fiction, Space Opera, Fantastic fiction, General, United States, Fantasy, Imaginary wars and battles - Fiction, Imaginary wars and battles, Adventure, Historical, Fiction, Alternative histories
ISBN: 9780345406149
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine Books
Published: 1998-04-29T08:19:35+00:00

XI

Abraham Lincoln watched the soldiers building the gallows outside Fort Douglas. It was a touch of General Pope’s, either extraordinarily good or extraordinarily bad, depending on how things worked out, for Lincoln was not the only one watching that exercise in practical carpentry. Far from it: the work had to be visible from a goodly part of Salt Lake City, and those of the Latter-Day Saints who could not see it would have heard of it.

As Lincoln watched the men labor, stripped to their shirts, a guard in a blue blouse watched him. He suspected the guard had stretched the truth about his age to get into the Army. The fellow was trying to raise a mustache, but had only a little pale fuzz on his upper lip. His eyes never left Lincoln. It was as if he were tracking a nine-point buck, a resemblance only strengthened by the loaded Springfield he carried. The index finger of his right hand never got far from the trigger.

“You want to be careful with that,” Lincoln said mildly, “lest something happen we would both regret afterwards.”

“Oh, no, Mr. Lincoln.” The guard shook his head. “I wouldn’t regret it one bit.” His smile was wide and bright and pitiless and about half crazy. “So you’re the one who wants to be careful.”

“Believe me, I shall,” Lincoln said. Shot while trying to escape. How many murders hid behind that stern mask of rectitude? He did not care to add another to the number.

Half a dozen traps on the gallows. Half a dozen nooses, though the ropes were not yet in place. Half a dozen Mormon leaders to dance on air at a time, though they were not yet in place, either. Lincoln knew John Pope wanted to hang him, too. Had Pope had his way, he would soon climb those steps with Orson Pratt and George Cannon and the rest of the high-ranking Mormons the U.S. Army had managed to run down. A Democrat in the White House might have let Pope hang him.

Of course, with a Democrat in the White House, the United States would no doubt have passively acquiesced to the Confederacy’s acquisition of Chihuahua and Sonora. The Mormons would not have gained an excuse for showing their disloyalty to the government that loved them so little. Would that have been better? Lincoln shook his head. The United States should have resisted the expansion of the slave power, and should have started resisting long since. His smile reached only one corner of his mouth. The United States should have done a better job of resisting, too.

One of the soldiers up on the multiple gallows tried a trapdoor. It didn’t drop. “God damn it,” he said, as any workman would have when what he was making didn’t perform the way it should. He called to another soldier: “Hey, Jack, bring me over that plane, will you? Got to smooth this old whore down.” Yes, it was just work to him. If he thought about what the work would do, he didn’t show it.

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