He took a sip of the coffee that had long ago gone cold and caught Booth’s gaze. “It’s getting dark.”
The actor muttered a curse and dashed the whip to the ground. “I know. He wouldn’t wait this long to start out. Something has gone awry.”
“Rendezvous, then?”
Booth bent down to snatch his crop, his expression thunderous enough to make Slade wonder if he wouldn’t rather snap it in two. “I suppose we must. Blast it! What could have gone wrong? The plan was perfect.”
Indeed, it had been. If the first two men failed for some reason, there were another two waiting beyond them. And another pair after that, each with a carriage ready to mask their movements. And finally him and Booth, ready as a final line if all before them failed. Or, if they were successful, to supervise the transportation into Confederate territory.
Slade had spent much of the day praying it wouldn’t come to that. If it did, he would have no choice but to show his true loyalties…and that was unlikely to end well.
His only answer to Booth now was to swing up into the saddle. And pray that his relief didn’t show in his face. “Maybe the others know more.”
“Of course they do.” Booth huffed once more but mounted his horse. “ ‘The best laid schemes of mice and men,’ I suppose.”
Slade’s borrowed mare moved of her own volition into a trot and tossed her head when he pulled her back to a walk to await Booth. He would have preferred to let the beast have her head, company be dashed, but he wasn’t entirely certain he remembered the way back to the Surratt boarding house given the serpentine route they had taken from it earlier that afternoon.
When Booth drew even with him, curious amusement colored his gaze. “The tavern keeper seemed to be trying to place you earlier. Have you stopped here before?”
“No.” But he’d noticed the narrow-eyed stare too. And it made him wonder if maybe Ross had. “He might have met my brother at some point, though.”
“Are you and your brother often confused?”
Slade snorted a laugh. Perhaps not as often as one would expect of identical twins, given that Ross had always had his clothes neatly pressed, his hair perfectly combed, and his behavior well under control, whereas Slade had…not. Never once had anyone tried to blame perfect Ross for any of Slade’s sins. Why, then, did his brother seem to demand retribution for Slade’s very being, and only after he’d changed? Why did it now fall to him to clean up the mess again, when he had already done it once, with his own life?
“More often than either of us liked.”
“Hmm.” No suspicion entered the actor’s eyes, thankfully. “Such things always put me in mind of Shakespeare’s comedies of errors. Mistaken identity—a classic device, which the Bard so skillfully put to use. Have you ever seen Much Ado About Nothing?”
Slade had a vague recollection of it being performed in a Chicago theater he had visited before a game of cards one evening. A brief nod was sufficient, he knew, to fuel Booth on in his talk of plays.
“I prefer the tragedies and histories, but Shakespeare knew how to write a comedy, to be sure.” Booth guided his mount to the left, glancing at Slade as he followed. “Where is he now?”
He couldn’t know how the question punched. “Dead.”
“My apologies. Must have been hard to lose a brother.” Booth’s voice went soft, barely discernable over the clop of horse hooves over cobblestones. “I am the ninth of ten children, myself. My brother Edwin and I have always been rivals. He is an actor as well, you know.”
“I’d heard.”
Booth laughed, tight and short. “And he’s a Unionist, of all things. Still, he is my brother. And a dratted fine Hamlet, though perish me if I ever admit it to him.”
Slade chuckled because it was necessary, but the sound was a lie. Good humor had no place in him right now. How could it? Even among enemies, sympathy hit whenever he heard of the unseen ravages of this endless war. Loyalties divided, houses divided, families divided.
His father had once preached a sermon on how the End of Days was always at hand. It was hard to deny in this gray world. When ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars, be ye not troubled: for such things must needs be; but the end shall not be yet.
Booth swore under his breath. “I cannot believe we failed again. What do you suppose went awry?”
“Hard to say.” But Slade noted that the man’s shoulders bunched up, his jaw pulsed. With the Confederacy faltering more each day, with the end in sight, failure would not sit well with any of the Knights. These are the beginnings of sorrows.
“We were so thorough. So careful.” Booth’s fingers went tight on his reins.
But whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost. Slade drew in a long breath. “We always are.” Yet had always failed.