Rival Caesars Read online

  Rival Caesars by Desmond Dilg

  Originally published 1903, Thurland & Thurland, Chicago, IL

  © 2019 Benjamin Garland.

  All rights reserved.

  Cover by Lucullus

  ISBN: 9781792670763

  “The matter of what is good and what is bad cannot be satisfactorily decided by one strict rule. What is one man's good is another man's poison.”

  “Good or bad I propose to be something great!”

  “There is no field of activity for great men without the coming of great wars, great struggles and great revolutions.”

  “What is more beautiful than to have one's name live forever linked with the heroes of all the ages?”

  “Like misfortune [politics] makes men acquainted with strange bedfellows. Truly, it is no business for a gentleman. It would corrupt the principles of a saint.”

  “Good always results from a great war. The main point is not to be on the wrong side.”

  “War burns up the mental cobwebs that are liable to gather in a man's mind from overmuch contemplation of ordered tranquility. War is the grim realist. It places a note of interrogation opposite every belief and every opinion, however hoary, however sanctified.”

  “Majorities are nothing except they have arms in their hands.”

  “Men of property must always stand ready to defend their possessions.”

  “If the soldier hasn't anything material to gain he naturally enough loses his enthusiasm. Fame and glory are very nice, but so is gold and silver and a new pair of breeches now and then.”

  “The vast majority of men, being futile and hopelessly weak, always delight in having the successful men among them taken down a peg.”

  “Politics would soil the Prince of All Evil himself.”

  “What is the world itself but an arena for Love and Conquest? Are we not here to increase and multiply and Take Possession? Whosoever “believeth” otherwise hath surely not been endowed with the power to either think or observe.”

  “Love the great Creator of life, and war the great Selector!”

  “Women find little pleasure in the society of women.”

  “Why do men go to war? Is it not in some way to better their condition. All these newfangled notions that men fight for other things than their own personal advantage is pure delusion.”

  “As I understand human nature, to go to extremes is ever symptomatic of genius and greatness. Weakness is to compromise, to hesitate, to be half-hearted. Are not the great names of ancient and modern times the names of haughty and aggressive personalities who carried their loves and convictions to 'extremes,' that is to say, to logical and clean-cut conclusions?”

  “Mediocrity is safe, no doubt it is, but it is very commonplace and of a drab color. Mediocrity is for men of the secondary, the bloodless type.”

  “If we want to shoot a man in war and he badly wants to shoot us, why should we not take his property (if we can) as well as his life? . . . what is the good of being a soldier, of risking your life, and being a brave man in battle, if you cannot seize from your beaten enemy, what your greater valor wins and what you stand badly in need of?”

  “Is not the sword of conquest the Scythe of Selection? Is not the leaping forks of fiery light the Signal of the True? And, is not the Crash of Cannon the actual Voice of the Gods?”

  “The delight which all women take in men of power and valor is elemental and undying. From the dawn of time it has ever been the instinctive wish of a good woman to mate herself with the boldest and most heroic man of her acquaintance. And in this there is a profound mystery and meaning. Its purpose is divine and godlike, that is to say, Selective of the Best and Bravest.”

  “The reason there are no great poets and writers now is because there are no great deeds or heroes to write about. The world is becoming tame and sad and dreary.”

  Dedicated to the memory

  Of the late

  Perry A. Hull of Chicago.

  A man of valiant and limitless ambitions (cut down in the heydey of a brilliant and successful career)—a man in whom the hereditary joy of struggle was instinctual—who daily delighted in returning blow for blow—one to whom the god-like pleasures of victory were as the breath of life—a “man among men” who was at all times a terror to his enemies—and whose homeric fidelity to friends and associates, was as effective and unswerving as it was romantic and royal.

  —The Author

  Introductory Note

  From original documents preserved from utter destruction in a very remarkable manner, this book has been written.

  The discovery of these documents (withered and tattered and moldy with age and damp) is in itself a strange and tragic story. Some day it shall be related.

  Sufficient however for the present to say, that these papers were found by an American scout among the secreted archives of a plundered monastery, on the Island of Cuba.

  For over two years the contents of three small boxes (clamped with iron and eaten by ants) containing private letters, deeds, personal memoranda, half-written memoirs, parchments, copies of secret political negotiations, suppressed pamphlets and treaties, old love letters, old newspaper cuttings and books, have been placed in the possession of the writer, that he might relate, in regular sequence, this true tale of love and jealousy, ambition, intrigue and war—a tale quite as remarkable and romantic as anything to be found in the classic literatures of ancient or of feudal times.

  It is understood, however, that many of the facts and happenings bearing on the actual record of the two principal characters are intentionally veiled or wholly omitted.

  Notwithstanding the alleged tolerance of our times, the day has certainly not arrived when famous but unfortunate historical personages can be actually placed upon the stage, with all their manifold faults and failings, as well as their idealisms and successful deeds.

  The views and opinions of the great mass of living men (and women) are still bubbling over with illusion and conventional fallacy. They delight to steep their souls in parroted fables, and accept the fashionable historians as unimpeachable messengers from heaven. The fact that “History is a series of lies agreed upon” (which was Napoleon Bonaparte's mature opinion) never seems to even dawn upon them.

  Thus romances have ever been written, and shall continue to be written, to relate the true things that nobody believes.

  Therefore the readers of this book are expected to think between the lines. Nay, they are commanded so to do.

  Let them also remember that if the whole truth relating to any great man could be published the tale would be scounted as incredible, abnormal, fabulous.

  For even as the light of the sun exceedeth that of the moon, so doth the wonders of solid fact exceed by far those of mere invention.

  “The lion in man, the tiger in man, verily they are in him for evermore. A monster would he be if made otherwise.”

  Contents

  I.

  II.

  III.

  IV.

  V.

  VI.

  VII.

  VIII.

  IX.

  X.

  XI.

  XII.

  XIII.

  XIV.

  XV.

  XVI.

  XVII.

  XVIII.

  XIX.

  XX.

  The Blood Compact

  The Eight Day Clock

  The Secret Society

  The Initiation of Betsy

  The Enchanted Clearing

  The Prophecy of Fate

  An Apollo of Revolution

  The Beautiful Spy

  Marriage by Compulsion

  The Burning Farm

  “It Was Not to Be”

  Widow Provost Pro
poses

  The Battle in the Dark

  Mr. Warwick Hamilton

  Robber Rob Robber

  The Secret Tribunal

  Mortuum Bellum

  Trial by Combat

  O, Tragic Shores of Weehawken

  “The Plains of Mexico”

  I

  The Blood Compact

  An’ trust me on my troth

  If thou keep faith with me,

  My dearest friend, as my own heart,

  Right welcome shalt thou be.

  'Twas the early morning of a beautiful summer day. Two handsome young men, dressed in the height of fashion and conversing earnestly, walked rapidly into the old town along Broadway.

  They were returning from a duel. As if well accustomed to the locality, they turned sharply round a corner and entered Wall street.

  Rapiers hung by their sides with glittering hilts and shining scabbards. Their hair profusely powdered and combed back over prominent brows, hung down behind in the shape of queues over well-fitting silver buttoned velvet coats.

  They wore stylish ruffles, slashed scarlet vests, knee- breeches, garters, silken hose: and broad silver buckles flashed in the sunlight upon their low red-heeled shoes.

  Judging by their dress, general appearance and distinctly aristocratic deportment, they were men of good family and superior standing. There was an indefinite “something” about them, that undefinable “something,” which denotes men intended by birth and nature for the exercise of power and high command. Both were of medium height and seemed “for dignity composed and high exploit.”

  One bore his arm with care as if it had been hurt. He had dark grey eyes, a frank, generous, cheerful countenance, aquiline nose, a powerful chin, high forehead, light colored hair and a mouth at once indicative of great eloquence and business capacity. A curious sphinx-like repose rested upon his features, a repose that seemed as it were to penetrate without effort into the very heart of things. His general manner betokened pride and self-confidence, with a strong dash of caution.

  The other man was more compactly built and remarkably handsome. His limbs were in perfect proportion, he walked with a gait of unconscious pride, and his cameo-like beauty of feature was very striking. His hands were of extreme delicacy, yet with long powerful fingers. He had a noticeably large head, with projecting brows, a swarthy sun-tanned complexion, small shell-like ears, dark curly hair, eagle nose and black orb-like Oriental eyes—eyes that seemed, when he talked, to emit sparks.

  His look was that of an eagle in its flight, dauntless, graceful, calculating and remorseless. Decidedly an extraordinary, a very extraordinary individual.

  As these two young men turned the corner, a richly caparisoned family chaise, drawn by two beautiful small white stallions and driven by a coal-black slave, trotted jauntily by. In it sat two fashionably attired young ladies, accompanied by a jovial old gentleman. All smiled graciously upon the two pedestrians, who lifted their hats and bowed profoundly in return, with true Chesterfieldian grace of manner, while the old gentleman waved his hand in a courtly old-fashioned style, full of friendliness, as the carriage swept past.

  “O, Catherine,” whispered the darkest of the two ladies, a lovely damozel of about 18, “who is that divinely dark young man with Aleck? He looks just like the magic prince in the last story book that Cousin Clinton sent over from London. I’ve never seen him before. And doesn’t he walk elegantly? Who is he?”

  “O, he is a Puritan Collegian from Princeton on a visit,” answered Catherine. “They say he is a grandson of the great Jonathan Edwards whom we hear so much about on Sundays. His mother was a celebrated Puritan beauty. I forget his name, but I met him at the Livingstons. I'll tell you what we’ll do, we'll ask Aleck to bring him over next Thursday to Judge Livingston's at ElizabethTown. There is to be a great birthday party, and everybody is invited.”

  At this the first fair speaker clapped her hands delightedly saying: “I’m so pleased. I like him already. He is just charming. I do believe I'll fall in love with him.”

  At this impetuous outburst, Catherine admonished her saying: “You ought to be more reserved, Betsy. It is not proper for a young girl to express such open admiration for a man, more especially one she has never seen before.”

  “You jealous old dear. I believe you’re in love with this Sir Puritan yourself.”

  At this outburst, Catherine blushed crimson, while the old gentleman laughed outright.

  * * * * *

  In the year 1775 New York was a beautiful little half Dutch town of 20,000 inhabitants.

  It was ruled over (and almost entirely owned) by less than half a dozen Colonial families, which included the Livingstons, the Clintons, the Morrises, and the De Lanceys.

  The cobblestone streets were crooked and narrow. Here and there grew wide-spreading shade trees, upon the lower branches of which the small boy swung by his hands, exactly as his ancestor did, the primordial monkey in the primordial forest.

  The houses were prim and whitewashed, with plain oak doors and brass knockers. Along the streets were rows of empty lots, littered with rubbish, also wide unfenced common lands, green with grass and park-like with trees, upon which cows, horses, sheep and goats grazed placidly, with jangling bells lashed securely around their necks by thongs of plaited green hide.

  There was a row of gloomy old cannon where the Battery now stands. Wooden wharves built on piles, rafted down from Colonel Schuyler's estate, jutted into the harbor. Fastened to these wharves by heavy twisted hawsers were numbers of heavy old fashioned, square rigged trading craft with high poops and blue figureheads. Also moored near by, were tall transatlantic clippers, smellful emigrant ships, fore-and-aft smuggling schooners, coasting brigs, revenue cutters, long, low, heavily armed privateers from the Spanish Main, greasy wide-ribbed bulging whalers from Baffin's Bay, heavy warships from Plymouth-Hoe and quick sailing slavers from the Congo Coast.

  * * * * *

  After passing the Livingston carriage the two young men turned up a narrow court above the entrance of which hung a creaking lamp. Climbing a flight of stone steps, the front man knocked at the heavy door in a peculiar way. The janitor, in semi-military uniform, evidently an old soldier, opened it to them. Brushing past him they walked rapidly up a flight of oaken stairs and entered a large room over-looking the harbor.

  At one end of this room was a wide, old-fashioned fireplace. The tables, chairs, shelves and hooks on the walls were crowded and littered with papers, books, hats, canes, guns, swords, overcoats, and the general bric-a-brac of an 18th century bachelor's apartment. Upon the walls hung pictures of famous battles, famous generals, and famous local beauties.

  On the mantel stood a bronze statuette of Cromwell at Naseby leading his Ironsides against his king, and another of Caesar crossing the Rubicon to make war upon his Government.

  Between the legs of Caesar's horse lay two books; one the Holy Bible, and the other, “The Prince,” by Niccolo Machiavelli.

  Upon one end of a large table in the center of the room lay a great heap of law books and on the other end a substantial breakfast for two stood ready and inviting.

  On entering each man helped himself to a gobletful of French wine from a sideboard and then proceeded to where a basin of water stood in a small alcove. The taller of the two removed his coat, rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and began to carefully wash the dry blood from his swollen arm.

  His friend assisted him to unwrap the hardened bandage tied tightly below the elbow. When the bandage had been well saturated with water it was gradually unwound, exposing a deep ugly gash from which the blood slowly oozed. After washing the wound they rubbed it over with some salve and neatly bound it up again with a new linen bandage.

  “I regret,” spoke the wounded man, “that this affair was not fought with pistols. The bullet is the thing. I challenged him, and of course, he had the choice of weapons. This placed me at a great disadvantage as you saw. I am not like you a first-class swordsman. My fort
e is not the rapier, but the pistol. With it I am well practiced, taking quick aim and firing first. These naval officers are seldom good pistol shots. He had the advantage over me in this affair, but I have the satisfaction at least of having left my brand on him.”

  “Of course,” answered the other, “I quite agree with you. I prefer the bullet myself to the sword. It is not that, however, I am concerned about, but this. This duel must be kept secret as far as possible. It will not do to have it talked about too much. The public situation is becoming explosive. Serious trouble is brewing between the people and the king, and should either of us get the reputation of being noticeably antagonistic to the king's officers, the fact would do us much present injury. As your second, therefore, I advise hushing the matter up. What do you think?”

  “I agree with you,” answered the wounded man. “We should not be too precipitate in openly taking sides until we see how things are going to shape. My sympathies are all as you know with the colonists, but I have no particular desire to become a mere solitary martyr. I do not wish to run my neck into a halter without some prospect of adequate backing.”

  Both men then seated themselves at the table and proceeded to eat heartily.

  “Now,” said the unwounded man, “let us forget the duel for an hour or so while we talk confidentially. I have been waiting long for a convenient opportunity to discuss important business with you. There is no better time than the present. Afterwards as I go down to the ferry, I can call at the old doctors and send him up to dress your wounded arm.”

  The wounded man looked at the speaker inquiringly. The latter continued talking while his face lit up with enthusiasm.

  “A grander duel than that between individuals is imminent, a civil war, a revolution. This you yourself must already have observed. Revolution must come. It is inevitable. No negotiations can stop it. The cry for independence is ever growing stronger. And both sides have gone too far to now back down. The rapacity of the king and his hide-bound ministry is preparing a situation brimful of battle and also of vast possibilities for young men like you and I. How pleasing it is to feel that we may be living in an age of great and heroic doings?