Washington D.C.

Washington D.C. serves as the national stage on which Cyrus Trask, a one-legged private who never saw serious combat, constructs a second life as a revered military expert and political insider. It is in the capital that Cyrus’s fraudulent military past becomes the foundation of genuine influence, and where his son Adam, summoned from the frontier, witnesses the full, unsettling transformation of his father into a figure of power and pretense.

Cyrus Trask’s Rise in Washington

After moving to Washington to take a permanent paid position with the Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.), Cyrus Trask remakes himself entirely. He dresses like a great man—black broadcloth coat and trousers, a wide black hat, an overcoat with a velvet collar, and an ebony cane he carries like a sword. His speech becomes slow, mellow, and measured, and new teeth give him a vulpine smile. He replaces his crude wooden leg with a mechanical one that works on a hinge and a spring, so that he barely limps when he sets his mind to it. Cyrus’s knowledge of military history, gained from research rather than experience, becomes so penetrating that his articles in magazines attract attention, and his letters to the War Department, printed simultaneously in newspapers, begin to have a sharp effect on army decisions. He is consulted on matters of army organization, officer relationships, and personnel and equipment. He becomes one of those responsible for organizing the G.A.R. as a cohesive and potent force in national life, and after several unpaid offices takes a paid secretaryship that he keeps for the rest of his life, traveling from one end of the country to the other attending conventions, meetings, and encampments.

Adam’s Summons and the Meeting

Adam, having re-enlisted in Chicago after his discharge, is ordered to report to the office of the Secretary of War in Washington. He arrives to find his father a stranger. Cyrus’s accommodations amaze Adam: he has not only a bedroom but a sitting room beside it, and a toilet in a closet right in the bedroom. The hotel clerk bows to Cyrus, calls him “Senator,” and offers to throw someone out to give Adam a room. When Adam insists on reporting to Colonel Wells as ordered, Cyrus reverses himself grandly, saying he was testing Adam to see whether the army has any discipline. Adam feels a faint distaste; something is not true. He thinks, “This is the Secretary of War. Can’t he see that this isn’t the way my father is? He’s play-acting.”

The Confrontation and Its Aftermath

In his hotel room, with the mechanical leg off, Cyrus becomes himself again, and Adam’s childhood fear and respect return. Cyrus asks why Adam re-enlisted, and Adam admits he didn’t want to go home. Cyrus offers to get Adam into West Point, but Adam refuses. When Cyrus asks if Adam is defying him, Adam says, “Yes, sir.” Cyrus threatens him with his influence—he can throw the Grand Army at any candidate, make and destroy men—but Adam insists on returning to his regiment. Cyrus sighs and says, “Maybe I made a mistake. You’ve learned the dumb resistance of a soldier.” He orders Adam back to his regiment, where Adam will rot in barracks. Adam remembers his father’s tone and how he looked, and he has plenty of time to remember, because he does rot in barracks. He remembers that Cyrus was lonely and alone—and knew it. Adam also asks why Cyrus doesn’t bring Charles to Washington, and Cyrus replies, “Because I—No, Charles is better where he is—better where he is.”

The Legacy of Cyrus’s Washington Career

Cyrus dies in Washington of pneumonia, and his funeral is a grand affair: carried on a caisson with a flag over it, the Vice-President in attendance, the President sending a wreath, a line of carriages half a mile long. He is buried at Arlington. After his death, his attorneys discover that he has amassed over ninety-three thousand dollars in the bank and ten thousand dollars in good securities, a fortune that leaves his sons Charles and Adam rich. The source of this money is never explained, and Charles torments himself with the suspicion that Cyrus stole it from the G.A.R. Adam, by contrast, chooses to have faith in his father, refusing to believe the evidence of the discharge papers that prove Cyrus was never at any major battle. The money, tainted or not, becomes the means by which Adam eventually buys the Sanchez ranch in California and begins his new life.