Free To Catch a Copperhead by Pro Se Press Page B

so I pulled the trigger. The ball shattered the joint
and he rolled over in a fetal position, held his leg and screamed
in agony. Given the severity of the gash and the gunshot, I doubted
that even the best surgeons would be able to save either
leg.
    “ Now, worm,” I said and
pulled him onto his back. I shoved the barrel between his legs and
pushed hard against his manhood. “This goes next if you don’t tell
me what she’s talking about.”
    I smiled inwardly as he
started to talk. I always found it amusing that a man would be so
willing to betray his cause in an effort to protect his nether
regions.
    “ We’re gonna burn da whole
place down. Let da people know that da Confederates can strike in
the heart of da Union,” he said.
    “ We?” I asked and pushed the
barrel down a little harder. “Who is we?”
    “ Sons of Liberty,” he
grunted.
    My gaze moved to the girl
and back to him. I knew who the Sons of Liberty were. Around here,
we called them Copperheads, Southern sympathizers who were working
in the North to aid the Rebel cause. Like the snakes they were
named after, the bastards moved silently, waited and always sank
their poison filled fangs into the skin of the Union.
    “ Why are the Copperheads
doing this?” I asked, but he just smirked and said
nothing.
    A frightened voice rang out
behind me. “I overheard them. I was cleaning up late and walked by
the door and they were talking….”
    I looked up at her and saw
the fear in her eyes. She was as terrified of me as she was of them
and understandably so. Given that my tactics for protecting the
innocent usually left bodies strewn about, the newspapers had
dubbed me Assassin Anne.
    “ What did you overhear?” I
said in a calm and reassuring voice.
    “ Don’t…” he started, but my
pistol found his sensitive spot and I applied the right amount of
force to arrest his tongue.
    She looked at him, swallowed
hard and choked down her fear. I gave her a knowing nod and asked
again.
    “ They… are going to burn
down hotels. Set fires with the people still in them. I remember
that they said something about a special type of fire,” she
stammered and looked at him.
    I pushed the barrel a little
harder and watched him flinch. A police whistle blew somewhere
nearby and I knew my time was short. “Tell me what she’s talking
about or I end you now.”
    With some reluctance, he
finally relented and told me their scheme. The Copperheads planned
on setting fires to a dozen hotels in New York with hopes that it’d
rally the populace to demand a ceasefire with the Confederates. A
new invention called Greek fire, a chemical that would burst into
flames upon contact with the air, would be used. Members of the
plot carried large vials in specially fashioned wooden totes. They
were to go into each hotel and set fire to the lower floors, but
their big target was the Royale Hotel. Mitchell Madeira, special
adviser to the President, was in New York and their main goal was
to trap him in the burning building and, with his death, make a
personal stab at Mr. Lincoln.
    One of the wooden totes sat
on the ground nearby. It’d been dropped by one of them. I stepped
over, popped the latch and opened it up. The case was no bigger
than a doctor’s satchel, but once opened, revealed the large glass
container. The liquid inside sloshed around but a tightly packed
cork made sure that it wouldn’t seep out. Thick cotton wadding
lined both sides to keep the vial in place.
    I snatched the vial and
walked over to a tin garbage can that sat nearby. I withdrew the
cork and poured the Greek fire into the empty can. Within a minute,
the concoction ignited into a very bright and intense flame, but
without fuel the fire died away quickly. My test proved that they
were capable of doing what they planned. In a hotel with plenty of
wood and fabric to douse with the Greek fire, the effects would be
catastrophic.
    “ Time to go,” I said to the
girl. “I need you to come with me since