The Lost Constitution

 

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THE LOST CONSTITUTION
A Book Sense Notable Book
“The rich historical episodes … tell an engrossing family saga peopled with beautifully drawn characters and set in New England’s mill towns and forests from the days just after the Revolution through the Civil War and into the early twentieth century. Thrilling. Highly recommended.”
—Library Journal
“A rocket sled of a ride that will be loved by history buffs, conspiracy nuts, puzzle nerds, and even baseball junkies. After The Lost Constitution, Green Monster will have a whole new meaning for Red Sox fans. William Martin is not just one of America’s finest historians, he is also a storyteller of the first magnitude.”
—Randy Wayne White, New York Times
bestselling author of Tampa Burn and Sanibel Flats
“Martin’s style is perfectly suited to this wedding of multigenerational saga and detective drama.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Smart, witty, terrific storytelling. A great sprawling read. Enjoy!”
—Allan Folsom, New York Times best selling
author of The Machiavelli Covenant
“Intriguing and imaginative.”
—Visalia Times-Delta
“A story as old as time yet as current as today’s newspapers. An electrifying novel that crackles in your hands until you white-knuckle the pages and can’t let go.”
—David Nevin, New York Times bestselling
author of 1812 and Dream West
“Anyone even vaguely interested in American history will find The Lost Constitution unputdownable. It’s got everything a reader could ask for: depth, narrative pace, suspense. Best of all, the national charter takes on new meaning. So does the word American.”
—Thomas Fleming, New York Times bestselling
author of The Secret Trial of Robert E. Lee
“Well conceived and entertaining while being educational in constitutional issues and what this most important document means or should mean … An engaging and intelligent mystery.”
—Lexink.com
“Fascinating, informative, and impeccably set in the northeast American landscape that was the cradle of the Constitution and our country. Martin’s extensive research and suspenseful storytelling skills make for compelling and thought-provoking fiction.”
—Carole Nelson Douglas, bestselling author
of the Irene Adler historical suspense novels
“A well-written fast paced adventure guaranteed to entertain and make you think about what our country stands for.”
—Midwest Book Review
“A good mystery, a better examination of constitutional issues, and a superb paean to New England, its people, natural beauty, and resources.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Weaves mystery, history, politics, and wit into the deadly search for a document stolen in the eighteenth century and worth far more than money in the twenty-first.”
—Lucia St. Clair Robson, author of Shadow
Patriots: A Novel of the Revolution

BOOKS BY WILLIAM MARTIN
Harvard Yard
CitizenWashington
Annapolis
Cape Cod
The Rising of the Moon
Nerve Endings
Back Bay

The
LOST
CONSTITUTION
WILLIAM MARTIN

A Tom Doherty Associates Book
New York

NOTE: If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

THE LOST CONSTITUTION

Copyright © 2007 by William Martin

All rights reserved.

A Forge Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010

www.tor-forge.com

Forge® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

ISBN-13: 978-1-4299-1088-0
ISBN-10: 0-7653-5446-2

First Edition: May 2007
First Mass Market Edition: June 2008

Printed in the United States of America

0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For
Louise
and
Kitty,
two wonderful mothers

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In a scene early in this novel, Peter Fallon reads the acknowledgments in a book called The Magnificent Dreamers. He skims through the names and thinks, “Requisite stuff, polite and thankful.”
Well, I hope my acknowledgments have more impact, because they are certainly more than “requisite.” Polite? At the very least. Thankful? Absolutely. Throw in appreciative, grateful, indebted, too.
Writing any book is a journey, especially one that spans two hundred and twenty years and touches on the history of all six New England states. If not for the people willing to help along the way, the going would be very lonely. Thanks to all of them.
Start with Peter Drummey, librarian of the Massachusetts Historical Society, whose fictional counterpart in The Lost Constitution has “a photographic memory for all the manuscripts, books, and artifacts in the collection, no mean talent at a place that had been gathering historical treasures since the end of the Revolution.” It’s true of Peter, too. He is a friend to scholars, researchers, historians, and at least one New England novelist. I decided to write this book following an afternoon spent examining one of the society’s most treasured documents and discussing it with Peter Drummey.
Others have provided everything from moral support to specific technical information: Jonathan Chu, Thomas Cook, Lou Gorman, Helen Gow, Jeffrey Hollis, Christopher Keane, William Key, William Kuntz, Stephen Martell, Wendell Minor, Ann Rauscher, Martin Weinkle, Robert and Joan Wilson, Sue Zacharias.
And if writing one of these books is a journey, getting there is half the fun, thanks to the librarians, docents, and park rangers who keep history alive across New England.
In Vermont: at the St. Albans Historical Museum.
In New Hampshire: at the American Independence Museum in Exeter; on trails and at shelters maintained by the Appalachian Mountain Club; at natural and historical sites across the White Mountain National Forest, Franconia Notch State Park, and Crawford Notch State Park; at the Mount Washington Hotel, where a bygone era lives on.
In Maine: at the Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain House in Brunswick; at the Maine Historical Society in Portland; at the Portland Observatory; at the Museum at Portland Head Light.
In Massachusetts: at the Charles River Museum of Industry in Waltham; at Fenway Park; at the Lowell National Historical Park and Boott Cotton Mills Museum; at the Quabbin Reservoir; at the Springfield Armory National Historic Site; at River Bend Farm and other sites up and down the Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor, which also rolls south into Rhode Island.
In Rhode Island: at the Slater Mill and Museum in Pawtucket; at the Museum of Newport History; and at the Preservation Society of Newport County, which maintains the mansions.
In Connecticut: at the Mystic Seaport in Mystic; at the Mark Twain House in Hartford; at various sites across the Litchfield Hills.
Beyond New England: at the Independence National Historic Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the Fredericksburg Battlefield Park in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
As always, thanks to my agent and friend, Robert Gottlieb, who has represented me for over twenty years; to Bob Gleason, my editor at Forge, and his assistant, Eric Raab; and of course to my wife and family, who are ready to offer insights, opinions, and in the case of this book, companionship on the New England hiking trails that led to the vistas that inspired much of this book.

WILLIAM MARTIN
December 2006   

PROLOGUE
“I’M A GOOD AMERICAN.”
“Sure you are.” Peter Fallon studied the man on the other side of the bulletproof glass.
“Bein’ in here is just the cost of doin’ business.”
In here was the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Cedar Junction, formerly known as Walpole State Prison, home to the most felonious citizens in the Commonwealth, or at least the ones who’d been caught.
“Why did you want to see me?” Peter Fallon didn’t like being in here any more than the prisoners did.
“Like I say, I’m a good American, and I don’t hold a grudge.”
“I appreciate that.” Peter also appreciated that they were separated by that glass and talking on telephones.
Bingo had once been the toughest troublemaker in South Boston. If you wanted to fence stolen property, steal the property to fence, or steal a fence, you saw Bingo. If you wanted to sell controlled substances, from absinthe to OxyContin, you asked Bingo.