Payne broke away at last, and ran down-stairs, seriously
wounding an attendant on the way, reached the door unhurt, sprang upon
his horse, and rode leisurely away. When surgical aid arrived, the
Secretary's house looked like a field hospital. Five of its inmates were
bleeding from ghastly wounds, and two of them, among the highest
officials of the nation, it was thought might never see the light of
another day; though all providentially recovered.
The assassin left behind him his hat, which apparently trivial loss cost
him and one of his fellow conspirators their lives. Fearing that the
lack of it would arouse suspicion, he abandoned his horse, instead of
making good his escape, and hid himself in the woods east of Washington
for two days. Driven at last by hunger, he returned to the city and
presented himself at Mrs. Surratt's house at the very moment when all
its inmates had been arrested and were about to be taken to the office
of the provost-marshal. Payne thus fell into the hands of justice, and
the utterance of half a dozen words by him and the unhappy woman whose
shelter he sought proved the death-warrant of them both.
Booth had been recognized by dozens of people as he stood before the
footlights and brandished his dagger; but his swift horse quickly
carried him beyond any haphazard pursuit.
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