Bon Marche (42 page)

“No. Even if I stayed, though, you'd still have to do what I'm advising now—
hear
them, Charles.”

The master of Bon Marché sighed. “You're right, of course.” He chuckled. “I have accepted your advice on one thing: I found a few minutes today to write a letter to Katherine, telling her of the progress of the children. And wishing her a happy New Year. I'm afraid, though, that I couldn't force myself to extend those greetings to Funston.”

“It's a start, old friend, it's a start.”

30

E
VEN
if he had not been told that Andrew Jackson would be a guest at the wedding of Franklin Dewey and Amantha Bolling, Andrew MacCallum would have known who he was. Jackson's appearance in the living room at Bon Marché, where the ceremony was to be held, started a buzz of comment.

MacCallum guessed that everyone in the room already knew Jackson; yet there was a special quality about the man that stirred an excitement in them in spite of their familiarity with him. A step behind him was a subdued woman, handsome enough, but made plain, Andrew thought, by her pained shyness. That had to be Aunt Rachel, Jackson's wife.

As Andrew watched them, Mattie walked up to the Jacksons, smiling sweetly and proudly, kissing them both on the cheek. Charles Dewey was not in evidence.

MacCallum waited until several of the other women drew Rachel into conversation, and Jackson stood alone for a moment.

“Excuse me, sir,” Andrew said as he went quickly to Jackson's side. “My name is Andrew MacCallum. I'm a friend of Mr. Dewey. We knew each other in Virginia.”

Andy pumped his hand amiably. “Of course. Charles has spoken of you. His tutor, weren't you?”

“Yes.” He was surprised that Jackson knew even that much about him.

Jackson swept a hand to indicate all of Bon Marché. “Dewey has done a marvelous job here.”

“Yes, he has.” Although MacCallum had thought about what he wanted to say to him, the presence of the man kept him silent for a moment.

“I was wondering, General,” Andrew started hesitantly, “what are your views on the election of James Madison?”

“I would have preferred Monroe,” Jackson replied sternly. “Madison is … well, too much Jefferson's altar boy for my tastes.”

MacCallum just nodded, hoping that Jackson would go on.

“Mr. Madison's election merely continues the policy of allowing the English to do as they damned please on the high seas—harassing our ships, impressing our seamen!” Jackson's ire had been quickly raised.

Again, MacCallum merely nodded, as though agreeing.

“Why, Madison has had the gall to interfere in the matter of denying General Wilkinson his rank,” Andy raced on. “Here we are, on the eve of war, and that traitor is still at the head of the army!”

“You're convinced that Wilkinson is a traitor?”

“Could any intelligent man think otherwise?”

“But his co-conspirator, Mr. Burr, has been acquitted.”

Jackson shook his head sadly. “Burr was a fool, but I'm not certain he intended treason.” He shrugged. “It's of little consequence now; Burr has left the country. He doesn't matter any longer. What must continue to concern us, Mr. MacCallum, is that Madison will do nothing to restrain the English. Nothing! Our national honor is at stake, and Madison will be an image of Jefferson: too cowardly to resent a foreign outrage on our Republic!”

“What would you have Madison do?”

“I'd have him fight, sir!” Jackson permitted a slight smile to cross his angular face. “I pray that I will be given the opportunity to prove that real men, real patriots, can still fight!”

An eavesdropper next to them applauded spontaneously. Jackson whirled to silence him with a glare.

Turning back to MacCallum, embarrassment on his face, Jackson said, “Perhaps this isn't the occasion for the discussion of such a heated subject.”

Andrew laughed. “You're right, of course, General. My apologies for precipitating it.”

Jackson waved aside the apology, glancing about the room. “Perhaps I should seek out young Franklin. I have some advice I might give him about the sanctity of the marriage vows.”

He strode off without another word. Only then did MacCallum notice that he wore a small formal sword. He wondered whether Andy also carried a pistol in his coat.

II

T
HE
wedding ceremony was simple and dignified, conducted by the minister from the Presbyterian church in Nashville.

When it was ended and the orchestra was playing, the guests were treated to a lavish buffet, with more than adequate liquid refreshments, including champagne.

MacCallum strolled about, chatting with the Nashvillians he had already met, introducing himself to those he had not, impressed by the universal friendliness of the people. He came upon Charles.

“You made a handsome best man,” Andrew said.

“I thought so, too,” his friend laughed. “You know, I'm really happy for Franklin. Amantha is not the girl I would have chosen, but I believe she's right for him.”

“Mattie tells me they will honeymoon in New Orleans.”

“Yes. Can you believe they plan a month there?” He sighed. “I can't help but think about the quick honeymoon Mattie and I had—four days in the wilderness.” He grinned mischievously. “I'll wager that Franklin and his bride won't know the same passion—”

“You're an evil man.”

“True.” Dewey tapped MacCallum's arm. “See that lady over there?” He inclined his head toward a handsome woman chatting with Mattie.

“The buxom one?”

“You've noticed! You might have asked: ‘The woman standing with Mattie?'” Charles playfully slapped him on the back. “That's Mercy Callison, a recent widow. Her late husband was a lawyer in Nashville.”

Dewey propelled Andrew across the room.

“Mrs. Callison,” he said, “I'd like to present my dear friend, Andrew MacCallum. You two should have a lot in common. Mr. MacCallum is a professor at the college in Princeton. And Mrs. Callison, Andrew, was a teacher somewhere in Pennsylvania…”

“In York,” the woman prompted him.

MacCallum bowed awkwardly, taking in the woman's pleasant face, flawless complexion, and intense dark eyes.

“Mattie was just mentioning you, Mr. MacCallum,” she said easily. “As a matter of fact, she was about to escort me across the room to meet you.”

“A pleasure,” Andrew muttered, wondering why he felt so ill-at-ease.

Mattie spoke: “You'll both excuse us, I'm sure. We have other guests to greet.” She tugged at Charles's arm, leading him away.

Mrs. Callison was amused. “It seems we have been thrown together to see what might happen.”

Her candor was refreshing, but Andrew wasn't quite sure what he ought to say.

The dark eyes studied him. “If I may be bold, may I suggest that we not stand on formality. I'm Mercy. And you? Andy, perhaps?”

“No, please. I was never cursed with a nickname. Andrew will be just fine.” He coughed nervously. “Charles tells me you're a widow.”

“And Mattie tells me you're a bachelor.”

Andrew relaxed a bit. “May I get you a drink, Mercy? Sherry? Champagne, perhaps?”

She wrinkled up her nose. Delightfully. “I'd much prefer a whiskey.”

“Ah, a woman after my own heart.”

Mercy Callison's tinkling laugh turned heads their way. “I believe, Andrew, that that's exactly what our friends had in mind.”

III

I
MMENSE
gray clouds, roiling and churning in a stiff wind, approximating wads of filthy cotton, hung over the Nashville Inn. The dark early evening was suddenly turned into midday by a jagged slash of lightning, followed by a roaring boom of thunder that seemed to shake the hostelry.

MacCallum raised his eyebrows. “A thunderstorm in January?”

“Out here,” Mercy explained, “there are no seasons to the weather. As a matter of fact, our weather is fairly consistent. Most of it bad.”

They were seated in the dining room of the inn. It was the last Saturday in January and, for the third time since Franklin's wedding, MacCallum was entertaining the attractive widow. They always dined at the Nashville Inn; the town offered few such accommodations for a lady and gentleman to dine.

Andrew had learned a great deal about Mercy Callison in the few weeks he had known her. For one thing, she had been a mathematics instructor at a girls' academy in York, Pennsylvania—somewhat of a rarity among women teachers. For another, she had married a promising young lawyer, Calvin Callison, in York, where his father was a judge.

“The Callisons were an important family in York,” Mercy had told him. “And Calvin was quite handsome—the catch of the season, I think, is the proper phrase. At the risk of sounding overly romantic, Cal swept me off my feet. We were married a month to the day after we met. That was considered somewhat scandalous.

“But we had a good life: a socially prominent young attorney and his pretty…” She giggled at that. “… wife. Cal, though, was restless. He wanted to go west, to seek new opportunities. And I, as a dutiful wife, came with him. Truthfully, I would have preferred to stay in Pennsylvania, but wives don't have the luxury, I'm afraid, of making such independent decisions.”

She frowned at the memory. “Let's just say it didn't go well. We were in Knoxville for a time. Then in Kentucky, at Lexington. Then in some god-awful outpost in the Northwest that didn't even have a name—somewhere near Lake Michigan—where Cal hoped to make his own fortune. Then back to Lexington. And finally, here to Nashville. Cal died last February of pleurisy. He was just forty-two.”

Mercy had told him that much. A biographical outline only, with no details and no emotion. It was plain that Calvin Callison had been a failure, but Andrew didn't know why. He had asked about children, a question that turned her bitter for the first time.

“Cal,” she had said, “didn't have time for that.”

Now, as they sat at dinner in the Nashville Inn, huge drops of rain began to splatter against the windows. The lightning and thunder continued unabated for nearly a half-hour. When it did abate, the rain continued—hard sheets of rain, driven horizontally by the high winds.

Andrew and Mercy decided to wait out the storm, ordering another whiskey after finishing their meal. The winds finally ended, but the rain persisted. Harder than before, it seemed.

“I fear it's going to continue all night,” Mercy said.

“I believe you're right.” Andrew got to his feet. “Come, I'll show you home, and then I'll get a room here at the inn. I certainly don't want to ride back to Bon Marché in that mess.”

Mrs. Callison lived on the opposite side of the town from the inn, and they had gone only a hundred yards before their clothing was soaked through. At first it was uncomfortable, then disagreeable, and then it didn't matter. The dirt street had been turned into a river of sticky red mud, making the going hazardous. But before they had gone halfway, they were laughing together like happy children. Getting to her home became a game.

And when they reached the Callison home, Mercy found the door locked.

“Stupid, damned—” she muttered under her breath, pounding on the door. “Delilah, open this door immediately!”

A black servant girl opened the door, filling the frame with her ample body. “Ah sorry, Miss Mercy, but Morgan he done git fightin' drunk agin an' Ah lock so—”

Mercy sighed disgustedly. “Delilah, just step aside and let us come in, please.” To Andrew: “Morgan is my Delilah's paramour from the livery stable.” She started to laugh again at the absurdity of it all, with Andrew joining her.

Mercy entered the one-story brick house. MacCallum entered, too, but stood dripping just inside the sill.

“I'll say good night here,” he announced. “I don't want to track all of this mud into your house.”

She stared at him for a moment, water running down her face from her rain-soaked hair. “Andrew, my dear,” she said with a note of annoyance, “don't be so damned prudish. We're both like drowned cats, and I'll not see you tramp back through the mud and the rain to the inn. You'll be ill by the time you get there.”

Still he hesitated.

Mercy closed the door firmly and set the bolt. “Delilah,” she ordered, “take Mr. MacCallum's hat, and his coats, and his boots, and put them into the pantry to dry. And then stir up that fire.”

“Yas, ma'am.”

“Now, that's settled,” the widow said. “Try to make yourself comfortable by the fire, Andrew. I'll be right back.”

Mercy disappeared into a room that Andrew guessed was a bedroom, and he heard her humming a silly little song. He stood with his back to the fireplace, but he knew he'd never get dry that way. Water dripped from his trousers and sizzled on the hearth.

He stepped aside for a moment as Delilah stirred the glowing embers and added more wood. The fire roared up quickly.

It was only a few minutes before Mercy, wearing a light robe and toweling her long black hair, returned. Andrew eyed her appreciatively; the robe showed off her good figure.

“Your turn now,” she said gaily. “Go in there and get out of those wet clothes. I've laid out Cal's old robe—it's quite warm—and a towel.” She grinned. “And a set of underclothes.”

“Oh, I don't think—”

Mercy groaned. “Andrew, please. You can't stay in those wet clothes. Just go in there and do what I told you.”

MacCallum entered the bedroom, closing the door behind him.

“When Mr. MacCallum is finished in there,” Mrs. Callison said to the servant, “gather up all those wet clothes and hang them somewhere to dry.”

“Yas, ma'am.”

“And, Delilah—”

“Ma'am?”