Camp Follower: A Mystery of the American Revolution (52 page)

With a jolt,
she comprehended that if she obeyed Tarleton, not only would she miss the heart
of his story, she'd miss the heart of the story about the followers and why
they were resolved to deprivation and self-sacrifice.
 
Rain, icy wind, inadequate food and shelter, assault from rebels
— what was their reward for enduring?

She'd never
know.
 
She wasn't traveling into
purgatory with them.
 
The more she
stewed over it, the more disquieted she became.

She might face
appalling danger by continuing with the camp women.
 
But she'd settle for unfinished stories if she didn't do so.

Mid-afternoon,
she signaled Jonathan for a conference in her tent and lowered her voice, so
the Pearsons wouldn't hear.
 
"I haven't
seen the Legion in action against a foe.
 
Nor have I seen camp civilians united in action with them."

He studied her
without response for several seconds, his gaze flicking over her face.
 
"You're considering remaining with the
Legion on the morrow."

"I
am."

"Hannah is
unable to carry on."

All-day
"morning" sickness, a burden borne by some pregnant women, could
debilitate or kill those who were unable to slow down.
 
Frustration and concern spilled into her
exhale.
 
"I realize that.
 
If you lend me financial support, I shall
send the Pearsons to Camden to wait for me for a month."

Perhaps the set
of her jaw or shoulders or the firmness in her eyes indicated her resolve and
lack of romance over what lay before her.
 
He leaned forward on his campstool, elbows on his knees.
 
"A month?"

"Well, can
you imagine Tarleton taking more than two weeks to find Morgan?"

"No."
 
He nodded once with conviction.
 
"I shall come with you."

She fancied
faint amusement about his eyes, and some of her resolve faltered.
 
He'd volunteered for a journey to the
interior of Hades.
 
"Jonathan, I
cannot compel you to go."

"You'll go
regardless of whether I join you.
 
If
David hadn't put that ball through Silas's head, your husband would have died
of apoplexy over your doggedness."

She leaned
toward him, curious.
 
"You aren't
the apoplectic type.
 
What does my
'doggedness' do for you?
 
Does it make
you want to rescue me?"

He
snorted.
 
"You are the most
un-rescue-able woman on the face of the earth."

She reached for
his hands, and her gaze lingered on his fingers twined with hers.
 
Years ago, the two of them had moved beyond
teacher and student.
 
Jonathan now meant
more to her than friendship and imagination.
 
"Thank you."

***

During a lull
in the rain, she summoned the Pearsons and informed them of their next
steps.
 
Hannah wailed about failing
Helen, emotions snarled in the strange brew that flowed through the veins of a
mother-to-be.
 
Roger, at first blustery
and indignant, subsided with morose resignation.
 
If he wanted a healthy wife and baby, he had to get Hannah to
safety and comfort and help her manage her debilitation.
 
Travelers from the Legion's camp at Daniel's
Plantation would assist them to Camden with the wagon and horse team.

While daylight
remained, the four prepared for departure.
 
Helen packed most of her belongings with the Pearsons.
 
She debated sending Calliope with them, too,
for the Legion might appropriate the mare to replace horses killed on
campaign.
 
But she and Jonathan needed
Calliope as long as possible to carry the canvas and blankets they'd use in
place of a tent, as well as their own emergency trail rations.

That night, she
lay with Jonathan, rain drumming the top of her tent, and for the second night
in a row, found herself too distracted to relax in his arms and enjoy him.
 
Her mind went over and over what they'd
packed until Jonathan again fell asleep without making love to her.
 
She dozed, her brain a haze of lists.

In the dark
before reveille on January fifth, she awakened.
 
The Seventh Regiment of Foot would arrive at Daniel's Plantation
in a few hours.
 
Late the previous
evening, confirmation had arrived that Cornwallis promised the Seventeenth
Light to Tarleton also.
 
The infantry
and dragoons would escort civilians and heavy baggage to Brierly's Ferry and
proceed west across the Broad River to rendezvous with Tarleton.

She expected to
encounter Fairfax.
 
She felt it in the
ether, the energy of trillions of spiky particles that herald a tornado, and
knew in her blood that he'd marked what she'd removed from his trunk and denied
her any communication or acknowledgement.
 
She'd incensed Ares, god of war.

Jonathan might
be traveling with her, but if she wanted the final chapters on her features,
the ordeal — the
appeasement
— was hers to undertake, alone.

Chapter Fifty-Three

MORE THAN ONE
hundred sixty infantrymen of the Seventh Regiment descended upon Daniel's
Plantation on the morning of Friday, January fifth, the scarlet of their
uniforms dulled and their footsteps and clank of gear muffled by misty drizzle.
 
Around the foot soldiers rode a hornet swarm
of red-coated cavalrymen upon steaming horses: fifty dragoons of the
Seventeenth Light.
 
After Tarleton
received the baggage, the Seventh would march to Ninety Six and help guard the
town.
 
The Seventeenth was ordered to
accompany Tarleton down the very throat of hell, if necessary.

Base camp was
fully struck by then, the baggage ready on a road grown muddy from the
departure of non-essential personnel.
 
Officers discussed strategy and postured.
 
Infantry from the Seventh and 71st assumed position in the
train.
 
Cavalrymen from the Seventeenth
ranged back and forth inspecting wagons and securing the route.

Helen huddled
in the train with Jonathan and Calliope and talked herself past Hannah's
anguish at their farewell that morning, substituting it with the sagacity on
Enid's face.
 
I had a word with
Rhiannon last night, and she assures me you'll be back in good time
.
 
The gods rewarded warriors.
 
Several times, Fairfax trotted past her upon
his gelding.
 
If he recognized her, he
didn't acknowledge her.
 
Ample time
later for their reunion.
 
Huzzah.

Flatboats
conveyed baggage, infantry, civilians, and some horses across the Broad River,
and cavalry splashed across at the ford.
 
On the opposite bank, the army drove westward through winter-dreary
Carolina forest, following a trail gouged by the Legion three days
earlier.
 
Fallen branches popped beneath
the crush of wheel and hoof, horses whinnied, wagon wheels creaked, and men
called out to each other.
 
The wet wind
smelled of splintered pine, tobacco smoke, churned mud, and horse turds.
 
Dragoons of the Seventeenth faded into the
forest around the baggage train to act as vanguard, rear guard, and shield
during the march.
 
Messengers came and
went on horseback.

No one said a
word about the females who remained with the army.
 
Helen's sense of paradox and black humor swelled.
 
They weren't invisible.
 
In a few days' time, Sally, Liza, Jen, and
Margaret would provide a woman's secret softness to their men: touches of humanity
in the vast, grim game they played.

By late
afternoon, when they halted for the night, Helen was tired and dirty, having
thrice lent her strength to freeing wagons from mud, but the soul of two
stories hummed in her blood.
 
As soon as
she and Jonathan set up their own site, he ambled off to make supper.
 
Beneath a canvas slope, she used remaining
daylight to pen an account of her first day on march.

They crawled
north and west during the following days, rain and cold such a frequent
companion that Helen's enthusiasm at going where no woman reporter had gone
before deflated under the weight of reality.
 
Despite her oiled leather boots and heavy woolen gloves, chill seldom
left her hands and feet.
 
While she
wrote in her journal, she stored her bottle of ink inside her bodice to keep it
fluid enough for the quill.
 
Dried peas,
johnnycakes, coffee, and an occasional nip of rum formed the monotonous
sustenance for the army, once or twice supplemented with beef jerky.
 
She dreamed of bathing in warm, lavender-scented
water, and eating peaches in the sunshine.
 
She awakened to omnipresent drizzle, to smoky, moldy, dampness that
snaked beneath her clothing and smeared a residue of foulness on her bones.

Late on Monday
the eighth, the army and baggage arrived at Tarleton's bivouac on Duggin's
Plantation, south of the rain-swollen Enoree River.
 
Tents emerged from wagons, along with celebratory victuals, for
although rain pursued them, the colonel had received word that Morgan had
scampered back north, and the Earl Cornwallis had reportedly marched his mighty
army north from Winnsborough that day.
 
Cornwallis on the move just on the other side of the Broad River
provided reassurance to the Legion and a serious threat to Greene, stationary
near Camden, and Morgan.
 
However, the
rain hampered everyone, so there was nothing for it but to hunker down and wait
for skies to clear and treacherous rivers to subside.

Deep in the
night, when camp quieted, Helen awakened, restless, and stared overhead at the
slope of canvas shielding her and Jonathan from rain.
 
A familiar scent invaded her nostrils.
 
Comprehension and fear knifed her gut.
 
She shifted to gaze over Jonathan at a silhouette in the open
entrance.

He crouched
facing them, as if he'd studied their repose many minutes — although surely no
human's eyesight could discern details back as far as she and Jonathan
lay.
 
Shadowed in greatcoat and night,
he rose and slipped away with the stealth of a nocturnal predator.

She sank back,
resolve repairing the tatters panic made of her nerves.
 
On the morrow, she and her brother must be
reunited.
 
Perhaps he'd let her keep the
desk afterward.
 
But there were certain
to be unpleasantries traversed before Fairfax did her any more favors.

***

Moisture-swollen
clouds smothered sunrise the ninth of January.
 
Each breeze stung exposed skin as if laden with ice.
 
Harsh greenwood smoke hazed the
encampment.
 
Eyes watered.
 
People coughed.
 
Off-duty soldiers milled around the fires and stamped to stay
warm.

Word spread
that sentries had nabbed a couple of backwoodsmen loitering at the perimeter
and brought them straight to Tarleton.
 
The colonel's charm didn't extend to the business of interrogation, for
the men wasted no time confessing their mission from rebel chieftain Andrew
Pickens.
 
The domestic pound and bang of
wheelwrights and blacksmiths almost obliterated the fuss the duo made when the
Legion dispensed the standard treatment for spies caught behind enemy lines.
 
Major John André would have appreciated it.

After the spies
had grown silent, Jonathan stepped out to stretch his legs, and Helen wrote in
her journal.
 
Finding her light blocked,
she looked up at the three washerwomen.
 
"Why, good morning."
 
She noticed their sober expressions and corked her inkbottle.

Liza flicked a
glance to the desk.
 
"What are you
writing?"

Unease spread
through Helen at the remoteness hollowing their expressions.
 
She shut the journal in the desk and started
to rise.
 
"Sit down," said
Liza.
 
All three women ducked beneath
the tarp and surrounded her.
 
"Hand
the desk over to Sally, Nell."

Her heart
pounding, Helen complied.
 
Sally
squatted, opened the desk, searched through it, and perused journal entries in
silence.
 
Helen studied them, guessing
the purpose for their visit.
 
They
needed to reconcile why "Nell" had remained with the Legion after her
mistress had departed camp.
 
Perhaps
they suspected her of spying.

Liza made a
vague motion with her chin to indicate somewhere outside the tarp.
 
"Mr. Quill is a family servant.
 
We understand him staying with Mr.
Fairfax.
 
But women don't march with the
Legion unless they got a good reason."

Sally scanned a
page.
 
"You write real pretty,
Nell.
 
Better than men who write for
them magazines.
 
Why don't publishers
let women write more than silly society news?"