Ghost Soldier (19 page)

“I think they'd have figured it out anyway,” I told Carleton as I pulled on my gold “Keep the Past Alive!” T-shirt.

Wind chimes sounded from downstairs and I heard voices. Carleton cocked his head. Then he beamed and jumped up.

“Dr. Seagraves is having lunch with us today,” he announced. “She likes my dinosaurs.” He ran out with his tyrannosaurus under his arm.

Was it lunchtime already? Had anyone told me Dr. Seagraves was coming to lunch? Probably. Something about her tugged at my memory, but I was too tired to think about it. I lay on my bed hugging Carleton's dumb green stegosaurus, and tried to find the energy to go down and be polite.

*   *   *

“Alexander?” Dad called. “Please come downstairs.”

I could hear the tension in his voice. He was still mad, but trying not to show it.

I got to my feet slowly, laid the stegosaurus on the pillow, and went down into the kitchen, avoiding Dad's eyes. Mrs. Hambrick handed me a basket of rolls, and I took it without saying anything. The dining room table was already set, and I put the rolls down next to a salad and went back for the next dish.

Dr. Seagraves held Carleton's tyrannosaurus, pretending to talk to it. She bent down, shaking her head at the red dinosaur until Carleton giggled. Then she straightened, brushed her hair back, and smiled at me. “Hello again, Alexander—historian extraordinaire.”

I said, “Hi,” and looked away again, embarrassed. She seemed to like me, and I couldn't figure out why.

“I like history, too!” Carleton announced, and she looked at him, distracted by his account of how much fun history museums were.

Relieved, I went back to carrying things. I didn't think I wanted to be any sort of historian. History was more than stories about Odysseus or the War Between the States. I thought of Louise hiding that locket for Rich, and Rich himself, firing and reloading and firing again at Fort Stedman until he ran out of ammunition, then charging with his bayonet. History was real people. I could see the portrait of their mother again, her long black hair and her deep eyes. Even in the picture, those eyes looked full of emotion.

Mrs. Hambrick came into the dining room and told me to sit down. Nicole appeared in time to eat. I tried to ignore the conversation around the table and concentrate on the food.

“How did you enjoy Petersburg?” Dr. Seagraves asked.

I looked up to answer—but nothing came out. I just stared at her.

“Alexander.” Dad's voice was strained.

“Is something wrong?” Dr. Seagraves asked. “You've been so quiet today.”

“He's grounded,” Carleton said.

“Shut up, brat,” Nicole muttered. Carleton jumped a little, as if she'd kicked him underneath the table.

“I'm sorry,” I said at last, confused at my reaction. “Petersburg was great.” I scooped some salad onto my plate and passed the bowl to Nicole.

I picked up my fork, but didn't take a bite. I stared again at Dr. Seagraves. There was something important about her—something about her face. But what was it?

Then I realized everyone was looking at me staring at her, and I flushed.

“I—I'm sorry,” I stammered. “Really. It's just—I've seen you somewhere before.”

“Like at the university?” Nicole asked, rolling her eyes. “Like over here for supper the other night?”

Dr. Seagraves looked at me, her black eyes grave and sympathetic, and I set the fork down suddenly. Dr. Seagraves, and the locket, and Louise's message for Rich …

“No,” I said, more slowly. “Not in person—I meant a picture of you. I've seen a picture since I met you at the university.”

Why had it taken me so long? I should have recognized those eyes and that hair when she was talking to Carleton. She reached up one hand nervously to brush it back from her face, and I could see Louise brushing the loose hair out of her eyes last night and Rich brushing his shorter hair back the same way. Dr. Seagraves' thick black hair was like theirs, and like the woman's in the locket miniature. And her eyes were the familiar deep black eyes I'd seen so often in Rich's face. But I didn't know how to tell her what I knew.

“Your family,” I tried to explain. “You were trying to trace your family, and you couldn't find out who your great-great—” I shook my head. “I'm not sure how many greats—grandmother was. But you knew she came from around here, right?”

“She came from North Carolina,” Dr. Seagraves said slowly, looking confused.

“Alexander, that's enough,” Dad said, his eyebrows nearly meeting in the middle of his forehead.

“I think we should listen,” Mrs. Hambrick interjected. “He's been—very caught up in history since he got here.” She studied me. “Go on, Alexander.”

I took a deep breath. “You said she came out of North Carolina to Missouri, but you didn't know her maiden name, and you couldn't trace your family back any further. Well, I know who she was.”

Dr. Seagraves stiffened in her chair, her hand clenching the edge of the table.

Dad said, “Alexander?”

“Wait!” Mrs. Hambrick reached across the corner of the table and laid one hand on my father's arm. “Let him finish, Bill.”

I swallowed. “Her name was Louise Chamblee,” I told Dr. Seagraves. “You can see a picture of her mother in a locket at the museum we went to on Tuesday. That picture looks so much like you—it could
be
you! I mean that.”

Dad let his breath out. “Alexander—an old picture could look like anyone.”

I shook my head. “It's not just the picture.” I turned back to Dr. Seagraves as another piece of the puzzle fell into place. That clinched it. “You said her husband was named Andrew Harkens, didn't you? But you couldn't find any Andrew Harkens in North Carolina who went to Missouri?”

She nodded, surprised. “How did you remember all that?”

I couldn't understand why I hadn't remembered it sooner. “Well, you couldn't find him in North Carolina, because his family lived in South Carolina. He was on his way back to his regiment at Petersburg when Sherman's raiders came through, and he saved Louise and her sister Amalie.”

The room was silent. Now I realized why I had come to Durham, and why I was the right out-of-timer for Rich. Richeson, Louise, Dr. Seagraves—they all had pieces of a puzzle, but they needed me to bring them together so they could find the answers they needed.

“She wrote a letter telling her … brother where they were going,” I said, my voice cracking at the word
brother.
“It was wrapped around the locket. It's all messed up, but they have it at the museum, too.”

“He's right about the picture and the name Chamblee,” Nicole said, backing me up unexpectedly. “But the woman at the museum said the note was illegible. How did you find out it said all that, Alexander?”

“I don't understand at all,” said Dr. Seagraves, her black eyes troubled. “How could you learn all this? And why would you try to find out about my family?”

I shook my head, helplessly. “I didn't know I was—until now. I found this out for someone else, someone who knew Louise Chamblee and that she disappeared in the spring of 1865. Last night I found out about Andrew Harkens, and it wasn't until I really looked at you today that I realized what was so familiar about—” I started to say Rich and Louise but stopped myself, “—about the portrait in the locket.”

“What happened last night?” Dr. Seagraves asked.

At the same time, Dad asked, “Who was this someone else? Was that who you were with last night?”

I didn't know how else to answer, except with the truth. “His name is Richeson Chamblee.”

“The family is still here?” Dr. Seagraves asked, her eyes lighting up.

“He's the friend!” Dad exclaimed. “What were the two of you doing at Research Triangle Park in the middle of the night?”

I had to shake my head at Dr. Seagraves. “I don't think any of the family is left around here.”

“Then—” Dad started. Mrs. Hambrick reached out to him again, and he stopped. But he looked confused—and somehow hurt.

I swallowed. “Richeson Chamblee was a Confederate soldier who died at Fort Stedman. He wanted to know what happened to his sister. Last night was the anniversary of Sherman's raid on the Chamblees' farm. Their house was near where the computer company is now, in Research Triangle Park. So I went there, and I found Louise, and she told me she was leaving with Andrew Harkens. He was taking her and her sister Amalie to Cairo in Illinois—he had friends there.”

Nobody said anything.

“They were ghosts,” I said in a small voice, feeling sick. I knew no one would believe me.

Dad jerked away from Mrs. Hambrick and stood up so hard the dining room chair rocked on its legs. “Alexander!” he practically shouted.

Dr. Seagraves just sat there looking at me.

“Ghosts?” asked Carleton.

Nicole smiled slowly. “So that's what the cold was.”

Mrs. Hambrick glanced at her and then at my dad, but she spoke to me. “Don't look so stricken, Alexander. You seem to have taken this in stride up to now. Have you seen ghosts before?”

I couldn't tell if she was making fun of me or not. She didn't seem to be, but I didn't trust her. I nodded.

“Stop it, Alexander,” Dad said, his voice breaking. “Paige—I can't believe you're encouraging him!”

She sighed, but she didn't get angry. “I love the precision of statistics,” she said thoughtfully. “I like wind chimes for the precise musical notes they ring out.”

“The wind chimes made a lot of noise this week,” Carleton interrupted. “Was that the ghost?” I nodded again.

Mrs. Hambrick didn't look surprised. “Based on the wind and the experience of listening to them over time, I can sometimes predict which chime will sound. But they've been different this week.” She looked at my father. “I love the way mathematical probability tells me what I
can
predict, but I think it's just as important that it shows me there are unexpected insights that
can't
be predicted.”

Nicole suddenly interrupted. “Daddy understood that, didn't he? That's why he got you all those wind chimes?”

Mrs. Hambrick smiled in agreement. “If Alexander says a ghost told him about Louise Chamblee, then I'm prepared to believe him, even if I've never seen a ghost myself.”

I looked at Mrs. Hambrick, stunned. It was as if I'd never seen her before. I wasn't seeing the woman Nicole had teased me about hating, or the math whiz who thought like one of Dad's computers. She had a whole deeper level I never realized existed. I wondered if she'd surprised Dad, too.

Dr. Seagraves nodded once, decisively. “I don't know what to believe, but I understand about unexpected insights. That happens in historical work all the time, when you think you know where your research is taking you, and then you look at the facts in a new arrangement and you realize they mean something entirely different.”

She turned to me. “Alexander, I want to see this locket—and the note.”

Chapter Seventeen

T
EAMWORK

At first I didn't think Dad was going to come with us, but then he asked Mrs. Hambrick if she would ride to the museum with Dr. Seagraves. “We'll meet you there,” he told them. “I need to talk to Alexander alone.”

I felt my insides tighten. He still didn't believe me.

I climbed into the front passenger seat of Mrs. Hambrick's van, not looking at her or Dr. Seagraves in the driveway behind me. Dad waved briefly at them, fumbled with the unfamiliar controls, then fired up the engine.

We were barely out of the driveway when he started in on me, but it wasn't what I had expected. “Out all night trying to track down ghosts?” he practically shouted. “What if something had happened to you?”

“Nothing happened,” I said, glad I hadn't mentioned the guards or the fact that I was real enough in the ghosts' time to risk getting hit by a Yankee bullet at the farm.

“Besides—you never believed me.” My anger flared. “And since we got here, you've been so busy with Mrs. Hambrick, I didn't think I mattered. You never care what I want, about going back to Indiana. I bet you got that job here, didn't you?”

He turned the corner, heading toward downtown. “Yes. They offered me the job.”

I twisted the lariat tighter around my wrist. “And you took it, right?”

Dad didn't say anything for a minute. Then he asked, “You know how I've always been so big on teamwork? Well, it's not a big thing in programming, actually. We each work in our own special niche.” I thought of the way Rich had described all those little rooms, with people shut inside staring at lighted windows, all alone. Dad went on, “Teamwork is something your mother taught me.”

My jaw dropped. He never had anything good to say about Mom.

“But you two were the team,” he said. “I always felt like I was on the outside looking in. When she left, I wanted us to be a team—you and me. I wanted to be there for you—remember how I used to go out with a stopwatch and time you when you were getting ready to try out for the track team?”

That startled me. I suddenly remembered Dad huddled in a bright green, hooded raincoat, water dripping into his eyes as he cupped one hand over the stopwatch and peered at the time. When I beat my own record that rainy day, he laughed and hugged me.

He was right that I knew what teamwork meant. You run alone in track, but at a meet it's the sum of the individual scores that counts. I cheered Gary and the other guys, and I could hear them cheering when I ran.

“You always tried to be there for me, too,” Dad was saying. “But when this happened, you couldn't tell me.”

“Dad—I tried to tell you—a long time ago,” I protested, “when I saw those ghosts back home, the soldiers in armor.”