High Hearts (33 page)

“No.” Di-Peachy blushed.

“Nothing good comes from mixed blood,” Ernie intoned.

Furious, Sin-Sin kicked Ernie in the shin. “Doan be talkin’ that way.”

Lutie held her breath.

“That girl achin’ her heart over that white boy!”

“Thass none of our business.”

“Trouble be my business, and we gonna have a peck of
it.” Ernie turned her round face to Di-Peachy. “Give him up. You gonna break your heart.”

“He’s not mine to give up. I’m not married,” Di-Peachy said.

“Doesn’t matter if a cat be black or white as long as it catches mice.” Sin-Sin’s teeth flashed.

“The mens always foolin’ with the wimmins. You wan this boy to spoil her, after all the learnin’ and work? ’Zat what you want, Sin-Sin? I kill my Boyd iffin’ she make sech a fool of herself! And I knows the white man kill Braxton iffin’ he try it!” She stamped her foot and then delivered her crudest blow. “But why I think you’d watch over her I doan know. You nobody’s momma.”

Enraged, Sin-Sin pushed Ernie off the chair. “You shut your trap.”

Lutie’s sharp voice surprised them. “That’s enough! Love is like malaria. You never know when you’re going to catch it. It’s not her fault if she’s infected.”

Di-Peachy, horrified, did not think of love as a disease. Ernie and Sin-Sin kept still.

“Furthermore,” Lutie continued, “you could no more keep white men away from Boyd than I could. Stop such foolish talk.” Her voice increased in volume. “Do you think I like sitting in this house knowing what goes on? What has gone on? Do you think I live without anguish? I will not have us fighting about it!”

Tears ran down Di-Peachy’s cheeks. “I’m sorry, Miss Lutie.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about. If you’ve fallen in love with Mercer Hackett, then God help you, because I cannot.”

“I gots work to do.” Ernie, humbled by Lutie’s outburst, picked up her broom and left the room. Di-Peachy, her doe eyes large with tears, left, too.

Only Sin-Sin remained. The two women glared at one another. “That was quite a show you put on, old woman,” said Lutie finally.

Sin-Sin crossed her arms over her ample bosom. “That fat tub Ernie June’s so ugly she’s an elephant fart!”

Despite herself, Lutie laughed. “You’re mean and hateful to say such a thing.”

“When she start flappin’ her gums ’bout no good comin’ from mixed blood, I sees red!”

“I don’t understand it. Ernie’s never been ugly like that before.”

“Work her on Sunday. Show her!”

“I am not going to work her on Sunday, Sin-Sin. Aside from the scandal, what would it show her?”

“She doah know who’s boss ’round here.”

Lutie, clutching her Bible more tightly than she realized, replaced it on the smooth, inlaid satinwood table.

“You gots to talk to Di-Peachy,” said Sin-Sin softly.

Lutie stared into Sin-Sin’s dark, disturbed eyes. “I know I do. I don’t know if I have the courage.”

“Anyone can work like you did over them sufferin’ mens got courage.”

“Thank you.”

Sin-Sin rewrapped her shawl in preparation for her own day’s work. “You know what I really hates about Ernie June?”

“No, what?”

“She so petty she could find flyshit in pepper.”

Around six-thirty that evening the rain crow hollered, and within the hour, silvery beads of cold rain beat down on the meadows, stables, and houses of Chatfield. The temperature was in the high thirties and caused the damp to cut to the bone. It would have been more tolerable had it snowed.

Lutie was down at the main stable. One of the mares was giving birth, and she wanted to be there. If the foal was female, Lutie told Braxton to name it Elizabeth since this was Elizabeth I’s coronation day in 1558. Lutie kept odd dates in her mind, strange pieces of information. She thought that her brain was a catchall like sawgrass in fall. If a milkweed floated through, it stuck on the blades. The foal, strangely white, was male. Lutie dubbed him Count Blanc and left to return to the big house.

Behind those low, fluffy rain clouds beamed a full moon giving the evening a noctilucent quality. Lutie felt that she parted silver curtains as she slipped over the wet grass. Despite the chilling damp she enjoyed evenings such as this; their magical quality excited her imagination.

A strange light coming through the raindrops interested her. She stopped for a moment and peered skyward into the billowing mass. Overhead, she thought, the planets are a
cosmic parasol, and the earth is no bigger than a teardrop in an inky sea.

Suddenly a hound dashed before her. She hadn’t heard it. Then another followed and another and another. They were black and tans.

“No. No!” Lutie cried out.

The hounds bayed, leaping in a ballet of the chase. Out of a pool of liquid shadows thundered the huntsmen. Handsome men, laughing men, pressing their heavy-boned horses faster. Casimer Harkaway, his great chest to the wind, led the way. He cut away from the pack and rode to Lutie.

She stood still, calmly facing this muscled phantom.

“Is it my time?” she asked.

Casimer removed his hat courteously and bowed. His horse pawed the ground. “You shall live a long life.”

“Whose time is it then?” Her heart was in her mouth.

“I don’t come to predict death, madam, but merely to prepare you for life, for the yoke Fate lays upon your back.” He replaced his hat.

“Wait!” Lutie reached out to touch his boot but she withdrew her hand. “Do you believe in prayer, sir?”

“Your existence is a prayer.” He smiled and rejoined his huntsmen, then disappeared into the rain.

At sunrise, Lutie hurried back onto the vast rolling lawn between the big house and the main stable. The rain stopped and curls of thick, white clouds clung to the sides of the Blue Ridge mountains like baby possums clinging to their mother’s tail. The sun turned them soft pink and deep pink and scarlet before banishing them.

Breathlessly Lutie ran to the spot where she had seen
Casimer Harkaway. She searched the earth and found the place where his horse dug into the soft turf.

“It could have been one of our horses,” she thought. “I’ll bet Braxton or one of the boys exercised them out on the lawn.” However, she knew the horses were never exercised on the verdant expanse where she one day hoped to have fountains.

She glanced back at the house. The first full day of brilliant sunlight assaulted Di-Peachy’s harp, and it glittered like the torn wing of a golden butterfly. It was true. Last night was true. Lutie pleaded, “Take me, dear God. Take me and let my people live.” She saw Sumner in her mind as well as Geneva, Henley, and her adored sister, Poofy. She saw her younger brother, T. Pritchard Chalfonte. She saw the people she loved, even Sin-Sin. She would willingly put down her life in exchange for their lives, especially her children’s lives. But she knew the dice were thrown. It was not her turn.

Lutie thought of the women from the icy coasts of Maine to the sticky swamps of Florida. She thought of the women along the Mississippi from its northernmost waters to its exultant release into the gulf below New Orleans. And on the other side of that great river there were women weeping. Two nations were weeping for their dead, for what was lost, and for what would never be.

Carefully she put the toe of her shoe into the churned earth. “I won’t weep,” she vowed. “I’ve been down this road before, and I won’t weep. I’ll fight!” She was determined to bear the yoke Fate laid on her back.

Frost coated Gallant’s whiskers. A scarf knitted by Di-Peachy was wrapped around Geneva’s throat to ward off the cold. The regiment rode on the Leesburg-Alexandria Pike toward Dranesville. Wagons were spread out along the road like square pearls in a long, frozen necklace. Food supplies had become so scarce that Brigadier General Stuart was ordered to cover this foraging expedition to the west of Dranesville, a small town about seven miles inland from Coon’s Ferry on the Potomac and fifteen miles west of Washington, D.C. The land, good for cultivation, yielded results even when the army couldn’t pay for the hay and supplies.

About sixteen hundred infantry troops, one hundred fifty cavalrymen, and four field pieces protected this vital chain of food. Mars wanted to bring his entire regiment, but higher powers deemed it unnecessary.

As the sun heralded the day at 7:10 Geneva and her company were ordered toward Dranesville. The Yankees were reputed to have set up advance posts there, and if they got wind of the forage wagons, they would try to steal them for themselves. Winter was impartial as to its victims, and the Yankees were hungry, too.

Banjo rode on one side of Geneva; Nash was on the other. On the east side of the little town the two turnpikes, the Leesburg-Alexandria and the Georgetown, intersected. As the regiment neared the town, Geneva saw that Dranesville was a cavalryman’s nightmare. High hills, a spur before the Blue Ridge mountains, blocked the south side of the town. Much of the ground was covered in thick woods. Banjo was first to see that the Yankees already had the ridge. “Look,” he said, “caissons moving up one of the pikes.”

Nash pulled on his cigar. “We can’t charge in this terrain.”

“No,” Banjo said, fingering his card deck, “but if they’ve got cavalry, we could be back and forth all day.”

“Why?” Geneva wanted to know.

“To draw them off the wagons.”

Mars ordered his small detachment of one hundred fifty men to ride back on the Leesburg Pike. The bugle sounded, and the detachment split as neatly as if cut by a wedge.

Four artillery pieces, twelve-pounders pulled by draft horses, roared by. “Make way! Make way!”

“We’re gonna hit them,” Nash said.

“Off the road!” ordered Mars again. Again they moved out of the way as the infantry ran forward on the double-quick.

“Halt,” a major called.

The infantry stopped, removed their blankets and personal effects, each laid neatly on the ground like rows of large cotton.

“Forward, double-quick!” he shouted again.

The sound of feet on the frozen road sounded like thousands of walnuts being crunched underfoot. Despite the cold, these men were already sweating.

Geneva heard the first cannon fire. This was followed by rhythmic bursts from the other three. Company after company of sober infantrymen hurtled forward. She thought that the artillery boys were wizards the way they could limber guns, get their angle, and fire. Sumner taught her that a twelve-pounder had a maximum range at 50° of 1,700 yards. They used ball for the long range, cannister for shorter range, and grape against infantry at two hundred yards. Geneva didn’t mind artillery duels, but she thought the antipersonnel cannister and grape horrible. She’d seen horses and men disemboweled by the stuff.

Boom. The deep-throated Federal guns began to answer the South. One after another, they sang like murderous children. Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Their register increased.

“How many batteries do you think they’ve got?” Geneva asked.

“I counted twelve guns,” Nash answered.

“Either that or some Yankee genius devised a new firing pattern,” Banjo said.

“We only sent up one battery,” Geneva called to him.

Mars, riding back to check his rear, heard her. “We can make hell with what we have.” The sound of battle gave Mars a wild energy. He was larger than life and utterly fearless.

Once Banjo asked Mars if he was ever afraid. Mars replied that he was afraid of disease, insanity, the terrors of the hearth, but not battle. He knew he wouldn’t die on the field.

Banjo allowed that whether that was true or not, worrying wasn’t going to do him much good, so he might as well soldier on. If nothing else, it gave his companions courage.

“Close up!” Mars bellowed. “The infantry is through. Close up! We’ve got to get to the wagons.” He wheeled and came alongside Banjo. “Cover the rear, Banjo. If you see any Yanks, tell Mandy here to blow.”

The bugler came alongside Banjo, too. “We’ll do what we can.”

For two hours, they heard the cannon fire and rifles crackle. The sound grew more tinty as they turned the wagons and nudged them back toward Leesburg. The cannon stopped.

By late afternoon every wagon was accounted for and secure in camp. Mars and his men waited, but the Yankee cavalry never showed its face. Men attended to their mounts, and Mars paced, but no further orders came. Finally the men dismounted at sunset.

An hour after sunset a courier arrived. The cavalry was to advance upon Dranesville at daybreak and harass the enemy’s left flank.

Mars read the dispatch and said to Sam Wells, “We might be able to do some damage on the left. The right’s impossible. The men have withdrawn to the railroad station, and Stuart’s at Frying Pan Church. What do you think?”

“I’ll tell the men to cook up a day’s rations, just in case.”

“Sam, they were unusually clairvoyant knowing where our supply wagons were heading.”

“It wasn’t us. Goddamned Richmond cabinet leaks like a sieve.”

Mars folded the dispatch and slid it into his breast pocket. “Not a happy thought. Soldiers take the risk, and politicians reap the rewards. I think I’d rather sit in a room full of maggots.”

Dawn hovered on the eastern horizon. Deep frost covered the fields. Every sense alert, Mars and his men rode into Dranesville. The Yankees evacuated. Dead bodies from yesterday’s fighting randomly covered the ground. Neither side got all their dead off the field, although they did take care of their wounded.

The lone artillery battery took a beating but the surviving men withdrew the guns, in good order, to shelter.

The small cavalry detachment walked over the broken ground, regrouped on the Georgetown Pike, and trotted east to see if they could pick up the enemy. The infantry was left with the task of burying the dead which did not further endear the cavalry to them.

As Mars questioned people along the Georgetown Pike he learned that the Federals had withdrawn fifteen regiments of infantry and seven companies of cavalry along with several batteries. It was a godsend that the Federal cavalry did not flank Dranesville and come out on the Leesburg Pike. Mars began to wonder about their leadership.