In The Face Of Death (41 page)

At last I have been able to send two letters, one to Euphemia Stephens in San Francisco, and one to Saint-Germain at his house in Amsterdam, though he may have left there by now. . . . Writing has reminded me how much I miss the sound of French being spoken. While I was with the Indians, this did not vex me, I suppose because I knew their tongues, like their ways, were foreign to me. But in the last few years, I have come to hunger for my own language. . . .

This evening a lovely young woman of mixed race came to me, to ask me to help her. She is pregnant, either by Southern or Northern soldiers, and she cannot bear the child, for she has no means to support it and no home left to go to. She is not far along, and there are few outward signs of her condition. . . . Against the wishes of the surgeons, I have decided to give her a tincture that will cause her to abort the fetus, for I can see no earthly reason to burden this young woman more than she has been burdened already. . . . There will be many women with children to raise without fathers, and I do not see the need for another such unfortunate, not with Negresses attempting to hide their children in the army’s supply wagons every day. . . .

There have been few chances to see Tecumseh, let alone talk with him, and while I am pleased he is willing to be so prudent, I am less glad that I am left in so awkward a situation regarding my place in this war, for I have no stake in it, unlike everyone else. . . . No one, not even Captain Foster, knows what to make of me. . . . I am not an American, Northerner or Southerner. Most of the officers are troubled that I am with the army, and though they are all unfailingly polite, I have heard the whispers and I know they cause problems for Tecumseh he will not address. . . . How like him.

The going has been hard and getting harder. The Southerners have taken to burying bombs in the path of the army, and they are taking a toll. It is dank and chill, and the land is marshy, which causes me discomfort, but I have enough of my native earth left to insulate me from the worst. . . . We are still making more than ten miles every day, and have been able to forage enough to keep the army well-fed. . . . I, however, am becoming famished, for I will not visit any of the men of this army in sleep, and the one I most long to love awake is not available. . . .

I can find it in my heart to be jealous of Hazen, Blair, and the rest of them.
. . .

“It is ironic,” Sherman said to Madelaine in a brief midnight meeting at a makeshift hospital in Savannah; in another few days a new year would begin. “I have personal letters from Generals Hardee, Smith, and McLaws, now that they are run out of this city, in which they ask me to make the protection and welfare of their families my personal concern.” He looked puzzled. “The women seem to trust me, or so they tell me, at any rate.”

“Is there any reason they shouldn’t?” Madelaine asked, trying not to make it appear that she was giving him undue attention, for though the anteroom was empty but for them it was far from private.

“Certainly not,” he said stiffly, then relented. “You weren’t questioning me, were you?”

“No.” Madelaine left off rolling bandages and looked at him with curiosity. “Why is that ironic? That those officers should entrust their families to you?”

“Why, because they are the ones most responsible for the tales of my atrocious conduct in this war. If you were to believe the stories they spread, I ought to be hanged by my own men. They have me listed as embroiled with every sin in the catechism, and have attributed to me the most dishonorable actions any commander could commit or endorse. However,” he said, straightening, some of his humor returning, “I have said I will do as they ask, and I will, as I will for any officer’s family here in the city. As I hope they would do for my wife and children. I will look after their families, and now, circumstances being what they are, they are willing to rely on me.”

Madelaine knew this was not the reason he had sought her out. “As well they know; you are that sort of man, Tecumseh.”

“I wish I knew why you, of all people, should have so much respect for me, given what you know.” He glanced around.

“Why would you ask me this, when you have succeeded so well?” Now it was her turn to be perplexed.

“Yes, I have done it, now that this campaign is over I can see it is done; yet there is no decisive victory until the end, and we may still falter,” he said apprehensively. “But since this success is ours, and won without discredit to me or my men, I have to contend with more notice than I have had in some time. It is not only the politicians, but the press who have taken an interest. I had not counted on that happening. I suppose I should have, knowing what ferrets reporters are but—” He cleared his throat. “There will be newspaper stories made on all I do, and there is little I can do to stop it happening; I will have little chance for privacy.”

She nodded. “What you are saying is that you cannot spend time with me, any time, let alone in private.” She managed a bit of a smile though her face ached with the effort.

He was more apologetic than frustrated. “No, I can’t. I thought I would be able to make some arrangement for you . . . for us, but—” He looked about uneasily.

“You don’t need to explain. I’ve been expecting this,” she said to forestall his long explanation.

“You have?” he asked in some surprise.

“Yes.” She wanted to go into his arms but would not risk compromising him now; she sensed the same desire in him, and his careful hesitation. “Do not fear; I meant what I’ve told you before. I will do nothing to embarrass you, or myself, nothing.”

He had the grace to be distressed by her subdued demeanor. “Just like that? No argument?”

Madelaine regarded him for a few long seconds. “Would it do any good?”

“No,” he admitted, and then added ruefully, “But I wish you’d protest a little, for my pride.”

She could not trust herself to laugh. “If it is solace you want, rest assured then, that I would happily defy the world with you, if that was what you wanted of me; but since it is not, I will not let you goad me into anger. You are too much a part of me for that.”

“I wish I
could
be a part of you,” he said, fire shining in his steely eyes. “Right now.”

“Don’t,” she said simply. “This is hard enough without—”

He held up his hand to silence her, and looked down at his shoes. “I don’t deserve you, Madelaine. I know I don’t.”

It was her turn to stop him. “That is not your decision to make, it is mine.” She swallowed once, finding the words as painful to speak as if they had spikes on them. “And I am more glad than I can tell you now that you and I have had so much together.”

He looked hard at her. “We’re parting, aren’t we?”

She nodded. “Until you—”

“Until I what? Until I die?” His challenge lacked sharpness. “When I may become like you, perhaps a long time from now.”

“Yes. For your sake I hope it will be a long time.” She found it difficult to go on. “I am going to return to France as soon as there is a ship available to carry me there. It will not be long before such commerce resumes, and I will take advantage of it as quickly as I may. You need not bother about making arrangements for me. I can do it, and it would be wiser if you did not become part of my dealings. But to do that I will have to be put in contact with my bank, to arrange for funds, and that may not be for a few weeks yet—” He waved this away with an impatient movement of his arm she had come to recognize as his way of wanting to put irritating things behind him.

“I can vouch for your credit.”

This time her smile came more easily. “So you can.”

His lips twitched, his eyes going distant. “I still remember the way you looked when you came to my office on Montgomery Street, at the bank, the first time I saw you.” Impulsively he touched her hand. “You took my breath away, the way you moved, the way the light made gold in your dark hair, the way you looked at me, the candor and self-possession you had. Your courage. And the way you have made me feel from the first, as if I was not alone, or strange. With you I have nothing to make up for, nothing to prove. No one ever . . . I will treasure my memory of you always, as I will treasure all you have given me.”

Madelaine moved her hand away. “The bond will not break, Tecumseh, no matter where you are in the world. You are part of me, and I of you.”

He lowered his head. “I know.”

Savannah, Georgia, 21 February, 1865

At last a letter from Saint-Germain, and copies of my first monographs on the Choctaw, sent more than a year ago, and carried down from Baltimore. How long ago that work now seems to me. I am assured that copies will be sent to Joseph Greentree and that initial responses to the works are favorable. I realize I ought to feel some pride, or vindication, but I can take little satisfaction in them, for they were done so long ago. I find I do not want to read what I wrote, for all the memories it awakens. Worse, reading what Saint-Germain writes is not only a great consolation, but painful as well, for I can feel the many, many people he has lost. . . . He tells me that he understands too well the hurt I have felt since I bid Tecumseh farewell; I know this is true, but it does little to assuage my pain. . . . I told Tecumseh he had to grieve, and ultimately I suppose I must, for the loss of his loving though not the loss of his love. . . .

Now that money has been transferred from Brooklyn, I have been able to lease a house for a short period; it is a small domicile, hardly more than a cottage, built when I was truly a girl, just six rooms, and I have one housekeeper to look after the place for me. . . . It is a relief to have money in my hands again, that the local people accept without hesitation. . . .

They say General Beauregard has left to meet General Hardee at Charleston, so the fighting goes on. . . though I wonder how it can last much longer, given the privations and disruption in the South. . . .

Lillyanne has found herself work at a dressmaker’s shop, and came to me today to offer to make some new clothes for me. She was very kind in pointing out that my few remaining garments are more fit for a backwoods farmer’s wife than for what she insists on calling ‘a grand French lady,’ and now that a few ships are bringing goods to Savannah, there is cloth to make the dresses with instead of using up bolts from attics and salvaged upholstery. . . . We spent an hour discussing what I would need for my return to France, and I have told her that I must be assured that she will receive a commission beyond her wages for this work. . . .

That I should be thinking of clothes again, and starting to miss real theatre and good society. That is not to say that the families of Savannah have not been cordial, for they have, but I am aware that I remain a puzzle to most of the hostesses and few of them receive me with complete comfort. . . .

Savannah, Georgia, 31 March, 1865

Wonder of wonders, I have at last found a British ship willing to take me to Italy, whither it will be bound when a few necessary repairs are completed, which cannot be done at once, given the lack of supplies. . . . While the work is being done, I have taken advantage of this time to learn something about the Captain, a man of forty years and stolid demeanor, who tells me that his brother is a don at Clair College, Cambridge, and has mentioned my work to him. Whether this is a polite fiction or the truth, I cannot guess, but at least Captain Wolverton has agreed to take me aboard when he sails, and for a price that is not so outrageous that I tremble to think of it. . . . he projected date of departure, given the fading state of the war, is the middle of next month, when he expects certain items to arrive from Boston. . . . He would rather leave before then, but as there is still fighting in the Carolinas, commercial shipping from North to South has not yet resumed with any reliability. . . .

Speaking of ships, Tecumseh has gone to City Point to meet with General Grant and President Lincoln. I have received one quickly written note from him telling me that the meeting has exceeded his expectations and that, upon reflection, he has come to realize that Lincoln grasps the problems of the South more comprehensively than he had first assumed, and has a deep commitment to healing the wounds the country has inflicted upon itself. This is high praise, given Tecumseh’s usual opinion of politicians. He informs me that the President is eager to avoid any unnecessary bloodshed and that any reasonable terms of surrender should be considered acceptable in order to ensure the reestablishment of the Union without any more rancor than absolutely necessary. . . . Since Tecumseh has been afraid for so long that a punitive peace would only stir the South to greater rebellion and anarchy, he endorses this idea emphatically. But then, Tecumseh does everything emphatically, including doubt himself. . . . Even in this moment of triumph, he is troubled by doubt, anticipating every catastrophe he can imagine and preparing himself to face each one by turns, so that he will not be caught off-guard. . . . General Meade is expected to join them in a day or so, according to his note, and possibly his brother John as well. . . .

At last today I have had word from Euphemia Stephens: she tells me she has opened a school for young women, where the study of languages is emphasized. She thanks me in the letter for she says that the bonus I paid her financed her venture, which is doing well. . . . Reading her letter, I thought I was looking back on another existence, as remote to me now as my childhood is. . . . According to what she tells me, San Francisco is much changed in the decade since I left, and she reckons I would not recognize half the buildings in the city. . . . Society has changed, too, and there are many more respectable women living with their families in San Francisco. A few of the men who have made fortunes have begun to build mansions along California Street. Fanny Kent is now a widow, according to Euphemia, and the doyen of the society hostesses, something of a terror among the ambitious matrons of the city. . . . It is not as pleasant to remember San Francisco as I would like, for I cannot help but find Tecumseh tangled up in my memories. . . .