Seidel, Kathleen Gilles (15 page)

"No, no. But I'm glad you caught me. I was about to go for a walk." Sunshine and exercise were Jill's cure for jet lag.

"Do you want some company? Randy and I are across the street, getting gas."

"That sounds great."

"Then let's meet on the median strip. But I have to warn you—I look pretty weird."

"What do you mean? Do you still look like Phillip?"

"More than ever, I'm afraid."

This Jill had to see.

In the last few days she had thought about Doug a lot. Once she had decided to come to the Valley, she had called a clipping service to see if they had any information, however dated, on a former hotshot basketball player. The packet they sent over was startlingly thick.

Jill had been mesmerized by the articles, profiles, and columns describing his career, detailing the scandal that had ended it. Here was a man liked and admired by other men. When his own athletic director had turned on him, dozens of others had come to his support. "Shoot," the Lynx had been quoted as saying—although Jill doubted that that had actually been his word—"Doug's dad has been G.M.'s top salesman about a hundred times. If Doug had had anything to do with this, would those guys have been driving Chryslers?"

However much Doug might look like Phillip, his personality was his own—relaxed and articulate with a dry self-depreciating wit. His style was one of effortlessness. "Make it look easy, guys," was one of his comments from the sidelines. "Make it look easy." He commanded his troops without the anger or strung-out intensity of other coaches. He led by example; he, too, made it look easy. Jill liked that.

Determined to get beyond the way he looked, she clipped back her hair and tucked her room key, some money, and a credit card in her pocket. She rarely carried a purse; she liked the sense of freedom, the sense of not needing a lot of things. Her hair was thick enough that it didn't need to be combed very often; her sunblock was strong enough that it didn't need to be renewed. Her one credit card looked ordinary enough, but she could have bought the
Mono Lisa
with it.

She pulled the motel door shut, listening for the locking click. It was a lovely, sparkling day, still slightly cool although the radio had promised the afternoon would be in the upper seventies. The light here was softer than in the West. The blues of the sky and the greens of the meadows and hills flowed together in a swirling watercolor wash.

The motel was in a little commercial oasis. Five or six businesses servicing the interstate traffic straddled the road that was four lanes for a few hundred yards before it narrowed into a country lane bordered by green fields and roadside ditches dotted with buttercups and sweet clover. Among the businesses were a Wendy's and a McDonald's, a 7-Eleven with gas pumps, and across from the Best Western was an Exxon station. Behind its sign, waiting for a break in traffic, was Doug.

He was in uniform, a Confederate uniform. Jill stopped dead. So much for getting beyond the way he looked.

It was a beautiful uniform. Even with the four lanes and traffic between them, Jill could see that. It was made of thick grey wool with yellow satin facings, shining brass buttons, and scrolling gold cording, finished off with glossy cavalry boots and a low-slung leather sword belt.

It was too much. It really was. Jill watched him sprint across the road. Was this what he called looking weird? She had another word for it.

He was across the road now, standing in front of her, the morning sun twinkling off his brass buttons. He was breathing lightly, so well conditioned that his body didn't notice a quick sprint. She heard herself speak. "You look gorgeous. You shouldn't be allowed out of the house in that."

"I'm sorry," he apologized, laughing. "But this is the first time I've done one of these re-enactments, and this getup is borrowed."

"I'm not complaining." Good God, was she flirting with him? She never flirted.

"Well, I am. I feel like a bloody fool. No, that's not true," he said, honesty warming his eyes, crinkling his nose. "I felt like an idiot when I first put it on, but now I'm starting to feel rather dashing. In another hour or so I will be strutting and preening insufferably. But enough about me. Welcome to the Valley. Are you having a good time? 'Not quite yet' is a perfectly acceptable response."

And an accurate one. "I'm having an interesting time. But I committed a terrible
faux pas,
insisting on staying in a motel."

"I know. I heard."

"You did?"

"Oh, yes," he assured her. "Between us, Randy and I have eight sisters. We hear everything... no, that's giving us too much credit. We are told everything; we don't always listen."

"You have
eight
sisters?"

"Personally, I only have four, but Randy has four, too. That's why we deal so well together. Nobody else knows what it's like. He's at the pay phone now. We had a great idea." He was checking the traffic. "Here, I think we can cross now... although this uniform does make me feel like I should give you my arm. Anyway, as long as we're on our way to New Market, and you're on your way to New Market, we thought we'd let you hitch a ride with us. Is that okay with you? Randy's trying to negotiate with his dad. Can you bear to change your plans?"

Now, that was one tough decision. She could spend the morning with Brad, who would tell her all about the battle of New Market as clearly and tersely as a National Park Service leaflet, or she could spend it with this man and his gorgeous uniform.

She spoke. "You talk more than Phillip, don't you?"

"He didn't have four sisters." Doug's smile was honey. "I'm making up for lost time. I never got to use the bathroom and I never got to talk. Am I driving you nuts? Back in college, the guys always said I never met a mike I didn't like."

No, he was not driving her nuts. Not in the least.

They were at the Exxon station now. Standing at the pay phone was another Confederate soldier. He was freckled with sandy hair, only an inch or so taller than Jill. His uniform was quite different from Doug's. Torn and patched, it was a yellowy-brown butternut. He pulled off his forage cap, stuck it under his arm, cradled the phone under his chin and reached out his hand to Jill. It was his left hand, so that when Jill put her right hand in it, they were holding hands rather than formally shaking them.

"Yes, Dad," he said, rolling his eyes, instantly creating a little relationship with Jill in which they shared some knowledge about Brad. "I'll be careful. I have the new truck; that will make me careful even if I didn't care about my Aunt Jill whom I now see to be the most astonishingly gorgeous woman."

Lynette's card file had reported that Randy was almost exactly Jill's age. He was the youngest of Brad's five children, the only son. He had gone to college at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg and had been working with his father and uncle when he had received the unexpected legacy from Cass. At least, the legacy was supposedly unexpected, but within two weeks Randy had been at the bank with ambitious plans for his egg production operation.

He was still listening to Brad, his expression making it clear that he was hearing another round of paternal instructions. Then he said good-bye and, still holding Jill's hand, hung up. "Don't tell me you're my Aunt Jill. I don't believe it. It's not fair. The best-looking girl around is my aunt."

Jill didn't like responding to comments about her looks. Before she could muster a reply, Doug spoke. "What did your dad say? Can we have Jill?"

"If we drive carefully, if we make sure she gets lunch, if we swear to deliver her to the lower meadow at one o'clock sharp."

"So what do you say, Jill?" Doug turned to her. "Do you want to accompany us warriors as we march off to celebrate our Glorious, Noble, Sexist, and Racist Past?"

"I feel underdressed," she said. She was in a short denim jeans skirt and a white knit shirt. "Shouldn't I be in a hoop skirt?"

Randy stepped back and drew Doug with him. He tilted his head sidewards to look down at Jill's showgirl legs, which rose up to meet the hem of her skirt... and when you were five feet ten and wore a size six, a knee-length skirt hit mid-thigh. "I think a hoop skirt would be a crime."

Randy's truck was parked by the gas pumps. It was indeed new, glittering with a blue metallic paint. It had oversized tires, so Jill had to hike her short denim skirt up even farther to climb in. She slid into the middle of the wide seat, automatically reaching for the seat belt. Doug, she noticed, buckled his belt, too. Randy did not. The minute they were on the Interstate she decided that that was foolish of him, indeed. He drove at a blinding speed.

New Market was fifteen miles to the south, and during the trip, which was a whole lot briefer than it ought to have been, Doug and Randy told Jill about Civil War re-enactments. It was as if she and Doug knew that the
Weary Hearts
search was only between the two of them, something not to be discussed until they were alone.

"Who participates in the re-enactments?" she asked.

"It varies," Doug answered. "There are some serious students of military history. There are the ones who just want to get out of the house and drink beer—"

"That's the two of us," Randy added. "I just wish there were more girls."

Doug ignored him. "And then there are the serious crazies."

"Tell me about them," Jill said. She had, she was sure,  the greatest respect for the serious students of military history, but she was more interested in the crazies.

"They think the South should have won the war. It's like they think that if Lee had had his wits about him at Gettysburg, they would now own Twelve Oaks and four hundred slaves. Although it always seems to me that these are precisely the folks who would be in terrible trouble in a society without a large middle class. Other people really get into the authenticity thing. At least Randy and I have on our own sturdy, white Jockeys. Some of those guys will be wearing authentic reproduction Confederate underwear. Can you imagine?"

Jill could not.

"And you wouldn't want to," Randy added. "The Tenth Virgina has the biggest bunch of beer bellies you've even seen. I always heard that the Confederacy was starving. These guys aren't."

Apparently the re-enactors had gathered at the battlefield the night before, and each army had set up an encampment. Doug and Randy, tied to a morning routine by the habits of three hundred thousand chickens, hadn't been able to come for that. But once they got to New Market and a uniformed Eagle Scout had directed them to park on a grassy meadow, they sought out the Tenth Virginia, and "Private Casler" and "Private Ringling" reported for duty and instantly asked for permission to escort this lady, commonly thought to be a Northern spy, around the grounds.

"Be back for mess," their sergeant told them. "Or I'll put you on report. Private Casler, you still have extra duty from Chancellorsville."

Randy did not seem stricken by this news.

The encampment was permeated with a wonderful holiday spirit. Confederate soldiers were crawling out of their tattered tents, stretching and scratching at pretend lice, boiling Maxwell House coffee over campfires. Besides the soldiers, there were doctors, chaplains, undertakers, and sutlers. Some of the women wore the dress of nurses and camp followers—long, dark skirts and grey blouses, their hair held back by black snoods. Others swept through the orchard in polyester ball gowns, their swaying hoop skirts trimmed with yards of pregathered nylon lace. Mingling with them were the observers, wearing ridge-soled running shoes, carrying cameras and styrofoam coolers, and pushing strollers. Everyone was in good spirits; the atmosphere was gleeful, carnival-like.

Doug and Randy set a brisk pace, striding over stacked muskets, ducking under ladies' fringe-trimmed parasols, plunging down rows of low floorless tents. At one point they got trapped behind a unit of men marching in tight formation. The man directly ahead of Jill had a wooden canteen and a metal cup clipped to his belt; a long-handled frying pan swung behind the seat of his pants.

They watched a precision musket-firing competition, saw a display of nineteenth-century surgical instruments, and stopped at a line of twentieth-century porta-potties. Between the two of them, the men knew an amazing number of people. They were always stopping to introduce Jill to someone or another. No one seemed surprised that Randy had an aunt his own age. Reports about Jill had preceded her. "Oh, right," several people said, "you're the rich one."

"I know that boy," Doug said the first time they heard this remark. "I grew up with him. And his mama would cut his tongue out if she heard him talk that way."

Jill gathered that this was an apology. "Don't worry about it." Even though she hadn't wanted to talk about her money in group, she wasn't ashamed or embarrassed about it. If anything, she was proud of what it said about her father's good sense... although his fiscal shrewdness was hardly what she valued the most about him.

Money was an issue at these re-enactments. The uniforms and replicated equipment were expensive, at least by the standards of the participants. Jill learned that the people who were playing clergymen and doctors often couldn't afford to buy the period-style, black-powder muskets used in the battle.

"I can't say I find that too comforting," Doug observed. "Those folks are responsible for the health of my body and my soul, and all that qualifies them is poverty."

The morning grew hotter and brighter. Jill eavesdropped on a "clergyman" showing off a small Bible. It was neither period-style nor a replica—it was genuine. His great-great-great-great grandfather had carried it through the war.

Jill was impressed. She hardly even knew the names of her grandparents. "Aren't you worried about something happening to it?" She stepped forward to ask.

"I'm careful." Sunlight glinted off his small, round spectacles. "But wait a minute... aren't you what's-her-name? Randy's cousin or something? Didn't your father work on the movie?"

Her father had made twenty-eight movies. "He was a director."

"Then maybe you'll know. Hey, guys." He turned, signalling to some people gathering around a nearby tent. "Here's somebody who should know. We were up half the night wondering—how did Phillip get out of the draft?"