A Secret Refuge [02] Sisters of the Confederacy Read online

  “Let me see.” The man with the green eyeshade and arm bands holding back the sleeves of his white shirt turned and sorted through the boxes along the wall. He returned with three envelopes. “One for Miz Highwood and two for you. You are Jesse Highwood, right?”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” Jesselynn looked at the handwriting on her two letters and could have jumped for joy. One from her sister Louisa in Richmond and one from Lucinda, the head of the household help at Twin Oaks. Cavendar Dunlivey had lied when he said slavers got all those left at Twin Oaks. No longer could she call her people slaves, since she herself had signed the manumission papers in her father’s name, but what other title could she give them? Perhaps if Lucinda and the others were still on the home place, Dunlivey had also lied about burning the farm to the ground. Letters from home! No longer did she notice the lowering gray clouds.

  Not even attempting to hide her smile, she tucked the letters in her shirt pocket and mounted her horse. No sense loitering here in plain view while she read the letters. She could do that at the house. “Come on, Sunshine, let’s hustle on back.”

  “A letter for you,” Jesse called to Aunt Agatha when she entered the kitchen.

  “Coming.” The answer floated down from upstairs.

  Jesselynn moved the teakettle to the hottest part of the stove. She picked up the lid on the stewpot and savored the fragrance of rabbit stew. The wild roots and herbs they’d been using at the cave in no way measured up to good garden fare.

  “Where’s your teapot?” she asked as Agatha entered the kitchen, several pieces of clothing slung over her arm.

  Agatha pointed to a high shelf in the cupboard and laid the garments across the back of a chair. Bright pink spots on her cheeks, most likely from the exertion of bending over trunks or boxes, made her look more like herself. “Why?”

  “Because Mr. Dummont included a packet of tea with the groceries. He said you must be in terrible need of a cup of tea by now.” A little fib to make her aunt feel better paled against the lies she was forced to tell on a regular basis.

  “Oh, he is such a good man.” Agatha gazed at the brown paper packet with shining eyes.

  Then why are you so tied in knots about asking for flour and other things you can’t live without? But Jesselynn kept the thought to herself and slit open the letter from Lucinda.

  Dear Marse Jesse,

  I am sorry I did not write before, but things have been very bad here. Dey burned de house and barns right after you left and cotched many of de field hands to sell to de slavers. Some of us got out and hid in de woods for weeks, too ‘fraid to come out. Dere no place to dry de t’bacca, but we go ask Marse Marsh if we can use his barn. He say yes, so if dere be some crop, he sell it for us. When you come home, Marse Jesse? We made a shack out of logs so we be out of de rain. Joseph hurt him back. You write us by Marse Marsh. He bring it here. God bless you. Come home soon.

  Lucinda

  Jesselynn closed her eyes. So Dunlivey had burned Twin Oaks and sold most of the freed slaves. Her gorge rose, threatening to choke her.

  She opened her eyes to see her aunt staring at the sheet of paper she held, her face as stark white as the letter.

  “Aunt, what is it? What is wrong?”

  Agatha waved the paper and blinked her eyes as if she were having trouble seeing.

  Jesselynn dropped to her knees beside her aunt and took the lady’s shaking hands in her own. They were icy and quivering like cottonwood leaves in the breeze. “Please tell me. What is wrong?”

  The old woman seemed to shrink within herself right before Jesselynn’s eyes, aging years in moments. She handed Jesselynn the letter, mouthing words but unable to speak.

  Was she having a fit? Jesselynn had once seen an old man sink to the ground and start twitching, then go slack, one side of his face looking like candle wax in the heat as it melted to one side.

  Agatha pointed to the paper. “Read it,” she croaked.

  Jesselynn scanned the precise legal writing, then went back to read the entire letter. Her heart took up a staccato beat. “They can’t just throw you out!”

  “But of course they can. I thought dear Lettie had paid the taxes last year, but obviously she didn’t. I hold no title to the house since she died. I just lived here at the gracious invitation from a friend to a widow in dire straits. And even if I did have the title, I have no money for taxes. Appears to me I shall be homeless before the robins nest.”

  Jesselynn studied her aunt. The woman was not complaining, just stating facts as she saw them, and at the moment, Jesse saw no other alternative either. “Is there someone else you can live with?”

  Aunt Agatha shrugged, a brief motion that barely raised her thin shoulders. “I shall ask around. I am strong. I can be a good companion to someone who is more advanced in years than I.”

  Strong? It wouldn’t need a brisk breeze to blow you over. Had her aunt no idea that she had slipped so far downhill in the last few weeks? Did she never look in a mirror? What had she done with a disposition more than slightly verging on that of a sergeant or a general, a woman sure of her place in Southern semiaristocracy? Had it slid away with the disappearing flesh?

  War! And man’s ego! They are responsible for this. Both Father and Uncle Hiram thought they could help save the South. Now their families have to pay for their gallantry by being left with nothing. Aunt Agatha should be able to go to Twin Oaks, where relatives would take her in. But her relatives are no longer there. They’re now hoping to be taken in themselves. It’s always the war! The horrid war! She had to clamp her teeth together to keep the anger from spewing forth.

  Jesselynn folded the paper and inserted it back in the envelope. “Perhaps the new owner would let you continue to live here.”

  “Perhaps. If I were able to pay for the privilege. But look around. This place is falling down around its posts. The roof leaks. The walls are riddled with vermin and dry rot. The best thing to do is burn or bury it.” Her face sagged, sorrow seeping out of her pores. “Not like our home place. Ah, Jesselynn, Oakfield was beautiful. Much like Twin Oaks, since Hiram always thought of that as home.” Her eyes sharpened. “But the dirty deserters stole what horses we had left, burned our farm, and even knocked over Hiram’s gravestone. There was nothin’ left.”

  Except the slaves you sold like they were cattle. Jesselynn still couldn’t understand her aunt doing such a thing. Why, she could no more have sold Twin Oaks’s slaves than cut off her right hand. That was why she had freed them all before she left home, not that it saved those Dunlivey had caught after burning Twin Oaks. Burning seemed to be a favorite tool of ruffians, deserters, and Yankee soldiers. That and lynching.

  The thought made her shudder. Benjamin had come so close to being hanged. The freed slaves she had with her were more her family now than her two sisters whom she’d sent to Richmond to keep safe. Danger and hardship had a tendency to draw folks close together no matter what color their skin.

  You’ll have to invite Aunt Agatha to come west with you. The thought, more like her mother speaking across the reaches between heaven and earth, made her catch her breath. No. No way would she take this weak and trembling woman with them, nor the whaleboned one she’d known when they arrived in Springfield in November. Either way, there was no room in the wagon for Aunt Agatha.

  “I need to be going so I can get back to the cave before dark.”

  Agatha nodded. “Make sure you get yourself plenty of the store from the cellar. Hate to see any of it go to waste.” She motioned toward the stove. “I wouldn’t turn down any meat you might want to bring in. And wood.”

  “I’ll see to it, Aunt Agatha. But with all the soldiers in town, using the horses to pull the wagon is taking a big chance. Since the mule was stolen . . .” She shrugged. “After coming all this way, I sure don’t want to lose them now.”

  “No, no. Of course not.” The older woman traced the outline of the envelope lying on the table. “Think I’ll ask Mr. Dummont at the sto
re if he would like to come by and help himself. That would allow me to purchase more of the things I need. Unless I find another place to live, of course. I would want to take some with me.”

  “I reckon.” Jesselynn lifted her coat from the hook on the wall. “I’ll be back when I can. You take care now, you hear?”

  “Oh, I will. Give that little Thaddeus a kiss for me. I sure do want to see that baby before he’s a grown man.” Agatha tipped her head sideways to make it easy for Jesselynn to drop a kiss on her cheek.

  “I’ll try to bring him in. One day Meshach may come and bring you back to our camp. If you would like to visit, that is.” Jesselynn could hear her mother extending an invitation in the same tone of voice. What on earth was the matter with her for even suggesting such a thing?

  “We’ll see.” The arch of her eyebrow was more reminiscent of the real Aunt Agatha than anything else Jesselynn had seen since she arrived.

  With two tow sacks full of vegetables, both dried and fresh, and apples on top for the pure joy of eating, she headed on out of town, keeping a sharp lookout for any more soldiers. Perhaps they were all back at camp by now. If that were the case, then she or Meshach should come and go just about twilight. She’d heard from home. Remembering made the ride seem like minutes. Carrie married. Zachary still alive. Life went on even here.

  Darkness hid the land by the time she drew near to the cave. She whistled the three notes they’d agreed upon for a signal, and when one answered, she rode down the bank to where the mouth of the cave was fairly well hidden by a trio of maple trees and brush. They had stumbled on it quite by accident. Of course Meshach said God had led them to their new home, but she had only nodded. Benjamin found it when he’d skidded down the bank on the way to the creek that meandered along the bottom of the hollow. Ridges and hollows, as the locals called the terrain, the Ozark Mountains without any peaks.

  “What take you so long?” Meshach met her at the cave entrance. A big man in every way, long legs, broad shoulders, hands big enough to hoist a tobacco hogshead yet gentle enough to comfort little Sammy who clung to his leg like a bloodsucker. Meshach bent down and swung the toddler up to his shoulder. Since they’d found Sammy, he had learned to walk. He was perhaps too weak before, but it didn’t take him long to totter after Thaddeus once his legs grew strong enough. Sammy tangled his little fingers in Meshach’s kinky black hair, the better to hold on. Meshach had the little one’s leg in a firm grip should he start to topple off.

  Jesselynn swung to the ground and untied the tow sacks, so heavy that one was beginning to fray at the bottom. “Here. This should help our larder, and we each get a big red apple for dessert.”

  “Good. Daniel done brung in another deer. ‘Phelia settin’ strips to dry already. Fried liver for supper.” He flinched as the little one on his shoulder yanked on a handful of hair.

  “Where’s Thaddeus?”

  “Down de creek with Daniel, fishin’. Benjamin still grazin’ de horses.”

  “Good.” They each picked up a sack and started for the cave. At the same time Meshach swung Sammy down from his shoulder and under his arm like a tied-off sack of grain. Meshach’s hair grazed the roof within the cave, but he had to duck to enter. With the horses roped off at the back where the ceiling was higher and the fire kept burning near the front, they were safe from wild animals as well as the elements. Curious humans were another matter; thus, they took great care not to make visible trails to the cave and the surrounding area.

  “Oh, Meshach, Ophelia, I got so excited about the apples I almost forgot to tell you. We have a letter from Lucinda and one from Louisa, which I forgot to read to Aunt Agatha. For shame.”

  “Glory be to God. Dey’s safe.” Meshach spoke as reverently as if they were in front of the altar in church.

  Ophelia clasped her hands to her chest and rocked back and forth. “Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus.” She opened her eyes again and shook her head. “You read to us right now?”

  “You don’t want to wait for the others?”

  “Kin read it again. Dat man lied to us.”

  “If you mean Dunlivey, not quite.” Even the mention of his name made her stomach churn. Cavendar Dunlivey had been pure evil wearing men’s britches. At least she hoped and prayed he was gone. When they left him gutshot in the clearing, she’d promised to send a doctor back, and Meshach had done so, but there had been no word of his demise. But no one lived being gutshot.

  Without a miracle.

  The vivid memory brought burning anger. She hoped he’d died a very slow and extremely painful death. A quick death was far too merciful for the likes of him. Her mother would say she had to forgive Dunlivey in spite of the atrocities he had committed. But she wasn’t ready to grant forgiveness to a man who could do such awful things. Would she ever?

  As she read the letters in the light of the fire, she kept one ear tuned for the jabbering of one little boy and the teasing of the two young black men who cared for the “young marse.”

  “Praise de Lawd, Marse Zachary still alive and gettin’ well. And Missy Carrie Mae done got married.” Tears coursing down her cheeks, Ophelia used Meshach’s broad chest for a towel.

  Tell me these people don’t care for us as much as we care for them. They are not my slaves, but my family. Jesselynn wiped the tears from her own eyes and sniffed. She still had a brother—not a whole one, but a live one nevertheless. Restoring Twin Oaks would be up to him. Saving the Thoroughbreds was even more important to her now. They had to have something left to start over with.

  Hearing the fluted call of a mockingbird, Meshach loosened his hold on Ophelia and stepped to the mouth of the cave to answer. Within moments Thaddeus tore into the cave, a string of two small fish hanging from one hand. “I catch fish. See, Jesse, my fish.”

  Jesselynn held them up and glanced over to see a look of delight on Benjamin’s face.

  “He done caught dem hisself.” He laid a hand on Thaddeus’s curly head. “He be good fisherman.”

  “Those are some fish.” She reached over, grabbed Thaddeus around his middle, and pulled him right into her arms so she could hug and kiss him. He made a face and wriggled to escape.

  “Show ‘Phelia.”

  “Good fish. Good boy.” Ophelia admired his two fish and glanced up to see the string that Daniel held. “Oh, hallelujah days! We have fish and fried potatoes for supper.”

  “And cooked cabbage with onion and a bit of dried venison.” Jesselynn wrapped her arms around her middle. “My belly is dancing up and down.”

  “Read to dem.” Meshach had to shout to be heard above the chatter.

  “We got two letters today, finally one from Lucinda and one from Louisa. Which do you want first?”

  “Lucinda,” the two said in unison.

  Jesselynn read the letter again amid tears and cries of “praise de Lawd” and “thank you, Jesus” as if no one had heard it before.

  “Dey’s alive.” Benjamin cleared his throat and turned away to wipe his eyes. “Smoke bad in here.”

  “I know.” Jesselynn ducked to hide her smile. Why shouldn’t he cry? The rest of them surely had been.

  “Someone still live at Twin Oaks.” Daniel spoke reverently, much like Meshach had. While the buildings were gone, their family was still there, at least part of them.

  “Read de next one—please.”

  Jesselynn did so, receiving many of the same reactions. Who could accept it all? Such wonderful news in both missives!

  “De Lawd giveth and de Lawd taketh away, blessed be de name of de Lawd.” Meshach’s deep, rich voice rolled around the cave almost like music.

  As the others agreed, Jesselynn wanted to cover her ears. The Lord did too much taking, far as she was concerned. “To think Louisa had been caring for this poor soldier, not knowing that he was really her brother, and now he’s back at Aunt Sylvania’s along with other wounded.” She shook her head. “Amazing.”

  “De Lawd’s doing.” Meshach managed to have the
last word.

  Supper that night was a grand affair, and when she brought out the apples for dessert, the only sound to be heard in the cave was the crunch of teeth into crisp apples and the slurping of juice.

  “Ah, me. That some supper. We save de liver for tomorrow.”

  “With more potatoes.” Jesselynn never would have dreamed she could be so ecstatic over apples and potatoes.

  Jane Ellen, another one of the additions to her family since the trip began, started getting the boys ready for bed. While she still spoke little, she no longer had to be fed and walked, as she had after her brother’s death. Now she took on her share, helping Ophelia with the cooking and the smoking of meat. She had volunteered to take over tanning the hides so they would have one hide for a blanket and the other to make moccasins for Daniel and the two little ones. Thaddeus had outgrown his boots and now wore thong-laced foot coverings, more makeshift than moccasin. She’d make his with the hair side in and an extra pad for the sole. That should keep Thaddeus’s feet warm. They were fortunate the winter had been mild so far.

  They all heard the noise at the same time and froze to listen better. Benjamin faded out the opening of the cave like a wisp of smoke.

  RICHMOND, VIRGINIA

  EARLY JANUARY 1863

  The men were arguing again.

  To keep from eavesdropping, Louisa Highwood strolled between the rosebushes in her aunt Sylvania’s garden, the garden she and her wounded men from the army hospital had brought back into its former beauty. Golden daffodils nodded a greeting, and primroses glowed under the magnolia as though an artist had dabbed his brush in bright yellows, reds, and pinks, then spattered the colors in happy profusion. Red and pink azaleas bordered the fence and the house, inviting her to cut a bouquet or two for the rooms inside, which she did, filling the flat basket she carried for just that purpose.

  Cutting and arranging flowers always brought her a time of peace. As usual, the Lord met her there too.

  I know you know where he is. I just wish you would give me some indication. If my lieutenant is alive, please bring him back. If he’s already gone home to be with you . . . The tears blurred the branch of azalea, so she snipped thin air, grazing her finger enough she was sure she’d see blood. “That was close.” She blinked and sniffed, settling her clippers in the basket in order to blow her nose on the hanky she always carried in her apron pocket.