CHAPTER XXX
AT THE PRESIDENT'S
A large warehouse on Main Street in Richmond had been converted into ahospital. Conveniently situated, it had received many of the moredesperately wounded from Williamsburg and Seven Pines and from theskirmishes about the Chickahominy and up and down the Peninsula. Typhoidand malarial cases, sent in from the lines, were also here inabundance. To a great extent, as June wore on, the wounded fromWilliamsburg and Seven Pines had died and been buried, or recovered andreturned to their regiments, or, in case of amputations, been carriedaway after awhile by their relatives. Typhoid and malaria could hardlybe said to decrease, but yet, two days before the battle ofMechanicsville, the warehouse seemed, comparatively speaking, a cool andempty place.
It was being prepared against the battles for which the beleaguered citywaited--waited heartsick and aghast or lifted and fevered, as the casemight be. On the whole, the tragic mask was not worn; the citydeterminedly smiled. The three floors of the warehouse, roughly dividedinto wards, smelled of strong soap and water and home-madedisinfectants. The windows were wide; swish, swish! went the mops uponthe floors. A soldier, with his bandaged leg stretched on a chair beforehim, took to scolding: "Women certainly are funny! What's the sense ofwiping down walls and letting James River run over the floors? Might besome sense in doing it _after_ the battle! Here, Sukey, don't splashthat water this a-way!--Won't keep the blood from the floor when theyall come piling in here to-morrow, and makes all of us damneduncomfortable to-day!--Beg your pardon, Mrs. Randolph! Didn't see you,ma'am.--Yes, I should like a game of checkers--if we can find an islandto play on!"
The day wore on in the hospital. Floors and walls were all scrubbed,window-panes glistening, a Sunday freshness everywhere. The men agreedthat housecleaning was all right--after it was over. The remnant of thewounded occupied the lower floor; typhoid, malaria, and other ills wereupstairs. Stores were being brought in, packages of clothing and lintreceived at the door. A favorite surgeon made his rounds. He was cooland jaunty, his hands in his pockets, a rose in his buttonhole. "Whatare you malingerers doing here, anyhow? You're eating your white bread,with honey on it--you are! Propped up and walking around--Mrs. McGuirereading to you--Mrs. Randolph smilingly letting you beat her at her owngame--Miss Cooper writing beautiful letters for you--Miss Cary leavingreally ill people upstairs just because one of you is an Albemarle manand might recognize a home face! Well! eat the whole slice up to-day,honey and all! for most of you are going home to-morrow. Yes, yes!you're well enough--and we want all the room we can get."
He went on, Judith Cary with him. "Whew! we must be going to have afight!" said the men. "Bigger'n Seven Pines."
"Seven Pines was big enough!"
"That was what I thought--facing Casey's guns!--Your move, Mrs.Randolph."
The surgeon and nurse went on through cool, almost empty spaces. "Thisis going," said the surgeon crisply, "to be an awful big war. Ishouldn't be surprised if it makes a Napoleonic thunder down theages--becomes a mighty legend like Greece and Troy! And, do you know,Miss Cary, the keystone of the arch, as far as we are concerned, is acomposition of three,--the armies in the field, the women of the South,and the servants."
"You mean--"
"I mean that the conduct of the negroes everywhere is an everlastingrefutation of much of the bitter stuff which is said by the other side.This war would crumble like that, if, with all the white men gone, therewere on the plantations faithlessness to trust, hatred, violence,outrage--if there were among us, in Virginia alone, half a millionincendiaries! There aren't, thank God! Instead we owe a great debt ofgratitude to a dark foster-brother. The world knows pretty well what arethe armies in the field. But for the women, Miss Cary, I doubt if theworld knows that the women keep plantations, servants, armies, andConfederacy going!"
"I think," said Judith, "that the surgeons should have a noble statue."
"Even if we do cut off limbs that might have been saved--hey? God knows,they often might! and that there's haste and waste enough!--Here's Sam,bringing in a visitor. A general, too--looks like a Titian I saw once."
"It is my father," said Judith. "He told me he would come for me."
A little later, father and daughter, moving through the ward, found theman from Albemarle--not one of those who would go away to-morrow. He laygaunt and shattered, with strained eyes and fingers picking at thesheet. "Don't you know me, Mocket?"
Mocket roused himself for one moment. "Course I know you, general! Cropsmighty fine this year! Never saw such wheat!" The light sank in hiseyes; his face grew as it was before, and his fingers picked at thesheet. He spoke in a monotone. "We've had such a hard time since we lefthome--We've had such a hard time since we left home--We've had such ahard time since we left home--We--"
Judith dashed her hand across her eyes. "Come away! He says just thatall the time!"
They moved through the ward, Warwick Cary speaking to all. "No, men! Ican't tell you just when will be the battle, but we must look for itsoon--for one or for many. Almost any day now. No, I cannot tell you ifGeneral Jackson is coming. It is not impossible. 'Washington Artillery?'That's a command to be proud of. Let me see your Tiger Head." He lookedat the badge with its motto _Try Us_, and gave it back smilingly. "Well,we do try you, do we not?--on every possible occasion!--Fifth NorthCarolina? Wounded at Williamsburg!--King William Artillery?--Did youhear what General D. H. Hill said at Seven Pines? He said that he wouldrather be captain of the King William Artillery than President of theConfederate States.--Barksdale's Mississippians? Why, men, you are allby-words!"
The men agreed with him happily. "You've got pretty gallant fellowsyourself, general!" The King William man cleared his throat. "He's got adaughter, too, that I'd like to--I'd like to _cheer_!"
"That's so, general!" said the men. "That's so! She's a chip of the oldblock."
Father and daughter laughed and went on--out of this ward and intoanother, quite empty. The two stood by the door and looked, and thatsadly enough. "All the cots, all the pallets," said Cary, in a lowvoice. "And out in the lines, they who will lie upon them! And theycannot see them stretching across their path. I do not know which placeseems now the most ghostly, here or there."
"It was hard to get mattresses enough. So many hospitals--and every onehas given and given--and beds must be kept for those who will be takento private houses. So, at last, some one thought of pew cushions. Theyhave been taken from every church in town. See! sewed together, they dovery well."
They passed into a room where a number of tables were placed, and fromthis into another where several women were arranging articles on broadwooden shelves. "If you will wait here, I will go slip on my outdoordress." One of the women turned. "Judith!--Cousin Cary!--come look atthese quilts which have been sent from over in Chesterfield!" She washalf laughing, half crying. "Rising Suns and Morning Stars and Jonah'sGourds! Oh me! oh me! I can see the poor souls wrapped in them! Theworst of it is, they'll all be used, and we'll be thankful for them, andwish for more! Look at this pile, too, from town! Tarletan dresses cutinto nets, and these surgeons' aprons made from damask tablecloths! Andthe last fringed towels that somebody was saving, with the monogram sobeautifully done!" She opened a closet door. "Look! I'll scrape lint inmy sleep every night for a hundred years! The young girls rolled allthese bandages--" Another called her attention. "Will you give me thestoreroom key? Mrs. Haxall has just sent thirty loaves of bread, andsays she'll bake again to-morrow. There's more wine, too, fromLaburnum."
The first came back. "The room seems full of things, and yet we haveseen how short a way will go what seems so much! And every home getsbarer and barer! The merchants are as good as gold. They send and send,but the stores are getting bare, too! Kent and Paine gave bales andbales of cotton goods. We made them up into these--" She ran her handover great piles of nightshirts and drawers. "But now we see that wehave nothing like enough, and the store has given as much again, and inevery lecture room in town we are sewing hard to get more and yet moredone i
n time. The country people are so good! They have sent inquantities of bar soap--and we needed it more than almost anything!--andcandles, and coarse towelling, and meal and bacon--and hard enough tospare I don't doubt it all is! And look here, Cousin Cary!" Sheindicated a pair of crutches, worn smooth with use. To one a slip ofpaper was tied with a thread. Her kinsman bent forward and read it: "_Ikin mannedge with a stick_."
Judith returned, in her last year's muslin, soft and full, in the shadyEugenie hat which had been sent her from Paris two years ago. It wentwell with the oval face, the heavy bands of soft dark hair, the mouth ofsweetness and strength, the grave and beautiful eyes. Father anddaughter, out they stepped into the golden, late afternoon.
Main Street was crowded. A battery, four guns, each with six horses,came up it with a heavy and jarring sound over the cobblestones. Behindrode a squad or two of troopers. The people on the sidewalk called tothe cannoneers cheerful greetings and inquiries, and the cannoneers andthe troopers returned them in kind. The whole rumbled and clattered by,then turned into Ninth Street. "Ordered out on Mechanicsvillepike--that's all they know," said a man.
The two Carys, freeing themselves from the throng, mounted toward theCapitol Square, entered it, and walked slowly through the terraced,green, and leafy place. There was passing and repassing, but on thewhole the place was quiet. "I return to the lines to-morrow," saidWarwick Cary. "The battle cannot be long postponed. I know that you willnot repeat what I say, and so I tell you that I am sure General Jacksonis on his way from the Valley. Any moment he may arrive."
"And then there will be terrible fighting?"
"Yes; terrible fighting--Look at the squirrels on the grass!"
As always in the square, there were squirrels in the great old trees,and on the ground below, and as always there were negro nurses, brightturbaned, aproned, ample formed, and capable. With them were theircharges, in perambulators, or, if older, flitting like white butterfliesover the slopes of grass. A child of three, in her hand a nut for thesquirrel, started to cross the path, tripped and fell. General Carypicked her up, and, kneeling, brushed the dust from her frock, wooingher to smiles with a face and voice there was no resisting. Shepresently fell in love with the stars on his collar, then transferredher affection to his sword hilt. Her mammy came hurrying. "Ef I des'tuhn my haid, sumpin' bound ter happen, 'n' happen dat minute! Dar now!You ain' hut er mite, honey, 'n' you's still got de goober fer desquirl. Come mek yo' manners to de gineral!"
Released, the two went on. "Have you seen Edward?"
"Yes. Three days ago--pagan, insouciant, and happy! The men adore him.Fauquier is here to-day."
"Oh!--I have not seen him for so long--"
"He will be at the President's to-night. I think you had best go withme--"
"If you think so, father--"
"I know, dear child!--That poor brave boy in his cadet grey andwhite.--But Richard is a brave man--and their mother is heroic. It is ofthe living we must think, and this cause of ours. We are on the eve ofsomething terrible, Judith. When Jackson comes General Lee will haveeighty-five thousand men. Without reinforcements, with McDowell stillaway, McClellan must number an hundred and ten thousand. North andSouth, we are going to grapple, in swamp, and poisoned field, and darkforest. We are gladiators stripped, and which will conquer the godsalone can tell! But we ourselves can tell that we are determined--thateach side is determined--and that the grapple will be of giants. Well!to-night, I think the officers who chance to be in town will go to thePresident's House with these thoughts in mind. To-morrow we return tothe lines; and a great battle chant will be written before we treadthese streets again. For us it may be a paean or it may be a dirge, andonly the gods know which! We salute our flag to-night--the governmentthat may last as lasted Greece or Rome, or the government which mayperish, not two years old! I think that General Lee will be there for ashort time. It is something like a recognition of the moment--alibation; and whether to life or to death, to an oak that shall live athousand years or to a dead child among nations, there is not one livingsoul that knows!"
"I will go, father, of course. Will you come for me?"
"I or Fauquier. I am going to leave you here, at the gates. There issomething I wish to see the governor about, at the mansion."
He kissed her and let her go; stood watching her out of the square andacross the street, then with a sigh turned away to the mansion. Judith,now on the pavement by St. Paul's, hesitated a moment. There was anafternoon service. Women whom she knew, and women whom she did not know,were going in, silent, or speaking each to each in subdued voices. Men,too, were entering, though not many. A few were in uniform; others asthey came from the Capitol or from office or department. Judith, too,mounted the steps. She was very tired, and her religion was anout-of-door one, but there came upon her a craving for the quiet withinSt. Paul's and for the beautiful, old, sonorous words. She entered,found a shadowy pew beneath the gallery, and knelt a moment. As she roseanother, having perhaps marked her as she entered, paused at the door ofthe pew. She saw who it was, put out a hand and drew her in. MargaretCleave, in her black dress, smiled, touched the younger woman's foreheadwith her lips, and sat beside her. The church was not half filled; therewere no people very near them, and when presently there was singing, thesweet, old-world lines beat distantly on the shores of theirconsciousness. They sat hand in hand, each thinking of battlefields; theone with a constant vision of Port Republic, the other of someto-morrow's vast, melancholy, smoke-laden plain.
As was not infrequently the case in the afternoon, an army chaplain readthe service. One stood now before the lectern. "Mr. Corbin Wood,"whispered Judith. Margaret nodded. "I know. We nursed him last winter inWinchester. He came to see me yesterday. He knew about Will. He told melittle things about him--dear things! It seems they were together in anambulance on the Romney march."
Her whisper died. She sat pale and smiling, her beautiful hands lightlyfolded in her lap. For all the years between them, she was in many waysno older than Judith herself. Sometimes the latter called her "CousinMargaret," sometimes simply "Margaret." Corbin Wood read in a mellowvoice that made the words a part of the late sunlight, slanting in thewindows. He raised his arm in an occasional gesture, and the sunbeamsshowed the grey uniform beneath the robe, and made the bright buttonsbrighter. _Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, yechildren of men. For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterdaywhen it is past, and as a watch in the night._
The hour passed, and men and women left St. Paul's. The two beneath thegallery waited until well-nigh all were gone, then they themselvespassed into the sunset street. "I will walk home with you," said Judith."How is Miriam?"
"She is beginning to learn," answered the other; "just beginning, poor,darling child! It is fearful to be young, and to meet the beginning! Butshe is rousing herself--she will be brave at last."
Judith softly took the hand beside her and lifted it to her lips. "Idon't see how your children could help being brave. You are well caredfor where you are?"
"Yes, indeed. Though if my old friend had not taken us in, I do not knowwhat we should have done. The city is fearfully crowded."
"I walked from the hospital with father. He says that the battle will bevery soon."
"I know. The cannon grow louder every night. I feel an assurance, too,that the army is coming from the Valley."
"Sometimes," said Judith, "I say to myself, 'This is a dream--all butone thing! Now it is time to wake up--only remembering that the onething is true.' But the dream goes on, and it gets heavier and morepainful."
"Yes," said Margaret. "But there are great flashes of light through it,Judith."
They were walking beneath linden trees, fragrant, and filled withmurmurous sound. The street here was quiet; only a few passing people.As the two approached the corner there turned it a slight figure, a girldressed in homespun with a blue sunbonnet. In her hands was a cheapcarpet-bag, covered with roses and pansies. She looked tired anddiscouraged, and she set the carp
et-bag down on the worn brick pavementand waited until the two ladies came near. "Please, could you tell me--"she began in a soft, drawling voice, which broke suddenly. "Oh, it'sMrs. Cleave! it's Mrs. Cleave!--Oh! oh!"
"Christianna Maydew!--Why, Christianna!"
Christianna was crying, though evidently they were joyful tears. "I--Iwas so frightened in this lonely place!--an'--an' Thunder Run's so faraway--an'--an' Billy an' Pap an' Dave aren't here, after all--an' Inever saw so many strange people--an' then I saw _you_--oh! oh!"
So brushed aside in this war city were all unnecessary conventions, thatthe three sat down quite naturally upon a wide church step. An old andwrinkled nurse, in a turban like a red tulip, made room for them, movingaside a perambulator holding a sleeping babe. "F'om de mountains, ain'she, ma'am? She oughter stayed up dar close ter Hebben!"
Christianna dried her eyes. Her sunbonnet had fallen back. She lookedlike a wild rose dashed with dew. "I am such a fool to cry!" saidChristianna. "I ought to be laughin' an' clappin' my hands. I reckonI'm tired. Streets are so hard an' straight, an' there's such a terriblenumber of houses."
"How did you come, Christianna, and when, and why?"
"It was this a-way," began Christianna, with the long mountain daybefore her. "It air so lonesome on Thunder Run, with Pap gone, an' Davegone, an' Billy gone, an'--an' Billy gone. An' the one next to me, she'sgrown up quick this year, an' she helps mother a lot. She planted," saidChristianna, with soft pride, "she planted the steep hillside with cornthis spring--yes, Violetta did that!"
"And so you thought--"
"An' Pap has--had--a cousin in Richmond. Nanny Pine is her name. An' sheused to live on Thunder Run, long ago, an' she wasn't like the rest ofthe Maydews, but had lots of sense, an' she up one mahnin', mother says,an' took her foot in her hand, an' the people gave her lifts through thecountry, an' she came to Richmond an' learned millinery--"
"Millinery!"
"Yes'm. To put roses an' ribbons on bonnets. An' she married here, a mannamed Oak, an' she wrote back to Thunder Run, to mother, a real prettyletter, an' mother took it to Mr. Cole at the tollgate (it was long ago,before we children went to school) an' Mr. Cole read it to her, an' itsaid that she had now a shop of her own, an' if ever any Thunder Runpeople came to Richmond to come right straight to her. An' so--"
"And you couldn't find her?"
"An' so, last week, I was spinning. An' I walked up an' down, an' thesun was shining, clear and steady, an' I could see out of the door, an'there wasn't a sound, an' there wa'n't anything moved. An' it was asthough God Almighty had made a ball of gold with green trees on it andhad thrown it away, away! higher than the moon, an' had left it therewith nothin' on it but a dronin', dronin' wheel. An' it was like theworld was where the armies are. An' it was like I had to get theresomehow, an' see Pap again an' Dave an' Billy an'--an' see Billy. Therewa'n't no help for it; it was like I had to go. An' I stopped the wheel,an' I said to mother, 'I am going where the armies are.' An' she says tome, she says, 'You don't know where they are.' An' I says to her, Isays, 'I'll find out.' An' I took my sunbonnet, an' I went down themountain to the tollgate and asked Mr. Cole. An' he had a letterfrom--from Mr. Gold--"
"Oh!" thought Margaret. "It is Allan Gold!"
"An' he read it to me, an' it said that not a man knew, but that hethought the army was goin' to Richmond an' that there would be terriblefightin' if it did. An' I went back up the mountain, an' I said tomother, 'Violetta can do most as much as I can now, an' I am goin' toRichmond where the army's goin'. I am goin' to see Pap an' Dave an'--an'Billy, an' I am goin' to stay with Cousin Nanny Pine.' An' mother says,says she, 'Her name is Oak now, but I reckon you'll know her house bythe bonnets in the window.' Mother was always like that," saidChristianna, again, with soft pride. "Always quick-minded! She sees thesquirrel in the tree quicker'n any of us--'ceptin' it's Billy. An' shesays, 'How're you goin' to get thar, Christianna--less'n you walk?' An'I says, 'I'll walk.'"
"Oh, poor child!" cried Judith! "Did you?"
"No, ma'am; only a real little part of the way. It's a hundred and fiftymiles, an' we ain't trained to march, an' it would have taken me solong. No, ma'am. Mrs. Cole heard about my goin' an' she sent a boy totell me to come see her, an' I went, an' she gave me a dollar (I surelyam goin' to pay it back, with interest) an' a lot of advice, an' shecouldn't tell me how to find Pap an' Dave an' Billy, but she said a dealof people would know about Allan Gold, for he was a great scout, an' shegave me messages for him; an' anyhow the name of the regiment was the65th, an' the colonel was your son, ma'am, an' he would find the othersfor me. An' she got a man to take me in his wagon, twenty miles towardLynchburg, for nothin'. An' I thanked him, an' asked him to have some ofthe dinner mother an' Violetta had put in a bundle for me; but he saidno, he wasn't hungry. An' that night I slept at a farmhouse, an' theywouldn't take any pay. An' the next day and the next I walked toLynchburg, an' there I took the train." Her voice gathered firmness. "Ihad never seen one before, but I took it all right. I asked if it wasgoin' to Richmond, an' I climbed on. An' a man came along an' asked mefor my ticket, an' I said that I didn't have one, but that I wanted topay if it wasn't more than a dollar. An' he asked me if it was a golddollar or a Confederate dollar. An' there were soldiers on the train,an' one came up an' took off his hat an' asked me where I was goin', an'I told him an' why, an' he said it didn't matter whether it was gold orConfederate, and that the conductor didn't want it anyhow. An' theconductor--that was what the first man was called--said he didn'treckon I'd take up much room, an' that the road was so dog-goned tiredthat one more couldn't make it any tireder, an' the soldier made me sitdown on one of the benches, an' the train started." She shut her eyestightly. "I don't like train travel. I like to go slower--"
"But it brought you to Richmond--"
Christianna opened her eyes. "Yes, ma'am, we ran an' ran all day, makinga lot of noise, an' it was so dirty; an' then last night we gothere--an' I slept on a bench in the house where we got out--only Ididn't sleep much, for soldiers an' men an' women were going in and outall night long--an' then in the mahnin' a coloured woman there gave me aglass of milk an' showed me where I could wash my face--an' then I cameout into the street an' began to look for Cousin Nanny Pine--"
"And you couldn't find her?"
"She isn't here, ma'am. I walked all mahnin', looking, but I couldn'tfind her, an' nobody that I asked knew. An' they all said that the armyfrom the Valley hadn't come yet, an' they didn't even know if it wascoming. An' I was tired an' frightened, an' then at last I saw a windowwith two bonnets in it, and I said, 'Oh, thank the Lord!' an' I went an'knocked. An' it wasn't Cousin Nanny Pine. It was another milliner. 'Mrs.Oak?' she says, says she. 'Mrs. Oak's in Williamsburg! Daniel Oak gothis leg cut off in the battle, an' she boarded up her windows an' wentto Williamsburg to nurse him--an' God knows I might as well board upmine, for there's nothin' doin' in millinery!' An' she gave me mydinner, an' she told me that the army hadn't come yet from the Valley,an' she said she would let me stay there with her, only she had threecousins' wives an' their children, refugeein' from Alexandria way an'stayin' with her, an' there wasn't a morsel of room. An' so I rested foran hour, an' then I came out to look for some place to stay. An' it'smortal hard to find." Her soft voice died. She wiped her eyes with thecape of her sunbonnet.
"She had best come with me," said Margaret to Judith. "Yes, there isroom--we will make room--and it will not be bad for Miriam to have someone.... Are we not all looking for that army? And her people are inRichard's regiment." She rose. "Christianna, child, neighbours musthelp one another out! So come with me, and we shall manage somehow!"
Hospitality rode well forward in the Thunder Run creed. Christiannaaccepted with simplicity what, had their places been changed, she wouldas simply have given. She began to look fair and happy, a wild rose insunshine. She was in Richmond, and she had found a friend, and the armywas surely coming! As the three rose from the church step, there passeda knot of mounted soldiers. It chanced to be the Pres
ident's staff, withseveral of Stuart's captains, and the plumage of these was yet bright.The Confederate uniform was a handsome one; these who wore it were youngand handsome men. From spur to hat and plume they exercised a charm.Somewhere, in the distance, a band was playing, and their noble, mettledhorses pranced to the music. As they passed they raised their hats. One,who recognized Judith, swept his aside with a gesture appropriate to aminuet. With sword and spur, with horses stepping to music, by theywent. Christianna looked after them with dazzled eyes. She drew afluttering breath. "I didn't know things like that were in the world!"
A little later the three reached the gate of the house which shelteredMargaret and Miriam. "I won't go in," said Judith. "It is growinglate.... Margaret, I am going to the President's to-night. Father wishesme to go with him. He says that we are on the eve of a great battle, andthat it is right--" Margaret smiled upon her. "It _is_ right. Of courseyou must go, dear and darling child! Do not think that I shall evermisunderstand you, Judith!"
The other kissed her, clinging for a moment to her. "Oh, mother,mother!... I hear the cannon, too, louder and louder!" She broke away."I must _not_ cry to-night. To-night we must all have large brighteyes--like the women in Brussels when 'There was revelry bynight'--Isn't it fortunate that the heart doesn't show?"
The town was all soft dusk when she came to the kinsman's house whichhad opened to her. Crowded though it was with refugee kindred, withsoldier sons coming and going, it had managed to give her a small quietniche, a little room, white-walled, white-curtained, in the very armsof a great old tulip tree. The window opened to the east, and the viewwas obstructed only by the boughs of the tree. Beyond them, throughleafy openings, night by night she watched a red glare on the easternhorizon--McClellan's five-mile-distant camp-fires. Entering presentlythis room, she lit two candles, placed them on the dressing table, andproceeded to make her toilette for the President's House.
Through the window came the sound of the restless city. It was like thebeating of a distant sea, with a ground swell presaging storm. The wind,blowing from the south, brought, too, the voice of the river, passionateover its myriad rocks, around its thousand islets. There were odours offlowers; somewhere there was jasmine. White moths came in at the window,and Judith, rising, put glass candle-shades over the candles. She satbrushing her long hair; fevered with the city's fever, she saw notherself in the glass, but all the stress that had been and the stressthat was to be. Cleave's latest letter had rested in the bosom of herdress; now the thin oblong of bluish paper lay before her on thedressing table. The river grew louder, the wind from the south stirredthe masses of her hair, the jasmine odour deepened. She bent forward,spreading her white arms over the dark and smooth mahogany, drooped herhead upon them, rested lip and cheek against the paper. The sound of thewarrior city, the river and the wind, beat out a rhythm in thewhite-walled room. _Love--Death! Love--Death! Dear Love--DarkDeath--Eternal Love_--She rose, laid the letter with others from him inan old sandalwood box, coiled her hair and quickly dressed. A littlelater, descending, she found awaiting her, in the old, formal, quaintparlour, Fauquier Cary.
The two met with warm affection. Younger by much than was the master ofGreenwood, he was to the latter's children like one of their owngeneration, an elder brother only. He held her from him and looked ather. "You are a lovely woman, Judith! Did it run the blockade?"
Judith laughed: "No! I wear nothing that comes that way. It is an olddress, and it is fortunate that Easter darns so exquisitely!"
"Warwick will meet us at the house. We both ride back before dawn. Why,I have not seen you since last summer!"
"No. Just before Manassas!"
They went out. "I should have brought a carriage for you. But they arehard to get--"
"I would rather walk. It is not far. You look for the battle to-morrow?"
"That depends, I imagine, on Jackson. Perhaps to-morrow, perhaps thenext day. It will be bloody fighting when it comes--Heigho!"
"The bricks of the pavement know that," said Judith. "Sometimes,Fauquier, you can see horror on the faces of these houses--just asplain! and at night I hear the river reading the bulletin!"
"Poor child!--Yes, we make all nature a partner. Judith, I was glad tohear of Richard Cleave's happiness--as glad as I was surprised. Why, Ihardly know, and yet I had it firmly in mind that it was MauryStafford--"
Judith spoke in a pained voice. "I cannot imagine why so many peopleshould have thought that. Yes, and Richard himself. It never was; and Iknow I am no coquette!"
"No. You are not a coquette. Ideas like that arrive, one never knowshow--like thistledown in the air--and suddenly they are planted and hardto uproot. Stafford himself breathed it somehow. That offends you,naturally; but I should say there was never a man more horribly in love!It was perhaps a fixed idea with him that he would win you, and othersmisread it. Well, I am sorry for him! But I like Richard best, and hewill make you happier."
He talked on, in his dry, attractive voice, moving beside her slender,wiry, resolute, trained muscle and nerve, from head to foot. "I was atthe Officer's Hospital this morning to see Carewe. He was wounded atPort Republic, and his son and an old servant got him here somehow. Hewas talking about Richard. He knew his father. He says he'll be abrigadier the first vacancy, and that, if the war lasts, he won't stopthere. He'll go very high. You know Carewe?--how he talks? 'Yes, by God,sir, Dick Cleave's son's got the stuff in him! Always was a kind ofdumb, heroic race. Lot of iron ore in that soil, some gold, too. Onlyneeded the prospector, Big Public Interest, to come along. Shouldn'twonder if he carved his name pretty high on the cliff.'--Now, Judith, Ihave stopped beneath this lamp just to see you look the transfiguredlover--happier at praise of him than at garlands and garlands foryourself!--Hm! Drawn to the life. Now we'll go on to the President'sHouse."
The President's House on Shockoe Hill was all alight, men and womenentering between white pillars, from the long windows music floating.Beyond the magnolias and the garden the ground dropped suddenly. Far andwide, a vast horizon, there showed the eastern sky, and far and wide,below the summer stars, there flared along it a reddish light--thecamp-fires of two armies, the grey the nearer, the blue beyond. Faint,faint, you could hear the bugles. It was a dark night; no moon, only theflicker of fireflies in magnolias and roses and the gush of light fromthe tall, white-pillared house. The violins within were playing"Trovatore." Warwick Cary, an aide with him, came from the direction ofthe Capitol and joined his daughter and brother. The three enteredtogether.
There was little formality in these gatherings at the White House of theConfederacy. The times were too menacing, the city too conversant withalarm bells, sudden shattering bugle notes, thunderclaps of cannon, menand women too close companions of great and stern presences, for theexhibition of much care for the minuter social embroidery. No necessaryand fitting tracery was neglected, but life moved now in a very intensewhite light, so deep and intense that it drowned many things which inother days had had their place in the field of vision. There was an oldbutler at the President's door, and a coloured maid hovered near to helpwith scarf or flounce if needed. In the hall were found two volunteeraides, young, handsome, gay, known to all, striking at once the note ofwelcome. Close within the drawing-room door stood a member of thePresident's Staff, Colonel Ives, and beside him his wife, a young,graceful, and accomplished woman. These smilingly greeted the coming orsaid farewell to the parting guest.
The large drawing-room was fitted for conversation. Damask-covered sofaswith carved rosewood backs, flanked and faced by claw-foot chairs, werefound in corners and along the walls; an adjoining room, not so brightlylit, afforded further harbourage, while without was the pillaredportico, with roses and fireflies and a view of the flare upon thehorizon. From some hidden nook the violins played Italian opera. On themantles and on one or two tables, midsummer flowers bloomed in Parianvases.
Scattered in groups, through the large room, were men in uniform andcivilians in broadcloth and fine linen. So peculiarly constitu
ted werethe Confederate armies that it was usual to find here a goodly number ofprivate soldiers mingling with old schoolmates, friends, kindred wearingthe bars and stars of lieutenants, captains, majors, colonels, andbrigadiers. But to-night all privates and all company officers were withtheir regiments; there were not many even of field and staff. It wasknown to be the eve of a fight, a very great fight; passes into townwere not easy to obtain. Those in uniform who were here counted; theywere high in rank. Mingling with them were men of the civilgovernment,--cabinet officers, senators, congressmen, judges, heads ofbureaus; and with these, men of other affairs: hardly a man but wasformally serving the South. If he were not in the field he was of herlegislatures; if not there, then doing his duty in some civil office; ifnot there, wrestling with the management of worn-out railways; or, cooland keen, concerned in blockade running, bringing in arms andammunition, or in the Engineer Bureau, or the Bureau of Ordnance or theMedical Department, or in the service of the Post, or at the Treasuryissuing beautiful Promises to Pay, or at the Tredegar moulding cannon,or in the newspaper offices wrestling with the problem of worn-out typeand wondering where the next roll of paper was to come from, or in thetelegraph service shaking his head over the latest raid, the latest cutwires; or he was experimenting with native medicinal plants, withballoons, with explosives, torpedoes, submarine batteries; or thinkingof probable nitre caves, of the possible gathering of copper from olddistilleries, of the scraping saltpetre from cellars, of how to get tin,of how to get chlorate of potassium, of how to get gutta-percha, of howto get paper, of how to get salt for the country at large; or he wasrunning sawmills, building tanneries, felling oak and gum for artillerycarriages, working old iron furnaces, working lead mines, busy withfoundry and powder mill.... If he was old he was enlisted in the CityGuard, a member of the Ambulance Committee, a giver of his worldlysubstance. All the South was at work, and at work with a courage towhich were added a certain colour and _elan_ not without value on herpage of history. The men, not in uniform, here to-night were doing theirpart, and it was recognized that they were doing it. The women, no less;of whom there were a number at the President's House this evening. Withsoft, Southern voices, with flowers banded in their hair, with barethroat and arms, with wide, filmy, effective all-things-but-new dresses,they moved through the rooms, or sat on the rosewood sofas, or walkingon the portico above the roses looked out to the flare in the east. Somehad come from the hospitals,--from the Officer's, from Chimborazo,Robinson's, Gilland's, the St. Charles, the Soldier's Rest, the SouthCarolina, the Alabama,--some from the sewing-rooms, where they cut andsewed uniforms, shirts, and underclothing, scraped lint, rolledbandages; several from the Nitre and Mining Bureau, where they madegunpowder; several from the Arsenal, where they made cartridges andfilled shells. These last would be refugee women, fleeing from thecounties overrun by the enemy, all their worldly wealth swept away, benton earning something for mother or father or child. One and all had comefrom work, and they were here now in the lights and flowers, not so muchfor their own pleasure as that there might be cheer, music, light,laughter, flowers, praise, and sweetness for the men who were going tobattle. Men and women, all did not come or go at once; they passed inand out of the President's House, some tarrying throughout the evening,others but for a moment. The violins left "Il Trovatore," began upon"Les Huguenots."
The President stood between the windows, talking with a little group ofmen,--Judge Campbell, R. M. T. Hunter, Randolph the Secretary of War,General Wade Hampton, General Jeb Stuart. Very straight and tall, thin,with a clear-cut, clean-shaven, distinguished face, with a look halfmilitary man, half student, with a demeanour to all of perfect ifsomewhat chilly courtesy, by temperament a theorist, able with theability of the field marshal or the scholar in the study, not with thatof the reader and master of men, the hardest of workers, devoted,honourable, single-minded, a figure on which a fierce light has beaten,a man not perfect, not always just, nor always wise, bound in the toilsof his own personality, but yet an able man who suffered and gave all,believed in himself, and in his cause, and to the height of his powerlaboured for it day and night--Mr. Davis stood speaking of Indianaffairs and of the defences of the Western waters.
Warwick Cary, his daughter on his arm, spoke to the President's wife, acomely, able woman, with a group about her of strangers whom she wasputting at their ease, then moved with Judith to the windows. ThePresident stepped a little forward to meet them. "Ah, General Cary, Iwish you could bring with you a wind from the Blue Ridge this stiflingnight! We must make this good news from the Mississippi refresh usinstead! I saw your troops on the Nine-Mile road to-day. They cheeredme, but I felt like cheering them! Miss Cary, I have overheard sixofficers ask to-night if Miss Cary had yet come."
Warwick began to talk with Judge Campbell. Judith laughed. "It was notof me they were asking, Mr. President! There is Hetty Cary entering now,and behind her Constance, and there are your six officers! I am but aleaf blown from the Blue Ridge."
"Gold leaf," said Wade Hampton.
The President used toward all women a stately deference. "I hope," hesaid, "that, having come once to rest in this room, you will often let agood wind blow you here--" Other guests claimed his attention. "Ah, Mrs.Stanard--Mrs. Enders--Ha, Wigfall! I saw your Texans this afternoon--"Judith found General Stuart beside her. "Miss Cary, a man of the BlackTroop came back to camp yesterday. Says he, 'They've got an angel in theStonewall Hospital! She came from Albemarle, and her name is Judith. IfI were Holofernes and a Judith like that wanted my head, by George, I'dcut it off myself to please her!'--Yes, yes, my friend!--Miss Cary, mayI present my Chief of Staff, Major the Baron Heros von Borcke? Talkpoetry with him, won't you?--Ha, Fauquier! that was a pretty dash youmade yesterday! Rather rash, I thought--"
The other withered him with a look. "That was a carefully planned,cautiously executed manoeuvre; modelled it after our oldreconnoissance at Cerro Gordo. You to talk of rashness!--Here's A. P.Hill."
Judith, with her Prussian soldier of fortune, a man gentle, intelligent,and brave, crossed the room to one of the groups of men and women. Thoseof the former who were seated rose, and one of the latter put out an armand claimed her with a caressing touch. "You are late, child! So am I.They brought in a bad case of fever, and I waited for the night nurse.Sit here with us! Mrs. Fitzgerald's harp has been sent for and she isgoing to sing--"
Judith greeted the circle. A gentleman pushed forward a chair. "Thankyou, Mr. Soule. My father and I stay but a little while, Mrs. Randolph,but it must be long enough to hear Mrs. Fitzgerald sing--Yes, he ishere, Colonel Gordon--there, speaking with Judge Campbell and GeneralHill.--How is the general to-day, Mrs. Johnston?"
"Better, dear, or I should not be here. I am here but for a moment. Hemade me come--lying there on Church Hill, staring at that light in thesky!--Here is the harp."
Its entrance, borne by two servants, was noted. The violins were hushed,the groups turned, tended to merge one into another. A voice was heardspeaking with a strong French accent--Colonel the Count Camille dePolignac, tall, gaunt, looking like a Knight of Malta--begging that theharp might be placed in the middle of the room. It was put there. JebStuart led to it the lovely Louisianian. Mrs. Fitzgerald drew off hergloves and gave them to General Magruder to hold, relinquished her fanto Mr. Jules de Saint Martin, her bouquet to Mr. Francis Lawley of theLondon _Times_, and swept her white hand across the strings. She was amistress of the harp, and she sang to it in a rich, throbbingly sweetvoice, song after song as they were demanded. Conversation through thelarge room did not cease, but voices were lowered, and now and then camea complete lull in which all listened. She sang old Creole ditties andthen Scotch and Irish ballads.
Judith found beside her chair the Vice-President. "Ah, Miss Cary, whenyou are as old as I am, and have read as much, you will notice howemphatic is the testimony to song and dance and gaiety on the eve ofevents which are to change the world! The flower grows where in an hourthe volcano will burst forth; the bird sings in the tree which the
earthquake will presently uproot; the pearly shell gleams where willpass the tidal wave--" He looked around the room. "Beauty, zeal, love,devotion--and to-morrow the smoke will roll, the cannon thunder, and thebrute emerge all the same--just as he always does--just as he alwaysdoes--stamping the flower into the mire, wringing the bird's neck,crushing the shell! Well, well, let's stop moralizing. What's shesinging now? Hm! 'Kathleen Mavourneen.' Ha, Benjamin! What's the newswith you?"
Judith, turning a little aside, dreamily listened now to the singer, nowto phrases of the Vice-President and the Secretary of State. "Afterthis, if we beat them now, a treaty surely.... Palmerston--TheEmperour--The Queen of Spain--Mason says ... Inefficiency of theblockade--Cotton obligations--Arms and munitions...." Still talking,they moved away. A strident voice reached her from the end of theroom--L. Q. C. Lamar, here to-night despite physicians. "The fight hadto come. We are men, not women. The quarrel had lasted long enough. Wehate each other, so the struggle had to come. Even Homer's heroes, afterthey had stormed and scolded long enough, fought like brave men, longand well--"
"Ye banks and braes and streams around The castle o' Montgomery--"
sang Mrs. Fitzgerald.
There was in the room that slow movement which imperceptibly changes awell-filled stage, places a figure now here, now there, shifts thegrouping and the lights. Now Judith was one of a knot of younger women.In the phraseology of the period, all were "belles"; Hetty and ConstanceCary, Mary Triplett, Turner MacFarland, Jenny Pegram, the three Fishers,Evelyn Cabell, and others. About them came the "beaux,"--the youngerofficers who were here to-night, the aides, the unwedded legislators.Judith listened, talked, played her part. She had a personal success inRichmond. Her name, her beauty, the at times quite divine expression ofher face, made the eye follow, after which a certain greatness of mindwas felt and the attention became riveted. The pictures moved again,Mrs. Fitzgerald singing "positively, this time, the last!" Some of the"belles," attended by the "beaux," drifted toward the portico, severaltoward the smaller room and its softly lowered lights. A very young man,an artillerist, tall and fair, lingered beside Judith. "'Auld langSyne!' I do not think that she ought to sing that to-night! I havenoticed that when you hear music just before battle the strain is apt torun persistently in your mind. She ought to sing us 'Scots wha hae--'"
A gentleman standing near laughed. "That's good, or my name isn't RanTucker! Mrs. Fitzgerald, Captain Pelham does not wish to be left in such'a weavin' way.' He says that song is like an April shower on a bag ofpowder. The inference is that it will make the horse artillerychicken-hearted. I move that you give John Pelham and the assemblage'Scots wha hae wi Wallace bled'--"
The singing ended, there was a wider movement through the room. Judith,with Pelham still beside her, walked on the portico, in the warm,rose-laden air. There was no moon, and the light in the east was verymarked. "If we strike McClellan's right," said the artillerist, "allthis hill and the ground to the north of it will be the place from whichto watch the battle. If it lasts after nightfall, you will see theexploding shells beautifully." They stood at the eastern end, Judithleaning against one of the pillars. Here a poet and editor of the_Southern Literary Messenger_ joined them; with him a young man, asculptor, Alexander Galt. A third, Washington the painter, came, too.The violins had begun again--Mozart now--"The Magic Flute." "Oh, smellthe roses!" said the poet. "To-night the roses, to-morrow thethorns--but roses, too, among the thorns, deep and sweet! There willstill be roses, will there not, Miss Cary?"
"Yes, still," said Judith. "If I could paint, Mr. Washington, I wouldtake that gleam on the horizon."
"Yes, is it not fine? It is a subject, however, for a mystic. I have anidea myself for a picture, if I can get the tent-cloth to paint it on,and if some brushes and tubes I sent for ever get through the block."
"If I had a tent I certainly would give it to you," said Pelham. "Whatwould you paint?"
"A thing that happened ten days ago. The burial of Latane. The womenburied him, you know. At Summer Hill.--Mrs. Brockenborough, and herdaughter-in-law and grandchildren. Somebody read me a letter aboutit--so simple it wrung your heart! 'By God,' I said, 'what Roman thingshappen still!' And I thought I'd like to paint the picture."
"I read the letter, too," said the poet. "I am making some verses aboutit--see if you like them--
"For woman's voice, in accents soft and low, Trembling with pity, touched with pathos, read O'er his hallowed dust the ritual for the dead:
"'Tis sown in weakness, it is raised in power'-- Softly the promise floated on the air, While the low breathings of the sunset hour Came back responsive to the mourner's prayer. Gently they laid him underneath the sod And left him with his fame, his country and his God!"
"Yes," said Judith, sweetly and gravely. "How can we but like them? AndI hope that you will find the tent-cloth, Mr. Washington."
Reentering, presently, the large room, they found a vague stir, peoplebeginning to say good-night, and yet lingering. "It is growing late,"said some one, "and yet I think that he will come." Her father came upto her and drew her hand through his arm. "Here is General Lee now. Wewill wait a moment longer, then go."
They stood in the shadow of the curtains watching the Commander-in-Chiefjust pausing to greet such and such an one in his progress toward thePresident. An aide or two came behind; the grand head and form moved on,simple and kingly. Judith drew quicker breath. "Oh, he looks so great aman!"
"He looks what he is," said Warwick Cary. "Now let us go, too, and saygood-night."