A Secret Refuge [02] Sisters of the Confederacy (4 page)

Two days later they heard cannon fire to the north of them.

“Where you goin’?” Meshach gripped the reins under Chess’s bit.

“I’ve got to see if Aunt Agatha is all right.”

“You can’t go now. Dey’s still shootin’.”

Jesselynn slumped forward in her saddle. She couldn’t help but recognize the wisdom of his words, but she had the terrible feeling her aunt was in trouble and needed her.

“We go together on toward dark so we can sneak into de town.”

But what if she is wounded and there’s no one to help her?
Jesselynn dismounted, feeling guilt like the weight of the heavens pressing her down. So many to take care of. How would she stand it if Aunt Agatha was forced to join them in the cave earlier than either dreamed?

Within herself she cursed the war and the men who thought war so glorious, including her brothers. Her father had done everything he could to keep Kentucky out of it, but hotter heads than his had prevailed.

The thought of the western prairies and Oregon was becoming more practical all the time. And more real. What started as Meshach’s dream was rapidly becoming hers. Anything to get away from battles and skirmishes and soldiers of either gray or blue. If she never saw another uniform, it would be far too soon.

“Is Chess trained to harness yet?”

“Some. You want we take him and Dulcie to pull de wagon?”

“I think so.” Jesselynn rubbed her forehead. “I don’t know what I want.” With her monthlies upon her again, she felt like crawling under her quilt and pulling it over her head. None of this thinking and worrying. She shivered in a blast of cold air blown from the north through the hollow, turning it into a wind tunnel.

The wind also brought the sound of artillery fire. She flinched every time a cannon fired. If they could hear the reports this far away, what was it like in town? One of the four small forts built throughout the city was only a few blocks from Agatha’s home. Who was firing? Union or Confederate howitzers or both? While she’d never been in an area under siege, she’d seen the aftermath.

“Jesse. Up.” Thaddeus reached his arms high as he begged. When she paid him no nevermind, distracted by another volley, he tugged on her pants leg.

Acting on habit and paying no attention to her actions, she swung him up into her arms and rocked from side to side. “Can anyone live through all that?”

“Jesse.” Thaddeus swung to the side to look directly in her face, and when that didn’t work, he put his hands on both her cheeks and turned her face his way.

“Stop that.” She jerked away but melted instantly when his round blue eyes swam with tears. “Sorry, baby. Jesse is thinking of something else.”

“Guns go boom.”

“Yes, that they do.”
And people die, and houses and stores are destroyed. Why can’t they go fight out in the woods instead of in a town?
She had heard stories of how the fashionable people from Washington and other cities had taken picnic baskets out to sit on the bluffs and watch the fighting down below. In some cases retreating soldiers ran right over the spectators.

Sometime later Benjamin returned from a scouting trip, and after standing by the fire to warm himself for a bit, he turned to Meshach. “I found somethin’ real interestin’.”

“What you find?” Meshach kept working the deer hide, softening it so they could make clothing from it.

“Tracks of our mule.”

Jesselynn looked up from her stitching. “Where?”

“’Bout three miles south. I follow, cotch up, and watch. Dey got five niggers in chains.”

“Slave traders!” Jesselynn hissed the word with pure venom. “The ones who beat Daniel.”

“But why dey beat ‘im and den try to lynch ‘im?”

“Pure stupid mean, like Dunlivey. That’s why.”
What if these are Dunlivey’s men? The ones who deserted him?
Jesselynn let her thoughts take off on this trail. Having the mule back would be a godsend. But having five extra mouths to feed would be tantamount to disaster.

“We get dem. I takes care of movin’ dem on.” Meshach looked up from studying his clasped hands. Sitting on the other side of the fire, his eyes shone white in the gloom.

“But they’ll come lookin’ for them.”

“Maybe not.”

“You’d . . .” Jesselynn gulped. Shooting in self-defense was one thing. Looking to murder was another. Yet how many people had this band murdered, lynched, or burned out? “But the Bible says, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ ”

“Bible also say, ‘eye for an eye.’ ”

Here she was arguing with Meshach, using the Bible, all the while trying to convince herself that God didn’t really matter. Or at least that He didn’t care what happened in this brutal mess of man’s own making. She shook her head. “I’ll go with you.”

“No.” Meshach motioned to the two sleeping boys, to Jane Ellen and Ophelia. “Someone need take care of dem.”

Jesselynn knew he meant if the three men didn’t come back. The thought gave her a raging case of dry mouth. She set her sewing aside, rose, and got a drink out of the bucket of water. Standing, sipping the cold water, she studied the big black man across the cave. Gentle was always her first thought of him. She thought she knew him through and through.

“When?”

“Tonight.”

“But you said we would go for Aunt Agatha.” She was the mistress. She had to take control here.

“Yes. First town, den we go.”

Five fugitive slaves and Aunt Agatha?
But then, Aunt Agatha might be just fine, mostly frightened out of her wits by the shelling but cooking meals and reading her Bible, and . . . Jesselynn thought longingly of that quilt again. And her silent surrender to its comfort.

What if they didn’t come back? What would she do?

“We come back, Marse Jesse. Don’ you fear.”

She shoved her hands in her pockets. “That’s what Father said too, and Zachary and Adam and John and every other man I know. Meshach, they will do their living best to kill you. Don’t doubt that for a minute.”

“Not if dey don’ hear us comin’.” His words fell in a silence punctuated by Ophelia’s sniffling and a log breaking in the fire. Sparks flew upward. Meshach stood. “I get de wagon ready. We start soon.”

With cut firewood loaded in the wagon bed, they set off for town under gray skies and a chilling wind. They would either leave the firewood off for Aunt Agatha or take it to Mr. Dummont at the store in exchange for grain for the two mares. The closer the time for foaling, the better feeding they needed.

Jesselynn pulled her wool coat tighter around her shoulders. Now if she’d only made herself a cap of the deerskin, the wind wouldn’t penetrate clear to her bones. They could see smoke on the horizon as soon as they topped the last ridge to the prairie.

As they drew closer, Jesselynn shuddered. From here it looked as if the entire town was afire. Surely they wouldn’t torch Springfield. But within a mile or so, they could see the fires were separate, not a massive conflagration.

When Meshach drove into a yard that had a large open barn, she looked at him with questions jumping faster than her words.

“What . . .”

He held up a hand. “We be safe here. We walk rest of de way.”

“Oh. How do you know—?” Again her question was cut off by that same hand now guiding the horses into the dark barn. He wrapped the reins around the brake handle and stepped to the ground. While he tied the horses to a post, Jesselynn stood and stamped her feet, willing feeling back into them before she tried the descent.

“Don’t we need to ask, to tell . . .”

He shook his head and strode on ahead of her. She dogtrotted to catch up to his long strides.

“Meshach, wait!”

“Sorry, Marse Jesse. I got to thinkin’ ‘bout dem slavers, and I get so mad I want to go after dem now.”

He slowed to her speed, even though she knew she walked fast. And thinking of Aunt Agatha leant wings to her feet anyway. They walked around a hole in the street caused by an exploding cannonball. One of the houses a block from her aunt’s was burned to the ground and still smoldering. A dog lay dead in the street. An old man and a woman stood crying in front of a house now minus half a roof.

Jesselynn broke into a jog. “Please, God, please, God.” She had no idea what she was saying. All she could think about was Aunt Agatha. Agatha lying dead under a tumble of rafters. Agatha bleeding with no one to bandage her.

They stopped in front of the house. Several windows had been shot out, and the brick chimney now lay in a pile of bricks. And while other homes were starting to light lamps and candles against the graying dusk, not a glimmer showed in the black eyes of the sagging house.

“Aunt Agatha?” Jesselynn pushed open the back door. “Agatha, where are you?” She listened for an answer that never came. She rushed through the house, checking the rooms downstairs while Meshach took the second floor.

“Nothin’.” They met at the foot of the staircase.

“Me either. Where could she be?”

“Someone take her in? Big hole in de roof. Cannonball go through de wall too. Bad time when rain or storm come.”

“You check that way, and I’ll go this way.” Jesselynn pointed up the street. “And we meet back here in just a few minutes.”

She pounded on doors, but no one would or could answer. Where were all the people who lived on this street? Were they in hiding, afraid to answer? Had the soldiers rounded up all the citizens of Springfield? She darted out of one picket gate and ran to the next house. Looking over her shoulder, she saw Meshach heading back for Aunt Agatha’s, so she turned and ran back.

“Dey’s in de church two blocks dat way.” He pointed toward the west.

As they jogged down a side street, he added, “De reverend put out a call for all who were hurt or dere houses shelled to come to de church. De people bring food and keep warm dere.”

But Agatha wasn’t at the church. And no one claimed to have seen her.

“I’m sorry,” the pastor said. “If she arrives, I will tell her you are looking for her. Ah, did you check the cellar? Many of the older people around here hid in the cellar and barricaded the door.”

“Thank you, no, I didn’t think of the cellar, but we hollered loud enough to wake the dead.”

Jesselynn and Meshach trotted back to the house. “I’ll get a candle, and you see if you can open that door.”

Jesselynn found a candle but not a spill to light it, and the fire had long since gone out. She dropped the candle on the table in disgust and hurried back outside.

“De door locked from inside.” Meshach stood and, puffing slightly, put his hands on his hips. “Call her. Say who you are.”

What if she hid in the cellar like a cat that crawls away to die? Father would never forgive me for not taking better care of his sister
. Jesselynn leaned over the door. “Aunt Agatha, it’s me, Marse Jesse, your nephew.” She knew those words, if anything, would bring her aunt out of hiding, if she were able. “Aunt Agatha, can you hear me? Are you hurt?”

“Jesselynn?” The weak voice brought tears of gratitude flowing down Jesselynn’s cheeks.

“Yes, Aunt, it’s me. Can you unlock the door?”

“Who’s with you?”

“Meshach has come to help. Just open the door now, hear?”

They listened to the scratch and thud of a board being removed from the brackets on the underside of the doors.

“There.”

Meshach pulled up on the edge of the door and laid it back, then the other one.

Aunt Agatha’s face glowed white in the dimness. Jesselynn clattered down the stone steps and took her aunt in her arms. “Come, let’s get you out of here. You must be freezing. You are shivering.”

“I carry her?”

“I can walk, thank you.” The spice back in her voice made Jesselynn smile at Meshach and receive one in return. Spice was good.

A silence lay over the town, the sound of no shooting or yelling almost as loud as the battle. Smoke hung in the air, smelling both of burning wood and gunpowder. The wind of earlier had died with the falling of the sun, even though the cloud cover prevented them from seeing a sunset. A child wailed in a house somewhere near them.

Agatha used the railing to pull herself up the remaining steps. “How bad is the damage to the house? I heard a terrible crash some hours ago.”

“Cannonball knock over de chimbley. Big hole in roof and one wall. Rain come in some bad.”

They entered the dark house, following Agatha, who had no need to feel her way.

“Then I shall have to sleep in the parlor.” She crossed to the stove and rattled the grate. “If you would light the stove, Jesselynn, I will put supper on to heat.”

“But you have no chimney.”

“Surely the stovepipe works. Start it and we shall see how it draws.”

“Aunt Agatha, I think you should come with us. We have the wagon near here, and you can bring a few of your things.”

“Pshaw. Reckon I will remain here until they force me to leave.” She returned from the pantry with the pot Jesselynn had started the rabbit stew in. “Not a lot here, but we can make do.”

“Aunt, you aren’t listenin’ to me. You would be safe with us in the cave.”

“Ain’t never lived in a cave and don’t intend to start now.” She glared at Jesselynn. “Now you goin’ to start that stove, or am I goin’ to have to do it myself?”