By Way of the Rose (42 page)

“Why would Nathan have anything to do with Shane's death?”

“Because Shane found out that Nathan had raped Sarah. That's how she got pregnant. Shane was going to kill him.” Marion stiffened her spine, anger flashed from her eyes.

“You get out of this house with that lie this instant! Get, I say!” She leapt up from her chair so suddenly that it toppled over.

“It isn't lies! For the first time truth is abounding around this place! Sarah is not the bad seed... Nathan is, though! He always has been. You knew it too! You let him be like that!” She pointed her finger in Marion's face. “You let him beat her, mistreat her and now you're ready to let him by with raping her and killing my brother too.”

“Get out! I said get out of here!” Marion shouted wildly as she flailed her arms in the air.

“Read the letter if you dare... It will explain everything.” Greta stood like a statue, solid to her ground.

“I don't need to read a heap of lies, take the thing with you!” Marion threw it toward the door. Greta picked it up and tossed it back at Marion. “Your son killed my brother. The least you could do is be civil to me.” She walked away. It was a while after Greta left that Marion picked up the letter and began to read. When she was done, her hands were trembling. She tried to cram the damning letter back in the envelope, but her hands were too clumsy and shaky. She wadded it and screamed. “No! It can't be true! No!” She rushed to the fire that was blazing in the stove.
No one must see this!
She threw the letter in and breathed a sigh of relief as she watched it burn. She didn't know that it really didn't matter now, the truth was out.

Sarah woke just before daybreak Monday morning as if she had to get ready for her day of teaching. For nearly four years this had been her daily routine. She decided that she would have breakfast ready for Nora when she woke. Nora heard the rattling of pots and pans and came into the kitchen. “You up already?” she said, through her yawning.

“Oh, I didn't mean to wake you. I just woke up and couldn't get back to sleep. I thought I'd fix breakfast for you, for a change. I've already got the biscuits in the oven. Why don't you sit down and I'll pour you a cup of coffee.” Sarah pulled out a chair from the kitchen table. “I hope I made it as good as you do.”

“I'm sure it's wonderful,” Nora assured her. “Why, just to get up and have coffee already brewed is a treat. Maybe that's what really got me up. I smelled that coffee.” she smiled as she took her seat. Sarah sat the cup of coffee on its saucer in front of her aunt who began stirring the sugar and cream into it. Then she lifted the cup from its saucer and sipped it with a loud, slurping whistle. “Oh, this is the best cup of coffee I've ever had in my entire life. What in the world did you do to it?”

“I may have ground it a little longer, but I don't know that it's any different or better than yours.”

“Well, maybe it's just because someone else made it.” Nora chuckled. Sarah scooped some grits into the boiling water and stirred over them. She looked into the egg bowl.

“Did you know that there's only two eggs in here?”

“Oh yeah. Hens have been getting lazy lately. I'll run out there and see if we have some fresh ones this morning.”

No, I'll do it. You just relax.”

“Don't fuss. Go ahead and slice the bacon, I'll be right back.” Nora took her basket and walked out the back door toward the chicken coop. Sarah took out the large slab of bacon and began slicing thin strips of the marbled meat. She watched Nora from the kitchen window. In the faint morning duskiness she was just an outline moving about. Her silhouette bent forward and disappeared into the coop. Sarah looked back at her chore. She lay the slices into the cast iron skillet, sending a spattering and popping of hot grease. She picked up the butcher knife and began slicing again. Suddenly she heard Nora scream. She looked up and saw other silhouettes besides Nora's in the dusky morning light. They were tall and dark and wrestling about with her.

“Lord, God no! Not Nora!” Sarah gasped as she remembered what Mr. Carrol had told them what had happened to the McKenny's. Then Nathan's evil violation flashed through her mind. A rage boiled up in Sarah. Nora had lived a lifetime of pain and suffering. Sarah had lived a lifetime of pain and suffering. They'd had enough. This horrible thing would not happen! This day would not be remembered in tears and sorrow! Sarah would stand strong against them or die! She charged from the house like a tigress, still clutching her knife. “Get your filthy hands off her this minute, you filthy cowards! Get off this land!” She saw the dirty filth of what used to be Union and Confederate soldiers. Deserters.

“Well, ain't you a sweet little tidbit.” The Southern deserter turned Nora loose as he stepped toward Sarah.

“Run, Nora. Get out of here,” Sarah demanded. The man had his pistol drawn, but Sarah paid it no mind as she walked straight up to him, plunged the knife into his side and twisted the gun loose from his hand. She turned and fired into the Northern one so quickly that neither of them had time to think. The one she'd stabbed held his bleeding side and stared in disbelief. Sarah drew back the blade and sliced through his neck, his blood spattered over her before he sprawled onto the ground. In less time than it took to swat a fly, the two degenerates lay dead.

Nora's eyes were wide as she looked at Sarah. She trembled at the sight of her blood covered niece. Sarah looked down at the deserters. She slowly wiped the blood from her chin with the back of her hand that still held the man's gun. “That'll teach you to mess with this
savage witch
.” She turned and walked away. She sat down on the stoop still clutching to her knife and the gun as if they were her security blanket. Smoke billowed out the back door from the burning bacon. Nora saw the smoke.

“The house is burning!” She rushed past Sarah and through the back door. Immediately the fiery skillet flew out into the yard. Sarah looked from the two dead men to the burning skillet and down to her blood soaked hands. She breathed deeply. Nora walked out and sat beside her. Her hand trembled as she reached toward Sarah.

“Don't be upset, dear. You did the right thing. You did what you had to do, child.” Sarah looked at her aunt.

“I'm not upset, Nora. I'm not upset at all.” She stared back at the men. “I'm glad. I feel strong. I feel like there's nothing I can't do.” Sarah smiled as she felt her own strength. She had protected herself and her family. She wasn't weak... She wasn't helpless... She wasn't a victim... Not this time and never again would she be. Suddenly she realized that she'd always held this strength. She had been strong enough to bear Nathan's attacks and keep them hidden to protect Marion, Daniel and John. Now, she knew she was strong enough to face all foes who dare hurt anyone she loved. With this knowledge came a wonderful freedom from all fear! She felt this mighty power within herself as she took a deep, satisfied breath. “I'll get the shovel.” She spoke matter-of-factly as she calmly walked toward the barn.

Sarah placed the two men's pistols on the mantle-board, side by side, Northern and Southern alike, resting there together. “Look, Nora, my spoils of battle. Let all scallywags take notice. Come back around here and if the Southern one don't get ‘cha, then the Northern one will!”

“Well, little
tidbit
, I guess you showed them how
sweet
you were!” Nora laughed as she remembered the last words out of that one man's mouth. His last words before the
little
tidbit
killed him dead.

Doug and the other men were camped out on the side of a hill near Vicksburg, Mississippi. They were to meet with another Regiment in the morning. General Grant's armies were now almost 80,000 men strong.

Confederate General Johnson's army of 20,000 men had been summoned from Arkansas to Vicksburg to relieve and join General John C. Pemberton's army of 31,600 starving men holed up in a garrison there. Together they would meet and execute an assault against Grant on July the 7th. Pemberton's starving men had been reduced to eating the army's mules. When that ran out, they ate grasshoppers, rats, gophers or armadillos in a desperate attempt to hold out until Johnson's army arrived, but on July the 4th they succumbed and surrendered to Grant.

The Union armies now occupied Vicksburg, Mississippi, delivering a devastating blow to the South. The confederacy was split in half.

A letter from Sarah was forwarded to Doug along with a letter from home. He tore into Sarah's letter first.

Dearest Doug;

I pray things are well with you!
Are you keeping yourself safe for me, my dear friend? My senses tell me that this war can't go on forever, but every new day that comes without an end makes me wonder.

Things in Arkansas aren't going well. I miss teaching the children, but we have to do what we have to do. We are luckier than most. We have food and a place to sleep

What a sad world. This Nation has bled enough! It's time to stop. I know you'd said that the end was near and I believed it, but everyday it gets harder to be strong and wait with patience while people are being killed left and right. When you can't go into town without fearing for your life it's gone too far! It is a sad, sad world and I pray this fighting is over soon and you will return safely to your family and all of us who love you!

Blessings, and all my love

Your dear friend,

Sarah

Doug lay back and stuffed the letter in his coat pocket. Then he opened the letter from home.

Doug;

I'm so sorry to tell you this, but Gracie is very ill. She came down with typhoid fever. We're not expecting her to pull through. She's very weak and the Doctor says the end could come at any time... .

Doug stopped reading the letter. He'd heard enough. Tears filled his eyes. No, he'd never wanted to marry her, but she was one of his best friends and a dear cousin, now she was dying. She might even be dead already. Goodness only knows how long it took him to get this letter.
God bless her sweet soul.
Doug cried into the pages of the letter.

The next day Doug's company met together with several others to form a battalion. They would start toward the southeast to meet up with other battalions. This regiment of soldiers would head into Alabama.

Doug heard a voice that sounded oddly familiar. He looked around and saw a tall lanky man with an unkempt beard and mustache. He walked toward him. The man looked at Doug and smiled. “Douglas Mahaffey! You old son-of-a-gun!” When he said that, he thought he saw John DuVal in there somewhere!

“Is this the man who has come back from the dead yet again... John, is that you under all that hair?”

“In the flesh.” John chuckled.

“My Lord... I can't... .I can't believe it!” They grasped each other tightly and laughed. “It's so good to see ya. How have you been and where in the blue blazes have ya been? I just knew ye were dead for sure that time!”

“Oh, I've been here and there. There mostly. All things considered, I'm doing pretty well. And yourself?” John asked.

“I'm a soldier... we don't do good and we don't do bad. We just do.” He laughed. “I did see Sarah a few weeks ago.”

John paused as the joy of seeing his old friend oozed from his face. “
Really
?”

“She said that something had happened and that you two never got married. From the look on her face it was something bad but she wouldn't tell me what it was.”

“Well I wouldn't think she would. No, we didn't get married.”

“Why?”

“Can we talk about something else? Anything else?”

“That's about the same response I got from her. I'm just puzzled. I got a letter from her yesterday.”

“She's been writing you, has she?”

“Yes... for a while now.”

“She's no good, Doug. I'm warning you... stay clear of her!”

“Stay clear of her? Why would ya say that? What happened with you two?”

“She's a whore! She's a lying whore!”

Doug's eyes burned with fire as anger flared... how dare he call Sarah, the purest heart on earth, a whore! He held his temper. “I can't believe ye'd say such a thing about her!” Doug rasped in anger.

“Calm yourself, now. You don't know the facts. She was pregnant, Doug. Did you know that? Did she write that to you in any of her little letters?”

“No that can't be. Not Sarah!”

“Yeah, Sarah. When I got back to marry her, she was pregnant! Her lies got an innocent man killed too. I'm done with her, and if you have any sense, you'll be done with her too!”

“If it's one thing I know about Sarah, it's that she was faithful herself and to her love for yerself!”

“How do you know anything? You weren't even there, or were you?”

“I know because I tried to get her to care for me... even after you were gone I tried and she almost threw me from the train for telling her that I loved her! She was heartbroken and devastated. She almost lost her mind the day I had to tell her you were missin', ‘presumed dead'. She loved you, John... I saw it in her. I saw her adoration for you... and, oh God, how I envied you that! Now, I find out you threw it away! You're an idiot! A stupid idiot!”

“She was pregnant, Doug! Please, explain that away for me. Did
you
do it? I didn't!”

“Maybe it wasn't her choice, John. Have you ever thought about that? Maybe something happened to her. Maybe it wasn't a
willful
act on her part? I can't imagine her being anything but honorable. Even so, you brought it all on yerself. Ya had to go
think
before you could admit to her that ya loved her too and got yerself in more trouble. If I'd had her love, if I'd been that damn lucky, if I'd been you there would have been nothing to
think
about. She'd have been my wife today and her baby
would
have been mine!”

“You're so naive. Go on. Keep writing her and let her rope you in. You'll find out when she tears your heart in a million pieces!”