Encounter at Cold Harbor (7 page)

Leah lowered Esther to the floor, Colonel Majors reached down, and the child flew to him. “Papa! Papa!” She patted him on the cheek.

Leah had no time to say anything,

“Esther, this is Mrs. Fremont.”

Esther looked up at the woman but held tightly to her father. Her eyes grew big, and she said, “Hello.”

Eileen Fremont smiled at her. “You’re a pretty baby, Esther. Would you let me hold you?”

“No, Papa hold!”

Eileen Fremont laughed at that. “Well, I can see she’s attached to her father. Give me a day or two, and I think she’ll come to me.”

“I brought Mrs. Fremont to meet Esther to see if they could get along,” the colonel explained to Leah. “Jeff, Tom, and I will be leaving pretty soon, and we thought you could use some company in the house and some help with Esther.”

“That’ll be fine, Colonel.”

“You won’t mind having me on your hands, will you, Leah?” Mrs. Fremont asked.

“No, of course not. It’ll be nice to have company. It gets a little lonesome out here.”

“I’ll try not to get in your way. Maybe we could teach each other something new about cooking.”

“I’ll start with these,” Jeff said. He held up the string of fish. “I’ll clean these if somebody will cook them.”

“I’ll do that,” Eileen Fremont said. “Do you have any cornmeal?”

“Yes, of course, we do. I’ll make some hush puppies,” Leah said quickly.

While Colonel Majors played with his daughter on the floor, Eileen and Leah did the cooking. The table was soon set with a huge platter of fried fish, hush puppies, fried potatoes, turnip greens, and
purple-hulled peas, and supper turned out to be a huge success.

As Colonel Majors sat down and looked at it all, his eyes grew wide. “I wish every soldier in the Army of the Confederacy had a supper like this!” he exclaimed.

He asked the blessing quickly, and Jeff grinned at him. “You sure did that in a hurry, Pa. I was afraid you was gonna say one of your long prayers.”

“I’ll reserve that for another time.” His father winked at him.

They began to eat, and Jeff said, “These fish are cooked real good, Mrs. Fremont.”

“I guess frying fish is something people from Louisiana know how to do. I grew up on a bayou,” she said. “I believe I could fish before I could walk very well.”

“Did you ever see an alligator in the bayou?” Leah asked.

“Yes, lots of times. They’re good too.”

“You mean—” Jeff stared at her “—good to
eat?”

“Why, yes! Haven’t you eaten alligator?”

“No, ma’am!” Jeff said. “I’d just as soon eat a snake.”

“Well, they’re not bad either. But on the whole, I’d rather have alligator than snake.”

Colonel Majors was looking at his new housekeeper with amusement in his eyes. “I’d like to try that sometime.”

“You’ll have to come down to Louisiana after the war. I’ll show you some cooking like you’ve never tasted.”

“I’d like that.”

For a while they talked about Louisiana and the Cajun people who lived there, but at last the colonel
said, “Well, we better go back to camp. Will you be all right alone one more night, Leah? I’ll see that Mrs. Fremont gets back tomorrow after we pick up her things.”

“Oh, yes, I’ll be fine.”

“Better go hitch up the team, Jeff. We need to get back.”

Leah followed Jeff outside. As he was finishing harnessing the horses, she drifted over to him and said rather shyly, “I hope you liked the supper, Jeff.”

“It was great.” He grinned at her. “Best meal I’ve had in a long time.”

Leah wanted to say her apologies, but just as she opened her mouth, Colonel Majors and Mrs. Fremont came out of the house.

Mrs. Fremont was holding Esther, who had gone to sleep. “Would you take her, Leah?”

“Of course.” Leah took the sleeping child, and the moment for apologizing to Jeff passed.

After the good-byes were said and the wagon rattled off, Leah said aloud in disgust, “Boys are pretty silly—but so are girls!”

She went back into the house, determined that the next time she saw Jeff she would tell him how sorry she was. After all, it wasn’t that big a thing.

Still, she wasn’t quite sure that he had Lucy Driscoll out of his mind. “I’m not jealous,” she told Esther as she dressed her for bed. “It’s just that Jeff and I are old friends and that Lucy’s such a flirt. Boys don’t know how to handle things like that. They sometimes act pretty silly.”

E
ileen Fremont had taken the position of housekeeper and nurse to Colonel Majors’s daughter with apprehension. Actually, she had very little choice. Louisiana had been her home, but things had been hard for her there. The Yankees occupied Baton Rouge relatively early in the war. Eileen had been willing to bear it as long as her husband was alive, but when she lost him and then in a short time her only child, the city itself seemed hateful to her. It had been almost with relief that she had undertaken the journey to Richmond to see what she could do to help her brother-in-law.

She had at first wondered if she could bear to be around another child so near the age of the daughter she had lost, but there had been an almost instant bond. Esther, she discovered, was an affectionate child and just as bright as her own had been. And at first Eileen determined not to become attached to the girl, but that had been almost impossible—perhaps because she herself was so lonely and there was a vacuum in her heart. In any case, she found herself loving the blonde little girl more and more.

Leah came into the parlor early one morning to find Eileen holding Esther in her lap. The child had fallen asleep.

“She’s not sick, is she, Eileen?”

“No, I think she just had a bad dream.”

“How long have you been up holding her like that?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Two hours, more or less.”

“Well, you should’ve put her back to bed,” Leah admonished the older woman. “Here, let me take her.”

“No, that’s all right. I’ll hold her.”

Leah had started forward, but now she stopped and scrutinized the pair. Taking a seat on the couch across the room, she said, “You’ve really fallen in love with little Esther, haven’t you?”

“Who could help that?” Eileen smiled. She carefully smoothed the blonde curls away from the sleeping child’s forehead. “She’s as sweet as my own child was.”

“What was your baby’s name, Eileen?”

“Juliet.”

“What a lovely name! Did you pick it out?”

“No, my husband chose it. He always said we were like Romeo and Juliet, so young when we fell in love. He named her that, and I thought it was sweet.” Eileen had never mentioned her husband to Leah before.

Leah hesitated. “You got married very early, didn’t you?”

“I was only seventeen, and he was eighteen.”

Leah’s eyes grew round. “I’m almost that old myself!”

“It doesn’t work well for everyone to get married at that early an age,” Eileen said. “Most need to wait longer.”

Leah got up and went over to look out the window. “The sun’s coming up, and the cows are coming up to the barn,” she commented. Then, turning
around, she said, “Did you think about getting married when you were a girl?”

“Why, of course. Every girl thinks about that when she starts getting a little older. I expect you’ve thought about it.”

“Yes, I have, but—” Leah broke off and hurriedly left the room.

Startled by her sudden departure, Eileen thought for a moment, then carefully got up. She placed the sleeping child on the sofa, threw a coverlet over her, and went into the kitchen, where she found Leah sitting at the table. “What’s the matter, Leah?”

“Oh, nothing!” Leah twirled a lock of hair around her finger restlessly, then blurted out, “Did you ever have a fight with your husband—before you were married, I mean?”

At once Eileen knew exactly why Leah was troubled. “Of course,” she said. “I expect sweethearts always have arguments.”

“I hate them!” Leah said.

Eileen knew that Leah’s mother was far away. Perhaps the girl had been keeping her thoughts to herself for so long that she desperately longed to share them with someone.

“You see, when I came back with Tom and Esther, I saw … my friend with this other girl—Lucy Driscoll.”

Something about the way Leah pronounced the name caught Eileen’s attention. “I take it you don’t like Lucy very much?”

“Well, she’s small and pretty. Not a big cow like I am. I’m a giantess, practically.”

“Oh, I don’t think that’s true! You’re going to be tall and stately. I think that’s very attractive in a woman. I was always too short, I thought. Every
time I saw a tall girl,” Eileen said, “I wished I could be like her. I actually thought about stretching myself. Tying a rope around my arms and putting weights on my legs.”

Leah stared at her, then giggled. “I used to think about trying to shrink myself, but I could never figure out how to do it.”

“Actually, I think God knew what was best for each of us,” Eileen said. “Just as He knows what’s best for everyone. Now, tell me more about Lucy and Jeff.”

Leah gaped at her. “How did you know I was talking about Jeff?”

“Oh, I saw the way you were looking at him and the way he was looking at you when he came to visit. You’ve been friends a long time, haven’t you?”

“All of our lives. We did everything together when we were kids.” She began talking with enthusiasm about how she and Jeff had grown up together. “But it’s different now,” she ended almost sullenly. “Ever since we came to Richmond, he’s been paying a lot of attention to Lucy Driscoll. Her father is rich, and she has all kinds of pretty clothes. She knows how to do all the latest dances. And look at me. Why shouldn’t Jeff go to the minstrel show with her? I don’t blame him a bit!”

Guardedly, Eileen tried to explain how difficult it is to grow up. “All of us have to do it. Boys, too. We have to learn how to stop being children and become adults. And sometimes when we’re halfway between, not quite grown, not quite a child, it’s hard to know how to behave.”

“Did you feel that way when you were growing up?”

Eileen laughed, her eyes sparkled, and she shook
her head in despair. “I thought I’d go crazy for a while there when I was about your age. I couldn’t seem to do anything right.” Eileen knew she was good at giving counsel without seeming to. She went on making light of her own foolishness and finally she saw that Leah was becoming quieter. And then Eileen said, “I even feel a little bit funny about Jeff’s father.”

“About Colonel Majors? Why?”

“Well, there’s an officers’ ball coming up, and he’s asked me to go to it. I’m all confused about it.”

“Why, it would be fun!”

“I suppose, but you see, all the other ladies will have nice dresses and shoes. And I don’t have anything like that here.”

Instantly Leah got to her feet. “Well, you
will
have, Eileen! You’ve got to go! We’ll fix you a dress. As a matter of fact, some of my sister Sarah’s dresses are still here from when we were in Richmond before. We’ll fix you something that will make you the belle of the ball!”

Eileen Fremont sat quietly, amused at the girl’s enthusiasm. Then, “I haven’t been to a ball in I don’t know when,” she said. “The last time I went, it was with my husband, just before Shiloh. I think it might make me sad to go.”

Leah came close and put a hand on her arm. “I think you ought to go,” she said softly. “It would be good for you. Come, let’s go look. Maybe one of Sarah’s dresses can be taken up for you a little bit. You’re smaller than she is. We’ve got everything we need here.”

“But what about shoes?”

“We’ll paint your feet black!” Leah laughed. “No,
come on. Shoes aren’t important. It’s going to be such fun. When is the ball?”

“On the twelfth. That’s day after tomorrow!”

“Oh, that’s plenty of time! You send word that you’ll go, and we’ll have you ready like Cinderella when Colonel Majors comes to get you.”

Jeff learned about the ball on the morning of the twelfth. He came into the tent to find the colonel getting his hair cut by the regimental barber, and Jeff stood quietly watching. After the barber had left, his father said, “I’m going out to buy a new uniform—if I can find anything.”

“You mean to wear when we leave?”

“No, I mean to wear tonight. I’m taking Eileen to the ball.”

“You’re taking Mrs. Fremont to a
ball?
But she’s a servant!”

Colonel Majors was studying himself in the mirror. “Oh, I hardly think that’s the case. She’s just helping us out, Jeff, and she’s been a
great
help. Esther’s crazy about her!”

For some reason Jeff found the idea of his father taking Eileen Fremont to the ball unpleasant. He did not know how to express this, so he said nothing. But when the colonel left to go to town to search for a new uniform, Jeff went out to Uncle Silas’s.

He found Leah very excited. The entire house seemed to be rather in a mess, and there was a lot of activity. “What’s going on?” he asked.

Actually, Leah looked happier than he had seen her in a long time. Her eyes were shining. “I’m getting Eileen ready to go to the ball! Isn’t it nice, Jeff, that she and your father are going to go together?”

Jeff bit his lip. “I don’t think he ought to do it!”

Leah blinked and asked, “Why not?”

“Well, I don’t
know
why not! It just doesn’t seem right to me, that’s all!”

“Not right? It’ll be good for both of them. Your father hasn’t had a lot of fun, you know, since he’s been here in Richmond. He’s been fighting, and wounded, and trying to take care of you and Tom, and worried about Esther. I think it’s fine for them to go.”

“Well,
that
wouldn’t be too bad, but—” Jeff broke off as Eileen came into the room, wearing a robe.

“Oh, I didn’t know you were here, Jeff.”

“I just stopped by for a minute,” Jeff said dully. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“You couldn’t do that. Why don’t you go play with Esther?”

“Where is she?”

“In the bedroom. I’ll get her for you.” Eileen hurried off and soon returned with the little girl. “There, you two can play while I go try to do something with my hair.”