Flashback (31 page)

"Why didn't you just ask?" I repeated to Tilly.

Tilly lost her prettiness in that moment. I have never seen a child so changed. Her face grew sullen, her eyes hot and dull and she would not look at me. It struck me as a blow. Our Tilly has always carried such a light within her. Foolish she can be, and rash most certainly, but I had never seen her secretive and sly. The ugliness with which it clouded her delicate features made me want to cry. At this point I had sovereignty over the disputed skirt. It was clear that whatever was in the pocket was not only of utmost importance to Tilly, but was something she believed would cause others a great deal of displeasure.

"We'll see about this," I said, once again using Molly's voice and, though I disliked myself for doing so, could no more have stopped than I could carry one of the great cannons to the third level of this fort.

I fumbled through the wad of fabric in my arms till I found the pockets. Inside one of them I felt the crinkle of folded papers and pulled them out. I shook them open to see what dreadful words could change Tilly from child to cornered fox. Before I could read a word, she snatched them from my hand, shouting, "They're no concern of yours!" and ran down the hall, through our rooms and, by the slamming of doors, I surmised out on the veranda and down the stairs.

For a moment I thought to give chase but chose not to humiliate her or myself in such a way. I was angry, but mostly I was worried. This was so unlike Tilly. After apologizing again to Luanne, I went not back to the parlor but to our rooms, where I could be assured of being alone. There I sat and thought.

Peggy, do you think it could be a love letter? Maybe from Joel Lane? That was my first thought, but surely the discovery of a love letter would bring on blushes, stammers and giggles, not the desperation and wretchedness I saw. Unless it was a profession of love (or, God forbid, some baser emotion) that was not appropriate. Perhaps from Dr. Mudd or Samuel Arnold? I mention them because, other than Joseph and Joel, they are the men she sees, speaks of and I know full well Dr. Mudd has gotten too much influence over her. Lord knows Joseph has made note of it as well. The mere mention of the doctor is enough to put him in a pet.

I assumed Tilly would be back within the hour. On this bit of earth there simply is no place to run to. In the heat and the dust, the ever-shifting sea of men on land and water from horizon to horizon, I was sure discomfort would hound her home without my having to dangle after her.

Two hours passed. Then three. Many times I cycled through anger to worry and back again. Worry won out in the end, and I decided to search for our errant sister-not to reprimand her but to see her safe and well for my own peace of mind.

I went first to the top tier of the fort. After that last cannon was lifted into place, the building and arming was stopped. Since we are no longer at war, an order came through that the arming of the fort was to cease, though the construction continues as Jefferson will be used as a prison for some time to come. Within six months Joseph estimates that our confederate soldiers will all have been released, but those sent here for other crimes, the deserters, thieves, murderers and, of course, the Lincoln conspirators, will remain to serve out their sentences.

The third tier, blessedly devoid of humanity, was manned only by sentries and a few knots of off-duty men up catching sea breezes and smoking and gambling. Not wanting to air our domestic concerns before this rough gathering, I did not ask any of the men if they had seen Tilly.

A circumnavigation of the fort revealed no truant girl. It is close to a mile walk to complete the circumference of these walls. By the time I had done so I was sweating, and worry had once again come round to anger. I returned to quarters expecting to find her there. She was not, and my anxiousness for her safety again pushed out my anxiousness to slap her.

I debated whether or not to tell Joseph. In telling him I would have marshaled the forces of the Union Army to search for Tilly. I was not yet sufficiently concerned for her welfare to subject her-and us-to the ensuing gossip. That is the good reason I did not tell my husband but not the only reason. The other is not so easily articulated even to myself. I shall try to tell it to you, but you must burn this letter should I die unexpectedly. I would not like a distant relative to read it and know what a small person I was.

I did not tell Joseph partly because I was afraid, not of his anger at Tilly or of his anger at me for failing to run our home in such a way that its inner workings did not interfere with him. On reflection I believe I did not tell him because I was afraid to see the concern in his face, afraid it would be greater, deeper than any concern he has ever shown me. Peggy, I was jealous of our sister, jealous of my husband's affection for her. May God forgive me. You, my dear sister, I know will understand. Though it is undoubtedly a sacrilege, to be understood is far more comforting than the cold release of forgiveness.

In this unpleasant state of the heart it came to me that possibly Tilly had been so madly protective of her letter because her brother-in-law had written it. I cannot tell you what sudden sickness this thought engendered in me. The instant it came into my mind I was doubled over with it as if I had received a blow to my midsection and could not draw breath.

Fortunately this miserable and unworthy state was short-lived. The letter could not have been written by Joseph. It simply could not. Joseph is not given to writing letters of any sort and least of all love letters. Even when he was courting me with such purpose, he never wrote me. And, though I only glimpsed the papers, I am sure I would have recognized his handwriting.

Once I recovered myself, I set off to look in the only other place I could think that Tilly might have run to. Both Joseph and myself have expressly forbid her to visit Joel Lane's cell unaccompanied, but given her newly acquired insolence, I thought that's where she might have gone.

It took only a moment to bully one of the sentries at the sally port into escorting me to the cells above and unlocking the door. By now they were not only accustomed to my going there but had become used to the Lincoln conspirators and, though they are still much reviled, Arnold and Mudd are no longer feared as they once were. The sentry was an older man, nearly fifty-much too old to be an infantryman, but it is the life he's used to. As we ascended the spiral stairs adjacent to the guardroom, he said: "First the young miss and now you. Those rebs must be pouring some mighty fine tea to attract the prettiest ladies at the fort."

I did not thank him for the compliment. He took my silence as a rebuff and didn't say another word. I had not intentionally snubbed him. It was his testimony that Tilly had visited the cells that caught up my attention. I wanted to ask when she'd come, if she was still there, but that would have been to admit I did not know the whereabouts of the child entrusted to my care. Soon enough I would find these things out.

He unlocked Joel's cell door, then said: "I'll be waiting just out here. You call out if you need me." It wasn't concern for my privacy that motivated this act. As he turned away he was already fumbling for his tobacco pouch. Men are not allowed to smoke on duty. They can be beaten for it or made to carry a heavy cannonball in circles hour upon hour or even be cruelly strung up from one of the trees. Though I believe the regulation to be just and necessary, it is hard on those men who have come to depend on tobacco. Behind these enclosed casemates was an ideal place to enjoy a smoke undetected.

Joel was lying on his mattress, his back propped against the wall, doing nothing. The forced inactivity of our prisoners must be the most difficult cross they bear, worse even than bad food and poor living conditions. Those who can work are able to earn money for the small luxuries available at Sender's store by the docks. Joel was healing quickly but was not yet fit enough to join the crews building or recoaling the ships.

"Good afternoon, Private Lane," I said, attempting to sound cheerful. There was no need to add the weight of my concerns to his.

"Is it?" His sulleness so matched Tilly's I began to wonder if poor manners were contagious.

I chose to ignore his tone. "Has Tilly been here?"

He glanced at the door that communicated between his casemate and that of Dr. Mudd and Mr. Arnold.

"Is she here?" I amended my question with some alarm. The thought of her behind closed doors with two men-any two men-was not something I would have condoned.

"She was. She's gone," he said.

There was some comfort in that at least.

"Do you know where she went?"

"Why don't you ask my glorious physician? It was him, not me, she came to see." At this moment Joel Lane was no longer a soldier, a man recuperating from a beating or a carefree actor and balladeer. He was a peevish boy looking and sounding as young as our little sister.

Clearly I was not the only one bitten by the green-eyed monster this clay. I was beginning to understand why women are often banned from military postings. It is not our behavior that is an endangerment but that of the men made foolish and rash by the presence of a skirt in their midst.

"Is Dr. Mudd in?" I asked, then realized the stupidity of my question and crossed to the adjoining door without awaiting a reply.

I felt a bit silly knocking on the door to a prison cell as if I'd come calling of a Saturday afternoon, but simply flinging it open like an invading army was unthinkable. I tapped and called out: "Dr. Mudd? It's Mrs. Coleman. May I speak with you a moment?"

Rustling came from within and went on much longer than I would have expected. In the heat they may have been resting in a state of undress, so I did not hurry them. At another time it might have crossed my wicked mind to see Mr. Arnold in shirtsleeves or singlet. My mind was so full of Tilly at this moment that I was saved such evil thoughts.

It was Samuel Arnold and not the doctor who finally opened the door. "Raphaella," he said. "How can I be of assistance?" It took me aback both that he knew my Christian name and that he had the audacity to use it. Since he seemed genuinely pleased to see me-and a man has not looked at me in that way or said my name with such gentleness in a good while-I'm afraid I did not reprimand him as I should have. We all have an unlocked window through which the devil can creep, as Molly was fond of telling us. It's a pity that mine is dangerous-looking men. (Oh. Dear. Peggy, when you are burning up pages of this letter would you expunge that bit as well?)

This foolishness passed in the blink of an eye, and I do not think I let any of it show on my face. "I'm looking for my sister," I said. "We had an upset over a letter and she ran from me. She's been gone several hours and I've become concerned." Why I decided at this moment to tell the truth and to this man who both frightens and attracts me I cannot say. Certainly not because I trust him above all people-or above any people for that matter. Maybe I told Mr. Arnold because the weight of the situation had been building within me and I needed to shift some of the burden. By shifting it onto one even more helpless than I, I was assured there would be no outcry, no search and no recriminations. Rather like talking to the cat.

"Miss Tilly was here an hour ago, maybe two," Arnold said. "She didn't stay long."

"Did she mention where she might go?"

Arnold laughed a pleasant sound, but I resented it given the state of my nerves. "I well know there is not anywhere to go," I said tartly. "But she is indeed gone, and in a brick box of a thousand men I believe I have cause to be concerned."

"I'm sorry," he said at once. "I was laughing at my own prospects, not your sister's."

With the heat and the dashing about, a strand of hair had come loose from the pins and fell in my face. This man actually tucked it back. Of all the schoolboy tricks, that has to be the first one learned. I'd not thought any man over twenty would still be using this crude form of seduction. If indeed it was seduction and not merely an attempt to improve the aesthetics of the cell. To my credit I neither melted nor swooned, but neither did I put him in his place as he most richly deserved.

"Tilly didn't talk to me; she came to see Mudd," Mr. Arnold said.

I couldn't but notice he had dropped the honorable title of "doctor" and wondered if they had quarreled. Mr. Arnold did not move from the doorway as I'd expected, and I was forced to ask: "May I speak with him?"

He stepped aside and, holding the door wide, gestured me through with mock gallantry. Dr. Mudd had fashioned himself a desk of sorts from a wooden cask begged off one of the guards and fitted it with a stool of piled brick. The "desk" had been set to catch what shards of morning sun came through the three deep gun slits high above the floor. At the time of day I was there the sun had moved into the western sky and the cell was uniformly gloomy. Regardless of this, Dr. Mudd was writing, paper and pen sent to him regularly by his wife, along with other items to make his life bearable.

I stood inside the door, Mr. Arnold to my left, close enough I could sense him without turning to look. The doctor kept right on scratching away. It was bizarre to be kept waiting like a tradesman come looking for work by a man one's husband keeps under lock and key. Another time I might have allowed him this fleeting and petty exercise of power. That day I had no patience for it. "I need to speak with you," I said.

He looked up, sighed to signify his annoyance and forbearance, and said: "Very well. One moment," and went back to his correspondence.