Читать онлайн книгу «Counterfeit Courtship» автора Christina Miller

Counterfeit Courtship
Christina Miller
Second Chance ReunionReturning home, Confederate hero Colonel Graham Talbot faces his toughest battle yet—avoiding the marriage-minded young ladies in town vying for his attentions. With a stepmother and orphaned niece to support, the penniless soldier has no intention of marrying. Neither does the woman he once loved, his next-door neighbor Ellie Anderson. But Ellie has a proposal of her own: a pretend courtship to keep their unwanted admirers at bay.Ellie’s unpredictable childhood left her determined to safeguard her independence—and her plantation. Blaming herself for driving Graham away to war, she devises a plan to help them both. But when it goes awry, Ellie will face a choice: save her beloved property…or trust in a relationship that’s becoming undeniably real.


Second Chance Reunion
Returning home, Confederate hero Colonel Graham Talbot faces his toughest battle yet—avoiding the marriage-minded young ladies in town vying for his attentions. With a stepmother and orphaned niece to support, the penniless soldier has no intention of marrying. Neither does the woman he once loved, his next-door neighbor Ellie Anderson. But Ellie has a proposal of her own: a pretend courtship to keep their unwanted admirers at bay.
Ellie’s unpredictable childhood left her determined to safeguard her independence—and her plantation. Blaming herself for driving Graham away to war, she devises a plan to help them both. But when it goes awry, Ellie will face a choice: save her beloved property...or trust in a relationship that’s becoming undeniably real.
“Ellie, you need a husband.”
“You’re a fine one to think so.”
Graham’s downcast gaze cut into Ellie like a cotton hoe. “I’ve always thought so,” he said, his voice quiet.
“I meant you have no room to speak, since you refuse to marry, too.”
“With good reason.”
“My reason is good, too.”
“Then let’s hear it.”
She knew she shouldn’t have told him how good her reason was, knew he’d take it as a challenge. And one thing she’d never seen Graham Talbot do was back down from a challenge. “I don’t want to, that’s all.”
She couldn’t explain to him the horror of being orphaned, of being taken in by strangers. Relying on her father to provide for her—and being disappointed—had been one thing. Depending on neighbors for daily food was another.
Never again would she depend on anyone else to provide for her. Her uncle had taken the past thirteen years to teach her to be a planter. Not a planter’s wife.
And a planter she would be.
CHRISTINA MILLER has always lived in the past. Her passion for history began with her grandmother’s stories of 1920s rural southern Indiana. When Christina began to write fiction, she believed God was calling her to write what she knew: history. A Bethany College of Missions graduate, pastor’s wife and worship leader, Christina lives on the family’s farm with her husband of twenty-seven years and Sugar, their talking dog.

Counterfeit Courtship
Christina Miller


www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.
—Philippians 4:13
To Jesus, the giver of dreams and gifts...
To my husband, Jan, my real-life hero and man of God who has always believed in me...
To my mother, who taught me to read as soon as I was big enough to hold a book...
To my father, who taught me that I could do anything I set my mind to.
With gratitude to...
Miss Mimi Miller, Executive Director of The Historic Natchez Foundation, for helping me with countless historical accuracies and details and becoming my lively new friend.
Mr. Terry Trovato, Dunleith Historic Inn docent and storyteller, for brightening this book with his tales and historic tidbits. What a delight it was to write portions of this book in the parlor, dining room and galleries of Dunleith, the house after which I patterned Graham’s home.
Dina Davis, my amazing editor, whose expert skills made my book sing. I can’t imagine this journey without her!
Mary Sue Seymour, the sweetest and wisest agent in the business.
Aunt Sister Sylvia Gehlhausen, who gave me a quiet place to write in her ancient, enormous home.
Contents
Cover (#ua906a081-4094-5e14-a7a7-d3b756985cca)
Back Cover Text (#u6fc7b73b-539d-5e68-b23b-28c990fc5f74)
Introduction (#ue537fe28-0a9e-5052-a7b7-5ac9dd1ce265)
About the Author (#u0ad71d05-f236-51cf-aae4-13d0efee0f96)
Title Page (#ue2e8b8c6-6693-5b54-aebc-b14be0247475)
Bible Verse (#ua7ff652f-3818-5a99-b643-acc818fe06d8)
Dedication (#ue5450b12-f590-551b-8af0-2c6f3a43f78b)
Chapter One (#ulink_2e94caad-4c08-5406-9a45-2a34e066b704)
Chapter Two (#ulink_fb4cce4f-9d85-552f-b801-5a5e8abb677c)
Chapter Three (#ulink_ae5c3c9a-d192-52ea-98fa-a47e9e308b08)
Chapter Four (#ulink_b3e33fad-ddb4-59c0-8ec0-6d7292dbd54d)
Chapter Five (#ulink_be222f79-b4b5-50c2-815c-1f69922a1d3c)
Chapter Six (#ulink_f1d658d7-fc04-5555-b4ef-48ff63a4b6db)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Dear Reader (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_bd9427dd-7abd-5de3-973f-f5da77b6698e)
Natchez, Mississippi
June, 1865
Colonel Graham Talbot slid from his mare and eased the reins over a live oak branch, the need for stealth and silence driving him. He crouched low to the ground and prayed that Dixie wouldn’t whinny and give away his position.
As he surveyed the surrounding area, a gang of five appeared from behind the stable. How had they gotten there without him seeing them? And how had they known when he would arrive?
Crossing toward the imposing structure in the open air would make him vulnerable, but if he stayed where he was, they’d be on him in moments. He had to take the chance that they wouldn’t look his way. Staying low, he rushed for the next oak. Just a hundred more yards and he’d make it—
“Colonel Talbot, is that you? Sneaking through your own backyard?” The shrill, syrupy voice brought him to a halt. “We’ve been waiting for you for days.”
He stood and raised his hands in surrender. Just as he’d feared, he’d been captured by a force he dreaded more than a platoon of Yankees: a mob of husband-hunting Natchez girls.
As the gaggle of simpering females emerged from the side yard of his stepmother’s town house, Graham held in a groan. Their exaggerated giggles and faded finery didn’t improve his mood.
The girl who reached him first snapped shut her yellow-fringed parasol and leaned in close, taking possession of his arm in a way that made him want to head back to the army camp. She was pretty, even charming in her own way, but when had the hometown girls become so bold?
And why couldn’t they have stayed away until he got a bath and a shave?
He sneaked a glance at the Greek Revival manor next door and caught a glimpse of Ellie Anderson waving out an upstairs window. Her honey-blond hair gleamed in the sun as brightly as her mischievous grin.
Ellie. His childhood chum, the instigator of most of his youthful calamities—and the reason he’d entered West Point, leaving behind his rejected heart. Even at this distance, the belle of Natchez brought back memories he’d worked hard to forget.
He stopped the thought cold. That had been eight years and a war ago. He’d been only seventeen at the time and still more boy than man. Things had been different in those days...
Ellie continued to smile in that maddening way of hers, a sweet, guileless smile, nothing like the cloying grins of the misguided maidens surrounding him—
“Our own war hero is home at last.” The girl next to him interrupted his thoughts, and that was probably good since, as he now realized, he’d been staring at Ellie with his big mouth open. “You remember me, don’t you, Colonel? I’m Susanna Martin, but an old friend like you can call me Susie.”
“We’ve heard all about your war exploits,” the redhead next to Susanna said. She looked vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t place her. Then again, after eight years, he probably looked different too.
“What is General Robert E. Lee like? Is he as handsome as they say?”
Handsome?
“General Lee is a brilliant soldier and a fine Christian man. I was proud to serve under him.” He started toward the house, wanting nothing more than a hot bath and a long visit with his stepmother.
But they sailed along with him, their giant hoopskirts swaying as the women jostled into each other, vying for position next to him. He was surprised they wanted to get that close. Having ridden all day yesterday and all night last night, he was bound to smell as ripe as fresh manure.
This sure wasn’t the homecoming he’d looked forward to, but he extended an arm to each girl closest to him and let them carry him along. The South may have lost the war, and Andrew Johnson, the Yankee president, may have stripped Graham of his citizenship, his plantation and all his property, but he was still a Southern gentleman. And a gentleman didn’t offend a lady. Not even five ladies who’d disrupted his plans and wearied his already-troubled mind with their chattering.
And with the war’s end, being a gentleman was all he had left.
Climbing the stone steps to the breezy front gallery with its white columns and comfortable outdoor rockers, Graham hesitated. Surely these girls didn’t expect him to invite them in—not in his filthy condition. But Noreen, like the lady she was, would welcome them into her home—his childhood home—and so should he.
“We haven’t had many parties this year, so we can’t wait for tonight. Miss Ophelia started planning your homecoming when Lee met with Grant.” Susanna spoke in low, intimate tones, as if four other women weren’t hovering about her, taking in every word.
“A party—tonight?” How was he going to get out of that without hurting Aunt Ophelia’s feelings? Now that she was a war widow, she’d likely mother—and smother—Graham more than ever. Starting tonight, apparently. “Would you care to come in and tell me about it?”
Say no, say no...
“We’d rather hear about the war. All of Natchez knows about the hundreds of Yankees you captured.” Susanna’s drab green eyes turned hard as an artillery shell. “Although I don’t see why you didn’t just shoot them.”
“I spared as many lives as I could.” They reached the front door, and he saw it was shut. He hesitated. As hot as it was, why would Noreen not have all the doors and jib windows flung wide open to catch a breeze?
He grasped the brass doorknob. Surely his stepmother would entertain these girls and let him escape upstairs to a bath. Graham opened wide the cypress door painted to look like mahogany, and followed them inside the too-quiet center hall. He gestured toward the parlor. “Please be seated while I find my stepmother.”
He barely had them in the parlor before he took off down the hall to the library. The room was empty. Where was she? It wasn’t like her to leave the house unattended. Anybody could have walked in that door...
Something seemed amiss in the room, but he couldn’t discern what. He ventured farther inside, toward the collection of poetry Noreen kept on the shelves between the windows on the east wall, and then he saw it. A nearly full teacup and a half-eaten slice of bread and butter sat on the table next to his stepmother’s favorite fireside wing chair.
Food and dirty dishes sitting out—in Noreen Talbot’s home? Something had gone wrong. He could sense it, just as he always could in battle.
Graham turned from the library and checked the dining room. He stepped through the breezeway to the kitchen dependency—nothing. He charged up the stairs. “Noreen?” Upstairs, he headed for her room at the end of the hall.
As he’d suspected, it was empty too, with both bed pillows fluffed and in place, Noreen’s hairbrush and mirror at perfect right angles to each other as always—and the third drawer of Father’s lowboy flung open.
The drawer where he hid his revolver.
Graham hastened to search the drawer. As he’d feared, Father’s Colt Dragoon was gone, and the lid lay beside the open box of bullets.
What could this mean? He glanced down at his dirt-caked boots and the clumps of dried mud he’d left on the Persian silk and wool carpet. Noreen could have moved the gun, but she didn’t leave drawers and ammo boxes open.
A wave of soprano giggles pierced the air around him, interrupting his thoughts. The girls.
He dashed into the hallway and toward his own room. He had to find out what had happened to Noreen, a mother to him since shortly after Mama and Graham’s baby sister died in childbirth. But first he had to get rid of those girls. The thought of doing that made his stomach sick.
He could think of only one way to get them out.
* * *
Ellie Anderson pulled her head back inside the window of Uncle Amos’s second-story bedroom, unsure whether to laugh at the scene below or feel sorry for Graham Talbot. For a moment, she fought the urge to send him their old childhood signal: a shrill whistle from between her teeth. But from the looks of things, he had enough noise in his ears as it was.
Would he even remember that signal, or had his war years erased the memory? It was such a childish thing, like the handkerchiefs they used to attach to wires and dangle out the windows of their rooms. A blue handkerchief was an invitation to an adventure, red for a picnic, and a white one was a distress signal. They had worked fine until Uncle Amos caught Ellie trying to fly hers from the weather vane.
She watched until Graham and the debutantes entered his home. Then she turned from the window in time to see Uncle Amos tip a spoonful of grits onto his lap.
She hastened to the bed, where he sat propped up by three pillows. “I’m not getting the hang of this,” he said, the slur in his speech still unfamiliar, even two months after his stroke of apoplexy.
Reaching for a napkin, Ellie tried to smile some encouragement into his drooped face. “You will. Keep practicing.” She wiped his chin and nightshirt front, and then she loaded more grits onto the spoon she had built up with a length of inch-thick dowel.
Uncle Amos reached for it, grunting as he spilled the grits again, and tried to dredge the spoon through the bowl.
“Grab it like you would an ax handle, not with your Natchez table manners.”
A twinkle appeared in his eye—the first one she’d seen since he took to his bed. “When did you last see me holding an ax?”
Ellie breathed a prayer of thanksgiving for this smidgen of humor. Surely it was a sign that he would recover. It had to be. Because if he didn’t get better—
Light footsteps tapped down the hall, interrupting her thoughts. Within seconds, Ellie’s maid poked her head in the doorway, a fringe of tight, gray-streaked black curls escaping her red kerchief. “That spoon you made working?”
“Better, Lilah May,” Uncle Amos said in a loud voice of optimism—as always when anyone other than Ellie was around.
“Let me help him. Colonel Graham just got home. You best get over there and rescue him from all them women.” Lilah May sat next to Uncle Amos on the bed and lifted a cup of no-longer-steaming coffee from the tray. “Besides, this man needs some coffee.”
“Graham Talbot?” When she raised the cup to his lips, Uncle Amos held up one hand, stopping her. “What women?”
“Maiden women, that’s who, from all over town. They got designs on him, for sure. One of them is going to wiggle her way right into that big mansion of his.”
Her uncle’s good eye widened, making the droopy one seem even worse by comparison. “Get over there, Ellie.”
She glanced out the window, the hot midmorning sun streaming in and heating up the room, bringing only a breath of a breeze with it. At least today her uncle remembered who Graham was. “I’m driving out to Magnolia Grove to check the west cotton field this morning before it gets too hot. I want to see how well the plants are squaring.”
“All you ever do is work. You’re the best plantation manager a planter could ask for, but you’re also a young lady. Go see Graham.”
From the look on Uncle’s face, this was an argument she was going to lose. “Make sure he gets more than coffee, Lilah May. If he had his way, that’s all he’d take.”
With Uncle Amos’s snort ringing in her ears, Ellie headed downstairs. Her maid and uncle could imagine her running to Graham’s side if they liked. But she had no intention of joining the fuss and flurry over the war hero’s return. They’d been friends too long, and she knew him too well to think he would enjoy the festivities this town had planned for him. A Confederate colonel who’d served under General Lee was worthy of celebration, to be sure. But Graham would rather entertain General Grant in the parlor than attend all the parties, balls and dinners that were in his future—starting tonight.
The poor man. Surely all he wanted to do was rest after traveling all the way from Virginia.
Someone ought to warn him. He might need her help.
She hastened to the library and rummaged in her desk for stationery, then she dipped her pen in the ink.
Graham, old friend,
Maybe your welcoming committee has already told you this, but your aunt Ophelia has been at the ready for weeks, prepared to give you a coming-home party the night you arrive. If you need a quiet evening instead, I’ll be at our old hideout and will bring you home for some of Lilah May’s good cooking.
Your friend, Ellie.
As she put away her pen, she noticed a letter addressed to her, propped against her walnut whatnot box where Lilah May always left the mail. Ellie pulled a pin from her hair and slit the envelope, then drew out the single thick sheet. Only three lines of large, bold handwriting scrawled across the page.
After my father’s demise, I must put his accounts in order. May I call at your home Friday next at 8:00 p.m. to discuss the business he left behind?
As always, Leonard Fitzwald.
As always? Surely that didn’t mean Leonard intended to loiter here at their home as he had before the war. Honestly, if the neighborhood hadn’t known better, they’d have thought Ellie and Leonard were courting.
The thought sent a cold chill down her back. Although not necessarily bad-looking, Leonard had an almost frail demeanor and, worse, some undefined, underlying peculiarity that made her uneasy. She’d have to find a polite way to discourage him from visiting, especially now that the cotton fields were squaring. Between supervising her new workers, keeping track of cotton prices and watching for the right time to sell the portion of last year’s cotton harvest that she still had stashed away, she had no time for Leonard. However, since his father had been their cotton broker, Leonard no doubt had legitimate business to discuss.
But for now, Graham needed her help, so she tossed Leonard’s letter onto her desk and headed for the back door. Maybe her old friend would take her up on her offer of escape from the party, and maybe he wouldn’t. Either way, she’d have an excuse to miss it too. Some girls never grew up, like that silly Susanna Martin, who’d all but thrown herself at Graham in the yard. And Miss Ophelia, who seemed as excited about Graham’s return as the debutantes were. As much as Ellie loved Miss Ophelia, she’d welcome a chance to forego the festivities.
As Ellie neared the back door, Sugar got up from the rug and let out a sharp bark. Ellie grabbed the braided leather leash from the nail she’d hung the dog’s leashes on for the past ten years. Fastening it to Sugar’s matching soft leather collar, she gave silent thanks to God for allowing them to keep their ancestral home, as stately as Graham’s and even larger. Others around them had suffered much more than she and her uncle had, but now the war was over, and they could all make a new start.
Everything would be fine—if Uncle Amos recovered. And if Magnolia Grove returned a profit this year.
The thought took her breath. As the only father she’d known since the age of twelve, her uncle had to get well. But he had shown little improvement since the early days of his affliction, and she had to face that fact.
Magnolia Grove stood an even smaller chance of improving—and now it was up to Ellie to make that happen. At least she still had ground to work. Graham, on the other hand, had little to come home to.
If things had been different, he might have come home to her.
She brushed aside the thought as always. Their world had changed—they’d changed—since that summer night when he’d come calling, a bouquet of white crape myrtle in his hand and his heart in his eyes.
If only she’d been free to accept his offer...
The black-and-white-spotted English setter barked again and tugged at the leash. Ellie made her sit, then she scratched behind the dog’s floppy, curly ears and opened the door. With Sugar nearly dragging her toward Graham’s home, she let her gaze drift over the white house with its two-story columns and Doric capitals.
A white handkerchief hung from his bedroom window, fluttering in the gentle breeze.
Their distress signal?
She picked up her pace, Sugar trotting ahead of her. He’d been home ten minutes. What calamity could have happened in that time? And why ask for help from her, of all people?
She caught sight of him in the stable and hastened toward him. “Graham, welcome home.”
He turned toward her from the horse he was brushing. If she thought earlier that he’d changed, she now saw how much. Once the best-looking boy in Natchez, today he could turn every woman’s head in Mississippi. Of a stronger build than she remembered, and still in his uniform, he looked at once both powerful and intimidating—and yet she felt strangely safe with him. His dark hair brushed his collar, needing a trim, and he wore several days’ growth of beard, but the lack of scissors and razor couldn’t detract from his stunning looks.
His eyes had changed the most. She’d dreaded this day in the past weeks, not wanting to see cold, war-hardened eyes. But instead, she found gray-green eyes that had surely seen the worst of horrors—horrors he had commanded—and yet had become even softer than before.
They no longer held his heart in them—at least not for her. At the thought, she drew a long, slow breath of thanksgiving that held a pinch of bitter disappointment as well.
“Ellie.” He dropped his currycomb onto a low table. Then he bowed from the waist, a little too formally, considering their long friendship. “Perhaps you’d rather I call you Miss Ellie, or Miss Anderson.”
“That would be silly.” Equally silly was her sudden pleasure in hearing his deep, velvety voice. “Why did you hang the distress flag?”
He drew a ragged breath and glanced toward the house, his eyes intense, as if he was heading into battle. “I’m in trouble.”
“You?” Ellie couldn’t help laughing. “The hero of Natchez needs my help?”
“It’s female trouble.”
Female? “Well, you do work quickly. Don’t expect me to get you out of a hasty engagement or any such nonsense.”
“It’s nothing like that.” The intensity in his eyes lessened a bit, so maybe her teasing had lightened his mood. “A whole flock of women was here when I got home. They came inside with me, but Noreen’s gone.”
“Is that all? All you have to do is put on some water for tea. Noreen keeps a few cookies in the pantry, so put them on one of her Spode dishes—”
“I don’t want to serve refreshments. I want them out of the house so I can find Noreen.”
The man must have been too war-weary to think straight. “She’ll be back. You can surely tolerate an hour with a few pretty women.”
“You don’t understand. Something’s wrong. I know she left in a hurry, because her half-eaten breakfast is still sitting in the library. And Father’s revolver is missing.”
Now, that was different. “In that case, tell them you need to go. If Miss Noreen left dirty dishes, something has happened.”
“They’re not going to listen.”
She thought for a moment, watching Sugar inch closer to the horse.
“Don’t worry. I have a plan.”
Chapter Two (#ulink_30b75443-6b20-5a81-9f36-d33b431d10f2)
I have a plan. How many times in his life had Graham regretted having heard those words? He had a feeling he was going to regret it again. “All I want you to do is go in there and ask those women to leave while I look for Noreen.”
“If that’s all it takes, you do it,” Ellie said in her easy drawl.
The sick feeling in Graham’s stomach intensified to a burn. How was he supposed to tell her that, since he left her house that night eight years ago, he had spent almost no time with women and had no idea how to handle them? What was he supposed to say—that he’d led men into battle but couldn’t lead a gaggle of women out of his home? After all his time at war, he simply didn’t trust himself with the social graces. But the grin on Ellie’s face told him she wasn’t interested in hearing about it anyway.
Well, she was going to hear about it, whether she liked it or not. “Look, I’ve been three days without a bath and in the saddle the past day and a half, and I smell worse than a wet dog. I’ve been stripped of everything I own, plus my citizenship, and now to be disgraced in front of all those ladies— I still have my pride. I can’t do it.”
“My plan is brilliant. Trust me.”
He blew out his breath, sounding a little like Dixie when she saw something she didn’t like. “Don’t even tell me about it. You’re just like the Confederacy—full of great ideas that never quite work out.”
“I’m honored to be compared to the glorious Confederate States of America.”
To his dismay, she smiled her sweet smile. He’d wanted to make her mad, prod her into helping him. Why couldn’t she just do as he asked?
Then he realized she was baiting him, as she had for years when they were young.
“Fine. Carry out your plan. But I don’t want any part of it.” He stuck his foot in the stirrup, swung himself onto Dixie’s back and guided her out of the stable.
Just as he was about to tap the horse’s flank and take off, Ellie slipped out of the stable and closed the door, leaving the dog inside. She climbed the marble carriage steps and then took him by the arm and started to hoist herself right up there in front of him.
“What are you doing?” Against his will, Graham helped her mount. He’d left this woman here eight years ago, and she’d gone crazy while he was away. Now he not only had to get five girls out of his house, but he had to get another one off his horse.
“Ride up to the front of the house and pass as close to the south parlor windows as you can. You put the girls in the parlor, right?”
“Where else would I put them? The cellar?”
She leaned back against him. “Get the horse moving, and act as if you like it.”
“Ellie, we’re not children anymore. This isn’t one of your schemes. Noreen could be in trouble.”
“The sooner you stop talking and ride up there, the sooner you’ll be gone to look for her.”
How did she always make everything sound so logical? But in his situation, what else could he do? He nudged Dixie with his heel and she took off.
“Slower. We’re supposed to be enjoying this.”
He gritted his teeth so hard, they might break, and he slowed the horse. When they were ten yards from the window, Ellie began to giggle.
She really had gone crazy.
Turning back to look at him, she stopped the laugh cold and spoke through her teeth as she smiled. “You’re scowling like an old schoolmarm. Smile and act as if you like me.”
After all those years of war and responsibility, he wasn’t sure he remembered how. He tried a rather tentative grin but it felt like a grimace.
“Better but not good. Think of something pleasant.”
“Be glad you get this much. I’m out of practice.”
As they passed the windows, Ellie primped a little and giggled again. “They’re looking right at us. Smile.”
This was ridiculous. He urged Dixie across the side yard and to the front hitching post, although he didn’t exactly want to advertise the fact he was home. He didn’t need any more women showing up. “Now what?”
“Help me down.” She gave Dixie a good pat on the head and then held on to Graham as she slipped to the ground, her white hoopskirts twirling.
He dismounted and secured the horse. Then they ambled up the walk, Ellie clasping his arm as Susanna had done earlier. “I’m surprised you can stand being this close to me,” he said.
She looked up at him, her eyes blue as the sky and almost as wide. “You’re not that bad.”
“I was referring to my hygiene—or lack of it.”
“I admit you don’t smell like a crape—” She cut herself off and lowered her head, a flush across her cheeks.
But he knew what she was going to say. Crape myrtle. He’d wanted to cut down that tree eight years ago, and he would have, if Father hadn’t stopped him.
She remembered too. And since he didn’t know what to say to break this sudden, awkward silence, he let it remain.
Actually, after the first few seconds, it wasn’t so bad. Quiet was a rare thing around Ellie.
On the gallery, he opened the door for her as he had for those girls. And the quiet stopped.
“Graham, how nice of you to give me a ride. I’d been counting the days until your return.” Ellie tugged at his arm and pulled him along with her until they stood outside the parlor doorway. Then she looked up into his face and batted her lashes at him, smiling like a debutante. “I can’t believe you’re finally home. Now we can—”
She pulled her gaze from him and turned to the parlor. “Oh, dear. You have guests.”
Graham ventured a glance into the parlor. If Ellie was trying to get their attention, she’d accomplished her goal. They all sat motionless as sharpshooters, and a few had their mouths open.
Then, before he could figure out what she was doing, she took his hand and nudged him toward the parlor. Now what? Holding Ellie’s hand in front of these girls was more awkward than the silence had been.
“Graham was on his way upstairs to freshen himself after his journey.” She looked at him with those big eyes again. “Go ahead, honey. I’ll serve refreshments.”
This time she pushed him toward the stairs. Whatever she was trying to do, at least he’d get a quick sponge bath. Nothing else was going the way he wanted today, so why shouldn’t he take ten minutes to get cleaned up? It would have taken a lot longer than that if he’d had to wait for those women to decide to leave. Come to think of it, he couldn’t very well go out to look for Noreen as long as he smelled like a horse. A dirty, sweaty, dust-covered horse.
Although it was hard telling what he’d have to deal with when he got back down here.
* * *
“Ladies, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll fetch some cookies and tea.” Ellie started for the hall, knowing full well she wouldn’t get out the parlor door, acting the hostess this way in Graham’s home. Immediately, she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. She turned to see the group rushing toward her, hoopskirts dancing with the motion.
“We appreciate the offer, but we must decline,” Susanna Martin said, making the decision for the whole group as usual. “We came to see the colonel, and since he will be occupied for a time, we’ll come back another day.”
Ellie moved farther into the room and perched on the edge of a gold damask settee. She took a white lace handkerchief from her day-dress pocket and flicked an imaginary fleck of dust from the gas lamp next to her. “Whatever you say, Susanna.”
She needn’t have wondered about the effect of her actions. The girls, all from her Pearl Street neighborhood, sat back down as well and began asking questions all at once.
The charade was rather enjoyable, and Ellie let them answer their own questions for a time. Then she held up one hand. “Ladies! Your mothers would be appalled at your manners.”
“Colonel Talbot was right here in this room with us just minutes before the two of you came in. How did you end up riding with him?” Not surprisingly, Susanna took the lead.
“He sent a message for me. A white flag, so to speak.”
“While we were all in the house?”
“It would seem so.”
“But you never allow a man to come calling.”
Ellie cast her gaze out the parlor door and toward the staircase. “Of course not.”
“How long have you had this understanding with Colonel Talbot?”
“Understanding?”
“I heard years ago that he proposed marriage to you. Is that true?”
Ellie turned her face to the floor in what she hoped looked like a demure gesture. “It’s true.”
“Something’s not right about this.” Susanna stood and made for the door. “I don’t believe you and the colonel are courting at all.”
“Believe what you like, Susanna. It makes no difference to me.” Ellie walked with her to the entrance, and the other girls trailed in their wake. “See you at church on Sunday.”
When she’d shut the door behind them, Ellie fetched Sugar from the stable and brought her back to the parlor. Although she still wanted to go to Magnolia Grove before the heat of the day, she probably needed to stay until Graham came downstairs.
She went to the library to collect the dirty dishes he had said were there, and she washed them in the kitchen dependency. This area was as clean as if Miss Noreen still had a staff of twelve servants. How she kept it that way was beyond Ellie. If Lilah May and Roman hadn’t stayed on after the others left, the Anderson home would be in sorry shape.
Moments after she had dried and put away the dishes, she heard Graham clambering down the stairs. Ellie hastened through the breezeway to the dining room and then the center hall.
“They’re gone?” he asked, freshly bathed, shaved and dressed in what must be his father’s suit—a good idea, considering all the Union troops still occupying the city. “How did you manage it?”
“I didn’t manage much of anything.” Ellie moved to the sunny spot Sugar always chose on the faded runner extending from the front entrance to the back door. The dog ignored her until she picked up the leash. Then she came to life, prancing in anticipation of going outside.
“I told nothing but truth, but I let them come to the conclusion that we are courting.”
“But we’re not courting.”
“Lands, no. But since they think so, they got out of here in a hurry. You’re free to go and look for Miss Noreen.”
The look of dismay on Graham’s face was not what she’d expected. “I can’t believe you did that. Don’t you realize why they left in such a hurry?”
“Of course. They wanted to leave us to our happiness.”
He sat down hard on the wooden settle bench along the hall’s east side and dropped his head into his hands. Just the way he always had when one of her childhood schemes had gone wrong. “No, they didn’t. Have you forgotten who you’re dealing with? Susanna left here to spread the ‘news’ all over Natchez.”
“I’m not sure about that...” Or was she? What if he was right?
“The entire Pearl Street neighborhood will know by the time the party starts. Maybe the whole town.” He raised his head and impaled her with his gray-green eyes. “You did it again, Ellie.”
“What did I do?”
“You trapped me in another of your great ideas without thinking it through. That’s why these plans of yours don’t work out. You don’t stop to think.”
“I thought about it—”
“You never think beyond the present. You have to start considering the consequences of your actions.”
Hadn’t she heard that all her life? First from her parents, then from Uncle Amos and the tutors he’d gotten for her. “I can’t help it if the consequences surprise me, can I?”
He groaned. “We’re going to have to figure out what to do. After I find Noreen.”
“Graham, I’m sorry—”
“You say that every time too.”
Well, maybe she did, but that was better than not saying it.
Graham got up and started for the door. “I’m going to see if the neighbors know anything about Noreen. This afternoon, we’ll decide what to do about this. And how I’m going to get out of going to Aunt Ophelia’s party.”
The party. Ellie retrieved her note from her dress pocket and handed it to him. “I was going to slide this under your door, but then I saw your signal.”
She grabbed Sugar’s leash and followed Graham outside as a carriage pulled up near the spot where his horse snitched mouthfuls of grass from the yard’s edge. Within moments, Miss Noreen stepped unassisted from the conveyance. She turned and faced the carriage door and held out her arms. Someone placed a bundle into them.
A bundle that squirmed and cried...
Chapter Three (#ulink_9c20740d-be36-5b28-a331-01deeec4ad20)
Graham’s eyes misted over at the sight of his stepmother, and that surprised him more than anything else that had taken place this morning. What had happened to the soldier, the commander in him? He’d apparently been replaced by a nose-wiping ball of mush who hadn’t even realized he was homesick.
He also hadn’t realized he’d been running toward Noreen, but his slightly elevated pulse told him he had. He reached for the slender, gray-haired lady to give her the hug of her life—
And was met with a tiny fist to the gut.
“What? What is this?” In his relief and joy at seeing Noreen, he’d noticed but paid little attention to the white blanket he’d thought was merely wadded up in her arms. But there was something in that blanket. And that something was raising a fuss. So the crying hadn’t come from the baby buggy Mrs. Lemar was pushing up the walk as he’d thought. “What’s going on?”
“Graham.” She laid one hand on his upper arm and leaned toward him. “I thank God you made it home.”
He bent down to receive her kiss on the cheek. That alone would have made him start to bawl right here in the street, along with the baby, if he hadn’t been so shocked by his—or her—appearance.
“Everyone please come inside,” Noreen said. “Ellie, you too, dear, and Joseph.”
Joseph? Graham shot a glance back at the carriage. Their attorney, Joseph Duncan, climbed out and stretched his long legs. His suit was somewhat shiny from age and his stovepipe hat faded, but his famous, magnificent mustache was groomed to perfection as always and white as the clouds overhead.
Graham was about to offer his hand when the old gentleman gave him a snappy salute. “Welcome back, Colonel. I was a captain in the War of 1812. I know how pleasant it is to come home.”
Although it felt rather silly to salute a civilian more than three times his age while wearing a borrowed suit, Graham returned the gesture. “What’s going on? Whose baby is that?”
Joseph ambled down the walk with him. “We’d better let Miss Noreen tell her story.”
Noreen and Ellie—and Sugar—were halfway to the gallery by now. “I should carry that baby for her.” Graham started to pick up his pace, but Joseph clasped his arm.
“I wouldn’t. Let her hold the child.”
Inside, Noreen seated everyone in the parlor—Graham in his favorite leather wing chair, Ellie in the old-fashioned writer’s chair in the far corner and Joseph on a comfortable upholstered settee. Noreen chose the gold damask settee for herself. “In a few minutes, I’ll ask Ellie to prepare refreshments for us. We’ll all need strength by the time I’ve finished my story.”
She unwrapped the quieted baby from the blanket and cradled him—or her—in her arms. “This is my granddaughter, Noreen Elizabeth. She’s eight months old. Her mother called her Betsy.”
Ellie gasped, and until that moment, Graham had forgotten she was in the room.
“Yes, my daughter-in-law named her after you, Elizabeth.” Noreen smiled a tiny smile. “Apparently, she called her Betsy instead of Ellie to avoid the confusion of your shared name.”
Just what Graham needed—another female with Ellie’s name. What were the chances that her namesake would be as maddening as Ellie? “Why do we have Betsy?”
“I learned of her existence only this morning. You know that my son, Stuart, died of dysentery in Tennessee a year ago last March. Shortly after dawn, Joseph brought me word that his widow, Francine, succumbed to pneumonia.” Noreen’s always-soft, always-gentle voice was now edged with a sorrow Graham had never before heard. “A neighbor cared for Betsy overnight, and at first light, Joseph took me to Harrisonburg by ferry to fetch the child.”
“I didn’t know Stuart had a child.” But he’d had a furlough shortly before his death, so it made sense. And now the poor little girl was fatherless. And motherless. That mist threatened Graham’s eyes again. He swallowed hard to choke it down. He must have been more exhausted than he thought, as blubbery as he was.
“Neither did he. Stuart had just gotten back to his camp when the sickness swept through it. And Francine didn’t know Betsy was on the way until after she learned of Stuart’s death.” Noreen caressed the top of the baby’s head and then kissed it. “Now I’m her only relative, besides her step-grandfather when he gets home from war. And you, of course, Graham. I’ve always considered you my own.”
Graham put his head down and pinched the inner corners of his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. If he didn’t get control, he was going to embarrass himself. He cleared his throat and searched his stepmother’s eyes. “Thank you, Noreen. I feel the same.”
He stood and went to the window, not to see what was out there but to hide the fact that he had to wipe a bit of moisture from his cheek. What was wrong with him, anyway? He hadn’t cried in eight years.
Turning back to Noreen, he rubbed his face hard and focused on keeping that stupid huskiness out of his voice. “I’ve been your son for the past twenty-two years, and Stuart was like a brother to me. I’ll take care of you and his child as long as you need me.” Although he had no idea how he was going to do that, since the government had confiscated everything he owned.
“I’m sure we’ll hear from your father soon, and he’ll return with his own troops. Between the two of you, and with God’s help, we’ll all be fine.”
Did that little quiver in Noreen’s voice mean she harbored some doubt? Well, so did he, so he could hardly fault her.
“I’ll help you take care of Betsy, Miss Noreen.” Ellie got up and rushed to the older woman. “I don’t know much about babies, but you can teach me.”
Seeing her mistress crossing the room, Sugar did too, and gave the baby a tentative sniff. Betsy reached out her impossibly small hand and grabbed the dog by the ear. Sugar stood still as the baby pulled her ear and giggled.
“Sugar won’t bite, will she?” Graham sprang to his feet.
“She’s never even snapped at anybody in her whole life, and she’s ten years old. She’s not going to start now,” Ellie said, but Graham noticed her moving in closer too.
Betsy apparently grew bored with Sugar’s ear and released it, and the dog lay at Noreen’s feet, facing the baby as if guarding her.
Joseph laughed his rich, deep laugh. “I’d say this is going to be the best-protected baby on Pearl Street.”
As Noreen smiled at him, Graham drew in a huge breath. Ellie had certainly lightened the mood for them and helped them through this hard time, or rather, her dog had. But that didn’t mean she had to help care for the child. He and Noreen could manage that just fine.
“Would you like me to watch her this evening and give you a chance to rest?” Ellie said as Noreen handed Betsy to her.
“No, you and Graham have a party to attend. Betsy and I will be fine by ourselves.”
“I’m not going,” Graham and Ellie said simultaneously.
Noreen gave Graham her mother-knows-best look.
He ignored it. “I’m going to take a hot bath. Then I’m going to the train station and sending a telegram to General Lee to ask if he has any news of Father’s whereabouts. I’m going to write a letter to Andrew Johnson, asking for pardon and amnesty, and then I’m going to bed early.”
“Graham, you have to go to the party. Ophelia has gone to great trouble and expense, more than she can afford, to give it for you. You’ll break her heart if you don’t go.” Noreen turned to Ellie. “You too, dear. She thinks as much of you as she does of Graham.”
He held in a groan. This was already the longest day of his life, and it was only noon. Did the women in his life have to make it the longest night too?
“Would you like me to come tomorrow afternoon and help?” Ellie asked.
The little minx, changing the subject like that. Sure, she didn’t like the Natchez social whirl any better than he did, but if he had to go, so did she. He’d just sit back and wait for the best time to break that news to her.
“You can come back as many afternoons as you like, when it’s too hot for you to be at Magnolia Grove.” As the baby began to fuss again, Noreen took her from Ellie and bounced her on her knee.
“Noreen, you’d be better off without her help. If you let her hang around, you’ll end up engaged to somebody.” Graham started for the center hall, beckoning Ellie to follow. “But for now, we have some things to discuss.”
He strode to the door and out to the front gallery, not bothering to see whether Ellie—or her dog—followed. Outside, he eased himself onto one of the old rockers. It still felt as good as it had before he left.
Within moments, Ellie came outside and chose the rocker farthest from him.
“Sit over here by me. I don’t want to have to yell so the whole neighborhood can hear.”
She took her time in complying, which was no surprise, but she eventually sat next to him.
“We need to talk about this party,” he said, using his colonel voice.
“We already did. You’re going. I’m not.”
He should have known it wouldn’t be easy. “Oh, yes, you are. You cooked up this courtship idea, and you’re not leaving me to explain why you’re not with me on my first night home. You owe it to me after causing this fiasco.”
She huffed out a big sigh. “It’s not that bad.”
“It’s not?” He leaned forward in his chair. “What happens when time goes by and there isn’t a wedding? Did you think of that?”
Her wide eyes and surprisingly silent mouth told him she hadn’t.
“You’re the big plan-maker. I hope you have a solution for this.” As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he regretted them.
“Now that you mention it, I have thought of something—”
“No!” The word came out like the howl of a man falling off a cliff. He sprang from his chair and headed for the door. “No more plans! I’ll call at your house at eight. Just don’t think between now and then. Please do not think!”
But he could see from her dreamy-looking eyes and the angle of her cocked head that she was, indeed, thinking.
* * *
Another orphan.
After dark that evening, Ellie leaned against one of the massive white columns on Miss Ophelia’s back gallery and waited for Graham to return with her cold drink. Since he’d left her at this secluded corner, she’d discouraged eight hopeful suitors, from around age seventeen to over sixty. Now she finally had a moment alone to think, with the gentle strains of orchestra music wafting out all six of the floor-to-ceiling jib windows. If only a cool breeze would come and blow away the fog in her mind. In wartime, one heard of orphans all the time, but to have held one in her arms this afternoon—it made her want to cry.
As Graham had.
He’d tried to hide it, didn’t want to admit how that baby had affected him, but she’d seen him wipe the tears. And that might be a good thing, after four years at war. Perhaps he was starting to heal from its horrors already.
If only Ellie—and Magnolia Grove—could also recover from the war. Her visit to the plantation this afternoon hadn’t eased her mind. The cotton was squaring nicely, but the fields were full of weeds, and the workers were few.
And what of that cryptic note from Leonard Fitzwald? What could he possibly have to say to her that she didn’t already know? It was no secret that Uncle Amos owed Leonard’s father fifteen thousand dollars, due after this year’s harvest. She didn’t like the fact that they’d borrowed money from their broker. But they’d had little choice, and nearly every planter in the Natchez area, plus across the river in Louisiana, had to do the same.
Magnolia Grove had to do well this year. They couldn’t sustain another year like the past three. And with Uncle Amos laid up, Ellie had to make the ground profitable. If only she could be sure she could do it...
You can do anything you set your mind to.
Her mother’s voice drifted back to her from the past.
I married an Anderson, but remember that I am a Stanton, and therefore, so are you. Stanton women have pulled their families through Indian raids, fires, death and destruction. God may call you to hard things too, but you’ll come through, because you can do anything you set your mind to.
She twisted Mother’s pearl ring, the one Ellie had worn on her right hand ever since Mother placed it there on her last day on earth. Yes, her mother and grandmother had been strong, but it would take more than the Stanton backbone and the Anderson name to keep Magnolia Grove in the family this year.
The tall case clock chimed the quarter hour in Miss Ophelia’s center hall. Ellie glanced at her timepiece—a dainty little brooch from Uncle Amos last Christmas—and realized Graham had been gone nearly half an hour. Had Susanna or one of her friends cornered him? Did he need help escaping?
Just as she was about to go in and look for him, he strode out the jib window, open tonight to extend the dancing to the back gallery, and handed her a silver cup. “Just as I thought, everyone in Natchez has heard about us.”
Ellie turned from the view of the formal gardens and gazed into the crowded ballroom as the quartet transitioned to a sweet rendition of “Aura Lea.”
“Who are they gossiping about? You and me? Or you, Miss Noreen and Betsy?”
“All of us. We’re the talk of Natchez tonight.”
Susanna and a man Ellie didn’t know, dressed in a Confederate officer’s uniform, whirled across the brightly lit room, her emerald hoopskirts sweeping the expanse. The woman seemed to think it was her responsibility to dance with every former Confederate soldier at the party. Ellie had to admit it was nice to see a few gray uniforms again after two years of occupation by the Union army.
Susanna’s cloying smile turned to a frown as she caught Ellie’s gaze.
“She’s going to cause trouble.” Ellie kept her own smile intact until Susanna and her partner danced across the room and out of sight.
Graham’s grimace might have meant he thought any trouble Susanna could cause would be minor compared to Ellie’s plan.
She snatched his arm and pulled him closer to the gaslight to see his face better. “I know what that look meant. I’m doing only what you asked me to do—helping you get rid of the girls. They aren’t bothering you now, are they? Think what tonight would have been like if I hadn’t done as you asked.”
In the brighter light, his eyes blazed like the flame. “I shouldn’t have hung the distress flag. I should have camped out in the old hideout until the party was over.”
So much had happened that day, it seemed she had seen the signal last week rather than twelve hours ago. Just this morning, she’d had no idea Graham would come home, that she would enter a fabricated courtship with him, that a baby would enter her life—
“The baby... What did you learn about her this afternoon while I was out at Magnolia Grove?”
“For one thing, I found out why the baby is your namesake.” Graham swirled the punch in his cup as he used to when in deep thought. Then he looked up and met her gaze, the trace of an undefinable emotion in his eyes. “I didn’t know how much you did for Francine before she and Stuart got married and moved to Harrisonburg.”
Ellie sipped her punch, a little tart for her taste. “All I did was show kindness to her, a girl I liked, at a time when others in this town did not. She was a Ballard, and you know how most people in town viewed that family.”
“Outlaws, thieves, drunkards—but I think most of that was exaggerated. Your friendship apparently meant a lot to Francine. And I appreciate it too, for my stepbrother’s sake.” Graham tasted his punch, and then he swallowed another big gulp. “Want me to get rid of yours?”
After all these years, he remembered that she liked her punch as sweet as her coffee. “Don’t let Miss Ophelia find out.”
“This isn’t the first time I’ve rescued you from having to eat or drink something you didn’t like.” Moving nothing but his eyes, he scanned the gallery and gardens, then turned his back to the house and drank her sour punch as fast as if it were the best raspberry cordial. “Lilah May never knew that you didn’t eat a single pea the entire time you and your uncle stayed in town.”
She laughed at that. “Yes, I owe you for eating many a helping from my plate when no one was looking.”
Graham set both punch cups on the wrought iron table in the corner. “Noreen told me what happened when Stuart announced their engagement.”
“It was shameful. She was a good girl, no matter what kind of family she came from.” Ellie unfolded her fan and waved the effects of the humidity from her neck. “I don’t understand why Francine never let Miss Noreen know about the baby.”
“Francine’s father disowned her for what he thought was shameful behavior on her part. He thought Stuart, a man far above her station, was toying with her, using her for nefarious reasons. But he was wrong. According to Noreen, Stuart loved Francine and intended to marry her from the day they met.”
“That’s how I saw their relationship too. Francine lived by her Bible.”
“She was afraid her family would try to take Betsy from her if they knew about her. So she continued to run the store Stuart’s father left him, just as she had after he went to war. Harrisonburg is far enough away that no one in Natchez, including Noreen, found out she’d had a baby. I guess she never knew her father and brother were killed in the war.”
Poor Francine. To have found love, had a child and then lost that love—it had to have been the hardest thing imaginable.
The only thing worse was never to experience love at all...
Where had that thought come from? She pushed it away. Romantic love was not for Ellie. And here at this party, with the man who knew her better than anyone else, was not a safe place to explore such a notion. Family love was enough for her, and she had that with Uncle Amos and even Lilah May and Miss Noreen, in a way. And she could love Francine’s child like a niece. In fact, since Betsy was her namesake, she owed her as much love as she could give.
“Aura Lea” drew to a close, and Graham offered his arm. “Stroll in the garden?”
As they descended the stone stairs to the lawn, Ellie had to admit that the moonlight made him even more handsome, as every unattached female in the city had surely noticed tonight.
Since he seemed to want to talk of other things, Ellie decided to ask the question that had been nagging at her since he came home that afternoon. “Graham, why are you so opposed to spending time with a woman? I know Susanna isn’t your type, but Natchez, and especially the Pearl Street neighborhood, has lots of nice, pretty girls.”
She could feel the tension build in his arm—but why? “Did something happen during the war to make you leery of women?”
“If I tell you, will you promise not to think up a solution to the problem?”
Ellie had to laugh. “I promise.”
“A promise is a sacred thing.” His voice deepened, lowered to a near whisper.
She held her breath, waiting for what she sensed was close to his heart.
“I can’t marry. I can’t support a wife.”
“Graham, just because Ashland Place and Ammadelle are gone—”
“You don’t understand. None of those girls in there do either.” He gestured toward the brightly lit house. “It’s not just our plantations. I have no livelihood. I have no money. I’m not even a citizen anymore—of any country. I’ve lost everything.”
“Why are you not a citizen? I haven’t heard of that happening to any of our neighbors.”
He let out a noisy breath. “Andrew Johnson has decreed that all West Point graduates who served as officers of the Confederacy must apply individually for our pardons and the restoration of our citizenship. Since Father and I are both West Point men and served as colonels, we lost Ashland Place, Ammadelle—and everything else.”
The full moon revealed a fresh line between his eyes—a line that hadn’t been there before baby Betsy arrived that afternoon.
The baby. His orphaned niece. No wonder Graham’s worry showed on his face. He had a child to support now, and no way of doing so.
And Ellie’s fear of marriage—fear that a husband would fail to provide for her as her father had failed—had driven him to West Point all those years ago. That meant she was to blame for Graham’s dilemma. The thought made her weak, and she eased herself to the iron bench next to them.
But she couldn’t let him find out about that. She blurted the first thing that came to her mind. “Well, that’s what you get for going to a Yankee military school. You should have gone to Charleston—to the Citadel.”
“Here we go with that again. Do you know that, at the time, I heard those words from everybody in town except Father and Noreen?” He sat beside her, keeping a good distance between them. “But that’s why I can’t marry. I have nothing. If our town house didn’t belong to Noreen from her first marriage, I wouldn’t have a place to live.”
Graham gazed off into the distance, in the direction of Ashland Place. “I can’t buy or sell property. I can’t vote or run for public office. My military career is over, my plantation is confiscated, as is Father’s, and I have no other skills. Everything is gone. And now I have Noreen and a baby niece to care for. There’s no room in my life for a wife.”
And it was her fault. Above all else, she had to help him somehow... “Listen to my idea. I think it will work. I can keep those girls away.”
He let out a moan that must have come from his toes.
“Let’s continue the courtship arrangement. It would help me too. Dozens of discharged soldiers are coming back to town, and they’re at my door every day, wanting to court me.”
“Why don’t you let them?”
“Well, just as you can’t marry, I won’t.”
“Why not?”
“My reasons don’t matter. Let’s keep up the courtship ruse in order to discourage each other’s would-be suitors and belles. But we have to promise to remain friends—nothing more.”
He paused so long, she was sure he would say no. Then he took her hand and leaned in close. “I’ll have to think about this. Something about making up a courtship doesn’t feel quite right to me.”
“But you’ll consider it?”
“I’ll consider it. And I promise to remain just friends with you. That suits me fine.”
She should have felt relief, knowing Graham wouldn’t attempt a true courtship again. But something in his tone made her wonder, for the first time, if maybe her great ideas weren’t so great after all.
The thought startled her as much as the rustling of leaves directly behind her.
She spun in the direction of the sound and faced a uniformed man, his left eye covered with a black patch and a scar across his left cheekbone. Ellie sucked in her breath. In the flickering gaslight, his gaunt face and form looked as if he had come back from the grave.
“Ellie,” he rasped, reaching for her hand. “I’m glad I lived to see you again.”
She instinctively pulled back from him. Then recognition hit her like shrapnel. “Leonard Fitzwald...”
Chapter Four (#ulink_14a66096-f635-5f99-91f6-a15b8d6fa0e5)
Graham’s fists clenched at his sides as his memories of this man brought out every fight instinct he’d developed during four years at war. Of all the men he would have expected to die of sheer cowardice on the battlefield, Leonard Fitzwald would have topped the list.
“I trust you received my letter,” Fitzwald said, his wheezy voice sounding like an eighty-year-old man’s.
This weasel had dared to communicate with Ellie? The thought ignited a searing flame deep in Graham’s gut. Fitzwald had no right to correspond with any decent woman. “Why did you send Miss Anderson a letter?”
Fitzwald took a half step back and ran his finger over the edge of the eye patch. “Business. With the potential of a social visit afterward.”
“You’re mistaken, Fitzwald. You’re not visiting Miss Anderson, and you’re going to do your business now, in front of me.” He looked the man over. The Confederate uniform on his back did nothing to make him look like a soldier. “And no more letters.”
“Graham!”
He was aware of Ellie’s high-pitched voice, but all he could see in his mind was Leonard Fitzwald calling on Ellie in the months before Graham laid his heart at her feet. “I know things about this man that you don’t know, Ellie. You have to trust me.”
“Colonel, let it go.” The weasel turned to her. “I’ll call at your house Friday at eight, as planned.”
“Stay away from her, Fitzwald. I haven’t forgotten how to fight.”
Ellie wouldn’t know he wasn’t talking about the war. Her gaze snapped from Graham to Fitzwald and back again, her mouth open as if she didn’t know what to say or whom to say it to.
But Fitzwald remembered the incident Graham referred to. He could see it in the man’s weasel eye.
“Tell me your business now, Leonard,” Ellie said, her voice quivering a bit. “Graham is an old friend, and you can trust him with whatever you have to say.”
“Fine way to treat a veteran.”
He had to be joking. “You’re no veteran. You’re a coward—at home and at war. I know what you did at Antietam.” So did every Confederate from colonel on up. The story had spread fast—how Fitzwald had crumpled on the battlefield, whimpering like a baby crying for its mama. Even Betsy didn’t act that way. Only Fitzwald’s father’s money and political influence had gotten him a desk job instead of the firing squad.
“Let him speak his mind,” Ellie whispered, still the peacemaker.
Graham let out his breath with a low growl. He crossed his arms in front of himself and waited.
The weasel drew himself up to his full height. “I’ve inherited my father’s property and investments. Ellie, your uncle—”
“Call her Miss Anderson.”
Fitzwald glared at him as if he was a Yankee. “Ellie’s uncle owed my father thirty thousand dollars. The loan comes due two weeks from today.”
“Two weeks?” Ellie’s voice turned shrill. “That’s not true. Uncle Amos was careful to set the due date a month after harvest. And he owes fifteen thousand, not thirty.”
“That was before he took out a second loan and attached it to the first. If you doubt my word, I can arrange a meeting with my lawyer.”
Graham had had enough of this. “Fitzwald, it’s time for you to go home.”
“My attorney will come with me on Friday.”
As the weasel retreated into the darkness beyond the gas lamps, Graham sat down again and motioned for Ellie to join him. The bench that had seemed inviting and comfortable minutes ago now felt rigid under his still-tense body. He took a few deep breaths in hopes of calming his jangling nerves and slowing his heartbeat.
Ellie eased onto the bench beside him, keeping as much distance as her hoops allowed. “Why are men as hateful as Robert Fitzwald allowed to have children?”
“I’ve wondered that for years.” After Fitzwald’s shocking news, it probably would have been appropriate to comfort her in some way. But wouldn’t that add to the awkwardness already surrounding them every time they were together? He scooted a little closer to the end of the wrought iron bench and away from her, but that felt strange too, so he reached over and patted her hand. But that only made his discomfort worse. He’d better just talk and not touch. “Noreen told me about your uncle’s illness. I was sorry to hear about it, but now I’m even sorrier. You shouldn’t have to deal with Fitzwald’s buffoonery.”
“It’s part of doing business. But I’d be glad to hand this over to Uncle Amos if he was able.” She glanced to the right and the left, and then she leaned toward him. “He had a stroke of apoplexy when he heard Lee surrendered to Grant. He refuses to get out of his bed. I think he could, with help, but he’s so melancholy, all he wants to do is lie there.”
That news was the biggest surprise he’d had since coming home. Seeing her downcast eyes and the way she bit her lower lip, he thought it might be best to change the subject. Courtship was one thing, but he had no idea how to deal with a crying woman. “Do you think there’s any truth to Fitzwald’s story?”
“None at all.”
“Good. Then he’ll have no reason to continue bothering us.”
He had barely rested his hand back on his thigh when the sound of chattering females once again assaulted his ears. What now? He turned toward the offensive noise. The full moon revealed a bevy of hoopskirts and curls flouncing down the stone steps toward them. He wasn’t sure, but they may have added a girl or two to the original pack.
He stood as dark-haired Susanna led the girls to the bench, although he would rather have hidden behind the giant live oak to their left.
“Colonel Talbot, Miss Ophelia requests your presence in the ballroom.” Susanna eyed them in the moon’s shadowy light. “I won’t apologize for intruding, because it doesn’t look as if we interrupted much of anything.”
She was probably right. Ellie had kept a rigid distance from him and, other than the moment he’d made his friendship-only promise to her, he’d done the same. Anyone watching would have thought they were cousins or siblings, not a courting couple.
This charade wasn’t going to work—not with Susanna around.
Ellie rose with as much dignity as he’d once seen in Mary Custis Lee. “Please tell Miss Ophelia that we will be in momentarily.”
Susanna stood speechless for a moment, which was almost as much of a surprise as Ellie’s sudden poise. The silence didn’t last long, though. “You’d better do as she says.”
Graham rested his hand on the waist of his “intended.” “As Ellie said, we’ll be along. Please give us a moment alone.”
“If you’re brave enough to defy Miss Ophelia, that’s your business. And I still say this is the most peculiar courtship I’ve ever seen.” The leader of the gang glared at Ellie for a moment and then stalked away, her troops following her as always. Apparently, his colonel voice worked better on Susanna than it did on Ellie.
As soon as they were out of earshot, Graham leaned in close to whisper. “I’m sorry you have to endure this party after receiving such upsetting news from Fitzwald. Would you like me to take you home?”
“No, because I don’t think he’s telling the truth. I’m not going to give this any more serious thought until I’ve had time to find out. And I won’t run out on Miss Ophelia now that we’re here.” Ellie began to pace the path in front of the bench as if in deep thought. Finally she stopped and faced him. “But one thing we have to think about is our arrangement. Susanna could make a lot of trouble, so we have to be more careful. Even when we think nobody’s around, people could be watching us.”
“That’s another reason I didn’t want to fabricate a courtship.”
“We can do it. We have to. If we stop now, neither of us will be able to turn around without enduring a marriage proposal.”
He had to laugh. “You’re the only one who has to worry about that.”
“Don’t be too sure Susanna Martin won’t try to make you propose.”
The thought turned his insides cold. Ellie was right.
“Here’s what we’ll do...”
The chill in his gut now turned to fire. How did this woman manage to keep him in such turmoil? Was this what life was going to be from now on?
No, it was not. She’d helped him out of a jam, that much was true, but it didn’t mean she could control him. He’d been a colonel in the Confederate army, commanding thousands of men, and no woman was going to give him orders.
Especially this woman...
“Whatever your new idea is, you can forget it. I’ll think of something.”
She smiled that smile that used to keep him awake at night—sweet, effortless, with a hint of amusement, as if she was going to let him talk his own neck into a noose. “That’s fine, Graham. What do you want to do?”
“Easy. We’re going to stop this nonsense.”
“How are we going to do that?”
“We’ll go into that ballroom and...” And what? Announce that they weren’t courting after all? While that seemed like a good solution, common sense told him it would make a laughingstock of Ellie. He studied her eyes in the moonlight—clear, unselfish, innocent eyes. Eyes that had kept watch over him in childhood and still looked after him today. Eyes that saw right through him to the man he was inside. Could he do that to her, offend her this way? No Southern gentleman would treat a woman in such a fashion. He looked over her head, to the east, toward Ashland Place.
“What’s your plan?” He ground out the words between clenched teeth.
Ellie took his arm and snuggled against him in a most convincing manner. “To go into the ballroom like a couple in love and let Miss Ophelia draw her own conclusions. She probably wants to honor your service to the Glorious Confederacy, so let her do that. Then just act natural and she’ll spread the word that we’re courting. But you have to make it look more realistic than you are now, or nobody older than little Betsy will believe it.”
At once he realized they’d been ambling back up to the gallery. “Courting doesn’t come naturally to me. I don’t know what to do.”
“Nobody here knows that. Just do as I do.”
Now how in blue blazes did Ellie know how to act “in love”? She’d never treated him like that, and according to Noreen this afternoon, she’d not courted with anyone in all the years he’d been gone.
But as they climbed the steps to the gallery and the gaslight there shone on her face, he saw that she did, indeed, know how to look that way. Those big blue eyes of hers, gazing at him like liquid love—he cleared his throat and swallowed hard to get rid of the lump that somehow formed there.
“That’s it!” Her lowered voice brightened with enthusiasm as they stepped through the window. “Now you look the part.”
Somehow, that didn’t make Graham feel any better. Pretending to be in love with the girl who had once ripped out his heart and then stepped on it—he couldn’t go along with it. “Ellie, we have to talk about this. I can’t— I won’t—”
Ellie’s adoring look vanished for an instant as something like an ache etched itself between her eyes.
She must have thought he found something distasteful about her.
How far from the truth that was. What Southern gentleman went about hurting women that way? And why did this whole situation have to be so complicated?
Holding in the groan that wanted to escape from his gut, Graham clenched his jaw and stepped aside to allow her to enter his aunt’s home. If Ellie and Susanna were right, their friends had many more events planned for him in the near future, and he had to learn to deal with that. He’d give it some thought when he was alone.
If he ever made it out of this house and away from this party.
* * *
Graham wanted to talk about the courtship ruse? Ellie was thinking the exact same thing. It wasn’t going to work unless he agreed to it with his whole heart.
The poor man. Ellie released his slightly trembling arm and stepped through the jib window and into Miss Ophelia’s home. He hadn’t seemed this uncomfortable even at their first “grown-up” party at Susanna’s house years ago. What could frighten this war hero so much—the party itself or the thought of an imaginary courtship with her?
“Colonel Talbot!” Miss Ophelia called in her exaggerated, singsong voice. She sailed across the vaulted-ceilinged ballroom toward them, wearing more yellow ruffles and bows and longer ringlets of red hair than even the debutantes had. Of course, Ellie would never have expected Miss Ophelia to wear mourning clothes for more than six months. And, being Ophelia Prescott Talbot Adams, she got away with it in Natchez.
When she reached Graham’s side, she enveloped him in a hug only a woman who had been like another mother to him could give. “You look stunning in that uniform, Colonel.”
Miss Ophelia’s matronly embrace brought a look of relief to Graham’s eyes, clearly comforting him more than Ellie would have thought possible. When his aunt finally released him, he gave her a peck of a kiss on the cheek. “If you call me Colonel again, I’m going to march right out of here and take all these troops with me.”
“Only in public, Graham,” she said, blinking her long eyelashes as if trying to keep from shedding a tear. “I’m too proud of you to pass up any opportunity to boast about you.” Then she gestured for the orchestra to stop, and she pulled both Graham and Ellie to the front of the room.
“The whole town has been waiting for this day.” Miss Ophelia raised her voice and commanded the room’s attention. “My nephew, Colonel Graham Prescott Talbot, war hero and defender of the great Confederate States of America under the celebrated General Robert E. Lee, has returned to us at last.”
True to form, Miss Ophelia led the crowd in genteel applause. As she’d requested, Graham wore his freshened uniform and polished boots, and Ellie noticed at least a dozen other former soldiers in cadet gray as well. They all carried the hardships of war in their faces, as Graham did, no doubt having seen and endured things they’d never be able to forget. But what about their futures? Were these men’s days to come as uncertain as Graham’s, their prospects as dreary, their responsibilities as heavy? Were their burdens as great as his: no occupation, no potential for marriage and family in the near future, no means to support the stepmother and baby in his care—
And a counterfeit courtship with Ellie, who had once laughed at his proposal?
At once, she understood his discomfort with the courtship arrangement she’d suggested.
Miss Ophelia’s pointed stare snatched Ellie from her thoughts, and she realized the room had gone silent. She nudged Graham in the side. “They’re waiting for you to speak.”
He cleared his throat as if summoning his colonel attitude. “Thank you, Aunt Ophelia, for the kind words. It’s good to get home to Natchez, where the Spanish moss sways in the breeze, the catfish wait for us in the Mississippi River, the grits are always hot and the punch cold. I pray none of us will ever leave her again.”
The men murmured their agreement, and Graham paused a moment. “As I told my troops in my mustering-out speech only months ago, ‘May we all discharge the obligations of good and peaceful citizens at home as well as we have performed the duties of thorough soldiers in the field.’ Always take comfort in the knowledge that, although we lost the war, your courageous men in gray did perform their duties well.”
Miss Ophelia began another long round of applause, seemingly understanding his discomfort and distracting the crowd from the huskiness of his voice and the pain in his eyes. He turned aside for a moment, but his mouth quirked a bit as if he were trying for a more cheerful expression.
“That was a beautiful speech,” Ellie said, sensing his pain. “It must have been hard, saying goodbye to the men who served under you for four years.”
“I worry about them, how they’ll fare now, what will happen to them.” He swallowed hard as if pushing back his tears.
This man had been through enough, even without her courtship idea. “We could go home now, if you like.”
“No, Noreen was right. Aunt Ophelia spared no expense for this party, from the roast beef and smoked ham on biscuits to the pecan and sweet potato pies,” he whispered to Ellie. “If nothing else, I need to show her some appreciation. Even though all I want right now is to get home and have some quiet time to rest and think—”
“Colonel Talbot, I haven’t danced with you all evening.” Like a machete through a cotton stalk, Susanna’s shrill voice cut through the murmur of the crowd as she drew near Graham. “We have much to talk about after your long absence.”
Six other neighborhood girls gathered in a semicircle behind their leader as if waiting in line for their turn to snatch up the handsome soldier.
Miss Ophelia’s gray-green eyes, a mirror image of Graham’s, turned a shade darker as always when she disapproved of the way someone treated her only nephew. “Let’s all dance to ‘Aura Lea’ again, in honor of Colonel Talbot’s own maid with hair as golden as Aura Lea’s. Graham, Ellie, please start this dance.”
“Dance? In front of all these people?” Graham’s low voice sounded less like a colonel’s than Miss Ophelia’s had. “Aunt Ophelia, I’ve lived the military life for eight years, with no frivolity to speak of. Not tonight—”
“We’d love to.” Ellie could hear the hint of challenge in her own voice.
“Ellie, you’ve gone too far.”
The poor man. He’d commanded the entire room’s attention with his wonderful speech, looked like the beau of Natchez in his uniform and had the bearing of a warrior. Yet the prospect of a dance clearly frightened him more than a line of cannons.
And it was up to Ellie to put him at his ease.
She swayed toward him and lifted her hand, then let it rest on his shoulder as she gave a tiny nod to her right.
He looked in the direction she indicated. Susanna stood a mere three yards from them, a knowing smile on her face.
Ellie knew Graham hated this charade and, in a way, so did she, but letting Susanna destroy it seemed even worse. He took Ellie’s other hand and stepped out with one foot, sweat dripping down his brow as if the room was lit with blazing fires instead of mere crystal gasoliers.
Ellie moved with him. Seeing that he had forgotten even the most basic steps, she guided him with a gentle touch on his shoulder, pressing this way and that to help him remember which way to step. “Act as if you know what you’re doing, and nobody will know the difference.”
His grip on her relaxed a fraction. “At least other people are dancing now too.”
“Including Susanna. Miss Ophelia and I saved you from her, you know.”
“Not to mention the rest of her mob.” Graham executed a graceful turn, and Ellie smiled her approval. “How many more parties did you say I have to endure?”
“Plenty. And all those girls will be at every one of them.” Not to mention dozens of former soldiers. She lowered her voice. “That’s why we both need our arrangement.”
He wrinkled his nose as if Sugar had trotted right by him, soaking wet. “I’m still not convinced about that.”
Ellie was, and not only because Susanna and her friends seemed ready to pounce on Graham, waiting for the moment Ellie would leave his arms. And not because of all her would-be suitors, either. From Graham’s more natural steps and more relaxed hold on her, she knew she was helping him through more than a mere awkward moment. No, he needed her. And since she had caused many of the problems he now faced, she would help him all she could. That was what friends did.
For that reason alone, Ellie smiled her sweetest at him as she came into Susanna’s line of sight, her mind grasping for a new plan that would solidify this faux courtship.
Chapter Five (#ulink_badc81ac-dacf-5e72-b935-426570fbdb7f)
An hour later, having seen Ellie home, Graham sank into one of the deep fireside wing chairs in the parlor, his thoughts racing as they always had before a battle. With Noreen at his side, rocking and singing softly to little Betsy, he sipped his tea and gave thanks for this peaceful home. Although common sense told him the baby would likely disturb that peace before morning.
Noreen paused in her humming. “You have a lot on your mind tonight. Your silence gives you away.”
“You’d think with the war over, a soldier could simply come home and pick up his life where it had left off.” Graham shifted in his chair, its plushness not sufficient to keep him as comfortable as it used to. But that probably had less to do with the chair’s quality than it did his own melancholy mood. “Life never turns out the way we’d planned, does it?”
She pulled the baby closer. “Not in the least.”
“I’m going to stay in Natchez with you and Betsy until Father gets home. But this afternoon, after I sent my request for amnesty to the Yankee president, I wrote to Major James White, superintendent of the Citadel. I inquired about teaching there, maybe starting this fall. Federal troops still occupy the school, but that surely won’t go on much longer.” He gulped the last half of his tea and set the cup on the cloth-covered walnut table at his side. “If I’d gone to the Citadel instead of West Point, I wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“Nobody should fault you for choosing the school your father attended.” The dimmed lighting couldn’t hide Noreen’s smile of encouragement. “And I’m sure he will be home soon.”
Graham wasn’t so certain. It was probably time for him to tell his stepmother all he knew of Father. “Because he and Father were classmates and close friends at West Point, General Lee graciously met with me after the surrender and tried to pinpoint Father’s whereabouts. I didn’t know he had been transferred to the Trans-Mississippi Department, which didn’t surrender to the North until May 26.”
“Then he could come home any day.”
“He was not on General Lee’s list of casualties. I sure wish the Confederacy hadn’t passed the new conscription law last year, raising the age limit to fifty. Father was a year too young to remain exempt.”
“Ellie’s uncle Amos escaped by only one year. He served in the Silver Grays instead.”
“Silver Grays?”
“The home guard. I declare, I wish James could have done the same.”
Betsy began to fuss then, as if she could sense their concern about her step-grandfather. Noreen jiggled the baby on her lap, but that didn’t seem to help. A new weariness lined Noreen’s delicate features, and she stood more slowly than usual. “She must want to be walked.”
Babies wanted their mothers—or grandmothers, in this case—to walk about the room with them at this hour of the night? The mantle clock looked nearly ready to chime one. Noreen had always been early to bed and early to rise. How was this going to work out, especially at her age? Sure, she was a spry fifty, but it had to be harder than when she’d cared for her own child at age twenty-one.
At once, he left his cushioned chair and laid aside his musings about his father and his own future. Until Father came home, Graham was needed here, and he’d care for his family with an undivided heart, no matter the sacrifice. He crossed the room to Noreen and held out his arms. “You’ve been looking after Betsy all day. Now I want you to go to bed and leave her to me.”
The baby let out a great howl, startling Graham into dropping his arms. Noreen shook her head. “You don’t know the first thing about quieting an infant.”
The howl grew to a shriek.
“Well, Noreen, I’m not sure you do either, at the moment.” He tempered his words with a grin, raising his voice to be heard over the racket.
Her eyes widened, and then she smiled. “I am a bit out of practice. But I’ll be all right.”
Graham reached for the child, and this time, he took her in his arms. “Sorry, Noreen, but I’m the man of the house now. Until Father gets back, I’m taking care of both her and you.”
Noreen pushed back a lock of hair that had fallen from her pins. “Maybe I’ll lie down for ten minutes.”
She climbed the stairs toward her room. Good thing it was in the back of the house, overlooking the gardens, while he cared for Betsy in the front. Otherwise, the little baby with the big lungs would keep Noreen from getting any rest at all tonight.
He looked around the parlor. What kind of atmosphere would a baby like at bedtime? Maybe less light. But dimming the room meant he’d somehow have to hold Betsy in one arm while turning the gasolier knob with the other hand. Could he manage that without dropping her? No, he should set her on the floor instead.
But the moment her set her down, she howled all the louder. With a sheen of moisture forming on his forehead, he dashed to the gasolier and turned down the light.
That was better. He picked up the baby again. Too bad she didn’t appreciate his effort.
Perhaps she was tired of being walked. He knew she wasn’t hungry, as Noreen had been feeding her when he came into the room a half hour ago. Graham eased himself onto the wing chair, first holding Betsy tightly and then a little looser. Jiggling her didn’t help either.
He had to get this baby to sleep, or Noreen would be right back down here, and she needed to rest after her exhausting day.
Fact was, Graham was beyond the point of exhaustion himself, and he couldn’t hear his own thoughts over Betsy’s howling. He shifted her in his arms and looked into her pretty little face, tears pouring from her eyes.
Did she miss her mother?
Heavenly Father, I can’t do anything about that. Please show me how to comfort this baby.
No ideas came to him, other than shutting the two massive parlor doors to keep Noreen’s room quiet. When he’d done that, he moved to the window, where he saw that the fog had obscured the Andersons’ gaslight. He closed the windows so the baby’s cries wouldn’t wake the whole neighborhood.
About five minutes later, as Graham began to despair of ever getting the child to sleep, the front door opened and closed quietly. Then the parlor door eased open, and Sugar trotted in, followed by Ellie holding the leash.
He ran one hand over his eyes, his fatigue making his head pound. He hadn’t the energy to spar with Ellie tonight. Why did she have to come over here? “Ellie, please...”
She unfastened Sugar’s leash, her smile as bright as if she’d just risen from a full night’s sleep. “I heard Betsy crying, and I came to help. I have an idea.”
He groaned like a cadet on his first ten-mile hike. “I’m not letting you involve this helpless child in one of your schemes. No baby, not even a Yankee baby, deserves that.”
* * *
“I’m a better nursemaid than you are.” Still in her ball gown after her short visit with Uncle Amos, Ellie sat on the edge of the gold settee. She had to admit that she came here to do more than help with the baby. The moment she’d glanced out her window and seen Graham’s silhouette in the parlor, pacing the floor with Betsy, she’d known how to calm her. This was the perfect opportunity to show him that not all her schemes went wrong. If she could somehow get that baby to stop crying, maybe he’d believe the courtship ruse would work out too.
Graham’s square jaw clenched, and it made him look all the more commanding in his Confederate grays. “I’m not a nursemaid at all. I’m relieving Noreen so she can rest.”
“She’ll never fall asleep as long as Betsy is crying so hard. Let me try. You haven’t done a great job thus far.”
“Fine. Have it your way.” He carried the squalling baby to her and placed her in Ellie’s arms. “What can you do that Noreen and I haven’t already done?”
She sat Betsy on the floor in front of her. “Nothing. But watch this. Come, Sugar.”
Sugar ambled up to Betsy and licked her toes. After a few moments, the baby’s cries began to taper off until she quieted. Then she reached out and grabbed a tiny fistful of black-and-white fur on the dog’s neck.
“How did you know that would work?” Graham no longer looked as if he were ready to fire a cannon at someone—namely, Ellie—but she also didn’t see the amazement she’d hoped for in his face.
“I remembered how calm Betsy got this morning when she grabbed that long, floppy ear, so I thought Sugar might settle her down tonight too.”
“I have to admit, it made her happy again.”
Graham Talbot—acknowledging that Ellie was right? That was momentous, and she needed to seize the moment. “My plan worked, and so will my courting idea. Give it some time, and—”
“Wait a minute. That’s not the same. Just because a dog came over here—”
“She didn’t come here on her own. I brought her. On purpose, so she could distract Betsy from whatever was wrong with her.” Surely even Graham couldn’t argue with that.
Sugar’s high-pitched whine drew Ellie’s attention. She looked down to find Betsy grabbing the dog by the tail.
“Not the tail, Betsy.” She gently pried the little fingers away, and Sugar retreated to a far corner.
Betsy’s face wrinkled, and she let out a long, low wail that sounded as if her heart had broken.
“Sugar, come,” Ellie coaxed, but the dog did her ceremonial dance of three circles and then flopped onto the floor, curling herself into a ball.
Ellie lifted the baby and held her against her shoulder, patting her back. “A wagon ran over Sugar’s tail last winter, and she can’t stand to have it touched.”
Graham strode to Sugar’s corner and bent down as if examining the tail. He must not have touched it, though. The dog would have let her know.
“Don’t you see that your schemes don’t work out because they aren’t based on logic? You have to think things through. You can’t expect a dog to sit with a baby all night long so the people in the house can sleep.”
Betsy’s sobs had dissolved into shallow, fitful breaths now, and Ellie lowered her from her shoulder and cradled her instead. The baby’s eyes drifted shut.
“Success,” Ellie whispered.
“Don’t forget how it went the last time she stopped crying.”
“I remember that Sugar quieted her, just as I thought she would. I wanted you to see that so you’d realize what a good idea my courtship plan is.”
“That’s not how it happened at all. Yes, Sugar momentarily distracted her, but that’s not what put her to sleep.” She could feel Graham’s exasperation in the air. “We’re not children anymore. I’m a grown man with a grown man’s responsibilities, and I can’t go along with you and play your silly games like I used to. This courtship of yours has to end.”
“Being an adult doesn’t mean you have to be gloomy all the time.”
“I’m not gloomy.”
Bless his heart. He didn’t begin to realize how much the war—and military school too—had changed him. “You used to be a lot of fun, but now everything is serious to you. The war’s over, Graham, and it’s time to stop fighting.”
A look of pain crossed his face, and although she used to know him better than anybody, she couldn’t understand that look or what had caused it. Was it her complaint about his seriousness? She couldn’t imagine that. Was he remembering the war, the suffering?
When he dropped his gaze to the floor as if unable to look at her, she knew. This powerful man, this war hero, had his mind on the past—their past—and she’d caused his pain with her careless words: You used to be fun. Her subconscious, underlying message spoke her truth: he wasn’t fun anymore.
But was that true? Considering how he’d spent the past eight years, was it fair of her to compare him to the carefree boy who’d proposed marriage to her?
She twisted the ring on her right hand. She’d give Mama’s best pearl if only she could take back those hurtful words. She wished she hadn’t said them, wished they weren’t true, wished she could somehow comfort him as she’d managed to comfort Betsy. She opened her mouth to say so, but he lifted one hand and shook his head.
“I can’t think about it tonight. I wasn’t this tired even after Chickamauga.” He strode to her side and took Betsy from her. “Let’s talk about it later. I’m going to put her in her crib.”
When he’d disappeared up the stairs, Ellie leashed Sugar and started for home, the mist of regret heavier in her mind than the settling fog.
Chapter Six (#ulink_5d7800bd-0248-503a-bb63-12e72b333751)
The next afternoon, Ellie straightened the piece of wire she’d found in the stable. She tied a rag, one of Lilah May’s old, frayed red kerchiefs, onto one end. Then she set the other end on the windowsill and weighted it down with Pride and Prejudice, flying the kerchief out her window like a flag.
Dear God, I’m putting this flag out here like Gideon’s fleece. Despite what she’d said to Graham, she realized during her sleepless night that she didn’t know whether Leonard Fitzwald had told her the truth about their debt. She needed advice—and help in searching Uncle Amos’s library at Magnolia Grove.
If only her uncle would get well again, she could tell him about her conversation with Leonard and get his opinion. But since Doctor Pritchert told her uncle to avoid the exertion of business, Ellie was on her own. Besides, Uncle Amos had sounded so confused this morning, he couldn’t have helped her anyway.
Her childhood Sunday school teacher used to say Gideon sinned by putting out his fleece to seek an answer from God. But Ellie didn’t see it that way. Gideon needed to know whether God was going to deliver his enemies into his hands. And in a way, that’s what Ellie needed to know too. She’d never thought of Leonard as an enemy before, but after last night, she wasn’t sure.
“If Graham sees the red flag and comes over by the time I’m ready to leave, I’ll ask him to go with me to Magnolia Grove. If he doesn’t, I’ll go alone,” she whispered to the Lord. “Above all else, don’t let me get outside Your will.”
Ten minutes later, she went to the dining room and poured herself a glass of sugar water. She sipped it as she watched out the window for a sign of Graham. If he hadn’t come by the time she finished her drink, she’d have to go.
When her drink was gone, she took her glass to the kitchen and then returned to the center hall. She tied on her plain, wide-brimmed straw hat in front of the mirror at the back door. It was time to go, and Graham hadn’t arrived. With a pang of disappointment, she pulled on her gloves and gave Sugar a goodbye pat. “I’m riding Buttercup today, so you can’t come along. We’ll take the landau tomorrow.”
At least tomorrow she’d have company, even if it was only her dog.
Pushing down the self-pity that wanted to rise up in her, she headed out the door. If God didn’t want her to have help, that meant He would do the helping. Ellie learned long ago not to complain about that. If she didn’t want to marry, she had to do things alone. Hard things. Hard work. Hard decisions.
She stepped into the stable, where Roman led Buttercup out of her stall, saddled and ready to go.
His eager service made Ellie smile. She wasn’t alone, after all. “Roman, I hope our fortunes will soon be restored so we can hire a gardener. Then you can do only what you love—care for a stable full of horses.”
“I’ll pray with you ’bout that.” The handsome older man held the reins in his mahogany-colored hand while Ellie mounted.
She spoke to Buttercup, and the horse started toward Commerce Street. As they turned onto Washington and passed the south windows, Sugar looked out and watched them go. Her throaty warbling let Ellie know she didn’t want to be left at home.
Before Ellie reached Pearl Street, Graham raced toward her on Dixie. “I thought we were having a picnic. That’s what the red flag means, right?”
He remembered. And he came. She didn’t recall ever being so glad to see him.
Thank You, God.
She reined in Buttercup and smiled at Graham. “I didn’t think you were coming.”
“I came as soon as I saw the signal.”
“I had a basket packed.”
“Where is it?”
“In the kitchen.”
“What’s in it?”
“A whole chicken, biscuits and honey, and watermelon.”
He spun Dixie around and cantered toward Ellie’s house. “I’ve waited eight years for Lilah May’s fried chicken.”
Ellie laughed at his serious tone. She nudged Buttercup, urging her to follow. “I have an ulterior motive.”
He groaned. “Not another plan...”
“Not like that. I couldn’t find any loan agreements in this house, so I need to search Uncle Amos’s library at Magnolia Grove.” She didn’t want to ruin the day by telling him she was in big trouble if she did owe Leonard thirty thousand dollars in two weeks. “I thought we could have a picnic and then look through the library together.”
“That’s not so bad. At least it doesn’t involve dancing.”
When they reached the stables again, Lilah May came out, their lunch in her hand and a grin on her face. “Goin’ on a picnic and forgot the basket. That’s love if I ever saw it.”
Love. Her maid thought she and Graham were in love. Ellie’s hand shot up and covered her mouth.
Lilah May handed the basket to Graham. As he settled it in front of him, Ellie noticed something she’d never seen before—his face and neck turning red.
Graham—embarrassed? Over the mention of love. It wasn’t about her, that much she knew, so why had he colored so?
Then a distressing thought hit her. Did he already have a girl? Was that why he fought against their pretend courtship?
She should have thought of that. She’d assumed, without even thinking of it, that he was unattached. Somewhere, a woman could be waiting for him to return. Even—oh, my word—a wife!
No wonder he didn’t want all those girls around—or want her at his house last night. It all made sense now.
But if he was married, or even courting a girl, they had no business riding out to Magnolia Grove together. “Graham, wait...”
He swung around in the saddle. “What for? I’m starving.”
“We need to talk.”
“Magnolia Grove is a twenty-minute ride. We’ll have plenty of time to talk.”
Ellie looked to Lilah May for help, but she merely shooed them away with a wave of her hand and headed back inside the house.
“We don’t have to go if you don’t want to.” If you’re courting. If you’re married...
He looked at her as if she’d suddenly lost all her senses. “I said I wanted some chicken.”
“But the picnic—we don’t have to. You can take the chicken home.”
He didn’t understand. That she could tell by the way he gazed into the sky as if asking for divine guidance.
Finally he lowered his head. “Look, you invited me to a picnic.” His voice dropped and he spoke each word slowly, as if she were too simple to understand normal speech. “Let’s ride out to the country, and if you want to talk on the way, we will. I just want to get there and get something to eat.”
Fine. He just wanted to eat. She tapped Buttercup’s flank and they took off toward the street.
Within five awkward minutes, they were out of town. Graham reined in Dixie a bit, trotting next to Buttercup. “Ellie, I’m confused. First you ask me to a picnic, and then you don’t want to go.” He paused. “Did you intend to invite me? Perhaps I misunderstood the invitation.”
“No, I’m the one who misunderstood.”
“Misunderstood what? Ellie, if we’re going to spend all this courting time together, you’re going to have to start making some sense. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Afraid to speak, afraid her frustration would come out in her voice, she blurted her concern anyway. “It’s about girls.”
“What girls? Susanna and her mob? They don’t know we’re going out there, do they?”
“No! How can such a smart man be so dumb? I’m talking about girls and you. Do you have one?”
He looked at her as if she’d asked if he had a bale of cotton in his pocket. “Unless we’re talking about you, and I assume we’re not, then no.”
“You’re not courting anyone? Not married?”
He laughed the laugh of mockery, his handsome features clouded. “Not courting, not married. No opportunity for either. I’ve been at war, remember? And before that, military school. I’ve hardly been around women since I left Natchez.”
Well, now, didn’t she feel silly?
“Why do you ask such a thing? And why did you wait until now to ask it?”
“I didn’t think of it until now.”
“Well, think of it no more, because you’re all I have along those lines.”
And he hardly sounded pleased about that.
* * *
Where had Ellie come up with that foolish notion? Courtship—true courtship—was the furthest thing from Graham’s mind. At this point, he was less interested in girls than he was in the basket of fried chicken he carried in front of him.
He glanced over at her, riding on the other side of the weedy road. Her hair shone like gold in the bright sunlight. He was wrong—the chicken wasn’t as interesting as Ellie. But it would give him a lot less trouble.
He shifted his gaze, along with his thoughts, toward the plantation they passed on the left. The fields of Mansfield Manor, once as productive as those at Ashland Place and Magnolia Grove, now lay fallow. The charred ruins of its big house stood crumbling at the end of an overgrown lane, and when they passed the run-down Mansfield chapel, Ellie let out a sigh.
“I sometimes attended that little church with Amy Mansfield when we were girls. With more and more plantations confiscated and abandoned, these little chapels will soon fall into disrepair and eventually blow down in a hard wind.” The crease between her eyes suggested that Ellie was thinking of Magnolia Grove.
“Have you been able to maintain your chapel?”
“It needs a new roof, but that will have to wait.” She turned from the chapel and toward the road ahead of them as if pushing aside morose thoughts of her own future. “When we’ve finished our dinner and the search in the study, I thought we could ride the fields. I’d like your opinion on the condition of the cotton.”
She was worried about more than just a chapel—Graham could tell it from the tone of her voice. “You suspect Fitzwald might be telling the truth after all?”
“He’s changed since I last saw him. He seems more...callous. Harder.”
They rounded a bend in the river road, Ellie’s horse picking up the pace as they neared Magnolia Grove. How much should Graham reveal to her about the weasel? He hesitated, choosing his words carefully, determined to say no more than necessary. “He’s always been that way. Selfish, greedy, cruel—you name the bad quality, he’s got it.”
“Don’t be silly. He’s not the beau of Natchez, but he’s not that bad.”
Ellie never could see the evil in a skunk. “You’re going to have to take my word for it, unless you want me to tell you some sordid stories. I’ll merely say I’ve had to intervene when he was on his way to mistreat a lady. I’ve also stepped in when he was cheating a man who couldn’t afford to lose what the weasel was trying to take from him.”
“Leonard behaved that way?” She turned those blue eyes on him, their innocence shining as brightly as her golden hair.
At her silence, Graham gave her time to think, to remember.
“I never felt completely comfortable in his presence,” she said after several moments. “He was often disrespectful to Lilah May. Sugar doesn’t like him either.”
“This time, I agree with Sugar.”
As they approached Magnolia Grove’s lane, Ellie slowed her horse. “What did you mean when you told Leonard that you haven’t forgotten how to fight? At first, I thought you were speaking of the war. But the surrender was only two months ago, and that’s not long enough for a soldier to have forgotten how to do battle.”
“You’re better off not knowing.”
“Have you ever fought with Leonard?”
“Fought hard and won.”
“You were defending someone else?”
He hesitated. “Someone much like you,” he said in a low voice.
They turned into the Magnolia Grove lane and stopped by the cypress bog. The still-magnificent big house hadn’t changed, at least not that he could tell from this distance. But the weedy drive, the unmown lawns, the sticks and magnolia limbs in the yard, had turned the plantation shabby.
Graham worked to keep his dismay off his face. Magnolia Grove was Ellie’s real home, where she and her uncle had spent the springs, Graham visiting nearly every day. This sprawling plantation was where she felt safe.
Now it looked less like a grand, productive estate and more like an abandoned, run-down farm. The fact nearly tore his heart from his chest, so how must Ellie feel?
She winced as if seeing Magnolia Grove through Graham’s eyes. “I’m ashamed to show you how much it’s changed. We haven’t even been able to keep up with the weeds in the fields, so we haven’t done anything with the drive, the lawns, or the formal gardens.”

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