A Sound Among the Trees (29 page)

And since she does not seem to care that we know she slips away after dark, I followed her last night. She went to the river to where she had a little canoe hidden in the rushes. I watched her get in and paddle away in the moonlight to the other side. I waited as long I could, but I became afraid to stand out there alone in the dark. I made my way back to Holly Oak and watched for her from my window. I had to pinch myself to stay awake. When at last I saw her return, I could see that she was not alone. Two men were with her. They wore hats and long dark cloaks. I watched them move soundlessly across the garden and make their way to the slaves’ quarters. They went to Tessie’s door. It was too far away to see if she was the one who opened it. I saw the door open and the three of them disappear inside
.

I grabbed my wrap and flew down the stairs as quietly as I could. I stepped out in the garden. The night had grown colder, and I shivered as I made my way to Tessie’s. I only wanted to listen at the window. I was nearly there when the door opened, and I suddenly realized I had nowhere to hide. Whoever was coming out
would see me, and there was nothing I could do to conceal myself. I froze and prayed
.

It was Eliza. She didn’t seem angry, just surprised. She closed the door quietly behind her. “What are you doing here, Susannah?” she said, calm and quiet. “Who are those men?” I asked. I tried to sound brave and curious, but my voice cracked, and I sounded like a scared child. “Come back up to the house,” she said. And she just walked past me as if I would obey her. “Are those men going to hurt Tessie?” I asked, even though somehow I knew, I knew, those men were Union men. They had no intention of hurting Tessie. Tessie was hiding those men. Tessie was helping them. And so was Eliza. She knew I had answered my own question. She just kept walking
.

I caught up with her. “Are they going to help Tessie escape to the North?” Eliza shook her head, and even in the shadowy moonlight I could see she was smiling at my naiveté. “No, Susannah. Come with me.” We went back into the parlor, and she led me to the finished pile of Confederate uniforms. She took two officers’ greatcoats and trousers and handed them to me. “I haven’t asked for your help before, Susannah, because I did not want to involve you. But I need you to do something for me. I need you to hide these in your room. Will you do that?”

At first I could not even breathe. Two men were hiding in our slaves’ quarters. Two Northern men. And she was asking me to hide two Confederate uniforms. “What for?” I said, when I was able
.

“For later,” she said
.

As I stood there holding those uniforms in my arms I knew Eliza wasn’t just a frustrated loyalist. She was more than a simple Union sympathizer. She was more than someone who wanted to see the horrible practice of slavery ended. She was aiding the Federal troops. She was out at night meeting with them, talking with them, hiding them. Helping them. And now she was involving me
.

“Who are they for? Are they for those men in Tessie’s quarters?” I asked. But she went on with her instructions, ignoring my questions
.

“Wrap them in a sheet, and put them deep inside your feather bed. Sew up the place where you cut to put them in. Then turn your feather bed over so no one can see the seam. Do you understand?”

“The man from the quartermaster’s office will know two are missing,” I said to her. “He’s coming tomorrow.”

“That’s why you have to hide them tonight. I don’t think he will be bringing us more fabric after tomorrow.”

Her words sent a chill into my bones. I asked her how she could know this. She said it does not matter how she knows. All that matters is keeping the two uniforms safe and hidden until she needs them. I asked her when that will be, and she said hopefully never
.

The next day the man from the quartermaster’s office came and took our finished uniforms. He counted them. He counted them again. He asked for all the unfinished pieces too, and we told him they were all finished. And he counted them again. I dared not to even glance at Eliza. Then he said our count was off. Grandmother told him he was mistaken. The count couldn’t possibly be off. He counted them again. “There are fifteen,” he said. “There should be seventeen.” Grandmother told him confidently that someone must have made a mistake. She opened the cabinets where we keep all our sewing supplies: the thread, the buttons, the braid. The space where the fabric sat was empty. “You have them all,” she said. And he thanked her and left. But he did not look convinced, Eleanor
.

My dearest cousin, I know you will probably never read this letter. How I wish you were here or I was there. I feel so alone
.

Yours always
,

Susannah

21 April 1862
Holly Oak, Fredericksburg, Virginia

Eleanor
,

I am in a daze. Words escape me as I try to describe what has happened. I do not know how to begin. Fredericksburg is occupied. Union soldiers have taken the city. Eliza told us they were coming, and she instructed us to hide whatever food and valuables we could. When she said this, Grandmother glared at her. And Mama just sat in her chair like she didn’t have the slightest care that the Yankees were coming to set up camp in Fredericksburg. Grandmother said to Eliza, “You brought this trouble upon us!” and Eliza looked angry enough to slap her. “I take responsibility for everything I’ve ever done, bad or good. But this is not my doing,” Eliza said. “Now unless you want to let the Yankees have your silver, I suggest you hide it!”

We spent the night digging up the cellar floor and hiding our jewelry and our coins and the silver in the dirt. I felt like a pirate hiding booty from other pirates, and my dress was covered in earth when we were done. We climbed the stairs to our rooms and stripped to our chemises. Eliza took our filthy dresses. I was too tired to ask her what she planned to do with them. Before I fell into bed, she told me to go into the parlor and remove all the braid, the buttons, the thread from our uniform making. Everything. She told me to put it all in a sack with some rocks and toss it into the river. “It is the middle of the night!” I told her. And she said, “Indeed it is, Susannah. Thank God it is.”

The next morning they arrived. Soldiers in blue. They poured into the streets. Eliza and I were at the haberdashery when they arrived, more and more and more of them. Some of them came into the store, said hello, then just started taking anything they wanted. Hats, gloves, watches, scarves, pipes
.

Eliza was red faced with anger, but she merely said what they were doing was wrong. They laughed at her. Told her she was a lovely girl even when livid and asked if her husband was away at the war. She told them to get out. And they laughed harder. It was a very strange laugh, Eleanor. It was not a cruel laugh reserved for villains but the kind of laugh a superior might have for a childish fool engaged in something that is doomed to fail. Beyond our shop windows I could see more Yankees in other stores, walking out onto the streets with clothes, picture frames, garden tools, and tins of tobacco. Storekeepers were running after them, yelling at them that they couldn’t just take what didn’t belong to them. And the Yankee soldiers simply ignored them
.

I stood there unable to comprehend what was happening. I didn’t know war could also be like this. I know there is gunfire and cannons and killing in faraway fields, but I didn’t know it was also this
.

Eliza grabbed my arm and whispered to me. “Use the back door. Get to the house as quick as you can. And lock all the doors. I will follow as soon as I can.”

“I can’t leave you here!” I whispered back
.

She turned to me, eyes bright with force. “GO!” she rasped. She pushed me to my knees, and I crawled to the back of the store. I heard Eliza yelling at the Yankees to get out, but I kept on my hands and knees. When I was no longer in the soldiers’ line of sight, I rose to my feet and pushed open the back door. I could hear whoops and hollers in the street—more Yankee revelry. I picked up my skirts and ran. I heard voices calling, shouting. They might have been shouting at me. I didn’t stop and I didn’t turn around. I just kept running, tears of dread running down my face. I could hear shouts of anger and panic coming from other houses as my neighbors reacted to the presence of Yankees, walking boldly and uninvited
into their homes. But I didn’t stop. I just kept running until Holly Oak came into view. I stumbled up the front steps, crashed the front door open, and fell to a crumple, out of breath, onto the foyer floor. I slammed the door shut with my foot and gulped in air, eyes shut tight
.

Then I sensed movement. I opened my eyes and saw boots approach me. Men’s boots
.

I looked up, and men in blue coats and hats stared down on me. Half a dozen or more of them. One of them stretched out his hand. I covered my head, ready for a blow, already feeling the sting of it. But then the man said my name
.

My hands fell away from my face. Will was standing above me. And Cousin John
.

Eleanor, they were standing in Holly Oak. Standing there in their Union uniforms. The incongruity of them being there, like that, swooped down on me like a crashing hammer. Will’s hand was still outstretched to help me up, but I could not will my arm to lift itself. The world had gone mad. And since I was part of the world, I had surely gone mad too
.

John dropped to his knees beside me. “Susannah, it’s John and Will. Do you not recognize us?” The other men with them snickered, though not unkindly. “Are you all right? You have been crying.”

Will was bent over now too, his arm now lightly reaching for my arm. He pulled me gently to my feet
.

“You’re here,” I whispered, and all of them laughed
.

John handed me a handkerchief. “Cousin, are you quite all right?”

I suddenly remembered why I had run home. “Where’s my mother? Where’s my grandmother?” I looked for a parting in the group of them, and there wasn’t one. They were circled around me
.

“We were wondering that too,” John said. “We’d like to ask
your grandmother if we can stay at Holly Oak while we’re here. Better us than strangers you do not know. And where might your aunt Eliza be?”

The room seemed to be spinning. Where was my mother? Where was my grandmother? Why were they asking about Eliza?

Will placed his hand under my elbow. Tender, as a father might. “Susannah, what has happened? Where is Eliza?”

Behind me the door opened, and Eliza charged inside, the store keys dangling from her hand. Her hair was loose and flying like I realized now mine was
.

“What the devil is going on?” she exclaimed angrily. She glowered at the Yankees standing in our foyer, at my cousin, and at the man I had loved since I was fourteen. Her eyes were blazing
.

I opened my mouth to tell her one of the Union soldiers standing in our entry was my cousin from Maine and the other was a good friend, but they stepped forward and told her that what was happening at the shops and houses had never been ordered by the general. And they didn’t approve of it
.

Eliza turned to Will. “They are sacking the town, Will! There are just innocent women and children left here. And a few old men. We’re not one of your battlefields! This is a town of civilians!”

She called him Will
.

John shook his head. “And I am telling you Gen. McDowell did not order this.”

Eliza whirled around to face my cousin. “Well, who’s going to order them to stop? Tell me that, John? Who is going to order them to stop?”

She knew them both. And they knew her
.

The room began to feel warm and sticky like a late July evening. I felt Will’s arms suddenly around my waist. As I fought to stay conscious I was aware of how close Will was, how solid he felt
against my body. Not some distant dream of a man, but here, in my house, guiding me and then picking me up off my feet and carrying me in his arms as I always dreamed he would do
.

When I awoke minutes later on a couch in the drawing room, the other soldiers had gone off with Eliza to find my mother and grandmother, who apparently were hiding in Tessie’s quarters. I found out later Tessie had run away. As had all the slaves. The gardeners, our houseboy, the cook, the groomsmen. They all left not long after the Yankees arrived because they knew there was no one who could make them stay. John had stayed behind with me and now held a cool cloth to my head as consciousness returned to me
.

“You know Eliza,” I said to him
.