A Sound Among the Trees (36 page)

“Is she your fiancée?” the lieutenant asked
.

His eyes implored me. And I nodded
.

A smile broke wide across his face. “You have decided then? You will marry me?”

Eleanor, I have never seen such joy and happiness on a man’s face as I saw at that moment. I think I began to love Nathaniel just a little then. I know I shall never love him as I should. But it is not like I do not love him at all
.

“Yes,” I said
.

He kissed my hand again
.

Lt. Carruthers took a step toward me. “I see congratulations are in order. And there should be no reason why then I could not have a look inside your case?”

Nathaniel frowned. “What for, Lieutenant?”

“Your fiancée came here saying she had medical supplies from a Dr. Prewitt. We know of no Dr. Prewitt.”

Nathaniel turned to me, a crease of worry across his brow. “Susannah?”

I had been telling lies for nearly half an hour. It was not hard to come up with another one. I pouted. “I wanted to surprise you, Nathaniel. I didn’t know I was in the wrong building. I made it up. I knew you worked with supplies. I thought I could surprise you at your office. Don’t you work with supplies?”

Nathaniel smiled and kissed my hand again. “Aren’t you a dear?”

“So if I were to have a look in your case …,” Lt. Carruthers said
.

“If I had known how much trouble this was going to be …,” I said, and I set the case on the floor, unlatched it, and opened it fully. Eliza’s two dresses lay in messy folds, their bows and lace and frills nearly cascading over the sides
.

“Satisfied, Lieutenant?” Nathaniel asked, clearly perturbed. “If so, we shall be going. My bride-to-be and I have many plans to make.”

The lieutenant nodded without a word, and Nathaniel bent down to close the case. “First thing we will do is get some better luggage for you, my dear.” Nathan took the handle of the case in one hand and mine in the other
.

“Good-bye, Lieutenant!” I said gaily, because I knew that’s what I should do
.

We left Libby Prison, where Will lay atop pilfered uniforms
.

Nathaniel kissed me as soon as we were in his carriage. Light and sweet. But it was Will’s kiss that still lingered on my lips, even after I met Nathaniel’s kind parents and even as I sank into the guest bed at his parents’ house
.

Nathaniel wants to marry me at once, before he is called away to the field again. He asked if we might send a message to my mother and grandmother so that they could come on the next train and attend the ceremony. But I knew my mother couldn’t travel and Grandmother was still mourning the loss of her own husband. And I really don’t want anyone I know and love to witness what I am about to do. I told him I already have their blessing and that I didn’t want to wait
.

I will wear his mother’s wedding gown today. We marry at five o’clock
.

I kept my promise to Will. My decision to marry Nathaniel has kept my beloved Will alive and will secure his escape
.

I will marry out of love
.

Yours
,

Susannah
.

28 December 1862
Richmond, Virginia

Dearest Eleanor
,

My wedding to Nathaniel took place in a lovely little church that was all decorated for Christmas. His parents were there, his married sister from Port Royal, his father’s mother, some neighbors, and a few colleagues from the quartermaster’s office. No one asked about my family other than to express condolences at the loss of my
brave grandfather and offer a remedy or two for my ailing mother, whom they were told was too ill to travel. Nathaniel did ask if my aunt Eliza might have come, and I told him she had gone away for a few days before I left Fredericksburg and I didn’t know where she was. Not entirely a lie
.

I will not embarrass you or myself by describing what it was like to share a bed with a man whom you only love a little. I can tell you that Nathaniel is a good man, a kind and gentle man, and that he is the same refined soul in even his most intimate moments
.

I do not deserve him
.

There is something about the bond of the physical that I had not known, could not have known. The oneness in flesh binds you to the other person in almost the same way Tessie was bound to us. But yet not the same. I don’t know how to explain how I feel toward Nathaniel after sharing his bed. It was not altogether unpleasant, Eleanor. The intense and raw loyalty I now feel for Nathaniel has surprised me. It is a strange, new devotion. But I know it is different, less somehow than what I carry in my heart for Will. The love I have for Will is purer than what I have now shared with Nathaniel. It is above it. And always will be. And it shames me to admit it
.

Nathaniel is attentive to my every desire, and I suppose I will learn to love him the way he loves me. I will try very hard to return that love
.

Will’s kiss returns to me at odd moments. When I am brushing my hair, when I am putting on a stocking, when Nathaniel places an arm over me in our bed in his sleep. Will’s kiss will replay itself. Part of me wants it to stop, and part of me wants to hold onto it with every ounce of strength I have
.

Nathaniel’s parents are kind and thoughtful, but I can see they are brimming with unasked questions about why I came to Richmond the way I did. When I walk into a room, they assume a
different pose than they had before. Most of the time his parents are engaged in quiet conversation and they cease when they hear me approach. They trust Nathaniel’s judgment, I can see that, and they are committed to accepting me because they love their son. But I do not think they trust my judgment. They surely think it is odd that I married Nathaniel with not a family member in attendance. They showered me with presents on Christmas nonetheless
.

I wish I knew where Eliza spent her Christmas. I have written home to announce my news and inquire about Eliza, but it is too soon to expect a letter back from my grandmother. It has been less than week that I wrote to her
.

I wonder if you have had a happy Christmas. I pretend that I did. In truth, it wasn’t all pretend. The news on the street on Christmas Eve was that two Union soldiers escaped Libby Prison and no one knows how they accomplished it
.

That is a gift to me
.

Yours
,

Susannah Towsley Page

7 January 1863
Richmond, Virginia

Dearest Eleanor
,

The Richmond paper reports that a dozen people suspected of espionage and crimes against the Confederacy have arrived from Northern Virginia to be imprisoned. They have been sent to Castle Thunder to await their trials; two of them are female. I simply had to know if Eliza was among them. I showed the paper to Nathaniel and told him Eliza had been escorted from Holly Oak by Confederate
officers the day I left for Richmond—for reasons unknown to me. I told him the officers threatened to arrest her if she didn’t come with them willingly
.

Nathaniel grew concerned at once, not just for me, but for all of us. He asked me if I had reason to believe Eliza might be aiding the enemy
.

“The enemy,” he called them
.

I began to cry, and it was not an act to convince my husband of anything. The tears fell because my world is at war and there is an enemy and I do not even know really who it is. Nathaniel took my response as childlike fear for my aunt
.

“If she has indeed made herself a traitor to the Confederacy, it is nothing you could have seen or prevented,” he said, and this only made me cry the harder
.

Nathaniel kissed my forehead and told me he would learn the names of the newly arrived prisoners to Castle Thunder
.

Castle Thunder sounds like a place where knights and princesses might dance and dine, doesn’t it, Eleanor?

It is a prison for traitors
.

Susannah Towsley Page

10 January 1863
Richmond, Virginia

Eleanor
,

Nathaniel secured the list of names. Eliza’s name is there, as I had feared it would be. He went straight to his commandant’s office and showed the colonel Eliza’s name. He swore that his new wife—me—had no knowledge of her aunt’s alleged activities
.

Nathaniel said his commandant was pleased Nathaniel had been so forthright
.

And when I asked Nathaniel if I might be permitted to visit my aunt, he told me not only was that terribly unsafe for me, his commandant would not allow it
.

A letter from my grandmother arrived today. She congratulated me on my marriage. She wrote that my mother sends all her love
.

Did you hear the news, Eleanor? President Lincoln has proclaimed all slaves are emancipated. You wouldn’t know anything has changed here in Richmond. The Cause rumbles on as if he had merely welcomed the New Year with a toast to the weather
.

Susannah Towsley Page

29 January 1863
Richmond, Virginia

Eleanor
,

Nathaniel is to be sent afield to oversee the Confederate Army’s supply wagons and sutlers across Northern Virginia. He came home with the news today at noon. He is distraught that we are to be parted, but he is hopeful that the war will end soon and that he will resign his commission, return to managing his deceased grandfather’s bank with his father, and we shall build a house of our own
.