Homeland (6 page)

I had been searching (vainly, alas) for another of Miss Austen’s books in the trunk when I came on a slender volume by Mr. Dickens entitled
A Christmas Carol
, which moved me to tears. Surely you have read it? But Papa remonstrated, “Do you truly think any work of man is fitter to read on Christmas, than the tale embodied in the second chapter of the Books of Matthew and Luke?” And he is right of course. Yet on Christmas Eve, Ollie and Peggie and I huddled together in my room all under the same quilts, long after our parents were in bed, and I read Mr. Dickens’s magical story to them. Knowing you were alone at the school that night, I pretended you were here with us, too. And I could just imagine how your eyes would sparkle when Bob Cratchit saw that Christmas turkey that was bigger than Tiny Tim!

When I say, by the way, that Papa was here to “celebrate Christmas,” I must add that most of Deer Isle holds by the old New England habit. Here, Christmas
morning
is marked by church-going and prayer, but beyond that, it is a day like any other. We exchange little presents on New Year’s Day, but that is all.

A quick word, to conclude. The weather has become threatening, and though we hoped that Papa might remain through Sunday, and return Monday to Yale when the students come back, it has been decided that he should leave today. There have been storms every week since I have been home, heavy snows followed by bitter “nor’-easters” as the fishermen call them. My fingers are always chapped and bleeding from the cold.

I see you in your curtained house, the grief of mourning, as if it were still going on today, this minute. But I look at your sketches and know that somehow, you will find a way.

I see Ollie bringing the sleigh around for Papa. I will write again very soon, Susie.

Dearest Susanna,

Would I have gone on with my education, if women were allowed to go to college? I assume you mean a true college, with the same education as young men receive: in law, in medicine, in engineering, rather than the sterile piling-up of “accomplishments.” There are, goodness knows, Female Academies and Colleges where one can progress quite far in the disciplines of history, languages, and such sciences as botany and mathematics: the Hartford Female Seminary, which I attended for four years, was one of them.

Yet at no time was there ever a discussion of what one
does
with one’s education, if one is a woman. We—women—have come far, in that it is even possible to attend a Female Seminary these days at all. Forty years ago, the great discussion was, Should girls be taught to read? (They would, after all, only consume foolish novels like
Pride and Prejudice
, poor silly things.) All a young woman may qualify herself to do is teach—if she can find a school. And then, only very young children. I wish there were a way to send you my copy of Mrs. Wollstonecraft’s astonishing book,
A Vindication of the Rights of Women
—since, rather to my surprise, a second copy of it lies in Mr. Poole’s trunk: well-thumbed, imagine that! Find a copy, Susie, if you can. Read it, I beg you. It will open your eyes, as surely as mine were opened by
Uncle Tom’s Cabin]

It has been brought home to me how few places there are to go, if one is a woman, and with child. I am glad and grateful that my family has welcomed me, but I am aware—with the wave of patriotic feeling now sweeping the land—of how few here would welcome a
Rebel soldier’s wife. I shiver to think of what my lot, and my child’s, might so easily be! As I grow weary of pointing out to Peggie, when I married Emory he was
not
a Rebel soldier, nor did he have any intention of so being! On her most recent visit, Elinor did not scruple to repeat to me what Deborah said to her:
Every time I look into her
(that is, my)
face I wonder if she prayed this morning, that my Charles would be killed
. I cannot tell you, how ill this makes me feel. I could only be glad that a snowstorm prevented me from attending this month’s meeting of the Daughters of the Union! I am grateful that by next month, snowstorm or not, I shall be too far advanced in my condition to be out in public.

Nor do I find comfort in the single newspaper that comes from the mainland once each week, with its squabbles over whether Southern slaves “deserve” freedom, and its dreadful cartoons of “Rebel ladies” collecting the skulls of slain Federal soldiers, and wearing shawls wrought of those soldiers’ scalps and beards.

Mother counsels Bible reading, for she has never approved of my addiction to newspapers. I do find comfort in the Psalms, and the Book of Job. At least I am not the only person in the Universe, who has been
full of tossings to and fro, unto the dawning of the day
. Mother firmly agrees with the ancient destroyers of the Library of Alexandria: “Whatever was true in those books is also in the Scripture; whatever in them was not also in the Scripture, is better consigned to the flames.” Yet my heart finds a gentler refuge in Mr. Dickens’s
Bleak House
. And since I am not yet reduced to sitting on a dung-heap covered with sores, I find in its heroine’s philosophy of helpful cheer a clearer road-map to guide me day to day, and, I blush to admit, in the horrendous Mr. Tulkinghorn an outlet for the pent-up malice in my soul: I can wish
him
all the ill in the world, and savagely rejoice when it finds him.

Wash-day today. Please excuse the awkward penmanship. I managed to burn my hand, raking out the ashes from the stove. Because of the cold we only black-lead it once a week, early on Monday mornings, when it has been cold over Sunday. Raking of ashes on other days is a trick for which I never acquired the knack. The latest nor’-easter has at last ceased blowing. Yesterday was spent hauling snow and boiling water to soak everything overnight for washing today. Despite the bandage, my hand smarts from the lye, and I face a day of pouring yet more lye, hauling yet more snow, and boiling yet more water. We hope to have a few days’ drying-time before another storm. With good reason do Deer Isle girls bring to their marriages wedding-chests brimming with sheets, chemises, towels, stockings to last through winter if possible. Since Peggie proves indeed to be with child, I can only contemplate what wash-days will be like next winter, with
two
infants in diapers under this roof.

All my affectionate wishes and prayers to your sister, who must be coming close to her own confinement.

I feel as if
I
had gone through the mangle, not the sheets. Yes, I long to see whatever drawings you care to send, Susie. Please send them, if you can. You are quite right, that no one in America paints like the Europeans—I
adore
Mrs. Acklen’s little dog. I will not tell you of the little portfolio I’ve started of your sketches, lest you become conceited, but your sketches put me instantly at your side. If I cannot speak to you, I can see what you are seeing, and I treasure that.

Dearest Susanna,

Is this how foxes feel, when hunters stop their burrows so that the wretched creatures can find no refuge? Though there can be little comparison, between the inconvenience of being whispered about by one’s childhood friends as a potential traitor, and the frightening presence of armed and drunken men around one’s house. I know your father and your brother Regal can be counted upon to keep Regal’s men on their own side of what is proper, at least insofar as you young ladies are concerned, though I consider it criminally irresponsible, to say the least, not to speak out for his servants. I am so glad to hear you will be returning to Nashville soon!

At least my cousin Isaiah has come to replace our hired man. He and Oliver—

[letter discarded—not sent]

Dearest,

Are you all right? The most awful rumors have swept the island that Nashville is being evacuated ahead of Federal invasion and bombardment. It will be next week before we will even have a newspaper story, if then. Please, please, write to me, to let me know where you are, and that all is well.

Dearest Friend,

Rec’d your letter today—so little time to write! I have to hide your letters now, and mine to you.

My hand and arm are so cramped it’s hard to hold a pen. The whole town is on tiptoe after the Yankee attack on the forts upriver.
Mrs. Elliott is on one of the hospital committees, and has the whole staff of the Academy and all the girls washing bandages. I didn’t do badly, but the town girls who’ve never seen anything bigger than a chicken killed got pretty sick. It isn’t just blood, the way it is with a deer or a pig.

Terrible news coming down the river all day. Last night I got Mr. Cameron to escort me (capped and trousered as before) to the landing, to see the wounded from Fort Donelson brought ashore. At home I used to sketch pigs when they were hung to bleed out after slaughter. I didn’t think this would be
so
different. If I am to be an artist—a true artist—I
have
to know. But it is different, and horrible, Cora! I didn’t faint, but Mr. Cameron said, “I shouldn’t have brought you.” Still, I’m glad I know.

More bandages. Raining on and off all day. Rumors everywhere, and no way of knowing which are true. People in the street just yell them up at the windows. Half the girls are weeping, and nobody is selling wood to do the washing with. I went to the attic to look for a basket for clean bandages and found Nora Vandyke up there, hiding. She called me all sorts of names and pulled my hair, but I got her downstairs somehow and put her right to work. If I can do it, she can. She’s announced she’d rather kill herself than be “taken” by the Yankees and now about fifteen of the girls are all in a suicide pact.

Word just came down the river. The Yankees have been thrown back. Mrs. Polk is giving a ball tonight. Just about every house along the respectable end of Spring Street is illuminated in honor of the victory. Mr. Cameron says, you can drink yourself unconscious on champagne just walking three blocks. Nora’s bragging how she knew all along the Yankees would retreat. Did I tell you she is engaged to three Captains and a Major?

In an hour Mrs. E is taking us up to the State House to hear the speeches of victory. Everyone is talking about the Battle of Marathon. All I can think about is Payne, and poor Gaius—who was killed with Jackson’s men so near Winchester, Virginia, last month—and all those men they were bringing ashore yesterday. Is it over? Will Tom be able to be there when Julia’s baby is born? Will Emory go back to Boston with you? Or will he be prosecuted as a traitor? Will Justin be able to come back, after all? And if so, what then? I thought I’d be glad when one side or the other won, but I just feel hollow, Cora, as if there’s a hole blown in me and the wind’s coming through.

I just re-read what I wrote to you last week. It’s as if it were somebody else writing about another world!

Late Saturday night, just hours after we got back from listening to the speeches of victory, word came that the Confederate Army was pulling out of Nashville and retreating south.

As soon as it was light I ran to the Russells’ house. I found Henriette’s mother and sisters packing to leave. They practically shoved Julia into my arms, to get rid of her. All Mr. Russell’s money was invested in cotton and tobacco, and they’ve been living on
almost nothing for months, so I can’t really blame them for not wanting another mouth to feed. Julia just about swooned at the thought of setting foot outside the house, much less taking a train, in her “delicate” condition. But I asked her, who did she want to be seen by? Strangers in the depot when she’s completely covered with a cloak? Or whoever was going to pull us out of the smoking rubble of the house if the Yankees
did
shell the town? There were mobs in the street, either trying to get to the depot and on a train, or taking carriages to loot the Army warehouses. Men and women—white and black—in rough, dirty clothes, were just walking around the streets watching to see who was loading up to abandon their houses: looters, waiting for people to flee. Of course the entire city police force joined the Army as it was pulling out. What a horrible feeling, knowing that if someone were to decide to kill Julia and me for our earbobs, nobody would stop running long enough to do anything about it!

Dr. Elliott somehow got the whole Academy down to the depot together. Half the girls were in hysterics the whole way. People were fighting to get tickets and cramming onto anything that moved. We got onto a train at about sunset, and reached Chattanooga just before nine. The self-respecting heroine of any novel would have gone into labor on the train, but for a wonder Julia didn’t. In Chattanooga Mr. Cameron took us all to a hotel (one room, and glad to get
that)
, where he’ll stay with the girls and Mrs. Elliott until Dr. Elliott gets word to everybody’s parents. But Julia and I went back to the depot first thing in the morning. After a lot of waiting, we got a train to Greeneville around noon.