To Whisper Her Name (3 page)

Two hours later, he stopped by a stream to water the horse, still thinking of Robert Green. Part of him wished he’d seen the man safely back into the hills. But then … the slave had seemed to be doing all right on his own, he guessed.

As he refilled his canteen, the tug of a tattered dream returned. One that had taken root deep inside him awhile back and that he’d acted on earlier that spring. But foolishly so, now it would seem. The past months of brutal bloodshed had shown him that. Yet, here he was, still coddling it like a stillborn child. Odd, how death could sometimes feed a dream.

If he got through this God-forsaken war alive, he vowed again to get as far away from these blood-drenched hollows and hills as he could. He’d head west, far beyond the banks of the Mississippi, past the borders of Missouri, to a place he’d seen a painting of once. A place called the Rockies where the mountains were so high, they disappeared into the clouds. He’d never seen the shade of blue the artist had used to paint the sky, but a man standing next to him that
day, who’d been to the Colorado Territory — or so he’d said — told him that God himself had chosen that color special, just to go with those mountains.

The memory of the painting acted like a blade to his hope and slit its throat clean through. Ridley was certain that if he looked down, which he didn’t, he’d see his dream pooling in a puddle of blood around his worn leather boots.

A snap of a twig drew his gaze up and his rifle with it. He listened, still as an iced pond in winter. One silent minute stretched into two, and he finally decided the longing inside him was making him edgy. Shrugging off feelings best left alone, he rode on for the better part of the morning, circling wide to avoid meeting up with the patrol.

The sun rose high in the sky, hot and relentless.

He reached back into his saddlebag and fished out a piece of jerky. It felt good to chew on something besides what was gnawing at him on the inside. First, how was he going to explain to his commander about returning without the thoroughbreds? And second — he felt a traitorous twinge of a smile, the next thought was so ludicrous — he was actually jealous of Robert Green. A Negro. A
slave
. But he couldn’t deny it.

In a different time and place, worlds away from this one, he would’ve appreciated a chance to learn from that man. To study his ways. Because Robert Green knew more about —

An explosion rent the air, and the gelding beneath him stumbled.

A second blast … and pain ripped through Ridley’s right shoulder and across his chest. The gelding buckled forward and the ground came rushing up with a force that knocked what little air remained from Ridley’s lungs. He fought for breath as another rifle blast sounded. The gelding convulsed beside him and let out a mournful cry Ridley knew he’d carry to his dying day.

Ridley struggled to stand, but a blow to his back rendered him prostrate. Dirt coated his tongue and he heard laughter floating somewhere above him, along with taunts in thick Southern drawls.

“Look’a here! We got us a lieutenant, Cap’n!” More laughter.

Ridley gasped, the simple effort excruciating. He managed to lift his head and saw the gelding looking straight at him, a flow of blood pulsing from a hole in its side. And with a certainty that knifed his gut, he sensed the animal’s confusion, its struggle to understand. Its silent, numbing question of why.

Heat shot through Ridley’s veins, filling him with a fire and strength that surprised him. Somehow, he gained his footing and — fists clenched tight — plowed into the corporal closest to him, managing to take him down. As well as the officer next to him.

Movement flashed on his left, but Ridley couldn’t react quickly enough. The butt of the rifle connected with a
crack
and pain exploded across his skull. His eyes felt like they were coming out of his head. He was falling again, except this time, the momentum pulled him under. Hard and deep. He struggled to form one last conscious thought, Robert Green’s promise returning to mind. He wished he could believe it, but he knew Green’s prayers for him would be wasted. God was deaf to them. Deaf to it all.

God had given up on them a long time ago.

May 10, 1866
Nashville, Tennessee

O
livia Aberdeen bowed her head as she hurried to the waiting carriage. Stares from people on the street bored into her like rusty nails, but she averted her gaze, certain if her eyes met theirs, the passersby would glimpse traces of guilt and would rush to heap further blame on her for what had happened.

Clutching an envelope in one hand, she accepted the servant’s assistance into the carriage. Despite what her late husband had done to the people of Nashville — and to
her
— she couldn’t bring herself to spit in the face of propriety. So while her heart was far from grieving the untimely passing of Charles Winthrop Aberdeen, she was properly adorned in the widow’s garb befitting a woman of her station in life.

Or what used to be her life.

Settled on the carriage seat, Olivia drew in a deep breath, the first in what felt like five years. She knew it was wrong, what she was feeling. Because a widow of only a week shouldn’t wish to dance a jig. But God help her, that’s precisely what part of her wanted to do. Not on the grave of her recently deceased husband, of course — that would be considered rude. Just off to the side would suffice.

A swift stab of remorse accompanied the disparaging thought, and she bowed her head again, feeling the hot prick of tears. Merely imagining someone might guess her true feelings scathed her conscience. The duplicity of her circumstances wore on her already-frayed emotions, as did the knowledge that those watching her were also judging her.

But one thing she knew they would agree with her about — including the men who had successfully plotted to kill her husband — Charles Aberdeen had been among the basest of men, lacking in morals and ethics and loyalty to the Confederacy.

She’d never wished Charles dead. But she
had
wished to be severed from their marriage almost from the moment they’d become man and wife in God’s eyes. The marriage had been arranged by her father in one of the final decisions of his life — an
irrevocable partnership
, as he’d explained — and Olivia had determined from the outset that what God had joined together, even without her consent, she had no right to put asunder.

Yet it would seem God himself had finally undertaken that task and had performed it with exacting precision and finality. So much so that, despite lingering doubt, she’d begun to wonder in recent days if he really did hear everything, even the silent desperate whisperings of a disillusioned soul.

The possibility brought a measure of comfort, but a greater feeling of unease when considering how little she really knew about his nature. She’d tried to be the very best wife she could be to her late husband, and
this
is how God repaid her.

“I got one trunk already loaded for you, Missus Aberdeen. But where are all the others, ma’am?”

Olivia sat straighter on the carriage seat, struggling to remember the servant’s name. He’d only been sent to collect her. “I’m only taking the one trunk … Jedediah. I have everything I need in there.” And nothing her brother-in-law had forbidden her to take. He’d been named the sole beneficiary of her husband’s estate — every last cent of which Charles had gained by cheating, lying, and swindling nearly everyone they knew. Even their friends, as it turned out. Those friends who — thanks to Charles’s elder brother, the last of the Aberdeen family — now believed she’d known all along about the far-reaching extent of her husband’s shady dealings.

Which she hadn’t.

But one thing could be said for Charles Aberdeen … he’d not been a respecter of persons when it came to taking advantage of someone. In that regard, he was no better than one of those Union sympathizers or fortune-seeking Northerners. And she wanted nothing that his greed and hypocrisy had garnered. Not even the wedding band — a family heirloom — Charles’s brother had demanded she relinquish.

Jedediah peered up at her, his dark brow knitting tight, and she wondered if he understood what was happening to her, if he’d read the newspapers, if he could read at all. She wasn’t about to try to explain it to him.

“Everything is fine,” she assured, glancing down at the letter in her grip. Or soon would be. Surely Aunt Elizabeth would know what to do to help her navigate these unknown waters.

The carriage leaned to one side as Jedediah climbed to the driver’s perch, and Olivia took one last glance at the handsome red-brick two-story house that had never been a home. Something went rigid inside her, and although it was ludicrous, she could’ve sworn she heard the scrape of mortar being spread on brick. Another layer being added to the wall she’d erected within herself. A wall that distanced her from every shed and unshed tear. Every unmet need. Every harsh word, look, and blow her strikingly handsome husband had bestowed upon her. And as much as she hated how the protective wall had changed her, hardened her, the wall also kept her safe, guarded her from being hurt again and from the sting of betrayal. She’d vowed to never place herself in a position where that could happen again.

And in the somber reflection of the moment, she silently pledged it for a second time.

She looked away, but recklessly so, for her gaze collided with that of a woman standing not ten feet away. The woman, older in years, draped in black, her pale skin sallow, her eyes sunken deep, stared at Olivia, unblinking. The woman’s lips moved and Olivia braced herself for whatever she might say. Or scream. But it wasn’t words that came from the woman’s mouth.

The carriage started forward with a jolt, and Olivia tore her gaze away. But not before she saw the woman wipe the spittle from her chin.

Rigid as stone on the outside, Olivia trained her gaze straight forward as the carriage bumped and jarred over the rain-rutted road, purposefully not looking to the left or the right. A recent newspaper article had reported in detail about the entailment of Charles’s estate onto his brother, so no doubt people were aware of her circumstances. Likewise, judging from their reactions, many of them were savoring her comeuppance.

Down Elm Street first, then Pine and Poplar, until, finally, the number of gawking pedestrians mercifully thinned.

Charles
.

A traitorous tear edged the corner of her eye, but she put a swift end to it, unwilling to shed one more drop of grief over that man. She didn’t miss him, so what was this … emptiness she felt inside?

Realization gradually dawned, and with difficulty, she acknowledged what she was feeling. Though she hadn’t loved Charles, a part of her did miss what they might have had together if he’d been a different kind of man.

The carriage passed a school, one she’d walked by often and always with a yearning. Though not for what most women might have wanted. Oh, early in their marriage, she had asked God repeatedly for children, truly wanting a child and believing it would help her and Charles’s relationship. But God had not granted that request and wisely so, looking back. Charles had blamed the lack of conceiving on her, as he had with everything. And though she still hoped for children someday,
if
she was able, what she wished for now — what she’d wished for growing up — was a chance to nurture in another way.

But even that, Charles had taken from her. Along with everything else. She watched the school disappear from view.

Street traffic was light, so stops and starts were few. But recent summer downpours followed by days of oven-like heat had left the roads deeply scarred and ill-fit for travel. The carriage lurched to one side as a rear wheel slipped into a rut, and Olivia grabbed hold of the door, her stomach knotting. The walls of the carriage seemed to close in, and the horses’ struggle to gain footing didn’t help her already taut nerves.

If it wasn’t so far a distance, she’d get out and walk. As it was, she tried to focus on something else, turning her gaze outward.

The war-torn city was gradually coming back to life again, though the number of boarded-up buildings stood as testament to how far a stretch remained on that journey.

A line of pedestrians trailed out the door of a bakery and that of a telegraph office, while a woman draped in black, like so many others, cradled a squalling infant in one arm and pulled two more children along behind. Men clad in tattered clothes — some still wearing their Confederate coats, now turned a dingy, defeated gray — stood clustered together on street corners, their shoulders thin and stooped beneath invisible burdens.

Olivia swallowed, tasting a bitterness, hating what the war had
done. And to think her husband — and her, by association — had profited from the less fortunate, by helping others to “invest” what little money they had left. No surprise people looked at her with such disdain.

The last image she had of Charles rose in her mind, and she squeezed her eyes tight, wishing she could erase it from memory. The way they’d killed him … His body so brutalized and —

Swallowing hard, she pressed back against the cushioned seat and focused on the buildings passing in a foggy blur. She steered her thoughts toward her destination, all while fingering the letter in her lap.

Aunt Elizabeth
.

Her mother could not have had a finer friend in this life, nor could her mother have chosen a finer woman to help fill the gaping hole her own passing left. Elizabeth Harding, “aunt” by friendship, was the closest thing to family Olivia had left. She clutched the envelope as if it were her ticket to a new life.
Thank God for you, Elizabeth
.

Where would she be right now if not for this kind and generous invitation?

One might think that going from the wife of Charles Winthrop Aberdeen to being the Harding family’s head housekeeper was a far fall. But managing the day-to-day household activities sounded like a haven to her. She would cook and clean too, if it came to that, and do whatever else was required to repay the Hardings for their kindness in taking her in.

Well, almost anything else … The only part of the arrangement that didn’t sit well was having to live in close proximity to General Harding’s spirited thoroughbreds.

She ran a hand over the sleeve of her left arm, still able to feel a slight bump, even through her suit jacket, where the bone had mended thirteen years earlier. She’d been only ten at the time, but the events from that afternoon remained vivid. The pain of the break was memorable enough, as was the unsightly scar. But the excruciating
snap
when the doctor reset the bone had haunted her for years. She hadn’t ridden a horse since. Not until Charles had insisted a year ago.

“Get on the horse, Olivia!” Teeth clenched, he’d gripped her arm tightly.

“Charles,
please
… I don’t want to do this. You don’t understand what —”

“You’re embarrassing me. And yourself! Now get on the —”

Her cheeks burned as she recalled his harsh words. A queasiness clenched her mid-section. She’d told him the stallion was too much horse for her. He hadn’t listened. Or cared. The horse had thrown her for no apparent reason, then turned and almost trampled her in the process. It had taken weeks for the bruises on her hip and thigh to heal.

She hadn’t been on a horse since.

She managed riding in a carriage well enough but didn’t like it. And a wagon too, though the nearness the open conveyance afforded to the four-legged beasts was much less preferred. She wished no ill will on the breed as a whole, she simply wished them to be kept far away from her. Which shouldn’t be an issue, even at a stud farm like Belle Meade. Not with her serving as head housekeeper to the Hardings.

The terrain outside the carriage window gradually included fewer and fewer buildings until only rolling countryside filled the frame. The air inside the carriage grew overly warm, and Olivia leaned closer to the door, letting the breeze blow across her face. She longed for fall and cooler temperatures, the crisp air and crunch of leaves underfoot. Something about summer giving way to autumn always made her think of new beginnings. Odd really, when nature was going dormant for a season. But she loved the fall and desperately needed a new beginning in her life.

Despite everything that had transpired with Charles and his death, Nashville was the only home she’d ever known. And as certain as fall passed into winter and spring gave way to summer, she knew she would live and die here.

The South was a part of her, and — for better or worse — she would always be a part of it.

The carriage slowed, and Jedediah negotiated a path onto a washboard road leading to the Harding plantation. Within seconds, Olivia was certain her teeth would be jarred completely out of her head. Wealthy as General Harding was, he couldn’t dictate the weather or control its aftereffects. Aunt Elizabeth had written to her more than once about the general’s determination to pave this road with macadam, and right now Olivia would’ve wholeheartedly seconded the plan.

After a mile, then another, the ruts seemed to lessen.

She’d been out here only once in the past five years since she and Charles had married, and once with Charles and General Harding in the same room had been more than enough. She remembered
General Harding’s exact words: “A man so keenly tied to the Union’s interests in both action and opinion smacks of betrayal to the Confederacy and to his fellow countrymen. I’ll extend no welcome to him in my home, nor will I claim association with him in any public forum.”

Aunt Elizabeth — though she too disdained Unionists — had been more understanding and had written faithfully, even suggesting they meet in town. But Charles had swiftly squelched that idea. Olivia touched the side of her temple, remembering their … “discussion.”

The letters between her and Elizabeth had been a lifeline, and she cherished them. But she’d been less than honest with her about the intimate details of her marriage. After all, it wasn’t proper for a woman to speak of such things. Once, in a letter to Elizabeth, she’d penned the truth of her relationship with Charles. But the very thought of him laying claim to that letter had sent her to the hearth posthaste, and she’d watched the fire devour the engraved stationery, the flames licking up the truth still locked tightly inside her.