House Divided

by Ben Ames Williams

  Against Peter’s protests she led him from the room, and Trav said awkwardly to his daughter: “Honey, why don’t you go to bed too?” When he and Longstreet were alone, he said: “That’s the hardest part of all this, for me: not being with my son. I hate to think of him goggling at public executions.”

  “There are worse things than death in war, Currain.” The big man stared at the fire, and when he spoke it was in dry anger. “I touched some of them today. I went to Colonel Northrop, told him our army was short of food. His only answer was that he’d foreseen they would be!” Longstreet’s heavy fist thumped his knee. “That pepper doctor seems to feel that if he has expected disaster, he’s done his full duty toward averting it.” He was silent for a moment, grumbling in his beard. “Currain, President Davis will ruin us all unless he learns to admit his own mistakes. Northrop should have been discarded long ago. You’re worth a dozen of him.” Trav had no high opinion of Mr. Northrop, and he thought honestly that this was probably true. “The army will do its best,” Longstreet said. “And its best is better than any other troops in the world can equal; but behind the army there’s corruption, inadequacy, laziness, greed, desertion, skulking. Currain, not one Southern man in ten has his whole heart in this war. If we had as many soldiers as we have exempts and extortioners—I could put together a full division of them from the men I saw on the streets right here in Richmond today—we could march to New York!”

  Trav smiled at this extravagance; yet there was truth in it too. “I know there seem to be plenty of able-bodied young men in the departments.”

  “Rats gnawing at the roots of our strength.” The General’s anger rose. “Damn it, soldiers must eat; and it’s only bad management that keeps them from it. Why, even here in Richmond tonight many a mother had to put her babies to bed hungry; yet there’s food enough for every baby, yes and every soldier, within two hundred miles of us as we sit here.” He came to his feet. Trav did not speak, and after a moment the other’s wrath ended in harsh laughter. “There, I’ve talked too much, thought too much. In wartime no man should ever think at all, or he’ll go stark raving crazy. He’d be better off if he did, too! I’m worn weary, Major. Shall we go to bed?”

  The General next day insisted on tramping off to St. Paul’s. Enid stayed at home, but Trav went with him, plodding through packed snow inches deep. Not many others faced the blizzard that day, but Cinda was at church; and President Davis was in his usual pew, and the President and General Longstreet talked a moment together. Others, after the service, crowded to speak to the General; and that evening, despite the continuing storm, there were callers at the house on Clay Street. General Pickett’s division was at Drewry’s Bluff, and General Hood’s had passed through Richmond a day or two before; and these two officers came to pay their respects. Trav often wondered at Longstreet’s cordiality toward Pickett. He himself, though faintly ashamed of his own feeling, disliked the other for his effeminate mannerisms, his long hair in careful curls around his shoulders, the cloud of scent which emanated from his hair and beard. Pickett was stupid, too; slow of wit and short of memory. Whenever Longstreet gave him an order, it was in elaborate detail and with many explanations.

  General Hood, on the other hand, Trav liked and admired. The tall young man, with fair hair and a tremendous beard the color of marsh grass after frost has touched it, had blue eyes in which a profound sadness seemed to dwell; but there was no better fighter in the army, and in camp he was a fine companion, with an easy laughter and a merry tongue.

  Tonight he was as shy and ill at ease as an awkward boy till Enid presently retired; but then he was himself again. The march to Richmond had been a hard one, he said. “There was no bottom to the roads at all, and a man’s feet picked up so much mud he might as well have had on a ball and chain. One boy died, trying to keep up. He was bound he wouldn’t straggle, so he marched till he fell dead.” General Hood had halted his men outside Richmond and given them time to wash the mud off their clothes, to scrape their boots and polish their muskets. “And I thought they’d better march through Richmond after dark,” he explained, and smiled. “Then they wouldn’t break ranks to buy liquor or candy. But I forgot about the theatre!”

  He told the hilarious tale. The Texans came opposite the theatre on Broad Street just as the audience was gathering; and some laughing soldier yelled: “Let’s go to the show, boys!” That started an instant rush for the entrance. The officers good-humoredly abandoned the attempt to keep formation, and in five minutes the auditorium was filled with bearded men, their muskets held between their knees, the muzzles rising above their heads like a thicket of leafless saplings. Some effort was made to persuade them to leave, but they had come to stay.

  “Hardly a man of them had ever been in a theatre before,” Hood explained. “The performance was The Virginia Cavalier, and they sat there with their jaws hanging, taking it all in, till they forgot it wasn’t real.” Mirth rumbled in his tones. “The last scene was a Yankee breastwork and it was supposed to be captured by our men. Well, the boys in the seats couldn’t stand the excitement, and when the fighting on the stage got real hot, someone yelled: ‘Drive ’em, boys!’ And at that the whole brigade swarmed out of their seats and charged the stage!”

  He laughed, a great guffaw, and they laughed with him. “I’d give a fat cut of Texas beef to have been there,” he confessed. “The orchestra dived out of sight under the stage, and what ladies were in the theatre began to scream and faint on the bosoms of their bombproof beaux. The manager, Mr. Ogden, saw the thing start, and he turned out the gas; and of course that stopped them. After they quieted down, the gas came on again, and Mr. Ogden came out and made a nice speech, said it was the best compliment his actors had ever had, and if they’d keep their seats, the show would go on.” He said again: “I wish I’d been there,” and Longstreet agreed with him, and Trav chuckled; but he thought Pickett’s mirth was touched with fastidious distaste. Probably even the imagined odor of all those sweaty, unwashed bodies offended Pickett. No doubt it was to defend himself against such contacts that he perfumed himself so heavily.

  Longstreet may have had the same thought, for he said to Pickett: “I trust your men behaved themselves, General.”

  “The men, yes sir,” General Pickett assured him. “But we had a charmingly hospitable welcome from the ladies, plenty to eat and to drink, and some of the officers let it go to their heads. I’ve put four of my Colonels under arrest and preferred charges of drunkenness against them.”

  Longstreet chuckled in a good-humored way. “Yes, yes, you have to do that, of course. They court-martialled General Van Dorn for drunkenness out west. Acquitted him, naturally; but if Van Dorn had an opportunity to drink too much and didn’t do it, he’s changed since that first summer at Centerville. Be sure you return your officers to duty as soon as we need them, General.”

  Hood and Pickett presently rose to say good night. Longstreet would have had them stay. “You’ll find no spot as comfortable at this hour,” he urged.

  Hood smiled. “I’d rather be in Hell,” he said, and chuckled at his own jest, and looked at Trav in laughing apology. “Not actually, Mr. Currain, to be sure; but they tell me the gambling hells here in Richmond are as near Paradise as a soldier requires, with good cigars, good eatables, good drinkables, and a game if you want it. I mean to see for myself.”

  “I’ve heard it’s true,” Longstreet agreed, “but I never investigated.”

  “The gentleman waiting to escort us makes many promises,” General Hood told him. “I once spent an evening in the palace Jim and Alf Monteiro run; but the stakes there were too high for me. That’s where the extortioners lose the money they bleed out of the rest of us; there and at Merrihay’s. But if we play, it will be at Johnnie Worsham’s. He’s respected in spite of his calling, and he’ll give a soldier his last dollar as readily as he’ll win it back from him!”

  When they were gone, Trav and Longstreet sat late, in comfortable talk together. Longstreet had
business next day with President Davis. The army needed men, and there were scores of thousands in the militia of the several states. “A hundred thousand at least,” Longstreet told Trav that night before they went upstairs. “General Lee thinks the number will run as high as a hundred and fifty thousand, and nine-tenths of them are fit for service in the army. But the states keep them at home, won’t let us have them. General Lee asked me to put the case to Mr. Davis, see if he can’t beat some sense and decency into the state governments.”

  Next day while Longstreet went to deliver this message, Trav met the train upon which Mrs. Longstreet and Garland arrived. He thought Mrs. Longstreet looked badly, pale, with shadowed circles under her eyes. She asked where the General was, fretting because he was not here; she complained of the cold and the snow. Trav saw Garland pat her hand in reassurance; and she laughed and said: “I know, Sonny. I’m all right. Just let me fuss a little if I want to.”

  At home Enid and Lucy—Lucy with a shy glance backward to where Peter had taken Garland in charge—led her away upstairs. When Longstreet arrived, the boys had departed on some business of their own, and the ladies had not yet come down. Longstreet’s scowl was evidence enough that his conference with President Davis had led nowhere; and to Trav’s questioning glance he said:

  “No, no encouragement. President Davis says the states are too jealous of their rights to let him call their militia.” He added thoughtfully: “He says the Confederacy was founded on the theory of states’ rights, and that we may yet founder on it. If we do we’ll die of a theory!” And he asked: “Did Louisa come?” At Trav’s word the big man bounded up the stairs three steps at a time, eager as a boy.

  But when he and Mrs. Longstreet presently appeared again he was subdued and silent. Mrs. Longstreet on the other hand was unnaturally animated. The General watched her with bewildered eyes, but she never looked at her husband; and Trav recognized the signs. Something was amiss between them. When, after supper, he and the General were alone, he thought the other might confide in him; and he was not surprised when Longstreet said Mrs. Longstreet wished to take a house in Richmond.

  “I told her that couldn’t be managed,” he explained. “Any house at all rents here tor two or three thousand a year, and a general’s salary won’t stand that. And even at that price there are no houses to be had!” He added: “But I’d like her nearer me, anyway. I’ll see if Major Moses can’t find a place for us in Petersburg.”

  This might have been the source of their difference. “He’ll find something if there’s anything to find,” Trav agreed. “Major Moses could find a side of beef in a cageful of lions.”

  They stayed in Richmond till Tuesday, the General busy at the War Department; but Trav was glad when they took train for Petersburg. After the first pleasant excitement when for a while Enid seemed as beautiful and as charming as she had used to be, so that when they were alone together he had to remind himself that there was a gulf between them, she had begun again to dart at him words that stung like persistent insects. If Mrs. Longstreet admired their home: “Trav always thought I was silly to want one, but I hate living with in-laws, no matter how nice they are. Of course Trav’s Mama was as nice as she could be to me, in her way. At least I’m sure she meant to be.”

  Or if the General spoke of the young men exempted from military duty who filled the Richmond streets, she might say: “Yes, isn’t it terrible? But Trav says he doesn’t blame farmers for deserting when everyone else is dodging the enrolling officers.” Longstreet remarked once that he preferred to keep his military plans to himself until time to put them into execution; and she said smilingly: “You’d better! Don’t even tell Trav. He talks in his sleep, terribly!”

  The General laughed. “Not everyone shares your husband’s couch, you know,” he reminded her; and Mrs. Longstreet said in an exasperated tone:

  “Jeems! I declare, sometimes your vulgarity is beyond endurance!”

  Enid delivered all her shafts from behind a pretense of amusement at Trav’s eccentric ways. When Longstreet once spoke of how Trav charged into the thickest fire at Seven Pines and again at Frayser’s Farm, Enid laughed and explained: “I expect he was mad! You know he has a frightful temper. It wouldn’t surprise me a bit if he just wrung my neck someday.”

  This was so profoundly untrue that when they were alone Trav said coldly: “It might be a good thing if I did wring your neck, Enid.”

  She looked at him with mocking eyes, her head on one side. “Really, Honey, I wish you would! Anything would be better than just treating me like—furniture!”

  She made him miserable, and Trav found small comfort in the fact that Mrs. Longstreet harassed the General too. He had developed a heavy cold; and she was sure it resulted from his folly in going to church through the storm on Sunday. She wished to put him to bed and rub his chest with that famous salve, and she was furious because he refused to accept her ministrations, and accused him of catching cold deliberately to worry her. When on Tuesday he insisted, despite his indisposition, on proceeding to Petersburg, she was so angry that she would not kiss him good-by.

  On the train, Longstreet filled his lungs with a deep sigh. “I’m glad women don’t command the enemy armies, Currain. We’d never be able to guess what they’d do next.” Trav said nothing, since to agree would seem a criticism of Mrs. Longstreet; and the General may have feared his remark might be thus interpreted, for he added: “Their health has so much to do with their spirits.” He coughed, not because of his cold but in a heavy masculine embarrassment. “Between ourselves, Currain, Louisa suspects that she’s in a family way, and that upsets her and she takes it out on me.”

  Trav thought how absurd it was, and how appealing, that this man who could dominate a battlefield should be so helpless against the tyranny of a woman not half his size. He was uncertain what to say to the General’s confidence, so he said nothing; and after a moment the other added:

  “It’s just over a year ago that our babies died. I’d begun to forget; but she’ll never forget. She doesn’t want any more children. At least, that’s her feeling now. So she’s wretched and rebellious, and angry at me.” Trav remembered that Enid had always raged at him when she knew a baby was coming. There were some wild animals among whom the female, at such times, drove the male away, as though to protect their unborn against the sire. Probably this reaction among women was a vestigial trace of that ancient instinct, a remembered defense against the possessive jealousy of the male. Longstreet said in a confused distress: “I never loved her as much as now, but she seems almost to hate the sight of me.”

  “She’ll be glad to be settled in her own home,” Trav suggested; and the General said in some relief:

  “Yes. Yes, give a woman a house to fuss over and she’s happy as can be.”

  Longstreet’s cold grew worse instead of better, and for several days after they reached Petersburg he kept his bed; but this did not hinder his direction of affairs. His command embraced North Carolina, where there was some enemy activity in the eastern counties; and he sent Trav off to Goldsboro to see General Hill, who had gone there a week or two before, and get his report of the situation.

  He found the General, always irascible, in a mood of more than usual exasperation. “Major,” Hill demanded, after the first greeting, “what poison’s loose in your old neighborhood?” And to Trav’s surprised question: “Why, damn it, sir, that whole region—yes, all the mountain country—is a hotbed of armed treason!” He fumbled among papers on his desk. “Here’s a letter from Governor Vance about the latest trouble. Yadkinville’s not far from your old home, is it?”

  “Not far, no sir.”

  “Hah! Colonel Joyce sent fourteen good men to round up some of the deserters and conscripts there the other day. The rascals took shelter in the school house. They killed Mr. West, the justice, and John Williams, and drove off the Colonel’s men and escaped. Oh, I believe some of them were killed and wounded, but the rest got clean away. They headed for Tennessee. W
hat have you to say for those old neighbors of yours, Major?”

  Trav hesitated: “I’ve known there was—feeling there.”

  “Feeling! By God sir, that’s a nest of traitors! That whole section. The entire population is banded together to hide the fugitives. An enrolling officer takes his life in his hands if he shows himself there. And if Colonel Joyce’s prisoners are brought to trial, Judge Pearson will hold the conscription act unconstitutional and turn them loose!”

  “Well, you know, General, that affair at Laurel Valley in December left an angry feeling all through the mountains.”

  “I know, I know! Governor Vance sent me a copy of Mr. Merrimon’s report. I suppose Colonel Keith acted beyond what was necessary. According to Mr. Merrimon, he dragged unresisting men from their homes, whipped some of their women, took thirteen or the men off and shot them without a pretense of trial. But Major Currain, something has to be done to meet this plague of desertion, or we’ll have no army left. These men who were shot had forcibly seized the country town, looted it, stole all the salt in the place. That was plain brigandry.”

  “I suppose they needed the salt to cure their hog meat.”

  General Hill looked at him sharply. “By God, I believe you sympathize with the rascals!”

  “I sympathize with hungry men, and hungry women and children.”

  The other after a moment nodded grudgingly. “I know, I know! Yes, there’s much suffering on those little farms with the men away; but we’ve got to suffer if we’re to lick the Yankees.”

  Trav brought him to the point. “That’s one reason General Longstreet sent me to you. The army’s half starved. Is there a chance to collect provisions here?”

  General Hill said this could be done. “There’s plenty of bacon and pork and corn in all the coastal counties, Hyde and Tyrrel particularly; and we’ve forage to spare.” He thought cavalry might come from the Rappahannock to rest and graze their horses and at the same time to collect a vast quantity of stores.