Libbie

by Judy Alter

  She reappeared about suppertime, bearing a thick steak that she had somehow produced—I would later learn that she could provide foods almost as magically as He who turned loaves into fishes.

  Autie arrived in the middle of the night and found me sleeping soundly as though I had not a care in the world. "I knew you'd be all right," he whispered as he woke me to his urgent need for love.

  * * *

  I was a rarity in camp. The men stared at me with open curiosity when I rode into camp for dinner. "Why are they staring?" I asked Autie.

  "It's... ah... not usual to see a woman like you in camp," he said cautiously.

  "What do you mean, a woman like me?" I demanded. We had just driven up to the mess tent in the wonderful carriage that Autie had "confiscated" for me—it had silver trim and was drawn by two fine matching black horses. Whenever I went out in it, Autie and four or five troopers rode alongside. "Too close to the enemy," Autie had explained. "They'd like nothing better than to capture Custer's wife."

  Now he looked patiently at me. "An officer's wife," he said.

  "Well, what women are in camp?"

  He shrugged. "We have laundresses."

  "Like Eliza?"

  "Some are," he said noncommittally, though his eyes told me he was laughing at me. "And a few are camp followers."

  "Camp followers?" I echoed.

  "They trade the soldiers, ah, certain favors for money or other things they need."

  "Oh," I said, blushing clear to my hairline. "And do your men think I'm like a camp follower?"

  "They best not," he said vehemently, and all the laughter was gone from his eyes.

  Actually I was a trifle flattered that men could think me that wanton. It made me—that sheltered girl who had only recently discovered the physical pleasures of intimacy—feel alluring, and I liked it. Years later I would remember with gratitude that Autie's soldiers had thought me attractive—and slightly naughty.

  Later Autie told me the story of Annie Elinor Jones, who had hung about his camp for a week or more, mostly out of curiosity. Somehow she had access to passes that allowed her to cross Rebel lines back and forth until one day she was arrested as a spy by the Federal authorities. Then she named Autie as someone who could testify for her and said that her trouble had started when Autie paid attention to her and made another general jealous.

  "Imagine that!" Autie said, and I nodded, agreeing that she must be a foolish girl, desperate for a daring experience. It never occurred to me that Autie might really have paid attention to her.

  I was amazed at the men of his command and their respect for him. Gray-headed men, old enough almost to be my father, snapped to attention when Autie spoke and said, "Yes, sir!"

  "Do they always obey you so?" I asked.

  "Of course," he replied without a doubt.

  "I wouldn't," I said, and laughed at him.

  One who not only obeyed but worshiped Autie was Johnny Cisco, the young boy who'd held the horse the night we arrived. He was Autie's other personal servant, as it were, along with Eliza. Johnny was fifteen, a year older than I had guessed, and he had blond hair that hung limply over his forehead, filling me with an urge to grab the shears and cut it for him. He was thin and freckle-faced and lost looking, except when he was around Autie. Then Johnny Cisco blossomed. He took care of Autie's horses, waited on his dining table, and slept with a hound puppy that Autie had adopted.

  "Just attached himself to the ginnel, he did, that poor child," Eliza said. "Hangin' 'round camp mostly starving to death."

  Autie, who would always attract stray dogs and orphans, dressed the boy in soldier's clothes, including a red scarf at his neck, saw that Eliza fed him, and earned his undying devotion. Johnny was less fond of me, treating me civilly but with a certain distance that said clearly he considered me an interloper. At dinner he always served Autie first, in spite of frequent—and loud—lectures from Eliza about the propriety of serving the lady first.

  The first time Autie was gone for a long time, I spent three miserable days at the plantation alone—even Eliza had gone with Autie—and then left for Washington. Autie wanted me to go when he left, and I stubbornly refused. Without comment he left orders with a soldier, also left behind, about my transportation should I change my mind. And change it I did.

  I was alone in Washington, ensconced in Mrs. Hyatt's boardinghouse, where Autie had made arrangements before we left for Stevensburg. It was a big, roomy house with probably ten boarders, several of them officers' wives like myself. My rooms were two—a parlor and a bedroom, both more comfortably furnished than the house in Stevensburg. I took my meals at the table with the other boarders and cried myself to sleep at night longing for Autie.

  But I had callers to break my loneliness. Congressman Kellogg from Michigan, who had long ago recommended Autie for West Point and who still considered him a protégé, came to see me almost immediately and took me to a reception for some of the military. And then came a summons that intimidated me—Secretary of War Stanton wished me to join him, as Autie's representative, in receiving captured Confederate flags. My heart nearly turned over in my chest as solemn-faced soldiers presented those flags and swore their allegiance to the Union.

  In no time I had a fairly busy social life in Washington, and most days I had some engagement on my calendar. Once I even met the President at a reception in the White House. I came away a lifelong Lincoln supporter, for he stopped the whole receiving line to say, "So you are married to the man who goes into battle with a whoop and a yell!"

  None of it made up for not having Autie by my side and in my bed at night, though I blushed to think how much I missed him at night. Papa, I thought, would never understand... and then I wondered why I thought of Papa.

  I had frequent reason to remember Autie's injunctions about the proper role of a wife. "Mrs. Custer," said one congressman, "you're looking particularly lovely tonight. I'll swear Custer doesn't know what he's missing."

  "He's defending his country," I said, lowering my eyes.

  "He ought to be protecting his wife," the congressman said.

  Another suggested that I would enjoy the view of the Potomac from his quarters, but I declined gently.

  The only really difficult moment I had was with a senator who cornered me one night at a reception on the pretense of talking about Autie's latest victory.

  "Splendid, my dear, just splendid. He's a remarkable man."

  I was always willing to talk to anyone who praised Autie. "Thank you, sir. I'm very proud of my husband."

  "And he of you, I imagine," he said, moving closer. "It's not every general who has such a pretty bride." He was overweight, and his face glistened slightly with perspiration. When he moved closer, I could smell garlic.

  I turned quickly to one side, meaning to avoid him. "Senator... ," I said softly, hoping to turn his advance away. Instead, he reached an arm for my shoulders and began to pull me toward him, breathing heavily on me until I thought I might faint. Before I could move quickly enough, he planted a wet kiss on my cheek and whispered, "I could make you proud, too, my dear."

  I remembered the night I'd stepped on the foot of lawyer Walter Ashburn in Monroe, and Autie had applauded me for taking charge of the situation. My tactic was different this time—Autie always said a commanding officer had to have several plans. My elbow moved ever so slightly, knocking the senator's hand by accident, and red wine poured down the front of his shirt and coat. I was profuse in my apologies and offered to go fetch a rag to clean his clothes—of course, I didn't return. At my last glance, the senator was lurking in corners, trying to hide his soiled clothes.

  Autie had made it plain it was always my duty to make him proud of me, and I grinned with satisfaction, knowing he would approve my actions that particular night. The senator was fairly drunk at the time and much embarrassed whenever he saw me afterward.

  * * *

  "You shall be the treasurer of our marriage," Autie wrote, "for I am notoriously improvid
ent with my funds." I suspect Autie assumed that since I came from a comfortable home, lavish to him, I was adept at managing money, but nothing could have been further from the truth. Papa had always provided, and I had assumed the well would never run dry. In Washington I was appalled at how fast it threatened to do just that.

  Autie gave me $500, but my board took $300, and he had a large commissary bill; before I knew it, I had spent almost the entire sum. I longed for a black silk dress that cost $60 and realized I could not buy it, a situation I'd never found myself in before. Resignedly I began to sew, though I was no seamstress. My stepmother wrote preaching letters about how much men valued frugality in their wives: "A dress," she said, "should never cost above $12." So I pricked my fingers and ruined my eyes and disposition while laboriously making myself a calico dress and a muslin wrapper, silk being obviously beyond my beginning skills. Autie howled with laughter the first time I wore the wrapper, for it did fit peculiarly. I never got the calico out. Thereafter, I confined myself to embroidery, a useless skill, perhaps, but one I knew.

  The most blessed sound I knew in those days was an unmistakable noise on the stair, a determined and rapid step as though someone were climbing the stairs two or three at a time. It meant Autie had come to surprise me again.

  He would sweep me off my feet, smothering my face with kisses even as he waltzed me around the room, my feet never touching the floor, my arms locked tight around his neck.

  "Come quick!" he said urgently on one of those visits. "We must get a copy of Harper's Weekly."

  "I have the last one here," I said, unwilling to share him with the public. "Let's just stay here." I looked at the bed, impropriety shining in my eyes.

  "No, you minx," he cried. "We must get the brand-new issue."

  I asked whatever for but was given no answer, and the next I knew, we were hurrying through the streets in search of the paper. Autie found and bought it without letting me see.

  "Hide your eyes," he commanded.

  "I will not, Autie. Tell me what it is!" I sensed his excitement but could not rid myself of the fear of some awful catastrophe.

  "Hide them!"

  Unwillingly I put a gloved hand over my eyes, knowing I could easily peek if I felt the need. Autie led me to a nearby bench and nearly pushed me down, spreading the paper in my lap.

  "There! Look!" he ordered.

  Cautiously I took my hand away and peered at the paper, to be greeted with a full-size drawing of Autie, charging into battle, his right hand waving a sword while the left quirted a heavily muscled dark horse. "Oh," I gasped, "Autie, how wonderful. He's caught your curls... and the expression on your face.... Oh, Autie, we must frame it!"

  He was obviously pleased beyond measure, marching back and forth in front of me, his chest puffed. "Artist came and drew right there in camp. Even followed me into battle until I sent him back."

  I didn't point out that the artist wasn't too good at details, or he would have seen that Autie had to have one hand or the other on the reins of his horse. Autie apparently didn't notice this detail.

  That night, as he held me in his arms, Autie talked more gently of the battle and the artist. "I thought to die in that battle," he said, "and it scared me to have the artist draw the picture, as though this were the last look you would have of me."

  I put my hand over his mouth to silence him, but he kissed it and held it away. "And then," he said, "I knew I could not die. I could not leave you... but I'll never allow another artist to draw me just before a battle. Custer's Luck can't last forever."

  It frightened me to hear him say that, as though someone had walked on that grave that I worried so about. I silenced him this time with a kiss, and he welcomed my advances, moving beneath me with a groan until we were both lost to thought, and the foolish artist long forgotten.

  Not a week later I thought that Custer's Luck had run out. I was in my sitting room, idly working at a painting, when I heard a newsboy hawking his wares below my window: "Custer killed! Read all about it! Custer killed!"

  I have no doubt that my heart stopped that moment. Unable to move, I sat frozen in the chair, hearing the young boy's cry as he moved away from the boardinghouse. Suddenly galvanizing myself into action, I flew down the stairs, out the door, and up the street, shouting, "Here, you boy! Here! Let me have a paper!"

  When he demanded payment—I had no coins with me—I snatched the paper out of his hand. "Hey, you can't do that!" he complained. He was a ragged young boy, his hair hanging into his eyes, and his too-short pants badly in need of washing and mending.

  Just as he reached a dirty hand to grab the paper, I turned away, hand clutched to my mouth. He stopped and stared. "You all right, lady?"

  I shook my head. "No," I said. "I... I'm General Custer's wife."

  His mouth hung open in amazement, and finally, without looking at me, he said, "Sorry, ma'am. Keep the paper."

  Clutching the paper to me, I headed back to the boardinghouse, though I had no idea of what to do, where to go. Woodenly I climbed the stairs to my room and sat on the bed.

  This is a dream, I thought. Any minute Autie will come bounding up the stairs. That, of course, I knew was not true. After a bit I began to think about what I must do. Whom to call? My parents and Autie's family were too far away to be of comfort... perhaps Congressman Kellogg? He was kind but hardly comforting. Even the officers' wives in Mrs. Hyatt's house were only casual acquaintances, not people with whom I would share the deepest catastrophe of my life. I was adrift in a sea of strangers, and Autie, my anchor, had been taken from me.

  At that moment I wished desperately that I had conceived Autie's child, but my monthly time had been frustratingly regular, a disappointment to us both. If only, I thought, I could have his child, and my mind pictured a young boy, the fair image of his father, wandering around my father's house in Monroe. Then the image of myself, living at home with my parents, a widow at my young age, rose before me, and I choked on the bitterness of it.

  It grew dark, and still I sat as though expecting Autie to come bounding up the stairs. At last there were footsteps, far too gentle to be Autie's. The wife of one of Autie's officers entered, took one look at me, and threw her arms around me, crying, "Oh, my dear!" I knew she was overcome with sympathy.

  "It was a false rumor," she said. "The secretary of war has said it is not true. Armstrong is alive and well, not even injured."

  My foggy brain did not register the words quite. "What?"

  She repeated her message, and it slowly dawned on me that her errand was not one of sympathy but reassurance. "He's alive?" I echoed.

  "Very," she said, laughing now, and I grabbed her and whirled around the room, just the way Autie whirled me when he was excited. We laughed and cried and hugged until I was exhausted. I slept for twelve hours straight after she left and never told Autie that I had once thought Custer's Luck had run out. To have told him, to my superstitious mind, might have cast a blight on the famous luck. Custer's Luck was to carry me through for a long time to come.

  * * *

  In the spring of 1864, General Philip Sheridan replaced Pleasanton, whom Autie had so respected and liked, as chief of the cavalry. Sheridan was an ugly man, I thought—short and chunky, with no neck, and long arms that hung halfway to his ankles. Convinced that Autie should have had his post, I was not prepared to like Sheridan, but Autie thought him an able and good commander, and I kept my silence.

  Autie was not as fond of General Grant, who assumed control of the entire Union Army. Autie disliked him for having routed General Pleasanton and, more important, for not giving Autie the promotion he wanted. Proud to be at the head of the Michigan Cavalry, he was still unsatisfied—he wanted a division, and he blamed the slowness of that promotion on Grant. Rumor was that Grant was intemperate in his use of alcohol. By then, in late March, the general already had victories to his credit, and supposedly President Lincoln said, "I cannot say whether Grant is a drinking man or not, but if he is, I should li
ke to know where he buys his liquor as I wish to present each one of my army commanders with a barrel of the same brand."

  Just after Grant's appointment, Autie was thrown from a carnage and injured badly enough to warrant ten days' sick leave. I had been with him in Virginia, and we immediately took the train to Washington. By luck, or fate, General Grant was also on that train. He was a short, unassuming man with sandy hair and gray-green eyes of the most remarkable color. He talked a great deal on the trip, and as he spoke, his clenched fist went up and down, from tabletop to thigh, back and forth, and I watched it, almost mesmerized. Occasionally he would unloose the fist and stroke his beard, but soon he clenched it again. I never did see him take a drink that day, though.

  Autie suffered a calamity he thought more devastating than being dumped out of a carriage when he returned to the front. He wrote the following to me:

  My dearest little girl,

  The worst calamity of my career has happened. Eliza and Johnny were captured when our brigade was hemmed in after a long and hard day. Both managed, to escape as soon as it came dark, but much to my dismay the Rebels got away with the wagon, which had all my personal belongings—and especially my desk, which had in it your ambrotype and your letters.

  Oh, my love, you cannot know how I grieve over those letters. When I think of some rough Johnny Reb reading them aloud, no doubt to the high amusement of his fellows, I am mortified for you that you should have expressed your passion so freely in writing. Such matters belong privately between a husband and wife, and I beg you to be more circumspect after this in what you write, never knowing who may see your beloved missives.

  Your loving husband,

  Autie

  In his letter I recognized the same man who would not make love to me in the daylight. Angrily, I replied that he need not be mortified for me and perhaps it was he himself who felt the embarrassment. I had nothing, I assured him, to be ashamed of for loving my husband, and I would not be scolded for it. I thought of the agony I'd endured thinking he was dead, and briefly I hated Autie for being unappreciative of my love and devotion. The thought that I could hate Autie, however briefly, came as a surprise to me, though later it would be a frequent if fleeting emotion.