The Soldier's Lady

by Michael Phillips

  Josepha came out of the house, dish towel in hand with a look of bewilderment on her face just like Emma’s and Micah’s. The only one who didn’t seem to see anything unusual in our early return was William.

  As Micah set him down on the ground he ran over to give Katie and me hugs as if we’d been gone a week.

  “Let’s just say things didn’t go as we’d planned,” said my papa, pulling down the carpetbags. “Things have changed since we were all there.”

  “What happened?” asked Micah.

  “The hotel where we usually stay has changed their policy,” said my papa irritably. “They wouldn’t let Kathleen and Mayme share a room. Made me so mad I almost lost my temper.”

  “Why didn’t you go someplace else?”

  “We did, but it was the same story everywhere—either no blacks at all, or separate accommodation for blacks. We searched the whole town but could find no place to stay. Reconstruction they call it . . . the New South.”

  “What did you do?” asked Micah.

  “It was getting late and we were angry and tired and frustrated and finally just decided to come home. We drove an hour out of the city under the moon, then slept alongside the road—nearly froze to death since we didn’t think to take blankets, then got up at sunrise and came the rest of the way.”

  “But it wasn’t a total loss,” said Katie. “Look at this book we bought in a bookshop in the city.” She held up a book by some fellows called the Brothers Grimm. “I can’t wait to read it.”

  Emma followed Katie and me inside while Micah helped Papa with our bags, and Uncle Ward tended to the horse and carriage.

  MASTER AND MISTRESS

  12

  WILLIAM MCSIMMONS HAD NOT BEEN SITTING around doing nothing in the matter of trying to find out what had happened to the result of his dalliance five years earlier with one of his father’s house slaves.

  That the lame-brained girl had run off and disappeared and not been seen or heard from again gave him hope at first that perhaps she was dead and the child with her. Or, if not dead, so far away that he needn’t worry about her popping up again at an inconvenient time.

  But in his heart of hearts, he couldn’t help but worry. He had a bad feeling. What he felt came from no guilty conscience. How much of a conscience he had at all in the matter was doubtful. The fool girl had been colored. What did it matter what happened to her? He was just afraid of getting found out. If his secret was discovered, it would doom any chance he had for a political future. North Carolina voters were not quite ready to elect a man with an illegitimate black child on his resume.

  “Have you thought any more about when you will make your formal announcement and first speech?” Mistress McSimmons asked.

  “I’m thinking early summer,” her husband replied. “There’s no hurry. Everyone already knows. I thought we would wait until the weather is pleasant. It will give you the opportunity to play the hostess with a real nice Carolina garden party—just like before the war.”

  “Then we should begin planning it,” she said. “What about that brat of yours that’s wandering around God knows where? Have you cleared that up yet?”

  McSimmons turned a dark look on his wife.

  “You don’t really think it’s going to turn up now, after all this time?”

  “I want to take no chances.”

  “If someone had any intention of trying—”

  “Look, William,” she interrupted, “I will not be made a fool of in public. I told you before and I will tell you again—do something about it so that we do not have to spend our lives wondering. I will not put on a lavish lawn party with every influential politician and plantation owner for miles, and their wives, only to have some colored wench sneak in and walk up to you, hold out a child in a blanket, and say, ‘Here, this colored baby is yours!”’

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Charlotte. If the child’s even still alive, it wouldn’t be a baby by this time.”

  “All the more reason. I tell you, William, I will not be humiliated. I refuse to be haunted by your, shall we say, indiscretion for the rest of my life. You figure out a way to deal with it once and for all, or you can count me out of your political ambitions. When I go to Washington it will not be to have myself talked about in connection with such sordid matters. I will not be made a spectacle of.”

  William McSimmons walked into Sheriff Jenkins’ office in Oakwood. He made sure the door closed behind him, then sat down.

  “Bill,” said the sheriff.

  “Sam,” nodded McSimmons. “What can you tell me about those two Northerners I’ve been hearing about—the ones causing all the trouble.”

  “You mean the ones with the coloreds?”

  “That’s them.”

  “The Daniels brothers,” nodded the sheriff. “They’re no carpetbaggers, that’s for sure, but even worse if you ask me. I’ve had words with them a time or two.”

  “They dangerous?”

  “Naw—couple of sissies who seem to think niggers oughta be treated like everyone else. If you got trouble with them, why don’t you come out one night with me and the boys? We can take care of things. We been there a time or two already.”

  “I can’t afford to get involved in any of that,” said McSimmons. “I’ve got to be respectable, you know, if I’m going to get to Washington. My wife’s putting me in three-piece suits—”

  “I can see that!” laughed Jenkins.

  “That’s not the worst of it!” rejoined McSimmons. “She’s got me going to social functions, kissing babies, letting old women fawn over me—it’s dreadful. But I suppose such is the life of the politician, and Charlotte’s been hankering to be a politician’s wife ever since she met me.”

  “No more whipping the darkies out behind the barn, eh?”

  “I’m afraid all that fun is gone,” answered McSimmons with a sigh. “Respectability is all I have to look forward to—the boredom of respectability.”

  “Then what’s going on between you and the Daniels brothers?” asked Jenkins.

  “Nothing much . . . a personal matter. Is it true what they say about the darkies at the place?”

  “It’s true—more niggers than whites—girls, kids, an old sow who used to be one of your slaves, even old Henry Patterson’s taken up with them.”

  “Kids too, huh?”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “Black or white?”

  “Don’t know. I’ve never actually laid eyes on any myself—it was night when I paid them a visit.”

  “I get your meaning, Sam,” grinned McSimmons. “You know . . . it would really help me out to know more of what’s going on there.”

  The sheriff’s eyebrows rose, but he quickly masked his speculation. “If I hear anything, I’ll let you know.”

  The would-be politician rose. “Thanks, Sam,” he said. “And, uh . . . this little conversation will stay just between the two of us, won’t it?”

  “I’ve already forgotten you were here at all,” replied the sheriff.

  SOMETIMES IT HURTS TO BE BLACK

  13

  After Jeremiah and Henry had come to live in the cabin at Rosewood, and all that Jeremiah and I had been through together and the promises we’d made to each other, I felt a little funny about going down to his and Henry’s cabin alone. Somehow it didn’t really seem right, things being the way they were between us and all.

  So for some time Emma had been in the habit of cleaning up their place once a week and gathering up the laundry and tidying the place up. At first, after Micah Duff came, she seemed a little reluctant but she kept going down and cleaning up as usual.

  That was what she was doing late one morning the day after our return from the city. Lunch was ready and the men were all back from town and chores.

  “Where’s Emma an’ William?” asked Josepha as she set a beef roast on the table.

  “She’s down at the cabins, remember, Josepha?” I said.

  “Somebody go fetch her,” said
Josepha. “She must not hab heard da bell, an’ dis meat’ll git cold effen we wait too long.”

  “I’ll go,” said Jeremiah. He was through the door before I had a chance to ask if he wanted me to go with him.

  It was five or six minutes later when Jeremiah and Emma came walking back to the house together. But the sound I heard was little William’s voice, not theirs. He was giggling and laughing so hard you could hear him from a hundred yards away.

  I looked out one of the kitchen windows. There were Emma and Jeremiah walking back from the cabins, talking freely and with smiles on their faces. William was between them and they each had hold of one of his hands. They were swinging him back and forth in the air and he was laughing with glee.

  Suddenly a voice sounded beside me.

  “That little boy needs somebody like Jeremiah,” it said.

  It was Micah. I hadn’t heard him walk up beside me.

  “He’s a good little boy,” he added, “but he needs a father.”

  “Uh . . . yes, he loves black men, that’s for sure. He lit up the day you got here.”

  “Yeah,” smiled Micah, “I remember. But you can tell he’s especially close to Jeremiah.”

  I didn’t say anything more. What was there to say? Micah was right. Emma, William, and Jeremiah did look awfully good together.

  When lunch was over I wandered away from the house. A lot of mixed-up feelings were stirring around inside me. I walked toward the woods. I didn’t realize that someone was watching me go.

  It was about thirty minutes later when I heard footsteps. I expected to see Katie. No one else knew about this place. I wiped at my eyes and turned around. The smile I’d tried to force onto my face for Katie disappeared.

  There stood Micah Duff.

  “I, uh . . . I’m sorry,” he said. “I followed you. I could tell at lunch that something was wrong. I’ve seen it all day. If you would rather be alone, just tell me and I’ll go . . . but I thought maybe you would like to talk.”

  I tried to work the smile back onto my face and tell him it was all right if he stayed and to ask him if he wanted to sit down. But trying to smile just made my eyes fill up. And as for saying anything, my voice came out in a croak, and I started crying again.

  Micah walked over and sat down beside me. He put his hand on my arm.

  “Do you want to tell me about it?” he said softly.

  “I don’t know,” I said, half sobbing. “I’m sorry . . . I don’t usually cry . . . I don’t ever cry . . . but it’s just—”

  I started in again. This was mortifying, to bawl like a baby in front of a man I’d only known a few weeks!

  “Just what, Mayme?” said Micah. His voice was so tender and compassionate that just the sound of it calmed me down a little.

  I tried to breathe in and out a time or two. But my breaths came in jerks.

  “I suppose I can tell you,” I said after a minute. “You would . . . probably understand . . . but I can’t even tell Katie. . . . That’s the worst of it, not being able to tell her . . . she and I tell each other everything, but . . . she just couldn’t understand this.”

  “Did something happen on the trip to Charlotte?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I whimpered.

  “Was it about the hotel?”

  “Yes!” I answered, starting to cry again. “It was so awful . . . I spoiled it for them . . . but there was nothing I could do—all those people looking at them and then glancing over at me and then their faces getting such looks of disgust on them, like I was . . . like I was I don’t know what! Oh, Micah—it was so humiliating. But I felt so bad for Katie and Papa and Uncle Ward. They had wanted to have a good time in the city, but they couldn’t with me along. I’ve never felt so low, so dirty, so worthless in my life. Living at Rosewood . . . I’d forgotten how mean people can be . . . but . . .”

  I turned away sobbing.

  “You don’t really think you spoiled it for them, Mayme . . . do you?” asked Micah.

  “I don’t know . . . it seemed like it. They were so disappointed.”

  “Don’t you think they were disappointed for how you were being treated more than for themselves?”

  “I’m sure you’re right. Actually, after the third or fourth hotel turned us away, Papa started to get really angry at the way people were treating me.”

  “Have you talked to him about it?”

  “No—I’ve been too embarrassed . . . and afraid I’d start crying,” I added, looking up at Micah with a faint smile. “I didn’t want anyone to see me cry. I hadn’t counted on being followed!”

  Micah smiled. “Sorry. I didn’t know.”

  “I’m the strong one around here,” I said. “If they saw me crying, they would think . . . well, I don’t know what they would think! But yes, you’re right, they were more embarrassed for me, and I suppose I was more embarrassed for them. It was so awful. Poor Katie—she felt so bad for me.”

  We sat for a few minutes in silence, just watching the little brook go by in front of us. I took two or three deep breaths and gradually felt myself coming back to my normal self.

  “Do you know those kinds of looks white people give you?” I asked after a while. “Do you get them too?”

  “All the time,” replied Micah.

  “Even in the North?”

  “Not so much. But after the war it’s been worse.”

  “What do you do?” I asked.

  “Ignore them. What else can you do?”

  “But how can you—it makes you feel so worthless to have people look at you with disgust like that.”

  “You have to ignore it and just be who you are.”

  “But how can you feel good about yourself when your skin is brown, when the whole world is looking at you in the same way they would look at a dog?”

  “The whole world isn’t looking at you that way,” said Micah, “only ignorant, foolish people. What should you care what they think?”

  “But it still sometimes hurts to be black.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” Micah nodded. “I know the feeling, but a long time ago I had to decide what it meant to be me, just me, not white, black, not what anyone else says or thinks I should be . . . but just me. Who I thought I was, who I really was, who God wanted me to be—that was all that mattered. Once I came to terms and made my peace with that, then I was able to live with myself no matter what anyone thought.”

  “But doing that’s not so easy.”

  “No, not easy at all,” nodded Micah. “But if you’re black, or brown like you say, or different in any way, you’ve got no choice. You’ve got to ignore the looks and just be who you are. Otherwise you’ll get angry and bitter yourself and then you’re no better than they are. An angry black person is just as bad as an arrogant white person. I wouldn’t want to be either.”

  Sam Jenkins had been giving a lot of thought to the conversation in his office three days earlier with William McSimmons.

  Something peculiar was going on. What . . . he couldn’t be sure.

  But he had the feeling McSimmons had more on his mind than what he’d said. And it wouldn’t do anyone in this town any harm to be on William McSimmons’ good side if he got lucky and made it to Congress.

  He didn’t know what kind of men Congress wanted. Sam Jenkins could think of a dozen men within ten miles that had twice the intelligence and three times the horse sense of William McSimmons, including the boy’s father.

  Old man McSimmons was a straight-talking, hardworking, good, fair man. His son was a hothead and an idiot. But he had married an heiress and social climber who had dressed him up in a three-piece suit and shoved him into politics. Maybe that was the kind of man they wanted in Washington. It didn’t matter anyway. Nothing Washington did made any difference in a little place like Oakwood.

  The “New South” the papers were calling it. Probably William McSimmons would fit in with the carpetbaggers and everybody else swarming into the region. Maybe William McSimmons would wear that suit long enoug
h for his wife to turn him into a respectable Southern gentleman. Jenkins doubted it, but you could never tell.

  In the meantime, it wouldn’t hurt to be on the man’s good side . . . just in case. That’s what he wanted to talk to his son about.

  “Weed,” said the sheriff when he and his son were alone, “I got something I want you to do. Might be some money in it. I can’t tell yet. We’ll have to see what turns up first.”

  STORM AND STORIES, LAUGHTER AND TEARS

  14

  Sometimes the rain could come on without warning. The storm that broke on us in May of 1869 reminded me of the time the flood had surrounded us and turned Rosewood into an island.

  Katie, my papa, and Uncle Ward had all gone into town for some business at the bank that had something to do with the changes and the lawyer in Charlotte. They wanted me to go too, but after what had happened in the city, I was still a little shy about going into town. I’d had enough looks from Mrs. Hammond and Mr. Taylor at the bank, I didn’t want anyone looking at me funny right now. So I stayed home.

  All of us but Josepha and William were out at the pasture where Jeremiah and Micah were putting in the new fence. Henry hadn’t gone into town that day, so he was helping them string wire along the new posts and pull it tight. Emma and I had just tagged along for fun. Even hard work is fun when you’re working with people you love and you’re all working together. We were trying to help but I don’t think we did much. Pulling fence wire taut takes more strength than we girls had. But we were pretending to help anyway!

  The rain hit so hard and so suddenly, we just stood there for a second or two staring up at it. Then we grabbed the tools and bolted for the nearest cover we could find. That happened to be Henry and Jeremiah’s cabin. We crowded through the door, soaking wet in the less than a minute it had taken us to get there, laughing and all talking at once.

  Henry went to his stove to stoke it up and add a few more chunks of wood. Within minutes we were standing around it, beginning to warm up. The rain was pounding on the roof so loud we almost had to shout at each other to be heard.