And now, before him, sat the most beautiful woman he had ever laid eyes on. She watched him intently with those gold-dusted eyelashes brushing gently against peach-colored cheeks, her lovely sunset hair falling softly about her face. His eyes moved to her breasts, firm, pointing. In spite of his weakness from his illness, he felt a tightening in his loins. He wanted her. He wanted her more than he’d ever wanted a woman in his life. He wanted to enter her and stay there until everything in him was drained into her. He wanted her beside him through the night, every night. He wanted to kiss those pouting lips into submission. He wanted her to stand beside him as he let the whole world know that she belonged to him and him alone.
Fool! He let out his breath and forced his eyes away from her. Fool! You’re nothing but a fool! She’s like all the rest. She’s no different. She just happens to be the most beautiful. That’s all. It was the sickness, the weakness, that was making him lose his head. He had to get well, get his strength back, his control.
“I want to sleep now,” he snapped. “Get over there and look after my soldier. He needs you more than I do.”
Slowly, Kitty got to her feet, still staring at him, as though trying to see deep inside the facade of bitterness, to probe for the roots and foundation of that bitterness. “I don’t think, Travis Coltrane,” Kitty whispered, “that you’ve ever needed anyone in your entire life.”
Chapter Twenty
Kitty sat at the window, staring down at the street below. It was late August, so hot in Richmond that every stitch she wore was soaked with perspiration. The room was stuffy, the air musty and close. How long had she been a prisoner there? She had lost count of the days. Or had it been weeks? Travis had deposited her there, placed a guard outside the door. A tray of food was brought to her twice a day, her chamber pot removed, cleaned, returned. No one stayed long enough for conversation.
Straining her eyes against the glaring noonday sun, she could see the street clock in front of the jewelry store. Back in Goldsboro, there had been a similar clock in front of Gidden’s, but this was a larger store. Probably there were thousands and thousands of dollars in merchandise on display in the big glass window. Her gaze moving over the crowds in the streets, it was obvious that there were many men about who could afford to shop at that store. She’d heard some of the soldiers talking on the ride into town about the huge amounts of money circulating thanks to the army and the war and the trading in sugar, medicines, coffee, and tea.
There were many blacks about, some free and others still slaves. They were driving carriages or holding doors open, sweeping sidewalks, stepping quickly out of the way to allow white men to walk by freely, bowing to them curtly from their waists.
Whenever a white woman passed, they glanced away quickly, the white men watching to make sure that they did.
Kitty had learned to identify many of the groups of soldiers by listening to their conversations as they passed beneath the windows. The Alabama soldiers wore blue. The soldiers from Georgia wore brown uniforms with full-skirted pants and green trim. The ones from Tennessee mostly wore coonskin caps, and the Texas soldiers wore cowboy hats. Some of the ones from Arkansas did, too. The Washington Artillery, from New Orleans, wore white gloves, and once she had seen a group that called themselves New Orleans Zouaves, dressed in baggy scarlet trousers, white gaiters, low-cut blue shirts, and their jackets were embroidered heavily and braided, each armed with a bowie knife held in a bright blue sash. Most of the other Confederates, like the ones from Florida and Mississippi and South Carolina, wore gray.
So many times Kitty had been tempted to call out that window to the soldiers and tell them she was being held prisoner by Yankee spies. But the last thing Travis had said to her was that if she wanted to see Andy Shaw alive again, she had better keep quiet. And she had. Because as Andy was led roughly away, down the hall to another room in the hotel, his eyes were wide and frightened. She couldn’t risk endangering his life. No, there would be another way to escape, and she had to be patient.
The sound of the door being unlocked made her jump to her feet. She dared to hope it might be Travis at last, and she would know where they were going from here. But it wasn’t Captain Coltrane. Instead, Sam Bucher came in with a tray and set it down on the table next to the bed. She looked at it and wrinkled her nose. “Rancid mutton…turnips…and dried-out corn bread! Sam, how much longer do you think I can live on this…this garbage?”
“Kitty, I’m sorry.” He sounded as if he meant it. “The innkeeper runs a poor place, I know, but he minds his own business and doesn’t ask a lot of questions about why we’re here, and that’s important.”
“Not to me it isn’t. I wish he would ask questions. I wish all those Confederate soldiers outside would ask questions. I wish they’d kill everyone of you and set me and Andy free…”
He smiled down at her as she flopped down on the bed. “Come on now, Kitty, you don’t mean that. You’ve grown kinda fond of us, as much as we’ve been through together.”
She looked at him thoughtfully. Sam was peppery and gruff, but there was something about him that got to her. “Well, maybe if they’d kill your precious Captain and spare you…”
“That’s my girl!” He laughed and pulled up a chair and sat down. “Maybe in a day or two we can get out of here.”
“How’s Andy?”
“Fine. He just asked about you. He doesn’t have a window in his room, so he’s worse off than you are. Travis said we couldn’t trust him not to panic and yell out, but you were smart enough to know we meant business when we said to keep quiet.”
“But why are we here? And where has Travis gone? And why are all those Confederates coming and going day and night?”
“We’re here because Travis and a few of the men are out getting information from drunken Rebs, and Richmond is a boiling pot of soldiers coming and going. And when soldiers come to town they drink…and when they drink, they talk. We’re here to listen.”
She picked at the turnips, tasted them, then shoved the plate away. Horrible. The food was horrible, and she just couldn’t eat a bite. A fly settled down onto the green mass and promptly flew away. “See? Even the flies won’t eat it.”
“Maybe it won’t be long, Kitty,” Sam said sympathetically. “Believe me, I like the food you cook in camp a lot better. That cornbread looks like a pile of cow dung baked in the sun, don’t it?”
She ignored his comment, thinking how crude Sam could be at times. Getting up and walking to the window, she stared down at the street once again. “I wish your Captain would come back.”
“You miss him, don’t you?”
“Miss him?” She whirled about to stare at him in wonder. “Sam, I hate him! He’s holding me prisoner when I want to be home with my people—my mother! I…oh, no one knows how much I hate that man!”
He scratched at his beard, smiling. “Oh, I’ve seen the way you two look at each other when you think the other’n ain’t watching. It’s the war’s got you at each other’s throats. Any other time, I bet you’d fall in love.”
“You’re out of your mind!”
“Oh, I reckon I’ve been around a heap more than you and the Captain, and I see how foolish young folks can be.” He got to his feet, picked up the tray. “Sure you don’t want to eat anything? Supper ain’t gonna be much better, I’m afraid.”
She shook her head. He walked to the door, kicked it with his foot, and one of the men opened it and let him out. Then t closed, and she heard the sound of the key turning. Locked in again.
Dismally, she leaned her head against the window and stared down at the street. The crowds were thinning out due to the heat. There was nothing to look at anymore, so she went to the bed and laid down, thinking it was too hot to fall asleep.
Kitty opened her eyes. The room was dark. And it was cooler. For that much, she was grateful. Getting up, she hurried to the window to catch a breath of fresh air. Leaning out, she gulped, closed her eyes, felt the whisper of a breeze against her skin.<
br />
“Hello there!”
Kitty turned her head, startled. To the left, at the next window, a shadowed figure sat on the ledge. He wore a gray uniform, and her heart began to pound excitedly. A Confederate soldier! In the very next room! Did she dare tell him she was a prisoner? The sight of Andy s young, frightened face swam before her eyes.
“Hello…” Her voice came out a whisper.
“What’s the matter?” the stranger asked. “Can’t you talk to a lonely soldier? Do you have a jealous husband or something?’ He laughed, but the laughter sounded forced, as though he genuinely hoped he was wrong, that she could offer him some companionship.
“I…I’m engaged,” she blurted out, still in a half-whisper so the guard stationed outside the door would not hear her talking to someone.
“To a soldier?”
“Yes a Confederate…”
Again he laughed, but this time it sounded genuine. “Well, I should hope so. I can’t picture a pretty girl like you getting mixed up with a dang Yankee. What’s his outfit?”
“Wayne Volunteers. He’s a Major, with a North Carolina Regiment. I don’t know which one.” Her heart was pounding excitedly. Did she dare to hope he might know Nathan —know something about him? “The last I heard, he fought at the Battle of Shiloh…”
“God, we lost a lot of men there—thousands…” He swore under his breath. The light was dim from the lantern in his room. She could not make out all the details of his face, but he was young, bearded. That’s about all she could tell of his features. “Haven’t heard from him since? You sure he’s all right? There’s been a lot of fighting.”
She wondered what to say next. How could she tell him she had no idea of what had been going on in the war? The only thing she knew was that the month was August, and they were in a town called Richmond, in the state of Virginia.
“I’ve been sick,” she thought of the lie and told it quickly. “Smallpox. I’m…recuperating, here, away from people. I…I’ve lost touch.”
“I guess you have.” He let out his breath. “There’s been a lot of smallpox. Lots have died with it. You were lucky. You sure picked a ratty place to hole up, though…” He sounded curious, so she made a comment about not having much money for food and shelter, and that seemed to satisfy him.
He started talking about the war as Kitty listened intently, eager to hear anything he might tell her. In April, he said, it looked as though the Confederates were constantly on the defensive everywhere. New Orleans was lost, McClellan had been at the gates of Richmond, Halleck was storming in on Corinth. Missouri was gone, and it looked as though the whole Mississippi Valley would follow it. “But now it looks different,” he said brightly. “It seems that victory for the South is not far away. McClellan got beat right in front of Richmond. And just a couple of weeks ago, Jackson advanced on Cedar Mountain and drove a detachment of General Pope’s army into retreat. ‘Course Jackson had to withdraw because Pope had some more men not far away, but the word is that General Lee is moving in a big army.”
“I do hope it will all be over soon,” Kitty said anxiously, glad to hear the good news. “I want to go home so badly.”
“Well, you sound strong enough, if you’d quit that danged whispering,” he teased her. “How about if I come over for a visit? I’ve been on the lines, and I’m mighty lonesome for the company of a pretty young thing like you. And that Major of yours wouldn’t mind you keeping a poor Johnny Reb from spending a lonely night…”
“All right,” she said nervously. She had to take the chance. If she could talk to him, tell him the whole story, he would surely gather some soldiers and rescue both her and Andy. They could charge the hotel and rescue them before Sam and the others had a chance to kill them.
“But be careful,” she rushed on. “There’s a guard at my door.”
“A guard?” He laughed and tilted the jug again. Then he lowered it and said, “You mean that Major put a guard at your door? Is he that afraid someone will take you away from him?”
“No, no, you don’t understand,” she cried, her brain screaming for the right words. Please, God, don’t let him be so drunk he can’t understand and grasp the situation. “I’m being held prisoner. That guard at the door is a Yankee, and they’ve got a fourteen-year-old Confederate held prisoner down the hall somewhere, and they’ve threatened to kill him if I ask for help. You’re my only chance. You’ve got to be careful…”
She heard the door opening softly, and she jumped away from the window. In the dim light, she could see the steel- blue eyes of Travis Coltrane gleaming angrily. “You talking to someone?” he asked sharply.
“No, no, of course not.” She forced a smile as he set down the lantern he was carrying. “I was listening to the people on the street talking. It gets lonely in here, all by myself with no one to talk to. I…I just sit at the window all day and watch and listen. Ask Sam. He knows when he comes in here, I’m always at the window looking out…”
She was talking nervously, and she knew it. He kept looking at her, eyes burning into hers, and finally she went over to the bed and sat down, folding her hands in her lap.
“Well, you’re back. That’s good. I’ve missed you, Travis. I know we aren’t exactly the best of friends, but we’ve been together so long now that I’m beginning to look forward to the times when we talk.”
He forced his eyes to leave hers and walked to the door to tell the guard to find Sam Bucher and a bottle of whiskey. Then he started pacing up and down the room silently, ignoring her. Kitty knew he was worried about something, and she prayed he hadn’t heard anything she said to the soldier-and she that the soldier had been sober enough to understand what she was saying. Perhaps at this very moment he was out gathering Confederate soldiers to storm the hotel…
Sam came in, nodded to her, then he and Travis sat down at the table in the far corner of the room, the bottle of whiskey Travis had ordered between them.
“It looks bad, Sam, damn bad,” Travis said worriedly, his brow furrowed, lips tight and grim. “McClellan’s now camped on the bank of the James River. He’s still out there and strong enough to resume the offensive on short notice, but he needs those 50,000 men that are being held back because of Jackson’s game in the Shenandoah Valley. This John Pope is moving down toward Richmond along the lines of the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, and there’s just no way that Lee can fend off both Pope and McClellan. But Lee’s smart, and I found out that he’s got the notion that McClellan is going to be inactive for a while. I had a hunch about what he’d do, so I did some checking and found out I was right.”
He paused, and Sam spoke up excitedly, “Go on, let’s have it. What’s Lee got up his sleeve?”
Kitty strained to hear every word. Somehow, she knew that this was the most important conversation she had overheard. What if they were, at this very moment, planning a move that might endanger Nathan’s life? The thought made her spine tingle apprehensively. She had no way of knowing just where he was fighting with his men.
He took a deep breath, held it, then let it out at once. “Lee has sent Stonewall Jackson, with about 25,000 men, north to attack Pope.”
Sam whistled between his teeth. “Goddamn, what do we do?”
“We round up the men and get ready to ride. Tell them to put on their Confederate uniforms so we can get through the lines, then we’ll change clothes and head for our lines and get word to Pope. We can’t let Jackson take him by surprise.”
The chair scraped the floor noisily as Sam got to his feet. Without another word, he left the room. Kitty prayed fervently that the Confederate soldier would come soon. Now she had valuable information to give him, and there was even more reason to turn Travis over for what he was—a dangerous Yankee spy. He could not be allowed to leave Richmond with such information. She looked at him sitting there, sipping whiskey from the bottle, What if the soldier didn’t come? What could she do then? She had to let their plans be known. But how? How could she get word to the Confeder
ates?
She and Travis had not talked together for some time. In fact, he had hardly paid her any mind since that night he had rallied after being in a daze with the fever of smallpox. It was a surprise that he had even come into her room that night. His clothes were there, but she seldom saw him. He usually sent in Sam for what he needed, as though he didn’t want to have to come in contact with her. Oh, thank God, she had heard that door open, or he might have slipped up behind to hear her telling that Confederate soldier how she was being held prisoner. Travis could be as quiet and slippery as the bobcats she and Poppa had hunted back home. But he hadn’t heard, and now she wondered how to handle the situation. Could it be that she just might be able to reach him now, gain his trust? If so, she would stand a much better chance of catching him unawares than if she continued to be so resistant to his presence. Awhile back, before he’d come down with the illness, she had tried to subtly push herself at him, but he had not acknowledged her advances. Perhaps then he thought it was a trick. Now, since she had nursed him back to health and had done nothing to antagonize him lately, there just might be a chance.
She had to try, she thought feverishly. What was there to lose at this point? If the soldier from the next room had been too drunk to understand what she was saying, then she had to go ahead, on her own, push herself at Travis, then hopefully catch him off guard so she could tip his hand to the Confederates—even if it meant screaming to someone out the window!
Thoughts of her father crept painfully into her mind. What if he was fighting with this officer Pope or McClellan? What if she was, in fact, betraying him? It was a chance she had to take. Her freedom—maybe even her life, was at stake—as well as that of Andy Shaw. And there was Nathan to think about—Nathan and her countrymen—the Southerners. Poppa was only one man, a grown man, with a conscience and heart of his own. And he had made his decision just as she had to make hers, now. And Poppa would understand. She knew he would. He would know that she had to do what she thought was right. Wasn’t that the code he, himself, had taught her to live by? Was there any other path for her to take except to Travis Coltrane’s arms and make him think she wanted him desperately? Had yielded to his irresistible charms?
Love and War: The Coltrane Saga, Book 1 Page 25
