Sarah's Ground (9781439115855)

by Rinaldi, Ann

  All will be well. All will be in order again. What you are doing here is for future generations.

  I can pretend the place is not in disarray but will soon be as Washington kept it in its prime. And I can pretend that there is no war.

  The letters from the Northern vice-regents went to the papers, including the Star in Washington, speaking for my loyalty to the Union and to the slavery question on Mount Vernon.

  Things settled down for two days. And then I had a visit from Mrs. Harbinger.

  She came driving her own cart one morning, bearing strawberry preserves.

  “Have you seen my boy?” she asked. “Has Robert been about?”

  I told her no, I hadn’t seen him. But it turned out she knew better.

  “He was here. I saw him come off your land with that recruiting man. I always knew you were a traitor,” she said.

  Her words were like a slap. Was she the person who had told the papers about me? That our people were slaves? That I was seen talking to Professor Lowe?

  “Mrs. Harbinger,” I said sternly, “mind yourself. Those are strong words.”

  “I don’t mind him going,” she said. “I have no illusions but that they’ll come round for him sooner or later. But to think he joined the Northern army! You are a traitor to have set this up for him. We are Southerners. My other boy died fighting for the South!”

  “Your boy died when he fell from a horse,” I said.

  But she would not hear of it. She sat at the kitchen table and cried. Not because Robert had joined the army. But because he had joined the Northern army.

  And somehow I managed to console her, angry as I was. Because she was confused. But who amongst us isn’t these days? I had heard that some of the Quaker neighbors around us were not speaking to one another anymore because one had a son fighting for the North and another for the South.

  Don’t they have enough confusion making the decision to fight? I thought.

  I ended up comforting Mrs. Harbinger. And I served her strawberry preserves.

  It is the fifteenth of August. The fixing of the house goes on. The wharf is repaired. Mrs. Frobel was here this morning and told me that when Mrs. Lee left Arlington, she left with a large farm wagon full of good furniture, portraits, china, and furbelows that once belonged to George and Martha Washington. I wish she had put them here for safekeeping. We need furnishings so. The house is so bare that sometimes it echoes.

  But no. Mrs. Lee took that wagonload of treasures deeper into Virginia. I hope they survive the war.

  Today I heard officially that both of Upton’s brothers, Arthur and William, and all his cousins joined the Confederate army. Arthur owns the bank in Alexandria. I heard this from Dandridge.

  Mary McMakin says mayhap she can come in September. I think she is fearful of travel. I think she is fearful of being here. She was always afraid of everything. I suppose I should write to her again and tell her I need her to come. At least it will keep Fanny happy.

  We heard guns in the distance yesterday. The shots rang out and carried in the air. They seemed not far away, and Upton ordered all the servants and workmen to stay close to the house.

  He rode out on Peaches to find the source of the trouble. Turns out it was a skirmish. The redbrick church, where General Washington and his family went, is six miles from here. Upton reports it was not damaged but it was pillaged. Everything inside that could be carried away was taken, even the white baptismal font.

  It is this part of war that bothers me so. That baptismal font was an original to the church. What will a soldier do with it?

  Mary writes that she is coming in September. Oh, my heart is glad. Not because I fear being the only white woman in the house. But because now speculation about my being alone here with Upton will end.

  I am preparing one of the upstairs rooms for Mary.

  I have to go to Washington City again. Not only do we need candles and oil, but we need new passes. President Lincoln has put General McClellan in charge, and the pass from General Scott is no longer valid. And our servants need passes to Alexandria. With McClellan, there are all new rules. They say he is pompous and orderly and crazy for regulations.

  I must get a new pass even for myself to go to Alexandria. As it is now, we’ve had mail only once in ten days. And I must have it three times a week or go mad. If only because I must keep up with the papers and see what people are saying about us.

  But now we have news of a different stripe. George Washington Riggs is an important banker and treasurer of the Association, and he and his wife have proved good friends. They live two miles short of Alexandria. She writes that Prince Napoléon of France is visiting Washington and wants to visit Mount Vernon.

  A prince! Well, we’ve had just about everything else happen to us. Why not this?

  Twelve

  In the weeks that followed I tried to remember if there was anything in any of Miss Semple’s teachings that prepared one for entertaining a French prince.

  There was.

  Girls, face your problems. Meet them head-on!

  So much had to be done. The workmen were still fixing the road to the west gate. It was filled with ruts from frozen spring mud, which were deep and were now dust beds.

  Upton asked me what I wanted done outside. “The hedges must be trimmed,” I said, “and the grass around the brick walks. And the walks weeded.”

  He set the men working.

  I had Priscilla bake a cake. Martha Washington’s “great cake,” for which we had the recipe. I sent for claret and groceries from Alexandria. They would not require supper, we were told. Just refreshment.

  And then I had a thought. Did they speak English? Could I remember my French from my days in New Orleans? I have been practicing.

  Thank heaven the place speaks for itself. The trees are lush, the lawns green, and the flowers in full bloom. Though it is August, we have plenty of flowers—lavender, heliotrope, pinks, phlox, ragged robin, Canterbury bell, musk roses, columbine, and sweet William. Even the old orange trees in the middle of the tumbledown greenhouses are in bloom.

  I have picked some flowers and put them in vases in the house.

  There is a special vase of musk roses in General Washington’s bedroom.

  Well, the place is ready. We await the prince.

  And then came a special messenger, up the road on horseback. I felt myself shake all over. Only bad news comes on horseback.

  Upton met him, gave him some money, had the servants give him refreshment, and brought the letter to me.

  It was addressed to me.

  It was from an officer on Lee’s staff.

  I looked at Upton. “I don’t know if I should open it. I might be accused of consorting with the enemy.”

  His brown eyes sought mine in understanding, and he held out his hand for the letter, which I gave over.

  I watched his expression turn into a scowl. “John Augustine Washington has been killed,” he said softly.

  “Killed?”

  “In the war.”

  “I didn’t know he’d joined up.”

  “Oh yes, I did. And apparently there was a skirmish in the western part of Virginia. And he was mortally wounded.”

  I put my hands over my mouth to still the cry. Upton put a hand on my shoulder.

  “A man with six children had no right to join the army,” I said.

  “No, but he had to prove himself.”

  I thought of him, how he’d been that last morning he was here, when I made him leave the house, how downtrodden and humble. I thought of him dead now. Oh, why had I been so pompous! Because I’d wanted to show my mettle to Upton and Miss Cunningham. And I’d made that poor man my victim. I was so ashamed of myself. Of course he’d gone and joined the army. Mayhap to prove himself to me, how did I know?

  I wanted the letter, but I did not take it. I would not let it be said that I had touched a letter from Lee’s staff. “Keep it,” I told Upton. “You keep it.”

  He folded it c
arefully. “I will.” His brow was furrowed, his manner solemn.

  “Upton, I know what you’re thinking,” I said. “Don’t think it, please.”

  He shoved his hands into his pockets. “He went and did his duty. And I’m here.”

  “You’re doing your duty,” I reminded him.

  “What? Entertaining a French prince?”

  “No,” I said, and my voice was full of resolve. “Keeping General Washington’s house from being pillaged and destroyed. Look what happened to Pohick Church. What will future generations have, if not for what you’re doing?”

  “It’s you who are doing it,” he mumbled. And he walked away, toward the old slave quarters, which I dearly wished had been taken down, but which, to this day, haven’t.

  I was about to go after him when somebody yelled that there was a carriage coming up the road to the house.

  I ran up to my room to change. I put on my best print dress and was fixing my hair. I knew I must greet them. Upton was likely walking in the road near the slave quarters, sulking. He often walks there when he wants to be alone.

  Then I heard voices and looked out my window. It was Upton and several men, walking about. He was showing them the gardens, and they were responding in French.

  I ran downstairs and outside to see Upton escorting them to the tomb. Good, that would give me more time. I must make lemonade. I went into the pantry to mix it, then needed the punch bowl from the sideboard in the dining room, so I went to fetch it.

  There I ran into two of them.

  I was startled, but I curtsied. So they bowed. Then I said something, in French, about the heat. Their eyes went wide that I could speak the language, and I invited them into the kitchen for a glass of lemonade.

  There we sat at the table. They were two aides, and there were seven in their party—the prince, who they called Plon-Plon, five aides, and Count Mercier.

  I showed these two aides Lafayette’s room. I let them handle the key to the Bastille. All the while I was watching Upton, hoping the news of John Augustine Washington wouldn’t put a damper on him.

  If it did, they didn’t notice. Upton was the perfect Southern gentleman. He told them all about the house, its history, its problems now. I interpreted for the others, but the prince spoke English.

  They nodded and smiled. Then they told us their problems.

  They’d had no breakfast. Their driver didn’t know the roads. Their horses were not up to the job, and they were anxious to have them cared for and find others. They needed to get back to Washington, but if they couldn’t change horses, they needed a village hotel on the way.

  At once I ordered a late breakfast be cooked up. Jane went right to it. I served them claret. I supervised in the kitchen while Upton entertained them in the dining room.

  We cooked everything we had.

  The prince was a quiet man of pleasant features and impeccable manners. He told us he was the son of Jérôme Bonaparte, that his wife was an Italian princess who was now visiting in New York, and that he was not welcome in the court of his cousin Napoléon III. “So I travel,” he said.

  He described, briefly, his travels. “We dined with Mr. Lincoln and saw the Federal encampments around Washington. Then,” the prince said, “with a flag of truce, we went from McClellan’s headquarters at Arlington to Jeb Stuart at the Fairfax courthouse. Ah, but when we came out of the woods and we saw this house,” he said. “To think of this house, where the famous general once lived, standing so upright in the middle of all the chaos, like a white dream.”

  A white dream. I had never thought of it that way.

  “The spirit of war is so near, yet this little corner of the world is so quiet, so safe,” he went on, “sacred ground. It is a fact, in itself, in the history of the world, what this house stands for,” he said. “And it is my fervent hope that you may keep it this way.”

  They stayed until four o’clock. I told them of Washington and the Marquis de Lafayette walking the grounds here, how the Frenchman had been like a son to Washington during the war. I told them of the visit of the duke of Orléans in 1797, before he became King Louis Philippe.

  They were introduced to the servants. They tipped them for their service.

  “We are descended from George Washington’s slaves,” Priscilla told them.

  Before they left, I got a small box, filled it with soil and small rare plants from near the tomb, and placed it in their carriage. And when the prince and his party left, they were going back to Washington pulled by two Mount Vernon mules.

  I thought that mayhap the visit would restore Upton’s spirits. But he was once again morose when they left. He walked out alone, smoking a cheroot. I saw the tip of it glowing in the dark off a ways from the piazza.

  Oh, I hope he does not decide to join the army! I hope we do not lose him. Must I worry about that now too?

  My sister, Fanny, has written again. To me. She says she has heard from Mary McMakin that she is not here with me but still in Philadelphia. She asks what woman is here with me. And if there is none, she will come, war or no war.

  “I hope you are not there alone with Mr. Herbert,” she writes. “Do you realize what a disgrace that will be on the family if you are found out?”

  Disgrace, indeed. Her accusation brought tears to my eyes, especially when I looked at Upton. Why, he is the dearest, kindest, most honorable man I have ever met.

  He would die before he disgraced me. And I mustn’t let him know what she has written, or he might join the army just to save my reputation.

  I found myself hoping that if Fanny took it upon herself to come here, she would get snared in one of the Union army blockades. Or captured by Confederate cavalryman Jeb Stuart.

  I have written again to Mary asking her, for heaven’s sake, to come. I will get her a special pass from Mr. Lincoln if necessary. “If you don’t come, you sentence me to my sister, Fanny,” I have written.

  Today I had Dandridge harness the mules to the wagon, and I drove the fifteen miles to Washington like a farm woman, with a load of cabbages to sell. Upton didn’t want me to go. “I’m safer than you would be,” I told him. “And I need to get a pass from McClellan for Mary McMakin.”

  What a day! First I disposed of all the cabbages at the Washington market. Then I purchased some salt and pepper and much-needed coffee and sugar for us. On to McClellan’s headquarters at Arlington, where I had to run several gauntlets of pickets to get through.

  I had never been in Lee’s home before and was looking forward to it. But I soon found that McClellan was at his other office in town and that his assistant could write me a pass if I wanted. I very much wanted. But it was done quickly, outside the house in a tent. So I never got inside. Well, at least I got the pass for Mary, and new ones for myself and the servants, too, since General Scott’s don’t do the job anymore. Arlington seems very bare, not only of decorations, but of essentials to such a magnificent home.

  I have to admit that I lingered too long, looking longingly at the outside of the house, taking my time driving the buggy on the grounds. Darkness near overtook me on the ride home. I had to watch for the many roadblocks set up against Confederate raiders and show my own pass at each one.

  Some of the Union pickets were nice. Others were snide, and all I could hope was that some ambitious one wouldn’t shoot me first and ask questions later.

  When I got home, I expected Upton to scold, but he couldn’t. We had a visitor, a man named Winslow Homer, who is an artist working for Harper’s magazine and is on his way to join the Federal army and do some sketches.

  Upton was entertaining him in the parlor. They were drinking claret, and Mr. Homer was talking about the importance of clean outlines on his engravings. Upton introduced me. I asked him if he was staying the night. He said Upton had prepared a room for him. So I went directly to bed.

  Mr. Homer stayed two days and he worked the whole time. He set up his easel and drew a pencil sketch of the mansion from the side. On leaving he gave
it to me.

  “Upton tells me you need money here,” he said.

  I would not have spoken to him of money. Only a man could do that. But I said, “Yes, we do. We have a budget. The roof needs repairing, and that will cost at least a hundred dollars.”

  “You may have copies of the sketch made and sell them, if it helps,” he suggested.

  I looked up at him. He was famous. He had spent a year in France. He was a regular contributor to Harper’s Weekly. He was a tall, rangy man with the saddest eyes I had ever seen.

  “Thank you,” I said. “Mayhap we will do that.”

  “This place is in good hands,” he said. “If I had time, I’d do more. There are dramatic contrasts of light and dark. Perhaps I’ll stop back again sometime.”

  “Please do, Mr. Homer.”

  He left the next morning before I was downstairs. Yes, Mr. Homer, I thought, there are dramatic contrasts of light and dark. Did you see it as I do? The light is so clean, with such dramatic, certain lines. And the dark is so troubled and fearful.

  I am keeping the sketch in my room. Someday we may need to copy and sell it.

  Thirteen

  We have a pass for Dandridge, the one I got when I went to Arlington. It says: “Pass Dandridge Smith (colored) with wagon, mules, and provisions, for the Mount Vernon Association in and out of Washington and Alexandria when necessary.”

  It is signed by General McClellan’s assistant.

  The first time Dandridge used it, it worked. The second time, it didn’t. I had to go to Alexandria myself to get the mail. And I was stopped several times and didn’t think I’d get through.

  “Better you get passes from the general himself,” one officer told me.

  I prepared to go to McClellan’s office again to find out what had happened. Of course Upton didn’t want me going alone and made me take Priscilla.