Come Juneteenth

by Ann Rinaldi

  So I'd walk the house in slippered feet, awed by the moonlight coming in the undraped windows, listening for the sounds of the hooty owls or whip-poor-wills, every sound becoming a terror for me.

  If only Gabe would come home. I'd feel safer. I wanted him as bad as I'd wanted him near when I'd had my lions under the bed.

  This night there was no moon. I'd need a lantern. I dismissed the temptation to wear my boots and put on the Indian moccasins Gabe had brought home for me on his last visit. Then I picked up a lantern and went in a roundabout way to the back of the house near the quarters, where the corncrib was.

  If caught, I had my story ready. I was sickly. Likely with bilious fever and was going to Mercy Love's cottage for some pills made of black pepper and opium. Best not come near me. It was catching.

  Why the small shovel in my hand?

  Mercy Love would most assuredly give me a red velvet bag and tell me to go to the cemetery on my way back and dig up some goofer dust just as an extra measure of protection against the disease.

  Heffernan would believe anything. And he didn't interfere with any comings and goings to Mercy Love's place because he was afraid of her.

  And so I made my midnight trip to the corncrib in the dark. I'd been running around the grounds here since I was two, bounding after Gabe and Granville on some adventure. I knew every hole in the ground, every tree, every bush and fence rail and path. I didn't even need the lantern, but I took it along for comfort.

  Of course, Heffernan had guards posted. In front and in back of the house. But I caught two sleeping, one other in the embrace of a negro girl, and the fourth awake but drinking and likely in his cups. They posed no problem.

  Luckily Granville had insisted I be with him the day he buried the guns, so I would know exactly where to go to dig them up. And luckily it had recently rained so the ground wasn't hard. I dug as soundlessly as I could. Darned Granville. Did he have to be so thorough and exact about everything?

  Finally my shovel hit something and I knelt down and shoveled away the dirt with my hands. And there, wrapped in an old blanket, were the double-barreled shotgun and the Colt revolver and all the ammunition I needed.

  I hauled them out, covered up the hole, and carried them, still in the earth-smelling blanket, back to the house.

  In my room I examined my treasures. I got a rag and cleaned them there and then on the spot, rubbing the handles until the special carvings and the initials, GH for Pa, Granville Holcomb, were clean and clear.

  Oh, how good they felt in my hands! And it came to me how I missed going out at least once a week and practicing my shooting. Now to hide them. I did so, under my mattress. I put the ammunition in an old pair of my boots in the corner and then lay down, feverish and plotting, until I went to sleep.

  I DIDN'T GIVE much thought to what I was going to do, why I had gone so out of my way to fetch the guns. I knew only that it was time. That Heffernan had gone far enough putting his hands on Sis Goose, who was carrying my brother's child. The very thought of him doing it was distasteful to me. And I had to put a stop to it.

  The when and how of it didn't concern me. It would all work itself out.

  THE "WHEN" of it happened the next night. Again I was sleepless. The night was so nice that I wished I could open a window, so I did, just for a minute. Any longer and the room would be full of mosquitoes.

  But in that minute I heard a girlish cry coming from the front gallery of our house.

  Sis Goose!

  This time I dressed quickly, put on my boots, took up my Colt revolver, and went out the front door.

  There were lanterns lit on the front gallery. Other light shone out through the front windows onto the two of them, caught in an embrace.

  "No, don't," I heard Sis Goose cry.

  I crept through Mama's orchard up to the front gallery. Just to one side was a brick terrace, and there, under an orange tree, I saw Colonel Heffernan trying his darndest to get his arms around Sis Goose. She was backing away and pleading, "Don't."

  "Leave her be!" I sent my voice out into the dark like a bullet, sure to hit its mark.

  "Who goes there? Identify yourself." It was the guard at the front steps.

  "Back off, Sergeant, I'll take care of this."

  The sergeant obeyed. And Heffernan, still with one arm around Sis Goose's waist, dragged her toward the end of the terrace. He peered into the dark. "That you, Luli Holcomb? What you doing out and about this late at night? Go to bed like all good little girls."

  "I said leave her be."

  He saw the barrel of the Colt revolver then, pointed right at him. He laughed. "Ho, a little girl with a pistol. You Southerners really are a sight."

  "She can shoot," Sis Goose said. "Don't anger her. She can shoot as good as you."

  "That so?" He pushed her away, his interest piqued. He took out his revolver and aimed it at me. "What you going to do now, little girl?"

  I took aim and fired. His arm. I wanted to get his upper arm. Maybe the muscle, and I must have because I heard a groan and then he bent over and clutched it. "Sergeant, get that little witch!" he yelled.

  But before the sergeant could gather his wits I turned and leaped back into the blessed darkness.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sis Goose leaning over Heffernan, saying, "Come on into the house, we have to fix the arm."

  The sergeant was there, too, helping him up and leading him in through a side door. I ran into the log house and bolted the door shut, then sank down on the floor in the front hallway. All I could hear in the silence was the beating of my own heart.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THE NEXT morning I slept late for the first time in a long time. Sun was streaming in my room through the mosquito nets around the bed. I pushed them aside and got up to look out the window. The place was wrapped in an eerie quiet that folded around us like the mosquito netting. In the distance was the faint singing of the freedmen working in the fields, then the neighing of a horse, the barking of the hound dogs, then silence again.

  No one was about. Where was Heffernan? Was he wounded? Dead? What would happen if I killed him?

  I dressed quickly and went downstairs and through the back gallery to the kitchen where Mama was overseeing the making of pies. Heffernan liked pies and kept Molly busy making them. Old Pepper Apron refused to make him desserts or anything except simple meals. He was grateful for that, grateful that she wasn't trying to poison him.

  Mama sliced me some ham and I reheated some muffins for breakfast. And there was coffee, real coffee. Mama was working at sorting the black-eyed peas.

  She sighed. "The war is over," she said, "but around here it still goes on. I don't blame you for firing at him, Luli, but please don't fire again at the occupation officers."

  "If Heffernan persists in pursuing Sis Goose, I'll kill him," I told her. "The war is over, yes, Mama, but even in peacetime Gabe or Granville would kill him for that."

  "Heffernan is gone," Mama said grimly. "That subordinate of his, Captain Cochran, came 'round this morning, drank my coffee, and told me what you'd done."

  "Gone? Where? Why? Not because of me."

  "Cochran said he deserted."

  "Well, good riddance to him."

  "He took Sis Goose with him."

  The words hit me like grapeshot, scattering my thoughts in a dozen directions.

  She said them flat, with no feeling, and she stopped what she was doing with the black-eyed peas and faced me, wiping her hands with her apron.

  "Mama," I started to say.

  "She's gone, Luli. My little Goose Girl is gone."

  She sat down at the table opposite me, her hands folded. "I can't even tell your father. I'm afraid he'd take a turn for the worse."

  "We've got to get her back, Mama." I meant the words, though I hadn't the faintest notion how we'd do it.

  She shook her head. "Don't try. Don't go after her alone. Wait until Gabe returns. He ought to be back any day now. Anyway," and she lowered her
eyes, "Cochran says you're under house arrest."

  "He said what?"

  "We're a conquered nation, Luli. We must submit or they'll think of some horrible way to get back at us. They'll burn the house, shoot the livestock, pay off freedmen to leave. And then we'll really have nothing."

  I got up. "I'm going up to the house to see Cochran," I said.

  "You're not allowed out of the house. I promised Cochran I'd keep you here."

  "I have a right to speak my piece. Don't worry, Mama." I started away and she put out a hand to stop me.

  "Where's the gun? The one you shot Heffernan with?"

  "In my pocket."

  She held out her hand and I reached into the apron pocket and gave it to her. It lay there on the wooden table, like a resting animal. Mama didn't like guns, I knew, but she was accustomed to them from the boys. She had approved of my learning to shoot when I was twelve because on our place being able to shoot a snake or a wild boar was a matter of life and death.

  "Watch your mouth," she said as I went out the door. "Don't sass him."

  IT SEEMED so strange to use the large brass knocker on the door in order to get into my own house. A soldier opened the door and let me in. I stood in the hall, wider than it ever seemed now because most of Mama's furnishings and her good carpet were gone.

  The soldier ushered me in to the front parlor where Cochran was riffling through papers on the desk they had put there. Pa's old desk. On it were empty drink glasses and food plates.

  Cochran stood when I entered. "I thought I confined you to the house."

  He didn't have the presence that Heffernan had had, the presence of command. And his voice was too high-pitched. Wrong for the job. I'd be willing to wager that in real life he'd been a schoolteacher or a store clerk, who'd never had reason to carry a gun.

  "They say you are a fair man," I lied, "and will hear me out."

  He nodded, flattered. Heffernan would never allow himself to be flattered. Cochran gestured that I should take a seat, then sat down himself.

  "What you did was a criminal act," he said with some firmness, like a teacher scolding a student because his arithmetic answers were wrong. "I should bring charges against you. But now I have a fugitive commanding officer to deal with, and all I want for the moment is for you to be under house arrest. Later on in the day I'm going to post guards around the cabin."

  I nodded. "He was making advances toward Sis Goose. I couldn't abide that. My brother left Sis Goose in my care until he gets back. And he'll be back soon. And he pointed a gun at me. It was self-defense. My brother wouldn't have aimed for the arm. He'd have killed him."

  "Then it would be murder," he said.

  "A matter of honor in these parts."

  He fooled with some paper on the desk, lowering his gaze. "You're very adult. Who taught you to shoot?"

  "My brother Gabe. Where did Heffernan go with Sis Goose?"

  "Don't you think I wish I knew? I'd send men after him. But I can't spare men when I don't know for certain where he's headed."

  "Does he know anybody in Mexico?"

  "No. New Orleans, yes. But still I can't be sure enough to justify sending my soldiers out."

  I nodded. Turned out he was a fair man.

  "I'm going to have to confiscate your gun," he said. "I thought we had them all. I suppose you had the gun hidden somewhere."

  I nodded yes.

  "What else have you got hidden?"

  "Nothing." That was the truth. Everything was in Mexico.

  "You Southerners are a mystery to me," he said. "Up home a young girl like you would still be learning to embroider. And these slaves, I mean freedmen, could walk off and more than half have stayed. Just about all your household help stayed. That cook in the kitchen is a specimen that deserves study." He shook his head wonderingly.

  "Go back to the house now. And stay there. I've got to have complete command around this place or there will be chaos. Would you cooperate with me, please?"

  I stood up. "What do you do when you're not in the army?"

  "I teach school in Philadelphia."

  I nodded. "You're going to have to negotiate with my brother Gabe when he comes home."

  "I've dealt with worse."

  I felt satisfied. There was a quiet, underlying determination in him after all. I was glad I'd come. I could explain him to Gabe.

  At the door his voice stopped me. "How is your father?"

  I turned. "Middling well."

  "Give him my regards and tell him not to worry. I'll keep order around here."

  "We don't want him knowing that Sis Goose is gone. He'd take a turn for the worse."

  He nodded. "Right. Now I'm going to send a man to the house later for any other guns you have. Please don't make trouble."

  I promised I wouldn't and I left. What I'd accomplished, I didn't know. But Pa always said that you should know and respect your enemy.

  That afternoon a soldier came for the guns. I gave them to him, the Colt and the shotgun, and I didn't make any trouble.

  The next day Gabe came home.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  IT WAS LATE in the afternoon when he came. I was in the parlor with Mama, who was going over the books.

  "Thanks to the freedmen who stayed and worked the fields we're going to be solvent this year. Just barely," Mama said.

  "What about the money Pa has in England?" I asked.

  "When Gabe comes home your father will give him authority to get it. There's no telling when Granville will come. I'd be willing to wager he's going to stay in Mexico a while."

  "Mama, is Pa going to die?"

  I was working on a sheet of paper, adding up the bales of cotton that would be shipped to Mexico this year. She looked up at me.

  "He isn't that well, Luli. So yes, he may soon die."

  "What will happen to us then?"

  "The boys will be home. And I'll be glad to relinquish the running of this place to them."

  "And me? What will happen to me?"

  "I suppose the boys will want me to send you to school in Virginia now that the war is over. Don't you want that?"

  I shook my head vigorously no. "After all we've been through here I couldn't abide a silly girls' school, Mama. Especially in Virginia. They'd make me ride sidesaddle there. And never shoot a gun."

  "We've all spoiled you." She smiled. "We'll see."

  "Now that the war's over there will be plenty of people coming south. Can't I just have a better tutor here?"

  "Go and make us some tea. I'll discuss it with the boys."

  I got up. "Granville will say no. Gabe will say yes. What then, Mama?"

  "We'll see who your father names to run things." I thought of Granville washing my mouth out with soap.

  "Lord, I hope it's Gabe." I went out back through the gallery and into the kitchen. There was usually a kettle of water over the fire in the hearth. I was just getting a tray and two cups and setting them down on the table when I saw a shadow across the floor and heard a voice.

  "Better make that three cups. And I'll have coffee."

  I looked up.

  He stood there in the open doorway, backlit by the sun, his boots dusty and worn, his uniform the worse for wear. He held his hat under his arm, military fashion.

  "Gabe!"

  I hugged him and he enveloped me in his arms, hard. "You just get here?"

  He gave a short laugh. "Yeah. If not for your letter, I'd have gone up to the big house and walked right in. They wreck the place much?"

  "Some. Oh, Gabe, I'm so glad you're here. Come on in. I'll make some coffee."

  "Where's Ma?"

  "In the parlor, working on the books."

  "Where's Sis Goose? I thought she'd be right here to greet me."

  Oh dear God, I remembered then that he didn't know. I must have looked stricken because he went grim. "What's wrong, Luli?" he asked in a tone that brooked no lies.

  "She's gone," I blurted out. "She was taken by Heffernan, the colonel."r />
  "Gone? What in hell do you mean gone?"

  So I told him. Everything. He listened gravely, then said in disbelief, "You shot Heffernan?"

  "Yes. He was making advances toward Sis Goose."

  "So he's wounded then. How far can he go? Come on, get that coffee. Here, I'll help. I want to see Ma and plan strategy."

  HE HID HIS grief well. I suppose after fighting Indians, after long hours spent riding through the mesquite-covered ground and under a blazing sun, keeping watch for Kick apoos who were always on the warpath, that he was good at hiding his feelings.

  Or, at least, directing them into plans. He didn't waste time mourning.

  Mama was absolutely daft, seeing him, of course. Tears came down her face and she kept saying, "My boy, my boy," and patting his face and his shoulder.

  We had our repast. I'd brought some sliced ham and biscuits, fruit and cheese in the parlor for Gabe, who was starved as usual. Then, when we spoke of the war, the Yankees, and Pa, Mama looked at me.

  "Luli, go upstairs and see your father. Tell him Gabe is home. I don't want him to be shocked. We'll be up directly."

  They wanted to talk alone. I understood that. So I did as I was told.

  I SAT WITH Gabe's captain's jacket on my lap and maneuvered the pair of scissors carefully.

  Gabe had given me the job of cutting off the insignias of rank from the shoulders. None of his civilian clothes fit him anymore. All the shirts and jackets were too tight. He'd grown in the shoulders and chest. When he'd gone up to the house to pay his respects to Cochran he was ordered to cut off the captain's insignias if he wanted to continue wearing the uniform.

  I remembered how proud Mama had been when she'd sewed them on. And as I cut carefully through her stitches, I remembered the conversation between Gabe and Captain Cochran.