“I do say so.”
“Okay. How’d you find me?”
“Maybe I just came up here to enjoy the view.”
“Maybe. In the freezing cold, you came to see the view you been looking at your whole life. How, Serena?”
“Your Ma said you were headed up here. She wasn’t too pleased about that or me asking, but she told me anyway.”
Jesse shrugged on the coat and pulled it close around his body. “They made the coats some of the officers wore double-breasted, like this one here.”
Serena tried and failed to suppress a bout of shivering. “Well that is very interesting to know, I’m sure.”
They stood unmoving and in silence. The last of the sun disappeared behind the next mountain. The twilight deepened. Serena shivered again.
“There is room for two in this old coat, if you’re interested.” Jesse opened the coat and Serena folded herself in and put her arms around him. “Holy Ned, you are an iceberg, girl.”
“You shut your mouth. I ain’t any such thing.”
“Maybe not in your heart, you ain’t, but your whole body, including your clothes, is like you been sled-riding in your nightgown.”
“My nightgown is definitely none of your business, Mister Sutherlin.”
“Nope, not yet.”
“Not yet? Not ever. By—”
Serena did not finish her thought because Jesse planted a kiss on her lips. He felt her stiffen and then relax. He kept on kissing her until she broke free.
“What do you think you are doing, Jesse Sutherlin?”
“Well, I thought that was kinda obvious, Serena Barker.”
“We can’t…”
“We can. Listen, Serena, I need to say some words right now and I need you to listen to them all the way to the end. If what you hear means you never want to see me again, okay, but hear me out.”
“If you are going to preach me a sermon about duty and honor, about being a man and all that foolishness, I will not listen. Men has spent centuries talking that talk and then going off to war and getting themselves killed, or maimed, or made crazy like your cousin Solomon. And what for? Nothing. When enough of you is dead, what’s left over staggers home and sits around and talks about glory. Well, I don’t want to hear it, Jesse.”
“Serena, I—”
“And who has to pick up all the pieces? Who has to patch you up when you all come limping home? And who is left behind to tend the children and the farm while you all are off being stupid and honorable? It’d be us, is who. It’s us women. We are the ones who hold the world together while you all march off to glorious war. And then you think we haven’t earned the right to vote?”
“Are you all done?”
“Maybe.”
“Serena, I will tell you what I told my Ma back a while. I didn’t spend all those months in the trenches, fighting Germans, tumbling into trenches full of them in the dark and crawling out bloody but alive, just to come back here to be done in by an upstart boy who’s developed a brain cramp. I cannot tell you what will happen here tomorrow, but honor and bravery will not be the featured item. I do not have anything to prove. You know that.”
“But then why?”
“Hear me out. I have a brother, you know. He has a sweet disposition and left to his own self, he wouldn’t step on a bug. But in this crazy divided piece of civilization we have created on the mountain, Lord only knows how many hundred years ago, he thinks it’s his duty to gun down anybody named or connected to Lebrun who so much as looks cross-eyed at him. You got people over on your side who feel the same. It don’t make sense. You can’t find a reason for it, but there it is. It is like we’re all raised up angry and can’t see straight. It’s got to stop. Solomon, Albert, Little Tom, and Abel almost…who’s next? That is why I will be here on this meadow tomorrow, not for glory, or honor, or out of loyalty to a situation that is a hundred years behind the times. I aim, one way or another, to put an end to it. That, or die trying.”
“Jesse…”
“Shhh…Let me finish. I made me a will, Serena, just in case I fail at this. The title to The Oaks and all the money the timber rights might bring in goes to you. I expect that you will see that my Ma is took care of and—”
Serena stopped him with a kiss of her own. Several, in fact.
“We should go,” Jesse said after five or maybe more like ten minutes slid by.
“Why?” Serena sounded a little out of breath. “You said so yourself, this coat is plenty big enough for two.”
“Well, yeah.”
“So, would that be standing up only, or do you think it might work as good if we were to sit down?”
“Better maybe. You are a wicked woman. Okay, there ain’t but one way to find out.”
“Do you suppose we could get off these rocks and onto some grass first?”
Chapter Thirty-nine
The night sky was flooded with stars. Only a quarter moon competed with them for attention. Time seemed to stop for them. Finally, Serena stirred and sat upright.
“What time has it got to be?”
Jesse checked the radium dial of his watch. “Going on two.”
“This is once in my life I am happy I do not have parents at home. I would have dogs out hunting for me and when they found me, someone would show up at your doorstep with a shotgun. What have we done here, Jesse?”
“I believe we have made a commitment to each other.”
“A what? What we did is hardly called making a commitment.”
“What would you call it?”
“Oh, my golly. What comes next?”
“Right now, I think I should walk you straight home. Come Sunday, you and me will have a word with the preacher about getting married. After that, well there is some decisions to be made about living arrangements and such.”
“You really want to marry me? This ain’t some idea you have about ‘making an honest woman out of me,’ is it? Because if it is, I ain’t having it.”
“It is about something I been thinking about since before I went to France. I think I must have been in love with you since I was old enough to know there was a difference between girls and boys.”
“Is that true?”
“It is. Swear on my daddy’s grave.”
“Mercy. How’d you know?”
“It just come to me. So, will you marry me?”
In the starlight, Jesse could just make out a smile. The she sat up and recited:
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
“That’s that Portuguese poem.”
“It is, hush up.”
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use”
“You won’t get no argument from me.”
“Be still, or I take it all back.”
“Oops.”
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
She took a breath. “Jesse Sutherlin, I will marry you, I will, but there is a one condition.”
“Oh, oh. What’s that? I can’t not show tomorrow.”
“I know that now. That’s not it. I will marry you but you have to survive tomorrow. You can’t get yourself killed, you hear me?”
“Staying alive is definitely my plan, more now than ever.”
“No, let’s get married first. At least I’ll have that if things don’t work out.”
“Except for saying the words in front of a preacher, I reckon we already are.”
“The preacher and saying words don’t seem so needed now. Just in case, come here and let’s make it for sure.”
***
For once, Jesse’s mother wasn’t waiting for him to come home. That had to be considered a mercy. He looked in on her. She slept peacefully. The stove seemed to have gone cold and he added some kindling. The fire caught and he added a few sticks. A few minutes later, he had enough heat to set the pot with the leftover dinner coffee boiling. He poured a cup and retreated to the table to drink and think over the last week. Whatever happened tomorrow, his life and that of many others would be forever changed. Not for the first time he wondered if that might not be the good thing he imagined. Loving Serena would, of course, but the rest? What right had he, when had God Almighty anointed him, to judge his family, his friends, or his enemies?
People said he should just run. Serena would happily go with him now. Could he run away from what had happened to Abel? From what happened to three men from the mountain who’d played together as children? They were dead and maybe there’d be more to come. Whatever was driving this probably wouldn’t be satisfied with three. Someone wanted him dead, too. Did he dare turn his back on that?
“What are you doing up this time of night? If I didn’t know you better, I’d say you was hoping to kill yourself before John Henry Lebrun has his chance to do it.”
Addie stood in the doorway of the room she and her late husband had slept in for the twenty-five years of their marriage and in which she now slept alone. Jesse’s father had built the room as an add-on to the cabin when their firstborn arrived. He’d added clapboards to the sides after Jesse’s birth and a porch after Abel’s.
“Why ain’t you asleep yourself?”
“How can a body sleep with you rattling pot and pans around?”
“Sorry, I tried to be quiet. There’s a tad more coffee in the pot if you want.”
“Naw, it will keep me awake. ’Course, it ain’t that far to sun-up. Maybe I will get me an early start.”
Jesse poured out a cup from the pot, inspected its interior and took it to the sink to rinse out.
“Tell me you ain’t going through with that meeting tomorrow, well, today, for a fact.”
Jesse folded his hands around his coffee mug. How to answer? He knew there were no words, nothing he could say, that would make any sense to his mother. Her only instinct was to keep him alive. The notion of cowardice or pride occupied an unsteady perch in her mind. Keeping her children safe and alive pushed everything else to the back.
“Ma, it won’t be what you think.”
“What does that mean? Either you get on up the mountain and take on that Lebrun boy, or you don’t. He will either kill you or you will kill him. What else can happen? Has they made up new rules on fighting? You going to use wooden knives, wear knight armor? What?”
“It means that none of those things will or even have to happen. I will find a way to make him talk to me. I will make the two sides of the mountain sit down and talk.”
“And then, I reckon, you will smack the dirt with a stick and make the Red Sea part, or bring down fire from heaven, or cause a plague of locusts, and pigs will fly. When did you decide to become a miracle worker?”
“It won’t be a miracle. Listen, you know I ain’t one to brag, but do you know what I did to get that medal? You don’t ’cause I never told anyone. I come out of that German trench alive, and six of them didn’t. How I ended up in there is a story for another day, but there I was. There was a moment, you know, like time was froze, like nobody moved and it just stood still. In that little second, I knew.”
“Knew what?”
“I knew that I was not going to die that night, that the Lord was going to deliver me out of that place like he done with Daniel from the lion’s den. Some others were going to their maker, but not me. It was as clear as one of them goblet things the rich folk drink their wine from, or maybe a mountain spring, all shiny bright. Whatever, I just knew that it was not my time to go. Well, that moment passed and we went at each other. A rifle and a bayonet are pretty useless when you’re all jammed in together. You squeeze off a shot and hope to hit somebody, take a stab at one and then it’s trench knives, or clubs, or anything heavy you can lay your hands on. The point is, what I did in that trench wasn’t glorious and it weren’t honorable. It was messy, and dirty, and bloody, but I was right. I was banged up some, did my share of bleeding, but that night, it was like I had on the full armor of God, like the Book says, and I was not going to die and I didn’t. Six German soldiers figured they had me and they ended up being the dead ones. The rest of them put their hands in the air and surrendered. Ma, I ain’t proud of that. I was raised up on this mountain and it is a hard place where shooting someone over a disagreement is part of the way we live, but killing ain’t something I ever got used to. I see them German boys’ dead faces in my dreams most every night. I didn’t know them men. They didn’t know me. We weren’t even angry at each other as far as I know. We just got put in a place where our only choice was to kill or be killed. It didn’t make sense then and it don’t now. That’s how it is with us and the Lebruns. I am just plain tired of it all. And, for what it’s worth, I got that feeling…I am not going to die on top of this mountain tomorrow.”
“Woo, I think you been talking to that Barker girl and she’s got your brains scrambled. I must have told you a hundred times, you can’t trust a Lebrun.”
“There you go. You are right, you told me that from the time I was a tadpole, clear up ’til now. Everybody did. Everybody still does. They say it over and over like they need to or else they might forget and actually talk some sense for a change. You all taught us to hate people we hardly know for no reason we could see. The funny thing is, when we were kids growing up, we played with them and nobody cared about who their Pa was. That all came later. Me and Serena, Abel, and Albert Lebrun and most all the small-fry on the mountain at the time, did. We wrestled and had us sword fights with sticks. King of the Hill, we played that and there was times when it got kinda rough and I come home with a black eye or a busted finger, but it weren’t hateful. Let me tell you something, Ma. This is the last thing I got to say on the subject. When this is all over, I aim to marry Serena Barker. There, you heard it from me first.”
Chapter Forty
Abel woke. He staggered through the front room and out the door. Five minutes later he reentered flailing his arms.
“Whooee, the hawk is out today. I like to froze to death out there. Morning, Jesse. Morning, Ma.”
He pulled up a chair and inspected what was on a plate Addie had set out and covered with a cloth.
“Flapjacks. Well, that is something. What’s the occasion?”
“It’s Saturday, son. Today is Saturday.”
“Yep, it is, sure enough. I thought we had the big breakfast on Sunday.”
“One of us might not be here Sunday. Has you forgot?”
“One of us is…?”
“Ma, ain’t nothing going to happen to me today. I told you. Don’t pay her no mind, Abel, dive in. There’s blackstrap molasses and some berries I picked off the vines on the fence.”
“What did I forget?”
“Nothing. Eat up.”
“Your brother is set to meet John Henry Lebrun noon today. One of them ain’t going to be at the supper table tonight.”
Abel’s fork clattered to his plate and he turned pale. “Is it because of me, because I took that note and stood in your place?”
“No, Abel. You been away. It’s the same thing as before only if you remember. He called me out right after the trial, right? It was put back a day or tw
o. Finding you was more important than settling some old dare, right?”
“You’re going to fight him today?”
“Not if I can help it.”
“You ain’t going to run, is you? Jesse, you can’t run. They will call you a coward. You can’t let them do that.”
“Abel, you remember what we used to sing when we was kids? Sticks and stones can break my ones, but—”
“Names will never hurt me. Sure I do, but that was when we was little and the names were just mean things we said to rile each other. This ain’t the same, Jesse. We got pride, we got—”
“Actually, the way I see it, it is pretty much the same. The only difference is, we don’t settle up with a punch on the arm. And, also, if this is how we show our pride, Abel, we got nothing. Besides, ain’t nobody going to die up on that mountain today. Not tomorrow either.”
“But—”
“Hey, here’s some news for you to chew on. Me and Serena is fixing to marry up. You can be the what-cha-call-it, groomsman.”
“That sounds like a job at a stable. I ain’t sure about that. You are? Marrying Serena? For real?”
“For real.”
“Ma, did you hear that? Jesse is getting married. Wait, ain’t she a Lebrun?”
“Abel, she is a Barker. You and me are Sutherlins. As far as this marriage is concerned, that is all. We are not McAdoos and they are not Lebruns. Period.”
“But— ”
“No buts. Now listen and listen close. I don’t want either of you two up on the mountain when I do what I have to do. I am counting on nothing bad happening, but I can’t control everybody up there. There will be a passel of folks from both sides and you know how easy it is for someone to do something stupid. So, just in case, you two hole up here.”
“By Ned, if there’s going to be a ruckus, I aim to be there, yes, sir.’
“No, you ain’t Abel. You are still a mite yeasty from that whack you took on your head. The last place you need to be is in among some of the dumbest folk in the U.S. of A. Ma, you keep him here if you have to steal his britches.”
“I am A plus, number-one fine and dandy, and hitting on all four, Jesse. You need me up there if them Lebruns—”
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