Southern Son

by Victoria Wilcox

  What he wanted was Mattie by his side, understanding him and helping him to understand life. What he needed was a fast horse and an open stretch of country, room to run and burn off the turbulent feelings that tore at him. So one sultry summer afternoon he quit work early and went on back to his Uncle’s house, saddled the family horse, and rode out onto dusty Church Street.

  Just past the edge of town Church Street joined up with the Fayetteville Road, the old stagecoach route that wound from Whitesburg all the way to Decatur. West of town, the road crossed over swampy Flint River into Fayette County where the Hollidays had first settled. To the south was the track that led down to Lovejoy’s Station, through rich red farmland and cotton plantations. He turned the horse loose and took off at a gallop, headed nowhere in particular. But Uncle Rob’s animal knew the country well and had made that ride to the south over and over again, and by the time John Henry tightened his hold on the reins he was halfway to Lovejoy, pulling up to the drive of Phillip Fitzgerald’s place.

  The Fitzgerald farm had been a fine plantation once, before the Yankees had ruined the cotton fields and everything else. But old Phillip, Irish stubborn, just plowed up the fields and started again. John Henry could see the result of that hard-headedness: acres of rich red furrows curving across the rolling hillsides, surrounding the white frame house in an ocean of cotton. Phillip had put everything he had into that ground, not minding that his home was hardly suited to a wealthy plantation owner. It was a rambling, doddering old dowager of a place, facing sideways toward the road, not bothering to put its best face forward. Phillip had bought the house along with the land when he first came to the country, adding onto it every time another daughter was born. Plenty of space was all the family needed, he insisted—what really mattered was the land.

  “John Henry Holliday, is that you?” From the shadows by the front door a lilting feminine voice called out to him, and he was startled into answering.

  “Yes, Ma’am. Sorry to bother you, Ma’am.” He couldn’t see the person to whom the voice belonged, but it sounded too young to be Phillip’s wife, Eleanor. Of course, with all those daughters on the place, it could be almost anyone. The horse snorted and tossed its head impatiently, ready to move up the drive.

  “Well, are you comin’ on up or not? We’re ‘bout ready to start supper if you’re stayin’.”

  “Hadn’t planned on it. I’m just out for a ride.” It was disconcerting talking to the shadows like that.

  “Well, suit yourself.” The voice paused for a moment, as if considering. “You tell Cousin Mattie I said hello.”

  He jerked the reins and the horse pulled around to the side. “Who is that up there?” he called. “Come on out where I can see your face.”

  Musical laughter, then a dimpled smile in a halo of golden hair: “Why, it’s only Sarah, John Henry. Don’t you remember me?”

  Even from across the yard he could see the blue of her eyes, thick lashed and shining. She was Phillip Fitzgerald’s second oldest daughter, close to Mattie’s age and every inch a young woman. She was tiny like all the Fitzgerald girls, with that wasp waist just about as big around as a man’s two hands put together, and a softly curving figure above and below. She put her hands on that little waist and tipped her head to one side, making her curly hair bounce in the afternoon light. “Well? Are you stayin’?”

  Of course he couldn’t stay. No one even knew he was gone, and it would be coming on dark soon. He was just about to tell her so when his legs seemed to take a life of their own and swung him down out of the saddle and onto the drive. Sarah smiled and those dimples showed again.

  “I’ll go and tell cook to set another place,” she said, then she turned and disappeared into the house, the porch door giving a sigh as it swung closed behind her.

  So there he was, joining the Fitzgeralds for supper, with a stable boy tending to his horse, and wondering all along how it had happened. He went through supper in a daze, listening to Phillip’s thick brogue expounding on the price of cotton and the ravages of the boll weevil, thankful that nobody asked him how he happened to be out riding by their place just before dusk like that. And every now and then he’d look up and catch Sarah looking at him across the table with a shy flutter of lashes that set his head spinning. What was he doing here, anyhow?

  Supper took forever but cleaning up took no time at all, with all the daughters rushing dishes off the table and into the kitchen. And suddenly he found himself on the moonlit front porch with pretty Sarah, a house-maid at a discreet distance, and those bright blue eyes looking up at him as if he were God Almighty. What else could he do? He slid his arms around that inviting little waist and stole a kiss from those sweet dimpled lips. And though he still had no idea how it had happened, it sure felt good to have a pretty girl in his arms. Damn Mattie for making him so miserable all summer! It gave him a sense of sweet revenge to know that it was Mattie’s own cousin he kissed there in the moonlight.

  Sarah laughed a little when he kissed her a second time, and it startled him. “What’s so funny, Miss Sarah?”

  “Nothin’ at all, Cousin.” He wasn’t really her relation, only first-cousin to her first-cousin, but it sounded nice and friendly. “I guess I just had a mind that you and Cousin Mattie were sweethearts.”

  “Mattie?” He laughed too, but with a bitter edge. “Mattie’s all but engaged to that soldier boy of hers.”

  “Well I’m awful glad to hear it, ‘cause I sure wouldn’t want to steal her beau away from her.” She cast her eyes demurely down, and her lashes made little crescents on her rosy cheeks. “And I had been hopin’ that you might notice me.”

  John Henry looked down at her and began to realize just what was happening. There were seven daughters in the Fitzgerald family, and few men of any eligible age since the War. No wonder he had received such a quick invitation to supper and a gentle push toward the front porch with one of the oldest girls. Well fine, if that was the way it was. It was about time that somebody realized he wasn’t a boy any longer. And Sarah was just about the prettiest thing he had ever seen. Might not be bad to be her beau, not bad at all.

  “I’ve heard folks talkin’ about what you did down in Valdosta,” she said, “tryin’ to chase out the Yanks and all.” Her eyes were dazzling in the moonlight, staring up at him like that. “I think it was mighty brave of you.”

  Brave was he? “Mattie doesn’t think so. She says it was just plain foolishness, and could have gotten somebody killed.”

  “Well, as long as you weren’t killed.” Her voice slowed a little as she said it, and her face dimpled again with that smile that made him feel like he’d just whipped the whole Yankee army single-handed. Why didn’t Mattie ever look at him like that? She just bossed and scolded and treated him like a child the way she always had.

  “I guess it was dangerous, but I’m a damned good shot. I could have handled myself, if it had come to that.”

  He raised his right arm over her head and aimed his hand into the starry sky, and Sarah gave a little “Oh!” when he pretended to pull the trigger.

  “Wherever did you learn to shoot like that?” she asked in a flutter.

  “My father taught me,” he said, and knew all at once that he shouldn’t have said it. He had a sudden memory of his father taking him out rabbit hunting in Valdosta. He remembered those days with a rush of emotion that stung at the back of his throat; happy days for him, before his mother had died and his father had married again.

  Rachel. The memory of her laughter in the night made him sick to his stomach. He looked down at Sarah with a strange suffocating feeling and pulled his arms away from her. He didn’t belong here. He shouldn’t be doing this.

  “Why John Henry, is somethin’ wrong? You look all pale. Why don’t you sit down and let me get you somethin’ to drink? Would you like a little lemonade?”

  “No, I . . .I need to be goin’. It’s gettin’ mighty late, isn’t it?”

  “Are you sure you’re all right? I
can have someone drive you home in the wagon. You can tie your horse to the back if you want. Wouldn’t be any trouble at all.”

  “No!” The last thing he wanted was to be coming home in the Fitzgerald’s wagon after disappearing into the night, like some lost boy being escorted home.

  “No, I’ll ride. There’s plenty of moonlight tonight.”

  “I know,” she said, and turned her head up to gaze at the indigo sky, “lots of nice moonlight tonight.” Then she laid her hand against his chest and asked sweetly, “You’ll come again soon, won’t you? Before that lovely moon is all gone?”

  How had he gotten himself into this fix?

  “Why, sure, I’ll be back. You just keep that moon hangin’ there for me.” It was a boldfaced lie, and there’d be hell to pay if Mattie ever found out he’d led her very own cousin on like that. Shameful behavior. What did they do to men who seduced innocent young women? He was sure he deserved whatever it was.

  He left her standing there on the porch, waving him a sweet goodbye. He would never be able to face Sarah Fitzgerald again, not as long as he lived. He was a cad and had ruined her innocence, kissing her like that right in front of the whole world. It was as good as a marriage proposal he knew, and now here he was riding back to Jonesboro in the dark, longing to hold Mattie, wishing it had been her there in the shadows.

  “Where have you been?” Mattie was waiting for him back of the house, scolding him while he unsaddled the horse. “Father is fit to be tied about the horse bein’ gone, and Mother is nearly frantic.” She stroked the animal’s face, and in the moonlight her hair was as red-brown as its russet coat.

  “I just went for a ride,” he answered, trying to stay on the far side of the horse from her, avoiding her eyes.

  “Fine time to go ridin’, in the dark!”

  “It wasn’t dark when I left.”

  “Well, where did you go that kept you so long?”

  The uncomfortable feeling he’d carried all the way home was turning to irritation.

  “I said I just went for a ride. What do you care?”

  “I care plenty, seein’ as how I had to walk all the way up to the depot today to bring you your letter. And when I got there, all hot and dusty, you weren’t even around. Where did you go to, anyhow?”

  “What letter?” he asked, not bothering to answer her question.

  “From your father, the one you’ve been waitin’ for. It came inside a letter for my parents.”

  She knew, of course, that he had been watching the mail for a letter from his father with forgiveness and a train ticket home. He was tired of railroad work and ready to get back to school. At least his summer of exile had taught him one thing: he didn’t want a life of physical labor. One more year of school and he could go on to college, learn to be a doctor like Uncle John, the richest man in the family. Sure would be nice to live in a fancy house like his Uncle John’s, with white columns and polished wood floors and servants bringing in dinner across the breezeway from the kitchen out back. And when he pictured himself in that kind of life, there was always Mattie by his side, dark eyes glowing, loving only him.

  “Well anyhow, here it is,” she said, slipping the letter out of the hidden pocket of her skirt. “Though I don’t think you deserve it after tonight.”

  He looked up at her with a sudden flush of color in his face, sure she was reading his thoughts. “Tonight?”

  “After you stole the horse and all.”

  “Oh, that. I only borrowed it.” Then he tore open the envelope and started to read aloud:

  “Dear Son,

  I hope that all is going well for you there in Jonesboro, and that you are being of great help to your Uncle Robert and Aunt Mary Anne, and remember always your manners and the debt of gratitude you owe them for taking you in.”

  He glanced at Mattie with embarrassment. His father was still lecturing him, even from two-hundred miles away—

  “Our businesses here are doing well, and I hope to see a good profit at year’s end. I am thinking of adding carriages to the stock of buggies we carry in town, which should do well here in Valdosta where there are no other carriage dealers as yet.

  In light of the recent news that Martial Law has been lifted once again following the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment by the Constitutional Convention at Macon, I feel that you will be safe in returning home. The military can no longer molest you for your mis-doings here, and the civil authorities are unlikely to pursue the matter further. Your friends have all been released from their incarceration in Savannah on a $200,000 bond raised by the merchants of Valdosta. I paid a share, as well, with the stipulation that the boys be sent away from Valdosta for a time, so there won’t be any more such trouble. Of course, I will expect you to be circumspect in your behavior when you return, paying all due allegiance to your new government. If I, a soldier of the Confederacy, can take the Oath of Allegiance and pledge to uphold the honor of the United States, then you, a mere boy, can certainly bow yourself to the civil authority . . .”

  He stopped reading and said in disgust, “How can he be so cowardly, givin’ in to the Federals like that? Damn pack of lyin’ Yanks!” Then he crumpled the letter and threw it to the ground.

  “Hush that swearin’!” Mattie scolded him. “Mother will hear you for sure.”

  She handed him a curry brush, and he went to work with a vengeance on the horse’s coat.

  “Well it’s a fact, lyin’ Yanks! And after all they’ve done against us! After all they’ve done to me, gettin’ me sent away from home . . .”

  “You’re talkin’ nonsense. You know you got your own self sent away for tryin’ to kill that congressman. If your father hadn’t hustled you out of town, you might have ended up in prison like your friends, or worse. What if the soldiers had come after you, too?”

  “I reckon I’m handy enough with a gun to take care of myself,” he boasted. “I could have finished off a few Yanks, if it’d come to that.”

  Mattie stopped to look at him over the horse’s back, shaking her head. “John Henry Holliday, you have entirely too much pride, and it will land you in a heap of trouble one day!”

  It was bad enough to be reprimanded by his father and uncle. He didn’t need to have Mattie criticize him as well.

  “Don’t treat me like a child!” he said, grabbing the reins away from her and leading the horse into the barn.

  “Well stop actin’ like one then, runnin’ off without even sayin’ where you’re goin’!”

  She stood in the doorway behind him, the moonlight making a dark halo around her. He had a sudden notion that her skin looked just like ivory silk in that silvery light, and he threw caution and good sense to the wind.

  “Do you really want to know where I was?” he asked suddenly. “Well, I’ll tell you. I was havin’ supper with the Fitzgeralds. Miss Sarah invited me.”

  Mattie’s eyes opened wide. “Sarah invited you? Why would she invite only you and not the rest of the family?”

  “Well, I don’t think she’s interested in the rest of the family, Mattie,” he said with a lazy drawl, taunting her. “Not like she’s interested in me.”

  A trace of surprise and something else went across her face, then she tossed her head to one side, forcing a laugh. “Don’t be silly, you’re not near old enough for her! What do you know about courtin’?”

  “Stop it Mattie!” he said, the teasing suddenly over. “Stop treatin’ me like I’m still a child!” His blood was boiling from the arguing, his mind still clouded from the confusion of the evening, and he reached for her arms and pulled her close to him.

  “Let go of me, John Henry!” she said, trying to twist away from him.

  “I will not.”

  “I want you to let me go!”

  His voice was husky with emotion. “I love you, Mattie, you know I do!” he said, and bent his head close to hers, letting the sweet smell of her skin fill his mind as his arms slid around her.

  She stared up at him, h
er eyes dark and wide as a frightened deer. “What are you doin’?”

  Until that very moment he didn’t know himself, but suddenly it was all so very clear. He knew just what he needed to rid himself of his frustrations, and just how to get it. “I’m gonna kiss you, Mattie, right here and now, in this lovely moonlight,” he said, echoing Sarah’s words without thinking.

  Mattie caught her breath, “You wouldn’t dare! You know I’ve got a beau. What would he think?”

  “I don’t give a damn what he thinks, or what your parents think either! Hell Mattie, right now I don’t hardly care what you think.”

  He held her tighter, and she wriggled and hissed at him, “You are the most selfish, arrogant, vain . . .”

  His kiss smothered her words into silence, and for a startled moment she stopped struggling, leaning toward him. Then she slipped one arm free from his embrace and swung back with all her might, slapping him hard against the side of his face. He let her go, stunned, and she finished the thought his kiss had interrupted:

  “. . . despicable thing! Get your vile hands off of me!”

  He laid his fingers against his burning face, speechless.

  Mattie put her head up proudly. “I am goin’ in the house now, and if you try to stop me, I swear I’ll scream and wake my parents. And my father will not be as gentle with you as I have been. Good night, John Henry!” And she swept out of the barn with as much dignity as her wounded innocence would allow.