An Acquaintance with Darkness - Ann Rinaldi [19]
I had the feeling he had. And that I had been too doltish to understand. Oh, I wished my head were clear.
The cemetery was deserted and cool. The grave had been dug, the flowers were in place, the reverend said the words about ashes and dust, which I never will understand. How can we return to dust when we are supposed to be made in God's image? From about a block away came the strains of "Dixie" being played by a brass band. It was Abraham Lincoln's favorite song.
Someone handed me a single flower. Its head was bowed, its petals drooped. I set it on top of Mama's coffin. Then I looked up. There was Mrs. Mary standing across the grave from me. In love with John Wilkes Booth, I thought. Well, she'd gone to that fancy girls' school with Mama. Like Uncle Valentine said, it had given them notions.
Everyone was leaving the cemetery. The funeral was over. I felt spent. From the street it seemed as if the revelry was getting louder. Dusk was falling. Tonight all of Washington would be illuminated in honor of the end of the war.
Annie came up to me. "Booth took Mama to Surrattsville this morning. He's coming tonight, too. I can't wait until he sees my candles in the windows. And I'm not moving them. I don't care what anyone says. Do you want me to come home with you?"
"I'll take care of her," Maude said. "She's my responsibility until she moves in with you people, if that's what she insists upon doing."
Maude and I went home, and I put Annie's candles in the two front windows of the parlor.
"Now, why do you want to do that when you've had a death in your family and can be excused?" Maude asked.
"I don't want to be excused." The candles looked lovely. The windows were open and the sweet spring air drifted in. "My daddy fought in the war. And this may be the only war I'll ever be able to celebrate the end of."
"Well, I certainly hope so." Then she turned and went back into the kitchen. "Come have your supper. There's plenty of food left over."
I followed her into the kitchen and sat down at the table.
"I went to the hospitals so many times with your uncle to attend the wounded. That's when you learn that suffering has no uniform," she told me. "Many times we met Mrs. Lincoln in the hospitals. She would bring flowers from the White House, candies, cakes, liquors, chickens, turkeys. Nobody knows this about her. She didn't want people to know. But we met her many times in the hospitals."
"What is she like?"
"A small, modest woman. Nothing like they write about her. She never wanted to be noticed. But I did speak to her on one occasion. It was right after they lost Willie. Do you know what she said to me?"
"What?"
"'We must let them go and get on with the business of living. The only way to let them go is to mourn them. We must work at it, the same as we must work at being happy.'...I noticed you didn't cry today at your mother's funeral."
I fell silent. "I'm going upstairs," I said, "to finish Mrs. Lincoln's dress."
I don't know how long I worked on Mrs. Lincoln's dress. Perhaps an hour. Outside I could hear the sound of rockets going off, bands playing in the distance, music, and the shouts of people enjoying themselves.
Grief is hard work. We must work at it, the same as we must work at being happy.
Who would have thought that you had to work at grieving? Was it a chore you had to apply yourself to? Was that why Mrs. Lincoln had gone visiting the hospitals?
I had not worked at grieving for Mama. I had not even tried.
An especially bright rocket went off down the block, but it was as if it was in my own mind. I set the black silk dress with the white flowers on it aside and went downstairs, meaning to slip out the back door.
"Where are you going?" Maude was there, watching me.
"Out. I'm going out."
"Where, at this hour of the night, with the streets full of unsavory characters?"
"It's only eight o'clock. I'm going to the cemetery."
"What for? Lunatics go to the cemeteries at night."
"I'm going to work out my grief. Like Mrs. Lincoln. I'm going to cry for my mother."
She took off her apron.