Candle in the Darkness - Lynn N. Austin [165]
At the rear of the yard, the magnolia tree that Grady and I used to climb was getting ready to bloom. Charles had kissed me beneath that tree the night he’d left for the war. Last winter, I had told Eli he could chop it down for firewood if we needed to, but he had urged me to wait. “We can bundle up to keep warm, Missy. But a tree that fine takes too many years to grow back.”
When Eli looked up and saw me he stopped digging. “Something wrong, Missy?”
I shook my head. “I just thought you’d like to know that the St. Johns’ servants, Jeremiah and Gus, ran away this morning.”
He leaned against his shovel. “I was expecting it any day,” he said slowly. “They didn’t steal nothing, did they? I made them both promise that they wouldn’t.”
“The St. Johns aren’t sure yet. They just went home to look things over.”
I stood watching the two men work for a while, their shovels and hoes churning the rich brown earth, and I was suddenly filled with an intense longing for Hilltop. I remembered the way it had looked before the war, with verdant crops growing in the fields and the smokehouse filled with hams—and Jonathan holding my hand as we walked in the fragrant woods, naming all the trees that were no longer there. I wondered if he and Charles and my father would have entered into this war so willingly if they could have seen how much they would lose. Even if the South won the war today, would it have been worth such a staggering cost?
My thoughts were interrupted when Ruby came up behind me and rested her hand on my shoulder. “Missy Caroline . . . I’m sorry, honey, but there’s a man here to see you. He say he has news about your daddy.”
“Oh, no . . . did he say what kind of news?”
“Tell you the truth, I was scared to ask. He waiting in the front hallway for you.”
I drew a deep breath and followed Ruby inside, my heart jumping. The man waiting for me in the foyer was dressed in working clothes, like the sailors I’d seen loading my father’s ships down at Rocketts Wharf. He carried a revolver stuck in his belt and looked as I imagined a pirate would, with a scarred, weatherbeaten face and a mangy beard. He frightened me at first, making me wish Gilbert or Eli had come into the house with me.
“Afternoon, ma’am. My name’s John Dooley.” He smiled nervously, revealing a gold tooth.
“How do you do? I’m Caroline Fletcher. Would you like to step into the library?”
He shook his head, staring at his feet. I couldn’t tell what was making him so uncomfortable—if it was me, our extravagant home, or the news he had brought.
“I understand you have news of my father, George Fletcher?”
“Yes, ma’am . . . that is, I wish I had news other than what I got, which is the fact that . . . well, he’s missing, you see.”
“Could you please explain?”
“Yes, ma’am. We was aboard a small steamship called the Florida, running the blockade at Wilmington. The Yanks have the main entrance to the Cape Fear River blocked, you see, but we can still use a narrow passageway around the other side because it’s protected by our Confederate guns at Fort Fisher. So we did like we always done, you see, which is to chart a course along the coast, like we was planning to sail on past it. But then we turned and made a run toward shore at the last minute, trying to outrun them. This time we couldn’t quite make it, ma’am. It was the coal, you see.”
“The . . . coal? You mean, your cargo was too heavy?”
“No, ma’am. The coal that fires our boilers ain’t worth a . . . pardon me. It’s poor quality, you see, and we can’t go as fast as we used to. The Yanks spotted us and came after us, firing their cannon. We took a hole in our hull on the starboard side. Captain