Candle in the Darkness - Lynn N. Austin [182]
“I guess not. It shows how determined the South is to keep fighting—and how desperate they are.” Caroline remembered how shocked and outraged the South had been when they’d first encountered Negro soldiers who were fighting for the Federals. Now that they’d seen how well the Negroes could fight, they were about to draft them into the Confederate army, too.
“They ain’t gonna take Eli and Gilbert, are they?” Ruby asked.
Caroline shook her head. “They can’t draft anyone without his owner’s consent. And I’ll certainly never give it.”
“Maybe they both be better off in the army,” Esther muttered as she mixed up a skimpy batch of corn bread. “Maybe they finally get a decent meal if they soldiers.”
“No, I don’t think the soldiers are eating any better than we are,” Caroline said. “One entire page of the newspaper was a notice from the Commissary General along with a plea from General Lee, begging people to turn over any extra food supplies they have to the army so they can feed the starving soldiers.”
Esther huffed. “Like we got anything extra to hand over!”
When it was time for the noon meal, Eli arrived home. Caroline had sent him downtown that morning, and she was eager to hear any scraps of news he had picked up through the servants’ grapevine. Since she had been confined to her home all these months, the grapevine had become her only source of news about Charles and his family.
“I saw a whole bunch of Rebel troops passing through the city this morning,” Eli said after he’d blessed the food. “They heading south. I tell you, if it wasn’t for all them white faces, I’d swear I’m seeing a gang of slaves going by on the way to the cotton fields. They so sorry-looking, all in rags, shoes falling off their feet, heads hanging down . . . and the horses nothing but skin and bones.”
“Did you talk to any of the St. Johns’ servants?” Caroline 398 asked.
Eli lowered his head, concentrating on his plate of food as if he hadn’t heard. That could only mean one thing—he had bad news that he was unwilling to share. Caroline laid down her fork.
“Tell me, Eli. Please. Don’t you understand that not knowing is worse torture for me than hearing the truth?”
When he still didn’t reply, Esther said, “Tell her. That gal ain’t gonna eat a bite of food unless you do.”
Eli sighed. “Massa Charles has gone on back in the army to fight.”
Caroline closed her eyes. For a moment the room went utterly still. Even little Isaac seemed to sense everyone’s shock and didn’t make a sound.
“Has Charles fully recovered from his wounds, then?” Caroline asked when she finally opened her eyes. She had to stare at Eli for a long time before he replied.
“His shoulder still stiff, and he limping some, but he determine to fight. He arguing with his daddy ’cause his daddy want Massa Charles to stay home—but Mr. St. John too sick to stop him. That’s all I know, Missy. That’s the truth.”
Caroline excused herself and fled to her room. It was all for nothing, she thought. In a few weeks it would be spring, and the war would resume, and this time she had nothing left to offer God in return for Charles’ life. She had bargained away her future with him so that Charles would live. But now he was going back to the trenches outside Petersburg again, where he might very well be killed. The Rebels would surely lose this war, and then her sacrifice— and Charles’ life—would both have been spent in vain.
She stood gazing out of her bedroom window, shivering in her unheated room, when she heard a voice behind her. “Missy Caroline . . .” She turned, astonished to see Eli standing in her doorway. Except for the night Robert had escaped, he had never dared to come into the big house unbidden, much less come upstairs to her room. It showed Caroline, more dramatically than anything else could, just how much her world had changed.
“Missy, I know you ain’t gonna like hearing this . . . but you got to put Massa Charles in God’s hands and trust Him, no matter what.”
“Why did he have to go back to fight?” she cried. “I gave God the only thing I had left—my future with