Tennessee Twilight: A Civil War Novel – Free Online Novel – Webnovel

July 1863
Amanda feared that Luke was forever changed. Even after his external wounds began to heal, his emotional health didn’t improve. While in the presence of others—even with her and Barbé—he was skittish and distrustful. Amanda spoke softly to him, remained calm, and tried in every way to avoid provoking him.

Amanda overheard part of a conversation between Luke and Barbé in the kitchen. She was ready to intervene, but thought Barbé might be able to make him understand, where she had failed.

“Your mother loves you,” Barbé said patiently. “She’s doing all she can to help you. She’d go back and take that beating your father gave you, if she could. You’re killing her by being so ungrateful.”

“It’s none of your business what I do,” he said hatefully.

“You’re right. Its not my place, but I’m so worried about your mother. While you’re here, I’d sure appreciate it if you’d fill the wood box.”

Then Amanda heard wood crashing into the wood box time after time. By the time Amanda arrived, the situation was already out of hand.

“What’s going on here?” Amanda asked, looking directly at Luke.

“The helpless old darkie wanted wood, now she’s got wood,” Luke said, hatefully.
Amanda could hold her tongue no longer. “Luke, don’t you ever call Barbé that foul name again. You know better than that.”

“I should have known you’d take here side. You’ve always loved her more than me.”

“That’s not true,” Amanda stated. “I love you equally.”

“I’m your son!” he shouted. “You should love me more.”

“Listen,” she said patiently. “No one knows better than Barbé and me how horribly you suffered at your father’s hand, but you can’t continue to take it out on us. Your father did you wrong, not us.”

“But he’s not here for me to take it out on, is he?” Luke shouted. His eyes were filled with rage.

“What is wrong with you?” Amanda said, much louder than she had intended.

“Some days I’m just angry,” he said. “I go to bed angry, I get up angry, and I’m angry all day long. I can’t help it,” he said, pacing the floor, repeatedly running his fingers through his sandy brown hair.

“I have tried in every way I know to make you feel safe again, to make you feel loved,” Amanda said. “I’ve told you that I will kill your father if he ever tries to hurt you again. What more can I do?”

“Nothing,” he mumbled. His face softened. Tears welled in his eyes. “And I hate myself when I treat you like this. I just don’t want to be here anymore. Everything I see reminds me of him.”

“Where else would you go?” Amanda asked, frightened of what the answer might be.

“The army,” he said quickly. “Maybe if I get away a while, I’ll feel different.”

“They won’t take you,” she said, after a long silence. “You’re only fifteen.”

“Mama, you know better than that,” he said.

“Give it a month. If you don’t feel any better, we’ll see. Please,” she begged.

“All right,” he nodded, and then headed up to his room.

Every step he took was a thud in her heart. She looked at Barbé and burst into tears.
* * *
Crocker continued to stop by Bluesmoke from time to time, as he had done before Jonathan left, usually to bring devastating news of the war, or a story he thought she might consider horrifying. She made it clear that she had no work for him, or any way to pay him if she did, but he continued to stop by.

Amanda talked to him on the front terrace one afternoon. He came to tell her about a raid in the Valley. A large party of Union cavalry had come down from Kentucky, and was on their way to Knoxville, wreaking havoc as they went.

“I hear they’re just scouting the area to see where might be the best place for an invasion. Maybe the Yankees will do better by us than the Rebels have done.”

“It’s all well and good”, Amanda replied, “if General Burnside is truly coming, and if he can run the Rebels out of the Valley. My fear is that it will only cause more fighting, and more trouble for the civilians. Just when Jonathan deserts me, the Yanks finally decide to make a fight.”

“Where’s Luke?” Crocker asked suddenly. “I haven’t seen him since Mr. Armstrong left.”

“He hasn’t been feeling at all well,” she said. “A spring cold, it probably was to start with, but it’s really got him down. He keeps to his room most all the time.”

“Well, you tell him I asked about him, and would like to see him sometime soon.”

“I’ll tell him.”

When she stepped through the front door, Luke was standing right in front of her.

“Why’d you tell Mr. Crocker I’ve got a cold?”

“So you’ve taken to eavesdropping now?”

“I have the right to know what you say about me.”

“I didn’t say anything wrong.”

“Yes, you did,” he insisted. “You lied. Don’t you think he’s going to figure it out eventually? Some of these scars won’t ever go away completely, Mother,” he said, touching his face, which was still scabbed and swollen in places.

“Crocker’s the last person I’d want to know about this,” she said firmly. “He tells everything he knows, and sometimes what he surmises. If he finds out about this, he’ll tell everyone from here to Knoxville. It would be just too good to keep to himself—another scandal in the Armstrong family!”

“He won’t tell if I ask him not to.”

“Oh, Luke, you’re so naive.” She sighed.

“Don’t you think people will ask me what happened to my face?”

“Sure,” she said, “but that doesn’t mean you have to tell the whole sordid story. No purpose will be served by telling everybody what a monster your father has become. I’m not asking you to excuse him, or what he did, but if word of this gets out—well, it would be embarrassing.“

“Mama, it seems to me you’ve spent your entire life trying to hide things Father’s done, but you haven’t hidden anything. People talk. Even those men who come and drink his whiskey—they know what kind of man he is. They pretend to like him, but behind his back they laugh at him.”

“Maybe you don’t care right now, but when you’re a grown man, you’ll want a name you can be proud of.”

“Not if it’s a lie,” he yelled. “If anybody asks me what happened to my face, I’ll tell them the truth. Maybe if all of you hadn’t lied and covered up what he did, he might have been a better man.”

“I know.” She nodded. “I just meant that—at some time in the future you’ll want a family—a wife and children—and you’ll want a respected family name to give them.”

“Why would I want a family?”

“Well, I assumed—everybody wants a family.”

“You assumed wrong.”

“Well, I guess we’ll have to deal with this when your father gets back.”
She had decided that there was no way she could survive without a man. From what she’d seen, Jonathan was about as good as any. At least, she was familiar with his foibles. God help her, she hoped he would come back soon.

“He’s coming back?” Luke shouted. “You said he was gone!”

“He is gone,” she said. “He went to Kentucky to join the army.”

“But you don’t think he’ll really do it, do you?”

“I don’t know,” she said reluctantly. “He likes his comforts too much.”

“You let me believe I was safe here.”

“You are safe here.”

“Not if he’s coming back,” Luke shouted. “You don’t care any more for me than he does.”

“How can you say such a thing?”

“Just stay out of my way, woman,” he said, spitting the words at her. “From now on I’m doing what I want to do.”

“You cannot talk that way to me.”

“Why not?” he sassed. “That’s the way Daddy talks to you.”
* * *
“Luke,” Amanda called the next morning, “breakfast.”

After she called again and got no response, she began to feel uneasy. She went upstairs. After knocking on his door, she opened it. The bed was neatly made, and most of his clothes and boots were gone. She hoped this was just another adolescent rebellion. Maybe she should just give him a little breathing room.

“If he thinks he can run away every time something not to his liking happens, he is sadly mistaken,” Amanda told Barbé.

Amanda was so sure she knew where Luke was that she waited three days before she went to see about him.

Crocker came to the door when she knocked.

“Luke’s not at the barn,” she said with a sigh. “Is he in the house?”

“I’ve not seen Luke but once since Mr. Armstrong left.”

“Old man,” she responded. “I don’t have the time or the patience to play your silly games today. Where is he? I just want to talk to him and make sure he’s all right.”

“Luke is not here,” Crocker said emphatically.

“Where else could he be?” she asked.

“The only thought I have is that he might have gone off to enlist with General Morgan, but the way he’s been beaten—how could you let that happen?” he said.

“I tried to stop Jonathan,” she said.

“I would have died before I’d let someone beat my child like that.”

“It’s so easy for you to judge when you weren’t there!” she shouted.

“Well, right or wrong, he blames you just as much as his father.”

“Why would he blame me?” she asked.

“A mother is supposed to protect her child.”

August 1863
Amanda had been frantic for a month. Not even Crocker, who seemed to know everything, could discover where Luke had gone. Her nerves assaulted her hourly, even in her dreams. She ate and slept little. Dresses that were once snug at the waist, now hung loosely on her frame. She felt compelled to find Luke, to make sure he was safe, but she had run out of places to look.

One Sunday evening, she was in the sitting room, reading. She had suffered a long and lonely weekend. Every day was lonely without Luke, but especially so when Barbé was at the Crossroads with Juba.

She was expecting Juba to bring Barbé home at any minute. In fact, they were later than usual. Amanda had long suspected that Juba made Barbé feel guilty every time he brought her back to Bluesmoke.

Someone was calling from the rear terrace. It was a male voice. She jumped up and ran to the window. Barbé was standing on the terrace, and Juba was leaning against the summer kitchen.

Amanda opened the door. “What are you doing out there?” she asked. “Come in.”

“We want to talk to you out here,” Juba said.

“Are you on foot?” Amanda asked. “I didn’t hear you come up.”

“Wagon’s broke,” Juba said.

Amanda walked slowly onto the porch. “What’s going on?” she asked Barbé.

“I can’t be your slave no more,” Barbé mumbled so softly that the only word Amanda heard was “slave.”

Juba noisily cleared his throat.

“I can’t be your slave no more,” Barbé said louder.

“You’re not a slave,” Amanda said. “Remember the papers I signed?”

Juba frowned, and looked at his wife. “What’s she talking about?”

“You didn’t tell Juba?”

“What papers?” Juba asked, looking at his wife.

“I gave Barbé her freedom years ago,” Amanda explained. “The papers are in the safe in Jonathan’s office.”

“How did you pay for it?” he asked, turning to his wife.

“There was no money involved,” Amanda said.

Juba shot a nasty look toward his wife.

Barbé began to sob uncontrollably.

“I can’t believe this,” Juba said.

“I thought if you knew you’d take me away from here,” Barbé said, through her tears.
But now Juba was fixated on Amanda.

“That’s just another way you’ve shut me out of her life,” Juba shouted, “another case where you can give her what I can’t.” He extended his index finger and, with every word, he jabbed it toward Amanda, coming closer and closer. He didn’t stop until his finger was almost in her face. “You even make her feel guilty when she’s not here. She dreads coming back here every Sunday.”

This time Barbé responded. “It’s my fault for that,” she said, sobbing. “I don’t want to hurt your feelings, Juba, but I can’t wait to get out of that stuffy little room above the shop.”

Juba looked at his wife, dismayed. “Well, that decides it,” he said. “We’re going to the North. The Union soldiers tell me what a good life we could have up there. Blacksmithing jobs are plentiful. I could charge higher prices for my work, wouldn’t have to take all this worthless Confederate money. We could own our own home, our own land.”

“What about the shop at the Crossroads?” Amanda asked.

“I’ve worked myself nigh to death for over a year, and I still can’t make a decent living. Ain’t enough business around here—after the war’s over, I’m afraid it will dry up to nothing.”

“It takes a long time to establish a business. You’re giving up too soon,” Amanda said.

“Barbé, is this what you want?”

“No-o-o,” Barbé sobbed.

“Enough of this!” Juba shouted. “You tell my wife to leave with me.”

“What?” Amanda’s head was reeling.

“She won’t leave Bluesmoke unless you tell her to go, and you know her heart will be broke if I leave without her.”

“And how will she feel if I throw her out of her home?” Amanda said angrily. “Juba, it’s time you knew how ungrateful you’re being.”

“Please, don’t!” Barbe screamed, but Amanda couldn’t stop herself.

“I made the deal with Bixby so you could buy the carriage house. I paid half the deposit, so you would have enough money left to buy tools. You wouldn’t have that shop today if not for me!”

Juba’s jaw dropped. His face went blank, as if his brain failed to comprehend what she had said. If he hadn’t been such a dark-skinned man, his face would have paled. He turned around and walked slowly back to the summer kitchen. He braced his arms against the doorway there, as if his legs alone couldn’t hold up the weight of what he had heard. He stood in that position for several minutes, shaking his head slowly from side to side.

“Is this true?” Juba asked, turning toward his wife.

“Yes,” Barbe whispered.

Juba grabbed Barbe’s arm roughly and pulled her away. When they reached the corner of the house, he turned and looked at Amanda, pure hatred in his eyes. “Her things are packed. We’ll be back for them when I get the wagon fixed. Oh—and you can do whatever you want with your blacksmith shop!”

As soon as they were out of sight, Amanda ran to the little cabin on the creek bank. Just inside the door, she found a small suitcase bulging at the seams with clothing, an old knapsack filled with various household items, and a large roll of bedding. There was nothing else in the cabin to suggest that Barbé had ever lived there.
Amanda slumped to the floor beside Barbe’s things. She wanted to cry, but not a tear would come.

A while later she went to Jonathan’s office to retrieve Barbe’s papers. If Barbe was really leaving Bluesmoke, she should carry them with her.

Charles had convinced Amanda to give Barbé her freedom. “No matter how well a white man treats a slave, he’s still a slave,” Charles had said. “He eats when his master says eat, works when his master says work, stops when his master says stop. If he can’t legally marry the woman he loves, can’t buy a piece of land, can’t go visit his relatives on a whim for fear he’ll be stopped and questioned, and Lord knows what else—no matter how much you love him, he’s a slave.”

Amanda hadn’t looked in the safe since Jonathan left, and was shocked to find only a few dollars in Confederate money. No Federal greenbacks at all. Her brown leather valise was empty. The little money she had saved from Father’s trust was gone.

“I could kill you, Jonathan,” she shouted, falling on her knees. “How will I live?”
***
Two days later Barbé and Juba returned to Bluesmoke in the wagon, which was almost full of his blacksmithing equipment. While Juba loaded the bags from the cabin, Barbé went to the house to see Amanda. They quickly said their farewells and turned away from each other.

Barbé managed to control her emotions until her hand touched the doorknob. “I don’t want to go,” Barbé said, sobbing.

“You swore you’d never leave me!” Amanda said angrily.

Barbé ran to Amanda, and they held onto each other tightly.

“Tell him I can’t go,” Barbé sobbed.

“It wouldn’t do any good,” Amanda cried. “You have to tell him.”

“I can’t,” Barbé said, pulling away from her.

“You have to!” Amanda shouted. “If you leave me, I’ll be completely alone here!”

“He’s my husband,” Barbé said. “I have to do what he says.”

“Barbé,” Juba called from the rear terrace.

“Go then!” Amanda shouted. “Desert me, like all the rest!” She walked quickly to the back door and pushed Barbé through it.

Amanda stood in the center hall, where she wouldn’t be able to see them leave, but she heard Barbe’s heart wrenching sobs as the wagon pulled away. Though it was only a few minutes, it seemed like forever before she heard the wagon’s wheels rattle across the wooden bridge near the Greeneville road.

When the full impact hit her, Amanda ran to the family cemetery on the hill and fell down beside Charles’s grave.

“Why is everyone leaving me?” she whispered.

She soon noticed that the dampness of the wet ground had soaked through her clothing. She wore no coat. Night was coming on. A cool wind had kicked up after the rain showers that had come earlier. Finally, the last light of that dreary, sunless day crept over the high ridges.

She remembered, as the darkness settled around her, that there was not a candle or lamp of any sort burning in the house. But it didn’t matter. No one was waiting for her. What if she lay down exactly where she was and gave herself up to the cold, just let the last, deepest warmth seep from her body? Who would care?
* * *
Her spirits were lifted a little when Crocker came the following morning with news of Luke.

“This isn’t fresh news by any means,” he said, “but it’s all I can find out at the moment. He was over in middle Tennessee with General Morgan, as I have suspected all along. I couldn’t get any specific details about his health or condition, but at least we know he made it that far.”

“Amen,” Amanda sighed.

“They are readying for another foray into Kentucky.”

“I don’t like the sounds of that.”

“This is what Morgan does best,” Crocker said.

“I owe you a debt of gratitude,” Amanda said, “and I won’t forget it.”

No matter how much you frustrate me.
***
Crocker came again. News of Luke was more troubling this time.

“General Morgan rode north and invaded Indiana and Ohio.”

“Good Lord, what’s he doing way up there?” Amanda asked, already anxious.

“I’m afraid it only gets worse from there.”

“Tell me, then!”

“General Morgan was overtaken by a superior Union force in Ohio, and was forced to surrender. They threw him into a penitentiary up there. I can’t ascertain if Luke was with him at that time or not.”

“Oh, no, I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” she sobbed.

“Now, don’t go slobbering all over yourself there,” Crocker said impatiently. “Some of Morgan’s men got away. Maybe Luke did, too.”
* * *
Amanda and Silver were walking along Bottom Creek, on the way back to Silver’s hut after a successful day of collecting roots and herbs for Silver’s cave. Amanda had badly needed a diversion from her worries about Luke and Barbé.

As they strolled along, a gang of grimy bearded horsemen burst out of the woods and onto the trail in front of them. One of them, a particularly obscene animal, jumped from his horse and pressed a long knife at Silver’s throat and shouted at her in short, clipped sentences.

“Hard of hearing, squaw?” he shouted.

Silver didn’t speak.

“I told you before. Get off that land. It’s mine.” He pressed the tip of the knife harder into Silver’s neck.

Amanda expected to see blood spurt out at any minute. She had been so startled when they jumped out in front of them that she truly could not move.

“White people told me where I can live all my life,” Silver said calmly. “I will not run again.”

A stubby cigar protruded from the corner of the man’s mouth. Brown drool ran down his chin. “You will leave, with or without my assistance,” he said. “Don’t make no difference which.”

He shoved Silver so hard she fell to the ground.

“I know where you live, too, Indian lover,” he said abruptly, turning toward Amanda. She gasped.

Laughing raucously, he quickly mounted, and they rode away.

“Who was that?” Amanda asked.

“A no-account bushwhacker who lives a few miles to the north. They call him ‘Judie’ Baker. His birth name is Judas, which tells you all you need to know about his character. He was a liar and a thief before the war. Now he thinks he has legalized his rampaging by wearing that dirty old Union jacket. He is not a soldier, never was—just looking to take from others what he’s too lazy to get for himself.”

“You’ve got to leave,” Amanda said.

“He came to these hills long after I did, laid claim to acres and acres of land around here, and ran almost everybody off.”

“He scares me to death,” Amanda whispered, still reeling.

“He’s just full of wind, likes to feel important. It galls him that I am still here. A woman—and a squaw at that. Maybe one of these days, he will believe me when I say I am not leaving. The land is not worth much, but it is my home.”

“What right does he have to evict you?”

“He says he has papers of ownership from the courts, but he will not let me see them.”

“Please, Silver,” Amanda begged, “promise me you’ll hide in the cave if he comes here again.”

“He hates all Cherokee. What did the whites expect us to do? They moved onto our land and took it as their own. The government sent men here from Washington, who managed to find the weakest and most immoral chiefs, and plied them with liquor. They signed away our land and got nothing for it. Nothing!”
Amanda had never seen Silver so agitated.

“So the Cherokee moved farther south, and farther west. But the whites kept coming, pushing us away from the mountain country we loved.”

“How did you come to be on this land?” Amanda asked. “I’ve asked a dozen times, but you’ve never told me.”

“It is hard to talk about.”

“Maybe it’s time you did.”

“I do not know if I can,” Silver said softly. “It has been inside me so long.”

They stopped. Amanda sat down on a boulder at the edge of the trail.

Silver was silent for a long time. Her eyes became very intense. She stared off into the distance while she told the story of running from the soldiers in her village at Tellico. Her voice took on a secretive quality, as if she were still that young girl, in that place, and couldn’t speak in a normal voice, or she would be captured.

“The soldiers began to capture the Cherokee and lock them in stockades, to force us to leave our homeland and march west. My family made a pact that when the soldiers came for us, if one of us was able to escape, we must do it at all cost. I saw the soldiers at our hut, heard my mother cry, and knew what must be happening. I ran from the field where I was hoeing the corn, but I stopped for a moment and looked back, and saw my parents and my brother being removed from our home. One of the horse soldiers saw me, and caught up to me at the edge of the woods. Bending down from his saddle, he struck me with the flat of his saber, then he dragged the sharp edge across my face.”

Silver touched the scar on her face as if she had just discovered it. It began on the right side of her forehead, from hairline to eyebrow, across the bridge of her nose, down her left cheek to her jawbone.

“I fell face first in the mud. I was bleeding badly. The soldier rode away, leaving me for dead. I packed the mud against my face to hold back the blood. If my mother had not taught me which medicinal plants to use to stanch the bleeding, I would have died. I traveled through the woods all the way here, living on nuts and berries. I followed the streams when possible in order to leave no trail. The soldiers were still everywhere. I lived in the cave behind my hut for many weeks before I began to feel safe.

“My mother and father died in the stockades before the march began. My brother escaped before they reached the Indian Territory. With the help of others who had run away, he found me here. He died soon after, from fear and exhaustion.”

Silver’s voice softened, and turned melancholy. “Every day I live, I ask myself if I made the right choice.”

Late August 1863
A loud knock at the front door woke Amanda from a sound sleep. She was on the settee in the sitting room. Somehow she felt safer there than all the way upstairs.

She shuffled down the hall, wondering who might be calling at such an early hour. Fear jolted her mind awake. Who could it be? What could they want? She began to sidle along the wall, looking through the sidelights at the front door, trying to see who was knocking.

But they were standing too close to the door.

“Who’s there?” she called in her gruffest voice.

“It’s Bixby.”

“Oh, thank God,” she muttered.

“What can I do for you?” she asked, opening the door.

“I’ve come for my monthly payment, of course,” he said nonchalantly.

“But Juba’s gone,” she said, trying to clear the cobwebs of sleep from her mind.

“Precisely,” he said, “and you promised to make the payments if he left.”

“Oh, no,” she sighed. “I have only a few dollars in Confederate money,” she said, reaching into a small pocket at the waist of her skirt.

“Well, that won’t do.”

“It’s all I have,” she replied.

“That can’t be,” Bixby stammered. “You’re the richest folks around here.”

“Not anymore,” she sighed.

“You’re lying!”

“Pardon me, sir,” she responded. “I do not lie. I know I promised to pay you, but Jonathan took all my money.”

“Then, I’ll sue you for it.”

“Feel free to do so,” she shouted. “Now get out of my house!”

Amanda was anxiously anticipating her monthly check from Father’s trust fund; maybe she could buy some food. If any were to be found, it would undoubtedly be outrageously expensive.
* * *
September 1863
“I have news of Jonathan, Mrs. Armstrong,” Crocker said.

“What of him?”

“I couldn’t care less myself,” Crocker said, “after what he did to Luke, but I thought you might want to know. He’s at Strawberry Plains, north of Knoxville, guarding the railroad bridge there. If he comes up this way, he might decide to pay you a visit.”

“Heaven forbid!”

“And I have better news. At long last, General Burnside has arrived!” he shouted. “You might want to stay real close to home and indoors as much as possible. The Union troops are trying to capture the Rebel soldiers General Buckner left behind when he pulled out of Knoxville. Since you’re way off the Greeneville Road, they might not find you back here, but you never know.”

“What would they want with me?”

“Shelter, food, money—anything that might make their lot easier. I certainly hope they wouldn’t—assault you,” he mumbled.

“Do you have to scare me to death?” Amanda said, her voice trembling.

“It’s for your own safety,” he said impatiently.

Amanda’s mind was racing. How could she remain at home with such dangers nearby?

“I hear Burnside will make his headquarters in Knoxville,” Crocker continued,” and the town will soon be safe for Unionists. You’re a Unionist, aren’t you, Ms. Armstrong?”

“What I am is none of your business.”

“I guess you’ll be going on down there to Knoxville to be with your kind. Us non-partials will be staying at home.”

He laughed at her with a wicked leer. Every conversation she had with him—no matter how benignly it began—eventually led to some sort of teasing or taunting.

“You expect me to believe you’re impartial.” She was tempted to laugh at that thought, but she couldn’t even muster up a smile.

He had no trouble producing a big belly laugh, leaning back, and pulling on his dirty red suspenders for effect.

“One of these days, old man,” she spat at him, “you’ll get your comeuppance, and I hope I’m there to witness it when you do. Do you know what Karma is, Crocker?”

His smile faded, and he shrugged his shoulders.

“I didn’t think so,” she said smartly. “Karma means that someday you’ll get slapped in the face with the same treatment you’ve given to others.”

“Now you’re just being devilish,” he said in disbelief. “There ain’t no such thing, and you know it well as I do.”

“You want to take that chance?”

He stuck his pipe in his mouth and shuffled off up the lane.

Why did she allow that man to make her angry? She would enjoy never having to look at his sickening face again, but if there were ever any news about Luke, Crocker would likely be the first to hear it. She wondered where he got his information, seemed to know everything before anyone else did.

The following day, Amanda received a letter from Mother:

”It is my sad task to inform you of the failure of the bank that administers your trust fund. They wired me, saying that there will be no further payments coming to you. Because Father and I were so extravagant over the years, my financial situation isn’t the best either. And, of course, our savings in the bank in Abingdon were converted to confederate currency with the onset of war, and becomes less and less valuable every day.

“I can’t believe everyone has deserted you at once, but there are so many women in your situation. Come to Hunter House. We’d love to have you here. Our gardens produced well this year, and we have enough vegetables to last the winter, if we can keep the thieves from getting it. The servants and I try to carry on with life as it was, though it will never be as it was. It amazes me that many of them are still with me, as loyal and true as ever.

“Be careful, and know that I love you always, and I will pray for your safety every moment until I see you again.

Love, Mother.”

Chapter 7 << – Index – >> Chapter 9