Appomattox Saga Omnibus 2: Three Books In One (Appomatox Saga) Read online

  “You’re looking well, Zander.” Paul smiled, yielding the items. “How’s Dorrie?”

  “We both fine, suh.” He hung the coat carefully on one of the brass hooks set in the wall of the spacious foyer. “Mistuh Thomas, he ain’t well. I worried about him.” The intelligent eyes of the butler studied Paul for a moment, and then a smile spread on the man’s dark face. “My, my! You done been all over the world, Mistuh Paul! I bet yo’ ma and pa glad to see you back. An’ Miss Luci, too, I ‘spec’?”

  Paul Bristol returned the smile. “Well, it’s nice to be back where everyone knows my business, Zander. Saves me a lot of thinking about what to do.” He had almost forgotten how efficient and tightly knit was the system that existed in the South. The slaves knew practically everything about their owners, for the house servants picked up the details and passed them along to the field hands. Paul had been amused at how vitally interested the English were in the activities of the Royal Family, but now as he looked at Zander, he suddenly realized that nothing that the Rocklins or the Bristols or the Franklins did was hidden from the eyes of these black pieces of property.

  Pieces of property… The thought drew Paul’s attention to Zander, and he studied the handsome features of the coal-black face thoughtfully. Though he could think of those thousands of faceless slaves all over the South as “property,” he had always had problems thinking of the slaves he himself knew in that fashion. Zander and Highboy and the other black men and women who had been part of his world—how could they be “property”?

  His mare, Queenie, she was property. How could anyone believe that this tall man who had given a life of faithful service to Thomas and Susanna Rocklin was of no more consequence than a horse? Paul shrugged his thoughts off impatiently. This was the question that was tearing the United States apart, and he wasn’t going to answer it by himself. Even so, a rebellious streak ran through him, for—no matter how Southern he might be—he refused to believe that Zander was the same in kind as a dumb beast.

  “The family, dey expectin’ you, Mistuh Paul,” Zander prodded. “Dey havin’ breakfus’ in de fambly dinin’ room.”

  “All right, Zander.” He paused and took out some bills, peeled two of them off, and handed them to the butler. “Christmas gift, a little early.” He smiled.

  Zander stared at the bills, his eyes opening wide. “Why, dat’s a mighty fine gif’, Mistuh Paul!”

  “I’ve missed three or four Christmases. And that’s some of that new Confederate money.” Bristol smiled. “Better spend it while it’s still good.”

  “Yas, suh!”

  Bristol moved out of the foyer and, as he passed the broad stairway that divided the lower sections of the house, thought of how Gracefield seemed to have been constructed for the purpose of holding formal balls. Fully half of the space on the first floor was designated for that purpose. Even now the maids were decorating the enormous ballroom for the ball that was to take place that evening. Turning to his left, Paul moved down the wide hallway and heard the sound of voices. He followed the sound through a large doorway into the small dining room, where he found the Rocklins gathered around the table.

  “Paul!” Susanna Rocklin was sitting beside her husband, Thomas. As Thomas looked up, an expression of genuine pleasure crossed Susanna’s face. “You did come after all! Come and sit beside me.” At the age of sixty, Susanna was a most attractive woman. She had long been a favorite aunt of Paul’s. He went to her at once, bent over, and kissed her cheek, saying, “You’d better keep an eye on this woman at the ball, Uncle Thomas. Some handsome devil will run off with her!”

  “Good! Let him pay her bills!” Thomas Rocklin smiled faintly at Susanna, but the smile faded quickly. “Sit down, boy, sit down!”

  He looks very bad, Paul thought. There’s a shadow on him, just as Mother said. But he hid his reaction and began to pile his plate high with the battered eggs and sausage that Susanna handed him. Looking across the table, he nodded to Ellen, saying, “How are you, Ellen?” He had met his cousin Clay’s wife only once, when the family had gathered earlier in the month at Lindwood for a photo session. She had been anything but pleasant then.

  “I’m not well,” Ellen snapped waspishly.

  Paul did his best to keep his voice soothing as he answered her. “I’m sorry to hear that.” He hadn’t spoken to Clay at any length since his return from Europe, and he asked, “Didn’t Mother tell me that Clay came home on leave?”

  Ellen’s brown eyes seemed to harden, and her lips tightened. “He’s on leave, but he’s never here. You’d think a man would want to be home with his wife and family after being in the war, wouldn’t you?” Her voice rose shrilly, and she gripped the arms of the chair until her knuckles turned white. “But no, he’s got better things to do!” She glared around the room, challenging them all. When no one spoke, she turned her bitter eyes back on Paul. “If you want to see Clay, you’ll have to go over to where he stays, with that white trash Yancy bunch!”

  Paul felt the oppressive silence that had fallen on the room, and a quick glance at Ellen’s children showed him the pained embarrassment that both of them felt. Rena, at fifteen, was a sensitive young girl, and she dropped her head at once, her cheeks red. David masked his feelings better, for at nearly twenty he was more able to do such things. Though his features were almost a copy of his brother Dent’s, David was the most thoughtful and steadiest of Clay Rocklin’s children. He said quietly, “My father is in a venture with Buford Yancy, Paul. He thinks it’s unwise to plant cotton, so he and Buford are going to plant corn and feed pigs out.”

  Paul nodded. “I’d say that’s smart. We can’t eat cotton, and neither can the army. Are you going to do the same, Uncle Thomas?”

  But Ellen was not interested in pigs and cotton. She glared at David, saying bitterly, “Clay’s not over there to talk about growing corn, and you well know it, David! He’s there chasing after Melora Yancy!”

  “Oh, don’t be silly, Ellen!” Susanna Rocklin held her head high, and temper flared in her fine eyes. She was furious that her daughter-in-law would say such a thing, especially in front of Rena! “If you can’t speak more properly, I’ll be glad to have your meals served in your room.”

  The suddenness of Susanna’s attack brought a dead silence into the room. Ellen gasped and pushed her chair back from the table. “I see what I’m to be treated like!” she panted, her face contorted with anger. “You’re all against me!”

  David rose at once, took hold of Ellen’s arm, and led her away from the table. “Come along, Mother. We’ll finish our coffee in your room.”

  When the pair disappeared, Susanna looked across at Rena, saying, “Don’t mind your mother, dear. She’s upset.”

  “Yes, Grandma.”

  Paul saw the stricken expression on the girl’s face. “I brought you a present, Rena,” he said quickly. “I meant to give it to you for Christmas, but it didn’t get here in time. You still like to draw and paint?”

  “Oh yes!”

  “Well, if you’ll go find Highboy and have him take the package out of my saddlebags, you’ll find something you’ll like—lots of brushes and paint and pencils.”

  Rena forgot her humiliation, her eyes lighting up. “Oh, will you give me a lesson, Paul?”

  “Sure I will!”

  Rena ran out at once, and Thomas said heavily, “That was kind of you, Paul.” Rocklin had been a handsome man in his youth, but sickness had drained him of much of his vitality. He had been, Paul sensed, as humiliated by Ellen’s behavior as the rest of them but was too tired to do more than say, “You’ll have to excuse Ellen, Paul. I sometimes wonder if the events in her life haven’t disturbed her emotionally.”

  “Yes, sir, that can happen.” Paul felt uneasy, for the history of Ellen Rocklin was not only tragic, but sordid. She had been an immoral woman for years—behavior that had only seemed to grow worse when Clay rejected her. Even now, Paul had noted that she had the look of a loose woman about her.

&n
bsp; Paul shook his head slightly. He had heard how Clay had returned just in time to save Gracefield from falling into the hands of creditors, but he had also heard that Clay was in love with Melora Yancy. Everyone in the Rocklin and Bristol clans knew that Ellen Rocklin didn’t want Clay—hated him, in fact, and made no secret of it—and yet she was filled with a blind, unreasonable jealousy over Melora Yancy. As a result, Ellen did all she could to make Clay’s life miserable, which greatly affected the rest of the family, as well.

  Thomas took a drink of his coffee, then asked suddenly, “So you’re giving away your paints and brushes, are you? That mean you’re through with that sort of thing?”

  “I suppose so, Uncle Thomas.” Paul shrugged. “I’m just not good enough at it.” He saw the look on his uncle’s face and smiled. “I suppose you’re thinking you could have told me that ten years ago, aren’t you?”

  Thomas brushed his thin hand across his lips, attempting to hide the smile that came there, but gave it up. “Well, it’s a rather unmanly sort of way to spend your life, as I told you once.”

  “Nonsense, Tom!” Susanna snapped impatiently. “I wish one of our young men would do something besides grow cotton and fight duels and hunt!”

  “Susanna!” Thomas Rocklin gasped, shocked by this heresy. “What a thing to say! I only hope that now that Paul’s got this art business out of his system, he’ll settle down and—and—”

  “And marry Luci DeSpain and live happily ever after? Is that it, Uncle Thomas?”

  Thomas thought of his son Clay, trapped in a loveless marriage, fighting for a cause he didn’t believe in. “There are worse things, nephew,” he said gently, and the pain in his eyes made Paul look away.

  “Well, sir,” Paul said quietly, “if I can’t paint, I guess I can do that. Provided, of course, that this war doesn’t bring the whole thing down around our heads.” He thought of the split in their own family…on the South were Clay and Dent and the Franklin men—Brad and Grant…and then he thought of Mason Rocklin, Thomas’s younger brother, who was an officer in the Union army. We’ll all be killing each other soon, he thought. Suddenly the hopelessness of it all descended on him, and he rose, saying, “Well, it’s a good time for a ball. Did you two plan it so I could court Luci DeSpain?”

  Susanna smiled at him. “No, but that’s what balls are for.”

  “Just be careful about how you talk about the war, Paul,” Thomas spoke up. “You’re not joining the army, and that’s bad enough at this time, but if you say the wrong thing, you’ll have half the young fireballs in the room offering to trade shots with you!”

  “I’ll be careful, Uncle Thomas. The last thing I want is a duel!”

  Luci DeSpain had never looked lovelier than she did that evening. She came into the room wearing a pale blue crinoline dress, which almost matched the color of her eyes, and which set off her figure in a spectacular fashion. The young men swarmed her at once.

  Paul was standing with Clay Rocklin and Brad Franklin, who was married to Clay’s only sister, Amy. Franklin was a major in the Richmond Grays, and he cut a fine figure as he stood there in his uniform. Clay was not wearing his uniform but looked very handsome in a brown wool suit.

  “You’d better not let those young fellows have too much of a head start, Paul,” Clay teased Bristol. Sipping the cider that Zander was passing around, his eyes went over the room. When Paul asked him about the army rather hesitantly, he shrugged and spoke mostly of his sons Dent and Lowell, and of Brad’s son Grant.

  “The Richmond Grays is one of the finest companies around,” Clay said proudly, “and I like to think that’s because of our sons’ involvement.” Brad Franklin smiled and nodded in agreement. Their sons were among the most respected soldiers in the Richmond Grays, a company filled mostly with young aristocrats from the area.

  Just then Amy Franklin came up and laid her hand on her husband’s arm. Amy, the only daughter of Thomas Rocklin, was not really a beautiful woman, but she made people think she was. She was tall and dark like her father, and her fine dark eyes were her best feature.

  “Excuse me, gentlemen,” she said, “but I need to steal the major away. I so seldom get the chance to dance with him, and I’m not letting this opportunity pass me by.”

  Clay and Paul laughed at the look on Franklin’s face, but Brad quickly recovered. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen,” he said, “I never refuse the request of a beautiful woman.” And with that he swept Amy out onto the dance floor.

  Paul watched them for a few moments; then he and Clay began talking again about the war. Paul had read what the papers had to say, but he was more interested in Clay Rocklin’s views. He had heard so much about the man and discovered that his cousin was very different from the man he remembered. The two of them had been well acquainted, of course, and Paul remembered Clay as a wild young man, given to fits of temper and moodiness. But the man who stood beside him was as solid an individual as Paul had ever met. Clay was one of the “Black Rocklins,” with raven hair and dark eyes. He was a big man, six feet two, and heavier than Paul remembered. There was an air of authority about him, and Paul had heard his father say, “Clay enlisted as a private, but he’ll be an officer before this war is over. He’s got whatever it is that makes men obey and follow.”

  Paul sensed that power as the two of them stood there talking, and once again he felt a queer sort of kinship with his cousin. Perhaps, he thought, it was because both of them had been aliens, wandering far from their homes. Clay had left in disgrace, had even become a slave trader, but eventually left that sordid profession in disgust. Paul had been away from the South for years, trying to find some sort of meaning for his life. Now the two of them seemed to be thrown together, and Paul was curious about Clay’s views on the war.

  “Do you think the South will actually win this war, Clay?” he asked. As Clay spoke, he discovered his cousin held little real hope for final victory in the South. He spoke of the huge armies of the North and how the smaller population of the South would soon be depleted. He soberly reflected on the might of Northern factories, one of which was owned by their uncle Stephen Rocklin.

  “The only hope the South has,” Clay concluded finally, “is that the North will get tired of the struggle. There’s a peace party now in the North, and if we can hurt their armies badly enough and quickly enough, they might be able to bring enough pressure so that Lincoln will have to cave in.”

  Paul shook his head. “Well, I’d like to see the thing over at once. It’s a bad war, and I think the South will suffer for it!”

  They had not noticed that several young men had come to stand close, listening to their conversation. And it was one of these who took exception to Paul’s remark. “If you like the North so much, why don’t you go live there?” the man demanded roughly.

  Paul blinked in surprise, becoming aware of the small group. He turned to find a tall, bulky man, who was dressed in a black suit, glaring at him. He had to think to come up with the fellow’s name, but finally succeeded. Leighton Huger…and he was, Paul remembered, one of Luci’s suitors.

  Paul frowned. “Why, I didn’t mean—”

  “You’ve got a fine right to talk, Bristol!” Huger broke in, his eyes hot with anger. “Go on back and play with your little paintbrushes in France! I’ve heard those artists over there are womanish enough for a fellow like you!”

  “Now, Leighton,” Clay Rocklin said at once, “let’s not have any trouble.”

  “Not with you, sir,” Huger said at once. “We all know where you stand. You and your sons are a fine example to Virginia, but I have no patience with a coward who runs away and lets his native state fight to the death while he draws pretty little pictures!”

  There was more to Huger’s anger than the matter of politics, Paul understood at once. He figures to show me up in front of Luci, was the thought that came to him. But he was determined not to let that happen. “Look, Huger, I’m sorry if my remark offended you. I love the South and wouldn’t do an
ything—”

  “Love the South!” Leighton Huger’s florid face glowed with anger. “You insult the Cause, then stand there and say you love our Confederacy?”

  “I didn’t say I loved the Confederacy,” Paul snapped, aware that the quarrel had attracted the attention of many, most of whom had turned to stare. “I said I loved the South!” But he knew it was hopeless, and when Huger grew abusive, he shrugged. “This is no place for talk like this. Not for a gentleman.”

  That was when Huger lifted his hand and slapped Paul in the face. A gasp went around the room, and Paul saw that Luci’s eyes were gleaming with some emotion that he’d never seen in them before. But he didn’t have the time to figure out what she was thinking—he had to deal with the situation at hand. Huger had left him no choice, not unless he wanted to leave Virginia. The code of his people was strong, and any man of his class who refused to stand up to such an offensive act as Huger’s was forever branded.

  “Shall it be cold steel or hot lead, Mr. Huger?” he inquired.

  “You must choose, sir!”

  “Very well. My man will call on you.”

  Paul left the room at once, furious and disgusted. He turned when he heard his name called. “Paul, let me be your friend in this matter.” Clay had come to stand in front of him, his face creased with concern.

  “That’s generous of you, Clay.” Paul nodded. He shook his head sadly. “What a stupid thing! Two grown men trying to kill each other over a harmless remark! Well, make the arrangements, Clay. And pray that we both miss!”

  The duel took place at dawn, just as the sun reddened the sky. One of Huger’s friends, a heavy young man who was so nervous he could hardly speak, stood with Clay as the two men examined the weapons—a fine set of dueling pistols that had belonged to Noah Rocklin. Clay loaded them carefully, then offered the pair of them to Huger. He took one indifferently, then watched as Paul Bristol took the other. Paul noticed that Huger’s face was pale and that he had nothing to say.