Heaven in a Wildflower (31 page)

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. I know what I’m doing. Now get out of here.”

“I came to talk about the funeral.”

“Let your family plan it. They seem to be taking over, anyway.”

“Somebody has to,” he snapped. “So I guess there’s nothing to do but take care of things myself. As soon as Daddy gets back with news of Anjele, we’ll decide.”

“You do that. Maybe you can plan a double funeral.”

He blanched to realize she could be so cruel, so cold. Still he made no move to leave.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” Claudia asked impatiently. “It’s all settled. You and your family will make funeral arrangements. I’m too distraught,” she added.

“I also wanted to take you home with me. I told you—people will be calling to pay their respects.”

“They’re calling here, too.”

“Yankees,” he sneered. “Your father’s friends won’t set foot in this house, and you know it.”

She gave her golden curls a haughty toss. “Well, they don’t really care about offering condolences to his daughter if they let pride stand in their way, now do they?”

“Pride? You don’t know the meaning of the word.”

Claudia’s eyes narrowed as she warned, “You’d better watch your tongue, Raymond Duval, or you’ll be staying with your parents permanently. You won’t be living at BelleClair when I go back with Union patrols to ensure things will be run like they always have. I’ll be rich, and you, like every other so-called
proud
Southerner, will be dirt poor.”

Raymond threw his head back and laughed. “You might be banging on the door begging for me to let you in, Claudia, because Anjele might lock
you
out of BelleClair.”

“What are you talking about?” Claudia didn’t like the gleam in his eye, as though he knew something she didn’t.

“Stupid girl,” he scoffed. “Do you really think BelleClair is all yours? That your father would leave it all to you, the way you’ve treated him?”

Claudia had thought of that possibility but also felt confident if Anjele did indeed recover from her injury, she’d be glad to yield her interest. After all, she would realize Claudia’s good relationship with Federal troops would be the key to future prosperity. Besides, Claudia figured she’d eventually drive her away, anyhow.

“I’ll work it all out later,” she said finally, curtly.

Raymond was enjoying himself, for he couldn’t remember ever seeing Claudia unnerved as she was now, despite the way she tried to conceal it. “Maybe Anjele won’t want to work anything out. Maybe she’ll want to run things herself.”

“I’d have a say.”

“Not when she’s the sole owner.”

“Elton would never—”

“Elton
did
.”

Claudia’s eyes bulged, and she began to shake her head wildly from side to side. “No. You’re lying. You only want to hurt me because you’re angry at me for staying here, and you’re making this up.”

“I saw his will. His
new
will. He left everything to Anjele. You, my dear, get nothing.”

Claudia swayed, feeling faint. “I…I want to see it for myself. I don’t believe you. Not till Lawyer DuBose verifies it.”

“He can sure do that. I delivered it to him myself.”

Their eyes met, held, in challenge.

Finally Raymond decided he was tired of fencing with her. “I’ll be going now. I’ll send word when the funeral will be.”

He turned to go, just as Elisabeth knocked, opening the door at the same time. “Oh, you’re leaving,” she said to Raymond with a tight smile. “Good. The parlor downstairs seems to be filling up with ladies calling to pay their respects.

“Claudia has become a dear friend to us, you know,” she added, well aware of his hostility.

Politely he responded, “Yes, and at a time like this, friends mean so much.”

“Not only now, but later.” Elisabeth went to sit beside Claudia. “I want you to know Major Hembree and I had a long talk this morning about your situation, dear, and he asked me to tell you not to worry about a thing. He says you’ll have all the assistance you need to keep your plantation operating efficiently. He’ll assign troops to keep the Negroes working, and you’ll have no problem getting your crops in.”

Raymond was moved to say, “There are others involved, too, Mrs. Hembree, like me, and let’s certainly not forget Anjele.”

She shot him a withering glance. “When you take the loyalty oath to the Union, perhaps you’ll be included in the plans for BelleClair, Mr. Duval. As for Anjele, with her attitude, I’m afraid my husband has no regard for her whatsoever.”

Ignoring Claudia, who was waving him out in hopes of ending the confrontation, Raymond wasn’t about to miss the opportunity to announce, “Well, I’m afraid he’ll have to regard her, Mrs. Hembree, since she happens to be the sole heir, according to her father’s will.”

Elisabeth snickered. “But you’re forgetting something, aren’t you? It’s now up to the Federal government to decide if Southerners get to keep their land.” She patted Claudia’s knee, gave her a fond smile. “So I don’t think my little friend here has anything to worry about.”

Raymond limped out, sick to the pit of his stomach.

Brett held the dying man’s hand. There wasn’t anything he could do but sit and listen to his last ramblings. His stomach had been ripped open. At least he was in shock and felt no pain.

When Brett had joined the army, he’d remained a loner. Yet Billy Bob Hawley, the soldier staring up at him with rapidly glazing eyes, hadn’t been put off by Brett’s coldness as other people had. He attached himself, determined to make friends.

Brave and courageous, Billy Bob was a good man to have at his side, Brett decided. Eventually he had warmed, and the two had become close friends.

They had been together through the Battle of McDowell, a major battle of the Shenandoah Valley Campaign. Among the few survivors after General Stonewall Jackson’s Confederates nearly wiped out their regiment, Brett and Billy Bob were sent to McClellan’s Army of the Potomac. But, en route to report for duty, they’d run into Reb bushwhackers. Billy Bob got two of them before they got him. Brett had taken care of the other.

“I wish,” Billy Bob whispered, “I could be buried back home… But I don’t reckon they’d want me…folks called me a traitor…”

“You’re no traitor.” Brett attempted to comfort him. “You fought for what you believe in. Same as me.”

Billy Bob’s attempt to smile was more of a grotesque grimace. “What do I believe in, Cody? Jesus, I don’t even know. Father against son. Brother against brother. What’s the point in this stupid war, anyhow? What am I dying for?”

“Maybe your God will tell you when you get to heaven,” Brett offered. Hell, he didn’t know what else to say.

“I reckon he will, if my name’s in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Otherwise, I reckon it’ll be Satan doin’ the talkin’.”

“I’m sure it’ll be there,” Brett said, having no idea what he was talking about. His own religious upbringing had been scant.

Suddenly Billy Bob was seized by a coughing spasm, spattering them both with blood, and when he finally caught his breath, he reached out and clutched the front of Brett’s shirt, using his last bit of energy to pull him close to plead, “Go home, Cody. Go home now. You don’t belong here. Neither do I. It ain’t our war. It ain’t…”

With a final gasp, he relaxed his grip.

For Billy Bob, the war was over.

Brett closed his eyes and bowed his head. But he wasn’t praying. He was trying to make some sense out of it all. It was times like this he wished he’d stayed out of it, gone looking for Adam Barnes’s gold mine. Maybe he’d be a rich man by now. Maybe he and Ruby might have even settled down together, had a family. But he knew that wasn’t likely. Back in ‘58, he’d sworn never to get seriously tangled up with any woman. So far, he hadn’t. He intended to keep it that way.

He took down a blanket, rolled Billy Bob in it, and tied him across the saddle. Then he mounted and headed toward Virginia.

Trying not to dwell on the death of his friend, Brett concentrated on the war. General McClellan was advancing on Richmond, Virginia. Brett hoped to catch up with him before he attacked. Norfolk had been evacuated.

He’d also heard Mississippi was the scene of skirmishes near Corinth. Billy Bob had teased that maybe Brett had a special reason for keeping up with news from there and Louisiana, like maybe a girl he had left behind.

Brett frowned.

No, he hadn’t left a girl behind.

He had left his heart.

“Damn it, stop it,” he cursed aloud, giving his head a vicious shake as though casting away pesky gnats.

But it was no use. Like a dream her face swam before him. God, she was beautiful. Long, silky hair the color of a bayou sunset. Eyes that could devour a man in their dark emerald fires and smoky shadows.

And never before, nor since, he recalled, swept with a heated rush, had he seen a body so perfect. Firm breasts, almost saucily tipped, long, shapely, tapering legs with delicate, slender ankles. He could remember as though it were only yesterday what it felt like to have those legs wrapped around his back, his hands clutching her tight, yet tender, buttocks.

He had tried to hate her for her weakness and lying, but somewhere along the way, love won out.

Despite everything, Brett knew he loved Anjele Sinclair…and always would.

So that was why he kept up with how the war was affecting Louisiana. It worried him to hear New Orleans had fallen, was now occupied by Union forces. He could only hope Anjele was safe but reminded himself she had her father to look after her, as well as a husband, because she had probably married Raymond Duval, maybe even had a baby.

Brett knew he was a fool to allow thoughts of her to consume him, but he’d stopped fighting it. That was the way it was, the way it would be.

It was the price he had paid for being so foolish.

“Anjele, can you hear me?” Vinson Duval smoothed her hair from her forehead, touched his fingertips to each cheek as he asked Kesia, “Are you sure she woke up?”

Hovering nearby, wringing her hands anxiously, Kesia assured him, “Oh, yes sir, Doctor, I’m sure. It was just like I said. I come in here this mornin’ and told Missy, the girl who sits with her at night, she could leave, and Missy, she say all night long, Miss Anjele, she moaned a little now and then. So I went ahead and started bathin’ her face, and that’s when she woke up and called out for her poppa, and she started cryin’ and went to sleep again. Lawdy, Lawdy,” she wailed, tears glistening on her cheeks, “I felt so sorry for that child. I’m glad she did go back to sleep, ‘cause Lord knows, I don’t wanna be the one to have to tell her her daddy is dead.”

Vinson snapped, “You’d better not. I’ll be the one to do that. Now go get me a pan of water, the colder the better, and a rag so I can sponge her.”

She hurried to obey, and then he dipped the rag, squeezed it, and began to rub Anjele’s face. For a few moments there was no response, and then slowly, ever so slowly, her head began to move from side to side. Again he asked, “Can you hear me, Anjele? It’s me, Vinson Duval. I’m here with you. Can you hear me, dear?”

Anjele’s lashes fluttered.

“Praise God, she is wakin’ up!” Mammy cried, slapping her hands together in delight.

He waved her away. “Get out of here. You’ll scare her to death. I’ll call you if I need you.”

She scurried out of the room, anxious to spread the word to the rest of the servants that Miss Anjele was going to be all right.

“Anjele, speak to me,” he continued to coax.

She felt as though she were floating in a world of black velvet, soft, comforting. The opium did not want to let her go, yet something unseen was attempting to pull her away from peace and thrust her into—what? She tried to think, to remember, as bits and pieces, images, danced in and out of her mind to tease and torment. Her father. Something about her father. “Poppa…” she whispered, not knowing why she was so desperate to see him, hear him, but it was like a dagger twisting in her soul. “Poppa…please…”

Vinson caught her hands as her fingers began to creep about, searching for something, someone, to cling to. “Anjele, don’t think about that now. Are you hurting anywhere? I want to help you.” He had diminished her drug dosage, fearing sedation was retarding her regaining consciousness, and now realized he’d been right to do so. Yet he didn’t want her in pain.

Anjele could see the blood, like a crimson curtain across her brain. Then the curtain slowly began to open, and she could see her father…and knew he was dead.

She began to cry, deep, soul-wrenching tears.

“Cry it all out,” Dr. Duval urged, drawing her gently into his arms. “Let it go.”

He held her for a long time and would have continued to do so, but suddenly there was a knock on the door at the same instant it opened. Drawing away from her, he looked around sharply to see who had dared intrude.

It was Major Hembree, having heard from Kesia that Anjele had awakened, and he was anxious to find out whether she could tell him anything that might help find her father’s murderer.

“Anjele, listen carefully,” Dr. Duval said, dabbing at her tears with the wet cloth. “I know you’re upset, but you’ve got to help us. The man who murdered your father hasn’t been found. Can you tell us anything? Anything at all?”