House Divided (53 page)

But General Longstreet liked dinners and easily found occasions. Toward the end of January a heavy snow fell; and Moxley Sorrel and Peyton Manning designed a sleigh, fixing a box on saplings bent to serve as runners, contriving a harness so that their two horses could be hitched tandem with a Negro boy mounted on each as a postilion.
When the first ride in this rude vehicle was attempted, everyone at headquarters turned out to watch; and during the preliminary banter Trav saw Longstreet draw one of the postilions aside and speak to him. So Trav was not surprised, when the sleigh started off, to see the horses leap from a trot into a headlong run. The sleigh raced away, and everyone mounted to follow and see the sequel.

The sequel was that the sleigh overturned, Sorrel and Manning were spilled into the drifts, and the General ordered an evening of wine and song at the expense of the discomfited adventurers. Longstreet's part as the instigator of the runaway was not suspected. Trav thought he would presently, to point the jest, avow it. The dinner was hilarious, and Trav, as usual the soberest among them, watched the others and thought how surely strong drink led men to show their true selves. Peyton Manning, no matter how much he drank, was always courteous and considerate, as was Osman Latrobe. Moxley Sorrel easily became overbearing; he lost his temper readily. Fairfax played the clown, and though others found him amusing, Trav did not. Walton in his cups became sarcastic and supercilious. Longstreet forgot his heavy dignity, and he might romp like a boy.

That evening there came a tragic interruption to their merriment. The fun had reached its height. The General and half a dozen others, on their feet, with their arms across one another's shoulders, their heads together while they produced a labored harmony, were singing
Lorena
when an orderly appeared at the door.

Trav went to meet him. The orderly had a telegram for General Longstreet; and when the song was done, Trav delivered it. As the General read the scrawled message, Trav saw his smile fade, saw his lips set, saw his cheek harden. Longstreet handed him the telegram.

“Please arrange for a special engine, a special train,” the General directed in a low tone, completely sober now. “I hope you will go with me.”

Trav read the dispatch.

January–March, 1862

 

C
INDA was at the Arlington with Mrs. Longstreet when the General and Trav arrived. The baby was desperately ill, and after the telegram was sent little Jimmy too had sickened. Despite all they could do, Mary Ann died late at night on the twenty-fifth of January, and Jimmy died early the next day.

Cinda came home to Vesta and to Jenny and to Jenny's babies with terror cold in her breast; for there was scarlet fever everywhere in Richmond and the Longstreet children were not the first it took, and would not be the last. To Vesta she confessed her fears.

“I wouldn't let Jenny know, but I'm frightened! Suppose Kyle got sick, or Janet, or little Clayton!”

“They won't, Mama!”

“I don't see how I could stand it! And yet of course I could. So many sorrows in the world, so many frightened, grieving people!” She added thoughtfully: “Yet I wonder if we're not brought closer together by our sorrows, Vesta. There's comfort in knowing you're one of many, all hurt and bewildered and weeping.”

“It gives me—” Vesta hesitated. “Well, having those babies die makes me want Tommy awfully; makes me want to have babies for him.”

“I know, darling.” Then, remembering when her own babies died, Cinda added: “Whenever we're frightened we always turn, if we can, to love.”

 

Upon Trav fell the sombre business of arranging that double funeral. He asked Cinda's advice and she sent him to Mr. Davies, the
stone cutter on Main Street between Eighth and Ninth. Mr. Davies pointed out that continued cold and snow had forged a frosty armor on the ground, so that no graves could be dug; but he had a vault in Hollywood where the little bodies could rest until a later day. Trav reported to Cinda and she agreed to this.

The vault was in the hillside on the right of the main drive, not far from the entrance, faced with stone and flanked by stone walls and fronting on a stone-flagged areaway. The day was wet with cold rain that made the occasion more dreadful; the stones were dripping bleakly, touched with ice; the low portal of the vault through which even by stooping a man could only with difficulty pass was like the entrance to the den of some loathsome, carrion-eating animal. Cinda shuddered and shivered as she watched one small coffin and then the other disappear into this black hole, and she looked toward the General and Mrs. Longstreet. Their two sons stood beside them; and Cinda saw Gussie suddenly sneeze, and a hard hand clutched her heart.

That night both Gus and Garland were feverish, and the fight to save them, this new and desperate struggle, left Mrs. Longstreet and the General no time for empty grief. Gussie died a short week after the other two, and went to lie in the same dark vault; but Garland was still dangerously ill, and to Cinda this seemed almost a blessing. Before he was safe, time might begin to heal these wounds.

“But I cannot stay in Richmond,” Mrs. Longstreet told Cinda, when Garland was surely on the mend. “Oh, I know I'm unreasonable—but I can't! Jeems says he'll take me to Lynchburg. I can't stay alone here in these empty rooms with just Garland. I'd be hearing their voices all the time.”

Cinda made no effort to dissuade her. Probably Cousin Louisa's decision was a wise one. But till Garland was well enough to travel, Mrs. Longstreet could not go to Lynchburg; and till he could see her settled there the General stayed here by her side.

Yet Cinda saw that he was greatly changed. His eyes that once had been so ready to twinkle were shadowed now; his tongue once so quick to jest was slow and heavy. He seemed remote and far away, sometimes failing to hear what was said to him as though he were become a little deaf. He seldom spoke directly of this triple tragedy; but once
when Cinda had been with Mrs. Longstreet and came to say good night to him, the General asked:

“How is she?”

“As steady as can be.”

He nodded heavily. “We've had other babies die,” he said in a low tone. “But they went one at a time. This—” His lips twisted in half-mirth. “I remember once in Mexico a Mexican fired at me around the corner of a house and missed. Next time, I was ready for him, but we both missed. Then I remembered Uncle Gus telling me once that at close quarters you should always use buckshot; so I took my knife and split a bullet into three slugs, and the next time we exchanged shots he fell.” He said quietly: “God used buckshot on Louisa and me this time—and every slug struck home.” His broad shoulders moved as though to settle themselves under a heavy burden. “I wish I could be at home with Louisa for a while.”

“Can't you, till winter ends?”

He shook his head. “No. I've already stayed too long. There's much to do, and there'll be no time to do it in the spring. The Yankees will be at us, then.” His jaw set. “And half the army's sick or home on furlough, and half those on furlough have overstayed their leave. And as if that weren't enough, soon now each company will be electing new officers; and that means the good men, the good disciplinarians will be thrown out, the army will become a mob. No, I must go back.” She saw his face harden in grim lines.

She spoke to Trav of the change in him, and Trav agreed. “I can't realize he's the same man who played that prank on Sorrel and Manning.” She asked what he meant, and he told her about the sleigh ride and the runaway, and added: “Why, Cinda, the night the telegram came saying Mary Ann was sick, at the very moment when the telegram came he was singing with some of the other officers, singing
Lorena.
I don't suppose he'll ever sing again.”

“I think he'll really be glad to get back to the army, glad to have work to do.”

“The men will be glad to see him,” Trav agreed. He had gone twice to camp during this interval. “A lot of them asked for him—Old Pete, they call him—when I was in Centerville Monday.”

“Why do they call him that?”

“It's a West Point nickname, I think. They've picked it up. Yes, he'll be better off with work to do.”

 

The day before the General and Mrs. Longstreet would depart for Lynchburg came news of the loss of Fort Henry in the West; and Longstreet told Trav and Cinda: “It was Grant who took Fort Henry. That man is the stubbornest fighter in the North, the most to be feared.” He added in grave tones: “Perhaps this defeat will wake the South to its danger. We're still celebrating Manassas; but McClellan's army is stronger every day, and the Yankee fleets are ready to pick their spot to hit our coasts.”

Faunt was in General Wise's garrison on Roanoke Island, and Cinda spoke of this. “Will they attack there, do you suppose?”

“Probably, yes,” he assented. “Roanoke's the key to the whole North Carolina coast, and Wise's force is inadequate. Burnside will gobble him up—unless Wise is reinforced.”

From that day, Cinda was concerned for Faunt's sake. There were presently rumors of fighting at Roanoke; and then the news of the island's fall, of the surrender of the little force there and the death of Jennings Wise sent a sobering shock and a wave of grief through every home in Richmond.

She had at first no news of Faunt. Presumably—if he were alive—he had been included in the surrender and was a prisoner. But late one night the door bell roused them all. Cinda was the first downstairs. It was Brett. Faunt was at Great Oak, he said; and Cinda cried: “Oh, thank God!”

“But he's hurt, and he's sick,” Brett warned her. “A bullet through the fleshy part of his shoulder, another in his side; and both wounds are inflamed. He came afoot along the outer beach from Nag's Head to Norfolk; days without shelter, and without food. He's coughing badly, and feverish.” Cinda's quick imagination pictured Enid hovering over Faunt, sitting with him all day long. “I'm going to take a surgeon down to probe for the bullet in his side.”

“We'll get Dr. Little. I'm going back with you!”

“I thought you'd want to,” he agreed.

At Great Oak, when he had removed the bullet from Faunt's body, Dr. Little said there was no immediate danger; but Faunt would need
constant attention, and Cinda decided to stay on. Enid protested that this was not necessary. “Mama and I, with April to help us, can do everything,” she declared; but Cinda insisted on remaining.

Brett rode off to his post on Warwick River, and next morning before leaving for Richmond, Dr. Little assured them Faunt was better, needing only their tender care. Sleep had rested him, his color was good, and Cinda had never seen him so full of many words. A high indignation colored all he said—indignation against General Huger and against Mr. Benjamin for their failure to reinforce the island.

“The politicians will ruin us before they're done,” he declared.

“Everything's politics in Richmond,” Cinda agreed. “Politics and gambling. There are gaming houses everywhere, running all night long. And the place just smells of politicians. At the President's receptions I can hardly breathe for the smell of tobacco and rum they carry with them. Of course,” she added, “all the riffraff has gone into politics. The best men are in the army. The rest are just in politics so they won't have to risk their necks!”

He said thoughtfully: “You ladies—I don't mean you, of course—but the ladies are to blame for that. Politics used to be the profession of gentlemen; but now if a man's not in uniform ladies call him shameful names, so they've made politics disreputable, left it to such men as Mr. Benjamin, who don't mind what names they're called. He and the Government betrayed Roanoke as truly as if they'd shot us all.”

“Maybe they couldn't help you. Or maybe they didn't know you needed help.”

“Know? Why General Wise told them, over and over, right up to the last minute! He was sick at Nag's Head, sick in bed, but he still directed the defense; and five days before the attack he sent Dick Wise to Huger to tell him the situation.” His color rose as he spoke, and Cinda was concerned.

“Ought you to talk so much, Faunt?”

Enid answered her. “Oh, he likes to talk. He says it rests him to get it out of his system.” She said to him: “Tell her how you got away, Cousin Faunt.”

He obeyed so readily that Cinda thought it was true he found easement
in many words. “Why, the Yankees made their landing Thursday, in a howling northeast storm. They landed on the west side, at Ashby's. One of the Yankee steamers towed about a hundred boats full of men in a line along the shore, and the boats cut loose and hit the shore all abreast, forty or fifty men in each boat. We weren't there when they landed. We crossed from Nag's Head that morning, and landed on the upper end of the island and marched down the western side. We could see the Yankee ships, but the troops were already ashore. That night Captain Wise took twenty of us to see what they were doing; and they'd gone into camp, thousands of them. They knew there was no hurry!” His tone was harsh, his eyes blazing.

“Tell her how you got away,” Enid insisted. “It was perfectly amazing, Cousin Cinda. You just can't believe it.”

“It's hard to believe it myself,” Faunt agreed, “now that I'm here and warm and well fed and comfortable.” He explained: “The fighting came next day, Cinda. The causeway crosses a marsh, and we held the causeway and hoped the Yankees couldn't come through the marsh without getting bogged down; but they did, and flanked us. It was a Massachusetts regiment. Captain Wise had forgotten his overcoat, so he had a red blanket wrapped around him, and we made him take it off. He got a bullet through his sword arm; but he bandaged it and kept on fighting till a ball struck him in the body. By that time, we knew we had to get out of there; so we carried him in a blanket up the east side of the island through the woods, and put him into a boat to take him over to Nag's Head. I was in the boat with Captain Wise, and some New York troops came along the shore and let off a volley at us. That's when I was hit. The bullet knocked me out of the boat, and the boat had to surrender.”

“And he swam clear to the outer beach,” Enid cried. “Bleeding all the time.”

Faunt said quietly: “Why, the water was cold enough to stop the bleeding, and I didn't have to swim all the way. It was shallow enough so I could wade some of the time. I don't know why the Yankees didn't come after me—unless they were satisfied with having caught Captain Wise. Anyway, I made it. They sent gunboats later to bombard headquarters in the hotel at Nag's Head; but General Wise's men carried him away up the beach, and got a carriage——”

“I wish you'd tell about what you did, Cousin Faunt,” Enid urged. “We don't care about General Wise.”

“Well, a few of us just walked to Norfolk,” he said mildly.

Enid exclaimed in a pretty exasperation: “You're the most provoking man! Tell her all about it, the way you told me.”

Cinda could imagine that scene, Enid plying him with many questions. “How far is it from Nag's Head to Norfolk, Faunt?” she asked.

“I don't know. A long way.” He hesitated, his eyes shadowed by the memory of that ordeal. “It was still storming. The hotel at Nag's Head is on a sand spit between the ocean and the Sound. Sometimes the spit is miles wide, and sometimes it's so narrow a storm tide blows right across it; and there are sand hills fifty or a hundred feet high all along. They're all just sand except one they call Kill Devil Hill. That has grass to hold it down, but the other hills keep moving a few feet at a time, this way and that, when the wind blows the sand around. The outer beach is as hard as a floor, and we tried to stay on that; but each high tide drove us up into the soft sand, and that was hard walking, like pulling your feet out of glue at every step. Where the spit was narrow, the wind drove the water right across it, and sometimes we waded knee-deep, trying to follow what road there was. I never saw so many wild fowl in my life, millions of swans and geese and brant and ducks blown in by the storm. They'd rise in front of us and circle and settle down behind us in any lee they could find.”