Mrs. Lee and Mrs. Gray (39 page)

“I was recalling last Friday's chapel service. You know the rector's words are never among the briefest of human utterances.”

“He does tend to go on and on.”

“Friday he prayed over us for so long, classes were delayed. My faculty were quite annoyed.” He turned to me, his dark eyes twinkling with mischief. “Would it be wrong of me to suggest that he confine his morning prayers to us poor sinners at the college, and pray for the Turks and the Chinese and the other heathen some other time?”

We laughed and returned to our books until the clock chimed ten. Then he rose and went into the parlor. The music fell silent, and I heard the sound of the window blinds being lowered.

“Good night, young gentlemen,” Robert said firmly, sending our callers on their way.

A week later on our regular church evening, a terrible storm commenced, and continued during a very protracted vestry meeting. The general had been so unusually occupied all day that
he'd had no time for any recreation except a little snooze after dinner in his armchair.

When I went into tea at seven he had not returned from the vestry meeting, and I sat down with my sewing to wait for him, one eye on the raging storm outside, my ears attuned for the sound of his return.

Half an hour later he came in, and I heard him put his hat and coat in his room. He came into the dining room where our tea awaited.

“You have kept us waiting a long time, Robert. What have you been doing?”

He stood at the foot of the table to say grace but did not utter a sound as he sank back onto his chair.

“You look very tired. Let me pour you a cup of tea.”

He made no reply, but simply looked at me with an expression that alarmed me.

“Custis!”

Our son came in, took one look at his father, and knelt beside his chair. “Are you all right, Papa? What do you want?”

When Robert made no reply, Custis sent for Dr. Madison, who had been at the vestry meeting. A few minutes later the doctor arrived, along with Dr. Barton, and they both bent anxiously over my husband.

Dr. Madison asked for cold compresses and hot applications for Robert's feet. The doctors began undressing him, and he was perfectly able to help pull off his things, but he couldn't speak.

“What's the matter with him?” Custis spoke with the doctors while my daughters and I hovered near Robert's bed.

“More than likely an attack precipitated by overstrained nerves,” Dr. Madison said. “After a good rest he ought to be good as new.”

But after sleeping continuously for two days and nights, Robert was no better. My daughters and I took turns sitting beside his bed, speaking to him in softest tones and holding his hand. Mildred had always been his greatest comfort, and with increasing urgency she tried to revive her beloved papa, regaling him with stories of her school days in Raleigh and reminding him of the many teasing letters he had written to her.

“Remember my pet squirrel Custis Morgan?” she asked one afternoon, silent tears slipping down her cheek. “Remember when he got out of his cage and you told me to hold his head under water or else make squirrel soup?” She rested her head on his chest. “Remember when you wrote to me that your pet rattlesnake had died? Say you remember it, Papa.”

She looked up at me with such desolation in her eyes that my own tears began to fall. I sent her to her room to rest and took her place beside the sickbed.

Days passed. The doctors gave him medicine, which roused him somewhat. In those lucid moments I sat beside his bed, talking to him of our children and of the good wishes for his recovery that had come in from around the country.

The following Saturday he greeted me with an outstretched hand and kindly pressure. “Mary.”

I took his hand. My hopes revived. “You look much stronger today. Before you know it you will be good as new and riding out on Traveler. He has missed you.”

A terribly sad look crept across his face then. He shook his head slowly and turned his face to the wall.

On Sunday night he suddenly became insensible and lay in that condition until Tuesday, when all hope was relinquished. I called for my children and we sat up all night, every moment almost expecting it to be his last. He lay breathing most heavily and, the doctor said, entirely unconscious of pain. It was a terrible night, everyone frightened and in tears.

Custis handed me a cup of tea. “I think we ought to send for the Reverend Pendleton.”

The minister arrived and knelt with us around Robert's bed. We recited the prayer for the sick. Afterward I sat with Robert's hand in mine, all moist with heavy perspiration, until about nine o'clock in the morning. Mildred went for Dr. Madison. He simply looked at Robert, shook his head, and walked away.

“Mama,” Custis said quietly. “Why don't you lie down for just a little while? You will make yourself sick just sitting here.”

Agnes agreed. “Let me help you get into bed. We will come and get you if there is any change.”

“At least have some tea and change your dress,” Precious Life said. “It will make you feel better.”

I allowed her to help me to my room, where I had tea and changed my dress. I was gone but for an hour, and when I went back Robert had begun to struggle for breath. After two very severe struggles, his breath seemed to pass away gently, and he then lay cold and insensible.

Custis kissed his father's cheek. He went into the hall and retrieved his coat and umbrella. “The girls will stay here with you while I telegraph Fitzhugh and Rob.”

“All right.”

“Where is Mary these days?”

“Kinloch.”

“I'll wire her too, but I doubt she can get here in time for the funeral.”

“Typical.” Agnes wiped her eyes. “Mary never loved Papa as much as we do. She won't even care that the most wonderful, kindest, and most handsome father in the entire world is gone.”

“Agnes, don't criticize your sister, please. Not now.”

“Sorry, Mama, but it's so hard to refrain.”

Robert's hand was growing cold in mine.

“Please leave me now. I want to be alone with your papa.”

“Of course,” Precious Life said. “But we will be right outside if you want us.”

I sat in the silence as the morning wore on. My mind moved in reverse across the many years with Robert, back to our shared childhood at Arlington, back to the joy of our wedding day, to the thousand small kindnesses Robert had shown me during all the years of our marriage. Rosebuds at my breakfast plate. Strong arms lifting me when I was too weak to walk. Sweet words comforting me in the deepest night. His unfettered delight in his children. The extraordinary sacrifice he had made for the Confederacy.

I couldn't think of a future without him in it. With the extinguishing of his breath, my life had shed the last vestiges of meaning, for everything in our house was always done with a reference to his comfort, his wishes. Now there was no object in having anything done.

Outside, the bells at Washington Hall tolled.

Custis returned. “I've sent for Mary and the boys.” He placed
a hand on my shoulder. “The news is out, and the whole city has gone into mourning for Papa. You had better prepare for another stream of visitors.”

A torrent of tears fell onto that most noble face as I bent to kiss Robert for the last time. I had never so truly felt the purity of his character as in that moment, when I had nothing left to me but its memory.

“Good-bye, my dearest love. My own heart. Good-bye, beloved warrior.”

1873

T
he newspapers took note of my return to Arlington and were effusive in their praise.

Mrs. Lee is a lady whose noble character and Christian graces render her an object of reverence to all who meet her. Mrs. Lee conversed upon the matter of her lost home without one single expression or shade of bitterness.

No shade of bitterness. Did they suppose I had forgotten for a single moment that my home was taken from me without any conscience or common decency, despite the countless kindnesses my father showed to the Northern people?

Let them think what they will. I will never be resigned to the loss of Arlington. If justice and law are not utterly extinct in the United States, I will have it back.

This is the story I tell myself. Hope, after all, is the comforter of the wretched. But death's swift scythe—so keen and unsparing—had taken so many who were so dearly loved.

It was my husband I missed most. He was a bright star that moved in its singular orbit, bringing light and warmth to my
darkest days. Without his strong arm and loving heart I lost much of the will to fight. It was lassitude and not capitulation that accounted for my seeming acquiescence to common thievery.

During my long absence, whenever I thought of Arlington in its present condition, it seemed like a terrible dream. Daily I had been almost maddened by accounts of fallen Union soldiers being interred on my own property. The dear old house was rarely out of my thoughts either waking or sleeping, until the longing to revisit it became almost more than I could endure.

Perhaps I ought to have been content with my memories. But memory is a treacherous thing, and in the end I felt I could not die in peace until I had seen Arlington once more. With Rob and a carriage full of Fitzhugh cousins, I went home.

Beneath a brilliant summer sky we drove through familiar hills stained with lemon-colored light, the rattle of the carriage wheels startling flocks of sparrows that lifted and winged above the river, black against the sun.

Rob buried his nose in the latest edition of the Washington City newspaper. My cousins nattered on about subjects of no consequence, attempting to draw me out of my melancholy reverie. But I could think of nothing but Arlington.

The scent of lilacs coming through the carriage windows transported me across the years to mornings in the dew-drenched rose garden with my mother, to the humming of insects in the whispering grass and the press of the sun on our heads as it spread its light across the gray surface of the river.

I thought of crisp October mornings on horseback with my father, the woodsmoke curling from the chimneys of the servants' quarters, the surrounding trees resplendent in the mellowed luster of autumn.

Rob folded his newspaper and set it aside. “The papers say the Syphaxes are pressing their claim to the acreage Grandpa left to Maria.”

To this bit of intelligence I made no reply. I had managed to keep thoughts of my father's former slave to myself, and to shield my children from the unpleasant truth that had come to light only after his death.

We crossed the long bridge and turned up the steep lane to the house. Filled with a mix of anticipation and disquietude, I leaned closer to the window. The hills where children both black and white had played were stripped of trees and occupied by the Freedman's Village where two thousand former slaves crowded together in idleness. I couldn't help feeling a jolt of anger that all of my efforts to improve their circumstances had borne such meager fruit.

The carriage halted at the door, and I looked beyond the village to endless rows of graves, the white marble tombstones stretching into infinity. Placed there out of nothing less than pure malice by a man my husband had once called a friend. I felt dizzy and sick with grief.

Rob laid a hand on my arm. “Are you all right? We can turn around and go back to Ravensworth if this is too difficult for you.”

His gentle attention calmed my racing thoughts. “No need for that, child. We're here now. I will be all right.”

“Cousin Mary?” The youngest of our party, only sixteen, caught my hand. “May we go down to Arlington Spring? Mother says there is a boat landing and a dance pavilion.”

“That was a long time ago. I have no idea what is left of it now.”

“I remember it, Mama,” Rob said. “I'll take them down there.”

The cousins spilled from the carriage and headed off toward the river.

Rob said, “Shall I carry you inside the house first?”

But I had no wish to go inside. I sent him off with the others and sat in the carriage, the door open to the breeze coming from the river. Birdsong wafted over the ruined gardens where I had spent so many happy hours with my sketchbook and paint box. Across the river, the half-finished monument to President Washington shimmered in the morning light.

A group of former slaves crossed the yard on their way back to the Freedman's Village, and I thought of Selina. Through many years, the necessary daily contact between mistress and servant had ripened into a mutual attachment. But I feared that despite our continuous exchange of letters, time and circumstance had frayed the bonds of friendship.

“Mrs. Lee.”

My eyes flew open, and I realized I had drifted into sleep. And that Selina—as if summoned by a dream—had come to see me.

I was shocked at the change in her. Though I was fifteen years her senior, she looked nearly as old as I. Her hair was threaded with gray, her hands careworn, and her eyes—which had so often glowed with curiosity or amusement or compassion—were devoid of light.

For a moment we regarded each other in silence. Not because there was nothing to say, but because there was too much.

Selina spoke first, and then it was as if all the years that separated us had not happened at all. “I'm glad you came back. I have been very anxious to see you. How are you, Mrs. Lee?”

“Truthfully? I am terribly weary these days.”

She handed me a glass of water. “I heard you were coming today, and I came to see you. I thought you might be thirsty after such a long trip. Nothing is sweeter than the water of Arlington.”

I made room for her in the carriage and drank deeply of that sweet, cold water.

“I never thought I would live long enough to see you again,” she said, blotting her face with her handkerchief. “Then I read in the paper that you were visiting your kinfolks at Ravensworth.”