Swan's Way (30 page)

Finally, Polly put an end to his monologue. “Time for the broomstick jumpin’, Brother Zebulon.”

He said a quick, “Amen!” and beamed at the couple he had successfully married.

“Don’t I get to kiss my bride?” Channing begged.

“Iffen you do it quick,” Zeb answered. “Polly’s got that broomstick ready and she ain’t a patient women.”

Virginia flowed into Channing’s arms and forgot the rest of the world existed, as he covered her lips with his. Even in the euphoria of that moment of first-wedded bliss, her thoughts went to the old Bible in the parlor. One more line could be filled in tonight. A line that would link her soul and Channing’s for all time.

Fiddlin’ Joe struck up his music again. All the servants clapped and sang and cheered. When Virginia looked around, she saw two of the fancifully dressed children parading about the hall with an old broomstick, beribboned and decked with flowers.

“Shall we?” Channing said, laughing, beaming.

“Take dem shoes off first,” Polly warned. “It don’t take, lessen you’s barefoot.”

Channing tried hopping on one foot and pulling his boots off, without luck. Finally, Polly brought a chair. When he sat down, she showed Virginia the proper way to put her backside to her man and tug off his boots. Laughing and blushing, Virginia almost fell flat on her face when the second one finally came loose.

“Now you sit, Miss Virginia. Mister Channing got to take off your slippers.”

Virginia tried to protest. After all, it might not be unseemly for her to bare her feet before her new husband. But in front of her mother, her sister-in-law, and all these servants?

“You got to do it, Miss Virginia,” Polly urged.

She looked toward Melora, who smiled and nodded. Only then did Virginia sit down.

Channing might have made quick work of the process, but he chose not to. Instead, he drew up her skirts slowly, until her satin slippers and bare ankles were exposed for all to see. Caressing her ankle gently, sending fire up her legs, he drew off the first shoe inch-by-inch, then repeated the process. When both her feet were naked, Channing rubbed his palms over her soles. She felt hot and cold and trembling with longing, by the time he released her and rose. For long moments, she sat staring up at him, afraid to trust her legs to hold her.

He offered his hand. “Come, darlin’, everyone’s waiting.”

The children with the broomstick danced about, teasing the bride and groom. “Catch us, iffen you can! Dis ole broomstick, she like to dance.”

Fiddlin’ Joe played faster and faster. Having no luck at catching the dancing broomstick, Channing caught Virginia in his arms and whirled her around the room—faster and faster, until it seemed they would take wing. All the while, he kept his eyes on the naughty scamps who held the stick. When they became mesmerized by Channing and Virginia’s dance, he swept her toward them, pretending not to notice they were there.

“Now!” he whispered into Virginia’s ear. “Jump, my love. Jump the broomstick!”

They left the floor together, clearing the final obstacle to their marriage by several inches. When they landed on the other side, everyone cheered. The children marched up and down the stairs, holding the broomstick on high. Fiddlin’ Joe played on and on. Everyone danced. Polly disappeared into the pantry and returned with punch for the wedding guests.

“I make you all a cake, soon as I get me some sugar,” she promised the bride and groom.

A short time later, Melora gave the signal that it was time for the party to end. Each servant came to the newlyweds to wish them well. Then they all filed out of the house, leaving only Virginia, Channing, Agnes, and Melora in the wide entranceway that had been the site of the spirited ceremony.

“Agnes,” Melora said, “you look weary, dear. Why don’t you go on up to bed?”

Realizing that this was more order than suggestion, Rodney’s wife said her goodnights and left them.

Melora turned to the happy couple. “I want you to know that both the Lord and I bless this marriage. Channing, Virginia, you are one now. Hold each other dear for all your lives. I’m going to leave you now. You must be gone by sunrise, Channing. It would be dangerous for you to stay longer, with my husband and sons so near. But you have this night. Cherish it, and each other.”

Virginia was beyond words when her mother came to kiss her cheek and give her an affectionate hug. Next, Melora turned to Channing. “Welcome to the family, son,” she said. Then in a whisper for Channing’s ears alone, “Take your bride to her room. The two of you should be
lovingly comfortable
there for the night.”

“Thank you, Mother Swan,” he said. “For
everything!”

A short time later, with the house all quiet at last, Virginia felt her heart sing. Lifting her into his arms, Channing carried his bride up the wide staircase, down the hall, and into her room. Polly and Melora had been there since Virginia left to go to supper. Wisteria set in vases perfumed the cool night air, and on the bed was the Sunday House quilt from Virginia’s hope chest.

The couple wasted little time on preliminaries. Before Virginia knew it, she was as naked as her handsome husband, lying in the bed where, until tonight, an old maid had slept. But it was no maiden who fell into Channing McNeal’s arms that night, who slept not a wink, but gave her man all she had to give and accepted his loving tribute in return. They made love that night, as though every moment might be their last on earth. They pledged with their bodies what their hearts and souls had long since vowed. They would be together
always—
in spirit, when not in the flesh.

As the first pearly-pink rays of dawn crept into the room, Channing kissed his well-loved wife, then rose from the bed to dress.

“How long before I’ll see you again, Channing?”

“I don’t know, darlin’. There’s no way I can give you an answer. But you’ll be in my heart and in my mind every minute I’m away.”

“I love you so, Channing!” She reached out and caught his hand, brought it to her lips, and kissed it.

Channing leaned down over her, caressing her breast and staring into her wide, brilliant eyes that were all the colors of heaven.

“I love you more than you’ll ever know, Virginia McNeal. And, if the good Lord was listening to Brother Zeb tonight, I’ll be home when you give birth to our first child. Early spring, when everything comes to life—the trees, the flowers, and our baby.”

He kissed her one last time—a long, sweet, tender kiss. Virginia felt her heart breaking when he strode out of the room.

“Come back to me, Channing. “Oh, please, my darling!”

Only a short time after Channing left, Virginia rose from her bed, recalling something they had forgotten to do. With her wisteria wedding bouquet in hand, she tiptoed from the room. Outside, in a plot behind the house, she planted the vines by dawn’s rose-gold light.

“There,” she whispered. “Let our love last as long as this sweet wisteria grows and blooms.”

Just after sunrise, on a dusty day in early August that was already hot enough to curl a pig’s tail, the unannounced visitor rode up the drive past the swan pond.

“Virginia! Agnes!” Melora Swan’s call of alarm echoed down the upstairs hallway. “Someone’s coming. Be ready!”

Be ready!
had become their watchword over the past weeks, as more and more strangers came to their door, begging or demanding food. In spite of the young mother’s protests, Virginia had taught Agnes to shoot one of the Colonel’s old squirrel guns. At the signal from Melora, Virginia and Agnes, both armed, would station themselves at upstairs windows that commanded a clear view of the veranda steps below. They all knew their positions and their duties. With the two young women covering him from above, Juniper would greet the visitors outside, while Melora, a loaded derringer clasped at the ready inside her apron pocket, stood watch from the shadows of the entranceway. After their near-disastrous run-in with those Yankees back in May, they weren’t about to take any chances.

Virginia watched from her window, as the lone rider came to a halt at the foot of the stairs and dismounted. She felt ill this morning, as she had for several days past. But she gritted her teeth and swore that the chamber pot could and would wait. She had her duty to perform. The man might be alone and seemingly harmless. Until he made his business clear to Juniper, however, the stranger would remain squarely in the sights of Virginia’s rifle.

She heard the man mumble something to Juniper.

“Captain Royal, you say, sir?” Juniper’s deep, clear voice drifted up from down below. “You’s a friend of Mister Channing?”

Virginia eased her trembling finger off the trigger and lowered the gun. Could it really be? Was she about to get some news of her husband, finally, after all this time? She had had one brief note from him that he wrote a week after their broomstick wedding. He had said they were on the march, headed West She had received his short message, vowing his love anew, over a month after Channing wrote it. Since then, not a word.

“Captain Royal, how good that you’ve returned.” Melora stepped outside to greet their visitor warmly. “My daughter told me of your last visit. I apologize for not coming out to speak to you then, but you arrived at a rather awkward moment. Do come in, won’t you?”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

Jacob Royal looked like a gray ghost, covered from head to toe as he was with the powdery dust of August. When he disappeared from view, following Melora Swan into the house, Virginia leaped to action. She had to talk to him immediately. There was no time to dress. She grabbed an old red velvet evening cloak out of her armoir and draped it around her shoulders. In moments, she was headed downstairs, her earlier queasiness forgotten in her excitement at seeing Channing’s friend once more. Maybe he would bring news of her husband.

By the time Virginia reached the main floor, her mother and the captain were in the library. She hurried to join them without waiting for an invitation.

Melora turned, shock registering on her face at her daughter’s unorthodox attire. “Virginia! You might have dressed!”

“I’m sorry, Mother, but I had to speak to Captain Royal at once.” She turned to him, glowing with expectation. “What news from Channing?”

He shook his head and averted his gaze. “I’m sorry, but I haven’t seen him in months, although our paths probably came near to crossing last month, during the Seven Days’ Battle, as it’s being called.”

“Seven days of fighting?” Virginia said, imagining all sorts of horrible scenes.

“Actually, it lasted much longer—nearly a month. McClellan’s forces under General Fitz-John Porter made a push toward Richmond. We clashed at every little crossroads along the way—Gaines’ Mill, Fair Oaks, Seven Pines, Glendale, Frays-er’s Farm, White Oak Swamp, and Malvern Hill, which was a clear victory for the North. We were totally out-gunned and out-manned. Even General Lee couldn’t believe it, when McClellan called a retreat. But “Ole Marse Bob,” as the soldiers call our commander, took immediate advantage of the situation. We forged ahead, pushing over one hundred thousand Federals back twenty miles, from the Pamunkey River clear to the James.”

Virginia’s heart sank. With so many battles fought, involving so many men, the casualties had to be enormous. She prayed silently that Channing wasn’t merely a statistic, by now. And what of her father and brothers?

As if reading her mind, Jake Royal said, “I do have news from Colonel Swan and the boys, though.”

“Are they well, Captain?” Melora’s voice was as rigid as her spine. She steeled herself for the worst.

“Alive, ma’am. I suppose, after such a campaign, that’s the same as well.”

Virginia watched her mother relax visibly.

“Tell me, Captain Royal. Please! Don’t spare any details.”

He glanced around, first to make sure that he was alone with the two women. He knew that Rodney Swan’s wife, the mother of his child, was also somewhere in the house. Luckily, Agnes had yet to join them. The news of her husband would be easier, coming from her mother-in-law than from a total stranger, and a man at that. Women seemed to have a knack for softening cruel blows.

“Your sons, Rodney and Jed, have been wounded, ma’am.” He voice was quiet with sympathy.

Both Virginia and Melora gasped. Virginia went to her mother and slipped an arm around her shoulders.

“How badly?” Melora asked.

From his discomifited expression, Virginia could tell that Jake Royal wished he were not the bearer of such news. He took a deep breath before he answered.

“Young Jed took a shot through the shoulder, ma’am. He was taken away in a hospital wagon, so I can’t report on his current condition, but I doubt it’s serious.”

“And Rodney?”

Royal hesitated for long moments and focused his gaze out the window at some distant point. “A head wound,” he said at length. “His father was with him when I last saw them. The Colonel believes that Rodney will recover, in time.”

In time
. The words hung in the air like a pall.

Melora looked directly at Virginia. “Not a word of this to Agnes, do you understand? She is not a strong woman. There’s nothing she can do, so there is no need for her to know.”

Virginia and Jake Royal exchanged solemn looks, then both nodded.

“My husband is uninjured?”

“Fine, ma’am. The Colonel thrives.”

Still holding her mother’s shoulders, Virginia felt Melora release a pent-up sigh of relief. Then, shrugging her daughter’s protective arm away, she said archly, “Just like a man, to thrive on war! I believe it’s past time we offered you some breakfast, Captain Royal. And, Virginia, you go and dress. This minute!”

Just then, one of the ever-present kittens on the place came bounding into the room, chasing a moth. The sight of the ball of calico fur bounding and leaping eased the tension in the room. Jake reached down and caught the little cat in mid-pounce.

“Hello, there, you pretty little girl.” He snuggled the kitten under his whiskered chin and laughed when she batted his cheeks.

“How did you know that Rainbow’s a girl?” Virginia asked. The men in her family cared little or nothing for cats.

He chuckled and scratched the kitten’s ears. “I never saw a calico that wasn’t a female. Good mousers they are, too. And this one—Rainbow—is a mighty pretty thing. My Amanda would love her.”

A thought dawned on Virginia, at that moment. “Then your Amanda shall have her, Captain Royal. A gift from the Swan family.”

Rainbow stared up at him with her wide, gold-green eyes and meowed, as if she agreed with the plan.

“That’s a sweet gesture, Miss Virginia, but I don’t know when I’ll get home again to take Rainbow to Amanda.”

“She can wait here, until you find yourself headed for Tennessee. Channing told me that you and Miss Kelly plan to be married over the holidays. Perhaps you can take Rainbow then.”

A warm smile spread over his handsome face. Virginia could tell he was thinking of his love and their coming wedding.

“Did you know that Channing and I are married now?”

He stared at her. “No. When?”

“Virginia, don’t you think you had better go up and get dressed now?” Melora asked. She did
not
want her husband finding out that his only daughter had been wed.

However, before Melora could stop Virginia, she had told Captain Royal the whole story about the Yankee soldiers and the silver teapot and Channing’s arrival in the nick of time and their broomstick wedding.

When she finished, Jake Royal was chuckling. “Well, as we say down home in Tennessee, that sure takes the rag often the bush, Miz McNeal!”

“It was
supposed
to remain our secret,” Melora warned. “Please, Captain Royal, don’t tell anyone. My husband absolutely forbad them to marry, until after the war.”

Jake put the kitten down and turned to Melora. “You needn’t worry, Miz Swan. Your secret is safe with me. I’m sure glad Amanda’s daddy doesn’t feel that way. I can hardly wait to get home and marry that girl.”

Suddenly, Virginia was sorry she hadn’t heeded her mother’s instructions to go upstairs and dress. She went from feeling fine to feeling faint and ill, in the span of a moment. She felt her mother’s hand touch her arm. She couldn’t see her, because of the strange, bright spots floating in front of her eyes.

“Please excuse us, Captain Royal. It seems my daughter’s taken ill.”

“I’m so sorry. I hope it isn’t the grippe.”

“I’m sure not,” Virginia heard her mother answer. “It’s something far more natural for a woman in her state.”

Virginia’s mother helped her to a chair. “Something far more natural?” What did that mean?

“Don’t worry, dear. I’ll have Polly mix you a morning sickness potion. The first three months are always the worst. You’ll be over this soon, I vow.”

Virginia still felt dazed. Then realization came. “Do you mean I’m
pregnant?”

“I wouldn’t be at all surprised, dear. Hadn’t you guessed? Why, Polly and I have been speculating on that possibility for weeks.”

All sorts of bright, happy thoughts danced in Virginia’s head. Still, her gaze was fuzzy, and she felt lightheaded and strange. The room suddenly seemed to be filled with people. Only they weren’t real people, but mere shadows laughing and talking all around her.

“A wedding!” she heard someone say. “Won’t it be fine?”

“The best time we’ve had at Swan’s Quarter since that young preacher from Front Royal first came to lead the Sunday singing.”

Virginia seemed to recognize the two female voices, but, then again, she didn’t.

She moaned softly, disoriented and feeling as though she were drifting through space. The room appeared to be turning upside down.

“A baby,” she sighed. “Channing’s baby.”

The next moment, everything around her went black.

“Ginna? Ginna, wake up!”

“A baby—mine and Channing’s …”

“Here, darlin’, let me help you sit up. Remember me? Neal?”

Ginna felt only half herself. Part of her was still Virginia, the woman carrying Channing McNeal’s child. She almost hated to give up that part of the past.

When her head cleared and she looked up, she spied the heavy wisteria that hung like a green and purple curtain overhead. This was the very vine she had planted the morning Channing rode off, after their marriage and their long, sweet night of love-making. Her bridal bouquet had now grown and matured, like her love for her husband.

“Ginna? You’re still a million miles away.” Neal was right She was.

“We’re back so soon?” she whispered. “But it wasn’t finished. I still don’t know what happened.”

“You know that Virginia and Channing were married, that they had a baby. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?”

“There’s still so much I don’t know. Did Channing come home from the war? And what about Colonel Swan? How about Rodney and Jed and the others. Poor Agnes! What if she had to raise little Roslyn all alone?”

“There are other ways to find out,” Neal insisted. “You said Kirkwood mentioned an old Bible containing the family records. We’ll take a look. But I
really
don’t think we’d better go back to the past, Ginna, ever again. We belong here-together.”

She turned to look at him. Why had he said that? He, above all people, should understand that Virginia belonged with her husband, Channing.

“I intend to find out what happened to all the Swans, one way or another.”

“And
then
you’ll marry me? I mean, I’m really beginning to feel cheated. You married Channing, now marry
me
. Hey, I’ll even jump a broomstick, if that’s the way you want it. Anytime, anyplace, you name it!”

Ginna couldn’t help but laugh. And she couldn’t help but love Neal for the way he put up with her whims and excuses.

She leaned forward and kissed his mouth ever so softly. “How does the day after tomorrow sound for our wedding?”

Neal threw his arms around her and hugged her close. “Do you really mean it?
Day after tomorrow?”

“If that’s too soon …”

He cut off her sentence with his lips, holding her gently, kissing her deeply.

Old Zee strolled in, interrupting their intimate moment, “You folks gonna miss dinner. They’s already in the dining room, you know. I done had mine in the kitchen.”

“Goodness! How did it get so late?” Ginna said, slightly flustered. “Come on, Neal. We’d better go.”

Hand in hand, they hurried to the dining room. Sure enough, everyone was seated. Elspeth motioned for them to come sit at her table.

“We just got started,” the old woman called. “Come on over, and we’ll send to the kitchen for two more plates.”

Ginna thought quickly, trying to come up with some excuse for their tardiness. She needn’t have bothered. Neither Elspeth nor any of the others asked where they had been. Instead, all the attention focused on Neal.

“Well, I declare!” Elspeth said. “I thought you were laid up in bed, Neal. The doctor let you up so soon?”

Suddenly remembering that he had been shot, Neal glanced down at his arm. There was no bandage, no wound, no scar. Also, no explanation. He laughed and raised his arm for all of them to see.