Encounter at Cold Harbor (3 page)

Sarah found him out beside the fence, watching the newest litter of pigs as they grunted at their mother’s side. It was hot, and she wore a cool dress made of cotton, which outlined her trim figure. Her
black hair caught the last rays of the red sun as it went behind the mountains. Stepping up beside Tom, she looked at the pigs. “You wouldn’t think pigs could be cute, would you?”

“I guess anything’s cute when it’s little—even a p
ⁱ
g.”

The two stood talking for some time about unimportant things, then turned to go back to the house. When they were halfway there, Sarah caught his arm and pulled him around. “Tom,” she said with a question in her voice and in her eyes, “what’s going to happen to us?”

“Happen to us? I reckon it’s already happened,” Tom said, and there was bitterness in his tone. “I don’t reckon that we’ve got any future, Sarah.”

“Because you lost a leg? I thought we had all this settled. A man’s more than a leg.”

“It’s all right for you to say that, but I’m the one who has to make the livin’. How can a one-legged man care for a wife and a family?”

“Why, Tom Majors, I reckon you can do just about anything you set your mind to!”

Tom stared at her briefly, stirred for the moment, it seemed, by her words. “I used to think that too, Sarah, but think how hard it’d be to be a farmer. I’ve tried to plow, and I just can’t keep up with Ezra.”

“There’s more to farming than
plowing
. You can always hire a hand to do that!” Sarah said steadfastly. “I just thank God every day that it wasn’t worse. You could’ve been killed!”

“Sometimes I wish I had been.”

“Tom, don’t talk like that!” Sarah put her hand on his chest, then laid it on his cheek. Her touch was soft as a feather.

Reaching up, he placed a hand over hers and held it. Finally he said in despair, “I’d like it if things were like they used to be, but they never will be, Sarah!”

“I thought you wanted to
marry
me!”

“That was when I was a whole man!”

“We’ve talked about this! You
are
a whole man! A man is what he is in his heart and in his mind!”

Tom stood there, perhaps trying to believe her words, but finally the depression that had been eating at him for some time seemed to overpower him. Heavily he said, “I’ve made up my mind. I’d never let you tie yourself to a cripple, Sarah.”

He pulled away, and she watched him limp down the path toward the house. Tears rose to her eyes, and she almost called after him. But she realized that the Tom Majors she had known might have lost a leg but he had retained all the Majors stubbornness. Slowly she followed him to the house and went inside.

Leah was sitting at the table with her father, studying arithmetic. Dan Carter had a fine grasp of the subject, and Leah was very poor at it. She could not keep her mind on numbers today, and from time to time she lifted her eyes to the homemade calendar that hung on the wall. She had made it herself, and every day she checked off the day before she went to bed. She got up to cross out April first. “I forgot to do that last night. Yesterday was April Fools’ Day, and you forgot it!”

“I reckon I did,” her father said. He looked down at the figures and began explaining them again, but at that moment Tom came in. “Well, hello, Tom! You been out walkin’ again?”

Tom stood by Dan Carter’s chair. “I been thinkin’ a lot, Mr. Carter,” he said. He sat down slowly and clasped his hands in front of him. “I think you’re right about Leah. She’s too young to go on that trip by herself.”

“I am not!” Leah protested.

“Yes, you are, daughter! Now, hush!” Dan Carter turned back to Tom. “Have you thought of something else?”

“Well, I should’ve thought of it first off.” Tom moved in his chair and then straightened his back.
“I’ll
take Esther to Richmond. It’s time I was leaving here anyhow.”

Dan Carter stared at his young friend. “Are you sure you could make it? Your leg’s going to be all right?”

“I’ll be all right!” Tom said shortly. He never liked anyone to refer to his injury. “It’s time for me to go back. I need to get back where I belong.”

“But you can’t go in the army!” Leah said, then wished she had not. “I mean—”

“I know. I can’t march with one leg, but maybe Pa can find something for me to do. Maybe be a clerk in headquarters.” Bitterness came to his lips then, and he said, “I can’t do much, but I’ll do what I can.”

Leah walked over and stood beside Tom. She put her hand on his shoulder, looking down at him, thinking how much he looked like Jeff. “Then, if you go, I’m going with you. You couldn’t take care of a three-year-old!”

Tom looked up and found a smile. “Why—that would be good, if it’s all right with your Pa.”

“Well, of course it’s all right with
you
along, Tom! Wouldn’t be good to ship the poor child off
with just a man to take care of her. She needs a woman!”

Leah smiled brilliantly. “I can do it, Pa! I’m going to tell Ma right now!”

As soon as the girl left the room, Tom shook his head. “It still could be dangerous, Mr. Carter. You know what it’s like in wartime.”

“I won’t worry about it a minute with you there, Tom. You Majorses have a way of doin’ what you set out to do.” He rose and slapped the young man on the shoulder. “I’m mighty glad you decided to do this. Your pa will be glad to see you, too—although we’ll miss you around here.”

“I’ll miss you too, sir.”

From that moment on, the house was in a flurry as everyone got things ready for the journey to Richmond.

The Carter family stood waiting for the stagecoach to arrive. The stage would take Leah and Tom and Esther to the train in Lexington, and from there they would travel by rail to Richmond. Because so many of the railroads were out, the trip would take a long time.

Sarah was sure Leah wasn’t thinking about that. Her sister was eagerly standing beside Tom, holding Esther in her arms, when the coach pulled up.

Sarah and her father and mother and Morena each gave Leah a quick kiss. Her parents and Morena all shook hands with Tom.

When it was Sarah’s turn to say good-bye to him, she looked up, expecting him to kiss her.

Instead, he awkwardly extended his hand. “Goodbye, Sarah,” he said gruffly. He got into the coach
with Leah and Esther, the driver cracked his whip, and the coach pulled out.

Sarah stood watching them go, and sadness came over her.
He didn’t even kiss me good-bye
, she thought. She watched until the stagecoach disappeared in a cloud of dust down the road, then turned to go with her family back to the house. She knew it would be an empty house for her, but there was no other way.

L
eah dabbed the edge of her handkerchief in the cup of water that Tom brought her and ineffectively wiped Esther’s face. The passenger car swayed from side to side, almost violently. She had to hold tightly to the child to keep her from falling off her lap.

“There,” she said finally, “that’s the best I can do.”

“Here,” Tom said, “let me hold her a while, Leah.” He took Esther and seated himself on the hard, horsehide seat next to Leah. Studying the child, he grinned, saying, “I believe she’s a better traveler than either one of us. She even seems to like it.”

As they had suspected, the railway systems were so disrupted by the war that they had to change trains innumerable times. However, Esther had made the trip well all the way from Kentucky. She had even flourished on the journey. Right now she struggled to get down to the floor, but Tom held her tightly.

“No, you can’t get down,” he said. “Here, stand up beside me and look out the window.” He turned her toward the glass.

This seemed to please Esther well. As the landscape flashed by, she chattered almost constantly.

“It’s been a long trip,” Tom said. “I know you’re worn out, Leah.”

“I’ll be glad to lie down on a bed again.” Leah groaned, straightening her back painfully. “It’s hard to sleep sitting up in one of these seats.”

“Sure is!” Tom looked out the window and said abruptly, “Looks like we’re pulling into Richmond. There’s the siding right over there.”

“Won’t be too soon for me!” Leah brightened and brushed away some cinders that had come in through the open window. Her face was smeared with smut. “We look like we’ve come from a sideshow!”

“I guess it beats walking.” Tom held onto Esther tightly. “Pa will sure be glad to see Esther again.”

“He’ll be glad to see you too, Tom.”

Tom did not answer for a while, and when he did he changed the subject. Turning to Leah, he said, “I guess you’ll be glad to see Jeff.”

“I guess so.”

“You
guess
so!” Tom jeered. “You two are thick as thieves. Always have been!”

They talked about the time Leah and Jeff had gotten lost in the woods and Tom had to go find them. “You two always were close,” he said, holding tightly to Esther as the train clanked and rattled over the rails, swaying from side to side. “Must be nice to have a built-in sweetheart. You don’t have to make any decisions.”

“Oh, don’t be foolish, Tom!”

“Nothing foolish about that!” He watched the tall buildings as the train rolled into the outskirts of Richmond. “Most girls have an awful time courting, have all kinds of fellows, and can’t make up their minds.”

He’d always liked to tease Leah, and now, she thought, he seemed to be light of spirit for a change.

“But you and Jeff—why, you just grew up together.”

Leah was watching the buildings of Richmond also. Finally she said quietly, “That’s just the trouble, Tom.”

“What trouble?”

“Jeff never thinks about me as a woman. He thinks about me as a little girl.” She touched her hair and, feeling the grittiness of it, made a face. “I guess he’ll always think of me as just the little girl he went hunting birds’ eggs with.”

Tom studied her. “Well, you look a lot better than you did when you were eleven or twelve. You were all legs and arms then and gawky as a crane.” He laughed. “I think you used to cry about that every day!”

“I did!” Leah admitted. “I thought I was too tall, and I still think so!”

“You’re not too tall for Jeff. He’s going to be taller than either Pa or me. Why, he might be six one or two by the time he stops growing.”

“It won’t make any difference,” she said. She sat quietly for so long that Tom must have noticed she was worried.

“What’s wrong, Leah? I thought you’d be glad to get back to see Jeff and Uncle Silas.”

Leah thought, then said, “It’s hard to grow up, Tom. I sometimes don’t know whether I’m a girl or a woman. I’m just halfway in between.”

Tom reached over and patted her on the shoulder. “Well, believe it or not, it’s hard for boys to grow up too. Hard to know when to act like a man and when to act like a baby.” He smiled. “I heard a funny story about Lincoln. Somebody asked him how he took a loss, and he said, ‘Well, when I was a
boy, things would happen and I would cry.’ He said, ‘Now I’m too old to cry, and it hurts too much to laugh.’”

Leah could not help smiling too. “I guess that’s about the way I am. It hurts too much sometimes, but—”

“One thing’s for sure. You’re
going
to grow up, and Jeff’s going to see one day what a fine-looking young lady you are. You already are, as far as I’m concerned.”

“I’ll never be as pretty as Sarah.”

Tom looked at her quickly. His mouth tightened into a straight line, and he said no more.

Leah knew that she had said too much, for Tom was sensitive about speaking of Sarah. “Look,” she said, “there’s the church tower right over there! See it?”

“Yep, we’ll be at the station in five minutes.”

His prediction was accurate. The train huffed and chuffed as it slowed down. When they pulled into the station, it expelled a great gust of steam.

“Guess we better get our stuff together,” Tom said. He stood up, balancing for a moment.

Leah saw that it pained him to stand. But she said nothing, for she knew he was sensitive about the leg too. As the train came to a clanking stop, she picked up Esther. “If you’ll get the suitcases, I can handle her.”

“All right.”

They stepped off the train, and at once Tom was gripped by his father, who suddenly appeared right beside him.

“Tom!” he said. “By Harry, it’s good to see you again! You’re looking fine!”

Tom swallowed hard and hugged his father, then stepped back. His father was in military dress, and Tom was wearing the uniform he had worn at Gettysburg—which had been patched together by Sarah. “I guess it must look funny—a colonel hugging a sergeant!”

“Who cares!” his father said. “Now, let me look at this girl of mine.” He took the child from Leah and held her carefully in his arms. “Hello, Esther,” he said quietly, his eyes going over her face. “Aren’t you the pretty one?”

Leah watched, afraid that Esther would cry. She was not used to strangers and was somewhat shy. However, something in her father’s voice must have calmed her, for she suddenly smiled and reached out to touch his mustache.

“She looks just like your mother, Tom,” Colonel Majors said, stroking the golden hair with his free hand. “She’s going to be as pretty as she was.”

Leah felt like crying over the sadness of the situation, but she knew that would not do. She stood quietly until the colonel said, “Well, suppose we get you three settled. You’re going out to Silas’s place. You’ll have it all to yourself. He’s gone to visit a friend of his.”

“He must be doing better then,” Leah said with some surprise. Uncle Silas had not been in good health when she had left Richmond, and she had worried about him.

“He seems to get stronger all the time. I’m real proud of him,” Nelson Majors said. “Come on. I’ve commandeered an army ambulance. What’s the use of being a colonel if you can’t break the rules once in a while?”

They got in, and he said, “I’ve got to go by the camp before we leave. There’s something I have to take care of. Besides, I want to show off my daughter to the general.”

Leah and Tom sat quietly in the back of the ambulance as a corporal drove them to the army camp. On the way, Tom’s eyes ran over the rows of men drilling in an open field. If he thought about never being able to march again, if he felt useless and helpless, he said nothing.