Wild, Beautiful, and Free(97)

He gestured toward the house. “I’m sure Lieutenant Stone has told her you are with me.”

“But I haven’t told her about you. I wasn’t ready. And I didn’t know . . .”

“If I was still alive?”

I nodded and said nothing. We held hands and began walking up the lawn.

“When Colonel Eshton told me you had gone to New Orleans, I was so proud of you,” I said. “I knew you were fighting for your home. I didn’t think I’d ever get the chance to tell you that.”

“Jeannette?”

“Yes?”

“This Lieutenant Stone. Have you known him long?”

“Since Shiloh. After the battle, Colonel Eshton asked me to teach the men who wanted to learn how to read. Lieutenant Stone was one of my students.”

“And was he a good student?”

“Oh yes. He’s very bright.”

Christian looked down at me. “You like him?”

“He’s a good man. I helped take care of him when he was wounded at Vicksburg.”

“Then you’ve spent a good deal of time with him?”

“Quite a bit. And it was a lengthy journey here from Vicksburg. He looked after me the whole way. Still does. Today, when I rode off the minute I heard you were at Petite Bébinn? You saw how closely he followed.”

“Yes,” he said slowly. “I did notice.” He paused. “Do you think him a handsome man?”

I smiled and suppressed a laugh. Christian was jealous. I would have immediately set him at ease, but then I remembered what he’d once said to me at Fortitude—how it was a luxury to behave as lovers do, to talk as lovers do. I took the opportunity, a delightful one, to tease him.

“You saw him for yourself,” I said. “He is tall and striking. I’m sure once he’s cleaned up and shaven that he is quite handsome.”

Christian said words under his breath that I didn’t catch. It sounded like “Damn him!”

But out loud, he only said, “You like him?”

I laughed then, unable to contain it. “You already asked me that! Oh, Christian.” I kissed his hand. “Did you think I would have ridden out to you like a crazy woman if I weren’t following my heart?”

“We’ve been parted a long time.”

“And I’ve thought of you ever since.”

“As I have you.”

“Very well, then,” I said. I kissed his hand again. “We belong to each other. It will always be so.”





Chapter 21


We married.

We married.

We married.

Christian and I didn’t want to wait. We didn’t see a reason for it. The end of the conflict was nowhere in sight—it was obvious hard times would continue. We wanted the comfort of each other to get through it. On the first day of autumn in 1863, Christian and I rode to the parish church and married there with Walter and Calista as our witnesses. That night, my secret fear that memories of Fanny would be a permanent barrier to my happiness melted away. I could truly be one with him, and in the consummation of our bond I felt my whole being magnified.

Catalpa Valley endured multiple frightening assaults by Confederate deserters, assaults that finally lessened the following summer when Christian received reinforcements from Sherman’s ranks after he defeated the Confederate general Forrest near Tupelo.

Madame’s doctor had once said that she probably wouldn’t long survive the Confederacy. He had been right. She died in April of 1865, after General Lee’s surrender at Appomattox but before poor President Lincoln was, to our horror, assassinated. Calista, I think, took Madame’s death harder than she’d thought she would. Maybe she’d held out hope that the woman would repent for all that she had done to both of us. But Madame never would. Calista and I made inquiries at the parish courthouse and learned that Papa’s will, unexecuted, remained in the records there. No one had ever pursued it because it was assumed Madame, as his wife, was Papa’s heir. They didn’t want to disturb a grieving widow.

However, the magistrates realized, if belatedly, that someone ought to have acted. Now, years later, it took some doing, but Calista and I ordered the resolution of Papa’s will. The deed to Catalpa Valley was transferred fully and legally to Calista. This sparked another time of celebration, one that came amid much excitement and confusion. After the war, the Southern landscape was as wounded as its soldiers. There was so much to heal. Some areas were no different from before—lanes with quiet houses and small towns with banks, blacksmiths, and general stores. But in other places, the smell of the scorched land still stung the nose and the heart. The countryside was full of former slaves. Some headed north, some searched for family members who had been sold away, and some were simply looking for food and a way to make a living in the ruins of the Confederacy. Word had gotten out that Catalpa Valley was a safe place, and daily Calista and I received these arrivals, many barefoot and poorly clothed. We had to build more dwellings to house the newcomers. I turned some of the lower rooms of the big house into schoolrooms, one for children and one for adults, and invited all who wanted to learn. I did this until there were too many for me to instruct in addition to my duties of running Catalpa Valley. We hired two teachers, and they took over the classes.