Before the Dawn: A Story of the Fall of Richmond

by Joseph A. Altsheler

  CHAPTER XXIV

  THE DESPATCH BEARER

  Leaves of yellow and red and brown were falling, and the wind that cameup the valley played on the boughs like a bow on the strings of aviolin. The mountain ridges piled against each other cut the blue skylike a saber's edge, and the forests on the slopes rising terrace aboveterrace burned in vivid colours painted by the brush of autumn. Thedespatch bearer's eye, sweeping peaks and slopes and valleys, sawnothing living save himself and his good horse. The silver streams inthe valleys, the vivid forests on the slopes and the blue peaks abovetold of peace, which was also in the musical note of the wind, in theshy eyes of a deer that looked at him a moment then fled away to theforest, and in the bubbles of pink and blue that floated on the silversurface of the stream at his feet.

  Prescott had been into the far South on a special mission from theConfederate Government in Richmond after his return from the Wildernessand complete recovery from his wound, and now he was going back througha sea of mountains, the great range that fills up so much of NorthCarolina and its fifty thousand square miles, and he was not sorry tofind the way long. He enjoyed the crisp air, the winds, the burningcolours of the forest, the deep blue of the sky and the infinite peace.But the nights lay cold on the ridges, and Prescott, when he could findno cabin for shelter, built a fire of pine branches and, wrappinghimself in his blanket, slept with his feet to the coals. The coldincreased by and by, and icy wind roared among the peaks and brought askim of snow. Then Prescott shivered and pined for the lowlands and thehaunts of men.

  He descended at last from the peaks and entered a tiny hamlet of thebackwoods, where he found among other things a two-weeks-old Richmondnewspaper. Looking eagerly through its meager columns to see what hadhappened while he was buried in the hills, he learned that there was nonew stage in the war--no other great battle. The armies were facing eachother across their entrenchments at Petersburg, and the moment a headappeared above either parapet the crack of a rifle from the other toldof one more death added to the hundreds of thousands. That was all ofthe war save that food was growing scarcer and the blockade of theSouthern ports more vigilant. It was a skilful and daring blockaderunner now that could creep past the watching ships.

  On an inside page he found social news. Richmond was crowded withrefugees, and wherever men and women gather they must have diversionthough at the very mouths of the guns. The gaiety of the capital, realor feigned, continued, and his eye was caught by the name of LuciaCatherwood. There was a new beauty in Richmond, the newspaper said, onewhose graces of face and figure were equaled only by the qualities ofher mind. She had relatives of strong Northern tendencies, and she hadbeen known to express such sympathies herself; but they only lentpiquancy to her conversation. She had appeared at one of the President'sreceptions; and further on Prescott saw the name of Mr. Sefton. Therewas nothing by which he could tell with certainty, but he inferred thatshe had gone there with the Secretary. A sudden thought assailed andtormented him. What could the Secretary be to her? Well, why not? Mr.Sefton was an able and insinuating man. Moreover, he was no bitterpartisan: the fact that she believed in the cause of the North would nottrouble him. She had refused himself and not many minutes later had beenseen talking with the Secretary in what seemed to be the mostconfidential manner. Why had she come back to Richmond, from which shehad escaped amid such dangers? Did it not mean that she and theSecretary had become allies more than friends? The thought would notlet Prescott rest.

  Prescott put the newspaper in his pocket and left the little tavern withan abruptness that astonished his host, setting out upon his ride withincreased haste and turning eastward, intending to reach the railroad atthe nearest point where he could take a train to Richmond.

  His was not a morbid mind, but the fever in it grew. He had thought thatthe Secretary loved Helen Harley: but once he had fancied himself inlove with Helen, too, and why might not the Secretary suffering from thesame delusion be changed in the same way? He took out the newspaper andread the story again. There was much about her beauty, a description ofher dress, and the distinction of her manner and appearance. ThePresident himself, it said, was charmed with her, and departing from hisusual cold reserve gave her graceful compliments.

  This new reading of the newspaper only added more impetus to his speedand on the afternoon of the same day he reached the railroad station.Early the next morning he entered Richmond.

  His heart, despite its recurrent troubles, was light, for he was cominghome once more.

  The streets were but slightly changed--perhaps a little more barenessand leanness of aspect, an older and more faded look to the clothing ofthe people whom he passed, but the same fine courage shone in theireyes. If Richmond, after nearly four years of fighting, heard the gunsof the foe once more, she merely drew tighter the belt around her leanwaist and turning her face toward the enemy smiled bravely.

  The President received the despatch bearer in his private room, lookingtaller, thinner and sterner than ever. Although a Kentuckian by birth,he had been bred in the far South, but had little of that far Southabout him save the dress he wore. He was too cold, too precise, too freefrom sudden emotion to be of the Gulf Coast State that sent him to thecapital. Prescott often reflected upon the odd coincidence that theopposing Presidents, Lincoln and Davis, should have been produced bythe same State, Kentucky, and that the President of the South should beNorthern in manner and the President of the North Southern in manner.

  Mr. Davis read the despatches while their bearer, at his request, waitedby. Prescott knew the hopeless tenor of those letters, but he could seeno change in the stern, gray face as its owner read them, letter afterletter. More than a half-hour passed and there was no sound in the roomsave the rustling of the paper as the President turned it sheet bysheet. Then in even, dry tones he said:

  "You need not wait any longer, Captain Prescott; you have done your partwell and I thank you. You will remain in Richmond until further orders."

  Prescott saluted and went out, glad to get into the free air again. Hedid not envy the responsibility of a president in war time, whether thepresident of a country already established or of one yet tentative. Hehurried home, and it was his mother herself who responded to the soundof the knocker--his mother, quiet, smiling and undemonstrative as ofold, but with an endless tenderness for him in the depths of her blueeyes.

  "Here I am again, mother, and unwounded this time," he cried after thefirst greeting; "and I suppose that as soon as they hear of my arrivalall the Yankees will be running back to the North."

  She smiled her quiet, placid smile.

  "Ah, my son," she said, and from her voice he could not doubt herseriousness, "I'm afraid they will not go even when they hear of yourarrival."

  "In your heart of hearts, mother, you have always believed that theywould come into Richmond. But remember they are not here yet. They wereeven closer than this before the Seven Days, but they got their facesburned then for their pains."

  They talked after their old custom, while Prescott ate his luncheon andhis mother gave him the news of Richmond and the people whom he knew. Henoticed often how closely she followed the fortunes of their friends,despite her seeming indifference, and, informed by experience, he neverdoubted the accuracy of her reports.

  "Helen Harley is yet in the employ of Mr. Sefton," she said, "and themoney that she earns is, I hear, still welcome in the house of theHarleys. Mr. Harley is a fine Southern gentleman, but he has found meansof overcoming his pride; it requires something to support his state."

  "But what of Helen?" asked Prescott. He always had a feeling ofrepulsion toward Mr. Harley, his sounding talk, his colossal vanity andhis selfishness.

  "Helen, I think," said his mother, "is more of a woman than she used tobe. Her mind has been strengthened by occupation. You won't object,Robert, will you, if I tell you that in my opinion both the men andwomen of the South have suffered from lack of diversity and variety ininterests and ambitions. When men have only two ambitions, war andpo
litics, and when women care only for the social side of life,important enough, but not everything, there can be no symmetricaldevelopment. A Southern republic, even if they should win this war, isimpossible, because to support a State it takes a great deal more thanthe ability to speak and fight well."

  Prescott laughed.

  "What a political economist we have grown to be, mother!" he said, andthen he added thoughtfully: "I won't deny, however, that you areright--at least, in part. But what more of Helen, mother? Is Mr. Seftonas attentive as ever to his clerk?"

  She looked at him covertly, as if she would measure alike his expressionand the tone of his voice.

  "He is still attentive to Helen--in a way," she replied, "but theSecretary is like many other men: he sees more than one beautiful flowerin the garden."

  "What do you mean, mother?" asked Prescott quickly.

  His face flushed suddenly and then turned pale. She gave him anotherkeen but covert look from under lowered eyelids.

  "There's a new star in Richmond," she replied quietly, "and singular asit may seem, it is a star of the North. You know Miss Charlotte Graysonand her Northern sympathies: it is a relative of hers--a MissCatherwood, Miss Lucia Catherwood, who came to visit her shortly afterthe battles in the Wilderness--the 'Beautiful Yankee,' they call her.Her beauty, her grace and distinction of manner are so great that allRichmond raves about her. She is modest and would remain in retirement,but for the sake of her own peace and Miss Grayson's she has beencompelled to enter our social life here."

  "And the Secretary?" said Prescott. He was now able to assume an air ofindifference.

  "He warms himself at the flame and perhaps scorches himself, too, or itmay be that he wishes to make some one else jealous--Helen Harley, forinstance. I merely venture the suggestion; I do not pretend to know allthe secrets of the social life of Richmond."

  Prescott went that very afternoon to the Grayson cottage, and heprepared himself with the greatest care for his going. He felt a suddenand strong anxiety about his clothing. His uniform was old, ragged andstained, but he had a civilian suit of good quality.

  "This dates from the fall of '60," he said, looking at it, "and that'smore than four years ago; but it's hard to keep the latest fashions inRichmond now."

  However, it was a vast improvement, and the change to civilian garb madehim feel like a man of peace once more.

  He went into the street and found Richmond under the dim cold of aNovember sky, distant houses melting into a gray blur and peopleshivering as they passed. As he walked briskly along he heard behind himthe roll of carriage wheels, and when he glanced over his shoulder whathe beheld brought the red to his face.

  Mr. Sefton was driving and Helen Harley sat beside him. On the rear seatwere Colonel Harley and Lucia Catherwood. As he looked the Secretaryturned back and said something in a laughing manner to Lucia, and she,laughing in like fashion, replied. Prescott was too far away tounderstand the words even had he wished, but Lucia's eyes were smilingand her face was rosy with the cold and the swift motion. She wasmuffled in a heavy black cloak, but her expression was happy.

  The carriage passed so swiftly that she did not see Prescott standing onthe sidewalk. He gazed after the disappearing party and others didlikewise, for carriages were becoming too scarce in Richmond not to benoticed. Some one spoke lightly, coupling the names of James Sefton andLucia Catherwood. Prescott turned fiercely upon him and bade him bewarehow he repeated such remarks. The man did not reply, startled by suchheat, and Prescott walked on, striving to keep down the anger and griefthat were rising within him.

  He concluded that he need not hurry now, because if he went at once tothe little house in the cross street she would not be there; and he cameto an angry conclusion that while he had been upon an errand of hardshipand danger she had been enjoying all the excitement of life in thecapital and with a powerful friend at court. He had always felt a senseof proprietorship in her and now it was rudely shocked. He forgot thatif he had saved her she had saved him. It never occurred to him in hisglowing youth that she had an entire right to love and marry JamesSefton if fate so decreed.

  He walked back and forth so angrily and so thoroughly wrapped in his ownthoughts that he noticed nobody, though many noticed him and wondered atthe young man with the pale face and the hot eyes.

  It was twilight before he resumed his journey to the little house. Thegray November day was thickening into the chill gloom of a winter nightwhen he knocked at the well-remembered door. The shutters were closed,but some bars of ruddy light shone through them and fell across thebrown earth. He was not coming now in secrecy as of old, but he had comewith a better heart then.

  It was Lucia herself who opened the door--Lucia, with a softer face thanin the earlier time, but with a royal dignity that he had never seen inany other woman, and he had seen women who were royal by birth. She wasclad in some soft gray stuff and her hair was drawn high upon her head,a crown of burnished black, gleaming with tints of red, like flame,where the firelight behind her flickered and fell upon it.

  The twilight was heavy without and she did not see at once who wasstanding at the door. She put up her hands to shade her eyes, but whenshe beheld Prescott a little cry of gladness broke from her. "Ah, it isyou!" she said, holding out both her hands, and his jealousy and painwere swept away for the moment.

  He clasped her hands in the warm pressure of his own, saying: "Yes, itis I; and I cannot tell you how glad I am to see you once more."

  The room behind her seemed to be filled with a glow, and when they wentin the fire blazed and sparkled and its red light fell across the floor.Miss Grayson, small, quiet and gray as usual, came forward to meet him.Her tiny cool hand rested in his a moment, and the look in her eyes toldhim as truly as the words she spoke that he was welcome.

  "When did you arrive?" asked Lucia.

  "But this morning," he replied. "You see, I have come at once to findyou. I saw you when you did not see me."

  "When?" she asked in surprise.

  "In the carriage with the Secretary and the Harleys," he replied, thefeeling of jealousy and pain returning. "You passed me, but you were toobusy to see me."

  She noticed the slight change in his tone, but she replied without anyself-consciousness.

  "Yes; Mr. Sefton--he has been very kind to us--asked me to go with MissHarley, her brother and himself. How sorry I am that none of us sawyou."

  The feeling that he had a grievance took strong hold of Prescott, and itwas inflamed at the new mention of the Secretary's name. If it were anyother it might be more tolerable, but Mr. Sefton was a crafty anddangerous man, perhaps unscrupulous too. He remembered that light remarkof the bystander coupling the name of the Secretary and LuciaCatherwood, and at the recollection the red flushed into his face.

  "The Secretary is able and powerful," he said, "but not wholly to betrusted. He is an intriguer."

  Miss Grayson looked up with her quiet smile.

  "Mr. Sefton has been kind to us," she said, "and he has made our life inRichmond more tolerable. We could not be ungrateful, and I urged Luciato go with them to-day."

  The colour flickered in the sensitive, proud face of Lucia Catherwood.

  "But, Charlotte, I should have gone of my own accord, and it was apleasant drive."

  There was a shade of defiance in her tone, and Prescott, restless anduneasy, stared into the fire. He had expected her to yield to hischallenge, to be humble, to make some apology; but she did not, havingno excuses to offer, and he found his own position difficult andunpleasant. The stubborn part of his nature was stirred and he spokecoldly of something else, while she replied in like fashion. He was surenow that Sefton had transferred his love to her, and if she did notreturn it she at least looked upon him with favouring eyes. As forhimself, he had become an outsider. He remembered her refusal of him.Then the impression she gave him once that she had fled from Richmond,partly and perhaps chiefly to save him, was false. On second thought nodoubt it was false. And despite her statement she
might really have beena spy! How could he believe her now?

  Miss Grayson, quiet and observant, noticed the change. She liked thisyoung man, so serious and steady and so different from the passionateand reckless youths who are erroneously taken by outsiders to be theuniversal type of the South. Her heart rallied to the side of hercousin, Lucia Catherwood, with whom she had shared hardships and dangersand whose worth she knew; but with the keen eye of the kindly old maidshe saw what troubled Prescott, and being a woman she could not blamehim. Taking upon herself the burden of the conversation, she askedPrescott about his southern journey, and as he told her of the path thatled him through mountains, the glory of the autumn woods and the peaceof the wilderness, there was a little bitterness in his tone inreferring to those lonesome but happy days. He had felt then that he wascoming north to the struggles and passions of a battleground, and now hewas finding the premonition true in more senses than one.

  Lucia sat in the far corner of the little room where the flickeringfirelight fell across her face and dress. They had not lighted candlenor lamp, but the rich tints in her hair gleamed with a deeper sheenwhen the glow of the flames fell across it. Prescott's former sense ofproprietorship was going, and she seemed more beautiful, more worth theeffort of a lifetime than ever before. Here was a woman of mind andheart, one not bounded by narrow sectionalism, but seeing the goodwherever it might be. He felt that he had behaved like a prig and afool. Why should he be influenced by the idle words of some idle man inthe street? He was not Lucia Catherwood's guardian; if there were anyquestion of guardianship, she was much better fitted to be the guardianof him.

  Had he obeyed this rush of feeling he would have swept away allconstraint by words abrupt, disjointed perhaps, but alive withsincerity, and Miss Grayson gave him ample opportunity by slipping withexcuses into the next room. The pride and stubbornness in Prescott'snature were tenacious and refused to die. Although wishing to say wordsthat would undo the effect of those already spoken, he spoke instead ofsomething else--topics foreign then to the heart of either--of the war,the social life of Richmond. Miss Harley was still a great favourite inthe capital and the Secretary paid her much attention, so Lucia saidwithout the slightest change in her tone. Helen's brother had madeseveral visits to Richmond; General Wood had come once, and Mr. Talbotonce. Mr. Talbot--and now she smiled--was overpowered on his last visit.Some Northern prisoners had told how the vanguard of their army was heldback in the darkness at the passage of the river by a single man who wastaken prisoner, but not until he had given his beaten brigade time toescape. That man was discovered to be Talbot and he had fled fromRichmond to escape an excess of attention and compliments.

  "And it was old Talbot who saved us from capture," said Prescott. "I'veoften wondered why we were not pursued more closely that night. And henever said anything about it."

  "Mrs. Markham, too, is in Richmond," Lucia continued, "and she is,perhaps, the most conspicuous of its social lights. General Markham isat the front with the army"--here she stopped abruptly and the colourcame into her face. But Prescott guessed the rest. Colonel Harley wasconstantly in Mrs. Markham's train and that was why he came so often toRichmond. The capital was not without its gossip.

  The flames died down and a red-and-yellow glow came from the heart ofthe coals. The light now gleamed only at times on the face of LuciaCatherwood. It seemed to Prescott (or was it fancy) that by thisflickering radiance he saw a pathetic look on her face--a little touchof appeal. Again he felt a great wave of tenderness and of reverence,too. She was far better than he. Words of humility and apology leapedonce more to the end of his tongue, but they did not pass his lips. Hecould not say them. His stubborn pride still controlled and he rambledon with commonplace and idle talk.

  Miss Grayson came back bearing a lamp, and by chance, as it were, shelet its flame fall first upon the face of the man and then upon the faceof the woman, and she felt a little thrill of disappointment when shenoted the result in either case. Miss Charlotte Grayson was one of thegentlest of fine old maids, and her heart was soft within her. Sheremembered the long vigils of Prescott, his deep sympathy, thesubstantial help that he had given, and, at last, how, at the risk ofhis own career, he had helped Lucia Catherwood to escape from Richmondand danger. She marked the coldness and constraint still in the air andwas sorry, but knew not what to do.

  Prescott rose presently and said good-night, expressing the hope that itwould not be long until he again saw them both. Lucia echoed his hope ina like formal fashion and Prescott went out. He did not look back to seeif the light from the window still fell across the brown grass, buthurried away in the darkness.