Homeland

by Barbara Hambly

  Your own,

  The Queen of the Woods-Fairies,

  S

  Susanna Ashford, Bayberry Run Plantation

  Greene County, Tennessee

  To

  Cora Poole

  [not sent]

  WEDNESDAY, MAY IO, 1865

  LATE NIGHT

  Dearest Cora,

  It’s so clear to me Will loved you, and you him. You wrote once, late at night, “I’ll give this to him when he arrives,” and then it was, “A friend on whom I relied has enlisted,” and you could not even write his name. I loved Art, and Justin, too, and worried so much about which of them I’d choose.

  A horrible squabble with Julia, when I came back from town last night with your letter. Mrs. V told me about the Ladies Aid Society sending clothing and household goods, for we are dressed in rags and worse than rags (including the blood-stained dress that Julia mended for me when I “fell on the mountain,” which I can barely endure to put on my body, only I must because there’s nothing else). Julia will not move into town, nor accept “Yankee charity”—”They’ll poke their long noses in our business,” meaning, the Yankees won’t want to give us clothing if it’s going to go straight onto the backs of the Secesh militia, or be traded to put powder and ball in their guns. When I told her, look around at how we are living here, she wept so violently that she collapsed. I went outside while Emory tried to comfort her. In time he came out to me, and said, “You mustn’t upset her, Susie. She’s so frail, and she’s terrified you’ll leave. Promise her you won’t. She needs you so.”

  It was the first time—literally—since he came to walk me home, in Vicksburg when I’d climbed to Sky Parlor Hill on the day Grant’s men came up—that Emory and I had been alone together, and I looked him in the face. I wanted to say, CORA needs you so. Cora is the one YOU promised not to leave, not to part from until Death. I said nothing, but either he has some of his Pa’s Sight, or I was madder than I’d thought, for he looked away from me and said, “Julie says you write to Cora. That true?”

  He wouldn’t meet my eyes and I know Julia still searches my room for your letters, so I shook my head and lied, “No. What would I say?” He mumbled, “I can’t go back, Susie. You know that. And anyway, she’s likely forgot me by now, and layin’ in some other man’s arms.” I couldn’t say what I had guessed from your letters, and only said, “If you think she’s been untrue to her marriage-vow, Emory, why don’t you write to her and ask?”

  “Maybe I will,” he replied.

  I write this to you because I have to: you the Pretend-Cora, who lives in a Gothic house in Paris, or is the Queen of the Barn-Fairies, and who understands things I don’t even understand about myself. Who understands that I’m crazy, and selfish, and bad, but that I’m trying to do my best.

  How right you were when you warned, how easily a woman’s freedom may be lost. Not even through her own folly, but just by being at the wrong place, at the wrong time, like me on the mountain.

  I know he won’t write you.

  FRIDAY, MAY 12

  The Unionists attacked Bayberry last night. I’m told they also hanged a man outside Sevierville in retaliation for Seceshes beating a Union man who was suing in the courts for lands that had been confiscated. Sometimes the view of you through that little sunlit window—of cows and goat-cheese and Miss Mercy singing “Daddy’s gonna buy you a mocking-bird”—seems just as far away as the gardens of Pemberley.

  Please forgive me.

  Yours,

  S

  Cora Poole, Deer Isle, Maine

  To

  Susanna Ashford, General Delivery

  Greeneville, Tennessee

  TUESDAY, MAY 30, 1865

  Dearest girl,

  It was entirely unnecessary and unkind of you, to mention the things Nollie and Miss Mercy may be getting up to in the barn! It reminded me too vividly of what Oliver and I did, that gave Mother gray hair and earned me many a whipping—because, of course, like my daughter, I was the guiding spirit of those expeditions to discover barn-swallow nests up under the barn eaves (with a thirty-foot drop to the ground!), and perilous experiments with hoisting one another up on the hay-pulley.

  How odd. I was laughing just now over the memory of being sent to get the paddle so that Mother could spank me, and it seemed that I saw that stern prophetess of my memory—who quoted Proverbs even as she shut me, smarting, into my room to impress upon me never to lead my tiny brother into danger again—saw them blend, without grief, without regret, into the withered old lady who sits silently shelling peas on the other side of the table from me. And I remembered—of all things—the Ghost of Christmas Present asking Scrooge, Had Scrooge never walked forth with the Ghost’s brothers, all the Christmases—all the years, more than eighteen hundred—before that day, that night, that time? And it seemed to me suddenly that I can see Mother-Then and Mother-Now united.

  To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under Heaven.

  If there is anything that you can give me, dear friend, this is what I would have asked for: the keys of these images that unlock the door into memories, and lead me to the peace I feel now.

  Is there anything that I can give you, send you … that will not call down Julia’s accusations of “Yankee charity” onto your head?

  THURSDAY, JUNE 1

  A time for every purpose under Heaven … A time for blackflies, which cause me to question Noah’s wisdom in taking all insects into the Ark! A time to weed the garden, and tie up the pea-vines, and pluck bushels of snails and caterpillars off the leaves of cucumbers, tomatoes, squash. Yet, how perfect the spiral shell of each nasty little leaf-glutton! Surely these creatures must have also lied to Noah in order to obtain passage? For why would God seek to vex, test, or plague a Humankind destined to keep His Commandments with such scrupulous care?

  A time to milk, and churn, and put butter away in the cold safety of the cellar against the time of snow that even in this day’s heat I know must come. (And oh, the selfish little song of pride and delight, at seeing the profusion I will have gathered!) A time to mend, and to sew endlessly into the evenings, to be able to buy salt and saltpeter to brine next winter’s pork? My green calico having been turned once too often, so that the bodice shredded away in my hands as I unpicked the threads, I am cutting up the skirt this evening to make a new dress for Mercy, whose golden head I can stroke now without bending down … upon all those frequent occasions whereon she loses her sunbonnet. There is fabric enough in the skirt for a dress for Nollie, as well. The dress is one I made in Boston, and as I cut it, I am back in Blossom Street again, in that tiny, sunny parlor, waiting for Emory to come home only from a day at Brock’s law office.

  SATURDAY, JUNE 3

  A blessing and a joy! When Papa came home last night, who should be with him but Brock! A sadly thin Brock, whose flesh hangs loose on his big frame and whose hands shake, for he is far from recovered from the malaria. My brother will, I fear, not be well for a long while. The week before last there was a great Review in Washington, all the armies of the Union marching past the White House for the new President—and I can scarcely believe that it is our Mr. Johnson!—to look upon, and thank, before they scatter again to their families and homes. Brock was not well enough to march. He tells me, though, that President Johnson has declared an amnesty, for all those who fought in the Armies of the South, with only a few exceptions.

  There is no reason then, that Emory need fear to return. I feel as if I have seen the clouds break at last, upon blue sky.

  MONDAY, JUNE 5

  Mother died, in great pain, late last night.

  Yours,

  Cora

  Cora Poole, Deer Isle, Maine

  To

  Susanna Ashford, General Delivery

  Greeneville, Tennessee

  FRIDAY, JUNE 9, 1865

  LATE NIGHT

  Dearest,

  A brief note, to let you know that I am leaving Deer Isle. I have made arr
angements with Abel Lufkin, to forward your letters to me at Willow House, Chapel Street, New Haven, Connecticut. This is the boarding-house where Papa has rooms, and where he has written to arrange a place for myself and Mercy. Peggie and Nollie will be moving into Uncle M’s house. If by any chance you should hear anything from Emory, please tell him to seek me there.

  Papa has been so sunk beneath his grief that he has been able to do little towards the arrangement of Mother’s funeral, nor towards the closing up of the house. Brock, too, is quite ill, and I have surrendered my room to him and Betsy, and am sleeping—in a welter of children—in the summer kitchen. I tell them greatly embellished stories at night about knaves and thieves, and the wars between the Barn-Fairies and the Woods-Fairies.

  I will write to you again, when we come to New Haven.

  Your friend always,

  C

  Cora Poole, Deer Isle, Maine

  To

  Susanna Ashford, General Delivery

  Greeneville, Tennessee

  TUESDAY, JUNE 20, 1865

  Dearest Susanna,

  A strange and curious change of plan. Today a letter reached me from Eliza Johnson, to whom I wrote at the time of Mother’s death. Mrs. J is now in Washington, rather uncomfortably situated in a boarding-house because of the continued prostration of poor Mrs. Lincoln at the White House. She has asked me, Would I wish to come to her, as governess and tutor to her grandchildren? (Both daughters and their families, will be living with them: a total of five children, the oldest of whom is ten.)

  Susanna, I will go! Papa expresses regret that he is unable himself to set up housekeeping—he will be supporting Peggie and Nollie at Uncle M’s, and helping Brock until he is well again—but it is clear to me that he looks forward to returning to his old boarding-house in New Haven. Nor do I wish to become my father’s housekeeper.

  And to tell the truth, I know that Emory, when he returns, will fare better in Washington than he would in any New England town.

  Last night I sat down and tallied up all those who had marched away from Deer Isle, never to come home. In 1861 there were 625 men of “military age” on our island; most of them with wives, and families already begun, or with parents to support. Of those, 277—just under half of the young men I’d grown up with—went into the service of their homeland.

  One in seven of those men died, Susie. There were families in which two brothers entered together, like the Hendersons, and both young men killed. Others, like the Eaton girls, were split up and sent to different relatives—or, sometimes, strangers—because their mothers could not afford to keep them, once their fathers were dead.

  Another 140 men—half as many as those who served—went into hiding rather than leave their families destitute for life, gambling that after the War, they could return. Over 50—maybe as many as 80—paid $300 rather than risk death, and I can not come to any tally of the wounded, who will be no longer able to support themselves or their families.

  The town is over $60,000 in debt, from bounties paid to the soldiers and their families. The fishing-fleet is crippled, for the expense of cordage, curing-salt, and mostly men. Many, many families have moved to the mainland, leaving their stony farms to be swallowed by the woods.

  The Union has been preserved, and slavery abolished.

  This is Victory.

  WEDNESDAY, JUNE 21

  My darling Mercy is three.

  Brock, Betsy, and their children left yesterday for Boston. Peggie and Nollie have gone to Uncle M’s. The cows have gone there, too, and Uncle M will harvest the crop here when autumn comes, to pay in part for the expenses of Peggie and Nollie. On Friday, Papa and I will be gone. I grieve to lose this last sweet summer here in Maine, but Mrs. Johnson truly needs help, and I will linger in New Haven only long enough to make sure that Papa is comfortable.

  Last week Mercy and I walked into the woods, where the wild-flowers bloom in their sweet profusion: steeplebush and meadowsweet, fragile trilliums and gorgeous Devil’s paintbrush, clouds of butterflies wafting around our heads. It will be long, I think, before I come to Maine again, so I picked some Devil’s paintbrush to press between the pages of Pride and Prejudice, to remember these years, this place, the things I found here and the things I lost. Three of these I enclose.

  Needless to say, all of Mr. Poole’s books will ride with me, south to our new home, until he can come to claim them again.

  Write to me, I beg you—how queer it sounds!—at The White House, Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington—an address to make your sister snatch the hair off your head! And if—and when—Emory should communicate with you, tell him, this is where I am.

  Always your friend,

  Cora

  P.S. My best wishes to Julia for her birthday—if sending them will not bring trouble down on your head for writing to a Yankee!

  Susanna Ashford, Bayberry Run Plantation

  Greene County, Tennessee

  To

  Cora Poole, Deer Isle, Maine

  [forwarded to Washington]

  WEDNESDAY, JUNE 21, 1865

  Dearest Miss Mercy Susanna Poole,

  All my kindest salutations on this the occasion of your 3rd (!) birthday.

  Your very loving,

  Aunt Susie

  THURSDAY, JUNE 22

  My dear friend,

  The only comfort I can draw from your letter is the knowledge that by this time your pain will have lessened a little: that you are not going through the first awful hurt now. I am so sorry. I wish I could have been there with you; I wish I could be there with you now, to help in what I guess is a difficult process of packing things up—surely your Father will not remain on the island? I am so glad that he was there with you (he must have been, for summer had begun?), as well as your brother and, I hope, your brother’s excellent wife (who had the good sense to tell you, three years ago, what happens when babies are born)?

  Please, please, let me know, what your plans will be now. Will you return to New Haven with your Papa? (All to the good for Miss Mercy, as one hopes that by the time she is eighteen—1880!—it will be possible for her to be admitted to Yale!)

  Indeed, our Mr. Johnson is now President of the United States, and not a soul in the house has a good word to speak about him—not even Julia, who bore her baby under his roof. I’m sorry Brock wasn’t well enough to march. It would have been a splendid parade! Not a man in the militia would stoop to avail himself of Mr. J’s pardon: “They can keep their damn Reconstruction!” They have bush-whacked and hanged more than one official the government sent out to implement Reconstruction and more than one Union soldier who has returned home under the impression that the War is done. To be honest, the Unionist guerillas have hanged a number of returning Confederates, too, in retaliation for the hardships their families suffered at the hands of the Seceshes. Many people in this countryside are still sleeping in the woods. The local Army Commanders have declared that bush-whackers are to be shot on sight and given no quarter.

  I would cheerfully shoot on sight the so-and-so’s who raided the corn out of three of my patches this week! It wasn’t quite ripe so I am certain Nature will accomplish my revenge for me. But the rest of the patch will certainly be raided as the pumpkins and beans come ripe, so I might as well abandon work on them, and concentrate on hunting. I have been stretching and drying the skins, at one of my hiding-places in the laurel hell up behind the Holler. I hope to sell them in town.

  SATURDAY, JUNE 24

  Alas, generous girl, anything that you might send me would simply be confiscated by the militia. We do not do badly here. The one comfort about living in a camp of thieves is that we are unlikely to starve as long as anyone in the county has corn!

  Thank you, for that image of your Mother as she was, and as she became in those last days of her life, united and at one. Strange to say, it helps me when the memory of what Bayberry was—of my childhood here—becomes too painful to bear. I tell myself, it is only the change of the season. That isn’t
easy now, but I will summon it back, and try to accept.

  Did you lead your tiny brother into danger, you horrid woman? Shame on you! It was Payne who was always daring me to do things like smoke Pa’s cigars or ride Caligula, Mr. Scanlon’s stud stallion, who was about twenty feet tall and mean as sin.

  Dear friend, tell me as soon as you know, where you will go, and what you will do.

  All my love,

  Susie

  Susanna Ashford, Bayberry Run Plantation

  Greene County, Tennessee

  To

  Cora Poole

  [not sent]

  SATURDAY, JUNE 24, 1865

  NIGHT

  Dearest,

  It seems that I am always asking, How can I help you? and you always reply, most generously, that my letters—little enough, and so much of it lies—suffice. I remember how awful it was, when I was five years old, and Ma died: that horrible feeling that no one would ever care for me again. For months I wondered what would happen if Pa died, too, and relatives would split up Payne and Julia and me. I didn’t think I could survive, if I had to live alone with strangers. I even planned how I would kill myself, by going up to Skull Cave and eating snakeberries, so I would be dead before anyone found me.