by April Hill
When Ned came by her hotel later that morning, he found Carrie sitting in a sagging chair in the lobby, amidst the jumble of shopping bags she’d left at the desk before she started to Puebla. Her only remaining suitcase and the Chinese pot were on the floor beside her. The long crack the Chinese pot had suffered during the robbery in the desert was bandaged with purple duct tape.
“You should have run over the son of a bitch while you were at it,” Carrie grumbled.
Ned sighed. “Yeah, I was afraid of that. Your new friend got to the bank, first?”
“If I respond to that stupid question the way I’d like to, am I going to get spanked, again?” she inquired sullenly.
He chuckled. “No. I figure you’ve got enough to worry about without sitting through lunch with a sore butt. I’m assuming, of course, that it’s still sore?”
She glared at him. “What if I said it wasn’t?”
“I’d be very disappointed in myself. I thought I did a pretty fair job, for a beginner. I may need a little more practice. You want to repeat some of what you called me last night, and give me another shot at getting it right?”
“No, thank you,” she growled. “I lied. My rear end feels like I sat down on a kitchen burner. Are you happy now, Max dear?”
“Not happy, exactly, but a man likes to know these things. For future reference, you know?”
“I hate you,” she said.
“No, you don’t. Let’s not forget what went on upstairs for the last couple of nights. Anyway, you’ll probably feel better about everything after lunch.”
“I can’t afford lunch,” she groaned. “I’ve got my ticket home, and a dollar and fourteen cents I found in the pocket of my sweater. That and a really old cough drop that’s been through the wash a couple of times. The bank tells me I’m not liable, but I can’t get my money back, or a new credit card until their investigation is completed, whatever that means.”
“It means I’ll be feeding you for a few days,” he said. “Starting with lunch.”
“Why?” she asked.
He began collecting her things. “Why, what?”
“Why are you being so nice to me? After everything I said to you, last night?”
“That was yesterday—when you were a pain-in-the-ass tourist. Today, you’re a fellow countryman, in trouble in a foreign land.”
“So, you’re like, the American Consulate, now?”
“Better. I have an apartment just off the Reforma, with a big, soft double bed.” He pointed to the rest of the shopping bags. “I’ve got your suitcase and the shopping bags. Grab the Chinese pot before they decide to bill you for another night in this dump. I’ll take you to the Cinco de Mayo parade, then back to my place. We’ve both got a few days of vacation left. I can’t think of a better way to spend it than having a kind of premarital honeymoon, can you?”
“Honeymoon?” she asked.
“Yeah. When I came down here, I sort of promised my mom I’d bring home a nice, well brought-up Mexican wife—from the countryside. I’m pretty sure you’re not what she had in mind, but the paperwork to get married will at least be easier.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to look around a little longer?” Carrie asked sweetly. “A well-brought-up Mexican wife from the countryside would probably be easier to live with, and better behaved.”
“That’s okay,” he said, tapping the cover of the book his friend Paul had written. “We can always count on Max’s guidebook to handling women to get us over the rough spots.” He held up her small suitcase. “You wouldn’t happen to have a big wooden hairbrush in here, would you?”
THE END
May and Memorial Day—Hannah, in: All Quiet Along The Potomac
Captain Jed Canfield knelt at the edge of the hot, barren field and slipped the rolled documents from their tubular leather case. In the distance, the Potomac moved sluggishly within its broad banks, a wide silver ribbon shimmering in the mid-morning sun. It was only April, but the city of Washington was suffering from a heat wave that made the air heavy and difficult to breathe, and the temperatures feeling more like August. The small group of Union Army troopers gathered around Canfield mopped their brows and pressed closer, watching over his shoulder as he spread the papers on the grass and moved one expert finger over the maze of lines and elaborate written instructions. Until this morning, when he’d been summoned to Colonel Dickerson’s office, he’d never seen these drawings, nor met any of the sweating men assigned to him. Not far from where the men stood, three wagonloads of lumber, construction materials, and several wooden boxes filled with hammers and saws sat in the open field under a blazing sun.
Jed swore under his breath as he studied the details of the “formal military parade ground, including properly elevated viewing stands sufficient to accommodate, with comfort, two hundred persons.” He had just over seventy-two hours to lay a hundred yards of gravel road, clear and smooth a rutted corn field of dried stubble well enough to have it pass for a parade ground, and erect two tiers of wooden bleachers. All because a bunch of overfed bureaucrats wanted to sit on their fat backsides and listen to a lot of long-winded bureaucrats making speeches guaranteed to bore the hell out of anyone dumb enough to come out in this blistering heat.
A tall, burly sergeant by the name of Jenkins cleared his throat loudly, and stepped forward. “With permission, Cap’n, sir?” he began, “don’t that seem to you like a lot of work for somethin’ that’s gonna get used just the one time? ‘Specially in all this heat?”
Several more of the men grunted their agreement.
Canfield stood up and dusted the dirt from the knees of his trousers. “How long have you been in the army, Sergeant Jenkins?”
“Goin’ on ten years, Cap’n, sir.”
“Then you should know that your time and sweat— and mine—is the army’s to squander as it sees fit,” the Captain replied.
“Yessir,” the sergeant growled.
Canfield grinned. “But we don’t have to like it. I, for instance, only have to like it for another two weeks. How about you?”
“Three more days, Cap’n. I’ll be musterin’ out come Friday morning. After that, I’m gonna hightail it back home and never look back.”
“And where’s home, Mr. Jenkins?”
“Pennsylvania, sir. A little place on the Susquehanna called Staleyville. And you, Cap’n, if you don’t mind my askin’?”
“I’ve got a little cattle ranch pretty much in the middle of nowhere,” Canfield said. “In Wyoming—not even a state, yet. Anyway, I’m sure we’ll both be glad to hightail it for home—after we build Colonel Dickerson and his friends a real nice formal parade ground and viewing stands, that is.”
“You know about this new holiday they’re talking about, Captain?” a second man inquired. “I hear they’re gonna call it ‘Decoration Day.’”
“That’s where we come in,” Jed explained. “Three days from now, there’s going to be a political rally right here where we’re standing, with demonstrations, a lot of noise and confusion, and people making speeches. This particular group has begun petitioning Congress to make the new holiday official, like Independence Day. Every year, there’ll be parades, picnics, and band concerts. But the real purpose will be to honor the men who died in the war. The plan is for people to come out and decorate the graves with flags, wreaths, things like that.”
One of the men gave a small, bitter laugh. “Decorate their graves, huh? You mean all of the fools that died durin’ the late unpleasantness? That’s what I read some folks who wasn’t there call what we did, now that it’s over and done with.”
“On both sides?” a trooper named Walker called out. “They plannin’ to put little flags on all them damn Johnny Rebs, too?”
Jed nodded sadly. “Not right away, but eventually, yes. The grave of every man who gave his life is to be honored, whichever side he fought on. And whatever we think now, that’s the way it should be. This wasn’t the first time brave men died for a stupid cause—
and I’m sure it won’t be the last.” He looked up at the soldier who’d asked the question. “You have a problem with that, Walker?”
Walker hesitated for a moment. “Nah, I reckon not,” he growled, scuffing the toe of his boot around in the dust. “The shootin’s been over for nigh on two years now, so maybe it’s time we all got on with it, and made our peace, sort of. I got me a brother down in Georgia I ain’t talked to for six years. He and me was real close before the shootin’ started. Hell, for all I know, he coulda’ been among those fellas we was shootin’ at all these years. Anyway, I figure it’s about time me and him buried the hatchet, if he’s not…well, you know.”
“Maybe building this parade ground is a good idea, after all,” Canfield suggested quietly. “A fitting way to do something decent before we all head home.” He chuckled. “Not that we have a choice. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m not about to cross a lot of generals and their spoiled rotten wives this close to the end of things. With that said, we might just as well get started. I understand one of those spoiled wives is coming out here, later, to make sure we’re going about this in the right way. Meaning her way, of course.”
* * *
The ground was sunbaked and hard, so the work went slowly, but by mid-afternoon, the road and the field were plowed and patted down, and the footings for the viewing stands had been hammered into place and set in poured cement. Tomorrow, after the cement had begun to cure, they would saw and assemble the board framework, and begin laying the freshly sanded seating planks.
“It’s good to know that none of them important folks’ll be getttin’ splinters in their butts,” Jenkins remarked, running a callused hand across one of the smooth boards. He glanced up at the cloudless sky. “Course, they’re likely to get theirselves one hell of a sunburn, ‘specially the womenfolk.”
At that precise moment, a cloud of dust rose in the distance, and in the center of the cloud, a wagon appeared. The wagon was coming much too fast along the badly rutted roadway from the city, and as it rounded the final curve, the vehicle careened sideways in the dust, and narrowly avoided turning over.
“That damned fool’s gonna get bad hurt if he don’t slow down,” one of the men observed, without much interest.
“Looks like it’s a woman driving that rig,” another man reported. “All by herself, too.”
“Never knew a female could handle a team,” a third trooper joined in. “Always too busy tryin’ to keep their danged hats from flyin’ off.”
“If that was my woman, I’d take my belt to her ass, for sure,” Sergeant Jenkins said. “It’s plain stupid is what it is—workin’ a fine pair of animals like that in this heat.”
“Speaking of a fine pair,” yet another man remarked. “That’s one real first-class set the lady’s carrying! Wheew-eee! What I wouldn’t give to get my hands on…”
“Shut your damn mouth, McFee,” Jenkins growled. “Can’t you tell that one’s a proper lady? Lookit that dress she’s got on. That’s real silk, I’ll betcha.”
“Proper lady, my ass!” McFee shrieked, waving his arms in alarm. “That crazy bitch is lookin’ to run us over! Move your asses, or get squashed like a lotta damn bugs!”
As the work party dove for the safety of a ditch, the wagon veered off the road and skidded to a halt inches from where the men had been standing just seconds earlier. Fuming, Canfield strode the short distance across the field to the ditch, shouting for the driver to get down.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he demanded. “You almost…” He stopped mid-question, and stared up at the lone female in the seat of the dust-covered buckboard.
“Hannah?”
The woman took a moment to straighten her hat and rearrange her windblown curls before she deigned to glance down at him. And when she did, it seemed to take some time for Captain Canfield’s face to register in her memory.
“Good heavens!” she exclaimed, finally. “I thought at first that my eyes must surely be deceiving me! Jedidiah? Can it possibly be Jedidiah Canfield?”
Her words took only moments to utter, but in those brief seconds, Jed Canfield knew without a doubt in the world that the woman’s apparent confusion was an act. Not only had Hannah Louise Norwood recognized him, she had clearly been expecting to see him, here. The lady had been pulling strings, again, probably with Colonel Dickerson himself, who just happened by an astonishing coincidence, to be the lady’s uncle. It was a familial relationship that had served Hannah very well over the years, while making Jed’s own life occasionally difficult.
He took the team’s reins, and tipped his hat politely. “How’ve you been, Hannah?”
The woman threw one dainty, gloved hand to her throat, fanning her overheated face with the other. “What on Earth are you doing here, Jedidiah? Gracious, what a shock it is, after all these years, to see…”
“Not all that many years, actually,” he observed. “Just over three, if memory serves.” He tied the reins to a tree, and offered his hand to help her alight from the wagon.
Hannah ignored his gesture, and tilted her head full of blonde curls to one side, as if puzzled. “Really? Are you quite certain of that?” she inquired. “It seems longer, somehow. At Uncle Stanley’s, was it? In Washington? On the evening of my eighteenth birthday party?”
Canfield smiled. “The night I asked you to marry me,” he said pleasantly. “An easy enough thing to forget, I suppose.”
“Now, now, Captain Canfield,” she scolded. “That remark was unkind. I hope I’m mistaken in detecting a small note of bitterness in your voice. Then again, I suppose it might simply have been reproach—for my having selected another man to be my husband, perhaps?”
He shook his head. “Not at all. What is it they say? To the victor belong the spoils? How is Edward, by the way? I heard that he became ill shortly after you got engaged—an unfortunate affliction that kept him from joining his company at the front—at the height of the late unpleasantness. A sudden attack of hemorrhoids, I understand?”
She shot him a look of pure loathing. “You have been badly misinformed, Captain. It’s true that the poor darling was mildly discomfited for a short while—with an intestinal disturbance resulting from overwork, I believe. And then, after he recovered, Uncle Stanley simply decided that Edward—Major Turner—would be far more useful to the Union cause stationed right here in Washington, serving as aide de camp to our dearest friend, General Murchison. After all, isn’t that where the most vital wartime issues were being decided at that point? Right in the thick of…whatever?”
Jed smiled. “Well, that’s certainly one way of looking at it. And I’m sure being in Washington made it more convenient for Major Turner to keep his dress blues brushed up and looking their best.”
In a transparent effort to change the subject, Hannah turned in her seat and looked around, taking in the work that had been done. “I must say,” she said with a sigh. “I’m terribly disappointed. I had expected to see a great deal more progress here. The event I’ve planned is to take place just three days from now. Wasn’t that explained to you when you accepted this assignment, Captain Canfield?”
“I didn’t exactly accept it, Miss Norwood, any more than these other men did. I was handed a set of plans this morning, along with orders to build an entire parade ground and viewing stands—in only three days.”
“And that is precisely why I’m come here, today,” she said briskly. “To make several changes to those plans.”
The captain shook his head, already expecting bad news. “What kind of changes?”
She handed him a small collection of sketches. “I’ve decided that we’ll need a bit of color—some flower beds, to be precise. The flowers will be delivered in the morning. They’re all to be red, white, and blue, and planted in rows, in order to resemble the flag. The effect will be simply lovely, and wonderfully patriotic, of course. After that, I’d like you to move the viewing stands a bit closer to the river, and for an awning of some sor
t to be erected. I assume you’ve noticed that the weather has turned frightfully warm. “
Canfield turned slightly, to indicate the sweat-stained group of men behind him. “We’ve noticed.”
“Oh,” she murmured. “Well, I’m sorry if your men are uncomfortable, but I assure you that all of their efforts are for a very good cause. In any case, if you’ll simply do as I ask, and move everything closer to the river, they’ll all be cooler while they work, now, won’t they? And I’m afraid that the awning I spoke of is absolutely not negotiable. I’ve invited quite a lot of extremely influential people, and I simply won’t have them swooning from the heat.”
“In the first place,” Jed explained, with a grim edge to his voice. “It’s too late to move anything. We’ve already poured the cement. As it is, those footings probably won’t have sufficient time to cure properly. Your influential friends will be damned lucky not to end up in one another’s laps. And you’re right about the damned awning. It’s not negotiable, or even safe. There’s an afternoon breeze on this river that’ll blow away any sort of cover we can rig quickly, and when the cover goes, it’ll take your idiot viewing stand with it.”
Hannah glared at him. “Why are you being so disagreeable about this? It’s all being done for you, you know!”
“For who?”
“The money raised at this event will pay for a lovely granite monument in honor of the new holiday. A lone Union soldier, cast in bronze, looking out across the Potomac. There’s to be a large plaque at the base, as well, honoring all of the wounded veterans of the war who served so nobly, and…”
Suddenly, someone near the back shouted. “All them wounded veterans you’re goin’ on about don’t need another damn statue, lady! What they need is a decent pension, and some medical attention for the godawful things that’s happened to ‘em, and…”