Savannah, or a Gift for Mr. Lincoln

by John Jakes

  At the dinner table on Friday afternoon, sipping weak tea brewed from Sara’s used holly leaves, Sara cleared her throat and discreetly asked, “Are you still taking pupils?” Hattie could have told her; she hadn’t seen a single one come or go.

  Vee said, “I’m willing, but most quit for lack of money. The last one able to pay left a week ago—Missy VanderPlonk, a promising child.”

  Hattie said, “You mean she just stopped coming?”

  “She and her family chose to escape across the river in a rowboat for which her father paid sixty dollars, gold, she said. I hope they’ll be safe, but you know how Sherman hates South Carolina. Oh, dear, I am so hungry.”

  Vee’s deeply felt sigh jiggled her chins. Hattie no longer counted the number of times a day Vee stated her condition, and truthfully, she did look thinner, as did Sara. Why not?—their diet consisted of rice from Silverglass, parched corn, and occasional desiccated vegetables topped off by well water, or a breakfast beverage concocted of okra seeds and chicory mixed with a tiny bit of hoarded coffee.

  With the teacups empty, Hattie suggested some music. Sara said, “That’s a fine idea. I keep forgetting the season.”

  Miss Vee dabbed her bow lips with her serviette. “The carols we once enjoyed were written in the North by a lot of radical Unitarian ministers who are also abolitionists. We’ll sing some nice English carols.” They trooped into the parlor. Miss Vee lowered her bulk onto the bench and they temporarily cheered themselves by warbling “The First Nowell” and “Good King Wenceslas.”

  Next day, Saturday, Sara sent Hattie to the City Market in Ellis Square. Hattie stayed on the boardwalks because the foot-deep sand in the streets was badly churned by military traffic. Instead of going directly to the market, however, she detoured to Bay Street, where prosperous factors had closed their offices and disappeared into grog shops, there to bemoan their economic loss, Vee said.

  A neighbor had told Hattie that curious things were afoot on the river, so Hattie trooped down the steep pedestrian stairs to the wharf forty feet below the bluff. She’d visited it with great pleasure in company with her father. She loved the checkerboard look of the warehouses and retaining walls made of stone ballast from oceangoing ships. If there had been a violent storm upstream, the Savannah might be flowing red, tinted by the unmistakable red dirt of Georgia. Today the river was disappointingly different: greasy yellow, awash with garbage and all manner of waste. Bales of rain-soaked cotton were rotting on the once-busy wharf.

  There were activities along the riverfront that Hattie didn’t understand. Negro gangs hammered and sawed and carried lengths of wood out of half-dismantled buildings. A curious construction of skiffs, barges, and rice flats lashed end to end extended from the foot of Broad Street two-thirds of the way to Hutchinson Island. As Hattie watched, men maneuvered another thirty-foot rice flat into place in midstream. Soldiers clambered over it to secure it with chains and ropes. Hattie marched up to an elderly Negro resting on a bale.

  “Grandfather, what’s that?”

  The old man smiled a smile that was mostly gums. “Why, child, General Hardee ha’nt confided in me, but it looks mighty like a bridge, don’t it? Maybe the general’s fixin’ to sneak off to Carolina. You’d have to ask him to be sure.”

  Soldiers planning to abandon the helpless citizenry? Vee would go wild if she heard that; matter of fact, Hattie was not reassured. She fled up one of the serpentine wagon roads leading to Bay Street and rushed on to the open-air market on Ellis Square.

  Under a shingle roof resting on brick pillars, the wartime market typically offered a few caged chickens, a basket or two of onions or sweet potatoes, and now and then shrimps and crabs some brave boatman brought in from neighboring creeks. Hattie’s arrival was well timed: a burly blue-black shrimperman was just emptying a sweetgrass basket onto a table. Hattie hurried to reach it ahead of a paunchy gentleman with the disdainful air favored by the well-to-do. She asked the price of the shrimp, then said, “I’ll have half a dozen, if you please, sir.”

  “Yes, miss.” The shrimperman put the shrimp into her tin pail while the paunchy gentleman harrumphed and spoke pointedly to no one about the manners of the younger generation.

  “Thank you, sir.” Hattie paid and curtseyed. She flashed her sweetest smile at the paunchy gentleman, whose eyebrows flew up while his mouth fell open.

  Outside the market she spied pallid and slow-moving Sparks Parmenter. Sparks was twenty, wore a special built-up shoe, and bobbed to the right at every other step. She called his name and caught up with him in Congress Street.

  “How are you, Sparks? Is the Pulaski House ever so grand?”

  “Pretty grand but pretty expensive. Ten dollars a day for one room. We moved to the City Hotel.”

  “Have you heard from Legrand?”

  “Not a word. Friend of Pa’s said Sherman sent a colonel into town under a white flag demanding unconditional surrender. They expect Hardee will say no. You know what that means.”

  “I don’t—tell me.”

  “Why, we’re sitting ducks. Hardee’s bottled up.” Evidently Sparks knew nothing of the strange boat bridge; Hattie didn’t mention it. Sparks continued, “Lee’s fighting in Virginia and hasn’t any relief troops to send. Sherman’s certain to mount a frontal assault across the causeways, torch the town, and turn his men loose to pillage.”

  “Oh, the beast. When will it happen?”

  “If you look out the window and see buildings burning, you’ll know.”

  “My heavens,” Hattie exclaimed with a shiver so pronounced, it made her curls bounce. “Can we do anything?”

  “No, nothing. Nothing.”

  “Well, you take care of yourself then, Sparks. Say hello to your folks. We’re at Miss Rohrschamp’s house near Wright Square. Please come tell us if you get any word from your brother.”

  “Like him a lot, do you?”

  “Why, he”—Hattie practically strangled, finding her excuse—“he’s a friend. Just a friend. I’d be as anxious about you, or anyone I knew.”

  “Sure you would,” Sparks answered with a crooked smile that reflected his sour view of life. Hattie stood there with flaming cheeks while he limped away. She ought not be too critical of him. She didn’t know how it felt to be unable to run or jump or climb trees.

  Back at Miss Vee’s, she delivered an edited version of Sparks’s unsettling statements but withheld news of the boat bridge. Sara said, “Well, let’s not make ourselves miserable waiting for the inevitable, if it is inevitable.”

  Vee wrung her hands. “There will be outrages—no woman safe, be she eight or eighty. Excuse me while I check the windows.” First, however, she checked herself in a hall mirror—patting her hair, smoothing her skirt before hurrying on. Sara put a hand over her mouth to suppress a giggle.

  While their benefactor was out of the room, Sara showed Hattie something Vee had discovered in her attic—an old issue of Godey’s. She opened it to the crafts page. “Isn’t this grand? Complete instructions for making a Father Christmas out of pinecones. There are plenty of those lying around town, and we must have some Christmas decorations, Sherman or no Sherman.”

  Hattie agreed to search the neighborhood. She collected two dozen pinecones, but her heart wasn’t in it. She kept reliving Christmas seasons before her father died, when the slaves came up to the house to receive big sacks of pecans, hard candy, and red apples, and Ladson Lester presented them seed for their own garden plots, plus three dollars apiece and a communal fir tree strung with popcorn. One year a married couple sang “Mary Had a Baby” so beautifully, everyone cried. The Lesters, including Hattie, didn’t differentiate between black and white, slave and free, not on those faraway, sharply remembered Christmases, anyway. Hattie wished they would come back. Though still a devout rebel, she had read enough, listened enough, to develop an uneasy feeling that slavery was wrong, and finished. She’d never admitted that to anyone except Sara, who agreed.

  Saturday night passed wi
th no attack by the minions of the feared Union general. On Sunday morning they tidied up and walked north on Bull Street to Miss Vee’s place of worship, Christ Church on the east side of Johnson Square. The church was high Episcopal, presided over by the Bishop of Georgia, the Right Reverend Elliott. Sara didn’t know of a Congregational chapel in town, and Hattie supposed she could pray for Legrand in one house of God as effectively as in another.

  Holding her mother’s hand and marching up one of the two staircases leading to the handsome Ionic portico, she felt her spirits lift, her fear of a sudden bombardment melt away in the mild air. They squeezed into a pew on the right of the aisle near the middle. In the front pew, left, sat Judge Drewgood, his wife, Lulu, and their children. Napoleon was swiveling his head this way and that to observe latecomers jostling into the balcony surrounding three sides of the sanctuary.

  Vee attracted sidelong glances when she maneuvered onto the kneeling bench with an excess of gasps and wheezes. Sara, unfamiliar with the ritual, remained seated. Hattie tried to shrink and hide. Napoleon craned around, spied Hattie, and began yanking his mother’s sleeve. We’re in for it now, Hattie thought.

  Miss Vee had informed her guests that Bishop Elliott’s stance as a religious leader veered between Confederate zealotry and Christian compassion. He wanted everyone in the parish to do his or her part, whether collecting food for the troops, rolling bandages, or providing nursing care to those who came home wounded or maimed. He no longer prayed for President Lincoln, instead for “Thy servant, the governor of Georgia.” Yet he prayed for a swift and merciful end to the debilitating war.

  Today the Bishop seemed more healer than warrior; his sermon began with the advent of the Christ child and segued smoothly to forgiveness of enemies as exemplified in the life of the adult Jesus. He quoted the Sermon on the Mount, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. He reinforced his argument with Proverbs 24:17, Rejoice not when thine enemy falleth, and let not thine heart be glad when he stumbleth, and Proverbs 16:7, When a man’s ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.

  Many in the packed church reacted with scowls, interpreting the message as acceptance of defeat. Hattie found it all rather murky, as she did most religious discussions. She couldn’t picture Jesus sitting down for a chat with General Sherman.

  At the conclusion of the service she followed her mother and Miss Vee out of the sanctuary while the shiny-pated organist in the gallery showed off with a noisy Bach chorale. The judge sped down a side aisle ahead of his brood, elbowing male and female parishioners alike; he cornered his quarry outside, at the foot of the steps.

  “Ladies, ladies! How delighted I am to see you.” He was the picture of Christian rectitude in a suit of somber black. He tipped his beaver hat and bowed so low, Hattie could imagine his nose scraping the sidewalk. “Sara, it’s indeed a comfort to know you’re in Savannah and not isolated out on the river.”

  “Very thoughtful of you to say so, Judge. Miss Rohrschamp kindly extended the hospitality of her house.”

  “And a good thing too,” the judge declared. Hattie noticed the Drewgoods’ carmine depot wagon parked among carriages and pony carts in front of the church. Old Adam held the reins as usual.

  Napoleon slipped an index finger up to his nose, saw Hattie watching, and canceled his explorations; he turned a furious red. Lulu trilled, “Children, say hello to Sara and Miss Rohrschamp. And let’s not forget dear Hattie.”

  “Oh, definitely not,” the judge said, managing to sound both pious and insincere.

  Merry was quick to offer a greeting, but squinty Cherry only mumbled while gazing elsewhere.

  The judge stepped in front of Sara to capture her attention: “I hope you realize the seriousness of our situation. There is no telling when or how Savannah will be attacked. I’ve written a letter to the Morning News announcing that I for one stand foursquare for compromise and conciliation, to prevent our homes from being looted and leveled. But who knows whether Sherman will be in a mood to listen to cooler heads? While that issue is being resolved, Yankee vandals are surely rampaging in the countryside. They say the cavalry of that devil Kilpatrick is raiding south into Liberty County. No doubt the enemy has overrun Silverglass, wouldn’t you suppose?”

  “It’s possible,” Sara replied in a guarded way.

  “Then all the more reason for you to be receptive to my purchase offer. What would a lady of your gentle disposition do if the Yankees burned the plantation?”

  “Why, I’d rebuild it, somehow.”

  “You have no means, no capital.”

  “I’d find the means and capital.”

  That wasn’t the answer he craved. His pumpkin-colored eyes drew down to slits. “Being stubborn will only invite tragedy. These are violent times. What if something unpleasant happened to you? Something debilitating—incapacitating?”

  “At the hands of the Yankees?”

  “Or someone else. We have our own criminal element.”

  Sara stared him down. “Judge, those are strange words. Should I interpret them as some kind of threat against me?”

  “Interpret them how you will.” So quick and fierce was his outburst, Lulu whispered orders for Cherry to run to Adam and have him ready the wagon. “I want to buy Silverglass, and I want you to sell it to me.”

  Sara smiled. “Never. And may I say, Judge, that is the most audacious and presumptuous salesmanship I have ever heard. The matter is closed.”

  “You think so? You wait.” He boomed it in his courtroom voice; the after-church crowd heard him and flowed away from them like the Red Sea parting. He clapped his tall hat back on his head; his little white goatee quivered. He bade them a sharp good morning and propelled Lulu away from the church by wrenching her elbow.

  Merry walked more slowly. Hattie darted after her. “Psst, Merry.” She crooked a finger. Merry leaned down so Hattie could whisper. “Have you heard from Jo Swett?”

  Merry’s eyes misted. “No, and I’m so afraid for him. There’s no telling what Papa will do if Jo appears. Thank you for caring to ask.”

  Giving Hattie’s hand a squeeze, she answered the judge’s peremptory summons and hurried off. Napoleon had already jumped up beside Adam and jerked the reins away from the slave.

  “That Drewgood is a viper,” Miss Vee declared as she gathered up her hoops to prepare for their walk home. “All he really cares about is property, his and yours. Do you think he’s capable of surrendering to Sherman rather than resisting?”

  With a doleful expression Sara said, “Alas, I fear he’s capable of anything.”

  At twilight Hattie sat on Vee’s front steps, her skirt tucked under her legs, her chin resting on her palm in a pensive way. The military encampment in Wright Square seemed to have settled into an unusual quiet. Maybe all the soldiers were collectively holding their breath, awaiting a Union onslaught.

  Distantly, an artillery piece boomed, scaring a spotted hound that went racing past. In the parlor, Miss Vee warmed up with several arpeggios, then launched into “Listen to the Mockingbird,” wildly popular a few years ago. Hattie cocked her head, puzzled; Vee was playing the song more slowly than usual. Maybe the whole of Savannah was holding its breath.

  Two barefoot Negro girls, eight or nine, paused outside the gate. One smiled at Hattie in a shy way. The other tugged her arm, but the first girl insisted on waving. Hattie returned the wave. The girls passed on into the smoky orange dusk.

  Hattie wondered where they lived. She imagined a hovel with no food on the table, pallets of ticking in place of beds, and certainly no toys or other personal belongings. From there it was only a short leap to thoughts of Christmas, a mere seven days away. What kind of celebration would those children enjoy? She suspected it would be poor, for them and all the children of the town. With shortages of everything—including coal—even the stockings of little beasts like Napoleon would be empty. She felt a pressing obligation to do something about it. But wha
t?

  At that moment she glanced up. Without making a sound, a soldier had approached along the sandy street. She supposed he was a soldier, although he wore soiled and torn civilian clothes. What prompted her conclusion was a clean white rag tied around his left thigh and a padded crutch under his left arm. Visibility in the dusk was poor, but there was something familiar about—

  “Legrand? Sakes alive, is it you?” She dashed down to the street and threw her arms around him.

  The hug lasted no more than a few seconds; Hattie skittered back, wild with embarrassment.

  Her friend was peaked and weary, no longer the “mere boy” of yore. A heady masculine odor surrounded him like a vapor cloud. Bay rum? Or—frightful thought—dressing for his wound? Who had wounded him? What horrors had he seen? “Legrand, where have you been?”

  He wasn’t offended by her foolish question. “The past two days, I’ve been at the City Hotel, recuperating. Sparks told me you and your mother were here.”

  “Come sit down, rest.” She tugged him toward the stairs. He gritted his teeth and hobbled up the steps as fast as he could. Hattie dusted the stoop for him. Legrand needed almost half a minute to sit down with the aid of the crutch.

  “Were you wounded something awful?” Hattie asked.

  “It’s a lot more hurtful than dangerous—that was the surgeon’s verdict.”

  “But you saw the elephant, didn’t you?”

  “And then some.”

  Hattie thrilled to hear him admit it. She hitched over near him and lowered her voice. “Did you see anyone—you know—pass over?”