by Lane, Cheryl
I started walking down the hill, which was flanked on both sides by bright pink crepe myrtles, into a series of courtyards on both sides of the main walk. Each courtyard was outlined with more boxwoods. A few yellow lilies and red roses grew here and there, as well as more crepe myrtles in pinks, whites, and purples. The terraces were separated by dirt paths leading to other areas of the plantation, and brick columns with rounded finials stood guard at the end of each pathway, covered with English ivy. A sundial stood in the center of one of the points where four trails met in the middle. I walked down further towards the river and looked to the right where there was a sloping hill that trailed down to the river, and to the left was a path that led over to a vegetable garden and the sunflowers I had seen earlier.
The main path led all the way to the bottom of the hill where there was a large grassy flat expanse, a small pond, and more grass that led to the water, which lapped against the rocky shore. There were tall poles sticking out where I suddenly remembered there used to be a dock. It hit me all at once that I had indeed been here before. This was the playground where I’d played hide-and-seek with my two boy-friends as a child! The dock – which must have been destroyed during the war – was where the blonde boy and I had come to by rowboat to see the dark-haired boy. I was at the home of the dark-haired, amber-eyed boy. Wellsy. I wondered what had happened to him. I couldn’t remember him as a grown-up. I hoped he was still alive.
I began to get excited. It felt so wonderful to finally be able to remember something, to see something that I’d only dreamt about, wondering if it was a real place. I had to wonder no more, at least about this place. I felt comforted and joyous. I frolicked up and down the “Ladies Winter Garden”, now overgrown except for a few roses and lilies, feeling like a child again. After dancing back up the hill a little ways, I rested on a bench by one of the brick columns on the third courtyard down, which was shaded by fragrant white crepe myrtle trees. I breathed in the moist perfumed air, feeling soft breezes creep up from the river against my face. Curious bees buzzed by me on their way to the succulent blooms. I dabbed sweat off my face with my handkerchief.
While taking in the peaceful surroundings, I heard shuffling feet in the dry dirt, crunching on occasional rocks. Someone was coming in my direction from the path that led towards the vegetable garden. I looked over at the same time that a man came around the corner of a tall boxwood. I caught my breath. There before me was the most handsome man that I could ever remember laying eyes on. He was tall and had dark brown hair which lay softly on his forehead and reached his collar in the back. He was wearing a brown hat to shade his eyes from the sun. He had thick sideburns, a beard, and a mustache. He wore a dingy white long-sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up, brown trousers with braces, and brown congress boots. He looked like he had been working out in the fields, as he was not wearing a waist coat or jacket, so he was probably a field hand.
I stood up, and he looked at me. He froze. I froze. He looked at me as though he were seeing a ghost. I wondered who he was, looking at me that way.
“Madeline?” he asked. It was him. The voice I’d heard in my head. This was the man I had longed for in my flash of memory…the one I had been hoping to find.
To my surprise, he dropped a shovel he had been holding and quickly shortened the distance between us. “Madeline, darling. Is it really you?” he asked as he reached me. Before I could answer, he threw his arms around me and embraced me tightly, lifting my feet off the ground for a moment. I had to put my arms around his back for fear of falling. “I thought I’d never see you again,” he said. I felt his warm breath in my ear.
I held my own breath. I didn’t know quite what to do. He took me completely by surprise. But just for a moment, I felt like I was in heaven. He put my feet back on the ground and loosened his embrace, still holding onto my arms, and looked at me with smoldering eyes. Fascinating eyes. They looked light brown and yet sort of green. He stood nearly a head taller than me. Upon seeing his face up close, I noticed his sideburns ran into his beard, which traced the edge of his chin, and there was a little small patch of hair directly under his lower lip. He took my breath away. He looked at me with such adoration. I wondered again who he was. I had hoped that Ethan was the one I had longed for, but now that I saw this man so casually dressed, I was sure I’d be disappointed, that he wouldn’t be the man I had been married to.
“Let me look at you,” he said. “You haven’t changed a bit. You look like you’ve been out in the sun a lot. Have you been outside working hard?” He held my hands and looked at them as he spoke, “Look at your hands. You have blisters. You shouldn’t have to work so hard, Madeline.” His deep voice warmed and stirred my heart. He pulled my palms to his lips and kissed each one ever so gently. My heart stopped. I’d never felt this way when Jefferson had touched me or kissed me. This was completely different.
“Please forgive my appearance,” he said, looking down at his soiled shirt. “I, too, have been working out in the fields.” He looked me over, seeming to be convincing himself that I was real. Then he looked into my eyes again. I felt his eyes penetrate to my very soul. Such love in those eyes. If I’d ever wondered if I had been loved in the past, I knew it now, just by looking into his eyes. I had certainly not seen that look in Jefferson’s eyes. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen you. I thought I’d lost you forever,” he said. He touched my face gently with his rough hand and leaned his head towards me like he was going to kiss me, but I spoke up, interrupting him.
“Um…are you Ethan?” I dared to ask him, biting my lower lip. I was nervous about his response. What if it wasn’t Ethan? What if this was someone I’d had a liaison with? What if I had committed adultery?
A confused look came over his face. “What do you mean? Of course, I’m Ethan. Are you ill?” He tucked a stray hair behind my ear. Relief flooded through me that he was, indeed, my husband. The man I had longed for had been my husband. I couldn’t be happier! Well, of course, I could be, if I could remember him.
Before I could answer, he continued with questions. “What happened to you? Where have you been?”
“I must apologize,” I began. “I don’t know what happened to me. I don’t remember you. I don’t remember your mother. I don’t even know who I am, or who I was. I was found by a family in Chester. I do remember getting hit in the head and falling out of a carriage.” I told him the whole story of how they nursed me back to health and took me in as one of their own; and also about how the house caught fire and they all perished except for me, Cora and the girls. I left out the part about Jefferson, for now. “So then I met your mother in the marketplace in Chester, and she offered to bring us here, even Cora and the girls. Your mother said you could use the help.”
Ethan smiled. “Thank God my mother found you,” he said. “I had given up hope of ever seeing you again.” He stopped smiling and his face grew somber. “I’m sorry about the Washingtons.” He picked up my hand and squeezed it gently. “So you don’t remember me? That we were married?”
“Honestly, no, I don’t. I wish I did.” I smiled at him. “But I did remember your voice.” I told him about the memory I’d had nine months previous when I heard him say my name, not mentioning the ring. “I’m so glad to finally put a face to that voice I heard in my head,” I said, blushing slightly.
He smiled brightly. “How wonderful that you remembered my voice! We were married right up there on the hill in that gazebo,” he pointed behind me. I looked around, trying to remember. So the gazebo had been filled with happy memories, too. I was glad. “It had been nearly destroyed during the war when it was hit with a cannon, but I built it back before the wedding. Where’s your wedding ring?” he asked, looking at my empty hands.
“I…wedding ring?” What should I tell him about the ring? That a man who supposedly was named Jefferson Banks had it, who claimed we had been betrothed to be married before I had the accident? Who told me that the ring had belonged to his mother? The ring that I
had to give back? I wondered if the ring Jefferson had really was the same ring Ethan was referring to.
“Yes,” he answered my earlier question. “You always wore it when you went to the marketplace. It has been missing as long as you have.”
“What did it look like?” I asked. If I knew that, then I would know whether Jefferson really had my ring or not. He began to describe it, and it was exactly like the ring I had in my possession for a short while, the ring I’d had the memory from. Somehow I knew it would be the same ring.
“I’m so sorry. I wasn’t wearing it when I was found.” That much was true. I wanted to tell him about Jefferson but held back for the time being. I didn’t know how Ethan would react, knowing that I’d let the ring literally slip through my fingers.
He smiled again. “No matter. At least you’re here. I’m overcome with joy! Let’s sit down. You must be fatigued from your long journey.” He waited for me to sit down on the bench, and then he sat beside me, very close. “Let me tell you all about us. I’m Ethan Wellington. You were Madeline Chambers before you married me. We grew up together. Our families were very close. You lived in a plantation up the river called Magnolia Grove.” I watched his eyes looking at my own as he talked. I loved hearing him talk…that voice I had longed for, for so long. “Your father died in the War of Northern Aggression, after getting shot and then coming down with dysentery. I also fought in the war and was lucky not to be injured physically, other than cuts and bruises. Your mother died of pneumonia during the war, and your brother, Jonas, now lives in that plantation, even though the Yankees made it a hospital after your mother’s death and destroyed nearly all the furniture. Jonas lives there alone – his betrothed Lucy was apparently murdered by the Yankees.”
I was saddened that my parents had died, even though I didn’t remember them. But he’d said my brother lived nearby. “My brother is still alive?” I asked, my eyes widening. Had Jefferson lied to me again?
“Yes. Do you remember him?”
I shook my head “no”. I was furious at Jefferson’s lies, not only about my brother being dead, but that we’d lived in Surry, when it was here that I’d lived. I was, of course, relieved that my brother was still alive. A thought began to stir inside of me, but I kept it at bay while Ethan continued talking.
“Our house also came under siege here. With Father and me gone out to war, Mother was left alone with the slaves. A lot of them escaped when a Union ship came down the river and docked over at City Point. They came back later for their wives. Only a handful stayed till Emancipation, and then only two men and one woman stayed. The Union soldiers came in and took over the manor, and Mother provided food, bandages, and other supplies for the injured men until ships arrived to take the wounded to nearby hospitals. That was during the first part of the war. Before they left, they burned a lot of furniture and stole loads of silver, china, anything they could carry out of the house with them. Am I talking too much?”
“No, not at all. I’m fascinated actually. Please continue,” I said, smiling. He returned the smile, showing a hint of a dimple on his chin between his whiskers.
“The Yankees came back towards the end of the war in 1864, when they were trying to gain control of Petersburg and Richmond. Mother had no choice but to let them use the house as a headquarters for the Union troops, and they held prisoners in the cellar. Abraham Lincoln even visited here. A cannon was placed on the top of the hill at a nearby plantation, where they bombed Petersburg across the river. They used the gazebo as a lookout for vessels on the water during the war, but it was damaged, like I said before. When the troops took over, Mother and the woman ex-slave left and came to your plantation up the river.” His face was melancholy as he was talking about all the tragedies that had happened.
“Where was I during the war?” I asked.
“We weren’t married yet, so you were at your plantation with your mother at the beginning of the war. There was a terrible raid of the house while you were there. You told me they cut your wrist when you tried to protest.” He turned my hand up to show me the scar on my left wrist.
“So that’s where that came from,” I said, mostly to myself. I could see that happening in my mind…chaos, noisy men, crashing things around the house, one grabbing my arm, slicing my wrist, pain. I didn’t know whether that was a vision of my past or just my own imaginings.
Ethan went on, “They broke up a lot of furniture and used the wood for fire in nearby camps. The troops left and your mother caught pneumonia, perhaps from one of the soldiers. The Yankees came back again later and took over both plantations. This plantation was used for the troops to have camp, and your plantation became a field hospital. When your mother died of pneumonia, my mother came to your plantation with Fanny, and you all helped our local doctor with the wounded. You also supplied water, bread, soup, and cloths for the soldiers when they were there. Finally, I came to visit you and Mother and convinced you to go over to the Edgewood House at the grist mill, where you stayed till the war ended, feeding soldiers from both sides of the war.
I could tell the war had an awful impact on him and his family, even on me and my own family, but I couldn’t remember my own experiences. Feeling pity for him, I picked up one of his hands with both of mine and gently squeezed it. He looked at my hand touching his, and his mood quickly changed. He smiled at me. “You and I were married just after the war ended, in 1865. We were happy for a year, until one day you went to City Point with Fanny to sell some cotton blankets you had made and never came back.” I let go of his hand, wondering if he felt resentment towards me. He looked disappointed that I had let go of his hand.
“Who’s Fanny?” I asked. No one had said there had been anybody with me at the time of my accident.
“She was a freed slave, the only female house slave who didn’t turn on mother after the war. She’s the one who came to your plantation with Mother when the soldiers took over our plantation. She came back here with Mother after the war, and then after we were married, she accompanied you when you went to the marketplace. She disappeared the same day that you did.”
“Oh, dear,” I said, not remembering that at all. “I had no idea. That’s truly upsetting.” I wondered what had happened to her. Bless her soul; I hoped she was all right.
I swallowed hard. I didn’t remember any of the things Ethan had told me. How terrible it all must have been. I looked bewilderedly at Ethan, at the man who claimed to be my husband. Had I loved this man? Yet I felt I already knew the answer to that, ever since I’d had that memory of his voice. Now that I’d found him, I was certain that we had been happy together, and I found myself wanting to be with him and thankful that things worked out the way they did to bring me back to him. I perceived him to be a gentle man. He seemed to genuinely care about me, and there was such adoration in his eyes for me.
“I’m sorry that I caused you so much pain, Mr. Wellington. I—”
“Please,” he interrupted. “Call me Ethan.”
I felt funny doing so, when I still didn’t remember him, but I consented to his wishes, knowing it might help me with my memory, since I had apparently known him since we were children. “All right…Ethan. I can’t say what happened to me. All I know is that I was found near the Washingtons’ farm, and they took me in. I had no memory, so I didn’t know where else to go. Please forgive me for not returning to you.”
“There’s nothing to forgive. It is just amazing that Mother found you and was able to bring you back home. It must be terrible for you not to remember anything.” I nodded. “I’m glad you’re here now. Maybe I can help you regain your memory.” He smiled at me with that devastating smile of his. It warmed my heart.
“Thank you, I’d like that very much.”
His face abruptly changed and his smile faded. “I do wish I’d found you sooner. There is something I must tell you.” He hesitated. I looked into his eyes and saw pain. “I’m not sure you’re ready for this. It won’t be pleasant for you.”
&nbs
p; “Go on,” I said, bracing myself.
“I was just married to another woman only a month ago. It was a short betrothal, I’ll admit, but I was terribly lonely after you’d been gone for nearly a year, and I thought I needed her. My father kept insisting that you were dead, since no one ever found you.”
I furrowed my brow, thinking of what he said. I was, of course, surprised. After receiving such a warm greeting of affection, I had thought he cared for me. Perhaps I was wrong. I must have misread the look in his eyes, his joyfulness, his attentiveness, and his gentle touches. Perhaps he didn’t want to be with me, after all. Even though I didn’t remember him, it hurt that he had moved on so quickly, only a year after I had disappeared. I didn’t even fathom that he could have remarried. If he loved me as much as I thought he did, why had he married again so soon? And yet, he hadn’t actually said he loved me. I had come to the wrong conclusion. I supposed that if he’d thought I was dead, he should be allowed to go on with his life. But still, it hurt.
I stood up to go. “I’m sorry,” I said, flustered, looking down at my hands. “I shouldn’t be here. You have your own life now.”
I turned to go, but he stood up quickly and caught my arm. “Where are you going?”
“I need to find some place I can call home, maybe to that brother of mine. I’ll just take my carriage and go now. I’m sorry to have troubled you, truly I am.”