It was all simple logic, he told himself, heaving a weary sigh. First he'd lied to save his skina good enough reason in any man's book. Then he had lied to aid his mission. As he became more emotionally involved with her, he'd lied to save her feelings. Later he'd lied to keep her ignorant of his business so she wouldn't be an accomplice if he was arrested by the Confederates. And so it had gone, with a valid reason for each lie. In effect, he'd rolled his sins forward, hoping they would be atoned at a later and more convenient time. In these wee morning hours, it seemed judgment day had arrived with no chance of atonement in sight.
Although he'd always lied to her for valid, logical reasons, he had to admit he'd never met a woman who thought logically about matters of the heart. Deep within himself he wondered if he could have forgiven her if she'd told him nothing but lies since the day they first met. It was almost more than the spirit could bear, he decided, imagining the brutal shock she'd received.
Then and there he promised himself that as soon as he'd seen Caroline, he would find some way to reason with Silky if it was the last thing he ever did. No matter if it took three days and three million words, he wouldn't let her go until she understood what was in his heart.
Only when he'd considered all of this did he recall Silky's words: I hope you're caught and hung from the highest tree in Richmond! She was now a free agent with enough evidence to see that her wish came true. His heart pounded deeply as he pondered that fact, and he wondered if the woman who'd touched him more deeply than any before her would actually turn him in.
Taggart paced about Caroline's shadowy library, waiting for her to join him. Since her shocked butler had admitted him to her mansion ten minutes ago, he'd disciplined himself to think only of the matter at hand, knowing it was vitally important. The servant had lit a lamp for him and light now pooled from her desk, revealing papers and a creased map. After glancing at the ticking clock, he paced to the desk and, smoothing out the map, ran his finger along the Petersburg road, which he knew would be heavily guarded. A wave of anxiety sweeping through him, he'd just turned to stare at the clock again when Caroline walked into the room. Dressed in a red velvet robe, with loose hair falling about her shoulders, she looked surprisingly young.
"You must have stumbled onto something very important tonight," she remarked, a smile blooming on her lips as she gracefully crossed the carpet between them. She sat down at her desk and gestured at a second chair nearby. "Tell me your good news."
"I'm afraid the news is very bad," he answered, his voice raw with concern as he claimed his seat. "I have some astounding information about the line."
Caroline raised her delicately arched brows. "And what is that?" she asked, her eyes sparkling with curiosity.
"Generals Gordon and Early are going to launch a surprise attack against Fort Stedman day after tomorrow," he announced evenly. He paused for a moment, then slowly continued, noticing her eyes widen in astonishment. "Their force is estimated at five thousand."
As he'd expected, her face went pale with shock. "Five thousand?" she repeated softly, her bosom rising and falling with emotion. "Why, an assault like that could change the course of the war with one stroke. Any amount of forewarning we can give the Union will be of immeasurable help."
Taggart sighed deeply, remembering the shabby fortification. "I believe it's the Confederate's last desperate push," he observed darkly, "and having seen the poor condition of Fort Stedman, it's possible they may be successful."
Caroline put on her glasses and for the better part of an hour they studied the map and talked about the information he'd extracted from the Rebel officer. Then they put all the details he'd gleaned into cipher.
After they'd finished, Caroline was still pale and shaken. "Yes, indeed, we must get this news to General Grant as soon as possible. I don't think it would be putting it too strongly to say we hold the future of the Army of the Potomac in our hands this night."
Taggart rose and paced about the room. "Getting the message to City Point will be a devil of a problem," he stated, racking his brain for a plan as he spoke. "With this impending attack, the Rebs will have a sharp eye out for anyone who looks suspicious." He paused and studied Caroline sitting at the desk, distress stamped on her features. "I was just there and I know how tight their security is," he commented. He pulled out a cigar and lit it. "I doubt your usual couriers can get through."
He threaded a hand through his hair, thinking the task was almost impossible; then an idea suddenly coalesced in his mind. "We need something to distract the Rebs," he declared, waving his finger at her. A slow smile worked its way across his mouth. "We need something they want very muchsomething the courier can give them that will absorb their interest."
Caroline gazed at him over her little half-glasses. "Yesbut what? That's the question, Major."
Taggart braced his hands on the desk. "Outside of more troops, what do the Rebs need most right now?"
She sighed, her face blank.
"Food," Taggart responded. "I've seen them in the trenchesthey're absolutely starving."
Caroline tapped a slender finger over her lips. "You know," she commented, "I think you're right. Ummm," she muttered thoughtfully, her eyes brightening a bit. "Tell me what you think about this idea."
She rose and walked about the desk, light flickering over her tense face. "I bought a large supply of canned goods before they became so scarce, and had my servants store the merchandise in the attic. Moses, one of my drivers, could take a dozen cases to the Confederate lines in an old wagon. I think after he delivered the food, he'd be able to drive a distance away, then simply abandon the wagon and slip through the forest to City Point. He knows the area well, and although he's still strong, he can feign a helpless appearance. Being occupied with the arrival of the food, I doubt the Rebs would take much notice of him, much less search him for a message."
Taggart puffed on his cigar. "But what if they did?" he asked.
She reclaimed her seat, her face lighting with mischief. "Don't worry. Moses will be wearing special shoes."
"Special shoes? What do you mean by that?"
She tossed her hair back, her eyes twinkling. "Remember you once asked me how I got messages to the North, and I said one of the servants walked them across?"
He nodded, wondering what that had to do with the problem at hand. "Yes, I remember."
"Well, the phrase has more meaning than you think," she said with a touch of humor. "Moses used to be a cobbler for a large plantation. He's made several pairs of shoes for my use with hollow heels. Whenever I want to send a message to the Union, I simply put it in one of the hollow heels, and a servant walks it to its destination.
Taggart smiled. "Clever," he said dryly, "very clever, indeed."
Caroline folded the message they'd coded and put it in her robe pocket. "I'll see that Moses is roused and the wagon is loaded with canned goods. He'll set out for the
Confederate line at dawn. When the Rebs see him, he can announce he's my servant. The officers know I purchase medicine for Chimborazo, so why shouldn't I send food to the trenches?" Her eyes snapped with satisfaction. "After all, everyone in Virginia thinks I'm crazy." Her lips turned upward as she put away the map. "The soldiers will be so involved in opening the cans, they'll pay little attention to where Moses goes after he's unloaded the wagon."
Smoothing back her hair, Caroline rose. "I saw you looking at the clock when I entered the room, Major," she commented with a kind expression. "And I can guess you're wanting to get back to the Spotswood. I suspect your haste concerns a matter of the heart, if you'll wait until one of my drivers gets dressed, I'll have him take you there."
He smiled at her. "I would appreciate that very much."
They walked to the door, and at the threshold she paused, concern kindling in her dark eyes. "Major Taggart, you must be extremely careful until General Grant takes Richmond," she warned, putting her hand on his sleeve. "I just received word a few days ago that the Confederacy is la
unching an all-out search for Union agents." Her face tightened with anxiety. "As you know, if you're caught, you'll be hanged."
Taggart's carriage rolled toward the Spotswood, the horses' hooves sounding hollowly against the rough brick pavement. As the vehicle turned onto the street paralleling Capitol Square, he could see the tall hotel standing out dimly against the pink sky. His concerns about Fort Stedman still hovered in the back of his mind, but all the way from Caroline's mansion he'd thought of nothing but Silky and their quarrel. Now, pulling out a pocket watch, he noticed that it was almost six.
At last the carriage creaked to a stop in front of the Spotswood and he stepped to the ground, seeing a few people emerge from the building, whose roof was gilded with golden light. As the driver wheeled the carriage about and the horses clattered away, Taggart entered the hotel, strode through the quiet lobby, and bounded up the steps. A turn of the key let him into his shadowy room and he quickly walked to Silky's chamber, expecting to see her curled in the center of her bed, tangled in a nest of sheets.
Pausing to light a lamp, he could almost catch her sweet scent and feel her soft skin next to his. Then, as he moved the light over her bed, an aching hollowness almost cut off his breath. The bed was empty, the coverlet as smooth and untouched as it had been yesterday morning after it had been made. Frozen in disbelief, he stood silently. She'd left him. She was gone.
Quickly he set the lamp down and jerked open her wardrobe. It was still full. Hope perked through him. She hadn't taken her clothes, so perhaps she hadn't left after all. Then after examining her vanity, he found her brush and comb and a few other personal items missing. In his mind's eye he could see her sitting there brushing her hair, bits of loose face powder tracing the vanity. There were no signs of powder now. The vanity was perfectly clean and orderly, polished, in fact, and its cold perfection tore at his heart.
At the wardrobe once again, he pushed back the gowns on their hangers until he discovered only two were missing. A sick feeling flooded his stomach as he surmised what had happened. She'd left, but that wild mountain pride of hers had only permitted her to take the barest necessities and a change of clothesthe two simplest gowns she had. The girl who'd been the center of his life since that fateful day he'd heard Freeze, stranger, or you'll be shaking hands with eternity was gone, and the fact hit him like a kick in the guts.
Chapter Eighteen
''Missy, this place done gone downhill real fast," Delcie cried as she and Silky paused in front of a run-down boardinghouse at seven that morning. "I wish to goodness I'd never told you about it!" Trash and empty bottles littered the gutters along Murphy Street, and next door to the building there was a broken-down carriage with several ill-clad urchins playing over it.
Silky, assuming all the dignity she could muster, opened the creaking iron gate, but the plucky servant wrested the carpetbag from her hand and surveyed the building with disgust. "I told you this was a bad place, but it's a heap worse than I 'membered. I sure wishes I'd known a better place to bring you," she added, circling her gaze back to Silky. "Let's us go back to the hotel so's you can talk to Lieutenant Taggart. He'll be worried clean out of his mind when he finds you done jumped up and run off."
Silky reclaimed her bag from Delcie. "No, I'm going to take a roomat least for a while," she declared with firm resolve. She squared her shoulders and marched up the broken walk, hearing Delcie's clattering steps behind her.
"This be a real bad part of town, too," Delcie warned, clutching her arm.
Silky exhaled a long sigh and turned about. "Quit worrying. I'll be all right," she promised, trying to ignore the girl's troubled face.
With that, she smoothed down the skirt of the plain blue gown and walked up the porch steps. She hadn't slept the night before, but by the time Delcie had arrived at the hotel, she'd already packed a bag and decided to find a place of her own. She'd stay a little longer in Richmond, she thought, sharply knocking on the door. She'd stay until Daniel was recovered; then she'd go back to the Blue Ridge where she belonged, where she could be herself, where people were honest and didn't try to deceive her.
She knocked again and heard heavy footsteps, then a gruff call from inside. "Hold your horses. I'm a-comin'!" All at once the door flew open, and Silky found herself staring at a huge, slovenly woman with frowsy hair and a dirty apron. The harridan reeked of musky body odor, and as for her figure, she looked like an enormous sack of grain with a string tied about the middle. "Yeah ... whatta ya want?" the landlady demanded, placing reddened hands on her hips.
Delcie tugged on Silky's sleeve. "Come on, let's just go," she whispered.
Silky shook off her hand. "I'm looking to rent a room," she said calmly to the woman. "The sign in the window says you have one."
The landlady opened the door a bit wider. "Room and board are five dollars a week," she announced, pushing her stringy hair from her eyes. "It's due every Monday mornin'. If you don't payyou're out."
"A-All right," Silky stammered, doing some quick calculations and wondering if she could make her money last until Daniel was well.
The woman cast her gaze over Silky's face and figure, her eyes gleaming with suspicion. "This ain't no bawdy houseno menfolks in the room. I have my morals, you know."
The landlady let the pair into the shabby foyer, which held a fetid, unpleasant odor, then led them up the rickety stairs covered with threadbare carpet. At the top of the landing, she ushered them into a room with the same gaudy, faded wallpaper Silky had seen in the stairwell.
Her heart sank like a stone in a pond, for the room contained nothing but a little cot, an old chest, and a scarred table and chairs. A tiny fireplace, hardly big enough to hold a foot-long stick of wood, filled one corner, a black poker laying across the empty grate. Outside of that, the squalid cubicle was cold and bare, the antithesis of the lovely room she'd enjoyed at the Spotswood.
The woman glared at Silky. "Take it or leave it," she bluntly proposed, tapping her foot. "If you don't, somebody else will."
Silky stepped forward and laid a five-dollar bill on the woman's open palm. "I'll take it."
At the threshold, the landlady glanced over her shoulder. "Dinner's at six sharp," she announced roughly, "and don't be late. We're havin' corn bread and cabbage." She threw Silky a look of contempt. "Hope that's all right with your ladyship," she added before lumbering out and slamming the door behind her.
Silky eyed the room, fighting back her depression. She'd never been used to soft living, but her log cabin was clean and cozy and filled with mountain flowers, bright quilts, and other pretty things. This place was bleak and filled with dust and the scent of greasy cabbage drifting up from below. But like it or not, she must stay here until she could get back to the mountains, she thought, sternly pushing her aversion aside.
In a huff, Delcie unpacked the carpetbag, all the while mumbling under her breath. Afterward she came to Silky, her dark eyes troubled. "You can't stay here, missy." She sighed with exasperation. "'Fore today, I's only seen the place from the outside. It's plumb filthy in here. 'Sides that, you didn't bring nothin' but two dresses. Why'd you come off with only two dresses?"
Silky flushed with anger as she thought of all the lovely clothes Taggart had bought her with counterfeit bills. "Two dresses are all I need," she replied crisply, wishing she had on her old buckskins this very minute. "It's all anybody needs."
The girl shook a slim finger at her. "You needs to go back to where you belongs," she informed her sternly. "Lieutenant Taggart been awful good to you and done bought you a heap of pretty things."
Silky raised her chin to a proud angle. "I don't want anything to do with Lieutenant Taggart or his money," she snapped, quickly crossing the room. "And I'd appreciate it if you'd never bring him up again."
Ignoring her request, Delcie pleaded Taggart's cause with all her might for twenty minutes. But at last she heaved a mighty sigh of defeat. "Reckon I'd better be goin' now," she finally said, her shoulders slumping in resignat
ion. "But don't fret yourself none. I's comin' back and see how you's doin'."
"Wait,'" Silky called softly. "Go to Mrs. Wilson back at the Spotswood and tell her you're free to work for her now. She'll hire you in a minute. I know she will."
Delcie nodded. "I's gonna do just that. But I ain't worded about me; I's worded about you."
Silky smiled, touched by her loyalty. "You don't need to worry about me. I'll be just fine." She watched the girl move to the door, knowing she'd be gone in just moments. When she remembered the secret she'd spilled to Fouche, a strong impulse surged through her, and she blurted out, "Tell Lieutenant Taggart that" Then, heaving a great sigh, she bit her tongue, asking herself if she was losing her mind.
Delcie gave her a questioning look. "Tell him what, missy?"
"N-Never mind," Silky replied nervously, thinking if Taggart hadn't left Richmond already, he soon would, now that she knew he was a spy. "It doesn't amount to anything." She moistened her lips, partially regaining her composure. "Remember now, if you do happen to see the lieutenant, don't be getting softhearted and tell him where I am," she ordered, putting some force into her voice. "Swear you won't."
Delcie pushed out her bottom lip in disapproval. "All right, if you be sayin' so," she answered, "but you be makin' a powerful big mistake, missy. A powerful mistake!"
After Delcie had gone, Silky sank to the lumpy mattress, untied a knotted handkerchief, and counted her meager funds. "Lord, what am I going to do?" she asked herself with a rash of panic, letting the folded bills slip through her fingers. She only had a little money, and Daniel had none. Well, somehow she'd just have to make her funds last until she could go home, she decided with a flash of spirit, tying up her money again.
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