by Holly Bush
The wagon passed the outcrop of rocks marking the Paradise property line, revealing a valley below with a plateau of flat land above it. The valley was fenced, with horses grazing and trotting about, and he could see a few foals probably born this past spring trailing their mothers. He looked at the house above and felt a tight constriction in his chest. Flat whitewashed fences surrounded its rambling two stories that had been one room when his parents moved there shortly after their marriage. It was now a sprawling twenty-room house of stone with large windows and wood shutters and a gabled roof. Flowers were still blooming, and trees overhung the house in the back. A large barn sat near it with several other neat outbuildings beyond. It was Paradise. It was his home.
There was a woman on the front porch in a dark dress, not his mother, could it be . . .
“There’s Olivia,” Adam said and nodded. “She must see you because she’s jumping up and down and running into the house—to get Mother, I imagine.”
“She’s no young girl anymore, is she?”
“She’s not. Mother has her hands full with our baby sister.”
Adam urged the horse on when they hit the level ground that brought them to the front of the house. Matt jumped down from his seat as his mother came out the front door, Olivia on her heels.
They hurried to each other without speaking, and Matt pulled his mother into his arms, holding her tight to him and feeling her hands around his neck, his eyes closed, knowing that he wasn’t foolish to stay away because of the things he’d done, just foolish to have stayed away. He was missing his father desperately at that moment as his mother’s unrelenting black reminded him she was a widow. She stepped back in his loose embrace and held his cheeks with her hands.
“I’ve missed you. I am so very glad you’re home, Matthew.”
She was dry-eyed, and he nearly wasn’t. She was still beautiful, with flawless skin and dark green eyes and a regal bearing. She was a lady through and through, who had set high expectations for her children but none higher than those she set for herself.
“I have missed you, too, Mother.”
And then Olivia launched herself into his arms.
“You wretch! Adam is now my favorite brother since you’ve stayed away so long!” Olivia shouted, crying and hugging him.
She had fulfilled all the promise she’d shown when he’d left, growing into a lovely young woman. She was thin in a coltish way, with dark hair like his own with a red shadow. He kissed both of her cheeks and picked her up and swung her around.
“I’ve missed you! All of a sudden you’re a lady! Do you still chase the chickens?”
She laughed as he intended, and he turned back to the wagon as Ben was inching his way out and a young man had come to take Chester and Adam’s horse.
“Double rations for that chestnut there. His name his Chester. Treat him right. He saved my life.”
“And mine, too,” Ben said, now seated at the end of the wagon.
His mother had hurried to Ben when she’d realized he was there, fussing over him and asking if he was well and thanking him for finding her Matthew.
“I’m fine, Miss Eleanor, but I do need to lie down. It’s been quite a day,” he said, tears in his eyes again. “If I could just get to my rooms, I’ll be fine.”
“You’ll do no such thing, Ben. You’ll be staying here in the house where I can keep watch over you.”
Matt went to the wagon and lifted him into his arms, with no disagreement. “Where am I putting this cantankerous old man, Mother?”
She looked at him and at Ben and back to him, speculating on what he didn’t know. “We’ll put him in the guest room on the lower floor beside Aunt Brigid’s room so he doesn’t have to climb steps. Olivia? Tell Jenny to check the room and tell Mabel to prepare extra for dinner. My Matthew and our Ben are home.”
“I just don’t want the womenfolk seeing that I can’t even shave myself or wash my hands and face.”
“But you don’t care if I see you?” Matt asked as he shaved the old man.
Ben chuckled. “No, I don’t care at all. It’d be different if it were our Annie.” He looked Matt in the eyes.
“There is no ‘our Annie,’ as she’s not mine,” Matt said. He’d made her his, though, in the basest most primal way. He’d had sex with her, left his mark on her by taking her virginity. She could be carrying their child this very minute.
“I think she is yours, son,” he whispered. “I think she is.”
Matt held his arm until he was seated at the dining room table. Adam was at the head now, with Mother at the other end. Aunt Brigid was alive and white-haired with crinkling, laughing eyes and arthritic hands. Mabel brought her to the table in a wheeled chair and then turned to Matt. She held his face in her hands, kissed his cheeks and told him it was high time he was home, that she had missed making his favorite meals.
“She’s been able to cook considerably less food since you’ve been gone,” Adam said and accepted a platter heaped with roast beef from a young girl.
“I will cook twice as much as usual,” Mabel said. “I intend to fatten Mr. Matthew up again.”
Matt filled his plate with beef and corn casserole and buttered parsnips and sliced potatoes, browned and seasoned, and then helped Ben cut his beef and tuck his napkin in his shirt. His mother’s table, of course, was covered with Irish linen and held shining crystal and china and heavy silver forks and knives. He and Adam and Aunt Brigid had a glass of wine with dinner. Everything was hot and delicious and well-seasoned and cooked, but it only made him think of Annie’s yellow tablecloth and the rough dishes he ate his turkey and corn bread stuffing from in her cabin.
Talk stayed very general during dinner, and he was glad of it. He had no intentions of retelling the last few years in front of everyone. He was still not certain if he’d only tell Mother or just Adam or both. He wasn’t going to tell Olivia any of it. He realized that his happy homecoming and his apparent status as a returning hero might not hold for long once he’d revealed where he’d been and what he’d done.
Mabel served slices of berry pie with cream for dessert, and Matt ate his and what Ben didn’t eat on his plate, too. It was strange to think how he now felt about Ben, whom he’d thought of as an interloper when Ben had found him, judging him and treating him as if he were a child. Was Ben his connection to his father? It didn’t matter. They’d weathered the river and their ailments and their travels home, but more than that, they’d left Annie together.
Adam rose and came around the table to help Mother and Olivia from their seats. “I’ll be going out to the barns for a quick check around, and then maybe you and I can have a brandy together in the library, Matt.”
Matt helped Ben to his feet. “I’m going to help Ben get settled and take a walk around the house. I’ll be glad to take you up on your offer of a brandy, but maybe just some more coffee instead.” He turned to his sister. “Olivia, would you care to join me?”
“I would love to.”
She came around the table, smiling broadly, eyes on Ben as she helped him to his feet. “Are you ready to lie down a bit, Ben?”
“Maybe I could sit by the fire in the main room for a bit first.”
“Let me get you comfortable,” she said.
Matt walked behind them, struck as he always was that the main room, as they all called it, was the entire house when his mother and father married and moved in. The walls had been plastered to the second-story balcony that had been added as part of the upper floor, and tall windows set in the front on either side of the door. The remaining original feature was the floor to ceiling stone fireplace with a hearth three feet wide and at least ten feet long. The mantel was one long polished piece of oak to match the door and the wood trim around the room. The firebox was tall enough that his mother could walk into it without bending over a bit, nearly six feet deep and at least that wide as well.
Ben sat down where a low fire was burning, as it was still summer, but cool in the house in the
evening.
“Would you like a blanket for your legs?” Olivia asked and moved his crutches to lean against the fireplace.
“I would, if Mr. Littleship agrees to allow my company that is,” Aunt Brigid said as Mabel wheeled her into the room.
“Yes, Miss Brigid. Join me. Are there two blankets?”
“Absolutely. I’ll get them,” Mabel said and turned to Olivia. “I’ll make them comfortable. Take your brother and show him around.”
Olivia slipped a hand through the crook of his arm. “Come along then, Matt. I will have you all to myself for a bit.”
The two of them wandered the lower floors, and she showed him the latest addition to the house, a large room, suitable for dancing or a large party. “Mother calls it the ballroom, but it’s much too small to be called that, wouldn’t you say? But it is a very stately room with its high ceilings, tall windows, and marble fireplaces. Mother let me choose the drapes and whatnot, and I’m very pleased with how it turned out.”
“I’ve been to balls in the South that were held in rooms this size or smaller. I think it’s a very nice room, but I wonder why it was added. Do the Gentrys do so much entertaining that this room was necessary?”
She tilted her head and smiled up at him. “Maybe not strictly necessary but customary on a property like Paradise. There will be three weddings at the least to be celebrated in this room.” She left his side and walked toward the fireplace. “It was finished just in time for Daddy’s funeral.”
He turned and looked the whole way around the room, just now connecting that there had been things associated with his father’s death that he’d missed. His father’s body had lain here. There’d been mourners. There’d been a funeral meal and a burial. His mother’s black dress and Olivia’s gray one had given him a hint of it.
“Were there many here as mourners? Did some stay here at Paradise?”
“We kept those closest to mother and father that lived far away here in the house and even had someone staying in Ben’s rooms. There wasn’t a hotel room to be had for twenty miles, and folks in town rented out rooms to visitors. I was able to coordinate much of it, thankfully, as Mother had her hands full here.”
“It seems strange to me,” Matt said finally. “Thinking about what sounds like a grand funeral for Daddy.”
“You were eighteen when you left and had been away much of the time at school the two years prior. I’m not sure as young people we quite understand how the world around us relates to us and to our families. The Gentrys are well known, Matt. Mother has had a ballroom built for several reasons, not the least of which is that we are a prominent family and have connections to the north and the south of us from shortly after the turn of the century and throughout and after the War between the States.”
He conceded that his expectations for his sister prior to arriving and even after seeing her again after six or more years were preconceived on the fact that when he’d left she’d been a young girl. He, being who he was, had never taken the time to see or understand her intellect, although he imagined that Adam had done that exact thing. Clearly, he’d been mistaken. Olivia was twenty-one years old and had a brain and had made some interesting and probably true observations.
“I’d never thought of it that way, Livie. You’re right. I was at the academy mostly and not home. I knew that our family had resources, money and the Morgans mostly, but I didn’t think we had that much. I guess I never thought of us as being in a different social class. My friends growing up were from town, Jim Somerset, the farrier’s son, and Winston Nettlestrom. There were no class differences among us. Mourners came from far away then?”
“Perhaps there were no class differences, but really, Matt, had you not considered that Mother insisted on fine manners and a good education for us? Even if it was only done idly because that was what Mother thought was right, although I don’t believe there was anything idle about it. We’re well educated with strong connections in a country changing rapidly. It would be foolish to not think that perhaps either you or Adam might be leaders or that I might marry one.”
“We’re a dynasty, now are we?” Matt chuckled and then gazed ruefully at his sister, who was looking at him with an arched brow, reminiscent of their mother. “You’re serious.”
“Of course I’m serious. And now we have a war hero to boast of.”
He walked toward her and shook his head. “I’m nothing like a hero, Livie. You must disabuse yourself of that notion immediately.”
“Because you were a Confederate officer? You were, weren’t you? Leaders lead, Matt. It will matter little what side you were on a decade from now.”
“This has been the most contrary conversation I’ve ever had. I was a captain in the Army of Northern Virginia. But you’re wrong—it will always matter what side I was on and what I did. It will still matter a hundred years from now.”
Olivia looked out the window and latched on to his arm again. “We’ve tarried here. I see Adam coming in from the barns.”
Matt walked her back to the main room, stopping before he entered to lean close to her ear. “I’ve heard that you were almost married, Livie. I’ll be sure to hear that story in the coming days.”
“That conversation will be contrary as well,” she said and hurried to Aunt Brigid’s side as she and Ben were being helped to their rooms.
Matt bid them all good night. Adam found him a few minutes later in the darkened kitchen, eating a second piece of pie and drinking a cup of coffee.
“I was right,” Adam said. “Mabel will have to start doubling her recipes. Still interested in a brandy?”
“I’ll keep my coffee, but we can still sit down together in the library,” Matt said as they walked. “Everything good in the barns?”
“Yes. We lost a filly a month ago that I had high hopes for, but the rest of the foals are doing well. We’ll have a good year.”
Matt opened one of the double doors of the library. It was dim inside, with just one lamp burning, beside the leather chair where his mother sat. Adam lit a few other lamps.
“Do not begin to think that you will tell your stories to your brother and not include me. I will hear it all, Matthew.”
Adam sat down on the end of a couch facing her, and Matt sat at the other end.
“We were just going to discuss Paradise, Mother, and I thought I’d tell him about Daddy’s funeral and other things that have happened over the last few years.”
“Ben told me that Livie almost married and that he and Daddy didn’t care for her young man,” Matt said and looked at his brother.
“Please tell me about your service in the war, Matthew,” she said.
He stared at his hands. It appeared that his and Adam’s attempts to keep conversations casual hadn’t worked. He thought at that moment of Annie and pictured her face in his head. She was never a coward, was she? He looked up at his mother. “I enlisted under Pickett, and my first battle was at Gettysburg in Pennsylvania.”
Adam covered his mouth with his hand, and his mother’s face grew pale.
“Gettysburg?” she said quietly. “Thousands died there.”
“Yes. Yes, they did. I survived as you can see. I was part of an infantry assault at the center of the Union soldiers, referred to as Pickett’s Charge. We were repulsed soundly and Lee ordered a retreat. We had skirmishes with Union soldiers and foul weather until we finally made it to the Potomac a few weeks afterwards. I had never seen such death and destruction and violence in my life. It was as if Dante’s Inferno had come to life that July day.”
“Dear God,” Adam whispered.
“I went on to the Battle of Mine Run and the Overland Campaign starting with The Wilderness over in Spotsylvania. I was a captain by then under Longstreet. Sometime in early May of sixty-four, I was sent south with a regiment to serve with the Army of the Trans-Mississippi and served there until the war was over.”
“Texas?” his brother asked. “Why Texas?”
“From the outside, w
ar looks very organized, very planned and well-thought-out by honorable men standing up for what they believe. It is nothing like that at all. Decisions were sometimes rash, especially at the division level, where personal victories could be the driving force and notice by Lee was prayed for more than a victory. There was often no pay, no food or uniforms, or even ammunition, especially at the end. The only thing in full supply was politics. And I imagine the Union Army was similar. I was astounded when I was told I’d be taking troops away from Virginia and would head to the deep south. The Trans-Mississippi, shockingly, was worse than anything I’d seen under Pickett.”
“But you went,” his mother said.
“Of course I went. I was a soldier. I thought of you often during those years, Mother. Your image was the reason I was able to continue on and certainly the only reason I was able to gather enough courage to head into the thick of a battle, where cannon balls whizzed by inches from my shoulder to remove the head of the man behind me and bullets came from all directions.”
“Don’t try and convince us you weren’t courageous. I’m certain you were, even being frightened,” Adam said.
“I carried my share of wounded off the fields of battle and led some ridiculously dangerous and yet successful missions into Union strongholds. Inevitably, though, I spiraled down, as there was rarely anyone honorable or even clever to follow in Texas. It’s shamefully easy to be a follower when you don’t know the right direction to go.”
“You were nineteen or twenty years old, Matt. Young men make mistakes,” Adam said.
Matt looked at him. “Don’t excuse me. Please. I’m already embarrassed that you’ve all welcomed me back with open arms.”
“You would prefer we chastise you and shake you?” his mother said. “What’s done is done and cannot be undone. And you are my and Beauregard’s son. You would serve as you committed to and do so honorably. I don’t have any doubt, Matthew. That doesn’t mean you haven’t had to see and perhaps do horrible things. It’s the nature of war.”