Southern Son

by Victoria Wilcox

  Henry looked almost flustered as he tipped his new hat to her, and Rachel responded by twirling around to show off her new traveling dress, gray silk and pink ruffles to match a beribboned pink bonnet. With all the ruffles and bows it looked like a little girl’s dress, and nothing like the costumes John Henry’s mother had favored, dark and elegant in their simplicity. Rachel was nothing like his mother, except that she shared his father’s bed, and the thought of that never ceased to rankle him.

  But on this trip, even Rachel’s irritating presence couldn’t dampen his spirits. Mattie was coming to the wedding for sure; she had written to tell him so, and he took that as a favorable sign. Favorable, because he had something important to discuss with her, something far too important to say in a letter, and he needed to know that she would be happy to see him again. Though it had been over a year since they had last been together during his summer of exile in Jonesboro, the memory of that kiss in the barn behind her father’s house had stayed bright in his mind—as bright as the moonlight that had made her skin shine like ivory silk and made him lose his head for one sweet, satisfying moment. With any luck, he’d find the opportunity to kiss her again and then . . .

  “Well, are you comin’ with us or not?” Henry Holliday said, as he climbed into the hired hack and took the reins in hand. “It’s a long walk out to your Uncle John’s house, if you’re plannin’ on standin’ here all day.”

  Uncle John’s home was eight blocks out Peachtree Street, past the gaudy new mansions of the Reconstruction Era and up the long hill of Forrest Avenue. The woods were still thick this far out from the city, and the road was little more than a dirt track between fields cleared for cows and chickens. But though Uncle John’s house wasn’t one of those elegant Peachtree Street mansions, it was substantial. Above a foundation of gray stone and red brick rose three stories of gothic elegance, with rows of balconies wearing fancy filigree woodwork and a hip-roofed verandah that curved from the front door clear around the side of the house.

  Behind the house, the yard was filled with outbuildings: carriage house and summer kitchen, smoke house and dairy, horse barn and cow stall. Like all well-off city families, the Hollidays kept a cow, providing the luxury of fresh milk every day. Vegetables came from the garden behind the barn, eggs from the chickens in the chicken coop. More exotic supplies came from the family’s store—cured hams from Virginia, oysters from the coast, beef all the way from Texas.

  Food seemed to be the main topic of conversation that week of George’s wedding, besides the decorating that needed to be done. Although the wedding was to be held at the Methodist Church and the reception at the home of the bride’s parents, there were several pre-nuptial dinners being hosted at the Hollidays’ home and plenty of company to entertain. The young people were recruited to help at first, until Cousin Johnny Holliday, thirteen-years-old and awkward as a growing puppy, knocked over Aunt Permelia Ware Holliday’s heirloom crystal punch bowl, shattering it on the shiny hardwood floor.

  “Y’all get on out of here, right now!” Aunt Permelia commanded, her anger only barely restrained under her properly-mannered upbringing, and even her neatly arranged curls were starting to come undone. “Robert, take your cousins on an excursion somewhere for a while. Your aunts and I are busy enough without havin’ to guard the dishware!”

  John Henry was glad to be sent out of the house, for since his arrival he hadn’t had a single moment alone with Mattie—though she did seem pleased enough to see him. But they were always surrounded by a crowd of cousins and aunts and uncles, and her smiles might have been meant for anyone, not just him. Nor would anyone else, without knowing what had gone on between them the last time they had been together, ever guess that her “‘Afternoon, John Henry. You’re lookin’ well,” sounded like a love song to him, coming from her sweet lips. But did she mean it to sound so sweet, or was it just his eager heart that made it sound that way? He was in a fluster just thinking about it, and if Aunt Permelia hadn’t sent them all away, he might have been the next to drop a crystal serving piece.

  Cousin Robert, who at nineteen-years-old had fast forgotten his country roots in Fayetteville and given his heart to Atlanta, was pleased to act as tour-guide for their excursions. With his father’s two fine carriages—a phaeton with a folding leather roof and seats for six passengers, and a roofless runabout that seated four—he and John Henry could carry all the cousins who wanted to go along. Besides John Henry and Mattie and Cousin Robert, there were Robert’s boisterous younger brother Johnny, Mattie’s younger sisters Lucy, Theresa, Roberta, and Catherine, and Aunt Martha Holliday Johnson’s boys John Allen and Daniel. But luckily, the ten cousins were a perfect fit for the two carriages—and John Henry made sure that Mattie ended up riding in the runabout next to him for their daily outings.

  There was plenty for young people to see in Atlanta, and to the thrill of the boys most of the sights had something to do with the War. There was Kennesaw Mountain, where General Johnston’s army had dug in to await the arrival of the Yankees only five short years before, and where the entrenchments were still filled with the refuse of battle: bullets and buttons and sometimes even knives to take home as souvenirs. There was Stone Mountain, a mile-wide outcropping of white granite that loomed over the countryside like a sleeping dragon, and that both Rebels and Yankees had used as an observation point during the War and Indians had used as a ceremonial site before that. In between the time of the Indians and the armies, the mountain was owned by Aaron Cloud, who built an enormous observation deck at the top with a hotel at the base of the mountain. In its day, “Cloud’s Tower” had attracted tourists from all over the Southern states before the Yankees came and burned it down, like they did everything else they came close to. But John Henry still enjoyed hearing the story of Aaron Cloud, as his mother’s mother was a Cloud and cousin to the enterprising Aaron, which in his mind made him part owner of Stone Mountain, too.

  But the sight which affected Mattie most were the countless dirt mounds that littered the city, marking where fallen soldiers had been laid to rest in mass grave trenches during the Battle of Atlanta.

  “Like Colonel Grace and his chaplain,” she said in a reverent voice as they drove past one after another of those trench grave mounds. “I didn’t know so many folks had their gardens turned into cemeteries.”

  “It’s a problem, all right,” Robert commented, as the carriages drove side-by-side down the wide dirt expanse of Peachtree Street. “Seems like every time a builder turns over the land to lay a new foundation, there’s already skeletons in the way.”

  They were about to turn the corner when they crossed paths with John Henry’s father and Rachel riding at his side, returning from a shopping trip to John Smith’s Carriage Manufactory to place an order for the store in Valdosta.

  “Ordered two phaetons,” Henry said, “like that one y’all are ridin’ in. Might be some folks around Valdosta foolish enough to spend their money on such frivolity.”

  Though Henry’s words sounded like an insult to anyone owning an expensive driving rig, the truth was that Valdosta’s rutted dirt alleys were no place for a fancy carriage like a four-wheeled phaeton. Wagons and buggies were all that were really needed in a country town like Valdosta. Still, John Henry smarted under his father’s brusque words. Without knowing about backwards Lowndes County, his cousins wouldn’t understand about the phaetons, and think his father plain rude.

  “I ordered some runabouts too,” Henry went on, “including one for us. Figured it’ll be good advertising for the business when folks see Rachel ridin’ in that new carriage up the hill to town when she goes to buy dry goods, instead of walkin’ a couple of blocks.”

  His reasoning made sense, but John Henry couldn’t help thinking that his father had never bought his mother a carriage to ride in, though they’d lived seven miles out of town and she’d been sick all the time. Alice Jane had never had anything nicer than an old buggy to ride in all the years of her marriage. Now Rachel, u
ndeserving as she was, would ride to town in style, showing off Henry’s new prosperity.

  But Rachel’s words made John Henry forget all about his irritation at his father.

  “Well, I reckon I’m gonna need a carriage to ride in,” Rachel added with a grin, “now I’m in the family way again. I wasn’t gonna tell anyone yet, not even your Pa, for fearin’ bad luck. But when he wanted to stop off to Rich’s store and buy me a new corset at that big sale, I figured I better tell him. ‘Course fifty cents for a pretty French corset is a fine buy!”

  There was a moment of startled silence, and John Henry felt the blood rush to his face as he blushed in embarrassment. It wasn’t Rachel’s pregnancy that he found so disturbing; Rachel was always either with child or trying to be. But the way she announced it so openly, along with the needless mention of his father’s knowledge of ladies’ underthings, was a humiliation. Both topics related to marital intimacy, and neither was appropriate in the current mixed company of young ladies and adolescent boys. What would Mattie and her sisters think? His hands tightened reflexively on the reins as though he could lead the horse to a quick run, removing his carriage and himself from the shameful situation. But before he could move or even look to see if everyone else was as offended as he was by the crass comment, Mattie smiled and reached a hand across to Rachel.

  “Oh, how wonderful, Aunt Rachel!” she said, as if Henry’s wife were a real relation. “I know Mother will be thrilled to hear about a new baby in the family. Congratulations to you both!”

  John Henry turned and stared at her in astonishment, amazed that she could act so cordial in the face of such disgusting news, but Mattie seemed to be truly pleased, holding Rachel’s hand in her own and smiling sweetly. Then she turned to her sisters, crowded together in the back seat of the runabout.

  “Did you hear that, girls? We’re gonna have a new cousin in the family!”

  Because of Mattie’s enthusiasm over the baby announcement—and her complete disregard of the corset comment—everyone else joined in the congratulations as well. Even Robert, who surely had to have known how uncouth Rachel’s remarks had been, seemed unperturbed, shaking his uncle’s hand heartily.

  “Well done, Uncle Henry! I’ll have to make sure Father makes a toast to you both at the wedding reception tomorrow evening. Just think of it, John Henry, you could have a younger brother like Johnny here to torment you!”

  But it wasn’t a new brother John Henry was thinking about, or even Rachel’s rudeness anymore. He was thinking about what a lady Mattie was by comparison, genteel and refined and ready to diffuse a difficult situation with her sweet smile and gentle ways.

  His mother, he knew, would have approved.

  George Henry Holliday and Mary Elizabeth Wright were married in Wesley Chapel Methodist Episcopalian Church, a most auspicious location for the Holliday family’s first Atlanta wedding. The simple log meeting house was the first church established in Atlanta and one of the few wooden structures to have survived Sherman’s fires, and folks said that if Wesley Chapel could withstand the burning of Atlanta, perhaps those married there could survive the smaller fires of family life.

  The only shadow on the service came when Aunt Permelia insisted that her Mulatto serving girl, Sophie, be invited to attend the ceremony and be seated in the Holliday family pews as well. The Wrights, long-time slavers from Tennessee, objected of course. In times past, coloreds had sat apart from the white congregation in separate rows at the back of the chapel, and since the War, there’d been no coloreds in Wesley Chapel at all, after the whites raised a subscription of seven-hundred dollars so the former slaves could start their own church and the African Methodist Episcopalian Church was founded. But Aunt Permelia was adamant: Sophie Walton was like family, having come to her years ago in Fayetteville and choosing to stay on with the Hollidays even after the Emancipation. And with Georgia back under Martial Law again for ousting the newly elected black members of the State Legislature, the Wrights didn’t dare make too much of a fuss. The Yankees were still in control, after all, and that meant coloreds could be seated anywhere they liked—even in Wesley Chapel Church.

  The wedding reception followed at the home of the bride’s parents, one of those gaudy Peachtree Street mansions that had risen up during the Reconstruction. The grand entry hall glowed in candlelight, a string ensemble played in the parlor, the dining room table groaned under the weight of a sumptuous wedding banquet, and the ballroom gleamed in polished wood floors and cut glass chandeliers with a grand piano toward one long wall and a table of refreshments against the other. In the middle of the floor a fiddle player struck up a lively tune, then the piano joined in and the guests gathered for the traditional Virginia Reel with the colored butler acting as dance caller.

  “Head lady and foot man, forward and bow to your partner! Bow to your partner again! Right hands ‘round, now left hands ‘round, now both hands ‘round and do-si-do! Foot lady and head man, forward, bow to your partner . . .”

  It took John Henry two turns through the reel to position himself opposite Mattie, and she laughed when she saw him standing there across from her. But the reel was not a place for talking, what with the loud music and the louder laughter of the dancers, so he still couldn’t do much more than grin back at her, enjoying the dance.

  By the end of the reel most of the guests were too winded to go on, and the musicians struck up a gentler waltz tune instead, and though John Henry had been about to offer to get Mattie a drink of lemonade, the music made him stop in his tracks.

  “Liszt,” he said out loud, and felt the notes all the way down to his fingertips. For it was one of his mother’s favorite pieces the musicians had chosen to play, an old love song he’d practiced as a youth . . .

  “Dream of Love,” Mattie said, finishing his thought. “I haven’t heard that song in years, not since your Aunt Margaret’s wedding down in Valdosta. Do you remember it?”

  He looked into her face, flushed from the dancing, and smiling at the memory. “How could I ever forget?” he asked. “That’s when I learned to dance.” Mattie had been his teacher, of course, showing the steps of the waltz to an awkward boy. But he wasn’t a boy anymore, and he asked with a bow: “May I have this dance, Miss Holliday?”

  She was so small compared to him, her head coming no higher than his shoulder, and with her in his arms he suddenly felt taller than he ever had before. He could have kissed her on the top of her auburn head without even leaning down, or swept her up in his arms to kiss her on the face. But as the final strains of the waltz finished, Cousin George’s new father-in-law, the host of the wedding, stepped forward.

  “Ladies and gentlemen!” Mr. Wright announced with a broad smile, “I would like to offer a toast to the wedding couple: to my beautiful daughter Mary and her new husband, Mr. George Henry Holliday. May their married lives be as full of happiness as this night!”

  “Huzzah!” the men in the room cheered, and raised their glasses to the bridal couple, while the ladies all applauded.

  “And to our host and his lady,” another of the men added, and the cheer went around again. It was a tradition of sorts that the first toast should be answered by a return of good wishes from the guests, then each gentleman would add his own congratulations for some other accomplishment. Everyone knew, of course, that the whole exercise was just an excuse for the men to continue refilling their liquor glasses without any dispute from the ladies. So it was good manners to continue the toasts, though continuing them often lead to some extremes:

  “To Atlanta, may she continue to rise from the ashes!”

  “Huzzah!”

  “To the honor of the South!”

  “Huzzah!”

  “To Stonewall Jackson, may he rest in peace!”

  “To old Abe Lincoln, may he rest in Hell!”

  They toasted the fallen Confederacy, the rising Klan, and their own good fortune in making money off the Yankees. They toasted each other and their families, their neighbors and t
heir health—whatever sounded good over a raised liquor glass. Robert even added a toast to his Uncle Henry’s good fortune, though he politely avoided mentioning the delicate nature of that fortune. So by the time the toasting came back around to Uncle John, there wasn’t much left to say that hadn’t already been said—yet his words took John Henry completely by surprise.

  “To my nephew, John Henry, who’ll be goin’ off to dental school next year. May he find many friendly smiles—and many more rotten teeth!”

  The men all laughed and shouted another “Huzzah!” but John Henry looked at his uncle in astonishment. What did Uncle John mean by announcing that he would be going to dental school, anyhow? Had his father told Uncle John about his plans? Had Uncle John prevailed upon Henry to let his son go off to school in Philadelphia? Or did Henry’s sudden change of heart have something to do with that new baby on the way . . .

  He looked across the room at his father, standing in the circle of men at the punch bowl and paying him no attention at all. Surely, that had to be the explanation for Henry’s sudden change of heart. With Rachel expecting again, it would be more convenient to have the troublesome John Henry far off in Philadelphia. He didn’t know whether to cheer at his good news or fling out in anger that he was being sent away again.

  Mattie, who must have seen the war of emotion passing over his face, took his hand in hers.

  “It’s awful warm in here, isn’t it, honey? Let’s go find some fresh air.”

  But they were hardly outside on the gravel drive before her questions came flying at him like hard rain.

  “What did he mean, you’re goin’ off to dental school? I thought you wanted to be a doctor. And where would you go? Why would you go?”

  “I did want to be a doctor,” he said, trying to defend himself. “But this past year, workin’ with Dr. Frink, I changed my mind. I’m good at dentistry. You know how I’ve always been clever with my hands. Dr. Frink’s written me a recommendation to the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surgery in Philadelphia . . .”