“I know what I said! How could I tell you the truth! I wanted to be married—I wanted to get out of that life. These last few years with you have been the happiest of my life! Don’t let it make you hate me, Howard!”
He blinked back tears. “I … I don’t know what I feel. This is a damned poor time to find out—out here in the middle of the street—me thinkin’ about goin’ off to fight Mexicans. There’s no time to feel anything, one way or the other.”
“Tell me you love me, Howard,” she sobbed.
He studied her eyes, then turned away coldly. A whore from New Orleans! How many times had that man bedded her? How many others had there been? “I have a meeting to go to. You go on back home.”
They stood in the middle of the wide, dusty street as wagons and horses rode by them. “I’ll be waiting, Howard. You come back … after the meeting. We’ll … we’ll talk.”
He just shook his head and looked away. “I don’t know. I just don’t know what to think … what to do.”
“You come back like I said,” she said, hope in her voice. “I’ll explain everything. No matter what you think, Howard, I didn’t lie to hurt you. I just … I love you so, Howard. Truly I do. I’ll always love you.”
He looked at her, his eyes red with tears. “Go on home, Emmy,” he said, a terrible sadness in the words. He turned and walked away, joining some other men who were headed for the meeting.
“Howard,” she squeaked. She turned and walked slowly back. Ruined! All of it ruined in that one brief moment of recognition. She should have told him. She should have told him right in the beginning before she realized how much she really did love him.
The people moving around her, the talk of war, none of it was real to her now. She managed to keep walking on rubbery legs until she reached the little cabin, where she sank into a chair and wept … and waited. Night came. He did not return. The next morning she went to the meeting place, only to be told all the volunteers who had gathered there yesterday had left to help in the fighting.
“But he … he didn’t come home to get his things,” she said almost absently.
The man shrugged. “I wouldn’t know about that, lady. He probably had everything with him he needed. Don’t take much but a gun. What’s your man’s name. I can tell you where he went.”
“Cox,” she said quietly, staring at a map on the man’s desk. “Howard Cox.”
The man scanned a ledger. “Cox. Here he is.” He read for a moment. “He joined them that went to help out at the Alamo. Maybe you’ll hear from him when he gets back, or maybe you’ll get a letter. They do try to get letters out. Don’t worry. We’ll end this thing right quick and send Santa Anna running back to Mexico where he belongs and your man will be back home. Sorry about the mix-up.”
She just stared at him, then turned and left. Maybe he would write. It was all she could hope for. And maybe after he had time to think about it, after the fighting was over, he’d come back to San Felipe, back to his Emmy. Yes. When he was through at the Alamo, he’d come home to her.
Chapter
Twenty
* * *
It was January 1836 when Jim Bowie rode to the Alamo with Houston’s orders to blow up the mission and retreat. Tom joined the other volunteers in vehemently objecting to those orders.
“That’s surrender, and we’ll never surrender,” men shouted.
“It’s not surrender. It’s the practical thing to do. Let Santa Anna get deeper into Texas; then Houston will strike,” Bowie told them.
“Santa Anna will never get deep into Texas. We’ll stop him right here!”
“You don’t have enough medical supplies, food and clothing, or even ammunition.”
“We don’t need much,” another volunteer shouted. “It won’t take us long to win this war. And Houston will see we get more when he realizes we’re stayin’ put. When Santa Anna comes, he’ll meet our musket barrels, not our backsides.”
The men laughed and cheered, raising their fists. They were here to fight, and that was what they would do.
That was fine with Tom. He just wished Santa Anna would hurry up and come. If he was lucky, he would be killed and this awful ache over Bess would be done with. He would be with her forever. Yet that would mean leaving this life and leaving his father, and losing another son would just about destroy Caleb Sax.
He noticed a man he’d seen come in with some new volunteers a few days earlier. The man looked familiar. Tom had kept mostly to himself since coming here, and he wondered if striking up a friendship would help this terrible new loneliness that had enveloped him since losing Bess and leaving home. He approached the big, bearded man just as the man was headed for the west wall to take his post there.
“Hey, mister,” he called out.
The man turned. He frowned at first, then put out his hand. “You’re a Sax. I’ve seen you in town.”
Tom nodded, shaking his hand. “Yes, sir. Tom Sax. I’ve been trying to place you.”
“Howard Cox. I was the blacksmith back at San Felipe.”
“That’s it.” Tom smiled. “You’re married to that woman my father knew years ago.”
Howard let go of his hand, masking his anger and sorrow over Emily. What did any of it have to do with this young man? “Yes. Emily.” Just saying the name brought back the remorse. He should have gone back first. He should have talked to her. She really did love him. Who was he to accuse her of anything without even talking it out first? After all, all that was before he’d ever known her. But it was too late now. He was here and he would stay until the fighting was over. “How have you been, Tom? How’s your family?”
Tom sobered. “Things haven’t gone so well. I lost my wife to cholera about a year and a half ago.”
“Jesus, that’s right. I remember hearing about that. I’m sorry, son. You lost a brother, too, didn’t you?”
“Yes. John. He was a half-brother, my father’s son by his Cherokee wife. John was only thirteen.”
Howard frowned and shook his head, showing genuine concern. “My God, that’s too bad, Tom. Your father has had his share of troubles, that’s sure.”
The pain moved through Tom again. “Yes. We all have.”
Howard thought again of Emily. He didn’t know anything about the troubles she’d had, why she’d been a prostitute. Why hadn’t he talked to her before leaving? He’d make it up to her. Somehow he’d make it up to her. He’d just been so shocked and hurt. She’d understand that. They’d fine a way to start all over.
“Well, now, we’ll have to kind of look out for each other, won’t we?” Howard said aloud.
Tom smiled. “I suppose so. My father is with Houston, as far as I know. I wonder who will see some action first?”
“Hard to say. But I expect it will be us. We’re closest to where Santa Anna has to come through.”
“Well, I’m ready. I just wish he’d hurry up. I’m tired of all this waiting.”
“Same here. You take care now, Tom. I’ve got to get to my post.”
Tom nodded. “Good to see a familiar face, Howard.”
Howard read the loneliness and sorrow in the young man’s eyes. “I’m real sorry about your wife, son. But you’re young. You’ll be all right, Tom. I know it’s hard to think that way now, but time takes care of a lot of things.”
Tom nodded and turned away, and the two men parted, each lost in his own particular sorrow.
* * *
Jim Bowie became ill with a bad cough, so ill that he was bedridden. William Travis, who had been competing with Bowie for leadership at the Alamo, became the undisputed man in charge of the mission. The nights were bitterly cold, and since Santa Anna was known to be a man who liked total comfort, no one believed he would consider attacking the Alamo in such inclement weather.
“He’ll wait till spring,” Howard told Tom one night over a campfire. “He’s got lots of men, which means lots of horses. He’ll need the spring grass for grazing. By then we’ll have lots of reinforcements.”
“I hope you’re right, but then I don’t like the idea of sitting here until spring either,” Tom replied. “It seems like no one is doing anything at all. We’re all just waiting, and nobody knows how anyone else is doing. I am worried about my father and the ranch.”
“I know what you mean, boy. Me and Emmy, we had kind of a problem when I left. I left angry, and it bothers me some. I’ve thought of writing to her, but I just don’t know what to say.”
“She will be all right. San Felipe is a big town now. She’s safe there. That’s where Mister Handel will take Sarah and the others if Mexican soldiers should get through that far and start attacking the ranchers.”
“This must be hard on your pa, too. He’ll be worrying about you and the rest of the family.”
“Yes. I sent a letter not long ago telling them I’m still here. I hope they got it so they know I am all right.”
“That’s good. I guess I should think about writing my Emmy, maybe patch things up some before I go home. Maybe then she won’t greet me with a fry pan and clobber me over the head with it for being such a fool.”
Tom laughed. “I don’t know what your problem was, but I don’t think she would do that.”
“Women can be mighty strange sometimes, son.”
Tom’s face saddened and he poked at the fire with a stick. “I guess I was never married long enough to find out.”
“Hey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring back bad memories.”
Tom shook his head. “They aren’t bad. They’re beautiful.” He picked up his musket. “I have to take my post. Good night.”
Howard nodded in reply, watching Tom leave and feeling sorry for him. He sat back to think about a letter to Emily. But he never got to write it. The next day scouts reported Santa Anna was on the march, headed straight for the Alamo. Travis began sending out calls for more help. His messengers managed to get away from the mission by following brush-lined irrigation ditches that hid them from Mexican soldiers who by then were entrenching themselves around the handful of Americans who held the Alamo.
On March 3 the siege began. While delegates at Washington-on-the-Brazos were declaring Texas a free and independent republic, the Alamo was under full attack, and no one had been sent to help the brave defenders of the little mission. Some thought the Alamo had been abandoned, as Houston had ordered; the volunteers at Goliad refused to leave, thinking their own post more important to defend than the Alamo; and general chaos and an unorganized defense all combined to prevent help from arriving for William Travis and his men.
Howard thought he wanted to fight, but this was more than he had expected. It was as though the whole world was exploding. Everywhere Mexican cannon fire broke through the walls of the outer court, the Mexican soldiers poured over the walls, pushing the American defenders back into the mission itself. After three days of fighting and no sleep, with ammunition nearly spent, it was evident this battle was not going to be won. Howard thought of Emily. If only he’d written the letter. If only he’d gone back to see her in the first place. Would she realize he loved her?
He searched frantically then for Tom Sax as Mexican soldiers managed to overrun the mission itself. But there was too much mass confusion, and he was too busy trying to stay alive to search for Tom. He could only pray that somehow the young man would escape this hell. He fired his musket directly into the chest of a Mexican soldier, then felt the pain in his back as a bayonet found its mark.
“Emmy,” the man groaned before collapsing over the bodies of comrades already fallen.
By the time the battle was over, 187 Texas volunteers had died, although the count would never be positively accurate, since so many volunteers came and went, and messengers had been sent out right up until the last heat of battle. The opportunity for Americans to take a truly accurate count would never come. Santa Anna ordered the bodies to be piled together and burned. The sickening smell of burning flesh filled the clear, cold air, the smoke wafting up into the bright blue Texas sky. Cannon and musket fire had stopped. The little mission sat silent and battered.
Santa Anna began his march northward, capturing militia volunteers at San Patricio, Agua Dulce and Refugio, promptly executing all prisoners. On March 20 Goliad was taken, and a week later 342 Texas volunteers, many of them already badly wounded, were led outside, blind-folded, made to lie facedown, and shot.
But already the news of the Alamo had reached those volunteers with Sam Houston, who had retreated from Gonzoles to the Colorado and then across the Brazos, where they had held up for two weeks, constantly drilling. It was Jess who brought the news to Caleb where he sat outside their tent cleaning his musket. For a moment Jess just stared at the man, wondering how he was going to find the words. But there was no way to get around it. It had to be said.
“I hope you’re coming to tell me we’re going to go fight someplace,” Caleb told him kiddingly. But his smile faded when he saw the grim look on Jess’s face. “What’s wrong?”
“Scouts just came with the news, Caleb.” He sighed deeply, looking away. “Santa Anna took the Alamo—killed every last man there and then … piled the bodies together and burned them.”
There was a long silence, and Jess finally turned to meet Caleb’s eyes. “You all right? Do you understand what I’m telling you, Caleb?”
Caleb returned to cleaning his musket. “That’s bad news. Gives us all the more reason to go after that bastard Santa Anna, doesn’t it?”
“Caleb, Tom was at the Alamo,” Jess said carefully.
Blue eyes lit into him angrily. “No! He got out somehow.”
Jess frowned. The man wasn’t going to let himself believe it. “Caleb, you know he was there. They were all killed. They say everybody at Goliad was killed, too. Even if he left and went there, he’d still be dead.”
Caleb just kept rubbing the barrel of his gun. He shook his head. “I’ve lost too many sons, Jess. God wouldn’t take that one from me—not my Tom—not my firstborn.”
Jess wanted to be angry with him, because he didn’t want to face the truth. His own heart ached with the thought of it. Tom! What a good friend he had become, and how sad the last months of his lonely life had been. What would this do to poor Lynda? If only he could be with her when she found out. He stared at Caleb. How was he going to handle this thing? He couldn’t even share his grief with the man, because Caleb wouldn’t believe it.
It was simply going to take some time. Caleb Sax couldn’t face this one. This one was too much. Jess turned away, thinking of home and how easy it would be right now just to desert and run to Lynda. Others had run off. But how was Santa Anna going to be stopped if they all just gave up? They had to take a stand, and he wished Houston would do something. Now they had all the more reason to fight—the Alamo, and Goliad. There had been needless slaughter at both places.
He turned back to watch Caleb, who was lighting a pipe. “Sit down and relax, Jess,” the man told him. “There’s been some kind of mix-up. My Tom is out there somewhere, and when this thing is over with, we’ll find him. Maybe he’ll even be sitting home waiting for us when we get there.”
Jess sighed deeply, turning away and blinking back tears. “Sure. You’re probably right,” he answered. He walked away. If the man wasn’t going to face Tom’s death, then Jess wasn’t about to cry about it in front of him. Let Caleb face it in his own way, in his own time. He walked off to be alone. For the time being there was no one with whom to share this sorrow, and the sorrow was made greater by Caleb’s refusal to face it.
He knelt by a gnarled old tree and wept. All those men—dead. It seemed incredible. And Tom Sax was surely one of them.
Lynda stood outside Emily’s cabin. They had all come to San Felipe for safety—Lynda and Sarah and the babies, the Handels and what few men were left at the Handel ranch. By now it was possible both their ranches had been overrun by Santa Anna and his men, who were now camped outside the city. Everyone expected them to come through the next day, and now even San F
elipe apparently was not safe. What few men there were in town would fight, but it would be useless.
Still, for the moment, there was no place else to go. At least with so many people in one place, Santa Anna’s men would be less inclined to abuse the women. It was better than being caught alone on a remote ranch. Fleeing settlers who had suffered at the hands of Santa Anna’s men had already filtered into town. More of his aids were marching through Texas at other points—men like Gaona, Urrea, Cós and Sesma. Rumor said that Houston was retreating from Santa Anna’s push.
Lynda wondered if Jess and Caleb were still with Houston. Their last letters had said so, but there had been no letters now for weeks. Everyone said Houston was retreating closer and closer to the Gulf, and no one understood why. When would the man stand and fight?
Emily Cox was certain her husband had been at the Alamo. Their first few days in town the woman had carried on about how Howard had found out about her past just before he left. At first she was weeping and remorseful. Now she was quiet, hard, bitter. There were no smiles anymore, and she had aged. Sarah had tried to comfort her, but there was no comfort for such a woman. Lynda wondered where their own comfort would be if something happened to Caleb or Tom … or Jess.
The thought of losing Jess, too, was overwhelming, and she clung to the porch post and broke into tears. Where were they? Were they even alive? And what about Tom? Their last word was that he’d gone to the Alamo, and they knew now that everyone there had been killed. Even if he had been among the volunteers who left there and went to Goliad, he would still be dead. All those at Goliad had been executed by Santa Anna.
Tom. Jess. And her beloved father. Not knowing what was happening brought literal pain.
“Lynda.”
She turned to see Sarah in the doorway. The woman knew all her thoughts, and shared them with equal concern. She’d thought once she’d lost Caleb Sax, lived without him for years. But this time … this time … if he didn’t come back … how could she face it a second time? Lynda came to her and they embraced, breaking into tears.
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