Southern Rapture

by Jennifer Blake

  "I know it won't be easy. I thought I might start by looking at the place where he was shot, this woodland spring, if you can direct me to it?"

  He frowned, touching a forefinger to his mustache as he leaned back in his chair. "The site is some distance away and in rather wild country, not the kind of spot you would want to visit on a picnic outing."

  "Indeed?" Lettie's tone was cool. It always amazed her how ready men were to jump to the conclusion that all women were foolish about distances.

  The colonel smiled. "I realize that may sound odd, considering that you have just made a journey halfway across this country, but what you may not realize is that the area is the stamping ground, so to speak, not only of the man you seek, our local Robin Hood, the Thorn, but also of a collection of other unsavory characters. These desperadoes are, many of them, former Confederate guerrilla fighters or else the deserters of the Confederate army known around here as jayhawkers. We are beginning to believe the organization may be of some size, rather like a band of the kind of outlaws that are epidemic in the Southwest. One thing we do know about them for certain is that they can be completely ruthless."

  She paid scant attention to his last words, seizing on the phrase that caught her interest. "Robin Hood? A strange name surely for such a vile criminal!"

  "That's what the locals are calling the man, though for myself, being in something of the same position as the Sheriff of Nottingham, I find the comparison less than apt."

  "I should think so," she said, relaxing a little in appreciation of his wry humor.

  "At least you know something of the man, and so are aware of the danger. I can't say that he would harm a woman, but then neither can I say that he would not. We have had so many descriptions of him, with hair and eye colors every shade of the rainbow, and such a list of crimes laid at his door supposedly perpetrated on the same night and miles apart, that it seems he may be capable of anything."

  There was more than a trace of bitterness in the colonel's words. The tone as much as what he had said reminded Lettie that there was something he should know. "I understand you were out last night on the trail of this man. Well, I saw him."

  Leaning forward in her chair, she explained the incident.

  "Extraordinary that he should have stumbled upon you," was the colonel's comment. "I can't say I'm surprised he was in the area. We've lost him there before. Seems he uses a pool of water in the vicinity called Dink's Pond to confuse the dogs."

  "But if you know that, surely you could set a trap, wait for him there?"

  "It isn't the only such place he uses. There are a dozen holes of water and streams, not to mention two rivers, where he can throw the dogs off the scent. As for setting a trap, he seems to have some kind of abnormal perception about where we will be. Clever bas—" He stopped, coughing. "That is, he's confoundedly clever."

  "Clever isn't the word I would have chosen." Lettie scarcely noticed the colonel's momentary embarrassment, in her interest in the object of her long journey South.

  The colonel lifted his brows in inquiry.

  "I would have said sneaking, overconfident, even conceited," she said with disdain. "Only look at this symbol he leaves behind him."

  "Yes, well, I will admit we aren't too happy about it, but he isn't the first to hint that the army and the radical Republicans we are supporting are a plague."

  She looked blank, then an exclamation that was half annoyance, half admiration escaped her. "A plague of locusts and a thorn to impale them."

  "Exactly so."

  "But I had heard the symbol was for something else."

  "The renewal of the South, as the locust renews itself? You can hear anything. But you may rest assured, Miss Mason, that we will look into your report, along with all the others."

  As he spoke, he waved at a pile of papers of some thickness that lay in front of him. Lettie took the gesture as a hint and got to her feet. "Thank you, Colonel. I won't keep you from your work any longer, though I appreciate the time you have given me. If you will just give me the directions to the spring?"

  Colonel Ward stood up as she rose. "I'll have a map drawn up and delivered to you at Splendora."

  "Oh, there's no need to go to so much trouble. Just a quick sketch, a few lines to show me the roads will do."

  He gave her a warm smile that made his mustache rise at the corners. "No trouble at all, Miss Mason, no trouble at all."

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  3

  Lettie heard the chanting before she reached the buggy. The voices were light and shrill with excitement, and they carried that edge of jubilant cruelty peculiar to the young. "Run, Ranny, run," they chanted. "Run, Ranny, lost your sense; left it hanging on the fence; buy it back for fifteen cents! Run, Ranny, run!"

  Ranny had elected to wait beside the buggy where he had wheeled it around into a large patch of shade across the street from army headquarters. Between the wheels, underneath the high vehicle's body, Lettie could see the bare prancing feet and short trousers of a group of boys, while Ranny was backed against the struts of the buggy top. Indignation rose inside her. She picked up her skirts, hurrying forward.

  As Lettie skirted the horse that backed nervously at the commotion, straining at the weight that anchored the reins, she saw much what she had expected to see. Ranny stood at bay with his legs set in a firm stance and his face impassive. Around him skipped five or six boys from nine or ten to perhaps thirteen in age. Their faces were wild with glee as they chanted their nonsense rhyme. One, larger than the others and obviously their leader, bobbed up and down in front of the tall blond man, feinting and punching at him. Ranny caught the blows on his forearms but made no attempt to return them.

  Lettie had not been a schoolteacher for some three years without learning a thing or two about the handling of half-grown boys. Her eyes snapping with anger, she lifted her voice in sharp authority. "What is the meaning of this? Stop it at once!"

  The capering came to an abrupt halt. Except for their leader, the boys turned to look at her, their eyes big. He threw a single glance in her direction, then went on punching.

  Lettie marched forward and caught the boy's shoulder. "What is your name, young man? Who is your father?"

  The boy, nearly as tall as she, swung on her with his hair falling into his eyes and a scowl on his face. For an instant, she thought he meant to strike her, but in a movement too swift to follow, Ranny's hand shot out and caught the boy's wrist, clamping tight. The boy gave a choked cry. His face turned white and he gave at the knees.

  Lettie reached out to put her fingers on Ranny's corded wrist. Her voice quiet, she said, "Let him go."

  Ranny obeyed, releasing his grip abruptly, as a dog might release a rat. The boy, considerably subdued, stood rubbing his arm.

  Lettie glanced from the culprit to the others. "I think you had all better go home. And take care next time where you find your fun."

  They straggled away with many a puzzled or baleful glance over their shoulders. She watched them for a moment, then swung around to Ranny. He did not seem to be hurt in any way. He was so large and so unruffled, in fact, that the way she had rushed to champion him seemed suddenly a little ridiculous. She could meet his gaze for only an instant before turning away. The words stifled, she said, "Shall we go back to Splendora?"

  "Yes, ma'am."

  Ransom handed her into the buggy, then stood watching with a suspended feeling in his chest while she settled her skirts and straightened her hat of woven straw. He allowed his gaze to rest on the dark brown fans of her lashes that cast their shadows on the creamy skin of her cheeks, on her slender yet capable-looking hands that smoothed her gray skirts, then were clasped in her lap. Who would have guessed that there was so much fire and fury hidden behind that cool, demure front or that it could be aroused for poor Ranny's sake? It intrigued him, and that would not do. That would not do at all.

  It was late afternoon when Colonel Thomas Ward brought the map to Lettie. He found her on t
he front veranda of Splendora taking the evening air and helping to snap beans from Aunt Em's garden for supper. With Lettie was the older woman and Ranny, as well as Aunt Em's niece and great-nephew from down the road at Elm Grove, a young widow named Sally Anne Winston and her small son Peter.

  It was Sally Anne's mother, her younger married sister, and her two children who were ill and whom Aunt Em had been visiting that morning. The boy Peter, a solemn and rather thin child of five or six, was not strong, and Aunt Em had invited Sally Anne and him to stay with her for a few days or until the summer sickness was over at their house. The two had arrived perhaps an hour before Colonel Ward had.

  Sally Anne was a silver-blond beauty with the translucent skin and calm blue eyes of a China doll. She wore black, as she had explained in her soft voice, for the death of her husband who had been killed at the battle of Mansfield, but most of all because there was little money for anything else. She felt guilty at deserting her mother and the others while they were sick, but there was an old nurse who was taking care of them and she did have Peter to think of. He was all she had, all she was likely to have.

  "Fiddlesticks," Aunt Em had answered, and as the nice-looking colonel had tied his horse to the picket fence and ducked under the rose arbor to approach the house, she had introduced him to Sally Anne with a certain smiling emphasis.

  It was lost on Sally Anne. The blond widow, shrinking a little from the blue uniform, had acknowledged the colonel politely enough, then retreated into silence. She reserved her smiles for Ranny, who sat on the steps, alternately snapping beans and playing cat's cradle with young Peter and his companion Lionel.

  The colonel was not their only visitor. Following close behind him was a gentleman who was rather elegantly dressed in a fawn coat and trousers to match, a cream waistcoat, yellow cravat, and a flat-crowned, wide-brimmed hat. He removed his hat as he greeted the lady of the house, kissing Aunt Em's hand with an air that made the lady bridle and simper at the same time. Turning to Sally Anne, he executed a bow so deep that he swept the canvas of the veranda floor with his hat.

  "Miss Sally Anne, how charming you look. I swear every time I see you that you are far too young to be a mother, especially of this hulking boy."

  "Don't be ridiculous!" the Southern woman reprimanded him, her tone amused but with a hint of coquettishness. "You know very well—"

  "Ah, but knowing and believing are two different things."

  The gentleman, who was of medium height, with crisply waving black hair, a small and neatly trimmed mustache, and brown eyes that were as merry as they were dark, turned to Lettie. "And this lady beside you must be the Amazon I heard about in town. The news of her fierceness and her beauty have spread so fast that I had to ride out at once to be presented."

  "Lettie," Aunt Em said, "this rascal is Martin Eden, a friend of Ranny's since they were boys together and something of a flirt."

  "Aunt Em!" Martin protested, his expression pained.

  "A flirt," the older woman insisted.

  Lettie was just as happy to be given no chance to reply to the outrageous compliment paid her. What was there to be said, after all? It was some comfort to reflect that nothing, really, was expected.

  "What is this about Miss Mason?" Sally Anne asked.

  "Yes, indeed?" Aunt Em took up the question. "What kind of things are being said?"

  Martin turned to his hostess, his smile charming. "Why, only that the lady singlehandedly routed a group of bullies plaguing Ranny. This was after she had bearded in his den the most cantankerous Federal occupation officer in the state."

  "I protest!" the colonel said, though his tone was mild.

  "False on both counts, I assure you," Lettie said with some asperity.

  Martin swung around to Ranny. "Old friend, I appeal to you. True or false?"

  Ranny looked up, a faint smile curving his mouth as his gaze rested on Lettie. "True."

  Aunt Em's eyes were large with wonder. "I declare! And last night she scared off the Thorn."

  It was a remark that had to be explained to Sally Anne and Martin, though Lettie left the task to Aunt Em. Afterward, however, there were so many questions to be answered concerning her visit to army headquarters that she was forced to explain her brother's death and her intention of exposing his murderer.

  "How very brave of you," Sally Anne said. "I would never dare."

  Lettie, more than a little uncomfortable at being the center of so much attention, shook her head. "Stubborn is the word, I expect."

  "Miss Mason is altogether valiant," Martin Eden said. "She is to teach for the Freedmen's Bureau also." He turned to her. "I'm covered with chagrin at being away from my post this morning when you came to the office. I have come this afternoon, all jesting aside, to welcome you to Natchitoches and to offer you every aid and comfort in my power to bestow as you take up your new job."

  "You are with the Freedmen's Bureau?" She could not keep the surprise from her voice. Other than former Union soldiers, the men most likely to be with the bureau were those with ties to the abolitionists of the prewar years. Martin Eden, with his gallantry and soft drawl, did not appear to fit either category. It was possible, of course, that he had been and was now a Unionist sympathizer. There had been many in the South.

  The attention of those on the veranda was at that moment, thankfully, diverted by a new arrival. He came cantering up in a whirlwind of dust and slid from his horse with more speed than style. He let the gate with its chain and anchor-weight closure clang shut behind him and moved up the path, beating dust from his clothes as he walked. Bounding up the steps, he clapped Ranny on the shoulder with an affectionate greeting and a handshake, ruffled young Peter's hair, pretended to pull Lionel's nose, and swooped down upon Aunt Em to give her a hug.

  It was easy to see, from the cries and smiles of greeting, that here was a general favorite. His name was Johnny Reeden. His hair, of a bright copper-red, curled with exuberance over his head. His skin was freckled, his eyes hazel, and his smile infectious. He was a little tongue-tied while speaking to Sally Anne, but when he turned to Martin, he buffeted him on the shoulder with the familiarity of long acquaintance.

  "Martin, you old scalawag, as dapper as always. How do you manage never to look wrinkled? Tell me the secret, I really need to know."

  Martin Eden smiled, but it appeared to be an effort. "I'd let you in on it, but I doubt it would help. And I've asked you before not to call me by that name."

  "I've never cared to be called carrot-top, either, but that doesn't change the color of my hair," Johnny said with a droll grimace.

  Scalawag. That was the word that Eden had found objectionable. It was the term given to Southerners who cooperated with the Republican Reconstruction administration. They were considered in most cases to be joined with the carpetbaggers to despoil the prostrate Confederacy. It seemed a shame that a man would have to bear with such a slur simply because his convictions ran counter to those of his neighbors.

  "It's been a long time," Martin said with deliberation, "since I said such a thing to your face."

  "Would you prefer that I called you a scalawag behind your back?"

  "I would prefer you didn't use the term to me at all!" Before Johnny could answer, Aunt Em spoke. "Now, now, none of that at my house. I've had enough fighting to last me all my days, and I'd think the two of you would, too."

  There was a small, uncomfortable silence. Lettie broke it. "You fought in the late war, Mr. Eden?"

  "We all did; Johnny, Ransom, and I." The tightness of his face relaxed as he answered. "We were in the same company starting out but were separated toward the end."

  "A Confederate company?"

  "Of course."

  "And yet now—"

  "Now I work with the Yankees. And here you are among the enemy, Miss Mason. Strange how things work out, isn't it?"

  "She's been fighting, too," Johnny said, "or so they say. What's this about you routing the multitudes?"

  Once more
Lettie was the center of attention as she repeated the tale of the events of the morning. It was a position she was growing to relish less and less.

  Only Ranny did not participate in the interrogation, though she knew from the way he watched them that he followed it with little difficulty. Except for his docility, his polite obedience to authority, his failure to understand large words or complicated questions, there was not a great deal to show that he was less than normal. She did not know what she had expected when his aunt had said he had the mentality of a twelve-year-old. Boys of that age were far from deficient in understanding; one had only to look at Lionel to prove it.

  Ranny had put away the string with which he and the two boys had been playing. Peter took a handful of marbles from his pocket and showed them to Ranny and Lionel, turning the brightly colored glass spheres in his hands. There was a low discussion and then an apparent agreement. As Lettie watched, Ranny set aside his pan of beans and stood up, leading the others down into the yard. There between the flower beds, in the area of sandy dirt scraped free of grass, he drew a circle and the three went down on their knees to play marbles.

  It was an odd sight: The handsome blond giant and the boys, one slight and pale, the other stocky and coffee-brown, all kneeling in the dirt, intent upon the marbles they were shooting with a flick of thumb and forefinger. It made Lettie smile, as much with an odd pleasure as with amusement.

  Ranny, looking up, caught that small movement of her lips. He ducked his head. A few minutes later, he leaned and spoke to Peter. The boy turned and called, "Mama, come and show me how you can shoot!"

  "Oh, no, Peter," Sally Anne called back. "I can't."

  "I know you can. You told me Cousin Ranny taught you when you were both little."

  "Really, my love, I would rather not."

  "Please!"

  "Please," Ranny echoed.

  Sally Anne rose with the stiffness of reluctance. She put aside her bowl of beans and moved down the steps with her skirts trailing over the wooden treads. "Very well, but you'll be sorry when I lose your precious marbles for you."