by John Jakes
All Stanley had to show for a life of struggle and suffering was more of the same, and a horsy, pretentious wife he faced every night in the huge, beautiful, desolate dining room in their mansion on I Street. So he drank. It kept him going when he was awake. And, mercifully, it put him to sleep.
“Johnson is after the Bureau, is that it, Stanley?”
“Yes. He’d like to see it dismantled. He believes that by acting in accordance with Radical objectives, we’re tampering with states’ rights.”
“I suppose it isn’t surprising,” Isabel mused. “He’s a Democrat and essentially a Southerner. I’m curious about land in the South. Why should it be fought over? Is it that valuable?”
Stanley swallowed the rest of his third glass of champagne. “Not at the moment. Some confiscated by the Treasury can be bought for almost nothing. Of course, long term, it’s very valuable. Property is always valuable. And cash crops are the whole basis of the Southern economy. They have no industrial economy and never did.”
Isabel’s eyes gleamed above the candles. “Then perhaps we should look into investments in the South, to replace the factory.”
He sat back, astounded as always by her audacity, and the way her mind leaped to sink fangs into some prey he hadn’t even spotted. “Are you saying you’d like me to make inquiries at the Treasury?”
“No, sweet. I’ll make them. In person. I am going to leave you for a week or so—I’m sure that grieves you terribly,” she added with venom. He silently called her a witch, smiled a sickly smile, and poured more champagne.
Old Mr. Marvin, our long-time friend at Green Pond, called to say good-bye. He is embittered, angry—bankrupt Treasury men seized $15,000 in Sea Island cotton, marking it “Confederate” right at his gin and hauling it off while he watched. It happened because he refused to pay the bribe the Treasury man demanded. The Yankee would have let M. keep the cotton and sell it, but he would have had to surrender half the profits to the agent.
Land and crops are being stolen everywhere by these two-legged vultures. Marvin’s neighbor lost a fine farm, Pride’s Haven, when unable to pay $150 of back taxes. We have our share of sinners down here, but all the saints and seraphims do not reside in the North …
Philo Trout, a cheerful, muscular young Treasury agent, met Isabel’s steamer in Charleston. Their inland journey was delayed twenty-four hours because a tropical storm came onshore, ripping the city with gale winds and pouring out more than six inches of rain before moving inland.
Once they set out, Trout’s covered buggy labored along muddy roads, and Isabel surveyed submerged fields on either side. She asked about the standing water. Trout said, “Storm surge from the tidal rivers. The salt will poison those fields for a few seasons.”
This immediately banished the idea that had brought Isabel south: absentee ownership of Carolina farmland. The storms, which came regularly, created too great a risk for her taste, or her money, although she didn’t say this to Trout.
On the river road along the Ashley, he pointed out various plantations including Mont Royal. Isabel reacted with silent disgust, but she never so much as hinted that she knew the owners.
A few miles farther on, Trout stopped the buggy at a crossroads store, whose crookedly hung sign said GETTYS BROS. Nailed over the front door was a board painted with one word:
C L O S E D.
Trout pushed back his straw planter’s hat and put his boot on the footboard. “Now here’s an interesting proposition, though it isn’t what you said you wanted. Still, someone could make money on this little store and never have to worry about the salt in the rivers.”
Isabel wrinkled her nose. “How could such a sorry place be profitable?”
“Three ways, ma’am, all predicated on having the capital to stock it properly. Real money, not Confederate paper. The local planters need goods. Implements, staples, seed. First, the store could charge plenty at the time of the sale. But the planters and the freedmen don’t have real money to pay. So the store could treat each sale as a loan—the cost, at any price you set, plus interest, at any rate you determine. Fifty percent? Ninety? They’d have to take it or starve.”
Just then, despite the cloying heat of the marshy country, and the insects, and the stench of decay, Isabel decided that the discomforts of the trip were worth it.
“You mentioned a third way, Mr. Trout.”
“Yes indeed. To secure every loan with goods, you also demand a fixed percent of the next rice or cotton crop.” He grinned. “Ingenious?”
“I couldn’t think of anything more ingenious myself.” She dabbed her moist lip. “Who could run a store like this?”
“Well, ma’am, if you bought it, you’d undoubtedly want a new manager, your husband being with the Bureau and all. The fellow who ran it before it closed, Randall Gettys, is pretty much of a secesh. I know him. If he stayed on, and assuming he’d even consider selling to nig—uh, the colored, he’d charge them eight or ten times what he charged whites, just for spite.”
Isabel beamed. “Why, dear Mr. Trout, what of that? It’s true that my husband and I are Republicans, but I really don’t care about the prejudices or operating policies of a store manager if he makes money.”
“Oh, Randall Gettys could do that, definitely. He knows everybody around here. Used to print a little newspaper for the district. Wants to start it again.”
“He may charge the nigras ten times what he charges white people, so long as no one in Washington finds out, and my husband and I are never connected with the business. That point would have to be impressed on him.”
“Randall and his kinfolk are so desperate, they’d sign a contract to sell ice in hell.”
Isabel could hardly contain her excitement. As usual, it was she who prospected and struck gold, while Stanley stayed behind.
“Everything could be arranged,” Trout assured her. He picked up the reins and turned the buggy around. “I can buy the property for you at tax auction next month.”
The horse plodded back toward Mont Royal. Shadows of Spanish moss drifted across Isabel’s perspiring face.
“We have one more consideration to discuss, ma’am.”
“Your fee for services—and silence?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Trout’s sunny face shone. “You know, I worked as a telegraph operator in Dayton, Ohio, before my uncle got me this job. I’ve made more in six months than I’d make in a lifetime up North.”
“The South is proving a land of opportunity for all, isn’t it?” said Isabel with another smugly charming smile.
Gettys Bros, open again. New whitewash inside and out, new goods crowding the shelves and floor. Young Randall G. is enthroned as manager amidst this new affluence. He has put up a gaudy sign on the roof. It features a painted flag—the Confed. battle ensign—and a new name, THE DIXIE STORE.
He refuses to discuss the sudden reversal in his fortunes, so we have a mystery now. I cannot solve it, but neither will I give much time to it. You know my feelings about the bigoted Mr. Gettys.
7
“TOO SHORT A VISIT,” George said, raising his voice above the racket of baggage being loaded two cars ahead. He hugged Brett. Despite her voluminous skirts, he was conscious of her stomach. “Take care of that youngster I’m not supposed to mention—and get to San Francisco in plenty of time.”
Steam blew around them. Brett’s lavender-scented cheek felt damp against his. “Don’t worry. He’ll be born a Californian.”
“You’re certain it’s he?” Constance said.
“Positive,” Billy answered. He looked spruce in his new sack-style coat of dark gray and trousers and cravat of lighter gray. He and Constance embraced, then the ladies hugged. George shook his brother’s hand.
“I can’t hide it, Billy. I wish you’d stay in Pennsylvania.”
“Too many memories on this side of the Mississippi. I’ll always love West Point, but, like you, I’ve had my bellyful of armies.” And what armies are sent out to do. George heard that
unspoken conclusion.
“God protect you and everyone, George,” Billy said.
“And you and Brett and your new son. Since Constance is the religious one in the family, I’ll ask her to pray for calm seas while you sail down South America and around the Cape.”
“It’s winter there, but we’ll manage.”
Better than I’m managing, George thought, with a deep melancholy. It had held him in its grip, making him unreasonably pensive and lethargic, ever since his confrontation with Stevens in Washington.
Constance said, “If your ship calls at the port of Los Angeles for more than a few hours, please visit my father’s law office, and give him my love.”
“By all means,” Billy said, nodding.
The conductor called, “All aboard.” From a few steps away, Patricia waved at the departing travelers. William had his eye on an attractive girl hurrying into a rear car. Through her smile, Patricia hissed, “Wave, you rude beast!” William stuck out his tongue at her, then waved.
The Lehigh Valley local began to move. George rushed along the platform beside Billy and Brett’s car, calling out, “Do press Madeline about another loan if she needs it.”
“We will,” Brett called back.
“Billy, send a message when you’re safely settled.”
“Promise,” his brother shouted. The whistle shrilled. “You let me know if the War Department finds Charles.”
George replied with an emphatic nod; the car was drawing away. So far the Department had failed to answer two letters from Billy asking the whereabouts of his best friend, who was supposed to be serving in the cavalry out West.
George ran faster, waving his shiny plug hat and shouting other things, which no one heard. Constance called to him to come back. The train chugged past the end of the platform and gained speed, following the riverbank and the old canal bed. Billy and Brett disappeared.
How George envied their youth, their independence. He admired their bravery, too, in setting out for a state they’d only read about in unreliable Gold Rush guidebooks. Americans were prospering in California, though. Four businessmen were blasting and tunneling through the Sierras to build part of a transcontinental rail line, and in a few years the Pacific coast would be linked with the rest of the country. Billy was determined to start a civil engineering firm, and no promise from George of a secure and lucrative future with Hazard’s would deter him.
“Damn,” George said, stopping at the end of the platform. He wiped his eyes before turning back to his family. He knew what his brother meant about memories east of the Mississippi. They had discussed it for hours one night, after everyone else was asleep. The war had touched both of them—changed them, perhaps damaged them, in ways that were deep, fundamental, and, in some cases, beyond understanding.
George described a meeting with two ex-soldiers before he left Washington. In the saloon bar at Willard’s Hotel, the men had been drinking heavily; they were blearily candid. One and then the other admitted that he felt bereft now that the highly charged excitement of the war was but a memory.
As the night grew older, each of the brothers told of his own ghosts. Billy would forever be haunted by memories of his comrade, old Lije Farmer, who’d died in battle despite his unshakable belief in God’s goodness. Nor could he forget his internment in Libby Prison, or the mistreatment there; he still had nightmares about it. He probably would have died there but for his wild, desperate escape, planned and carried out by Charles and Orry Main. And, from the end of the war, he remembered the ruthless, bleak look of his best friend, Charles, the last time they met.
George couldn’t forget the moment he learned of Orry’s death, or the half hour he’d knelt by Orry’s empty grave at Mont Royal, burying there a letter of friendship written in 1861 but never sent. The letter expressed his hope that the ties of affection between the Mains and the Hazards would survive the war, and that each of the family members would survive, too. For Orry, it had been a vain wish.
Sunk in despondency, George walked back to his family. Constance saw his condition. She took his arm as they returned to the lacquered phaeton, its hinged top section folded down in the August heat. The driver held the door for the Hazards, then took his seat and popped the whip over the heads of the fine matched bays.
My town, George thought as the phaeton proceeded toward the hill road. He owned a majority interest in the Bank of Lehigh Station, one square over, and he owned the Station House Hotel, on his left, and about a third of the real estate within the town limits. Most of it was in the commercial section along the river, but he also owned fourteen substantial brick homes on the higher, terraced streets. These were rented by foremen at Hazard’s and by some of the wealthier merchants.
As the carriage rolled along, George searched the streets for the town’s three war casualties. He saw the blind boy begging on the crowded sidewalk near Pinckney Herbert’s general store. He didn’t see the peg-legged boy, but in the next block he spied Tom Hassler.
“Stop, Jerome. Just for a moment.”
He jumped from the carriage; Patricia and William sighed with impatience. George’s short legs carried him to the boy he’d given a job at Hazard’s. But Tom couldn’t manage even the simplest task, so he shambled through Lehigh Station every day, rattling a tin cup in which his mother put pebbles to suggest that others had already given. George stuffed a ten-dollar note in the cup. The sight of Tom’s slack mouth and dead brown eyes always destroyed him. Like the town’s other two maimed veterans, Tom Hassler was not yet twenty.
“How are you today, Tommy?”
The boy’s vacant eyes drifted across the hazy river to the laurel-covered slopes on the far side. “Fine, sir. Waiting for orders from General Meade. We’ll charge those rebs over there on Seminary Ridge before dark.”
“That’s right, Tom. You’ll carry the day, too.”
He turned away. How shameful, this urge to weep that came upon him so often of late. He climbed into the phaeton and slammed the half-door, avoiding his wife’s eye. How shameful! What is happening to me?
What was happening, he sometimes understood, was exactly what had happened to his brother and to thousands of other men. Powerful and unfamiliar emotions in the wake of the surrender. Bad dreams. Thoughts of friendships formed in the strange giddy atmosphere of ever-present death. Memories of good men slain in pointless skirmishes, and of fools and pale trembling cowards who survived by accident or by means of a feigned illness the night before a battle …
What had happened to George, and to America, was a four-year struggle of a kind never before experienced in the world. Not only had cousin slain cousin, brother slain brother—that was not new—but mechanized weapons, the railroad, the telegraph, had brought a new efficiency to the art of slaughter. In meadows and creek bottoms and pretty, rustic glens, innocents had fought the first modern war.
It was a war that refused to release George now. Constance saw that in her husband’s pained, lost eyes as the phaeton followed the winding road up toward Belvedere, their mansion on the summit. She wanted to touch him, but she felt that his pain was beyond her reach—perhaps beyond anyone’s.
George spent the afternoon at Hazard’s. The firm was almost completely converted from war production to the fabrication of wrought iron for architectural embellishment, cast-iron parts for other products, and, perhaps most important, rails. Nearly all of the South’s railroads were in ruins. And in the West, two lines had created another huge new market. The Union Pacific, along the Platte route, and the Union Pacific, Eastern Division, in Kansas—no connection despite similar names—were racing each other to the hundredth meridian. The first to lay track to the meridian would win the right to go the rest of the way and link up with the Central Pacific, building east from California.
George didn’t arrive home until the family members had dined and were gathered around their new treasure, a grand piano, sent as a gift by Henry Steinweg and his sons in New York. Hazard’s provided much of the iron pl
ate for the firm’s pianos, which were called Steinways, because Steinweg thought that name more euphonious, commercial, and American. Steinweg had come a long way from the red field of Waterloo, where he’d soldiered against Napoleon. George liked him.
He greeted the family and in the kitchen found some slices of cold roast, all he needed for supper. On the veranda, he sat down, put a foot on the rail, and penciled comments on an architect’s site plan for a new foundry he wanted to build in Pittsburgh. The city, situated on two rivers that flowed into the Ohio, would almost certainly become the iron and steel center of the nation in the next ten years. George wanted to be in early, with Bessemer-process converters modified for greater dependability by a technique from Sweden.
Inside, Constance and Patricia sang while Patricia played. “Listen to the Mocking Bird” and “Dixie’s Land”—Brett’s favorite—and “Hail, Columbia!”, which many considered the national anthem; Congress and the public couldn’t decide on an official one.
Presently the singing stopped. George kept working until the August daylight failed. He saw the caretaker’s lantern moving through the sheet-shrouded rooms of Stanley and Isabel’s house next door. The owners were seldom in residence. George didn’t miss them.
He tried some mathematical calculations involving a piece of land he was considering for the new plant. He got the wrong answer four times and finally threw the papers aside. The melancholia, formless yet consuming, came on him again. He wandered inside, feeling old and spent.
In the empty library, he stopped beside a polished table and studied the two objects he kept there. One was a fragment of a meteorite—star-iron, it was called in the trade in ancient times. To him, it represented metal’s incredible power to improve life or, forged into weapons, eradicate it. Beside the meteorite lay a sprig of mountain laurel, so abundant in the valley. In the Hazard family, by tradition, the laurel was an emblem of resilience, survival, the certain triumph of hope and goodness made possible by love and by family. The sprig was dead, its leaves brown. George flung it into the cold hearth.