The Bride Fair

by Cheryl Reavis

  “Sir,” Max said, giving the minister his cue.

  “Yes. Yes, indeed,” the man said. “Now that you are both here, I will begin. I’ve come here tonight—at Mr. Markham’s invitation and with his permission—to make a very special announcement. As you all know, my dear friend is very ill. He has made a last request of me—and Colonel Woodard—and Maria—which may at first seem unusual, but is not at all—given the circumstances. I trust you will, in Christian charity, extend to the three of us all the help we may need to accomplish Mr. Markham’s wish.

  “I would, therefore, without further delay, like to announce the coming marriage of Colonel Maxwell Prieson Woodard to Miss Maria Rose Markham. The ceremony will be held…here?” He looked pointedly at Max.

  “Wednesday evening,” Max said, causing Maria to give him approximately the same startled look his sister had.

  The minister, on the other hand, didn’t seem to be the least bit intimidated by the time frame. “Wednesday evening,” the man repeated. “As you can see this is very imminent. Mrs. Kinnard and Mrs. Russell—Mr. Markham has asked that you handle the guest list. The colonel will advise you as to who among the military officers must be invited, and Maria will give you her particular preferences. Then, we are to fill in with invitations to other local persons, as available space dictates. You ladies will know best who should be included—”

  “That won’t do,” Mrs. Justice said from her position well below the salt, startling everyone with her daring, including herself.

  “Mrs. Justice?” the minister said.

  She looked panicked for a moment, then pulled herself together.

  “Well,” she said. “This is an important occasion.” She cleared her throat. Several times. “Only a few people can be accommodated here in the house—and given the situation, that is as it should be. But there must be a way to include more people. I was thinking if it was done in three…tiers—”

  “Tiers?” Mrs. Kinnard interrupted. “Mrs. Justice, what are you talking about?”

  “I’m sure Mrs. Justice is about to tell us,” the minister said. “Go on, Mrs. Justice.”

  “Well…the notion came to me the minute I heard the word ‘marriage.’ Just like that,” she said, snapping her fingers. “If the wedding was held in the upstairs hallway—it’s very wide, you see—then Bud—I mean, Mr. Markham—could be a part of it without having to venture very far—or at all. The persons who stand with Maria and the colonel would be the first tier. And then there can be those who are in the house, but stay downstairs during the ceremony. That would be the second tier. Then, there should also be guests who participate in a reception only—a special reception somewhere, you see—maybe in the yard if the weather is fine—for those who can’t witness the actual ceremony or be inside the house. So no one will feel slighted. That’s what I think…” she concluded, her boldness abruptly leaving her.

  “What an excellent idea,” Max’s mother said. “We certainly don’t want hard feelings because of the lack of an invitation. Don’t you agree, Mrs. Kinnard?”

  Mrs. Kinnard sat stonily next to Valentina, who looked ready to bolt from the table.

  “I’m sure I don’t—”

  “Mrs. Kinnard,” Max interrupted. “Before I forget it, I need your husband to come to my office to see me as soon as he returns from his business trip. At his convenience, of course.”

  The woman looked at him. Max could feel her weighing the import of his remark and once again trying to decide whether or not to offend him. He watched her as she re-evaluated her objectives. If she couldn’t advance her daughter, then she would advance her husband.

  “I…don’t see any reason why there can’t be three sets of invitations,” she said after a moment. “Valentina has a beautiful hand. She will help write those of first importance. We shall need the list right away—and the vellum cards, as well as someone who will personally deliver them and wait for the response—we simply cannot allow any leeway in waiting for RSVPs if the wedding is to be Wednesday evening. They will have to answer immediately or be passed by.”

  Valentina took a deep breath, and then another, as if she might make good her previous fainting threat. But she didn’t say anything.

  “The reception must be in keeping with your position, Colonel,” Mrs. Kinnard continued, clearly recovered and feeling her power now. “It will take much effort—more than I or Mrs. Russell can supply ourselves.”

  “I will see to it that you and Mrs. Russell have all the help you need. My sergeant major will be your liaison. You have only to tell him your needs and he will see to it.”

  Max thought at first that Mrs. Russell was going to balk, but, apparently, having a Yankee soldier at her beck and call had its appeal.

  “Is it all settled then?” the minister asked. “I see we are fast approaching curfew.”

  There was a murmuring of assent.

  “Then I expect you will all want to meet about this again tomorrow. For now, we must bid each other good night.”

  Max glanced at Maria. She looked so…determined—the way she had at the train station that first day. She was the obedient daughter, and her father had spoken.

  He shook the minister’s hand and accepted Carscaddon’s flustered congratulations. Then he moved into his mother’s embrace, followed by Kate’s, realizing as he did so that Perkins waited in the hall and that he did indeed have on his “sack and burn” face. But it was Perkins’s pacing back and forth that got Max’s attention.

  “I have to see about this,” he said to Maria.

  “What is it?” Max asked as soon as he and Perkins had walked out of earshot.

  “I got them glass candle-holding things,” Perkins said. “About a dozen. And I got a fiddler what can play a decent waltz, and a bunch of the boys lined up what know how to make a brush arbor in a hurry—if you’re wanting to hold any of this here wedding outside and the weather turns iffy.”

  “And?” Max said, because none of these announcements were enough to make Perkins agitated.

  “The son of a bitch who set the fire what killed Mrs. Canfield—I think we got him treed, Sir.”

  “Who? Where?” Max asked, lowering his voice.

  “Name’s Jimmy Julian, Sir. His uncle’s got a farm six or seven miles out of town. I had some of the boys keeping a watch on the place because I heard here and there he might have had something to do with all this incendiary activity around town. Sure enough, him and his men have showed up there.”

  “What men?”

  “He runs with a bunch that claim to be Union veterans. I’m thinking most of them sat out the war safe as you please up in the mountains—just like he did. Anyways, Sir, seems he thinks we need help keeping these ex-Rebs in line—especially in the western counties—so he’d got himself a little ‘army’ organized. He comes back here every now and then to show off for his kin-folk. I reckon he found out about that thing on the street between De Graff and Phelan Canfield, Sir, and he thought he’d show Canfield what was what.”

  “How many of them do you think there are?”

  “About a dozen, Sir. There’s a lot more of them altogether—but he didn’t bring the rest of them with him this time.”

  “Has he got any kind of authority or is he just doing this out of the goodness of his heart?”

  “No authority that I know of, Sir—but he sure as hell acts like he thinks some kind of free hand from the governor is on the way.”

  “Then I expect we better get him before that happens,” Max said, turning and heading back to the dining room. “Carscaddon!”

  “Sir!” the lieutenant barked.

  “You’re in charge of the wedding!”

  “Me, Sir?”

  “Yes, damn it, you! Unless you think Mrs. Carscaddon can handle a company of soldiers well enough to get it done.”

  “I expect she can, Sir,” Carscaddon said, glancing appreciatively at his wife.

  “Perkins is going with me. You’ll have to take over as liaison f
or Mrs. Kinnard and Mrs. Russell. Whatever they want—you do. Understand?”

  “Yes, Sir!”

  “Where’s Maria?”

  “Here,” she said from the dining room. She had a basket of leftover biscuits in her hands.

  “I have to go,” he said. “I’ll be back in time for the wedding.”

  She nodded, putting the basket down on the table, then picking it up again.

  “Maria,” he said.

  She looked up at him. The look held. And that was all he wanted.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I can’t believe it.

  Maria stood transfixed, staring at herself in the full-length mirror. The hastily finished dress fit perfectly. And her hair…Kate had performed some kind of miracle with her hair. How long had it been since she’d looked anything like this? Years.

  Years.

  “I remember you,” she whispered.

  “Did you say something, Maria?” Kate asked.

  “No,” Maria said. She took a deep breath and reached for the velvet case that held the garnet earrings, but she kept fumbling with the catch.

  “I’ll do it,” Kate said, taking it from her hands and opening it. “Ah. These must be the ones Hatcher stole from you.”

  Maria looked at her.

  “What?” Kate asked.

  “I-it just surprises me that you know about them.”

  “Max said they were a parting gift from your brothers and that both of them were killed at Gettysburg.”

  Maria looked away, still trying to reconcile herself to this openness Max Woodard had with his people. About the small things, in any event.

  “It will please him very much that you’re wearing them,” Kate said.

  “I doubt that.”

  “Well, of course, it will. It’s really a very kind gesture on your part. If you wear them today, on your wedding day, as your brothers intended, then it will mean that you accept Max and all that he must represent to you. You see?”

  Maria did see. But she didn’t say so.

  “Come sit down,” Kate said, leading her to a small table and placing a cushion on it, then spreading out a muslin sheet over all of it so that she could lift her skirts and sit and not muss the roses on the train.

  Maria took another deep breath and asked the question that had preyed upon her mind all day.

  “Do you think—” Maria stopped.

  “What?” Kate asked.

  “Do you think he’ll make it to the wedding?”

  “Of course he will.”

  “We don’t even know where he is.”

  “Max will be here, Maria. He may be late. He may even arrive a little grumpy and rough around the edges—but he’ll be here.”

  With Kate’s help, Maria sat down. And she tried to feel reassured. All these people, in the house and outside—and Maria Rose Markham all dressed up and nowhere to go. What an incredible humiliation it would be if Max Woodard didn’t show up for the ceremony—almost as humiliating as the real reason for it. Her pregnancy didn’t show, and she supposed that she could be grateful for that. Valentina Kinnard had come into the room twice on various and sundry errands, and the closer it came to the appointed hour and Max hadn’t arrived, the more elated she grew.

  Someone tapped lightly on the door, and Maria braced herself, expecting the increasingly happy Valentina again.

  “I’ll bet that’s news of him now,” Kate said. “Yes?” she called.

  Mrs. Justice opened the door. “Maria, Warrie Hansen is here. She wants to see you. Acacia doesn’t much want her up here, but I thought you should say if she can or not.”

  “Of course, she can,” Maria said.

  “That’s what I thought,” Mrs. Justice said. “I’ll go get her.”

  Warrie arrived shortly. She looked…better than when Maria had last seen her.

  “I’ve been trying to see you for two days,” Warrie said, hurrying into the room to take both of Maria’s hands. “Lordy, what a sight you are. Your mama—well, she’d cry her eyes out, wouldn’t she? She was like that, so tender-hearted about things.”

  “What did you want to see me about?”

  “Your Yankee colonel,” Warrie said. “He’s done hired me—to help take care of them young’uns. I’m telling you, Maria, I tried not to like him, but he sent word for me to come and do this—and I feel like the sun’s come out after a rainy day. But I got enough sense to know I need to ask you, too. Is it all right that I come here and work? I believe I can help you, darling. You know I love you—and those boys. Might be, I’m a kind of a wedding present,” she said, laughing softly.

  “I think maybe you are,” Maria said. “Thank you, Warrie. I need you.”

  “Well, that’s music to my ears. Now. Those boys are busting at the seams to get in here and see you. Can I bring them in if I hold on to them so they don’t topple you?”

  “Yes,” Maria said, laughing.

  “Well, good! Brace yourself, my dear,” Warrie said as she hurried out again.

  Nell’s mother as a wedding present, Maria thought. What an unusual idea.

  She suddenly smiled. She couldn’t think of anything she needed more than having someone around who was so firmly entrenched in her memories of “better times.”

  “The earrings, Maria?” Kate said.

  “Oh, yes.” Maria took them from the case and put them on.

  She would never forget her brothers or her love for them. But it was getting harder and harder to recall their faces. Whatever would they think of all this?

  Warrie brought the children in. They were both giggling in the hall, but at the sight of Maria, they became what could only be described as dumbfounded.

  “It’s me,” she said, smiling, and immediately they both would have rushed forward if Warrie hadn’t kept them in hand. She brought them close enough for Maria to touch them if she leaned forward, but not close enough for them to trample the hem of her dress.

  “Jake thought you died,” Joe said. “Like Mama.”

  “No, I’m here, Jake,” Maria said, whispering just to him, because she knew he preferred whispering when he was worried. “Do you like my pretty dress?”

  Jake nodded, his finger in his mouth.

  “Let Warrie hold you up so I can give you a kiss.”

  “I’ll do it,” Kate said, and she lifted the boy and held him so that Maria could kiss his forehead and cheek.

  “Me! Me!” Joe cried, jumping up and down, and Kate handed over his brother to Warrie and picked him up, as well.

  Maria kissed him gently, a kiss he promptly returned with a big grin.

  “Now. You and Jake go with Warrie—and I’ll see you in a little while. And do you know what I think? I think there will be cake later,” Maria said mischievously. Whether Max Woodard showed up for the ceremony or not, she thought she could safely promise them that.

  When they had gone, Maria took as deep a breath as she could manage and repositioned herself on the cushion. She was so tightly laced that there was no chance of her slouching. She smoothed the front of her skirt, picked at a satin rose or two. Sighed. Waited.

  “He’ll be here,” Kate said. “I’m going to go downstairs and see how things are progressing. Do you need anything? Something to drink?”

  “No, thank you. Nothing.”

  “All right then. I’ll be right back.” But she barely made it outside the door before she returned. “Maria, your father wants to see you.”

  “Is he all right?” Maria asked, trying to get to her feet and not step on anything she shouldn’t.

  “I think so. I believe he just wants to see you up close.”

  Kate helped Maria get down the hall, carrying the train of the dress carefully as they moved along. The upstairs was all ready, transformed into a bower of ferns and white ribbons. Someone had crafted the marriage bell; it, too, was wrapped in white ribbons. Two has-socks had been appropriated from somewhere for her and Max to kneel upon during the ceremony. No one had thought the preparations co
uld possibly be completed in two days—no one except the groom.

  Where is he?

  The door to her father’s room stood ajar. As Mrs. Justice had predicted, he would be able to witness the entire ceremony from his bed. Maria smiled slightly to herself. Mrs. Justice had known her father since they were children, and she wondered idly when it was that everyone—except Mrs. Justice—had stopped calling him “Bud.”

  Kate followed her inside the room and took a few moments to carefully arrange the train, then gave her father a little wave and discreetly left. Her father smiled and managed a weak wave in return. The effort it took made it necessary for him to rest before he could speak.

  Maria waited quietly. The room smelled of camphor and lavender. The window was open and a fly buzzed around the sill. The shadows were growing long. The sun would go down soon. She could hear the voices of the people gathering on the lawn outside for a wedding that might not even occur.

  “Daughter…” her father said finally. “You are a…vision…to behold. Is she…not…Bruno?”

  “Colonel Woodard is a very lucky man, Sir,” Bruno said.

  “I wish…your mother…were here,” her father said. “And the…boys. My…fine…boys. What a day…they would have…made this. Wouldn’t…they have…made it a grand…celebration?”

  “Yes, Father.”

  “You’re wearing…the earrings.”

  “Yes.”

  “Beautiful. As you…are. Are you…happy…today…Maria Rose?”

  She didn’t answer him immediately, and he reached out and took her hand. His fingers were so cold to the touch, cold in a way she never remembered before.

  “Maxwell…is a…good man,” he said after a moment. “I think—” He stopped abruptly and closed his eyes.

  “Father?” Maria said, growing alarmed.

  He suddenly gave a deep, rumbling cough that went on and on. Bruno stepped forward immediately to lift him up and wipe the spittle from his mouth.