‘I don’t care about the picture. We ain’t having a baby and I’ve got to get myself some time away,’ I whisper. Jeremiah cocks his head, confused, and I ain’t ever thought I’d have to explain it to someone else. ‘It’s my woman’s time … my monthlies?’
‘I see,’ Jeremiah nods, and his smile should make me happy but it don’t.
When we reach the woodlot, he and I go far enough so the sound of the boys talking and Henry swearing every time his and Jimmy’s saw snags don’t hardly reach us. I push my way into the low darkness of a thicket, crouching to dig through my knapsack and find the flannel strips shoved to the bottom, where anyone would have to go searching for them. I fashion a thick wad, hoping it can last, wondering about once I don’t need it no more, once it is soiled.
Through the trees Jeremiah stands guard, his back to me, his weight resting on one leg.
‘My Papa was always so pleased when he got a baby on my Mama, like he forgot all my brothers on the hill,’ I say as I push through the brush. It is safe enough I put my arms around him.
‘I can’t see how he’d forget a burden like that,’ Jeremiah says, ‘with all the bad luck your Mama had.’
‘I don’t know what he was so pleased about. I ain’t ever found one special thing about a baby, not even Betsy, unless more laundry and mending and coddling when there’s work to be done has got something to it that I don’t understand.’
‘Well, there ain’t no farm that don’t have babies a part of it,’ Jeremiah says. ‘And seeing my brothers with their babies—seems the trouble might be worth it.’
We ain’t ever talked about children before. For the first time I see a picture of that farm that ain’t only me and Jeremiah, and hired hands come harvest. There is Jeremiah in a red barn with a dark-haired child on his shoulders, telling what makes a good cow, and the two of them poking their fingers in the dirt, sowing seeds.
‘It ain’t our time yet.’ Jeremiah squeezes me real quick. ‘But your Mama’s troubles ain’t got to be yours.’
CHAPTER
13
FORT CORCORAN, VIRGINIA: APRIL 1862
We’re at mail call, and Mrs. Chalmers is there. She stands at the front of our lines, smiling at men, her skirt clean. She uses that smile of hers, gets those men’s attention. I watch Jeremiah close to see if her soft skin and pretty mouth draw him too, but if they do he don’t let himself get caught looking.
Instead, he leans over and says, ‘Now that Captain’s wife sure is a pretty thing. A nice proper wife any man would like to have. Looks nice in that dress of hers too.’
‘Well, she ain’t your wife and you ain’t any man, seeing how you picked a different sort.’ I glare back at him.
He grabs me round the neck, pulls my head toward his belly button, the sort of thing I’ve seen the boys do a hundred times. The sort of touching won’t attract no notice.
‘I got a fighting wife, that’s a fact,’ he says, rubbing his knuckles across my scalp, knocking my kepi off.
I push him, but he just laughs.
‘Don’t you think if Ross here put on a calico dress, he’d look almost as pretty as Mrs. Chalmers?’ Henry says loud enough for everyone around us to hear. Jeremiah stiffens. His hand on my elbow is the only thing that keeps me from turning on Henry.
It stings when Edward laughs, saying, ‘I think it’d be a damn sight harder for Ross to look as sweet as that honey,’ and it is a good thing Mrs. Chalmers calls his name right then to come collect a letter. He throws a wink over his shoulder at us as he goes to her, his face bright, looking like he might bend over at the waist and bow down like trampled wheat.
Edward is handsome in the way of a good workhorse, but Mrs. Chalmers don’t seem to take special notice of him. I wonder what that’s like, for a woman to do that to a man who ain’t hers, if a plain girl like me could do that as easy as Mrs. Chalmers does if I tried. There ain’t much strength in a woman who is only good at smiling, but I wonder if that is the kind of wife most men see for themselves. Still, if she knew about the dirty pictures Edward gets in his mail, I bet she wouldn’t be so keen on giving him smiles or anything else neither.
When Edward has turned back, I almost jump out of my skin to hear Mrs. Chalmers read my name. I thread through the other men waiting, trying not to look at her. Still, I can’t help staring as I take the square of paper from her hand, her skin silk like she’s never done a bit of real work. My skin ain’t never been that tender, not since I was a baby.
Mrs. Chalmers catches me staring and smiles before ducking her head. I turn away fast, snatching the thin packet out of her hand, blushing at how she must think I’m looking on her like the other men do.
PAPA’S THICK WRITING is on the face of that envelope, so firm it’s gone and pressed the letters into the paper and I am so hungry to read it, I almost can’t wait ’til I am safe from prying eyes.
The letter is short and all in Papa’s hand.
March 29, 1862