But many disagree with Axton, pointing out that Confederate General Kirby Smith has bragged of using cotton money from the North to turn back two Union campaigns.
“The more cotton the North buys, the more our boys die,” said Governor Horatio Seymour.
Dear James,
I agree. The irony is awful. I know you feel strange using the money from Axton Cotton to build the church. And yes, I agree with everything you have written. But think of the people we have helped. Without your parents’ money—without the transports coming out of Georgia—we’d never have been able to bring Jack and his family here to safety. We are fighting great powers and at the moment must do it by any means necessary!
My parents of course see something else in the church. The other night when I came into the parlor after I’d finished my sewing my mother said, “That would be a lovely, simple church for you to get married in.” I let her words pass over me.
I wanted to tell you: When I saw George last week he looked tousled and sullen and was not quite himself. We sat for a long time on the porch. I believe it is hard for him sometimes, especially now that he’s taken on nearly all of the management of Axton Cotton. He is rich indeed but I think he still sees himself standing in your shadow.
There was another fire, outside the town in Honeoye. And there have been gatherings of the WCP. People say it’s because Honeoye is such a backward place, so full of racists, and it’s true, but I know those evil sentiments are everywhere. Just as sentiments like ours are everywhere.
I have heard the WCP riding and have gone out on the porch to see them. Awful cowards so full of hate. Like ignorant children out of control. It strikes fear in my heart—and also rage. I try to keep the anger back but sometimes it is overwhelming. Valerie said every time it happens she expects them to ride right up to her house.
Later I was talking of these things with George. He took me on a walk to the church and we looked at the site and talked to the men who were building it. He knew them all of course, and they were so friendly, and amusing.
On the way home we talked about the fires in the town and in Honeoye and he asked me, How can you know what’s really going on? How can you tell, Fidelia? How can you tell from the outside what a person believes, or the kinds of things they’ve done?
Yours,
Fidelia
SIXTEEN
HOPE PULLED THE CAR UP TO THE ONCE-MAJESTIC PORCH of the Axton mansion. She and Gretchen and Hawk had driven the short distance with the windows down and the sweet smell of summer surrounded them. Now, outside the house, the heavy cloying smell of roses was almost overpowering.
“Wait,” Gretchen said. “Before we go in, I want to see the church.”
“There’s nothing there,” Hope said. “Or there is, but only Hawk can really see it.”
Gretchen raised her eyebrows.
“Who knows,” Hope went on. “Maybe you can see it too.”
“How?”
“You saw those things last night,” he said quietly.
“No, but how can I see them?”
“You’re sensitive. Most people think time is a straight line. But it’s not. Some of us can see things that were here before—or things that aren’t here yet. It’s like a vibration in music. There are waves and ripples in time.”
Hope smirked. “Don’t think it’s all mystical,” she said. “There’s usually a perfectly rational explanation for phenomena, we just don’t understand it yet.”
“You sound like Mom,” Hawk said.
This made her smile softly. “We might not know why people are sensitive like Hawk,” she said to Gretchen, her smile growing more playful. “But it doesn’t make him special.”
At this Hope punched her brother in the arm. He gave a short tug to the end of her hair and she swatted his hand away.
The cool pine smell of the forest wafted out around them. All that remained of the church was a cracked flagstone walkway leading nowhere. The grass had grown over the site, and apart from a scattered bloom of dandelions, there was nothing different at all from where the church had stood and the surrounding land. If Gretchen could see through time, she couldn’t do it there.
She watched Hawk intently, wondering what he was seeing in that space beyond the walkway, then shot several pictures of the cracked flagstone and Hawk, his hands in his pockets, looking straight at her with that wry smile.
“Weren’t you scared living out here after your parents died?” she asked him. From inside the woods she could hear a twig snap, an animal scampering.
“We were just so messed up at first. You know how it is. You can’t really think right. But there wasn’t much of a choice in the matter. We didn’t have anybody except our parents.”
“Nobody?”
“Nah, me and Hope are the last of our family line—just like you.”