In His Eyes: A Civil War Romance Page 13

  Sibby shot a glance to his mother’s bedchamber. “I’ll asks her, suh, but….”

  “But what?”

  Sibby lifted her shoulders. “I think she already know what you is goin’ to say.”

  Westley arched his eyebrows. “Oh? And who read my thoughts and conveyed them to her?”

  Sibby crossed her arms. “Ain’t like it’s hard to see that you don’t want her here. And ’sides, she done said you told her she can’t stay.”

  That he had. He shifted the cane. “I have a few more questions for her. Then I will make my decision.”

  Sibby pressed her lips tight and studied him for a moment. Finally, she shrugged. “All right.” She started to turn back toward the rose room.

  “Sibby?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Last evening. When I said I was master, I didn’t intend it to be taken as you thought.”

  She eyed him cautiously. “What you mean, then?”

  He rubbed the back of his neck. There was a time he would have reprimanded a servant for speaking to him in such a disrespectful manner. But such trivialities mattered little in light of all she had endured. “I wanted for the comfort my father’s bed provided. And as I am now the owner of this house, I thought it my due to sleep in the master’s chamber. My meaning did not extend beyond that.”

  Her shoulders lowered. “Oh. I, uh, thank you, suh.”

  “I consider all those that reside at Belmont under my protection.” He allowed meaning to weigh his words.

  “What ’bout Miss Ella?”

  He ignored the question and asked one of his own. “Who has been taking care of you since my father died?”

  Sibby’s gaze fell to Westley’s boots. “We been takin’ care of ourselves.”

  “We?”

  She shifted her weight. “Me, Basil, Nat, and…a few others.”

  He narrowed his gaze. Did the woman avoid a direct answer on purpose? He opened his mouth to prod her to speak further, but the protest of hinges drew his attention to the right.

  Miss Whitaker poked her head out of the door, caught sight of him, and darted back within.

  “Miss Whitaker!”

  She looked out once more, red-rimmed emerald eyes wide. “Yes?”

  “I would like for you to accompany me to breakfast.”

  Her delicate eyebrows joined ranks. “Why?”

  He suppressed a smile that seemed to want to surface whenever this contradictory woman was near. “So that we may both be nourished.”

  She tilted her head and her sunset hair with its red, copper, and gold tones shimmering, caressed her cheek. “I mean, why do you wish to eat with me?”

  He grunted. “I should think that obvious. I desire your company.”

  Pink tinged her cheeks. “Oh.”

  Westley narrowed his gaze. Something did not fit about this woman. She’d known men, and yet blushed at simple statements and hid her partially clothed form. He gestured toward the stairs. “Shall we?”

  She looked to Sibby as though she required permission from the servant woman. Westley cut his eyes to see Sibby give Miss Whitaker a nod of approval before she spun around and hurried down the stairs.

  Miss Whitaker stepped from the room in a dingy cream and tan dress, the child wrapped in a shawl and tied to her bosom.

  One corner of his mouth pulled up. “An interesting way to tote a child.”

  She glanced down at the baby and shrugged. “Keeps both hands free. And, besides, he seems to like it.”

  Westley gestured toward the stairs, and she hurried on in front of him, her feet fluttering about like a windswept sparrow. By the time he won the battle of the staircase, she had already disappeared into the dining room.

  The cane an ever present demotion of his pride, Westley crossed into the dining space and found Miss Whitaker looking out the window, her forehead creased.

  He paused. “See something of interest?”

  “Oh!” She dropped the curtain entangled around her slim fingers and spun around. “Um, no. Just a pretty bird.”

  Why should he be surprised that lies came so easily to an imposter? Worse, why should he be taken aback at his own disappointment to hear them slither from such beautiful lips? And there, again, that hint of lilt in her words that seemed more pronounced with her nervousness. Keeping his thoughts to himself, he rounded the long table and pulled one of the carved chairs from its place. She looked at it for a second, then stiffly settled on the cushion. He bent slightly at the waist.

  “If you will excuse me a moment, I’m going to the kitchen to see if Sibby has any honey. I haven’t eaten any in months, and I am rather fond of it.”

  She tugged on a curl hanging down by her ear and glanced at her baby. “All right.”

  He slipped out of the door at the front of the dining room that led to a small portico on the side of the house. Then he stepped off the brick pavers and onto the soft earth. At least the damp ground muffled the sound of his steps and eliminated the annoying tap of the cane.

  As his time as a soldier taught him, Westley measured his movements and eased around the long wing of the house, coming up to the open section near the kitchen. Nothing moved about in the yard. No vagabond Confederate militia lurked about seeking easy prey. The wind whispered over the grass, making it sway in a gentle waltz. A squirrel barked at his companion and a mockingbird trilled.

  Perhaps Miss Whitaker had merely watched a bird after all. Westley rolled his shoulders. He’d been ingrained in battle for too long. Now he searched about for enemies when only wildlife trespassed on Belmont lands. He almost started to feel foolish creeping around his own home when he heard whispers.

  He pressed his back against cool bricks that had been fashioned from the sandy clay of the banks of the Mississippi and slowed his breathing.

  “You sure? We might wanna wait.”

  Westley strained his ears, but could not identify the voice of the speaker.

  “Can’t. We done made a promise.”

  He narrowed his eyes. Sibby. What was she about?

  “Here. Take this with you. Better do it at night, just in case.”

  A few moments later, the door to the kitchen banged and footsteps moved over the floor. Westley straightened himself, stepped back onto the bricked sidewalk and made no effort to mask his footsteps and thump of the cane. When he stepped into the breezeway and to the kitchen door, Sibby looped the handle of a basket over her arm, her focus on the food she gathered.

  “Sibby?”

  She yelped, and a covered platter in her hand teetered. She stumbled to right herself and grabbed it with both hands. She turned wide eyes on him. “Suh! You done scared me!”

  He watched her carefully. “My apologies.” He glanced around. “Is anyone else in here with you?”

  She stiffened. “No, suh. Just me.”

  He tapped his finger on the cane. “That so? Hmm. I thought I heard someone talking as I approached.”

  Sibby let out a long breath and then a laugh that seemed counterfeit. “Oh, that was just me, Major Westley.”

  “Oh? Then to whom were you speaking?”

  She shifted her stance. “No one, suh. I was just takin’ to myself.”

  Westley tilted his head. More lies swarmed around Belmont. “Odd habit to keep, Sibby. You best be careful before others begin to think you are going mad.”

  Her fingers gripped the platter tightly. “Yes, suh. I’ll be rememberin’ that.”

  He stared at her and her gaze darted to the space behind him.

  “Well, I best be gettin’ on to the house afore these here biscuits get cold.”

  Westley stepped aside and motioned her past. When she slid through the door she turned guarded eyes on him. “Was there somethin’ you needed out in the kitchen?”

  “Oh. Yes. I nearly forgot.” He tried to smile. “Do we have any honey?”

  Something flickered across her eyes but she shook her head. “No, suh. Things like that are right hard to come by in these p
arts.”

  And yet, there seemed to be plenty of items stocked in the pantry. How had they kept the Rebs from raiding those supplies? Beyond that, how had they gotten so much to begin with when stores were scarce and wares even more so?

  As though reading his thoughts, Sibby’s eyes darted to the kitchen. “Mr. Remington hid lots of stuff under the house. We always had sumthin’ to eat. Not plenty like before. But sumthin’.”

  Westley watched her.

  She straightened her shoulders and turned toward the main part of the house. “I got Nat to bring all that stuff we had left up outta down there and put it back in my kitchen.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Seemed best, seein’ as how the war’s over and all now.”

  Over. Perhaps in the papers, but Westley knew better. Men would fight past the time when the governments called it to an end, and then the fires of battle would rage in hearts and minds for a long time to come. He’d studied war. He’d lived war. He was a man of war. His very name spelled out W.A.R.

  There were many things in this life Westley did not understand—women chiefly among them—but war always thrummed through his veins. He followed Sibby back to the dining room, watching the tightness in her shoulders and the stiffness in her neck.

  And as sure as he knew war, Westley knew something more. Whatever Sibby hid from him she would fight for. Whatever made lies shoot from her lips and deceit glow behind her eyes would be protected as surely as soldiers protected their lands.

  They came back to the dining room and Miss Whitaker’s gaze flickered between him and Sibby. Did she know what secrets had taken up residence in Belmont? Or did she simply guard the ones that waltzed behind those arresting green eyes?

  He turned up the corners of his mouth and slid into the chair at the head of the table. And then, as though secrets did not drift like ghosts among them, the three each pretended to be something they were not—he, the genteel Southern gentleman, Miss Whitaker the refined widow, and Sibby the loyal housekeeper.

  Ella looked through her lashes at the major as she pried open the biscuit on her plate. What had riled him? He did well hiding it, as far as men went, but she could tell something bubbled beneath that calm exterior. He sat relaxed in his chair, his movements unhurried. But Ella had learned to sense when men boiled within. Her father often fooled many people, and few ever suspected the inferno that raged beneath his smiling features.

  But Ella had always known. All too well.

  Ever since childhood she’d possessed a way of sensing certain things about people. Perhaps that came from watching her parents for clues about what they hid from her, or perhaps it had been bestowed upon her by the Maker as a form of self-defense. Regardless of the origins, her intuition now told her that whatever transpired when Major Remington went to the kitchen stirred something restless within him. His movements seemed too casual and his manner too at ease to be genuine. In her experience the man who looked the most in control was often the one that erupted.

  “You study me, Miss Whitaker.”

  Ella startled. Had she let her gaze linger too long upon him? She fluttered her lashes and forged a smile. “Surely you are used to women’s attentions.”

  He stiffened, and she realized her mistake. How utterly foolish of her! He already thought her a loose woman. To one such as he, she would only ever be a undesirable bit of rubbish to be discarded once he tired of her. Why that caused an ache, she didn’t know. Ella squared her shoulders. Let him think what he would. “My apologies, Major. I did not mean to be forward.”

  His gaze roamed her face as though he would discover something there. She forced herself to keep his gaze. He seemed curious about her. She could work with that. Curiosity meant interest, and interest meant this might be her opportunity to sway him.

  She placed her hands on both sides of her plate. “I know you are a military man, and not merely a volunteer for the war.”

  He made no response.

  “Therefore, I assume you will soon be returning to your duties?”

  He dabbed his mouth with a napkin and regarded her evenly. “You assume correctly.”

  A good start. She plowed ahead. “Then may I also assume that you would do well to have someone care for your home while you are absent for long periods of time?”

  His mouth twitched. “That’s what I have Sibby for.”

  She straightened herself and tried to show more confidence than she felt. “Of course. But as she and I discovered, not many accept a Negro woman running a household. Even though you Yanks claim the war was fought to end slavery, I have yet to meet a Federal soldier who did not regard the colored people as incapable of such things.”

  His nostrils flared and she feared she’d tread across something she should not. But she could not stop now. “Therefore, it would be prudent for you to have someone in place to handle such matters for you in your absence.”

  He watched her for a moment, and then the dark shadows in his eyes flitted away and something that almost resembled mischief took their place. “And you believe you are qualified for that position?”

  She bit back a retort that clawed for freedom on the tip of her tongue. How dare he sound so arrogant! Just because he thought her a harlot did not mean that he could also think her a simpleton. She rubbed Lee’s back to remind herself about the child at stake and forced a smile she did not feel. “I believe, sir, that I have already given evidence of such. I am a hard worker and learn quickly. I could serve you well.”

  He regarded her for so long she began to hope she would move him, but then he shook his head. “I do feel for your plight, Miss Whitaker. And, in honor of my mother, I will do whatever I can to be sure that you and your child receive the charity you came for. But you cannot stay here.”

  Her stomach constricted, and she feared she might lose the little she’d eaten. “But—”

  He held up his hand and swiped it through the air as though such a gesture could silence her. Ella seethed.

  Insufferable Yank!

  His eyes widened and he looked as though she had struck him, and only then did Ella realize that the words had not been contained in her head but had flown from her mouth! She covered her lips, but the damage had been done.

  His eyes clouded. “I should have expected such from one who is so in bed with the Southern cause that she named her child after The Marble Model.”

  Confusion arrested her next words and cut furrows in her brow. “Who?”

  He tapped a finger on the table. “The King of Spades.”

  Ella clicked her tongue. “You speak madness.”

  “For a woman so enamored with General Lee, one would think you would be aware of the things men dub him.”

  Her mouth went dry. General Robert E. Lee? He thought she named her son for a man of war? She detested all things to do with war! She narrowed her eyes. So be it. Let him think she named the boy for the Rebel general. Better he thought that than know her wee sweet baby had been cursed with the cur’s own name.

  “Better that than be named after a devil,” she said through clenched teeth.

  His lip twitched. “A devil?”

  Ella pulled Lee tighter against her, and he started to squirm. “What else would you call one who so loves the flames that he turns them on defenseless women and children? What other than a devil would wage war not against the enemy army, but instead sets its sights on devastating citizens? Leaving children to starve and women to fend for themselves!”

  Anger burned within her and she stood so quickly from the table the chair toppled to the rug. “Aye, the devil, those Yanks.”

  She no sooner gained her feet than he stood to his. A growl rumbled from within him. “What know you of war, woman?”

  “What do I know?” She clenched her hand at her side. “I know plenty. I know that Yankee flames ate my home and my family. I know soldiers are naught but men devoid of morals that use war as an excuse to ravage and pillage like pirates. I know that while men are off to defend what is being invaded, the
y leave behind families ripe for slaughter at the hands of devils who would rather demoralize the innocent people than fight in civilized battle.” Her chest heaved. “That, sir, is what I know.”

  He stared at her, the muscles in his jaw jumping under the skin. She knew she had roused this military man to the kind of anger that should have made him act out every atrocity his kind were known for, yet he remained frozen in place, the fury of his deep breathing belied by the questions raging in his eyes.

  Knowing she had sealed her own fate, Ella swallowed hard. Oh, why had she let loose such things? While true, it did her no good to voice them! Now the tiny seed of hope that she might be allowed to remain had been ground beneath her inability to keep her thoughts and feelings under guard.

  Knowing the recourse that would soon follow, she denied frustrated tears the opportunity to sting her eyes. Then she turned and walked calmly from the room, leaving the fuming Yankee devil to his demons.

  Westley measured the pounding beats of his heart and then breathed slower, bringing his pulse down with concentrated effort. Furious, he watched her stalk out of the dining room. He gripped the edges of the table. She had no idea the things that needed to be done to win a war—no concept of the choices men must make in order to save the lives of many.

  Memories of torches and flames seized him, and he squeezed his eyes shut. A tactic, he told himself. A simple method to bring the South to heel and all the sooner end the struggle. There had been times, yes, when the orders made him cringe, but he justified their actions and kept his mind from lingering too long on the effects of what they’d wrought. A harsh thing, perhaps, but necessary. Still, though Westley’s own men had burned barns as ordered, they had never set a torch to homes. The distinction would likely mean little to her, however.

  The same thing he told himself over and again on the battlefield. The lie he used to scrub away the guilt as he lit fields on fire and watched them burn. But the depth of the anguish and fear in those green eyes clawed at him.

  In a way, every word she hurled at him stank of truth. While the army tried to starve out an enemy, they damaged women and children. While men bent to the fever of battle, the innocent who’d had no say in the conflict suffered.