Anything But Civil. Anna Loan-Wilsey
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“The fifteenth of November 1864,” I said. I made a few notes in my book, checked Lieutenant Colonel Regan from the list, and then returned the newspaper scrapbook to the shelf, lining it carefully up with the others.
“Bloody hell!” Sir Arthur plopped down into the leather sofa and slapped his knee sharply. “I would’ve bet a pint Regan was at Appomattox. No wonder we haven’t been able to track him down. The man’s dead. Well, check him off the list, Hattie. Ah, General Starrett.” The last remark Sir Arthur directed to the elderly gentleman who appeared in the doorway. I rose from my chair as Sir Arthur jumped up to meet the man, shaking his hand vigorously. The old man winced in pain. “Good to finally meet you, General.”
“Is it? Well, I’m glad to be of service.”
Despite the roaring fire and the almost-stifling heat of the room, General Cornelius Starrett was dressed in layers, evident from the bulk beneath the charcoal gray velvet smoking jacket he wore. His eyes, slightly sunken, were bright blue and his skin taut and pale. The only hair on his head was a wreath of dark gray wisps. He stood slightly bent at the waist, leaning on a cane. The general closed the door behind him and motioned for Sir Arthur to return to the comfort of the sofa, which he did, puffing again from his cigar.
Tap, tap, tap. His cane marked the old man’s slow, methodical shuffle as it connected with the bare wooden floor at the edge of the Persian area rug, centered in the middle of the room. I unconsciously leaned toward him, ready to assist him if he faltered.
“Oh, do sit down, young lady.” His voice, husky and deep, boomed, its vibrant command at odds with the feeble body that housed it. I immediately complied with the general’s order, dropping quickly onto the chair.
“My secretary and I were availing ourselves of your newspaper clippings while we waited,” Sir Arthur said without a hint of apology in his voice.
Both us had been at our wit’s end waiting. Sir Arthur had paced the floor and smoked two cigars. I’d straightened every book on the shelf, read a chapter from three separate intriguing books on gardening I’d come across, and counted to one hundred in French. If this interview, our third attempt, wasn’t pivotal to Sir Arthur’s work, we wouldn’t have waited. And then Sir Arthur had found the scrapbooks of newspaper clippings.
“You don’t mind, do you, old boy?” I winced at Sir Arthur’s familiarity, but the general, either slightly deaf or being diplomatic, appeared not to notice.
“Of course not, of course not, Sir Arthur. That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it? To pick my brain? Why not my library as well? My wife, Lavinia, put those scrapbooks together. Hope they were useful.”
“I guess you could say so,” Sir Arthur said, reminded of his disappointment in finding Regan had died five months too early.
“You have quite a diverse collection,” I said. “I noticed a number of botanical books. Are you interested in botany, General?”
Sir Arthur frowned at me. I’d done it again. My job was to record the conversation and not divert it with my own questions. Yet I was forgetting this more and more lately.
What’s gotten into me?
“That’s Fred’s department. So you’ve had time to look around. Am I late for our appointment then?” the general asked, settling himself into an overstuffed leather chair across from Sir Arthur and setting his cane across his lap. “We did say two o’clock, didn’t we? What time is it now?” Instead of looking at the clock on the large marble fireplace mantel, General Starrett looked at me.
“Half past three, sir,” I said.
“Oh, well, nothing could be done.” He kneaded his bony thigh. The skin on his hand was almost transparent. “These legs aren’t worth a damn these days. Pardon my language, young lady.” I fought the urge to smile. Sir Arthur had sworn a dozen times while waiting without giving it a thought.
“Nothing is, the legs, the eyesight, the hearing (so it was deafness and not diplomacy after all), nothing. But don’t you worry, Sir Arthur,” the general said, tapping his head with his index finger. “Everything’s all right in here. Now, what is it you want to know?”
He reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and retrieved a sterling silver engraved pocket cigar case. He opened the case, chose a cigar, ran the length of the cigar under his nose, and rolled it between his thumb and index finger before closing the case with a snap. He snipped the tip off the cigar.
“Don’t mind, do you, young lady?”
“Of course she doesn’t,” Sir Arthur replied, brandishing his own cigar. “Miss Davish is far too professional to object to a man’s guilty pleasures.” He tipped his head in my direction. “Working for me, she probably doesn’t even smell the smoke anymore. Do you, Hattie?”
“No, of course I don’t mind,” I said, avoiding the question of smoke. I could’ve enlightened them on the nights spent laundering my suits and dresses since starting again in Sir Arthur’s employ. But I enjoyed working for Sir Arthur, and wanting to stay in his employ, I instead glanced at the bison head mounted on the wall above the built-in bookcases across from me. Then, repressing the urge to inquire about the procurement of the bison and distract the old man further, I studied a pair of silver table lighters, both in the shape of a ship’s lantern, one with green-colored glass, the other with red, sitting on the table. The general reached for the one with the red glass.
The general chuckled, lit the cigar, and took a series of quick inhales, then coughed.
“My, my. A woman who doesn’t object to smoking. You’ve found a gem in this one, Sir Arthur. Now if only Adella would agree. My library or not, the girl won’t even enter the room if I’ve been smoking. And the irony is . . .” A laugh gurgled up from his chest and exploded through his nose, followed by a series of deep, dry hacking coughs. He pulled the handkerchief from his breast pocket, one silver star stitched into the corner, and held it tightly to his lips. “Damn, old age! Pardon my language, young lady, but I can’t even have a good laugh anymore without having a fit. Should’ve died on the battlefield.”
“What’s so ironic?” Sir Arthur said.
“That Adella, my granddaughter, objects to my smoking cigars, but has no objection to Frederick making them.” He dabbed the handkerchief at the corners of his lips and frowned, looking at the puzzled expression on our faces. “Oh, never mind,” he said gruffly. “What do you want to know?”
As Sir Arthur explained our presence and need, as he had countless times before, I pushed aside the brown velvet curtain and glanced out at the lengthening shadows, stretching across the leaf-strewn yard, the dusting of snow that had fallen this morning all but a memory.
We may not have a white Christmas after all, I thought.
The narrow Galena River, once twice as wide and thronging with Mississippi River steamboats, was still and silent, filmed over with a thin sheen of ice, bits of which reflected brightly in the afternoon sun. Somewhere out of sight a horse snorted.
“Now if you’re ready, General,” Sir Arthur said. “We’ll get started.” I let the curtain fall and turned back to the task at hand.
I dipped my pen in ink and marked in longhand at the top of the page: December 17, 1892, 3:38 p.m., Brigadier General Cornelius Starrett, Union Army of the Cumberland. I propped my notebook in my lap and prepared to take dictation.
“Eeee!” someone squealed. The chandelier bounced up and down, the glass prisms jingling, as something thumped on the floorboards above us.
“What the devil was that?” Sir Arthur exclaimed as we both stared up at the ceiling.
“Oh, never mind that.” General Starrett chuckled. “It’s just Adella’s children romping around upstairs. Now what were you saying?”
“As I said in my letter,” Sir Arthur began, glancing at the swaying chandelier, “I’m writing a book about the men