JAMES NELSON - Thieves Of Mercy

It was dark and warm, springtime in tidewater Virginia, Thursday night, and the city was a frenzy of activity. McClellan was on the Peninsula, pushing for Richmond, and it was generally believed that the Yankees would soon be crossing Hampton Roads and landing on the Confederate side of the water. All that morning and afternoon they had heard the boom of the Yankee guns as the men-of-war in Hampton Roads shelled Sewell’s Point.

Rumors drifted like clouds over the city: the Yankees would overrun them, the Yankees would be beaten back by Confederate troops even now being sent from Richmond, the mighty ironclad Virginia would destroy any vessel attempting to ferry troops, as she had destroyed Cumberland and Congress just a month before.

Those stories had pulled Wendy’s emotions one way, then another, until finally she was so sick of the back-and-forth that she dismissed them all, out of hand.

But from the sounds that came out of the night she could tell that the rumors still found true believers. Portsmouth and Norfolk across the river were being abandoned; the signs and the noise of flight were all around. The clatter of hooves, the rumble of wagons and carriages, the huff and hiss and roar of the trains filled the night. Soldiers and civilians, they were all on the move.

For a second Wendy just stood, felt the handle of her carpetbag in her sweating palm, wondered what she should do. She had reckoned on getting a train and had not considered the possibility that she would not be able to. Still, she could think of no better plan, so she took a deep breath and headed down the flagstone path to the gate in the picket fence.

“There’s a war on, haven’t you heard?” The voice came from behind her, soft and feminine, and it startled her as if a hand had grabbed her ankle. She gasped, jumped, whirled.

Aunt Molly stepped out of the shadows of the rhododendron bush that huddled against the carriage house. “Are you fleeing from the Yankee vandals, dear?” she asked.

“Oh-” Wendy needed a moment to collect herself. She pressed a hand to her throat, took a deep breath. She could feel her heart thumping in her chest. “Oh, Molly, you scared me half to death! How did you-”

“You left your curtains open, dear. I’ve been watching you pack like a madwoman for the past hour. I suppose I got curious.”

“Oh. Well… with all the rumors… and such… of the Yankees coming, I thought perhaps I should go back to Culpepper… be with my family… my mother. You understand.”

Molly took a step closer and smiled. She was ten years older than Wendy, never married, which put her solidly in the category of spinster aunt.

Why she had never married, Wendy did not understand. She was a beautiful woman, her hair thick and blond, her skin pale and smooth as that of a woman half her age. In coloring she and Wendy were nearly opposites, but in temperament they were more alike than any other two members of the family. That was the real reason that Wendy’s parents had objected so vociferously to her coming to live with Molly. They did not think their daughter’s behavior needed further reinforcing.

“You’re worried about your mother?” Molly asked.

“Yes… and, you understand-”

“Wendy, darling, that is just such horseshit in so many ways.” Molly’s vulgarity made Wendy blush, not for the first time. The words sounded so odd spoken in Molly’s lilting voice, the soft tidewater accent. In truth, Molly was Wendy to the third power, the woman Wendy wished she was, but did not have the grit to be.

“How can you say that? How-”

“Wendy, you spent an hour staring at that letter from your sailor, and then you started packing. You might as well have shouted out your intentions into the night. And you didn’t even have sense enough to close your curtains.”

Wendy felt her eyebrows come together, her lips press tight. “Fine, very well, I am going to go to Samuel. You won’t stop me.” She was impressed with her own determination, her tone of defiance, even as she spoke.

“No, I won’t stop you,” Molly agreed. “I just want to be sure you’ll make it there alive.” She took two steps forward, her hand lashed out, grabbed the handle of the carpetbag, yanked it from Wendy’s grasp. She moved so fast Wendy only had time to gasp, and then she was standing there empty-handed.

“All right,” Molly said. “Now I have stolen your bag. But that’s no great concern, is it, because your money is hidden on your person. Right?”

“Oh… ah…”

“Your money is in your bag? All of it?”

“Well, yes.”

“Very well. So now you are a penniless woman, far from home and friends. And now I am a filthy lecher who is determined to have his way with you. And you do what?”

“Scream?”

Molly nodded. “Scream as you pull a gun and shoot me?”

“Pull a gun? Dear Lord.”

Molly shook her head. Her expression showed incredulity, amusement, pity. “My dear, you have a lot more courage than you do sense. That’s how I knew you weren’t going to Culpepper, because going to Culpepper would be the sensible thing to do, but it would not be the courageous thing. As it is, you’ll be lucky to make it out of Virginia alive.”

Wendy felt the tears coming and she wiped them aside. She was frightened, frustrated, uncertain. She stood there in the chaotic night and she felt like a stupid little girl caught trying to run away from home.

“Oh, come now.” Molly stepped up and put her arms around Wendy and Wendy buried her face in Molly’s silk dress. “I shouldn’t have said you lack sense, that’s not true. You just want for experience.” She let Wendy cry for a minute more before adding, “We’ll be all right. We’ll find your sailor boy.”

Wendy let the tears come, let the fear and uncertainty of the past two weeks flow out and soak into Molly’s dress.

Then, as she felt the tears ebb, another thought vied for her attention. Did she say “we”?

Molly, it turned out, did say “we,” and she meant “we,” literally. She parried Wendy’s protests like a fencer, turning each argument aside. “No, no, Wendy dear, it is not an imposition, it is an adventure. Besides, I don’t want to be left here in Norfolk with those damned Yankees overrunning the place. It wouldn’t be safe for a single girl.”

She presented her arguments as she led the protesting Wendy up the flagstone path to her own house and in the back door that opened into the kitchen. A bulging carpetbag sat on the table. Molly was already packed.

She set Wendy’s bag down beside her own. “All right, Wendy, get your money out of your bag.”

Sheepishly, Wendy fished around for her little bundle of Confederate bills. She found them near the bottom, pulled them out, handed them to Molly.

Molly began dividing up the bills like a card dealer. “Unbutton your dress, dear,” she said, and then, sensing Wendy’s hesitation, looked up and said, “Go ahead.”

Wendy cleared her throat, reached a tentative hand to the buttons on her dress, and began to undo them, feeling the snug-fitting fabric fall away. She had got to just below her breasts when Molly said, “That’s fine. Now here…” She handed Wendy one of the three piles of bills into which she had divided her niece’s net worth. “Stick this in your dress, right on your boobie.”

“Molly!”

“Come along. At least anyone who finds it there is someone with whom you are quite intimate. I assume you trust your sailor boy not to steal from you?”

Wendy felt her cheeks burn but said nothing as she positioned the bills.

“One stack to port, one to starboard, as your sailor might say.” Molly waited while Wendy secured the bills, buttoned her dress back up.