Linda Goodnight - The Rain Sparrow

“Kind of her.” Thad’s heart had returned to a steady rhythm as the dream faded. He was grateful for Abram’s distracting conversation. “You think your family is still there?”

“Yes, sir. Hoping so. My mama and my brother, Jesse.”

Since emancipation former slaves were scattered, searching for one another and for a new start to a way of life few of them understood. There was no telling where Abram’s family was now. But Thaddeus didn’t have the heart to steal the man’s hope.

“Chattanooga sounds like the place to start.”

“Won’t be long now.”

Thad removed his pocket watch, a timepiece he’d carried since before the war. A long-ago Christmas gift from Amelia, it was his most treasured possession. Even as the polished silver glinted in the sunlight, he recalled her smile, her joy at presenting him with such a fine watch. The memory both hurt and comforted.

“Ought to be coming up on my stop soon and then Chattanooga not long after.”

He’d no more than spoken than the train began to slow and the brakes squealed. A shrill whistle nearly split his eardrums.

“This yo’ stop right here?”

“This is it.” A water stop for the train, and a place for passengers to disembark or board that wasn’t much more than a handful of clapboard buildings. “I hope you find your family, Abram. If you ever get up around Honey Ridge, stop in and say hello.”

Thaddeus hoisted his satchel and rose, turning to offer a hand to Abram. The ex-slave seemed momentarily taken aback before he clasped Thad’s hand with a grin. “Good luck to you, Mr. Thaddeus.”

Steam smoke swirled around Thad’s face as he disembarked, and the strong odor made him anxious. He knew the scent came from the train and yet the memory of the fire that had stolen too much haunted him more than the years of unrelenting battle.

He glanced around at the tiny town, then toward the rising blue haze that would be the Smokies to the east and the rolling countryside that spread in every direction in undulant shades of green. The landscape across Tennessee was beautiful, even though too many burned farms and ravaged villages littered the countryside like the dead Confederacy.

Weary but hopeful, Thad aimed toward a sign proclaiming General Store in search of information. If he was fortunate, someone would share an easy route to Honey Ridge. If he was very lucky, he might even find a wagon headed in that direction.

His boots echoed in the hot afternoon as he stepped through the doorway into the tiny store. The inside was dim and smelled of coffee and leather and hog grease. Shelves stuffed tight with an array of goods lined the walls of the narrow room, a promising sign. Three men stood talking around a spittoon, while a white-haired merchant wrapped a length of brightly printed calico in brown paper.

Thaddeus approached the merchant. “I’m headed for Honey Ridge. Might you direct me toward the best route?”

Nimble fingers paused in tying the package. “I might.”

Thaddeus waited, but the merchant didn’t say more.

One of the tobacco chewers, a short, squat man with a big nose, approached. “Where you from, boy?”

It wasn’t the first time he’d answered that question, though not everyone across the South had been unkind to a former Yankee soldier. There were sympathizers in Tennessee, including the rosy-cheeked woman who’d sold him a loaf of bread and thrown in some dried apples for good measure. Thaddeus had a feeling this man wasn’t one of those.

He sighed. “Ohio.”

The man spat a long stream of tobacco, narrowly missing Thad’s boots. Thad followed the insult with his eyes.

“Yankee.” The man bit off the word as if it left a nasty taste. He looked to his friends, both of whom stared at Thad with more than a little animosity. The one in red suspenders tilted back to stare and Thad saw what he’d missed. One of the men was missing a leg. A soldier, no doubt. A Rebel. Probably all three of them had been.

“I’m not looking for trouble,” Thaddeus said. “Just directions.”

“You won’t find them here.” The man ran his hands under his suspenders. “You best head on back to where you come from.”

The tiny hope that he might purchase some food or even share a ride on a farmer’s wagon dissipated in the dark confines of the general store.

The merchant kept his attention on the parcel now neatly wrapped and tied with string.

Thaddeus gave a head bob and walked outside. A hundred yards down the track, the train chugged onward toward Chattanooga, its smoke a gray feather tickling the blue sky.

The air was sticky and thick. Nights would be cooler, though every bit as humid. Will had sent him a map, drawn by his own hand. A former army captain who’d campaigned all over Tennessee, William Gadsden would be accurate. The trip to Peach Orchard Farm was a long one, especially without food, but nothing to a man who had marched with a hungry infantry for three years.

He shouldered his satchel and started walking.

* * *

“You can’t. I won’t have it.”

Josie Portland tossed down her napkin to glare at Will Gadsden across a long oak table that had fed four generations of Portlands. Portlands, not Gadsdens. The former Union captain had married her late brother’s widow, and now the uppity Yankee thought he owned Peach Orchard Farm and Mill.

“Josie, please,” Charlotte said mildly. “Don’t fuss.”

“Fuss? You expect me to sit back and let more and more of the enemy invade my home? Haven’t we lost enough?”

Will’s jaw tightened. “The war is over, Josie. We are not enemies.”

“Tell that to Tom!” The chair scraped against a floor where dozens of wounded had once sprawled in bloody misery. Josie bolted upright. Heat swamped her, burning her cheeks. She fought hot tears, ever present at the mention of Tom.

Four pairs of eyes watched her. Her sister, Patience, as sweet and holy as Mother Mary herself, looked baffled as she usually did by any kind of disturbance, while her nephew, Benjamin, clearly sided with Captain Will. He always did. Admittedly, Will had been good to the eleven-year-old after the tragic death of Ben’s father.

Lizzy’s dark face appeared at the kitchen door, eyes wide. Charlotte’s former maid was one of the few slaves who’d stayed behind to work for provisions and little else. They were all like slaves now, doing what they could to survive.

“Josie, sit down please and let’s speak of this sensibly.” Charlotte folded her hands together on the edge of the table as calm as bath water. Ever serene, the British vicar’s daughter was too pious for Josie’s liking. Never a bad word, never a complaint, no matter how awful things had been since the war. At times, she didn’t know how Charlotte had kept the farm and the mill going, though her sister-in-law gave credit to God and the handful of crippled Yankees and former slaves who’d stayed to help.

Certainly, Josie comprehended all that her brother’s widow had done. She wasn’t a fool. If not for Charlotte’s stiff resolve and clever wrangling, they would have lost the farm and mill to Yankee carpetbaggers. Nevertheless, Josie wanted her life back the way it was before the hated war, before Father and her brother, Edgar, had died.

“Why couldn’t you hire someone from Honey Ridge?” Her chest heaved beneath the hatefully dull brown dress. She was so angry her face must be as red as her hair. “Why do you have to hire a Yankee?”

“Because no one here has Thad’s skills. He’s from a family of millers. He is a millwright as well as a miller, which means he can repair the machinery and make improvements. He can teach us what we need to know to make the operation smoother and more profitable.” Will lifted the letter he’d received earlier that day. The hateful letter he’d read to them over a supper of dumplings and stewed fruit. “We are fortunate he’s agreed to come.”