CHAPTER XLVI
Early in February of ’sixty-five, at the home of Mrs. Liddell, in Columbia, Jack Corbin and his wife and Helen Brooks were sitting round the open fire in the living room. The glow of the firelight on the hearth threw fantastic shadows over the rich furnishings and lit up the forms of the three who sat almost mournfully by his side. The darkness of the evening was made more dreary by the falling rain, through which, in a few minutes, the young captain must go to join his command. His suit of gray was worn and faded, and his felt hat that hung outside was full of holes.
“I am glad,” he was saying, “that old Joe is here. It was good of the colonel to send him. I saw him as I came, dressed up in a suit of Colonel Masters’, and new shoes and hat—”
“Yes, Jack, and I am so glad that Major Goodwin has said he will get us a guard for this house if Sherman comes.”
“He is coming, Bessie.”
“And you think there is no danger, Jack, dear?”
“I should certainly think not, with the examples the other generals on both sides are setting. Grant would not harm women, nor Thomas, nor Meade, nor Lee. Why, Bessie, my darling, Lee would hang a man who insulted a woman or destroyed private property. You remember when General Gordon captured the city of York just before the Battle of Gettysburg, and the inhabitants were scared lest he should burn the town, he said: ‘I beg you to rest assured that the troops behind me, though ill-clad and travel-stained, are good men and brave—that beneath their rough exteriors are hearts as loyal to women as ever beat in the breasts of honorable men; that their own experience and the experience of their mothers, wives and sisters at home have taught them how painful must be the sight of a hostile army in their town; that under the order of General Lee, non-combatants and private property are safe; that the spirit of lust and rapine has no place in the spirits of those dust-covered men.’ He pledged the head of any soldier under his command who destroyed private property, disturbed the peace of a single home, or insulted a woman. And not a person was harmed, nor a dollar’s worth of private property destroyed. Surely, if a half-starved Confederate force could be so knightly, the great army of Sherman, backed by unlimited supplies, will be as honorable.”
“I hear General Sherman says the Emancipation Proclamation was only a war act, and that he expects to own a hundred slaves after the war is over,” said Bessie, reassured.
“I met him over at Camellia before the war,” Helen remembered; “he was a polished gentleman, remarkably impressed, with Southern hospitality. Surely he will not forget the many times he has broken bread with the Carolinians. Barbarians do not forget that, and if he cannot be as chivalrous as Gordon he can at least be as honorable as Morgan.”
They sat for a moment in silence.
“Jack, come up stairs with me before you go,” Bessie murmured at last. They went out together, and Helen sat and looked into the firelight and dreamed of fires that never fail.
The brave wife, leaning upon her strong husband’s shoulder, led him to a little room and stood with him by a bed all covered with little garments. She lit a candle, and its glow showed him more of his wife’s heart than he had ever before seen.
There, each in its place on the white spread, were more than a full score of little prophecies of a woman’s love and joy and hope—a dainty cap intertwined with pink ribbons and another with blue; a tiny dress all stitched and sewn with silk, and others just as beautiful by it; some little coats of softest flannel and silken braidings, and a pair of tiny socks all crocheted in pink and white, so small that Bessie looked quaintly into her husband’s face and said:
“Jack, dear, do you think anything could be so tiny as to get into those?”
“Where did you get them, Bessie, in this poor land of fire and poverty?”
“From Helen, the sweet girl. I told her about it at the first, and she had her brother smuggle them to her. Oh, she is so lovely! And see the little basket all covered with dotted swiss and little ribbons intertwined in it; and the soft little brush with ivory handle, as soft as the silken hair it will touch; and the tiny comb. And do you see the little gold pins and the silver powder box and the puff? And she put in a dozen of the softest little undervests. Jack, I love Helen.”
“And I do too.” The strong man’s eyes looked suspiciously moist.
“Poor girl! When she gave them to me last night she looked at them so long and wistfully, and I knew she was thinking about Ervin.”
“Sad, sad, Bessie; but his death was the death of a hero.”
“I know it, darling, but—a woman—a true woman—wants—a—a son of her love—and life is a mockery without it.”
Then they were silent for a moment, and each deep in thought, until Bessie said slowly, looking at the tiny garments before her:
“Jack, do you think that is what Jesus meant when He said He would go and prepare a place for us?”
He kissed her then, and said a soldier’s farewell, leaving her standing at the bedroom door. When he had descended the steps, Helen was still looking into the fire.
“Helen,” he said, “we owe you much already, but I want to ask another favor.”
“What is it, Jack?”
“Sherman is coming, and I am afraid he will burn Columbia. They say he is going to throw the Fifteenth Corps into the city—the corps that fills its tracks with blood and covers them with ashes. The prisoners we have taken all say so. Bessie is here alone. Will you protect her? Here,” he said, drawing from his pocket a small, ivory-handled pistol, “take this and promise me to do all to protect her, if she needs it. You may need it, too.” Then he walked out into the night and looked up to the window of the little room; Bessie was still standing with the candle in her left hand, looking lovingly down at the tiny garments spread out on the bed, and Helen was sitting in the room below, recalling the face of the past, letting the memories trip with light steps over her soul, and listening to the vibrating of the chords that had lain sore and silent for so long.
It was a cozy little living room, and the wind and the rain outside only made it the cozier. Belated travelers were still hurrying home on the streets below, in the mud and rain. Every now and then one of them looked in at the window whence came the cheery rays of light and thought as he saw it of his own home and loved ones.
So Helen sat, and sitting, mused.
That fire, how brightly it glowed! What a world of poetry and beauty there was in it, from the deep, velvety coals to the dark, gray ashes. And that tiny, blue flame, how young it looked! That was youth. The coals in the full glow were impetuous manhood, and the dark, somber ashes told her of a life buried away, and reminded her that dust shall return to the earth as it was, and the spirit—the bright, pure, flaming spirit, had it not already vanished into the presence of the God who gave it?
Then, too, the long, dark shadows cast fitfully across the room by the irregular bursts of flames, and the occasional crackling of the good natured logs, and, yes, there surely was a cricket on the hearth. There are many Helens, and readers will see the one who sat by the fire that winter’s night in the fated city, but each looks upon his own Helen and the fire glows upon his own hearthstone. One looks at her and she at the fire, and the light falling over her is bathing her beautiful face till every feature is radiant with its divine glow, and the most fascinating tints seem to tinge each ringlet of her hair, and to sleep and dream in those dark, brown eyes. She, too, was dreaming—though none gazed at her there—of life and love, memories which only they could bring, filling her soul and steadying her nerves for life’s actions.
Gazing, she dreamed of the glowing embers, and they told her of life’s struggle, fierce, hot and fiery, and their crackling spoke of sharp surprises, and every falling coal of losses and separations. She watched the leaden ashes gather over the bright embers, and thought how she, too, would some day return to the dust, after her forehead was wrinkled with age, as the fires of youth slowly burned out, just as every seamed log before her was seamed and scarred by the flames. But these thoughts were only for a moment, for the fire had just been kindled in her heart, and she would have to sit and watch it glow and flicker and flame for a long time yet. Oh, that the kind Father of all spirits had granted that the leaden ashes should have gathered at the same time on her life-hearth as on his, and that their fires might have died out together! It was so hard to outlive those she loved!
During the days that followed, wild rumors came of fires and murder and pillage; and the women and children who would be left in Columbia after Hampton’s cavalry had evacuated the city trembled as they saw the nightly glow in the southeast growing brighter and the smoke growing daily denser. Till at last on the memorable fifteenth of February the men in blue appeared on the Lexington side of the Congaree and fiery shells fell without warning into the city.
Helen, standing by the white pillars of the old colonial porch, saw Major Goodwin riding rapidly down the street. He noticed her, too, and called, “I will get you a guard—am going now to see General Sherman.”
Then the bluecoats appeared here and there in the outskirts of the city, and Hampton’s cavalry hovered on the north to see that all was well before the evacuation. Soon the mayor returned and brought with him four Union soldiers.
“The general readily granted me the guard for you, Miss Brooks,” he said. “In fact, a regiment is to be marched into the city to be used for guards by those who want them. I surrendered the city unconditionally, and I do not fear much danger, as he promised me that all would be as safe in his hands as if I myself were in command.”
“And they will not fire it? Oh, how good of them!”
“He asked me about our waterworks and I told him they were in good condition. He was pleased at that, and said that he would be obliged to burn the public buildings, but not to-night, as it was too windy.”
“And there is no danger?”
“I don’t know—I don’t know. The soldiers all say—that is, some of them have told me that they would burn Columbia; that it has been the common talk around the camp fires for a long time. Somehow, one of them said, they had taken the idea that Columbia accidentally fired would be a particularly pleasant sight to General Sherman. The Fifteenth Corps is in the city; but you are safe. Your guard will protect you, and I am glad, for Bessie’s sake.
“And there is one other good thing about it, Miss Brooks,” he continued. “General Hampton very sensibly ordered that no cotton be fired on the streets and so far there is not a flame in the city except the railway station a mile away from town.”
So Helen went quietly back to Bessie’s bedside and told her what the Major had said, and the girl was glad that her first-born could be born in peace. The afternoon wore slowly on, and the night began to cover the city.
Helen was sitting in the doorway and the four guards were near. Knowing the critical condition of her friend, she ventured again to remark as to the safety of the city.
“I wish I was as sure of getting home safe as this house is to-night,” said one of the soldiers, whose face Helen could not like.
Then, as they looked toward the northeastern part of the city, a blue rocket shot high into the air. A moment, and then a white one, followed by a red. Helen turned and looked at one of the guards, a gentlemanly fellow, whom she had heard the others call “Old Secesh.”
“My God!” he exclaimed, “they are going to do it!”
The other three men rose and went up stairs, taking lighted candles.
“Madam,” said “Old Secesh,” “that signal you saw means that Columbia is to be fired immediately. If you want to save anything you had best do it. It is a hellish outrage, but the men want it, and they believe General Sherman won’t mind it. I will help you all I can.”
Even as he spoke a bright light shot up in the northeast and down the streets Helen could see men lighting camphene balls and throwing them at houses. She arose quickly to go to Bessie’s bedside, and as she reached the landing Mrs. Liddell suddenly appeared, crying:
“Fire, fire! The guards are setting fire to the lace curtains in their rooms!”
“God save Sherman the record of this outrage!” said the guard, who had followed her. “Madam, may I help you take the sick lady out? There is no use in our trying to put the fire out—the city is doomed.”
“What’s that, ‘Old Secesh?’ Can’t you keep your mouth shet once?”
“Shame on you, men—you are not worthy of the blue!”
But the men only laughed and stood on the steps while the fire burned above them.
“If Thomas or Grant only commanded us, madam!” old Secesh said, “this black chapter would not be written this night.”
So he helped Helen and Mrs. Corbin and Mrs. Liddell lift the fainting woman in a blanket from the burning house, and they bore her as gently as they might down the street. As they reached the gate, the flames burst from the windows of the house, and the street below was crowded with men and women and children. Everywhere balls saturated with turpentine were being hurled at the houses. As they went on they saw some firemen trying to put out the flames, but the soldiers, with their bayonets, punched holes in the hose and slashed it with sword and axe.
[To be continued.]