Chapter 7: A Cotillion

1865

The first snow of the winter was a total surprise. The citizens of the Capital area awoke one morning late in November, and there it was, milky white and tombstone quiet, a half-foot deep and still coming down in flakes the size of silver dollars. The field where Seth and his brother had been cutting hay lay buried, the uncut stalks now bent low into mounded hillocks near the old road, both parts of which had all but disappeared. The wet snow even clung to the deep loops of the telegraph wires.

"Guess we won't have to cut that," Seth said to himself, looking out the upstairs window and rubbing his callused hands together. A light glowed in his uncle's store, and he could see a figure with a broom, shoving aside the snow piled up at the edge of the front porch. It was the only sign of life in the wasteland before him.

Seth had not noticed the disappearing boot prints Robert had made in going to work only a half hour before, but now he understood why his brother had not bothered to awaken him. He had moved back in with Robert after his mother decided that the young man was well enough to put up with Seth's snoring.

"Won't have any school today," Seth said to himself as the fat flakes blew sideways for a while and then seemed to reverse direction making the store disappear behind a gauzy curtain. The leafless limbs of the trees clacked against each other. The fenceline by the deep old road in front of their house was barely discernible in the swirling waves of drifting snow, and the tall pine trees to the west were bent with the weight on their limbs. The storm seemed to suck the color out of the landscape.

"You don' like school anyway," Annie said from the hallway, still dressed in her long flannel nightgown and wearing knitted booties.

"Yes, I do, " said Seth, "it's that confounded lady teacher that's the problem. She's a consarned pain."

"Miss March," Annie said, "she's nice. You just hate the chores."

"I don't mind keeping the stove going," Seth said as he pulled on his heavy britches. "Or chopping wood either. But I sure don't like taking out the ashes or teaching you brats to add up your numbers or print neatly."

"Anyhow, we can get to school if we try."

"We don't have a sleigh, silly. 'Sides, I'druther stay home and read."

"We can go with the Connors. You know those girls will be going, and they travel right by here. Miss March rooms with the Perrys so she'll be there."

Seth buckled his belt and held his tongue, looking for his shoes.

"Mary Beth's sweet on you, ain't she," Annie said.

"Don't say ain't. Momma'll get you."

"Ain't, ain't, ain't," Annie cried running back to her mother's room and slamming the door. Seth dressed quickly, putting on two pairs of heavy stockings and Robert's old sweater, the one that kept unraveling at the elbows, positive his mother would ask him to make a path to the outhouse.

"What time did Robert go to work?" Seth asked when he got down to the warm kitchen, hoping to delay his mother's request.

"Not sure," she said, stirring something in a big bowl, "early. Can't say what roused him, north wind likely, rattling the shutters."

"I didn't hear it," said Seth, sitting on the edge of his chair and spooning up his honey-laced corn mush, wondering about the privy, needing to go.

"You always were a better sleeper," his mother reminded him, toasting a piece of bread in front of the grate with a long-handled fork.

"When's he going to get married? I'd like to have my own room back."

"You don't like sharing?" His mother dropped the toast on his plate and pointed to the apple butter with her blackened fork.

"T'isn't that," said Seth, not at all sure what it was but knowing he wanted someplace to be by himself now and then, a door he could close.

"Well, I don't think Robert is going to get married any time soon. He hasn't even gone to a dance or visited a girl yet, least not that I know about."

"Who was that he courted before he went in the army, the Conway girl? No, Amy Preston wasn't it? They were always making eyes at each other, especially up at the fair. I saw 'em holding hands."

His mother nodded. "She had a brother killed in the war, a Confederate trooper, up at Sharpsburg."

"Oh," said Seth. "Guess she wouldn't marry any Union man then."

"Probably not," his mother said, pouring hot water into her enameled basin. "It will take a while. I'm glad he's working."

"He sure don't talk much."

"Doesn't, not don't. Be patient."

"I thought he'd go back to school, maybe down to Georgetown."

"He talked about the law now and then. Guess he might read with somebody up at the courthouse." His mother raised her head from her small washtub, the one she used in the winter. "Annie, get yourself down here. The churn's waiting for you," she called loudly. "And Seth when you finish, make us a good path to the necessary and milk the cow."

At Luke Williams' general store, Robert and his uncle sat across the counter from each other on high stools, drinking coffee from thick, stained mugs and frying bread on the glowing pot-bellied stove. An open tin of strawberry preserves sat between them. Neither expected any customers before the snow stopped, and it showed no signs of doing that.

"Wha' you weigh now?" Luke Williams asked, seemingly out of the blue.

"No idea," Robert said, a bit surprised by the question. He patted his flat stomach. He was feeling a lot better and sleeping more soundly, too.

"Next time you go over to the French's, get on that there freight scale he's got in his barn. Bet 'chu go a hundred and thirty these days."

Robert guessed his uncle might have weighed twice that. "You heard anything about their business. He was doing real well before the war."

"Humph," said his uncle, "that guano near done him in." He shook his head and refilled his cup. "Ahead a'his time, I guess. He bought high and the price collapsed. And he didn't make no friends during the war neither."

"Guess not."

"Thought him and Mr. Bouve was gonna have a punch up right here in the store 'fore that poor man's son got hisself kilt."

Robert nodded, trying to picture the young Bouve boy.

"Course, I got tired a'explaining why you was wearin' blue."

"When are people going to forget it? War's been over six months."

"Not never, boy," Luke Williams said, wiping his mouth with his hand. "It's somethin' you're gonna have to live with."

Robert picked up the first order to be filled that day.

"Always," said his uncle to his back. "Always."

"Good day, Robert," Mr. French said with a smile. "Glad to see you."

"Brought that order you dropped off. Had to wait for our delivery of kerosene. Driver said the road was drifted over down around the Tenallytown hill." The young man rolled the small barrel off the back of his sturdy wagon and placed it carefully on the empty frame.

"Good thing that snow melted so fast. It would have been right dark around here in a day or two." Richard French smiled at Robert as he shouldered a bag of wheat flour and headed toward the kitchen. "Stop a minute, and Maude'll get you some coffee. Might even have some hot corn bread."

In the steaming kitchen, where the huge iron stove occupied the place of honor, Robert unwound his scarf and removed his heavy gloves after nodding a hello to the large, black cook. He unbuttoned his wool coat, one that had been his father's, and took the offered chair. "Stowed the flour in the pantry," he said.

"Been meaning to talk to you," said Mr. French, raking back his sparse hair with his fingers and hanging up his coat on the back of the door. "This is as good a time as any. I've rented a place up in Rockville, but I don't want to give up the store in Georgetown." He rubbed his chilled hands together.

Robert waited, enjoying the smell of baking corn bread.

"Can't be two places at once, obviously. How about you running the Rockville end of my operation for a while, t'aint very big. You know a lot of people out this way, and I guess you've worked for your uncle since you were about knee high." He held his hand a couple of feet off the floor and lifted an eyebrow. "Feed, grain and fertilizer, maybe farm equipment later."

"Didn't the Bouic brothers open a place just last year?"

"It's mostly a general store, like many of the others; like your uncle's. I plan to specialize."

Robert looked out at the windrows of snow still hiding in shady places. His stomach churned for some reason, and he uncrossed his legs. Why would I worry about a job, he thought. It's just a job. Things are moving faster, I guess.

"Most farmers get their fertilizer from Georgetown, buy it from Baker or old Dunlop. We'll sell directly to them. Should be able to beat the delivered price." Mr. French leaned back and waited, hands behind his balding head.

"Oh," Caroline said, banging open the kitchen door and letting in some chilled air from the unheated dining room, "didn't know we had company. Don't get up please."

Robert glanced at the girl dressed in an oversized sweater and faded pinafore, obviously ready to do her afternoon chores, his mind on her father's offer. She shrugged into her wine-colored winter coat, tied a kerchief about her head and hurried out the door, her feet in high-topped boots and her long hair thoroughly hidden. "Cow's waiting," she said as she turned up her collar and disappeared, wondering why she had felt so glad to see the lean young man in her kitchen. She hurried across the yard, jumping muddy puddles left by the fast-disappearing snow.

"As to money," Caroline's father said, making sure the outside door was tightly closed, "I don't know what your uncle is paying, but I can promise you that if this business thrives, and I think it will as soon as the older farmers see that the ones using the new fertilizer are getting rich, we both can do very well. We are not just talking about guano, you know. Many new products will soon be on the market, super phosphates and bone mixtures. I'll start you at ten dollars a week and promise you a raise every six months if business warrants it."

"Very generous," said Robert, doing the annual arithmetic in his head and liking the idea of earning five hundred a year.

"I'd expect you to keep your own books and decide who gets credit, that sort of thing," French said. "I'll show you the system I use, nothing very complex, just three columns. You know your uncle's accounts, how that works. I've already hired a black man to take care of the deliveries and the warehouse end, one of the Snowdens, a good man, and he's taking on a helper by spring, least I'm hoping he'll need one."

"You know," Robert said, aware he was opening a sore topic, "because of your politics, some folks might not do business with you. I won't help, not a bit. You might be a lot better off hiring one of the rebel veterans. There's a lot of them around." He wondered if the man was going to put his name on the store.

Mr. French nodded. "Time will heal the wounds, I'm sure." He stuck out his hand, and Robert stood and took it, surprised at the hardness of the businessman's grip and at his own quick decision.

"When can you start?" French asked. "Lease starts the first of the year."

"That's fine. I'll find somebody to work for Uncle Luke. Maybe Seth can take my job for a while. He's weary of being the oldest one at school." He buttoned his coat and stepped out into the cold wind, pulling on his gloves and wishing he had worn a hat.

"Leaving so soon," Caroline asked, her face reddened by both weather and work, a bucket half-filled with milk in one hand and a basket of chicken and duck eggs under her arm. She carefully locked the chicken coop with the peg that dangled there. "I wanted to ask you something."

"I'm going to work for your father," Robert said, still a bit surprised. "We just agreed." They stepped into the shed together, out of the wind.

"Well good," said Caroline, setting down her milk pail, stimulated by what she was planning to say. "He's talked about you several times. The old man that's with him now ought to be put out to pasture. He looks like something out of Dickens; you know, Marley's ghost."

"Not down in Georgetown, in Rockville, up near the courthouse."

"He didn't tell me about that," Caroline said, looking grieved, but her mind on something else, something exciting.

"First of the year," Robert smiled at her chapped face and picked up the reins.

"We're planning a cotillion up at the Academy, at the Montgomery Hotel actually," Caroline said rapidly, "the week before Christmas."

Robert looked behind him to make sure he had closed the tail gate, hitting with the flat of his hand.

"Would you go with me?" Caroline asked, standing by the front wheel and looking up at the young man, noting that his eyes no longer seemed to be sunken into his skull. She was not sure whether she felt brave or foolish.

"Me?" Robert said, looking down at her over his knees, truly surprised. "Me?" He jabbed a finger into his chest.

"Well, you know how to dance, don't you?" Caroline gave him her best smile. She really hoped he would do it, hoped she could show up some of the prissy girls in her new school by bringing a real, full-grown man to the dance.

"Some," he said, ready to beg off and wondering why. "A little, reels and things like that. I'm better at baseball and mumblety peg."

"Say you'll come. All the girls have to invite somebody and, and, well, you're almost the only man I know other than my father. Some of them are bringing their brothers. Can you imagine? Poor things." She made a face.

"How awful," said Robert, feigning horror with a dramatic gesture, forearm at his forehead. "The poor things indeed."

"Be nice," Caroline said, putting a hand on his wet boot as he pulled the horse's head around. "It's only a couple of miles, at the hotel's assembly room. We'll have punch and a real band, not just a fiddler. That's what they say."

"I know where it is," Robert said, making a mock bow and pretending to doff his nonexistent hat, "and I will be honored, Miss French, if you don't think I'm too old to accompany you. Do I have to wear shoes?"

"And a shirt," Caroline said with a giggle, "and comb your hair, and not cuss or chew tobacco." She almost said 'and shave' but choked that back despite the ragged condition of Robert's auburn beard. At least most of those things on his face had healed up, those ugly sores.

"Very strict, goodness, a high class affair to be sure," said Robert, clucking to his horse. She waved and hurried toward the house, overjoyed by her success.

By damn, he thought as he went down their long lane, how did I get roped into that. How old is that girl? Seth's age I suppose. Pretty little thing. Well, not so little either. Oh well, I'll meet some girls up there, about time I got back in circulation. She must be about the youngest one in that school. He took a deep breath, enjoying the surge of his blood, the stirring he had not felt for many months and trying to recall the color of Caroline's eyes. He still could not remember the Preston girl's name. Becky Preston, hm, he thought, doesn't sound right. Betsy? Now she was a real beauty whatever her name is. Rebecca?

"You know how to dance?" Robert asked Seth a few weeks later.

Seth shook his head, his mouth full of corn bread and creamed chicken.

"Durn," Robert said, proud that he had avoided another 'damn' which would have annoyed his mother. "I was kind of hoping you might get me out of something I got myself into."

"What's this?" said Mrs. Williams, napkin at her lips.

"About a month ago Caroline French snagged me for a school dance next week, the girl's academy out in Rockville," Robert said, "and now I've got a chance to go to a house party that Saturday, the Spencers. He came by the store and invited me, Charlie did. Sarah Spencer and her older sister, Genevieve, they're having this." And that Preston girl, whatever her name is, she might be there. He shook his head, annoyed at his bad memory.