Flirtation Walk Read online

  Bobby pulled a face, but he gathered up his jackstraws, stuffing them into a pocket. “I don’t see why I have to go up so early.” His dark eyes were sullen. “I’m nearly eleven.” The words came out as a boast.

  I swallowed my smile. “At finishing school they always said a gentleman is as a gentleman does. As I recall, a gentleman always obeys his mother.”

  Though his scowl was nearly identical to his father’s, his actions were gentle as took his sister’s hand in his and led her toward the hall.

  My aunt watched them walk away and then turned back to me, disapproval etching lines around her mouth. “They did leave in quite a hurry, your father and my sister. She climbed out her window one night and never . . . She never came back.”

  “Considering the way they left, perhaps my father didn’t think you’d wish to know about her death.” Frankly, I would have thought the same thing.

  She pressed a hand to her heart. “Why would I not want to know? She was my sister. I cried over her for days. And she broke my father’s heart, the way she left.”

  The poor woman seemed genuinely affected. “I didn’t know my father hadn’t told you.”

  She left her chair to sit beside me on the sofa. “My dear girl, it’s not your fault.”

  I risked meeting her eyes. “It was my mother’s dying wish that I return to her family.” Probably. If I had been her, it would have been. I gave the smallest of shrugs. “When my father died, I was freed to follow her wishes.”

  “Poor child. And you’ve come alone?”

  “There is no one else. Although I was not without companions on the train. Two very kind women agreed to accompany me.” There must not be one whiff of impropriety regarding my actions.

  “I’m just so glad you’ve finally come home.”

  Home. That was exactly what I’d been hoping she’d say. But why did I feel so duplicitous? “I don’t want to be a bother. I just wanted the chance to meet my mother’s family.”

  “Of course you did. You must stay with us.” She gave me a swift embrace and then dropped her arms, clasping my hands between hers. “Just look at you. So pretty. Such a lady.”

  “My father sent me to finishing school.”

  “Finishing school!”

  “In St. Louis.” And Chicago and Natchez and several other places in between.

  “I never went to finishing school. I’ve never even left Buttermilk Falls.”

  “You’ve spent your whole life here?” I couldn’t imagine such a thing.

  She smiled. “It’s not been as bad as all that. I was born here, as was your mother. I like it here. But my point is that you’ve had advantages that I have not. Perhaps you could share that knowledge with the children.”

  “The children?” In truth, I hadn’t had much to do with children. They were too young to have much utility. Now and then they had proved to be useful distractions, but as a rule, I didn’t have much need of them. I smiled anyway. Most of the time, people took a smile as a sign of agreement.

  “I’m just so glad you’ve come back to us!”

  If my aunt was overjoyed to see me, it was quite evident my uncle did not share the sentiment. Mr. Hammond was inscrutable. He might take me in out of a sense of duty, or he might just as happily show me the door. One thing was clear—he did not approve of my father. As he came back into the sitting room that evening, I cast my gaze down toward my hands.

  He came to a stop in front of me. “At least your father’s dead. Thank God for small mercies.”

  My aunt gasped.

  I couldn’t keep my chin from snapping up. “It happened quite suddenly. It was a very great shock.”

  My uncle spared me no sympathy. “How old are you, then?”

  “I’ve nineteen years.”

  He glanced away from me in apparent distaste. “At least we know now why Annabel ran away with the lout.”

  My aunt’s cheeks were flaming. “Richard!”

  I’d never felt quite so humiliated as I did just then.

  “I’ve no shame to spare for the shameless.”

  My aunt had joined him, cajoling. “None of it was Lucinda’s fault.”

  He appeared to consider that as he returned his pipe to the desk, looking at me from beneath his beetled brow. “What have you been doing that you’ve just now decided to find us?”

  I forced myself to meet his gaze straight on. “We lived in the territories and—”

  “Which one?” He was quite as terrifying as the headmistress in Chicago.

  “Iowa. And Wisconsin, when I was younger. But I’ve come to you from Madame Mercier’s Finishing School in St. Louis. That’s where I was when I received word of my father’s death.”

  “Finishing school. So he did well for himself, then?”

  “He did.” Some of the time.

  “And your mother?”

  “She died when I was three years old. Of cholera.”

  He said nothing in reply, but my aunt pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed at her eyes.

  My aunt’s tears provided the perfect opportunity for me to press my case. “I don’t know anything about my mother. I was hoping that I could spend some time, if you would have me, learning about her. And about all of you.”

  “We are not a boardinghouse. And I won’t be taken advantage of.”

  The tears I blinked back were entirely real. “I hadn’t hoped to take advantage of you. I had hoped to make your acquaintance.”

  “Why did you make no effort to correspond with us or contact us before now?”

  “Because I was under the impression that my mother had been disowned by her family when she left with my father.”

  “At least he told you the truth about that.”

  Sometimes when things were going poorly, my father would simply give in. “I don’t mean to trouble you.” I looked toward my aunt. “I am happy to have had the chance to meet you, and I will always look upon this day we spent together fondly.” I rose. “If you’ll excuse me, I think it best if I went on my way.”

  My uncle eyed me. “What will you do?”

  “What will I do?” I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do anything. At this point, usually the other party would give in out of a sense of shame and do what my father and I had originally intended. Clearly, this man was no ordinary citizen. “I’ve been to finishing school. I am not without contacts and accomplishments.” I smiled as if he were the most gallant of men instead of a boorish toad, and I walked toward my satchel.

  “Richard!” My aunt’s tone was pleading.

  I bent to pick up my things and continued toward the door, as if I weren’t listening to them.

  “She hasn’t anything in this world. If she can’t depend upon her family, then who can she depend upon?”

  “I only wanted to make sure this wasn’t some scheme of her father’s.” I heard the tap of footsteps across the room’s bare floorboards. “Lucinda!”

  I looked over my shoulder to see him coming through the room toward me.

  “Lucinda, wait. Please.” He ran a hand through his hair before extending his arm to clasp me about the shoulder, turning me from the door. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be rude, but in the case of your father, I’ve learned one can’t be too careful. Please. Come back. Sit with us. Give us a chance to decide what would be best for you. And for us.”

  4

  Seth

  Campbell slunk off to find the commandant, Major Walker, while I strolled the streets of the encampment. In the summer, immediately after graduation, the corps of cadets moved from the barracks out onto the flat, treeless Plain. Shaped like a coal scuttle, its base was to the south, along the road that fronted the barracks, academy building, and the chapel. It fanned out toward the river to the east and toward the row of faculty housing to the west. The West Point Hotel marked its farthest, tree-fringed reaches, and the tumbled, star-shaped ruins of Fort Clinton kept an eternal watch at its extreme northeastern point. West of its center the sunken, spherical
bowl of Execution Hollow marked the site’s revolutionary past.

  Here, at the oldest post in the United States Army, we were forever being forced to comply with the army’s wishes. Even the river itself had been required to bend at West Point’s command, causing boats to slow, passengers to gaze in wonderment, and railroad men to despair of ever conquering its nearly vertical cliffs. But that high ground and the vast, open space of the Plain comprised the chief parade ground of the military reservation. There we performed artillery and infantry drills, packed shells, mounted guns, constructed earthworks, trained the incoming appointees, and slept in musty canvas tents as practice for what it would be like in the real army.

  As first captain, my visible presence was expected in the encampment, but that summer, I’d walked those tent-lined “streets” mostly for personal reasons. I did it to keep moving, to keep myself from thinking too much about my mother. My sister. The farm. But the more I tried not to think about them, the more I thought about them.

  It was always a relief when I came upon groups of cadets and I was obliged to turn my thoughts outward. That evening, some of the plebes were suspiciously teary-eyed as they leaped to their feet to throw me a salute. And some of the yearlings were suspiciously bright-eyed as they went about gathering items like brooms and sheets that I knew from experience would be used that night for hazing the new appointees. But I didn’t inquire; some things weren’t worth knowing. And it wasn’t possible to punish someone for something they hadn’t yet done.

  Out beyond the tents, in the middle of the parade ground, where the dust eddied over the remnants of the day’s maneuvers, lanterns were being lit and fiddles were being tuned.

  There’d be a stag dance tonight.

  The tuning of a fiddle used to be a friendly sound. Now it just made me lonely.

  Beyond the Plain, among the trees, lightning bugs twinkled and up along the river’s bend, the West Point Hotel glowed in the twilight. The sounds of silverware on china dishes and trilling laughter drifted out through its windows. On its porches I could still see the light-colored smudges of wide skirts and lace-edged sleeves. And I could imagine I heard the rustle of silks. About the time the fellows started with their dancing, the girls at the hotel would wander in a gaggle across the Plain to watch the cadets cut up.

  This was all the home I had now.

  These cadets, my only family.

  There was still Elizabeth, of course, but she’d already begun making a new life for herself, with Mother’s family, in Kentucky. I’d never been to Kentucky. She hadn’t either. Could be I’d have time to visit after graduation, before I started off for my first assignment, but Professor Hammond was dropping hints about the possibility of my touring the military academy at Sandhurst in England directly after graduation. Or studying at École Polytechnique in France. In that case I might not have the chance to see her for another couple years.

  If the army really was considering sending me to France, then I’d best try to get some help with my French from Dandy Delagarde. Though I was at the top of our class in all the subjects that mattered, Dandy had everyone beat when it came to French, and he was the best marksman in the corps of cadets as well.

  As I approached his tent, I slowed to take a look inside.

  Glancing up from a book he was reading, he nodded. “General.” Dandy was the only cadet I knew who had more trouble being at ease than he did snapping to attention. Even this late in the day, his coat was buttoned up to his chin and his white cotton trousers were spotless, whereas mine needed a good coating of pipe clay to cover the day’s stains. His shoes shone like mirrors reflecting back the candle’s light, and that black, curly hair of his was slicked back in precise rows. There wasn’t a finer-looking gentleman among us, and he lent an exotic air to the academy with his New Orleans accent. “May I help you?”

  Dandy was numbered among the proud few we called Immortals. While Campbell and I battled each other for the top grades in our class, the Immortals lounged about at the very bottom, applying themselves to their studies only when it was truly necessary. It didn’t mean they were bad sorts or any less willing to pull their share of the duty when they had to. They were just very . . . spirited. In ways the academy didn’t condone.

  I put a foot to the wooden floorboards and nodded out beyond the encampment. “They’re getting up a dance on the parade ground.” A fiddle screeched in the distance.

  “So I hear.”

  “Just thought . . .” Just hoped was more like it. Dandy had never, in the three years I’d known him, ever joined in cadet diversions willingly. “Just thought you’d want to know.”

  “I think I’ll pass tonight.” His eyes flicked back down to the book he’d been reading.

  I started to move on, but Otter Ames, Dandy’s tentmate, hailed me. Another Immortal, he wasn’t the smartest cadet at the Point, but he was as good-natured as a calliope. Every time his failure at exams seemed certain, a beatific smile would cross his face like the first rays of a sunrise and inspiration would rescue him. It defied explanation how many times he managed to hang on by just a single point. His features were open, his eyes bright, and his grin was so wide a fellow could see it in the dark. He was also from the South, but no one would have accused him of being a wealthy planter’s son.

  Never one to miss a stag dance, he didn’t care if he danced the part of the girl, just so long as there was dancing to be had. “General! Hey there.” He slipped by me into the tent. “Got a letter from Mother today.”

  That was no surprise. Otter’s mother wrote him every day. And on Sundays, she wrote him twice.

  “You oughter come back later. I’ll read it to you when you got the time.”

  I tried to smile. “I’ll do that.” I nodded and withdrew through the tent’s flap to continue on my way.

  After settling a scuffle between two yearlings, I made my way to the tent of my barracks mate, Deacon Hollingsworth. While we couldn’t share a tent during Encampment, due to my rank, I looked forward to our return to the barracks when we could room together again.

  The candle flickered as I lifted the tent flap and ducked inside.

  Deke was our class reprobate, the last of our class Immortals, but everyone loved him for it. He might not often choose to do the right thing, but he consistently did the wrong thing with such style and good humor that a fellow could never quite fault him for his failings. Except Campbell Conklin. He could fault anyone for myriad failings both real and imagined.

  Other fellows might have been polishing their shoes on account of the girls who would be looking on at the dance that evening, but Deacon was lounging in a camp chair, sketching pad in hand. He was slowly filling it with portraits of girls to represent what he called “the delectable Greek goddesses of old.” As I set my plumed cap on his tentmate’s folded bedding and then loosened my red silk sash, he shot a glance at me. “You aren’t planning to dance?”

  “Maybe. Eventually.” If I showed up too early, it might put a damper on the fun for the younger cadets. And if they needed anything after the long weeks in Encampment, it was the opportunity to forget that a long academic year still awaited.

  “How’s the good professor?”

  I shrugged as I sat down in the other chair. “He has a niece come to visit.”

  He stopped drawing. “She pretty?”

  “As a china doll. And she’s got character too.”

  His smile was mocking. “Character! Is that what you been looking for all these years? Shoot, and here the rest of us have been willing to settle for pretty. You ask for too much, Seth. You always have. But that’s why you’ll be a general when the rest of us get stuck at captain.”

  The fellows were always saying things like that. I tried to ignore them. Flopping back into the chair, I put an arm up across my eyes. More than being tired, lately I was bone-deep weary.

  “Only ten more months. You can make it.”

  “I know I can. I will.” But June graduation still seemed so infernally
far away.

  I heard Deke’s pencil scratch across his sketching book. “Won’t be that difficult. Any of us who were going to be found deficient already have been. All a fellow has to do is stay the course.”

  “Stay the course and not be stupid.” I gave him what I hoped was a warning glance.

  “Caught a cadet today crying like a girl over being homesick. Know why? He’s from Philadelphia, and he says it’s too danged noisy here. Can’t sleep for the fish jumping in the river and that owl hooting from Fort Putnam and the cows lowing all over the place. Wanted to know didn’t we have carts and wagons round here? Wasn’t there anyone to come around and make deliveries and call their wares of a morning?”

  I joined Deke in a smile. His family owned land out in Ohio somewhere. He was as used to being outdoors as I was.

  One of the plebes stopped by and nearly propelled himself into the tent with a hardy salute. Deke winked at me before he addressed him. “You there!”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “What are you doing, fouling this tent with your miserable presence?”

  The poor boy didn’t quite know what to say.

  “Dismissed.” Deke tossed off a salute. “Get out of here.”

  The plebe started to turn on his heel but then stopped so quickly, he nearly fell right over.

  “Didn’t I tell you to leave?”

  “Yes, sir. Only . . . sir?”

  Deke grunted.

  “I came to deliver a letter, sir. To the captain.”

  “And you didn’t deliver it? Are you telling me you’re derelict in the performance of your duty?”

  The boy’s face was wreathed with indecision. Deciding to show him pity, I pointed toward the foot of Deke’s mattress. “Just leave it there.”

  “Yes, sir.” He fairly flung it at us before wheeling and running off.

  Deke took it up. “Seems like plebes were better when they were us.”