After their noonday dinner, Aunt Ella said, “Meg, take Will down to the river where Sam and Enos used to fish. Maybe he can catch something for our supper tonight.”
Will was elated. “I’ll go dig some worms for bait!”
“The twins always used grasshoppers,” said Meg. “I’ll help you get some out in the pasture.”
They walked slowly through the tall grass, swooping down on the greenish-brown insects with their cupped hands. As Meg shook a grasshopper into the canning jar Aunt Ella had given them, Will thought of how his sisters had squealed when they saw even the smallest insect. But Meg didn’t flinch at touching the raspy legged creatures.
“We’ve got more than a dozen now,” she said, holding the jar up for a better look. “Here, tie your handkerchief over the top while I find Sam’s fishing pole.”
“How far is it to the river?” Will asked as they set off.
“It’s through the woods a ways. We could go to the millpond instead, if you want.”
Thinking of his experience in the woods that morning, Will said, “That sounds like a good idea. And I know the way there—I saw the mill when we came yesterday.”
“Well, I’m going with you, anyhow,” said Meg, her chin set in determination. “I’d rather sit in the shade than hoe, same as you would.”
Will’s face burned. Why hadn’t he gone back to the garden after he’d carried Aunt Ella’s water to the summer kitchen?
They walked along without speaking for a few minutes. Will deliberately set a fast pace, but Meg seemed to have no difficulty keeping up. Finally she broke the awkward silence.
“Mmm, do you smell that?”
Will nodded, aware now of a delicate, roselike fragrance.
“We’ll have more blackberries than we can pick in a few weeks,” his cousin went on, gesturing toward the blossom-covered bramble bushes growing along the roadside. “When we had Bessie, we’d eat big bowls of blackberries and cream with every meal.”
“We picked berries at home, too,” Will said, “and Callie’d make blackberry pies and blackberry cobbler. And she’d make jam. ’Course, that was before the war, when we still had sugar.”
“Whatever became of Callie and Lizzy and Fred?” Meg asked.
“After Papa was killed, Fred came back and worked for us till the war was over. Now he works at the livery stable in town. Callie got a job as cook at the hotel, but Lizzy stayed to take care of Mama. Doc Martin said he’d try to find a place for her.” He kicked away a stick that lay in the road. “I guess I’ll never see any of them again.”
“I hadn’t thought you might be missing your slaves, too,” Meg said in surprise. “I miss Sam and Enos, but that’s different because they’re my brothers.”
“I wonder what it’s like in Ohio?” Will asked, quickly changing the subject.
“Well, they have cream for their blackberries in Ohio, ’cause the rebel army never camped nearby and took all the cows for beef. They’ve got plenty to eat, ’cause the rebel scouts never came through and took their harvest and their salt pork. And they could plant all their fields this spring, ’cause they still had horses to pull their plows and they hadn’t eaten most of their seed potatoes and beans to get through the winter.”
Will struggled to control his anger. “They’ll have flour to make crusts for blackberry pies, ’cause the Yankee cavalry didn’t ride through their fields all strung out in a row and mash the wheat down into the ground. And they can grind their wheat, ’cause Sheridan’s army didn’t burn their mills. And,” he went on, his voice rising, “they’ll have apples and cider next winter, ’cause the Yankees didn’t chop down their orchards for firewood. And in Ohio—”
“Stop! Stop it!” cried Meg, clapping her hands over her ears. “I don’t want to hear any more about the war!”
Will stopped and stared at her. She stood in the middle of the road, dust-covered feet showing beneath a faded skirt and the basket that hung on her raised arm sticking out at an odd angle. Her blue eyes were dark with anger.
“Well, you started it,” he muttered, looking away.
“You were the one who asked what it was like in Ohio,” Meg reminded him. They walked for a while in stony silence. Then Meg said, “I wouldn’t want to go to Ohio, anyway. Virginia’s our home, and Pa says now that the war’s over it’ll be a good place to live again.”
“I guess when he can replace the livestock and plant all his fields again, your life won’t be much different than it was before the war,” Will said. Then, remembering Beth, he added, “Your little sister could have died even if the army hadn’t got your cow.”
“Your sisters could have died of typhoid in peacetime, too, you know.”
Will looked away. “The epidemic started in the army camp,” he said stiffly. “They wouldn’t have died if it hadn’t been for the war. And neither would Papa and Charlie and Mama. I’d still be living with my family in Winchester if it hadn’t been for the war—if it hadn’t been for the Yankees.”
“Your pa chose to fight in the war,” said Meg, “so you—”
“Papa had no choice! He was a man of honor, and when his country needed him, he had no choice but to go to war!”
“My pa’s a man of honor, too, and he says a person always has a choice!” Meg said firmly. “He says you have to look at a situation and measure the good against the bad and then do what you think is right, no matter what other people do. And he didn’t think it was right for him to go and kill other men over something that didn’t matter one way or the other to him.” Then she added quickly, “Now I’m not saying your pa was wrong to fight in the war, ’cause I know it made a difference to him how things turned out. All I’m saying is—”
“Of course it wasn’t wrong! He was fighting for a cause he believed in! Can’t you understand that?”
“I can understand that, all right. The question is, why can’t you understand that my pa didn’t fight for a cause he didn’t believe in?”
Will didn’t know how to answer that. They walked on in silence again, the buzzing of the insects on the blackberry blossoms and the soft scuffing of their bare feet on the dusty road the only sounds. But Meg couldn’t be quiet for long.
“There’s something I can’t figure out,” she said. “Your brother Charlie was the same age as Sam and Enos, and you said he was killed two years ago. That would have made him only fourteen. How could he be in the army so young? Was he a drummer boy?”
The question came almost as a physical shock to Will. Surely Doc Martin had told Aunt Ella what had happened. Hadn’t she told Meg? “I never said he was in the army,” he said, walking faster.
Meg’s mouth fell open. “But—but you told me he was—was killed by the Yankees!”
“He was shot by a Yankee sentry,” Will said reluctantly.
Meg’s jaw dropped again. “They shot a plain, ordinary boy? Why did they do that?”
Will turned to her, his dark eyes blazing. “I don’t want to talk about it!” he shouted. “I just don’t want to talk about it!”
Meg fell back, and he walked on ahead, trying to ignore the throbbing in his temples. He picked up a stone and chucked it into a puddle in the road. Why did Meg have to ask? Wouldn’t he ever be allowed to forget the horror of his brother’s death?
By the time he saw a roadside spring ahead, Will had regained control, and when Meg caught up, he offered her the filled dipper. “Want some?” he asked.
She nodded. “The mill’s just around the curve,” she said, replacing the dipper.
Will drew a deep breath, relieved that Meg wasn’t the kind of person who sulked and held things against you. As they drew near the mill, he saw three older boys fishing in the pond near the motionless wheel.
“Let’s sit under that tree,” said Meg, pointing to a large sycamore on the far side of the pond.
Will baited his hook and tossed in his line. The grasshopper floated on the surface for a minute or two, moving just enough to make a circle of ripples on the still water. Then it slowly began to sink. Will was just about to sit down on the bank when he saw the boys who had been fishing near the mill wheel making their way around the pond.
“We should have gone to the river,” Meg said.
As the boys drew nearer, Will felt apprehensive. Their swaggering walk signaled that they weren’t coming over just to say hello.
“Who’s your feller, Meg?” taunted the tallest of the three, stopping a few feet away.
“Oh, he’s not my feller,” Meg said, looking innocently at her questioner. “He’s my cousin, Will Page. His father was killed in the war and his mother’s dead, so he’s come to live with us.” Then she turned to Will and said formally, “Will, I’d like you to meet Hank, Patrick, and Amos.”
Just then Will’s cork dipped beneath the surface and he felt a tug on his line. He jerked the pole, swung it to the right, and after a brief struggle landed a good-sized bass. The boys backed up a few steps to keep from being splashed.
Will knelt and grasped the flopping fish, skillfully removed the hook, and threaded a string through its gills. Tying the other end of the string to the branch of a small box alder growing at the water’s edge, he tossed the fish back into the pond to keep cool. Then, wiping his hands on his pants legs, he turned to the three boys. Stepping toward them he said, “Pleased to meet you. Which one of you is Hank?”
“I am,” said the tall, lanky boy who had spoken earlier. He looked about fourteen. Gesturing reluctantly toward a heavyset boy a little younger, he said, “That’s Amos, and this here’s Pat.” Patrick had red hair and freckles.
Hank turned to Meg again, but before he could speak, Will asked, “How many fish have you all caught today?”
The boys looked at one another. “Oh, we caught some little ones and threw them back,” Hank said unconvincingly.
“You know,” Amos chimed in, “little ones about this long,” and he used his hands to show the length of Will’s fish.
“Those little ones are the most tasty,” Will said, turning around and dropping to one knee to shake another grasshopper out of the jar. The skin on the back of his neck crawled with anxiety. He didn’t like to turn his back on the boys.
His worst fears were realized when a menacing voice close behind him said, “How’d you like to go for a little swim?”
Without looking around, Will said, “I’d like that just fine, Hank. Is there a swimming hole around here? We could race.”
“Race?” Hank sounded uncertain now. “I don’t think our swimming hole’s big enough for racing. And it’s too far away.”
“Come on, Hank. It’s getting kind of crowded around here,” Patrick said. “Let’s go somewhere else.”
“Yeah, somewhere that doesn’t smell so fishy,” said Amos.
Will baited his hook and tossed in his line. He watched the widening circles, waiting until the last one reached the shore and the grasshopper had sunk out of sight before he turned his head. The boys were gone! With a sigh of relief, he sat down on the grassy bank.
“You were wonderful!” cried Meg, plopping down beside him.
Will didn’t know what to say, so he brought his index finger to his pursed lips and stared intently at the water. Meg covered her mouth with her hands.
“I’m sorry, Will,” she whispered.
They sat in companionable silence, enjoying the occasional breeze that blew across the pond and watching the blue-backed swallows’ skittery flight as they skimmed insects off the water’s surface. Too soon, it was time to start for home.
“ ‘Those little ones are the most tasty,’ ” Meg said as Will retrieved his fish.
He grinned, hoping that his success at the pond would make Meg forget his lack of gardening skill and stamina.
After her enforced silence, Meg chatted gaily as they walked toward home. But as they rounded the curve and saw three familiar figures lounging at the spring, her words died away.
Will’s heart began to pound against his ribs. “Don’t slow down, Meg,” he said. “And don’t act like you’re afraid.”
She nodded and began chatting with great animation. Nearing the spring, she lifted her hand in a casual wave but kept right on talking to Will until Hank got up and sauntered into the road.
“Hand over that fish, Will-yum,” he said roughly.
Will could feel the thump-thumping of his heart, but his voice was steady. “This fish?” he said, looking at it in feigned amazement. “You don’t want this little fish!”
Hank glared at Amos, and Will said, “Come on, Meg, we don’t want this fishy smell to bother our friends any longer.” Will led Meg around Hank, and she began to chatter again. Will held his breath, listening for the scuff of running footsteps behind them, but there was nothing. Finally he allowed himself a quick look over his shoulder and saw that the road behind them was empty. He gave a sigh of relief.
Meg grinned at him. “You did it again! You really showed that Hank!”
Will didn’t answer. He knew he hadn’t seen the last of Hank and his friends.