Read Online Gwyneth Atlee by Against the Odds - Free Book Online

Others,’ chapter twentyseven, ‘Awkward and Unseemly Rescues?’ “ Gabe asked.
The bow of her mouth trembled until finally she gave way to
laughter.
“I have two sisters who live by Miss Willington’s edicts,” Gabe
confessed. “I’m afraid I spent a lot of happy moments mocking them
for what they called ‘developing their standards.’ “
“I must confess, I’ve never put a great store by what the lady had to
say,” Eve told him, “much to my sister and mother’s chagrin. I
brought you here because . . . it seemed best at the time.”
“Did you send for an officer or guard?”
“I-I didn’t feel that, ah, under the circumstances, that action would
be safe for you, either.”
Something in the way her gaze slid away from his convinced Gabe
she’d heard at least some of the conversation on the cabin deck. With
the realization, he felt a rush of shame so painful that he almost
wished Deming had tossed him overboard. Surely, drowning couldn’t
be worse than bearing this Southern woman’s pity.
“I was no deserter,” he insisted.
She said nothing in response, but her eyes looked expectant, as if
she guessed there must be more. And in that expectation, Gabe
dared to hope for something. Atonement? No, she could not offer
such a thing. But perhaps the throbbing pressure in his skull was his
long-silent explanation seeking its release.
Why not tell her? To her, he was just another Yankee, one she imagined
a great coward, from what he guessed she’d heard. What could possibly
make her think worse of him now?
“I did run once, in a battle,” he began, seeking only to ease the
pain by giving the true tale a voice. He searched her face, looking for
some sign that she would stop him. But she leaned forward ever so
slightly, as children do when an old uncle tells a frightening story by
the hearth.
At least she had not recoiled. For that he felt more gratitude than
for what she’d done to save his life. Before she could change her mind
and leave or cry for help, he continued. “It happened in Tennessee,
about six months ago. By then, the Confederates must have known
the end was coming. But I’ll give them this. They kept on fighting,
fielding every soldier they could find. They must have been running
low on fit men, though. After a while, we were fighting graybeards.
We were fighting boys as well. Kids young enough to cry when they
felt homesick for their mamas.”
A dim shade rose before his eyes, his brother, Matthew. Matthew
laughing, the sounds of it mingling with the thin splintering of the ice
beneath his feet. Unconsciously, Gabe reached out as if this time he
could grab him. As if he hadn’t been too far away.
“We gave the war our all, Mr. Davis,” Eve told him, her voice colored
by a pride undiminished by defeat. “We’ll always have the knowledge
that our beliefs, however wrong you people think them, have been
paid for with our blood.”
“Even in the blood of children,” Gabe said. “It’s a damned steep
price for pride.”
“There is no price too high for self-respect, sir, and I will thank you
to watch your language in my presence.”
He focused on her haughtiness, the contempt he imagined building
in her. Only by doing so could he force himself to spill the entire story,
especially the parts he’d been unable to tell Seth.
“There is,” he told her, “or I should say there was for me. Before
I became an infantry soldier, I spent several years designing and
testing different cannon. I was so proud of those gleaming bronze
Napoleons with my family name stamped on their barrels. Proud
of their beauty and efficiency until I saw the mangled corpses on
both sides.”
He could still see them when he closed his eyes, bodies pulverized
by grapeshot, pulped by exploding shells. So stubbornly, he kept
both eyes open to try to keep the disquieting past at bay, at least for
now. Later, when the only sounds around him were the snores of
sleeping men and the splashing of the paddle wheels, he knew