ELEVEN
Maggie waited while Sullivan digested her words. The thin skin beneath her right eye began to twitch from the stress of it all.
Please, don’t say anything else.
“There is one thing that I must know and will not take no for an answer,” he said evenly.
Crap.
“The brothers who died at Gettysburg—I want their names and details.”
That threw her for a loop. Why would he want their information? Is there any way her response could be used against her? She racked her brain, not wanting to utter their names to some stranger. “I don’t understand…”
“It isn’t a hard task, is it? Tell me their names and rank,” he said firmly.
There was no way out of this one. She’d be more at risk for lying than just simply telling the truth. She took a deep breath. “Corporal William Hugh Ackerman, the second. And Private Joseph Robert Ackerman.”
He stared off into the distance, seemingly memorizing the information, but not saying anything else.
“Why?” The suspense was killing her.
After a moment’s pause, Sullivan picked up the bread and handed her the dirt-covered plate. “This is all I need.”
He began to walk away when she ran in front of him. “WHY?” Maggie repeated her question. She was desperate for an answer, and he knew it.
But he wouldn’t meet her eyes, and for an unknown reason, that frightened her.
He sighed. “Over the course of knowing you these past few days, a number of questions have arisen. And I’m not required to give you any information. Now, ma’am, you’ll get out of my way, or I shall call for your companions to come and remove you.”
She loathed him. The revolving door of emotions left her dizzy and sick. Scraping her feet in the dirt, she moved a step back to allow him to pass. Sullivan breezed by her without another look.
In the time it took to ask one question, her world felt turned upside down. Again. There was no logical explanation for what her deceased brothers would have to do with her.
Unless…
Running to the barn, she pounded on the door. “Corporal Sullivan! Come out here, now.” Inside, Griffen and Sullivan’s voices rose, but she couldn’t tell what they were saying. She banged on the door again.
Finally, Sullivan threw the latch up and she barged in. Unlike his usual expression of boredom, Griffen was flabbergasted. Apparently, all the women he had met before were as dull as he was. Maggie paid him no attention. Her sole focus was Sullivan.
Unlike his companion, he didn’t seem surprised by her actions. Is this what he wanted? For her to cause a scene? It wasn’t hard to do.
“You don’t get to ask me specifics about my family and then just walk away,” she spat out. “Why do you care about two men who are dead?” Her voice broke on the last word.
He looked squarely at her. “I don’t care, Miss Ackerman.
What I do care about is uncovering the many secrets you seem to possess.
So, I thought I’d start with some simple facts.
Because if I don’t have all of the answers by the time my company returns, you’ll be making the journey with us back to the fort. ”
“On what grounds?” She cried out.
“On the grounds of possible treason. And suspected espionage.”
A spy? He thought she was a spy. The sheer ridiculousness of it made her mouth drop.
“My father, brothers, and mother died, leaving me alone and starving,” she responded slowly.
“And because good people take me in, shelter me, that happen to be on a different side than you—no, scratch that, no side because they are peaceful people—then the only logical explanation is that I’m a spy?
Do you realize how absurd that is? I couldn’t think of any war secrets that I have discovered while here, beyond learning how to tend sheep, grow a garden, and bake bread. ”
“Then you should have no problem answering any questions that arise. Goodnight, Miss Ackerman.” Sullivan gestured to the door.
Dumbfounded, she walked out of the barn, flinching when the door latched behind her. Her mind ran in rabid circles, unable to process one thing. She wasn’t even sure where she was going until she realized she stood in the uprooted winter garden.
Bits of decaying cabbage reminded her that this indeed was not a dream. Her legs didn’t seem to be able to support her any longer. She wrapped her skirts under her legs and sat. The cold ground seeped in through her clothes, but she didn’t care.
Maggie wasn’t destined to make it through this war. After all that she had been through, still, they kept on taking. Nothing would be left by the end.
She wasn’t sure how long she’d been there when Griffen poked his head out of the barn. Seeing her, he quickly went back in and shut the door. No doubt informing Sullivan that she was sitting in the dirt like a madwoman.
Eventually, she saw the light from the lantern in the barn go out. The two must be going to sleep, disregarding the watch.
Just as well.
Maggie had set out to distract the men and boy, had she.
Maybe if she stayed outside, they wouldn’t want to leave the barn.
But that would be lucky, and she didn’t bank on luck anymore.
Sullivan was sneaky. Much sneakier than she realized.
Levi had been wrong. Sullivan wasn’t even slightly interested in her as a woman.
He was just watching her to gain information.
Far, far from home, but she was still like a bird in a cage.
But it was a role she was used to, so she would just sit and wait.
How long had she been sitting there? When Levi spotted her and ran to help her up, her body was stiff from the cold. She stretched her calf muscles, blood rushing to the neglected muscles. She flinched at the burn seeping through her arms, her hands, her feet.
“Maggie! What is thee doing? I assumed thee had come in and retired to the loft. What happened?”
“I-I guess I lost track of time.” Her teeth chattered.
He ignored her question and wasted no time in taking her inside. “Come, let’s get thee inside at once.” Pushing her down into a kitchen chair next to the fire, he dashed into the parlor.
Really, how long had she been out there? At first, it was sheer determination to keep Sullivan inside the barn, but then her thoughts ran rampant. She couldn’t stop thinking of her family. Her brothers. Thinking of them and not where she was. Outside under the moon, she could’ve been home.
Levi came back supporting Abigail.
“Oh!” Both of the women cried at the sight of one another.
“What happened?” Maggie demanded when Levi helped Abigail sit and prop up her foot.
“No matter of that now,” Abigail sighed. “Would thee mind helping to wrap thy foot? I fear it may swell even more.”
Maggie immediately took the box from Levi. Once Abigail’s foot was wrapped, Levi insisted she lie down to rest. He made a pallet for his wife in front of the fire.
Maggie helped settle Abigail, who fell asleep almost instantly from exhaustion. Levi nodded towards the parlor so they might talk without disturbing her.
“Is thee alright?” He asked Maggie as soon as they closed the parlor door.
“What happened to Abigail?”
“Long story, so please, answer me first.”
“I just had a strange conversation with Sullivan and sat outside to clear my head. I lost track of time and didn’t realize how cold it had gotten.”
Levi looked concerned. “Strange in what way? Does he suspect anything more?”
Maggie hesitated. “No… at least not of you. He wanted to know specific information concerning my family. It seems my presence here has caused some questions to arise,” she took a deep breath. “He thinks I’m a spy.”
Levi’s eyebrows rose. “Maggie—!”
“I know, I know. But I’m not, obviously. Surely there’s a way to prove my innocence if it came down to it… Enough about me, though. Tell me about what happened to Abigail. Where’s Elijah? Did she find him?”
He rubbed his hand over his face, exasperated.
“Abigail checked at the Browns’ first to see if Elijah was there.
When she didn’t find him there, she decided to take a different route home to check in the woods.
She tripped and slid into the gorge, spraining her ankle.
By a miracle, Elijah found her. Or to hear Abigail tell it, she found him,” His voice broke.
“If they hadn’t found each other, God only knows how long she would’ve been stuck in that canyon…
” He drifted, clearly thinking of all the bleak possibilities the night could’ve brought.
“Abigail will tell you the rest tomorrow. Isham has been taken care of and laid to rest. Elijah is safe and Abigail is home. That’s all that matters. ”
The weariness of the day had finally taken its toll on him. “Go up to the loft and rest, Maggie. Everyone needs it. Tomorrow is bound to have problems of its own.”
Agreeing, she climbed the ladder. Up in the loft, she looked down once more and saw Levi tenderly brushing Abigail’s hair back from her face before kneeling beside her.
So many emotions rippled across his face as he seemingly prayed silently. She knew she shouldn’t be watching, but found she couldn’t turn away.
Tears streamed down his face as Levi was able to let the brevity drop.
Leaving him to process all that had happened, Maggie crept quietly into her bed. As Levi said, tomorrow was bound to have its own problems.
Tomorrow came quickly and before she felt like she’d fallen asleep, the sun was up. When she heard Levi attend to the morning chores, she knew she must rise. Last night’s conversation still weighed on her, and she was anxious to talk to Abigail.
Per usual, Abigail was already awake when she came downstairs. The only unusual part was that she was still lying on her pallet. She looked exhausted.
“How did you sleep?”
Abigail shrugged. “Not the greatest. Would thee mind helping me up? I let Levi believe I was still sleeping so I wouldn’t bother him.”
Maggie doubted either was true—they knew each other too well. But she helped Abigail regardless. She unwrapped Abigail’s ankle and suppressed a gasp. It was very swollen and badly bruised. Abigail would need to stay off of it for a few days.