Maude stared at him, as if she’d never imagined he would put it so baldly. And McGregor stared, too, catching as his wife had not quite done what lay behind the American captain’s words. Hoarsely, he said, “You don’t care whether Alexander had anything to do with that bomb or not. You’re going to keep him locked up anyhow.”
“I did not say that, Mr. McGregor.”
“No, you didn’t, Captain, did you? But you meant it, and that’s worse, if you ask me.” McGregor got to his feet. Maude rose with him, uncertainty on her face. He took no notice of it. He took no notice of anything but his contempt, and that was big as the world. “But then, what do you care what Canuck trash thinks? I’m sorry we wasted your time-and ours. I had chores I could have done instead of coming here.” He walked out onto the street, Maude following.
Maybe Captain Hannebrink stared at his back. He didn’t turn to see.
Nellie Semphroch was about to cross the street to visit Mr. Jacobs, the cobbler, when the guns started roaring north of Washington, D.C. As if drawn by a lodestone, her head turned in that direction. She nodded in slow, cold satisfaction. For a while, Washington had been too far south of the front line to let her hear much artillery fire. Then the rumble had been distant, like bad weather far away. Now it was guns, unmistakably guns, and louder, it seemed, every day.
A Confederate dispatch rider trotted past her, mounted on a bay gelding whose coat gleamed in the hot June sun. He tipped his slouch hat to her. Taken all in all, the Rebs were a polite lot. That made her distrust them more, not like them better.
Flies buzzed in the street as she crossed. She flapped with a hand to drive them away. There were fewer than there had been ten years before. Say what you would about motorcars, they didn’t attract flies.
She opened the door to Mr. Jacobs’ shop. The bell above it chimed. Jacobs looked up from the buttery-soft black cavalry boot to which he was fitting a new heel. The wrinkles on his face, which had been set in lines of concentration, rearranged themselves into a smile. “Good morning, Nellie,” he said, setting down his little hammer and taking from the corner of his mouth a couple of brads that hadn’t interfered with his speech at all. “It’s good to see you today. It’s good to see you any day.”
“It’s good to see you, too, Hal,” she answered. She didn’t view him with the relentless suspicion she aimed at most of the male half of the human race. For one thing, he was at least fifteen years older than she. For another, he’d never tried to get out of line with her. Up till the year before, they hadn’t even called each other by their Christian names.
“Would you like some lemonade?” he asked. “I made it myself.” He sounded proud of that. He’d been a widower for a good many years, and took pride in everything he did for himself.
“I’d love some, thank you,” Nellie said. He went into the back room and brought it out in a tumbler that didn’t match the one sitting by his last. Nellie sipped. She raised an eyebrow. “It’s very good lemonade.” And it was-tart and sweet and cool and full of pulp.
“For which I thank you,” he answered, dipping his head in what was almost a bow. His courtly, antique manners were another reason why he set off no fire bells of alarm in her mind. “I am going to fill my glass again. Would you like another?”
“Half a glass,” she answered. “I had a cup of coffee a couple of minutes before I came over here.”
“Did you?” He chuckled. “Drinking up your own profits, eh?” He went into the back room again, returning with his glass full and Nellie’s, as she’d asked, something less than that. After giving it to her, he asked, “And what do you hear in the coffeehouse these days?”
Before Nellie could reply, a young Confederate lieutenant came in, picked up his boots, and bustled out again without looking at her once. That suited her fine. Once he was gone, she answered the question that had sounded casual but wasn’t: “They’ve been talking about strengthening the bridges over the Potomac. I don’t know why. It can’t be for anything really important: they keep going on about barrels and tanks, not guns or trucks or wagons. Maybe they’re bringing beer up for their men.”
“Maybe they are. It would be fine if they were.” Jacobs muttered something his bushy gray mustache swallowed. Aloud, he said, “Anything you hear about tanks and barrels would be-interesting.”
“All right.” Nellie knew he wasn’t going to tell her anything more than that. Ignorance was her best protection, though she already knew too many secrets, guilty and otherwise. But Jacobs had connections-about most of which she was also ignorant-back to the U.S. government, whereas she was no more than one of his sources of news. She assumed that meant he knew how to run his business.
Another Confederate officer came in: the owner of the boot on which the cobbler was working. The fellow glowered. “You said that was going to be ready today,” he growled.
“So I did, sir,” Jacobs answered. “And it will be. I didn’t say it would be ready first thing in the morning, though.”
“As soon as you can,” the Reb said. “My unit is heading north this afternoon, and I want these boots.”
“I’ll do all I can,” Jacobs said. “If you come back about half-past eleven, this one should be all fixed up.” Shaking his head unhappily, the Confederate left. Nellie would have bet Hal Jacobs knew to which unit he belonged, and that the information about its movements would soon be in U.S. hands. And Jacobs had his own way of harassing the enemy: “Won’t it be a shame when some of the nails I put in go through the sole and poke the bottom of his foot? What a pity-he’s made me hurry the job.”
The bell rang again. Nellie wondered if it was the Reb, too impatient to wait for eleven-thirty. It wasn’t. It was Edna. That meant something was wrong. Except for a couple of times to get shoes fixed, Edna didn’t come in here.
“Ma,” Edna said without preamble, “there’s a Rebel major over across the street, says he’s got to talk to you right now.”
“You go tell him I’ll be right there,” Nellie said. When Edna had gone, she gave Mr. Jacobs a stricken glance. “What do I do now?”
“It depends on what he wants,” replied the cobbler who wasn’t only a cobbler. “I know you will do your best, come what may. Whatever happens, remember that you have more friends than you know.”
Cold comfort. Nellie nodded, composed herself, and went back across the street. The major was waiting for her outside the coffeehouse, which she did not take as a good sign. When she first came up to him, he said, “Mrs. Semphroch, you are acquainted with William Gustavus Reach.” It was not a question. She wished it had been.
“Yes, I know him some,” she said through ice in her belly so cold, she thought it would leave her too frozen to speak at all. Part of it was fear for herself, part fear for Mr. Jacobs, and part, maybe the biggest part, fear of what Edna, standing not five feet away, would hear and learn. “He came by this place every so often.” She made her lip curl. “Last time he came by, he was trying to steal things when they dropped bombs on us that night.”
“The acquaintance goes back no farther than that?” The Confederate major was one of those smart men who think themselves even smarter than they are. How much did he know? How much had Reach spilled? How much could she say without spilling more to Edna?
She picked her words with care, doing her best to sound careless: “I knew him a long time ago, a little, you might say, but I hadn’t set eyes on him from before my daughter here was born till he showed up again.” That was all true, every word of it; it helped steady her.
“Uh-huh.” The Reb looked down at his notebook. “You are not, and never have been, his wife?”
Edna stared at Nellie. Nellie stared, too, in astonishment commingled with relief. Maybe she’d come out of this in one piece after all. “I hope to Jesus I’m not,” she exclaimed-more truth. “I hope to Jesus I never was, and I surely hope to Jesus I never will be! If I never see him again in all my born days, it’ll be too soon.”