With a martyred sigh, Edna took the cups and saucers and plates from the tray and set them in the soapy water in the sink. Nellie nodded-that was what her daughter was supposed to be doing. Leaving Edna to the scrubbing, Nellie went back out to see what her customers needed.
A couple of Rebels held up empty cups and asked for refills. One of them asked for another ham sandwich, too. It was a good thing she was getting those extra rations, thanks to Mr. Jacobs; if the Rebs fought half as well as they ate, the United States were in more trouble than they knew.
She had just served the sandwich when a civilian came into the coffeehouse. That did happen now and again; some Washingtonians came in arm- in-arm with Confederate officers, and a lot of those who didn't still had the slick, prosperous look of men who were getting along well by getting along well with the enemy. She'd passed a name or two to Mr. Jacobs, in the hope of helping a collaborator to an untimely demise.
This fellow didn't have that look. He was a middle-aged man with gray muttonchop whiskers, and hadn't shaved the rest of his face any time in the past couple of days. He wore a suit and tie, but he'd been wearing his collar for a while, and his jacket had shiny elbows and a couple of spots on the front.
Nellie prominently posted her prices. One look at them was plenty to send most customers not armed with either Confederate scrip or good connections fleeing out into the street. The stranger studied the list, sighed, shrugged, and sat down at a corner table. Nellie went over to him. 'May I help you, sir?'
He looked up at her, sharply, almost disconcertingly. His eyes were tracked with red. He might have had a drink or two, but he didn't stink too badly of booze. 'A turkey sandwich and a cup of coffee,' he said.
'Yes, sir,' Nellie answered. When a customer didn't say what kind of coffee he wanted, he got the cheapest she had. 'That'll be a dollar even,' she went on, in a tone of voice suggesting she wanted to see the dollar before she served him.
Getting the unspoken message, the fellow dug in his trouser pocket. A big silver cartwheel chimed sweetly on the tabletop. 'There you are,' he said, still studying her.
She ignored that. She was good at ignoring men when they looked at her more closely than they should have. She didn't ignore the dollar. That she scooped up. Maybe this fellow thought he could leave it sitting there till she gave him his order, then scoop it up and slide out the door. Washington had always been full of grifters, and all the more so since the Rebs occupied it.
Money in hand, she went back behind the counter, poured the coffee, and made the man his sandwich. Because he looked down on his luck, she piled the smoked turkey higher than she would have for a damned Reb, and stuck a couple of sweet pickles alongside even though she usually tacked on an extra nickel apiece for them.
She carried the turkey sandwich and the steaming coffee cup over to him. He smiled, which stretched his mouth out almost to the tips of his mutton-chops. 'That looks mighty good,' he said, tucking the napkin into his collar to protect his shirtfront. 'Thank you, Little Nell.'
Nellie froze. No one had called her that since a couple of years before Edna was born. She'd hoped-she'd thought-no one would ever call her that again, as long as she lived. 'Eat your sandwich, whoever you are,' she said tonelessly. 'Eat your sandwich, drink your coffee, get out, and never come back here again.'
'Time was when you gave me something better for my dollar than meat and bread,' the man said with a reminiscent leer. Yes, there was whiskey on his breath.
'Get out now,' Nellie said, perhaps more quietly than she'd intended, because she felt a scream boiling up inside her that would shake the place down if she let it loose. 'Get out now, or I'll have the Rebs here throw you out.'
He assumed an injured expression. 'Don't take it like that, Little Nell. Don't you remember Bill Reach of the Evening Star}'
And, for a wonder, she did. He'd been panting after stories in those days. He'd been panting after anything else he could get his hands on, too, and he'd got his hands on her once a week or so for months at a time. He'd been better than some, but that wasn't saying much, not with what she'd seen there for a couple of years. Men were brutes, men were beasts, no doubt about it.
'Your voice hasn't changed at all,' he said, which explained how he'd recognized her. 'You're not as blond as you used to be, though.'
Her golden curls had come out of a bottle. They drew customers, so she'd kept them that color till she managed to escape the life she'd been leading. Bill Reach's looks weren't what they had been, not by a long shot. He looked to be about two steps up from a bum, too. Serves him right, she thought.
But, because he'd been better than some-only out for his own pleasure, not actively cruel-she said, 'All right, eat before you go. But don't come back. Don't you ever come back here.'
'Is that any way to talk to an old friend?' he demanded indignantly. Maybe that was how he thought of himself. As if she'd made friends with the men who set money on the nightstand! The idea made her want to laugh in his stubbly face. The only thing they'd ever done to make her happy was to get up, get dressed, and leave.
A large shape loomed up beside her: a Confederate officer. 'Is this man bothering you, ma'am?' Nicholas H. Kincaid asked. The clear implication was that, if she said yes, Bill Reach would regret it for a long time.
She would have been happier with anyone but Kincaid coming to her aid. He wasn't helping her because he felt like helping her; he was helping because, if she approved of him, he'd have a better chance at laying Edna. She knew how men's minds worked, oh yes she did, all too well.
'It's all right,' she said, surprising Reach and disappointing Kincaid. 'He didn't mean any harm.' She looked that eat-and-get-out warning at the ex-reporter. (What was he doing now? Nothing too well, by the look of him.) Reluctantly, Kincaid went back to his table and sat down again.
Nellie stayed out front till Reach had eaten and left. Then she gathered up his dirty dishes and those from several other tables and carried them in to Edna.
'What's the matter, Ma?' her daughter asked. 'You look like you seen a ghost or something.'
'Maybe I have,' Nellie answered. Her daughter scratched her head.
XV
Major Irving Morrell was waiting for the stew pot full of odds and ends to come to a boil when a runner hurried up to him. 'Sir,' the fellow said, saluting, 'I'm supposed to bring you back to division headquarters right away.'
'Are you?' Morrell raised an eyebrow. 'Well, you're going to have to wait a minute, anyhow.' He raised his voice: 'Schaefer!'
'Sir?' the senior captain in the battalion called.
'I'm ordered back to Division, Dutch,' Morrell told him. 'Try not to let the Rebs overrun us till I get back.'
'I'll do my best,' Captain Schaefer said, chuckling. 'As long as you're going back there, see if they'll send another couple of machine guns forward. We can use the firepower.'
'I'll do that,' Morrell promised. He turned to the runner. 'All right, lead the way.'
He was sweating by the time he got out of the front-line trenches; the runner had taken him literally, and was setting a hard pace. His wounded leg had unhappy things to say about that. Sternly, he told it to be quiet. It didn't want to listen. He ignored the complaints and pushed on through the hot, muggy summer night.
Division staff was too exalted to try to survive under canvas. They'd taken over several houses in the little town of Smilax, Kentucky. The one to which the runner brought Morrell had sentries all around and a U.S. flag in front of it. He gave the fellow a startled look. 'You didn't say General Foulke wanted to see me.'
'Yes, sir, that's who,' the runner said. He spoke to one of the sentries: 'This here's Major Morrell.' The soldier nodded and went inside. He emerged a moment later, and held the door open for Morrell to go in and see the divisional commander. As Morrell climbed the stairs, the runner trotted off down the street, perhaps on another mission, perhaps to escape one.
Major General William Dudley Foulke was sitting in the front room scribbling a note when Morrell came in. The general was a plump man in his mid-sixties, with a bald crown, a white fringe around it, and a bushy white mustache. He looked more like a French general than an American one; all he needed was a kepi and a little swagger stick to complete the impression.
