The Southern Devil Read online

  Morgan chuckled, thinking back to the latest triumphant letter he’d received. “Quite a few. Cousin Sophonisba and Great-Aunt Eulalia are my managers—”

  “That should terrify any malefactors into obedience,” Uncle Heyward remarked with a flash of his old spirit.

  Morgan heartily agreed. “Sherman’s men burned Longacres when they passed through last summer. Even so, very few of the freedmen left. According to Great-Aunt Eulalia’s letters, there’s still enough food to eat and cotton for a little spending money.”

  “I’ll wager those two terrors are even trading vegetables—or labor—with the other planters, and lecturing them on how to behave,” Uncle Heyward wheezed. He closed his eyes, his chest rising and falling rapidly under the heavy velvet dressing gown.

  Morgan watched him, heartsick and building up memories. He’d learned all too well to do so whenever he had the chance.

  “Why are you here, son?” his host asked, rousing himself to sit up.

  Morgan studied the ruby lights burning in the wine’s depths. Morgan’s father had always said to tell his old friend the truth, no matter how bitter. But how could he lay this burden on a dying man?

  “Out with it, Lieutenant!” Uncle Heyward snapped.

  Morgan raised an eyebrow. “Sir?”

  “As a major, I outrank you.”

  He arched an eyebrow but his mouth quirked affectionately. “You were invalided out, sir,” he reminded his godfather gently.

  “You’re here on military business, aren’t you?”

  “My father always said he never could fool you, sir.”

  Uncle Heyward grinned and took a tiny sip of his port. “Nothing else you’d try to keep quiet.”

  Morgan bit the bullet but kept his voice down. While he trusted Jessamyn, he didn’t know Cassiopeia well, although she was related by marriage to Somerset Hall’s chief groom. She’d only arrived in 1859, after he’d left for Arizona. “Forrest sent me to town. I’d like your permission to stay here and do some investigating.”

  Uncle Heyward stared at him. His wineglass started to rock in his hand and he set it down shakily. The lines on his face deepened, adding decades to his age, and he closed his eyes, hiding their agony. He was silent for a time, leaving the clock to fill the silence.

  What the hell was wrong? His father had always said he could trust Uncle Heyward with anything and treated the Tylers like the other half of their own family. Morgan started to wonder if he’d misjudged his old friends. He was reminding himself of the old escape routes from this room, when his godfather spoke again.

  “I was a soldier of the Confederacy and I will keep that vow. So you have my permission. Should the worst befall you and me, Cyrus Evans will ensure that no harm comes to Jessamyn,” he finished more softly.

  Morgan blew out the breath he’d been barely aware he was holding. He started to frame his first question about the best place to hunt.

  Uncle Heyward’s eyes flashed open, suddenly, unexpectedly green again. Their ferocity speared Morgan to the heart. “But stay as far away from Jessamyn as possible. She has Unionist sympathies, although she never speaks of them, in deference to me.”

  Morgan rocked back in his seat, nearly spilling his port. “Jessamyn, a Unionist? Doesn’t she understand the need to stand with her state, as a Secessionist?”

  Her father shrugged, his eyes full of pity for the younger man and the knowledge of pain to come. “I raised Jessamyn to be my heir and taught her to think for herself. I can’t be too surprised when she disagrees with me.”

  Morgan flinched, physically sick at the prospect of using Jessamyn in this fashion. Independent, intelligent, and loyal were the three terms that best described Jessamyn. If she’d decided she was Unionist, no man could change her mind. How the hell could he pull this off without her knowledge? How could he fool her?

  Then he remembered those green recruits, their faces shining with trust and enthusiasm at that icy river bottom rendezvous, when they heard how Forrest routed the Yankees. He couldn’t let them be destroyed by Grierson. This was war and one girl’s feelings meant nothing in comparison to saving the lives of two thousand men.

  “You’ll need to watch for Jessamyn’s cousin, Charlie Jones, a nasty viper if there ever was one.”

  Morgan nodded, thinking back to a few old meetings. Charlie was Sophia Tyler’s nephew. Like the other Joneses, his family had cut off all contact with Heyward Tyler when he divorced Sophia shortly after she ran off with Forsythe.

  “Worse, Cyrus will be here in a few days to escort Jessamyn and me to New York.”

  Morgan’s heart twisted again. Damn, he’d never grow accustomed to thinking of Uncle Heyward as ill. “Jessamyn mentioned that. I’ll have to work quickly.”

  “You’ll also need to watch for the servants,” Uncle Heyward added. “There’s only four here now, all completely loyal to Jessamyn. Cassiopeia the cook, her husband Aristotle who’s the houseman, his brother Socrates the groom, and his twin Plato who’s my valet.”

  “If Cassiopeia has family further downriver,” Morgan protested, “then I may be able to gain a hold on her.”

  Uncle Heyward brushed that notion aside. “Unacceptable. All the men are related to Galileo, Somerset Hall’s chief groom. I won’t have him disturbed.”

  Damn. No accomplices in this house except Uncle Heyward? He hated doing this. Still, he’d been successful before when he’d acted on his own and he could do so again. But he needed to hurry.

  Uncle Heyward’s gaze fixed on him, sharp as a surgeon’s lancet. “You’re posing as a deserter, of course.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Hmmm, that should work. It’s Christmastime. Even with a war, there are still many functions that a Tyler needs to attend. Jessamyn does what she can, of course, but I can’t escort her as I should,” Uncle Heyward mused with a conspiratorial air.

  Morgan cocked his head, a wild hope beginning to build. The Tylers’ social connections had always been superb, even better than his own family’s. By escorting Jessamyn, he might be able to discover exactly who knew Grierson’s orders, thus saving a great deal of time.

  “You’d be around soldiers, of course,” Uncle Heyward drawled. “They’re as common as boll weevils, since there’s a Federal garrison in town.”

  Morgan shrugged, well aware his smile had turned wicked. “I believe I can manage to be polite to Federals, sir.”

  “Well, of course you can. You’re an Evans of Longacres,” Uncle Heyward agreed. “We’ll give you Andrew Dorr’s clothes, my old clerk’s, so you’ll look like a civilian.”

  Morgan bowed. “Thank you, sir.”

  He’d manage somehow around Jessamyn. Maybe by telling her a minimum of the truth.

  Jessamyn settled herself into her seat and smiled up at Morgan, who held it for her—perfectly, of course. “Thank you.”

  He nodded and sat down next to her, looking precise in Andrew’s old clothes.

  On the other side of the table, their hostess’s daughter shot her a viciously triumphant glance. Jessamyn nodded slightly, still wary at being seated next to Morgan at a dinner party, even though he was using an assumed name. But Clarabelle Hutchinson had stopped by the house that afternoon to borrow some greens for the party’s decorations and spotted Morgan. Ever on the alert to remove possible competitors for the bachelors’ attention, she’d immediately assumed Morgan was Jessamyn’s impoverished suitor and invited him to the party. She’d been both insistent and loud, threatening to cry and summon her father to support her stated desire to see the numbers even. Jessamyn suspected that Morgan had only accepted out of his old childhood protectiveness toward her.

  Now she sat beside him, praying nothing would go wrong.

  Certainly her old friend had changed. He’d struck her dumb when she saw him in ’61, eighteen years old, tanned and lithe as a mountain lion after three years of life on the frontier. He and his father had stayed for only two days and a night, most of that spent closeted with her father.
She respected him for enlisting in a cause he believed in, even if she didn’t give allegiance to the same cause. She was extremely proud of Cyrus, who’d honored his oath and stayed in the Federal army, despite the agonies it cost him to lead troops against men from his native state.

  She glanced around the room, looking for possible threats. A Rebel soldier at a dinner party with Federal officers. Mercifully, no military secrets would be discussed tonight. She hoped.

  The chaplain on the other side of her rose to give the blessing and Jessamyn obediently bowed her head.

  Memphis’s position as a major cotton port in a border state had kept its upper echelons mixed, both Unionist and Confederate. Both sides still socialized together cautiously, especially at Christmastime. Jessamyn had kept her mouth shut over the past few years about her Unionist sympathies, given her father’s service as a Confederate officer.

  Tonight’s dinner party was designed to aid Confederate POWs in Northern prisons. The hostess was Lorena Hutchinson, a Confederate sympathizer whose son was a prisoner of war. She was an expert at using her formidable social skills to aid him and other POWs as best she could, which included drawing on her contacts in the local Federal garrison.

  Mrs. Hutchinson smiled sweetly at her small dinner party, composed of equal numbers of local Federal troops and families related to POWs. Tomorrow they’d be taking a shipment to the garrison, for delivery directly to the POWs, who were hungry and cold in the Northern prisons.

  Jessamyn shuddered at the thought. Like every other woman at the table, she was here to charm the Federals into helping those supplies through.

  “Thank you for the lovely blessing, Reverend Getty,” Mrs. Hutchinson purred and the dinner began. Morgan silently passed a dish of creamed peas to the matron beyond him and Jessamyn smiled at the lieutenant on her other side. Thank God nobody seemed to have recognized Morgan, which wasn’t very surprising since he hadn’t walked the town’s streets for six or seven years.

  Conversation became general, enlivened by Clarabelle’s flirtations with every bachelor and superior looks at Jessamyn—which Jessamyn found easy to ignore. Morgan was eating quietly and steadily, not with the speed and diligence he’d used when he’d first arrived. His wrists were so thin and strong; how long had it been since he’d eaten regularly?

  She glanced at his face, then looked quickly back at her own place setting. Studying his mouth—his lips, his teeth, his tongue—was too intimate, almost frightening. What would it feel like if he pressed it to hers?

  The ham arrived, followed by a lull in the conversation as the party enjoyed the very good food. It was broken by the officers around Clarabelle Hutchinson.

  Jessamyn cocked her head to listen as she buttered her roll; her dinner companion was shoveling ham down his throat, relieving her of paying any attention to him. Morgan was calmly passing chutney to the matron on his left.

  “I will personally oversee the loading, Miss Hutchinson,” the skinny, redheaded lieutenant pledged, gazing earnestly at Clarabelle. “You need have no fear for your precious jars of honey.”

  “But I will see them to St. Louis,” the dark-haired lieutenant on her other side vowed, slapping the table. Flatware rattled briefly, then settled back into place.

  The red-haired lieutenant leaned forward to glare at him. “You can’t do that, Wyeth. You’re on staff duty tomorrow, ensuring that the orders of movement are done properly.”

  Morgan’s hands stilled and he shot a hard look at Wyeth.

  Jessamyn glanced rapidly between the two men, wondering why her skin was prickling. What was going on here? Why would Morgan be interested in who was a staff officer? She pushed the concern aside as nonsensical; thinking about that would be the hallmark of a spy, which Morgan was far too honorable for.

  Clarabelle Hutchinson giggled and patted both officers’ arms. “Gentlemen, gentlemen, you are so magnificent! I’m sure both of you can help this charity.”

  Morgan went back to eating his dinner as if nothing had happened.

  Jessamyn looked at him uneasily, her stomach heaving. She refused another helping of ham and confined herself to sipping spring water. Her nerves were jangling as badly as when a prank was about to go bad. She began to shred her dinner roll, while she made polite conversation.

  During the after-dinner musicale, she convinced herself she’d imagined her nervous upset, probably because she wasn’t used to staying out for an entire evening with a gentleman of her own age. Especially one as handsome as Morgan, who had the look of a young cavalier with his clear-cut profile and high cheekbones. He could have been all too pretty but somehow he had a harshly masculine face, probably because his cheekbones were so very sharp and his eyes so very alert and his jaw so very strong. But his mouth certainly did look very capable of kissing a girl thoroughly.

  That thought led her to another—what Morgan might do on the return home, activities she wasn’t at all sure she’d reject.

  Sitting next to him in the small buggy made her insides purr and melt, while she wondered what it would be like when they were married. She watched him drive, sensing the rippling muscles under his skin, enjoying how easily he controlled the high-spirited bay gelding.

  Morgan brought her into the house, lit by only a few isolated gas lamps. Everything was very quiet, wrapping them in a cloak of intimate silence, so that they tiptoed across the wooden floors and the grandfather clock sounded like a drum.

  He stopped at the foot of the stairs and she looked back at him, still holding hands. “Aren’t you coming up?”

  “No.” His thumb rubbed over her knuckles. “Your father gave me the room next to yours. It would be more proper if I wait an hour, until you’re asleep.”

  “Oh.” His reasoning sounded solid but she didn’t want to release him. This was the first time she’d ever spent an evening with a young man, and his company had been everything a gentleman’s should be. She blinked up at him and tried to find something logical, or ladylike, or welcoming, to say.

  “Jessamyn.” Was he groaning?

  She opened her mouth to ask—and his lips covered hers.

  Their teeth banged against each other’s. Her lips caught his lips, then felt his tongue. His breath touched her lightly, making her shiver. She sighed and instinctively opened her mouth wider for him.

  He tilted her head to meet his and she yielded, closing her eyes with a little moan.

  A whirlwind rose through her body as his tongue danced and played with hers. She arched against him, wrapping her arms around his neck and rubbing her suddenly aching body against him. He kissed her thoroughly, exploring her mouth deeply and completely, bruising her. She moaned into his mouth and pushed against him, silently begging for more. He tightened his hold on her.

  The big grandfather clock started to strike. Boom!

  Morgan released her immediately and sprang away. She stared at him, her hand covering her mouth. Her heart pounded against her chest, like a terrified bird.

  Boom!

  He was tense, vibrating with it, as if he wanted to mount her. Her future husband.

  Jessamyn licked her lips.

  Boom!

  Morgan jerkily bowed to her. “Good night, Jessamyn. Now take yourself upstairs—fast.”

  She picked up her skirts and ran, frightened by her response to him.

  Boom!

  She heard the front door close behind him before the clock finished striking midnight. Her dreams that night were of being his wife.

  Morgan sat in the waterfront dive, nursing his gin, while he waited for Richmond’s pet informant to appear. He’d carefully mixed his drink with water, of course, as he’d been taught the first time he’d spied for Forrest. It was a very easy way to look as if he was drinking, while remaining sober. But it did nothing to improve the taste of either the water or the gin.

  He lifted the tankard for another sip and stiffened briefly. Then he deliberately swallowed the foul-smelling swill and waited for Charlie Jones, Jessamyn’s scapegrace
cousin, to join him in this dark corner.

  Charlie paused in front of the table, the same age but better fed than Morgan, flaunting his money in gaudy clothes. His passage across the room had been noted by other patrons but Charlie paid them no heed. “Well, well, if it isn’t Uncle Heyward’s godson. What are you doing on this dung heap?”

  Morgan spoke very deliberately and as softly as possible. “‘Comrades, leave me here a little, while as yet ’tis early morn.’”

  Charlie’s eyebrows flew up at the password’s beginning. “‘Leave me here, and when you want me, sound upon the bugle-horn.’” He swung around a chair and sat down. “Ridiculous to have to chant idiot phrases to begin a piece of business.”

  “The first couplet of Tennyson’s ‘Locksley Hall’ is a set of idiot phrases?” Morgan pushed a glass and a bottle of good brandy over, as he’d been instructed.

  Charlie glared at him and sniffed the brandy suspiciously. Then he poured himself a full glass, crossed his arms on the chair back, and tapped his fingers on the wood. “How much do you have for me?”

  Why Charlie still had his scalp was beyond Morgan’s comprehension. “What do you have for me?”

  Charlie frowned but lowered his voice. “Grant’s order of battle at Chickamauga.”

  The other patrons were surreptitiously eyeing Charlie’s clothes.

  “Old news, Charlie, and the other side of the state. What else?”

  Charlie’s voice dropped further. “Sherman’s orders to Grierson.”

  Morgan immediately turned calm, as if he were riding into an ambush. “How much?”

  Charlie deliberately drank some brandy before answering, all the while surveying Morgan. “Five thousand dollars.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  Their watchers were moving closer.

  Charlie shrugged. “Just sharp business practices, to charge what people will pay.”

  “Fifty.”

  “Two thousand.”

  “Charlie, I can discover those orders for myself.”

  “But I have them now.”