The Woman Who Loved Jesse James Read online

  The meal began with a long prayer, during which Dr. Samuel asked the Lord to bless not only the meal, but all those gathered around the table, and all those who fought for the cause of the glorious South. The wrath of the Lord was called down upon the enemies of the Rebel cause, and thanks were given for the return of the South to power, which we were sure was soon to come.

  The others around the table responded to this sentiment with a hearty Amen, while I stared in wonder. Even the most ardent supporters of the Southern cause that I knew had given up hope with the Rebels’ surrender at Appomattox. Only Aunt Zerelda and her tribe held out such fervent belief that the South would rise again.

  The conversation that evening was about crops and livestock and the sad state into which the economy had fallen. No mention was made of Jesse and Frank or their whereabouts.

  Jesse did not appear at breakfast the next morning, either. I was a little put out that he, of all people, was not here to welcome me. Wasn’t he as anxious to see me as I was to be with him? Zerelda remained silent on the subject, though she must have known I was curious. I debated waiting her out, but my longing to know won out over any desire to best her. “Where are Jesse and Frank?” I finally asked.

  “Their whereabouts are none of your concern,” she said. She set down her coffee cup with a loud thump. “When you’ve finished your breakfast, you can help me with the laundry.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, then shut it. If Zerelda was going to work, I couldn’t very well sit idle. I’d prove to her I could do my share, and give her no excuse to dismiss me as lazy or incapable.

  Zerelda built a fire under the wash pot in the back yard. The incessant wind whipped the smoke into my eyes and fought to drag the wet laundry from my arms as I carried the piles of sheets and shirts from boiler to scrub pail and back again. The harsh lye soap made my fingers burn and the icy weather made the rest of me numb. Zerelda ignored me as we worked, except to bark orders to stoke the fire or stir the pot or to drape an armload of heavy wet sheets across a row of privet to dry. She deflected my attempts at conversation and refused to talk at all about Jesse or Frank.

  The next day was devoted to scrubbing floors and polishing silver. Still no sign of Jesse or Frank. As I crawled into bed that evening I decided that Zerelda had determined to work me until I cried Uncle and returned home. But I was as least as stubborn as my namesake, and determined to stick it out.

  And I definitely would not go home before I saw Jesse and spoke to him. What did he mean, staying away when he must have known I’d come to be with him? Were all his words of love merely empty boasting, good only as long as I remained a two days’ journey from him?

  So I mended blankets and cleaned stoves, peeled potatoes and blacked boots and every other job Zerelda assigned me without complaint. I was stirring a stinking vat of soap over a smoking fire in the back yard on the afternoon of my fourth day with Aunt Zerelda when Jesse came striding across the yard toward me. I peered at him through the smoke, unsure if the man I saw was real or merely a phantom born of my intense longing for him.

  Then he was at my side, flesh and blood and blue eyes that burned into me. “Zee, what are you doing here?” he asked.

  “I’ve come for a visit. Didn’t your mother tell you?” I searched his face for some sign that he was glad to see me. But all I could find there was fatigue and a wariness I hadn’t known in him before. His clothes were wrinkled and dirty, his trouser legs and boots caked with mud. Dark half-moons hung beneath his eyes, and several days’ growth of beard roughened his jaw. “Where have you been?” I asked. “What have you been doing?”

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.” He turned from me, headed toward the house.

  “Jesse, aren’t you glad to see me?” I asked, hating the plaintive sound of my voice, but unable to keep the words back.

  He stopped, and that was enough to give me the courage to go to him and put my hand on his shoulder. “Of course I’m glad to see you, Zee,” he said, and covered my hand with one of his. The heat of his touch sent a shudder through me, burning away my resentment and fear.

  “Then show me,” I said, and leaned close to kiss him on the lips.

  “Zee, no, not here.” He gently held me away from him.

  I laughed at this sudden show of propriety. “Jesse, we’re engaged,” I said. “There’s no reason we shouldn’t greet each other with a kiss.”

  “We’ll talk later,” he said, and released me and headed for the house once more.

  I stared after him, and I might have hurled the soap paddle at him, if I’d had any confidence that I could hit him with it. I wanted to shout that this was not the welcome I’d expected. This was not the greeting of lovers who had too long been apart. But Jesse had already disappeared into the house, leaving me to silently fume.

  Frank returned later that afternoon, and Zerelda and I spent the rest of the afternoon in the kitchen with Charlotte, preparing a feast for the prodigals. At dinner the two men ate with the silent concentration of the starving and exhausted. No questions were asked and no explanation was made for the brothers’ absence.

  I wanted more than anything to go to Jesse’s bed that night, to hold him close and be held, to whisper plans for our future and hear once more the promises we had made during his weeks at my family’s home. But Jesse shared a room with Frank and their brother John, while I slept with his sisters Susan and Fanny. We had no opportunity to be alone at night, and I saw little of Jesse the next day. I began to suspect he was avoiding me. My heart broke as my anger increased. I told myself I should take the next train home, and never speak to him again.

  But I stayed, unable to tear myself from him. I wouldn’t leave until he’d told me to my face that he no longer loved me.

  That evening, all of us sat in the parlor after supper. Beneath the large Rebel flag that decorated one wall, the men read while Zerelda and I sewed, though I was having trouble staying awake after a day spent cleaning the Samuels’s attic. Dr. Samuel folded back the paper and cleared his throat. “It says here a group of masked bandits robbed the Clay County Savings Association over in Liberty—in broad daylight,” he said. “They made off with over $58,000.”

  “That’s a lot of money,” John said.

  “Not that the bank will miss it,” Jesse said.

  Something in his tone made me turn to him, so that I caught the sharp look Frank sent him. Jesse’s smile was almost a smirk, the expression of a boy who has pulled a good prank.

  “What else does the paper say?” Frank asked.

  “It says the men were described as bushwhackers.” He paused, silently scanning the columns of newsprint. “Among the men present, several have been identified as Jim and Bill Wilkerson, Frank Gregg, and Archie Clement.”

  “Well, what do you know about that?” Jesse drawled, and smiled a lazy, satisfied smile that sent a chill up my back. All those men were friends of Jesse and Frank, men they’d served with during the war.

  “A young man was killed,” Dr. Samuels continued. “Name of George Wyman, eighteen years old. The bank’s offering a five thousand dollar reward for apprehension of the criminals, and the governor has sent a platoon of militiamen to track them down.”

  “A whole platoon,” Jesse said. “After a few masked men that everybody seems to have identified in spite of their masks.”

  “Shut up, Jesse,” Frank said, but there was no heat in his words. He rose and stretched. “I think I’ll go out and check on the horses.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Jesse said.

  In my family, we all knew that when a man said he was going out to check on the horses, he really intended to take a few drinks from a bottle of whiskey tucked behind the feed barrel in the barn. But Frank wasn’t known as a drinking man, so I suspected he wanted a word with Jesse alone. A word about the bank robbery? Had the James brothers been among those masked bandits?

  The next morning I found Jesse in the barn, currying a horse. “Jesse,” I said as I approach
ed the stall. “We need to talk.”

  He glanced up at me, before returning his attention to the horse. “What about?”

  “I’ve been here a week now and we’ve scarcely been alone ten minutes,” I said. “I came here to see you, yet I feel as if you’ve been avoiding me.”

  “I haven’t been avoiding you, Zee. I’ve just had things to do.”

  “What kind of things?”

  He moved around to the other side of the horse, his back to me now, and made no answer.

  “Jesse, did you and Frank have anything to do with that bank robbery over in Liberty?” I asked. “Is that where you’ve been?”

  “I can’t answer that, Zee.”

  “What do you mean, you can’t answer it? Why not?”

  “Because it’s not an answer you need to know.”

  “Who are you to decide what I need to know?” I drew nearer, facing him over the back of the horse. I grabbed the wrist that held the curry-comb, forcing him to look at me. “Jesse, I’m going to be your wife. Don’t you think I need to know what you’re up to?”

  His expression softened. He set aside the brush and twined his fingers in mine. “I won’t tell you anything that might hurt you,” he said. “Let’s just say what I’m doing involves a certain amount of danger, and I won’t have you exposed to that.” He squeezed my hand. “You mean too much to me to ever see you hurt.”

  His words cooled my anger, and reminded me of all the reasons I loved him. I stood on tiptoe and leaned toward him, eager for his kiss, but just then the barn door opened, and Frank stepped inside. He looked at us for a long moment, with the sad, solemn expression he almost always wore. “Mama’s looking for you, Zee,” he said after a moment.

  “She probably has more work for me to do,” I said. But I let go of Jesse’s hand and set my feet firmly on the ground once more.

  Hard work and agreeableness had done nothing to win over my disagreeable aunt, so the next day I took off my apron, set aside my scrub brush and went to face both my affianced and his mother.

  “Did you finish scrubbing the floors?” Zerelda asked when I found her and Jesse seated by the fire in the front room.

  “No, I did not.” I sat on the sofa beside Jesse.

  “Zee’s been working mighty hard,” Jesse said. “I think she deserves a rest.”

  Zerelda ignored this attempt to keep the peace. “Why didn’t you finish?” she asked.

  “Because I’m not your slave,” I said, willing my voice not to tremble in the face of her formidable stare. I raised my chin higher and clenched my hands at my sides to keep them from trembling. “I didn’t come here to do all your chores. I came to visit so that you and I could get to know each other better, seeing as how Jesse and I are to be married.”

  Beside me, Jesse sat up straighter. Now would he come to my defense? Or would he protest and say he’d never intended to marry me at all?

  Zerelda never flinched. “You said in your letter you wanted to learn what I had to teach you,” she said. “That means the proper way to run a house.”

  “I already know how to run a house,” I said. “And I know how to cook and sew and make herbal remedies and dance a quadrille for that matter.”

  “You obviously don’t know how to keep a civil tongue in your head,” she snapped. “And you don’t know the first thing about looking after my son.”

  “That’s for your son to say, not you.”

  “I’m sure Zee can take care of me fine,” Jesse said, with maddening calmness. “When the time comes.”

  But when would that time be? This was not the declaration of undying love I had longed for. I felt as if the breath had been knocked from me. Somehow I managed to stand. Unable to face Zerelda’s smug expression, I turned and ran from the room.

  Blinded by tears, I raced up the stairs and pulled my trunk from beneath the bed. I shoved dresses, shawls and underthings into it, with no thought for order. If I had to drag the thing all the way to the train station myself I would, so anxious was I to be on the next train out of this God-forsaken place.

  “Zee, what are you doing?”

  Jesse’s words only added to my pain. I gripped the edges of the trunk, gathering my strength. “I’m leaving,” I said. “It’s obvious I’m not wanted here.”

  “I want you, Zee.”

  “You have an odd way of showing it.”

  Then he was kneeling beside me, gripping my shoulders. “I’m sorry, Zee,” he said, his voice soft and low, each word an arrow piercing my defenses. “I know you’ve had a poor reception here. I’ve been too preoccupied with other matters, though that’s no excuse for the way you’ve been treated.” He rubbed his hands up and down my arms, as if trying to warm me after a chill. “It was only today that I noticed how hard Mother was working you, and I meant to speak to her about it—truly I did.”

  “What’s been so on your mind you’d ignore me?” I asked, bitterness still tainting my words.

  “It doesn’t matter, Zee. It’s in the past now. All that matters now is that we’re together. I promise to make it up to you.”

  He kissed the back of my neck, and I leaned against him, feeling myself weaken. Determined to remain strong, I shifted until I was facing him, and searched his eyes. “Do you really intend to marry me?” I asked. “Or did you only say that to get me into your bed?

  The color in his cheeks heightened, as if I’d slapped him. “They weren’t empty words,” he said. “I love you, Zee. I want you to be my wife.”

  “When?”

  “Now isn’t the time.”

  “Then when will be the time? If you’re waiting for your mother to give us her blessing, you’ll be waiting a good, long time. And I won’t wait with you.”

  “This has nothing to do with my mother. I can’t marry you now because it isn’t safe.” His voice was firm, his gaze intent, silently pleading for me to understand. “I won’t put you in harm’s way,” he said. “Even if that means postponing being with you.”

  “I hate being apart from you,” I said. “I’m so lonely without you.”

  “I know.” He touched my cheek, the tips of his fingers rough. “It scares me sometimes, how much I want you. How much I need you. It feels like a weakness to say as much, but it’s the truth.”

  If I hadn’t already been kneeling, my knees might have buckled with the force of this sentiment. “I don’t care if it’s dangerous,” I said. “I want to be with you.”

  “Soon.” He kissed the corner of my mouth. “As soon as I’m sure I can protect you.” Then his lips fully covered mine, his arms encircling me, sealing the promise.

  Once more all the reasons I shouldn’t pledge myself to him faded in the heat and light of Jesse himself. Any conflict with his mother or strife with my own family seemed insignificant compared to the love Jesse offered. He wanted to protect me. To cherish me. I had spent my life wanting to be thought of as special, hoping to earn the regard Jesse had given so freely.

  Chapter Five

  The bank in Liberty offered a $5000 reward for apprehension of any of the suspected robbers. The thought of a price on Jesse’s head chilled me—how many men in these desperate times would sell their souls for less? But the worst blow came in December, when Archie Clement, Jesse’s friend and mentor, was assassinated while drinking with a friend in a saloon—a friend who might have easily been Jesse.

  I was frantic when I heard the news, and sent a telegram to Jesse, begging for word that he was safe. He sent a three word reply: All is well. Tears ran down my face as I stared at the words. How could anything ever be well again as long as there were men out there who wanted Jesse dead?

  And as long as the danger existed, we were not free to marry. I understood the danger was real. I believed Jesse when he said he only wanted to protect me. But as the months passed I began to despair that we would ever wed.

  “I’ll be twenty-two soon,” I confided to Esme one afternoon as we sat sewing in her front parlor. “How long does he expect me to wait?�
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  Esme was only three months older than I, but already she was expecting her second child, and she had become a true mother to Mr. Colquit’s children. Under her care the three had been transformed from wild creatures to respectable young persons. “Why should you wait for him at all?” she asked, her gaze focused on the tiny rows of stitching on the infant’s surplice she was sewing. “I’m sure there are any number of men who would be happy to make you their wife. Mr. Colquit has friends . . .”

  “No!” I struggled to temper my strident protest. “Thank you, Esme, but I don’t want another man. Jesse is the one I love.”

  “It’s one thing to love a man, quite another to marry him,” Esme said. “Jesse doesn’t strike me as good husband material. He’s too wild and always in trouble. Even now, he has to constantly be looking over his shoulder for some enemy or other he made in his bushwhacking days. His past sins prevent him from taking the oath. He’ll never be allowed to vote or hold a local office. He’ll never be thought of as respectable.”

  The Iron-Clad Oath, as it was also known, required every man to swear that he had not committed any of a list of eighty-six ‘acts of rebellion’ against the United States, up to and including expressing sympathy for the Rebel cause. Under those conditions, no one we knew could have truthfully taken the oath, but most people looked the other way and swore to it anyway. Jesse, who was well-known to have fought for the guerrillas, could use no such fiction to clear his name.

  “As long as I respect him, I don’t care what anyone else thinks,” I said. I stabbed the needle into the cotton tea towel I was embroidering, crying out as I pricked my finger beneath the cloth. I sucked on the throbbing digit while Esme shook her head—not over my clumsiness but my short-sightedness when it came to Jesse.