LITMIR.BIZ

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cut in the mirror. Beards and mustaches were in fashion these days, but yesterday’s trip to the barber was essential to his disguise. He hadn’t been clean shaven since his sixteenth birthday; he hardly recognized himself. In fact, he’d forgotten about that arrow-shaped scar his brother, Johnny, had put on his upper lip when they were kids. He touched the scar. Johnny was probably dead by now. Ma always said the good died young.

      Gabriel had every intention of living to be an old man.

      Escorted by the young lieutenant, he fumed all the way downtown to Confederate headquarters. Delia should have been headed upriver with her troupe by now. If they’d left without her, he had no way to get the cipher into Union hands with any expediency. And what if she’d been searched?

      His wait in the luxurious parlor of the Rice mansion, which housed Colonel Abernathy’s staff, did nothing to cool his temper. His only consolation was the proximity of his understuffed horsehair chair to the two yawning sentries lounging on either side of the front hall. He couldn’t help wondering why this war was taking so long. Grant or Sherman ought to stroll down here tomorrow and round this bunch up like so many hound dogs snoozing in the shade.

      He was beginning to lose interest when the secretive note in the voice of one of the sentries brought him fully awake.

      “You hear about the delivery coming in tonight?”

      “Yeah. About time, too. If I’d known there wasn’t gonna be no whiskey allowed, I’d thought twice before joining up. Where’s it coming from?”

      “Somebody caught a couple darkies with the Birdman last night. First time anybody’s actually seen ’em. Promised if they’d let ’em go they’d pass the next shipment our way.”

      The first sentry chortled. “The Birdman may be crackers, but he knows his blackstrap.”

      Hat over his face, Gabriel settled his head on the carved rosewood frame of the chair. So the Rebel army wasn’t above dealing in contraband whiskey. Idly he wondered about the identity of the Birdman, but a sudden series of piercing shrieks from the upper floor of the house brought his head off the back of the chair. The sentries jumped.

      The shrieks escalated in volume as a door opened and a harried-looking junior officer appeared at the bend of the stairs. He mopped at some beige-colored liquid dripping from his eyebrows and mustache. “Is there a Reverend Leland down here somewhere?”

      The shrieks ceased as Gabriel stood. He had his story planned out. “I’m Reverend Leland. I see you’ve made my cousin’s acquaintance.”

      The young man glanced over his shoulder. “That woman don’t act like nobody’s cousin—except maybe Old Nick’s. I’m pretty sure she sprung straight from the gates of Hades. Colonel Abernathy wants to see you. Right this way, sir.”

      They found the colonel in an upstairs bedroom, which had been converted into an office with the addition of a desk and a couple of bookcases. The colonel’s lank brown hair stood on end, a bit of egg yolk adorned his left sideburn, and grease stains marred the military perfection of his gray coat. He rose with an agitated scrape of his chair. “Reverend! Last night my men apprehended a young woman, and she—well, she’s what you might call a bit of a handful.” The colonel blushed. “She claims to be a gentlewoman, but we know she’s been traveling up and down the river as an actress.”

      Raising a sardonic eyebrow, Gabriel took the proffered chair. “Working as an actress might not be the most respectable occupation for a woman, but it isn’t illegal.”

      “Of course it isn’t, but one of my men claims Miss Matthews was pumping him for information.”

      “And your man was completely sober?”

      The colonel picked up a perfectly pointed quill in his inkstand and began to sharpen it. “You know as well as I do it’s against army regulations to sell whiskey to military personnel.”

      “Of course.” Gabriel sat back. “Would you mind filling me in on the circumstances of my cousin’s arrest?”

      The colonel huffed. “It seems Private Hubbard was enjoying a bit of leave aboard the Magnolia Princess last evening, and—well, Hubbard, being a strapping young man—caught Miss Matthews’s attention. She invited him to her room after her performance.”

      Gabriel kept his tone cold and incredulous. “I think I have the picture, Colonel. The scarlet woman seduced your innocent young enlisted man, plied him with liquor to loosen his tongue and proceeded to pull information out of him in order to sell it to the enemy.” The accusation sounded melodramatic and silly—the plot of a riverboat play.

      “That’s about it.” Abernathy ran a finger around his collar. “Unless you have some other explanation.”

      Gabriel straightened. “I don’t have to explain anything to you. The word of my clerical office should be enough to proclaim my misguided young relative’s innocence.” The colonel took a breath, but Gabriel forestalled him with a raised palm. “My family history may shed some light on our current dilemma.”

      Abernathy nodded stiffly.

      “Miss Matthews—Delia—is the daughter of my father’s brother, the product of his marriage late in life to a serving woman with designs on his pocketbook. When the little girl was barely walking her mother took off with a man of heftier income.” Gabriel paused to let this pathetic picture settle in his companion’s mind.

      Since the colonel seemed to have forgotten the breakfast tray heaved at his chest, Gabriel embroidered the story. Delia became a misunderstood soul looking for love in a callous world. She had run away to join a traveling theater troupe, and Gabriel, as her closest male relative—her father having long since expired of a broken heart—had been searching for her ever since.

      “I’d only last week received a hint of her whereabouts,” he concluded. “My mission is to see her restored to the bosom of her family.”

      The colonel looked impressed. “I declare.”

      Gabriel coughed delicately. “As I said, I’d nearly caught up with my cousin, and it was a simple matter to follow the trail of…shall we say, smitten officers and gentlemen.”

      Abernathy smiled sourly. “The lady has a way of choosing her targets.”

      “All the more reason to get her out of your hair, so to speak—” Gabriel eyed the egg yolk “—and return her to her home.”

      “I must admit I don’t know quite what to do with her.” The colonel rose and went to the window. “I cannot allow my men to go unpunished when they compromise military information, and yet the lady hardly seems to have the mental discipline to remember what she heard, much less pass it into enemy hands.”

      “Have you questioned her?”

      “I tried, but with very little intelligible response.”

      Gabriel grinned at the colonel’s back. “Perhaps if I spoke to her in your presence I might assuage your fears.”

      “Yes, that’s the ticket.” The colonel turned. “Bowden!”

      The young officer stuck his damp, sticky head around the door. “Sir?”

      “Tell Miss Matthews we require her presence.”

      Lieutenant Bowden looked as if he’d just been requested to shave a barracuda. He shifted from one foot to the other. “Yes, sir,” he said unhappily and disappeared.

      Gabriel didn’t have to wait long before Delia exploded into the room, followed by Bowden, who muttered a lame “Here she is, sir” and beat a strategic retreat.

      Delia Matthews in broad daylight was a sight to behold. She stood seething in the center of the room, onyx eyes snapping, fists planted on her generous hips. The tight trousers and coat she’d worn last night had been replaced by a dress with an equally tight and low-cut bodice. Gabriel was hard put to keep his clerical gaze above her neck. Colonel Abernathy didn’t even try.

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