Beloved Enemy Read Online Free PDF Page A

you has a lick of sense in your heads. I feel it in my bones that tonight’s foolishness will come to a bad end. You have no business going where you’re not invited. Virginia girls mixing with Northern trash is just like washing good china in a mud puddle. Like my mama always said: crows and corn can’t grow in the same field.”
    Julia’s skin felt dry and scratchy. She didn’t want to think about those Northern boys and their reputed evil ways—not yet. She placed her hand on top of Hettie’s. “Please don’t spoil our fun tonight. I haven’t been to a party since Christmas of 1860, and Carolyn has never gone to one at all.” She crossed her fingers behind her back before saying, “I promise that we will be as good as gold and twice as nice, won’t we, Carolyn?” she added in a warning note to her rambunctious little sister.
    Carolyn only nodded as she stared at herself in the looking glass. “First time I have ever had my hair put up. Oh, Hettie, you are a wonder worker.”
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    Lively music and golden candlelight spilled out of the Winstead windows and flowed down the curving brick steps. Julia and Carolyn quickly handed over their velvet, fur-collared cloaks to the waiting maid in the side chamber that had been reserved for the ladies’ use. With suppressed giggles, they slipped on their low satin pumps and hurried into the wide central hallway of the Winstead mansion. Julia stretched her mouth into a false smile while her stomach roiled at the prospect of meeting a live Yankee soldier face-to-face.
    Great swatches of berry-rich holly looped up the carved wooden balustrade of the main staircase. Grave-faced servers passed among the revelers balancing silver trays of champagne glasses on white-gloved hands. Carolyn snatched one of the brimming crystal flutes before Julia could stop her.
    â€œOh, it tickles my nose!” Carolyn giggled. She took a second sip.
    â€œOnly one glass, mind you,” Julia cautioned her with faint trepidation. “You promised to behave. Remember, we must not draw any attention to ourselves or we will be caught. Tonight, you will have to be invisible—and don’t forget, we are supposed to be Yankees.”
    Carolyn made a face under her half mask. “Don’t be such a wet dish rag, Julia. I’ll be so good, you won’t recognize me.”
    With that, Carolyn slipped through the throng and disappeared from view before Julia could also remind her sister that they must leave by eleven-thirty so that Hettie and Perkins, who was warming his feet in the Winsteadservants’ hall, could get the sleep they needed for the following day’s chores. With trembling fingers, Julia tightened the ribbons that held her mask in place. Holding up her glass of champagne to the light, she stared at it as if it were medicine, then drank it down in one gulp. Thus fortified to meet the enemy, she made her way into the double-wide reception rooms that had been cleared of heavy furniture and now served as a ballroom.
    A myriad of silver candelabra held a wealth of lighted tapers; their beeswax perfumed the air. The happy sounds of fiddles and banjos caught her like a sudden breeze on a sultry day. Her feet tapping to the lively music, Julia swept her gaze around the crowded room.
    Half of Alexandria must have been present tonight, but Julia had no intention of mingling with them. Everyone knew that the Chandlers were firmly Confederates, and therefore social outcasts among the Northern-leaning members of the citizenry. Julia told herself that she didn’t give a fig what other people thought of her. Tonight she was here to dance and laugh—and to be “ruined”. She lifted another glass of champagne from a passing tray. The bubbly spirits cheered her soul and tickled her brains.
    How deliciously wicked I feel! Clara Chandler would have fainted on the spot if she knew that her gently-bred daughters were