White Doves at Morning Read Online Free PDF

during a yellow fever epidemic and had stayed,
working both in the clinic and teaching in a private school down the
street. Her hair was thick, chestnut-colored, her skin without blemish,
her bosom and features such that few men, including ones in the company
of their wives, could prevent themselves from casting furtive glances
at.
    But for many her ways were
suspect, her loyalties questionable, her candor intimidating. On one
occasion Willie had asked her outright about rumors he'd heard.
    "Which rumors might that be?"
she said.
    "A couple of Negroes who
disappeared from plantations out by Spanish Lake," he replied.
    "Yes?" she said, waiting.
    "They got through the paddy
rollers. In fact, it looks like they got clean out of the state. Some
say you might be involved with the Underground Railroad, Miss Abigail."
    "Would you think less of me?"
she replied.
    "A lady who hand-feeds those
with yellow jack and puts their lives ahead of her own?" he said.
    But she was not reassured.
    Now, in the gloaming of the
day, he stood on her gallery and tapped on her door, his straw hat in
hand, a discomfort in his chest he could not quite define.
    "Oh, good evening, Miss
Abigail, pardon me for dropping by unexpectedly, but I thought you
might like to take a walk or allow me to treat you to a dessert down at
the cafe," he said.
    "That's very nice of you," she
said, stepping outside. She wore a plain blue cotton dress, buttoned
not quite to the throat, the sleeves pushed up on her arms. "But
someone is due to drop by. Can we just sit on the steps for a bit?"
    "Sure," he said, hoping his
disappointment did not show. He waited for her to take a seat on the
top step, then sat on the step below her.
    "Is something bothering you,
Willie?" she asked.
    "I enlisted today. Out at Camp
Pratt. I'm just in the Home Guards now, but I suspect we'll be formed
into regular infantry directly."
    The darkening sky was full of
birds now, sweeping above the chimneys, the oaks loud with cicadas and
the throbbing of tree frogs.
    After a long silence, she said, "I'm sure in your own mind you did
the right thing."
    "My own mind?" he said, and
felt his face color, both for his rudeness in mimicking her statement
and because he was angry at himself for seeking absolution from her, as
though he were not possessed of either humanity or a conscience himself.
    "I don't judge you, Willie.
Robert Perry is enlisting, too. I think the world of you both," she
said.
    "Robert believes in slavery. I
don't. He comes from a wealthy family and has a vested interest in
seeing the Negro race kept subservient. That's the difference between
us," he said, then bit his lip at the self-righteousness in his voice.
    "Robert is reading for the
law. He doesn't plan to be a plantation or slave owner." She paused
when she saw the injury in Willie's eyes. "Why are you enlisting?"
    Because I'm afraid to be
thought a coward, a voice inside him said.
    "What?" she said.
    "Nothing. I said nothing," he
replied. He looked out at a carriage passing in the street. Don't say
anymore, for God's sakes, he told himself. But his old enemy, his
impetuosity, held sway with him once again.
    "I think all this is going to
be destroyed. By cannon shot and fire and disease, all of it wiped
out," he said, and waved his hand vaguely at the palm trees in the
yards, the massive houses hidden inside the live oaks, a paddle-wheeler
churning on the Teche, its lighted windows softly muted inside the mist.
    "And you make your own life
forfeit for a cause you don't respect? My God, Willie," Abigail said.
    He felt the back of his neck
burning. Then, when he believed matters could get no worse, he looked
up and saw Robert Perry rein his horse in the dusk and dismount and
enter the yard, removing his hat.
    "Good evening, Miss Abigail.
You too, Willie. Did I break in on something?" Robert said.
    Robert waited for a reply, his
face glowing with goodwill.

    TWO hours later Willie Burke
was on his fourth glass of whiskey in the brick