Please Come Back
Chapter 1
1861
Tom Barkley frowned, giving in, but saying, "You're going to have to tell your brothers and sister. We're not going to do it."
He walked out of the library, heading for the kitchen, leaving his son Jarrod standing by the fireplace and his wife Victoria sitting on the sofa. Jarrod watched him go, not surprised he was walking out.
Victoria said, "He'll never like the idea, but he'll get used to it," Victoria said.
"What about you?" Jarrod asked.
"You're going off to war," Victoria said. "A mother never likes to hear that out of her son, but it looks like a lot of mothers are going to have to hear it." She looked up at him with eyes that asked if he was sure about what he was doing, but that she would accept it if he said he was.
And he said so. "This war is about a lot of things, Mother. The Union more than anything, but whether it will be a free union or a slave state. I can't ignore it. I'm of age, and I can't stay safe out here when so many men my age are sacrificing themselves."
"Men," Victoria said, to herself mostly. Then she took a deep breath. "Well, you father is right about one thing. You need to tell your brothers and sister about this yourself. You're seventeen, about to be eighteen later this year. A man. It's your responsibility to talk to your siblings."
"I know," Jarrod said. "And I know Nick will start itching to go with me."
"He's thirteen," Victoria said. "He will not be going with you."
"I know that," Jarrod said, "and Gene is three. He won't understand."
"He'll understand that you're not here, and we'll explain to him why when he begins to understand. That leaves Audra. She's only four, but she's sensitive and she notices things and she feels things. And you know now is not the best time to be breaking the news."
"The puppies," Jarrod said.
Victoria nodded. "The puppies."
It had only been two days since the stable yard dog, Bella, had given birth to a litter of six puppies – and they were all born dead. Too soon. They could not be revived. Jarrod had helped his father take the puppies away while Victoria consoled a devastated Audra. It was her first real experience with death. She was still finding her way to cope with it, and in the meantime, Bella was trying to find her way too. They were trying to help each other, and it was a painful struggle to watch.
But Jarrod was leaving in only two days. How was he going to explain to his grief-stricken sister what war was, why he was going? That like the puppies, he might die?
Jarrod said to his mother, "I'll try to explain, but…"
"But it's going to be difficult, and she's probably going to be running to me after you do," Victoria said.
Jarrod nodded.
"Do it now," Victoria said. "That will give her a couple days to deal with it before you go."
"Do you know where she is?"
"No, but I can take a good guess."
Jarrod moaned inwardly. He could take a good guess too, and when he went looking for Audra, he found her where he expected to find her.
A grieving Bella hadn't left the corner of the barn where she had birthed her babies. It was if she expected them to come back and she knew she had to be there to feed them and take care of them. Jarrod found Audra there with her, petting her, comforting her. It might have been her first real experience with death, but Audra knew those puppies weren't coming back. Now, Jarrod had to find some way to deal with telling her he might not come back.
Jarrod bent beside his sister and Bella. "How is she doing?" he asked.
"She doesn't understand," Audra said. "The puppies should be here, but they're not."
"I know you were looking forward to them too," Jarrod said. He petted Bella quietly for a moment before he said, "I need to talk to you about something. Something important."
Audra looked up at him with blue eyes that were already sad, and she said, "I heard you."
"What?" Jarrod asked.
Audra looked back down at Bella. "I heard you talking with Mother and Father. You're going off to war and they don't like it. You're going to leave and they don't like. It."
Maybe overhearing him and their parents talking was what sent her back out here to Bella, where the grief was. "Do you understand why they don't like it?" Jarrod asked.
"No," Audra said. "Except you won't be here. I don't like that either."
Jarrod reached for her hand. "Come with me for a moment."
Audra got up and went with Jarrod out of the barn, into the sunshine and to a bench just outside the barn door. No one else was around, everyone else being hard at work. Jarrod sat her down and sat beside her. "Audra, do you know what a war is?"
"No," she said.
"When people can't get along, they fight sometimes," Jarrod said. "You've seen that, haven't you?"
There had been occasions when some of the men around the ranch had a disagreement they used fists to solve. Audra said, "Like when Mr. McColl and Mr. Palmer had a big fight and hurt each other."
"Yes," Jarrod said. "When a lot of people can't get along with a lot of other people, then a lot of people fight, and they hurt each other. That's what a war is."
"A lot of people are fighting each other? Where?"
"In another part of the country, far away."
"Why do you have to go and fight with them? They're not here. It's not like you aren't getting along with them."
Now was coming the hard part. How do you explain a huge country to a little girl who knew only this little part of this valley in California? "Not exactly, but they're fighting over something that's important to everybody in our country, even us out here."
"What?"
"It's very complicated, but in a way, it's about Silas."
Now she was really confused. Silas was their houseman. To her, he wasn't particularly different from anyone else who worked here, and when Jarrod said what he said, she had no idea how to interpret it other than, "How can people far away be fighting over Silas? He lives here!"
"Yes, he does, but a lot of people who are black like he is – people whose skin isn't white like ours – are kept as slaves in another part of our country."
"What's a slave?"
"Someone who has to work for someone else and has no choice about it. They don't get paid, but they can't leave either. They can't ever leave until the person they work for sells them."
"How do you sell a person?" Audra said, her face screwing up.
Jarrod tried to figure out a way around this explanation that was sounding as complicated as the war did. A way that would make sense to a four-year-old, but how do you explain slavery, democracy, and the Union to a four-year-old?
Jarrod tried again. "That's what the fight is about. A lot of white people own black slaves and believe they should be able to keep them and sell them, but a lot of people don't think that's right, and that made people in another part of our country start fighting. That's why there's a war."
"And that's why you're going? Because of Silas?"
"Not because of Silas. Because of how people like him are treated so badly. I don't want people to be sold and made to work for people they don't want to work for. Silas is lucky because he works for us and we don't treat him that way, but a lot of people like him aren't as lucky."
Audra took that in. "That's not fair."
"No, it isn't, and that's why people are fighting, and that's why I have to go fight too, so people like Silas aren't treated so unfairly." He decided to forget the issues of the Union and democracy, and stick to a situation Audra could understand personally.
Then Audra looked toward the barn door. "Are you coming back?" she asked.
Straight to the hard part. Jarrod could tell she had connected Jarrod going away and fighting with the puppies going away, and never coming back. Jarrod said, "I don't know. I will try very hard to, I know that."
Audra looked at him. "Please don't go away."
Jarrod held her hands tightly. "I have to, honey. You'll understand better as you get older, and when I do come back, I will explain it all to you better."
"You said you don't know if you're coming back."
"I can't guarantee it. People die in wars – just like the puppies died – just because that's the way it has to be."
"You don't have to go to the war!"
"Yes, I do," Jarrod said more firmly. "I'm a man, and it's my responsibility to fight to protect people like Silas when I have to. I can't let Silas down."
"He has us to look after him."
"But a lot of people like him don't have anyone except people like me. I can't let them down either."
Audra looked back at the barn door again. "What happens if you don't come back?"
Jarrod squeezed her hands again. "You will comfort Mother and Father the way you're comforting Bella right now. And just like Bella, you will go on with your life and grow up to have babies who do survive and live. And you will do that because you love Mother and Father and because you love me. It's the way life works, Audra. It's the way growing up works. We love each other and we take care of each other, when good things happen and especially when bad things happen, because we can't keep the bad things from happening."
Jarrod knew what she was thinking as she stared at the barn door. Like the puppies.
Audra finally looked at him again. "Please come back."
Earlier, she had said please don't go away. Now Jarrod knew she had accepted that he had to go. It was all he could ask for. He smiled, kissed her on the forehead, and said, "I will do everything I can to come back and be with you again. And I know that, while I'm gone, you will do what you have to take care of Bella, and Mother and Father and Nick and Eugene too. I know you can do that."
Audra nodded, sadly, but she nodded. "Please come back," she said again.
"I'll do my best," Jarrod said.
