“Mama, tell us,” Faith said, her voice quiet as if speaking too loudly would wake the dead. “Tell us about Jaris, and Julia—and Carey. We want to know.”

Cordia drew in a deep breath through her nose and nodded. “But not here.” Silently, she walked out of the little cemetery and over to some trees. She kept walking until she’d reached a pond, and Hope imagined this was the one she used to run to whenever Jaris and Carey were chasing her. Finding a shady spot beneath a tree, Cordia fanned out her skirts and lowered herself to the ground, her daughters doing the same. And then, she began to tell them a story of the ones she’d loved, and the ones she’d lost, during the war.

“I was engaged to Jaris, as I mentioned, but it was here, at this farm, the day after your Uncle Nolan was killed, that I met your father. I had seen him a few times when we were much younger, but I didn’t remember him. I was out fetching water with Susannah when he and Julia rode up, and I remember thinking he was the most handsome man I’d ever laid eyes on.”

“But you were engaged,” Faith reminded her.

“I know. It was a dilemma. And your father being your father, it wasn’t as if I could just saunter over and have a discussion with him.” They all giggled. “It took some coaxing. And a spilled cup of water at a sending off party. But once I had him alone, there was no doubt in my mind he was the one for me.”

Hope wasn’t quite sure what a spilled cup of water would have to do with anything, but she couldn’t help smile at her mother as her face radiated the sort of love Hope had only dreamt of. “Did he kiss you that night? Even though you were engaged to Jaris?”

“No,” Cordia said quickly. “I kissed him.”

Both girls gasped, and Cordia’s laugh rang out around them. “Mama!” Faith admonished.

“I know, I know. It was very… bold of me. But I knew what I wanted, and I wasn’t willing to just sit back and let others dictate my life.”

“But then, how did you end up engaged to Carey Adams then?” Faith asked.

“You’re getting ahead of the story, Faithy,” their mother replied. She picked up where she’d left off, at the sending off celebration, told them about how she’d ridden to Springfield after Wilson’s Creek to find their father and Jaris, with her beloved servant Frieda, God rest her soul, and how she’d found Will in a church—alive but wounded. Jaris hadn’t been so lucky, and she’d brought his remains back with her.

She went on to tell about letter writing for many years, and how she’d visited Julia almost every day when she was well. “No one knew about our promise to each other,” she explained. “Except Julia. She figured it out.” She went on to tell about how Carey had asked for her hand, and her mother was so overjoyed, she’d somehow found herself engaged to the tyrant without ever having said yes. “Your Aunt Margaret let your daddy know, and he thought I’d done something awful, that I was just toying with his emotions.”

“Why would she do that?” Faith asked, wrinkling her nose.

“She didn’t know about my engagement to your father, of course,” Cordia explained, absently twirling the ring on her finger. “She thought she was sharing good news.”

“Was Daddy mad?” Hope asked, wondering how this repaired itself.

“He was devastated.” Their mother still sounded upset about the situation, even though it had happened over two decades earlier. “He came home from the war and didn’t even tell me. I discovered he was here when I came to visit Aunt Margaret.”

“Did he yell at you?” Faith asked.

“Yes, something like that,” Cordia admitted, and Hope couldn’t imagine her father yelling at anyone, let alone her mother. “And then I went straight to Carey’s house and threw his ring at him, even though I will admit I was frightened of him.”

“Did he hurt you?” Hope was practically holding her breath, despite knowing the eventual outcome.

“Not right then, but later that night, he snuck into our house and tried to hurt me. If your father hadn’t come over to bring me the coat I’d left here, who knows what might’ve happened to me.”

“That’s terrifying, Mama,” Faith said, covering her mouth.

“In our very kitchen, your father rescued me from Carey Adams. And then that man went and told the law your father had kidnapped me, had a whole search party out looking for us. But I left with your father, you see, because I was afraid of Carey. I left a note for Grandpa in a secret location.”

“Where at?” Hope wanted to know.

Laughing, her mother said, “The cookie jar, of course. We went off and got married, and then Julia got awful sick, so Uncle Arthur came to get us.”

“How did he know where you were?” Faith asked.

“He was one of the only ones who knew where the family farm was.”

Hope realized she meant the farm they’d grown up on, and she remembered another little cemetery like the one they’d stumbled on that day, one where she’d visited the graves of her Uncle Nolan and her paternal grandparents.

“We came back to town, and Julia passed away that night.”

“Daddy must’ve been heartbroken.” Faith had a tear in her eye as she spoke.

“He was. So much so, he insisted I go to my parents’ house while he stayed here with her. He didn’t want me to see him all choked up like that. But you see, that was the night of Quantrill’s raid, and Carey Adams and his men showed up at the house that evening, so Grandpa and I had to defend it. And then your daddy rode in and took care of most of Carey’s men, driving the rest of them away.”

“You mean he shot them?” Hope asked, wondering just how many men her father might’ve killed in his life, something he would never talk about.