“Slavery.”
“Yes.” Jasper nodded. “We need it. I know. They’ll see someday. You’ll get better and we’ll show them.”
Horace’s lips moved and Jasper could hardly make out the words.
“...shouldn’t...”
“Try to rest.”
“You shouldn’t be here. Neither of us should.”
“What good would it have done if you died in the camp? You know they don’t have the supplies for this.”
“You’re well,” Horace insisted. “You should go home, before someone spots you. Two people attract more notice than one.”
/> “You’re not well enough to travel on your own,” Jasper said bluntly. “And without this food, we’d be close to starving. Two people attract more luck than one too.”
“Luck?”
“A woman in the farmhouse down the hill gave us this.”
“You were seen? Jasper, we have to leave.”
“She brought food, not soldiers. It’s been hours. If they were going to kill us, they would have. She’ll...I think she’ll let us be. What?”
“Your face looks...odd.” Horace coughed slightly and winced.
“It’s nothing.” Jasper realized he had been staring into the middle distance and shook his head to clear it.
“You’ve been away from civilization too long if you’re getting misty-eyed over some old farmer’s wife.” Horace lay back with a wince.
“She was...young.” Jasper busied himself trying to wash out the old bandages. He would need to take them to the creek nearby, but there was time enough for that at dawn. His mind was only half on the task, however. “She was beautiful.”
“A young famer’s wife.” Horace tried to laugh and his breath caught.
“Unmarried.” Jasper thought back to her hands without a ring on them and felt a ridiculous stab of hope. Nothing more foolish than a young man’s heart, his father had said once, and it was surely true. Jasper’s heart, apparently, could not tell the difference between an upstanding southern woman and a Yankee oppressor.
“Oh?”
“Yes.” He tried to harden his heart, and could not. “Fair-haired, and blue eyes like....”
“Jasper?”
“What?”
“You’re just staring at the fire.”
“Apologies.” Jasper smiled distractedly.
“Are you going to leave me here to waste away while you go off wooing her?” Horace asked plaintively, with a spark of the humor that had kept the men cheerful around their campfires, and Jasper laughed.
“Oh, she wants nothing to do with me. She ran me off. I think she thought I was trying to go after her sister. Also a beauty.” He looked meaningfully at Horace and though the man laughed, he sobered quickly.
“We should go,” he murmured. “No joking, Jasper. We should leave before we’re spotted.”
“In the morning.”
“We should go now. We can travel by night. If anyone comes to find us in the morning, we’ll be long gone.”