The Yellowstone Campaign by Tim Piper

Author:Tim Piper
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tim Piper

CHAPTER 9

It was Jubil’s first trip east, and it had a strange effect on his nervous system. Traveling west, watching the landscape flatten out and open up as the population density dropped from crowded to sparse, he always felt himself relaxing into a sense of well-being. Going east, he found his body tensing up as the forested landscape closed in and the number of people per square mile rose to levels he had never experienced. He was intimidated by the crush of people in the station when he changed trains in New York City, and he already dreaded doing it again, on his way to Washington to see General Sherman.

He felt more at home when he arrived in Poughkeepsie, which was only slightly larger than Bloomington. The agent at the ticket window recommended the Morgan House as a good place to stay and gave him directions. Jubil stepped out of the station and admired the bustling landing along the Hudson River, then walked away from the river, east on Main Street through the business district.

The Morgan House was a stately affair, similar to the Ashley House in Bloomington. What distinguished Poughkeepsie from Bloomington was how long it had existed. The town had been settled long before the American Revolution, and the streets and the buildings had a feeling of being solidly established, well organized, and well maintained.

The hotel desk clerk told Jubil that the distance to Miss Mitchell’s house and Vassar College was a walk of a mile and a half, but he also pointed out that coaches for hire were readily available. Jubil decided to walk. The mid-October weather was mild, the sun was bright and the air crisp, and the leaves on the trees were in full fall display—yellow, orange, red, and rusty brown.

He also wanted to walk because he was nervous about seeing Nelly. Before leaving Council Bluffs, he had sent a telegram telling her he was coming, so she would not be shocked at his arrival. So much had changed since he’d left at the end of the summer that he didn’t quite know what to expect from her. Was she still the same person she’d always been? He remembered how awkward their last days together in Bloomington had been and wondered if they would ever get back to the easy company they had always been for each other.

Miss Mitchell’s house on College Avenue was a Victorian two-story that looked to Jubil like a miniature version of the Warners’ house, without turrets. He collected his thoughts, took a deep breath, and knocked on the door, only to be told by Miss Mitchell’s silver-haired housekeeper, Miss LeVault, that Nelly was not at home. She was most likely at the college, Miss LeVault said, but she was expected home within an hour.

The college was nearby, so Jubil decided to have a look at it. Miss LeVault pointed him in the right direction, and he set out for the southeast corner of town, where a great four-story building of gray stone sprawled majestically across a huge groomed lawn.

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