Free Ghost Soldier by Elaine Marie Alphin Page A

that?” I asked, pointing to the harmonica.
    He held it up, turning it so that the light from the living room reflected off the polished metal side plates. “But this is from my time, from my life. You’d have trouble holding it, I think.”
    As he crossed the porch and held it out to me, I reached out one finger tentatively. The little instrument felt like a slab of dry ice, so cold it burned, and my finger went numb immediately. I jerked the hand back and tucked my finger in my armpit to thaw out. “I see what you mean!”
    He smiled sadly and slipped the harmonica into his knapsack. “I can’t hold anything in your time, or in any time after my death. My hand just goes through it as if it’s nothing but a cloud. And there’s something I need to get that you can hold for me. I think that will tell me where my family went.”
    Rich sighed and propped his musket beside him. He floated cross-legged on top of the plank floor, leaning back against his bedroll. “We owned a farm in Wake County, North Carolina, near Stirrup Iron Creek.”
    â€œTwo Stirrups,” I said, remembering his words at the battlefield.
    â€œThat’s right.” He nodded. “My father called it that after the creek. The farm wasn’t that big—only about seventy acres. My father and my older brothers, George and Jefferson, laid in a good crop of tobacco each year, as well as the vegetables for the family. I loved growing things even when I was younger, and I had ideas about how to improve the farm.” Rich sat up straighter, pointing at the sloping yard beyond the porch as if he were still alive to make improvements. “I could see the mud in the runoff after the rain, and I got this idea that we should plow around the slope instead of up it. Father said he’d consider it after the War…” His voice trailed off and he looked sadly at the Hambricks’ yard. “Doesn’t it hurt you to see this tangle of weeds?”
    I nodded and set the recorder down on the porch swing. “It’s not my yard, but I’ve been aching to do some work on it. We don’t live on a farm, but we’ve got a garden at home—my mother loves flowers.” I went down the porch steps and crouched beside what looked like it had once been a flower bed. When I tugged at the tangle of ivy, it resisted for a moment, then began to tear free. I could see stunted dandelions and other weeds matted beneath the ivy and wondered what else was there. “Go on,” I said as I worked. “Tell me about your family.”
    â€œThere were five of us that survived,” Rich said, kneeling down above the patchy grass beside me. “George was the oldest. He was seventeen in ’59, before the war. Then there was Amalie. Avery came next, but he died of whooping cough before I was born. Jefferson was fourteen, then came Harriet—she took sick and lived just long enough to be christened. I was next, and then Louise. Mother lost one more boy, Andrew, and a girl, Marietta, before Hiram was born.”
    He pointed out a tendril of ivy that I’d missed, and I tugged until it ripped out. “Little Hiram lived only a few weeks, and then Mother died—a fever. That was 1859, right before I turned ten.”
    My hand jerked and the ivy slid through it. Mom had left just before I turned ten, also. “What is it?” Rich asked.
    I looked back at the weeds. “I lost my mother when I was about the same age.”
    â€œOh.” He was silent for a moment. “I’m sorry, Alexander. I didn’t realize your mother was gone.”
    I shook my head. “Not like that—she’s not … dead. She left.” I swallowed and began pulling the weeds the ivy had hidden. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
    Rich nodded after a moment. “I miss my mother, but not the same way I miss my sister Louise.” His voice cracked, and I