Taking a deep, deep breath as he settled into the wonderful fitting chair, he sighed and let out an equally deep breath. The livery had not had much to chose from in riding horses. He'd chosen a big ten-year-old gray-white wide backed mare, "Ghost". Ghost was an easy ride but he had traversed near two hundred miles all around the "Free State of Jones" - Jones County in south Mississippi. "Ghost would have been a fine mount if I were thirty," he thought. "But I'm not thirty. What is it now, sixty-five?" he added in reflection and wonderment.
He opened the letter from Lou.
December 15, 1897 "Dearest Solon, I write you with a heavy heart. There is nothing out of the ordinary here except my deep, deep hurt from our dear son's departing us. I know there is an All-Wise Dispensation but how it hurts. I haven't really shown my deepest feelings. That is not me, but this is the hardest work I've ever done, husband. I fully know how you have been hurt by Jim's death and I know it has been long enough that I should be worried about those new foals due in spring and getting Joe ready to go away to college in September. I have plenty of time for that, I know, but it is so difficult for me not to dwell on his brother. That day we named them. . .
I had to go for a walk in the cold air across the ridge towards the river for awhile. This is written Sunday night. I started this letter Saturday afternoon and thought about throwing it in the fire but didn't."
Solon stared at, without seeing, the needlepoint magnolia in a large black enamel frame on the wall above the desk.
Lou had never really been this expressive and her husband's eyes teared as his grief was rekindled by her voiced pain. He swallowed several times, pulled his spectacles off and wiped his eyes and face with his handkerchief. He then sat stark still with his hand across his mouth in this "milking" gesture Lou called it. His face was hard, his teeth clenched with jaw locked. He held that position for many moments before shaking himself out of the hatred of the dark, a mean place. He went there when he remembered when he had two living sons. He returned to Lou's letter half mad and half hurt with tears wetting his tired face.
"I'm not pleased that I have not been able to move on as I should, dear husband, but I know I will. We will.
I've gotten Joe a beautiful new leather trunk ordered by Mr. Washburn with his initials stamped in gold above the lock. Are you sure about him going all the way to Ohio for school? I know Buchtel is your choice, but what about Sawanee? Kirby-Smith heads it and General Polk - I mean Bishop Polk - founded it before the war. The "University of the South" is such a grand name, too. It's less than a hundred miles and Akron is over eight hundred!"