She picks up the pieces and placed them in a woodpile next to a red barn. She stops for a moment to smile at her beautiful black horse grazing in the pasture, her one and only companion. It is a glorious spring day; Annie catches the scent of lilacs on the wave of a breeze. Four Union Soldiers on horseback approach her homestead. The men look weary from years of Civil War fighting. Captain Harmon Taylor, aged beyond his thirty-something years, the battle experiences covering up his farm boy sweetness, leads the soldiers. He dismounts. Annie stops her chores and approaches the soldiers. “Good afternoon, Mrs. Landon. I'm Captain Harmon Taylor,” he says, an unwanted and ill-timed blush flushing his cheeks. He hadn’t expected to find her so comely. “Good afternoon, Captain Taylor. My husband has written often of you. He holds you in high regard.” Annie replies. “As I him.” Captain Taylor smiles warmly before taking a heavy breath. “It is with deep regret that I am here today, Mrs.
