Smolder on a Slow Burn

by Lynda J. Cox

  “Drop the formality. We’ve been friends for too damn long for this.”

  He turned slightly and settled his gaze on the insignia riding on Taylor’s shoulder straps. “I’m sorry but the last time I looked, I was still wearing a major’s rank in the C.S.A and you’re wearing gold oak leaf clusters on Union blue. I don’t believe that dropping the formality would be the best course of action, nor am I interested in assisting the Union army in recovering any stolen payroll wagons.”

  Taylor said, “As a captured combatant and therefore subject to the military orders of superior officers…”

  “You may order me all you like, Major, but we have the same rank.” A.J. choked back a laugh. Taylor was trying to argue the legality of a captured combatant being subject to military orders with a lawyer, one who had been with the adjutant general’s office before the War started? “I will not obey any order you give me. I am honor bound to keep the oath I gave to my country.”

  Taylor rounded on him. “You gave an oath to an illegitimate government. And that damned honor of yours also demands that you obey lawfully given orders by a superior officer. You are to be transported to the Union prisoner of war camp in Elmira, New York—”

  “Elmira?” A.J. asked. “I need to point out, again, Major, I am an officer.”

  As usual, when Taylor tried to convince him of something A.J. had no intention of being involved with, the man continued undaunted. Some things never change, A.J. thought. Taylor repeated he was going to be taken to Elmira and to learn all he could about the theft of stolen Union and Confederate payroll wagons.

  “You may have me transferred to Elmira.” His throat tightened over the words and his stomach twisted. It wasn’t the brutal cold wind whipping down over Lake Erie that made his insides clench but the thought of being held in that hell-hole in upstate New York. “I will not, however, betray my honor and my oath to my country, no matter how illegitimate you perceive that country’s government to be.”

  “If you agree to this, I can pull strings, station a small detail of men at Clayborne to protect your wife, your daughters, and your brother.”

  He couldn’t stop the laugh this time. “If anyone threatens your cousin, and those three children who call you ‘Uncle Harry,’ you know as well as I do, your father will shoot to kill, regardless of the color of the uniform. Nice try, Major, but I still respectfully decline to obey.”

  Taylor’s mouth compressed into a thin line, his eyes narrowed, and he clenched his jaw. Had he just pushed Taylor too far? He knew Taylor’s volatile temper, though he had never been on the receiving end of it. Taylor took a step closer and A.J. stiffened in anticipation of a blow. There was nothing stopping Taylor. A.J. knew he had done more than skirt insubordination.

  Taylor closed the distance, until he stood within striking distance. “Then, let’s try this, shall we? I will take you with me to the camp at Rock Island. I will have five men executed every time you refuse these orders and I will continue to execute men until you agree to follow orders and learn all you can about that missing gold and in turn relay that information to the proper Union authorities. Is that a little more incentive for you, Major Adams?”

  He staggered backwards into Sandusky Bay with those words. The icy smooth rocks under his feet shifted and he slipped and fell onto a knee. The water was so cold it felt like millions of red-hot needles stabbing him. Bile scalded at the back of his throat. Taylor would execute five men guilty of no other crime than wearing the wrong uniform? He croaked, “You wouldn’t dare. That’s murder.”

  “It’s war,” Taylor snapped. “My orders are to get your cooperation at any cost. You have your orders now. Where am I taking you? Rock Island or Elmira?”

  The wind shifted, blowing a mist through the hole in the soddy roof onto him and Allison, pulling him away from the past. To protect Allison from the cold mist, he adjusted the waterproof ground cover over her.

  A.J. pressed the back of his head against the wall, focusing on that, instead of the memory of five young men executed for his refusal to become a spy and traitor to his country. He clenched the hand not curled around Allison’s shoulder into a fist, and ground his teeth to keep his strangled breath from becoming a pained cry. Those young men had been denied even a blindfold and the terror on their faces haunted him, still.

  He didn’t believe Taylor would actually order the execution of those men. Within the hour he was on a train bound for Illinois. Taylor had ordered the shackles between his wrists shortened to two links and then bolted to the chain padlocked around his waist. In the end, A.J. had been trussed up more securely than a Christmas goose for the long train ride from Sandusky, Ohio to the prison at Rock Island, Illinois.

  A tiny leak over his head began to drip icy cold water down the back of his neck, uncomfortably reminding him of standing in the yard at Rock Island, his greatcoat wet, heavy and freezing with the thick snow/rain mix of that day…

  “Harrison, don’t do this.”

  If anything, it was colder here on the banks of the Mississippi River in Illinois than it had been in Ohio. He was shuddering with the cold that found its way through the wet wool of his greatcoat, and nauseous with the sight of five young, frightened Confederate soldiers standing bound against a wall. The snow falling in thick clumping flakes wasn’t melting as it settled onto their thin shoulders.

  Taylor turned to him. “You are not allowed to speak unless you’ve been spoken to, Reb. Will you obey the orders I gave you at Johnson’s Island?”

  “You’re going to have to gag me, then. Damn you, Harrison, this is murder, and you know it.” He leaned closer to Taylor, straightening when one of the four men guarding him pressed the tip of a bayonet into his chest. “I will not surrender my honor. I will not betray my country.”

  “So be it.” Taylor nodded his head at the master sergeant with the firing squad. The sergeant’s order of “Ready” carried through the snow and five Union soldiers snapped their rifles to their shoulders.

  If he lunged forward, he could drive the bayonet into his chest. If he was dead, those men could live. Taylor had apparently anticipated that because as A.J. reared back to create a little more leverage to impale himself, the two guards on either side of him grabbed his arms.

  A.J. struggled to free himself, desperation starting to choke him. “Harrison, I’m begging you, for the love of God, don’t do this!”

  “Aim!”

  Two of the five men against the wall started shaking and one was crying. Another of the five straightened as much as he could and stared across the yard. A.J. felt the weight of that young man’s gaze as if an ironclad ship had been dropped onto his chest.

  “Harrison! This isn’t war!”

  “Fire!” The word hadn’t even finished sounding when those five rifles barked with a single voice. The five condemned men crumbled into the snow, and didn’t move.

  A.J. couldn’t drag any air into his lungs and his legs wouldn’t hold him up. The firm grip on his arms was released and he slowly collapsed to his knees in the wet snow, huddling into himself, sobbing with the helplessness. The snow falling on the back of his neck melted into icy rivulets.

  Taylor crunched through the snow, stopping in front of him. A.J. stared at the man’s boots through a haze of tears.

  “I will order five more men be brought out this moment, Major Adams, unless you acknowledge your orders. Do I need to kill more men?”

  My country…or my very soul…

  Taylor was demanding that he betray one or the other. Either way he chose, A.J. knew he would be sacrificing both his honor and his conscience.

  A.J. dropped onto his heels, huddled deeper into himself, shaking with the enormity of what he faced. This wasn’t war. There was no honor in this. He drew a deep breath and looked at the five fallen men in the snow, small pools of red under each of them. “Forgive me,” he whispered.

  “Major Adams, I grow weary of asking for your compliance. How many more men will die because of your damned honor?�
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  A.J. slowly shook his head. He screwed his eyes shut in an attempt to shut out the knowledge that no matter which way he chose, his honor and his soul were damned. Those men died because of him, because he didn’t think his one-time friend would stoop to such depravity. His voice broke on a single word. “None.”

  Chapter Seven

  Evil is easy, and has infinite forms.

  ~Blaise Pascal

  Allison stirred and pulled him again from those damned memories. A.J. shifted uncomfortably, struggling to level his breathing and slow his racing heart. She sat up and he couldn’t force himself to look into her face. The sense of helplessness he’d felt at the time and his continued soul-deep self-loathing choked him. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “I’ve been awake for a while. You’ve been very restless and mumbling a lot.”

  Damn. He didn’t want her included in the recollected horror his life often was.

  He startled when her small hand caught the side of his face and turned his head to her. In the predawn gloom, she levelly met his gaze, her eyes bright with sleep. Without any prelude, she said, “You told me on the train that sometimes talking about things can make them better. Do you want to tell me what happened to you during the War?”

  For a moment he hesitated. He never talked about what happened. He’d never been able to force the words past a constricted throat, or drag the breath into his lungs to speak of those black days. “I don’t know if I can, but I have the feeling if I tell you I don’t want to, you’ll keep after me like a terrier with a rat until I do.” He concentrated on the warmth of her palm against the plane of his cheek. “How sugar-coated do you want it?”

  She scanned his face, her dark eyes shining. “I prefer the unvarnished truth.”

  He lifted his chin to break the contact of her hand and stared out the open doorway. Would she understand if he needed to bolt outside, to be someplace where there were no walls, only the scent of the earth and the breeze filling his lungs, and the sound of the wind silencing the screaming of his soul?

  “A.J.?”

  He drew a deep breath and released it on a long, less than steady exhale.

  “Officially, and even on the papers signed when I was paroled at War’s end, I was held at Elmira. Unofficially, I was held in a camp named ‘Infernum’. It was unofficial because on paper, Infernum never existed.” Just saying the name brought to mind the massive fifteen foot walls, the palisades with Union sharp shooters stationed every ten feet, and the devastatingly horrific conditions within those walls.

  “Like Dante’s hell?”

  The instant recollection of a similar conversation careened through A.J.’s thoughts.

  “So, I’m just going to disappear into hell like Dante?” The unease in his gut intensified with Taylor’s refusal to look at him. “Is that it, Harrison? You just throw me into hell and walk away?”

  “Yes. And, it’s Major Taylor to you, Reb.”

  “Even Dante had Beatrice to help him get out of hell.”

  “You don’t.”

  He shook himself. The camp walls weren’t there. He wasn’t huddled in a shelter cobbled together from wood scraps and fabric, praying to be allowed to die or granted a reprieve from the brutality. He became aware that all Allison had done in the face of his silence was wait for him to continue.

  “Four hours by train, north of Elmira, they had built Infernum. When the train stopped a mile outside of the camp, I was put on a horse and told that if I tried to make a run for it, every man in the guard detail had orders to shoot to kill. I didn’t doubt that for a second. Harrison Taylor, a man I counted as my friend before the War, was the man who sent me there, was in charge of taking me there and gave those orders.”

  Allison slipped her hand into his palm and entwined her fingers with his. Something deep in his chest loosened with her simple act.

  “Nothing could have prepared me for the sight within those walls. Row upon row upon row of flimsy tents covered the ground and it was early December. There was nothing there that resembled a mess or an infirmary. If our families even knew where we were and if they could have gotten money to us to buy food or anything to help protect against the elements, there wasn’t even a sutler so we could purchase those things. We were meant to die in that camp, once we’d been used up.”

  A.J. closed his eyes. The faces of the men in that camp came into view…

  “Major Taylor, there is no excuse for these men to be held in these conditions and apparently denied food, clothing, and shelter.” The formerly proud sons of the South who bothered to look up were gaunt, skeletal remnants. A few dared to glare in open hostility at the men in immaculate blue uniforms who surrounded him. Compared to the rags the prisoners wore, even with his uniform filthy and stained and his great coat caked with mud at the hem, he realized he was better dressed than almost every one of those men. Fury rose in his chest.

  “You Rebs get the same treatment as Union prisoners in the South receive.”

  He opened his eyes. Her hand tightened on his a moment before she eased herself closer. Allison lowered her head onto his shoulder and slipped her arm around him, holding him. That simple human contact undid him. The memory of his first hour at Infernum broke free and the words came in a torrent.

  “At the camp commander’s office, the only structure built with anything resembling permanence, Taylor stopped us. When I dismounted, Taylor’s hand-picked escort surrounded me with bayonets. I was already in wrist shackles, but he wanted to make the point clear there was no escape from Infernum, so I was put into ankle shackles. It made climbing stairs a little difficult.

  “Taylor told me that the Infernum was run differently than any other camp. The only time I would be allowed to speak to any man in Union blue was only after I’d been spoken to. And then we went into the camp commander’s office and I met Lieutenant Colonel Gene Oakten.”

  Allison stiffened against him and her grip on his hand tightened, but she didn’t interrupt. He wondered for a moment why she reacted to Oakten’s name.

  “He walked into his office and every Yankee in the room snapped to attention. I’ll admit, I debated it for about two seconds. I decided that hell would freeze before I came to attention. I never saw it coming. When I refused to come to attention, I got a rifle butt smashed into the small of my back.”

  He crumbled to his knees, unable to breathe.

  “Get up.” A Georgia drawl, polished and genteel, whispered in the words.

  He pushed himself to his feet, hampered by the shackles on his wrists and ankles. The other man closed the distance between them. “Regardless of the color of the uniform, I am your superior, Major. I expect the respect due a superior officer, and that means coming to attention when I enter a room. I am Lieutenant Colonel Oakten.”

  “I’ll grant you outrank me. But I’ll argue the other until the second coming.”

  The rifle butt crashed into his back again. Once more, he found himself on his knees, trying to bring the world into focus through a haze of blinding pain, and unable to breathe through that hurt.

  “Get up.”

  He took a little longer to push himself up. He pulled his head back and met Oakten’s icy glare.

  “I am the camp commander and I deal with all discipline issues and determine punishment for infractions of the rules.” His head tilted slightly to a side, as if he was puzzling something through. A decidedly nasty smile twisted the man’s mouth. “I have the feeling, Major, you and I will be seeing a lot of one another.”

  From the corner of his eye, he saw Taylor flinch with those unsettling words. A.J.’s stomach sank even further into his boots.

  Oakten continued, “I have been informed that Major Taylor has told you what is required of you here at Infernum. Is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  The rifle butt came down again. He went to his knees for a third time.

  Shaking with the white hot agony flaring throughout his body,
he struggled to pull himself erect before he was told to get up again. He was damned if the bastard was going to make him cower. Oakten’s subsequent smile was all the more chilling for the menace it held. “I will ask again if Major Taylor has told you what is required of you here at Infernum.”

  “Yes, sir.” He wasn’t going to cower but he had enough sense not to risk another rifle butt into his back.

  “In less than five minutes,” he told Allison, “I took three hard hits with a rifle butt. Sometimes I wonder if it would have been better if I had just stayed down the third time, if that would have given him what he wanted.” A.J. forced himself to draw a long, calming breath. “When I finally addressed him as a superior officer, he dismissed all the enlisted men, told Taylor to take a seat—and to this day, I didn’t think Taylor expected half of what happened in that office because when he declined and said he preferred to stand, he sounded ill. I was then told what Oakten required of me at Infernum. In addition to helping the Union recover the gold they were missing, any infractions of camp rules, which included a prohibition on gambling, dishonesty, and profanity would be on the man who committed the infraction and on my head because ultimately a commanding officer is responsible for the actions of his men.”

  “I know why you are here, Major.” Oakten opened a humidor on the desktop, withdrew a cigar, snipped an end off, and lit it. He took a long drag from the tobacco before he continued. “I fully expect your complete and total cooperation in learning the whereabouts of those missing payrolls and any information on shipments of gold within the states in rebellion.” He studied the lit end of the cigar, as if there was some deeply hidden secret in the ash. “I will use any and all means at my disposal to ensure that you follow your orders. Are we clear on this?”

  “Crystal, sir.” There was no way this was going to have a good outcome. The first fissure of real fear rippled up his spine.