The Wilderness Road

by James Reasoner

  When everyone had finished eating, Powell strode up and down through the group and said loudly, "All right, back on your feet! We won't get this road cut through by sittin' around and lollygaggin' all day!"

  There were a few groans of complaint as the men pushed themselves to their feet and took up their axes again. Davis was almost glad to start working once more. If he had sat there much longer, his muscles would have stiffened up and it would have been even more painful to move again.

  The afternoon proceeded as the morning had, with Davis's exhaustion growing deeper and deeper. Progress was slow. The men worked until dusk was settling in around them. Finally, Colonel Welles trotted along the road on his big chestnut horse and called a halt to the day's work. "I'm well pleased," he told them, "at least for a first day. We need to cover more ground tomorrow, though. We can't be falling behind schedule so early on."

  Davis sensed the undercurrent of resentment that went through the men. Talk like that wouldn't do Welles any good. But no one said anything in reply, because Conn Powell was riding along right behind the colonel, and the fierce glower on his face cast a pall of silence over the group.

  The night's rations were somewhat better than what had been served in the middle of the day. There were biscuits and molasses again, but with them this time was a big pot of stew rich in salt pork and wild onions. Davis ate hungrily, replenishing his body after the day's labor had drained it.

  He sat well back from the big roaring campfire built in the center of the small circle of wagons. That blaze would be visible for miles around, he thought, and he wondered how much trouble folks in these parts had with bandits and Indians. He put the distance between himself and the fire, however, not out of any sense of caution, but simply because he still didn't feel a part of this group. He might be with them, but he was still alone.

  He had been ever since the day Faith died.

  After a while, some of the men began to sing. They must have been sailors at some time in their lives, because they lifted their voices in sea chanties that spoke of rolling waves and faraway ports and sweethearts left behind.

  Davis found the songs moving, even though he had never seen any body of water larger than the Shenandoah River. Some of the other men took up the singing, launching into ballads that Davis knew, but still he took no part, preferring to just sit and listen. He found himself dozing off as he leaned against the trunk of a small tree.

  Everyone was tired, and the singing didn't last long. The fire began to burn down as the men rolled themselves in their blankets for the night. Davis did likewise, and he was so worn out that sleep claimed him easily this time.

  Despite the ease with which he fell asleep, his dreams were troubled again. If anything, they were even more vivid than the night before. Instead of reliving Faith's death, he saw his children this time. They were standing on a raft in the middle of a river, and they were calling frantically for him. The raft was drifting into a fast current, its speed picking up with each passing second. They were getting farther and farther away from Davis, and there was nothing he could do about it, no way he could reach them. Finally, the raft was carried around a bend in the river, disappearing from Davis's sight.

  Mary . . . Laurel . . . little Theodore . . . all of them gone from him forever. He would never see any of them again.

  He woke up, far into the night, with his face wet from tears, and spent the rest of the time until the camp roused an hour before dawn staring into the darkness.

  * * *

  The days crept forward, just as did the widening of the Wilderness Road. The work grew more difficult, as it came to be more than a matter of simply felling trees.

  Now the undergrowth was thicker and had to be cleared away as well. The men worked with shovels and hoes and heavy knives as much as they did with axes. Davis recalled clearing a bramble thicket from his own land, not long after he and Faith had come there from the Tidewater. This work was a lot like that, and despite the thick sleeves of his shirt and the gloves he wore, his hands and forearms were badly scratched at the end of each day.

  Just as he had thought, his muscles had soon regained their lean, corded strength, and now he could swing an ax or chop at brush all day without waking up in such pain the next morning. He was still exhausted at the end of each day, however, because Colonel Welles and Conn Powell pushed the men unmercifully. Even under the more arduous circumstances, the group was covering close to five miles a day, which was still only half of what Welles had estimated.

  One evening, a week into the journey, Welles and Powell had a long conversation, then Powell tapped into a barrel on one of the wagons that brought up the rear each day. He filled a jug, then began passing it around. A cheer went up from the men. When the jug came to Davis, he tipped it to his mouth and took a long swallow of rum. He passed the jug along as the warmth of the liquor flooded through him.

  Welles climbed onto the wagon and lifted his hands, calling out for the group's attention. "You'll get a drink of rum every night from now on," he told the men, "providing that we make at least five miles that day. What do you say to that, boys?"

  Another cheer welled up. Davis didn't join in it any more than he took part in the singing that still went on around the campfire nearly every night, but he was grateful to Welles anyway. Maybe the rum would deaden his brain enough for him to sleep soundly, unbothered by phantoms from the past.

  Phantoms . . . that was what his wife and children were to him now, he mused. And insistent ones at that. No matter how much he wanted to get on with his life, to face the future instead of the past, memories of Faith and the youngsters insisted on reminding him of what he had lost instead.

  He would have given his soul—dry, shriveled thing that it was—for the feel of Theodore's arms around his neck in a hug or the softness of his daughters' hair brushing his face as they leaned over to give him a kiss on the cheek.

  When the refilled jug came around one more time, Davis seized it eagerly and took an even longer swallow of the rum. In his misery, he had forgotten all about Hedge.

  * * *

  Later that night, he shifted restlessly in his sleep, and his eyelids flickered open. Something had disturbed him, but he wasn't sure if it had been the hard ground underneath him, the far-off howl of a wolf, or something else. Davis started to lift his head and look around.

  A hand grabbed his hair and jerked his head back painfully, pulling the skin of his neck taut. Davis's eyes widened in shock and horror as he saw the light from the embers of the fire glowing redly on the blade of the knife that was about to slit his throat.

  Chapter 8

  Instinct took over. Davis's arm shot up, his fingers clamping onto the wrist of the hand wielding the knife. Someone else grabbed at him, but it was too late. He had a death grip on the would-be killer's wrist.

  At the same time, Davis twisted on the ground, kicking free of the blanket and bringing his legs around toward another shape that loomed between him and the glow of the fire. He drove the heels of his feet into the middle of that shape and heard a satisfying grunt of pain and surprise.

  "Get him!" a voice hissed. "Hang on to him, damn it!"

  Davis thought he knew who the voice belonged to, but he didn't waste any time thinking about that. It didn't really matter who was trying to kill him. The only important thing was stopping them.

  He reached up with his left hand, groping for the man who had grabbed him from behind. His fingers touched beard-stubbled cheeks, then found the man's eyes. Davis dug in hard. A scream of agony ripped through the night, and the hand tangled in his hair suddenly released him and went away.

  He pulled his knee up, slammed the arm he was holding down across it. There was a sharp crack and another scream. The knife fell from nerveless fingers.

  Some sort of club crashed into Davis's side. He gasped in pain but managed to hold on to the man whose wrist he had grabbed. He rolled over, hauling the man on top of him and then underneath him. Davis's knee jammed into the man
's groin. There was a lot of shouting going on in the camp now, but Davis paid no attention to it.

  The club hit him again, this time clipping him on the side of the head hard enough to make him dizzy and knock him off the first man. He tumbled onto the ground, rolled over a couple of times, and came up in a crouch, trying to shake off the effects of the blow. Two of the men who had attacked him were down, but the third one was still on his feet, swinging the ax handle he had used as a bludgeon. Someone had thrown some more wood on the fire, and it caught with a crackle and hiss, sending a wider circle of light around the camp along with a shower of sparks that ascended into the night sky. The red glow was bright enough for Davis to see that the third and final attacker was the man called Clade. Hedge and Johnson were both sprawled on the ground where Davis had left them.

  Clade came at him with a yell, bringing the ax handle down in a murderous sweep. The heavy length of wood might have crushed Davis's skull if he hadn't dodged aside. He hit Clade in the small of the back, then darted away before Clade could bring the ax handle around in a vicious backhand.

  The rest of the crew had them pretty much surrounded, Davis saw from the corner of his eye. They were shouting encouragement to the fighters. Most of them seemed to be supporting Clade, but to his surprise, Davis heard his own name called out several times. He had thought he had no friends among these men. That might well be true, but there were at least some of them who obviously didn't want to see his brains leaking out of his head.

  Clade rushed him again, and once more Davis managed to get out of the way. His legs felt like lead by now, however, and his head was still spinning. It was only a matter of time until that ax handle connected with him, and then the fight would be over. His life might well be finished, too.

  The unexpected roar of a pistol shot made silence fall heavily over the camp. The ring of men parted, and Conn Powell strode through the gap. He had a pistol in each hand. Powdersmoke drifted from the barrel of the gun in his left hand, but the one in his right was still cocked and primed, and it was aimed right at Clade's chest.

  "Drop that ax handle," Powell grated.

  Clade hesitated, then lowered the ax handle and let it fall at his feet. Powell came closer to him and glanced past him at the sprawled bodies of Hedge and Johnson. His lean, dark face was unreadable.

  Davis's chest heaved as he tried to catch his breath. His pulse thundered in his temples, and his scalp hurt where Hedge had practically pulled out handfuls of hair. He knew from the way Hedge's right arm was bent at an unnatural angle between the elbow and the wrist that Hedge was the one who had tried to cut his throat, the one whose arm Davis had broken across his knee. Hedge seemed to have passed out.

  Johnson was still conscious, but he was curled up in a ball, clutching his belly where Davis had kicked him. A man could die from a hard enough kick in the stomach, Davis knew. At the moment, he didn't much care whether that fate befell Johnson or not. Nor did he feel any sympathy for Hedge's broken arm.

  "I think it's pretty obvious what happened here," Powell said. "Hedge just couldn't let it go, could he?"

  Clade pointed a shaking finger at Davis. "It's all his fault! He—"

  "Shut up!" Powell snapped. "You think I'm a fool, Clade? I know what's goin' on. I know you and Hedge and Johnson been plottin' to kill Davis." Powell shook his head grimly. "If you hadn't been so damned clumsy, we'd've only lost one man from the crew, 'stead of. three. I'm mighty disappointed in you."

  Davis thought he heard an edge of bleak humor in Powell's voice. It had been surprising enough that Powell had defended him from Clade. What the foreman said next surprised Davis even more.

  "You and your friends get out of here," Powell went on. "I don't care where you go, but I don't want to see you around here anymore."

  "You . . . you're kickin' us out of camp?" Clade was as taken aback as Davis was.

  "That's right. You're leavin' tonight. I'll give you half an hour, no more."

  "But . . . but where'll we go?" A whine crept in Clade's voice.

  "Told you, I don't care. Back along the Road to the Block House, or ahead to the Gap and Kaintuck. As long as you're out of my sight."

  "But there's Indians, and bandits—"

  "That's your look-out, not mine." Powell's tone was cold and merciless.

  Clade took a deep breath, then, as if realizing the futility of arguing, turned and went over to Johnson. He took hold of the other man's shoulder and hauled him to his feet. "Come on," he grunted. "We got to help Hedge."

  Powell turned to Davis. "You all right?"

  "I think so."

  "Good. Bad enough we'll be short-handed by three men. If you hadn't been able to work, this night really would have turned out bad."

  Powell started to turn away, but Davis stopped him with a hand on his arm. "Why did you help me?" Davis asked. "I thought you didn't trust me."

  Pointedly, Powell looked down at the hand on his arm, and Davis took it away. "I don't trust you. But that doesn't mean I'm goin' to let those three kill you."

  "You as much as said that if they had gotten away with it, you wouldn't have done anything to them."

  Powell shrugged. "If they'd gotten away with it, I wouldn't have had any proof. Since it wound up all out in the open, I didn't have any choice. Got to maintain discipline around here." He heaved a sigh. "But I sure do hate to be short-handed."

  This time when he turned away, Davis let him go. Despite what Powell had done to help him, Davis sensed that he hadn't made a friend of the man tonight.

  But on the other hand, he was still alive, and there was something to be said for that. The emotions he felt as that thought went through his brain surprised him almost as much as the fact that Powell had helped him.

  Once again, he was forced to confront the idea that, no matter what had happened in the past, he still wanted to live. He had fought with the desperation of a man who wanted to cling to life for as long as possible, who wanted every last second that he had been allotted.

  Davis was going to have to think about that, think long and hard.

  * * *

  He slept fitfully the rest of the night. Between almost being murdered and the realization that he wasn't ready to give up on life after all, his mind was whirling.

  When he dragged himself out of his bedroll the next morning and walked stiffly over to the wagons for breakfast, one of the men surprised him by offering him a cup of tea. "I reckon you probably need it," the man said with a grin. "You look a mite haggard this morning, Davis."

  "Thanks," Davis grunted as he took the cup. "I didn't sleep very well."

  "I can understand why." The man extended a big, callused hand toward him. "Name's Grimsby, Bill Grimsby."

  Davis's hesitation lasted only an instant, then he shook hands with the man. "Pleased to meet you, Grimsby." It struck him as odd that he had worked beside this man before but was only now learning his name. But that was the way you wanted it, he told himself. He hadn't wanted to make any friends.

  "Mighty glad Hedge and those two cronies of his didn't kill you last night," Grimsby went on. "I was yellin' for you durin' the fight."

  "Thanks," Davis said. "I'm pretty glad myself that I didn't get killed."

  Grimsby smiled. "There's more of us than you might think who were happy to see those three go. It'll be more work for us now without 'em, I suppose, but good riddance, I say. Their kind never does anything except stir up trouble."

  "Powell probably thinks I'm the one causing trouble, after what happened back at the Block House and then last night."

  Grimsby waved off that comment and said, "Don't you pay him any mind. Powell's just a naturally sour son of a bitch—and if you tell him I said so, I'll deny it. Get yourself some johnnycake there and come along with me."

  Davis took a hunk of the johnnycake from a pan on the tailgate of a wagon and followed Grimsby over to a small group gathered underneath a tree at the edge of the road. The other men greeted Grimsby in a friendly fashion, then
looked at Davis and waited until Grimsby said, "This here is Hal Davis, boys. I reckon you all know him."

  Most of the men just nodded noncommittally, but a few of them smiled. "Aye, we know him, Bill," one of them said. "Tis not every day that one man holds off Hedge and Clade and Johnson, and not only that but does considerable damage to a couple of 'em." The man held out his hand to Davis. "Mcintosh is me name, Davis. It's pleased I am to meet you."

  Several of the other men shook hands and introduced themselves as well, and while Davis could still feel the barrier of unfamiliarity between them and him, there was a new sense of camaraderie. New to him, at least. The other men had already formed rough friendships during the week since leaving the Block House.

  It would still be more than a month until they reached the end of the Wilderness Road, he told himself. Now that Hedge and the other two had left camp, the danger might be over, but the boredom and the arduous labor would continue. The weeks might pass more quickly if he had some friends among these men. The concept was still somewhat foreign to him, but he thought he could adapt.

  He ate breakfast with them without talking much, but he enjoyed listening to their conversation. The eastern sky was gray and the men were about to head for the wagons to claim their axes for the day when Colonel Welles came riding up.

  Immediately, the colonel singled out Davis and called his name. He swung down from the big chestnut and walked up to Davis, leading the horse.

  "I'm aware that there was more trouble last night," he said without preamble.

  Davis nodded warily. "Some." His old habit of being close-mouthed was still with him, especially at times like this.

  "Conn told me that you severely injured Hedge and Johnson."

  "I was defending myself."

  Bill Grimsby put in, "That's right, Colonel. I saw most of the ruckus myself."

  Welles silenced him with a look. "Thank you, Mr. Grimsby, but this is between Davis and myself."

  "I didn't do anything wrong," Davis said. His chin lifted slightly in defiance.