Zach could make himself comfortable anyplace like that, David thought. He’d enjoy this scene, the split log huts, built for just a few months use but fixed as cozy and homelike as the men could make them, firewood stacked outside and walls papered with illustrated pages showing through the open doors. He could write him that evening, maybe enclose a small sketch of the decorated roofs—
No! Dammit, what was he thinking of? He’d come down here to break himself of Zach. And Zach had let him know their friendship was over, in any case.
“Is something wrong, Mr. Carter?” David started at Matthews’ high, youthful voice, suddenly aware of the young reporter standing anxiously at his elbow. He shook his head, glad to be distracted. Several of the soldiers were staring at him with expressions of amused curiosity.
“No, everything’s fine.” He managed a smile, nodded at the curious soldiers. “I was just reminded of something. I guess we’d best be getting back before it’s too dark to see.”
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
“Sure, if it ain’t our Special Artist! Where’s your chicken?”
“My what?” David stared back at the husky infantryman sitting in front of the hut topped with the sketch of the prizefighters.
The soldier grinned. “Your chicken. The little feller who was here with you the other night.”
“He’s— I don’t know what you mean.” David shifted his feet nervously, clutching his sketchpad tighter under his arm.
“Pretty young lad like that. Ain’t he your chicken?” Christ. He didn’t imagine— “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I just met him—”
“Hey, don’t let Pete here rile you.” A lanky redhead stepped from the doorway, grinning at David from a face spattered with freckles. “That’s just army lingo. Now him and me’s been tentin’ together since we joined up, so I call him my old woman, makin’ me the old man. If you’re from Marblehead like us, your chum’s your chicken, ‘specially if he’s a young feller like that.”
“Oh. He’s gone to try and talk Meade into letting him ride along on a scout.” David hesitated, then lowered himself onto a log. He rubbed his chin where the itchy stubble of a new beard was growing in. “How long since you enlisted?”
“Be three years come May.” The redhead sat on the doorsill. “Five months and two days till we’re mustered out. And then this here army won’t see us for our dust. Ain’t that right, old woman?” He nudged his partner with an elbow and grinned again.
“Damn right. Goddamn generals use up men like turkeys at a shootin’ match and what in hell for? This here’s the same ground we fought over back in May. Now they’re sayin’ Lincoln’s gonna put Grant over us. Ain’t gonna make a blame bit of diffrence. He’ll be the same as the others, hold the life of a private soldier ‘bout as much account as one of the baggage mules. It’s gettin’ out I am while my hide’s still in one piece.”
“I don’t blame you.”
The soldier grunted. He clamped a pipe between yellow-stained teeth and shoved tobacco into the bowl with a thick forefinger. He groped in his pocket for a match, then removed the pipe a moment. “Saw you lookin’ at our pitcher when you was here before. Might not look like much to an artist like you, but it suits us fine.”
David smiled. “Were you prizefighters before you joined up?”
“Sure were.” The redhead grinned. “Leastways, we had us a couple matches apiece. Pete here won us a five dollar gold piece once. We’re sparring partners, see, ever since we were boys. So we made up our minds to keep helpin’ each other out and split our winnings.
“Pete even got himself his name in the paper that time. Hey, how ‘bout you drawing Pete and me for the illustrated? That’s Pete Moran, and I’m Colin Kelley. Kelley with two e’s.” He grinned again, with a sudden hint of shyness. “I got a girl back home. I’d kinda like for her to see it.”
“Sure.” David flipped his pad open to a clean page, past sketches of infantrymen drilling, sutlers’ wagons, camp barbers and mess call. “Only I don’t know how many pictures of camp my editor’ ll be willing to print.”
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
David stretched out on his cot, watching Al Matthews shave—mostly for show, David suspected. Still, Al never skipped a day. He wet his brush in the washbasin and began lathering up with his usual elaborate care. That water’s probably freezing, David thought. He stroked his own new growth. “Why put yourself to all that bother out here in the middle of an army camp? Anyway, beards are the fashion now.”
Al shrugged. “I’d sooner be clean shaven,” he said mildly.
“Well, I guess it’s none of my affair.” David got up and walked over to Al, peered over his shoulder into the glass. His hair was still the dark blond it had been from boyhood, but the new growth of beard was coming in a soft, decided gray. He fingered it again, smiling ruefully. “I’m growing old,” he said.
Al scraped the last bit of lather from his chin. “Nonsense. You don’t look a bit old.” He turned to examine David. “It’s not gray, anyway. More of a silver. Let me see.” He reached up and put a hand on David’s cheek, ran his fingers down along his jawline. “Yeah, it’s silver all right. I think you look very handsome bearded.”
David flushed and pulled back. “Well, thanks. I—we’d best get downstairs before they drink up all the Christmas punch.” He hurried down to the smoky parlor.
“Looks like we’re about to have this celebration preserved for posterity,” Ed Forbes said, winking at David. David turned. Alex Gardner, a one-time assistant to Brady, was setting up the cumbersome photographic equipment he lugged in his “what’s-it” wagon.
“If you’ll gather round the punch bowl, gentlemen,” Gardner directed.
Ed grinned. “Might as well have another glass apiece while we’re waiting.” They stood watching Gardner group the correspondents, peering each time through his camera lens, then making minute adjustments to his tripod.
“Here, you from the Herald. Suppose you stand behind the bowl like this.” Gardner waved the Boston reporter to a spot between the two solemn black servants. “And let’s have the little fellow up front here.” He tugged Al Matthews into place. “There. Now everyone stay put.”
The Herald reporter raised his glass. “I propose a toast. To a swift and victorious conclusion to this noble struggle! And a swift, telegraphic route for all our dispatches!”
“Hear! Hear!” Glasses clinked. Gardner pressed his camera shutter, admonishing his subjects to hold still. Al came up to David and Ed Forbes. “An A-number-1 device, the camera. You ever worry the photographers will take the livelihood away from you artists?” As if he didn’t have worries enough. “Not unless they can come up with a way to capture their subjects in motion,” David said.
Ed grinned. “By that time I’ll be earning my living from the sale of my paintings, which will hang in none but the finest galleries.” He winked broadly and headed toward the punch bowl.
The posing correspondents broke into groups of twos and threes, returning to their usual pursuits of drinking, smoking, cards and gossip, reminding David once again of Pfaff’s and the evenings spent there with Zach. He rose. “Colin Kelley and Pete Moran are stuck on guard duty,” he told Al. “I guess I’ll ride on out there, take them a drop of punch.”
“Mind if I tag along? I’d like to get a look at the picket line.”
David smiled. “Not if you give me a hand getting saddled.”
They rode slowly, following the directions Colin had given David, letting the horses pick their way in the gathering dusk till they came to the brush lean-to Union pickets had built against a fence. They tied the horses a few yards away.
Pete was stirring the contents of an iron kettle that simmered on a fire a few feet from the shelter. Al sniffed appreciatively. “Mmmn! Rabbit stew! You trap it out here?”
“Didn’t have to. Bought it off of Johnny Reb for a week’s coffee ration.”
“You did what?” David asked.
Pete grinned. “Trad
ed with the Reb pickets. One of them’s a damn fine hunter. Sure and we’ve got ourselves a sight better Christmas dinner than the mess the camp cooks are dishing up.”
“Good Lord!” David looked around apprehensively.
“It’s nothin’ to get rattled about,” Colin said, stepping from the shelter. “They’re in no more hurry to trade shots than me and my old woman here.”
“Oh. Well, here.” David pulled the flask of punch from his pocket. “Merry Christmas.”
“Thanks. Hey, sit down and warm yourselves. Dinner’s just ‘bout ready.”
“This puts me in mind of home,” Al said as they dug into plates of the savory stew. “My oldest brother was always a good hand at bringing home rabbit meat. Ma used to fix it this way, too, with plenty of onions and salt.”
David smiled. “Well, it’s certainly a lot different from any Christmas I remember.” He looked at the three other men sitting on logs pulled close to the fire. The quiet of the surrounding darkness was broken only by animal cries and the noises of the horses, though the Secesh pickets couldn’t be far away. Colin handed him the flask. He took a long swallow and passed it to Al.
“It’s nothing like Christmas at home. Or at my brother’s house up in Boston either. Of course it’s a lot different for his family this year too. Mike’s an army doctor now; he’s at a hospital in Washington City. And my nephew—his oldest son, that is—was captured by the Rebs. He’s in a prison in South Carolina.”
“Yeah? That’s a shame,” Pete said. “What’s his regiment?”
“Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts.”
“Fifty-Fourth! A nigger regiment!” The two Massachusetts soldiers stared at David in surprise. “He’s an officer like his pa, huh?”
“An—” Hell, David thought. Of course they’d know the Fifty-Fourth. He doubted there was anyone in the state of Massachusetts who hadn’t heard of the first regiment of colored volunteers. Or who didn’t know that only whites served as commissioned officers in the colored regiments—doctors and chaplains excepted.
He was damned if he felt like explaining how he happened to have a colored half-brother. Well, Peter had made sergeant before his capture. “Yeah, he’s an officer.”
“Then the Rebs’ll treat him better than if he was just an enlisted man,” Colin said. “Only thing, if he was leading nigger troops like that, they might be harder on him just to make an example—” Colin stopped. A flush spread over his freckles, visible even in the firelight. “Hey, listen. I shoot my mouth off too much. He’ll be okay.”
There was a long moment of silence. “Now Pete and me,” Colin said at last, “we’re used to roughing it for Christmas. This here’s our third one since we joined up. But next year ain’t gonna be like this. We’ll be outta the army and back home. And my girl and me, Rosie, that’s her name, we’ve been writin’ each other regular and we’re kinda thinkin’ ‘bout tying the knot.” He gave an embarrassed grin.
“Anyways, next Christmas her and me’ll be together. Course even if we do get hitched by then, I figger we’ll have to live with her mother and father till I can put enough by for a place of our own, but....”
David’s attention wandered as Colin talked of the Christmas dinner he and Rosie would share with her family. What would he be doing in a year’s time? Well, if—God willing—the war was over by then, he’d like as not spend it with his father and Mike’s family. He didn’t have anyone else to go home to.
Hell, here he was feeling sorry for himself when he could be a lot worse off. Look at Zach. He hadn’t seen his family in years. Who was he spending Christmas with? Still, Zach would be all right. He had enough old friends in New York. That Byron Roosa, for instance. They might even have rekindled—
Stop it! David told himself. He forced his thoughts back to the circle of firelight, listening as Colin shared his plans for the future. They mopped their empty plates with fresh cornbread and washed down the dinner with strong, hot coffee, parting with a final exchange of Christmas wishes.
“Reckon marriage is all right for him,” Al said, after they’d ridden in silence a few minutes, “but I’m in no hurry to settle down. I aim to make a name for myself first. Though I wouldn’t mind having a family after that. How about you?”
“What about me?”
“You’re awful close-mouthed about yourself. Do you have any family besides your father and brother?”
“Some cousins. They didn’t live too far from these parts, but I’ve lost track of them since the war started.”
“No wife and children though?”
“Oh. No, I’m afraid I’m just an old bachelor.”
“Not all that old. How come you never married?” David shrugged, then realized Al couldn’t see him in the dark. “I don’t know. I guess I just never had the inclination.”
“Still, I don’t see how you kept from it.”
“What do you mean?”
“A good-looking man like you. You must’ve had to fight off the ladies.”
“I—” David paused, startled by the teasing lilt in Al’s voice. Hell, he thought, if he was a girl, I’d swear he was flirting with me. What in hell’s wrong with me? What in God’s name am I imagining? “I’m afraid I’ve never been much of a lady killer,” he said at last.
Chapter 16 — 1864
THE DOOR TO DAVID’S BEDCHAMBER CREAKED OPEN. He turned over sleepily, smiling at the shuffle of Zach’s footsteps as he picked his way softly across the floor. An anticipatory ripple of pleasure ran through him. “You’re not still mad, Zach? God, I’ve missed you.” He slid to the edge of the bed to make room. A thought surfaced: “Did you turn the lock? We don’t want anyone surprising us.”
“Beg pardon? I didn’t mean to wake you.”
David woke. He stared groggily at the blanket-wrapped figure across the dark attic room. “Al? I— I must’ve been dreaming.” He shivered and pulled the covers tighter around his shoulders, marveling sleepily at the modesty that drove Al down two flights of stairs to an icy outhouse rather than use the chamberpot in the room.
Of course he’d been dreaming, confusing Al’s footfalls with Zach’s. God, what in hell had he said? “I guess I was talking in my sleep,” he muttered.
“Reckon.” Al’s voice was muffled by the blanket he’d pulled over his head after sinking back onto his cot. He couldn’t have made sense of what he’d heard, David assured himself. He sighed, wishing he could return to the dream. Forget it, he told himself. Anyhow, if Zach were in anyone’s bed, it was likely to be Byron’s.
He tried to thrust the thought from his mind. The room was too cold to return to sleep. His feet stuck out of the skimpy blanket; the chill crept through his long underwear. David drew up his knees, flexing his toes in an effort to warm them. He stared at the gray, predawn dimness, wishing it was time to get up. Sketching might keep his mind off—
“I’ll be glad to see warmer weather,” David said aloud. “My fingers are so damn stiff I can scarcely hold my pencil.”
“You said it,” Al replied. “I’ll be darn glad to have done with this waiting for the war to start up again.”
David shuddered. “I’m not eager for that. I’d sooner draw the men in camp than fighting.” He gazed curiously in the direction of Al’s cot. “Have you ever seen anyone die in battle?”
“Sort of. We’ve had skirmishes in Missouri since the war started; Independence isn’t far from the Kansas border. One of our neighbors was hung by some of Quantrill’s band last summer—after they raided Lawrence and burned the town. He’d called them a pack of murderers, not soldiers at all. I sent an account of it to the Republican and the editor printed it. It was pretty sad. His wife and kids found him in the morning. They were sobbing and carrying on. We had to cut him down, get him buried. I don’t reckon on fainting or anything.”
“It’s not the— Well, I guess there’s no sense dwelling on it now,” David said. He sighed and shifted position, trying to keep the covers around him.
“Reckon what I’d d
o if I was in your shoes,” Al said suddenly, “is go on home and visit a spell. Bound to be more comfortable than what this is.”
“I suppose I could, though I already spent a week there, after New Year’s. Dad wanted me to stay through the winter, but Alexandria’s pretty grim since it’s been occupied. I’d just as soon put up with the cold here in camp.
“Anyhow, there’s not really room. My father’s putting up two officers in my old bedroom. I had to share a bed with Dad when I was up there.”
Al yawned. “Well, bunking down together’s one way to keep warm, at any rate. Colin Kelley told me the soldiers do it all the time. Spread their rubber blankets underneath and lie together with double blankets on top, snug as a bug in a rug. I don’t suppose—” He broke off abruptly, gave another mighty yawn. “I’m too tired to go on chatting like this. Reckon I’ll go back to sleep.”
David closed his eyes. God, it would be good to sleep that way. He opened them before Zach’s image could tease him again and lay staring toward the ceiling. Al’s breathing sounded with soft rhythm across the room. Maybe they should pull their cots together, David thought sleepily, huddle under the covers and share their warmth. He imagined Al’s curly head resting against his shoulder, his breath warm against his neck. It wasn’t a bad notion. It would be a lot less lonely way to pass the night, at any rate. Not like lying with Zach, but still—
Christ, had he taken leave of his senses? He lay still, willing himself to think of something else, smiling finally at the notion of Colin and Pete bunking together—and as like as not sparring away in their sleep.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
January, February and the better part of March of 1864 had gone by, and the army was still in winter quarters. On March 9th, Ulysses S. Grant was appointed by Lincoln to the newly created rank of lieutenant general, and placed in command of the Union armies. A day later, General Grant reviewed the Army of the Potomac and promised to establish his headquarters in the field, near Culpeper Court House, rather than at the War Department in Washington City.
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