Wreaths of Glory

by Johnny D. Boggs

  Chapter

  Twenty-Four

  BEANS THE BUTCHER IS DEAD!

  JOYOUS NEWS OF FEDERAL VICTORY.

  DETAILS OF FIGHT AT NEGRO FARM.

  MISSOURI RUFFIAN KILLS FOUR

  BEFORE HAIL OF LEAD FELLS

  THE NOTORIOUS FIEND!

  HIS HEAD RETURNED TO LAWRENCE;

  HIS BODY DRAGGED BEHIND FOR MILES.

  TRAITOROUS WENCH RETURNED TO LAWRENCE,

  WHERE SHE IS JAILED.

  SEARCH FOR QUANTRiLL CONTINUES.

  * * * * *

  Alistair folded the Topeka newspaper. He couldn’t read the article.

  Father Finnian Molony reached over, picked up the paper, and tucked it underneath his arm. The priest frowned, and said: “I am truly sorry for your loss, my son.”

  “He wasn’t a butcher,” Alistair said.

  “Of course not. And not everyone in Kansas is like Senator Lane, or that girl’s father.”

  Alistair looked up.

  The priest smiled. “You spoke a lot in your sleep.”

  Alistair still wasn’t exactly sure how he had got here. Apparently, after the Federals had gunned down Beans Kimbrough, and ridden back to Lawrence, Dilly and Reginald had dug Alistair out of the collapsed soddy. Somehow, they had managed to haul him all the way to Spring Hill, Kansas.

  “This paper is a week old,” Father Molony said. “More recent news might ease the burden you feel, my son. This girl, Miss Shea, has been released from jail. Her mother has taken her back inside her home. She is now known as a heroine, that she saved many lives during Quantrill’s butch—” The priest stopped himself, smiled apologetically, and said: “Raid.”

  Alistair stared at the wallpaper. “It was butchery, Father.”

  “Would you like me to hear your confession, my son?”

  “I’m not Catholic, Father. I’m Baptist.”

  “We all have weaknesses.”

  Alistair smiled. He looked back at the priest, who matched his grin. “I am told that Baptists eat very well.” Rising from the rocking chair by Alistair’s bed, he moved to the dresser, uncorked a wicker-wrapped bottle, and filled two goblets with red wine. “But we Catholics …” He handed Alistair one of the glasses.

  Alistair took a sip, but no more. “Maura did save a lot of lives in Lawrence,” he said. “I tried to save her father’s life.”

  “And he shot you for it.” Father Molony could be as blunt as a sledgehammer, too. “My son, I have been in Kansas since ’56, working for the Underground Railroad. I saw John Brown. I saw border ruffians. I have seen Jennison and Lane and Quantrill and Shea. Ruthless, vindictive thieves. Some do right. Many others do wrong, but shield themselves with a righteous cause. War brings out the best in some people, an unholiness in others.”

  “I fall in the latter category.” He tried the wine again.

  “From what I hear … well, from what I suspect … you, too, had a hand in saving lives at Lawrence.”

  He didn’t want to hear any of that. “Father, I am eighteen years old, and I’ve probably killed twenty men. Maybe more. And I’ve had a hand in the deaths of hundreds of others.”

  “Listen …”

  “Some of those men I killed had surrendered, or been captured. They weren’t even armed.”

  “Forgiveness is yours for the asking.”

  “What about Beans Kimbrough?”

  The priest set his goblet on the floor, reached over, gripped Alistair’s forearm. “From what Reginald told me when he brought you here, he died to save the lives of you, Miss Shea, Reginald, and Dilly. There is no greater sacrifice.”

  “Like Jesus?”

  Father Molony’s eyes twinkled, and, after patting Alistair’s arm, he leaned back. “My son, I am not quite sure that I would put Beans Kimbrough up there with the Son of God.”

  Alistair wanted to laugh, but wasn’t sure he remembered how.

  They talked some more, about Spring Hill, the mission here, about Clay County, everything and anything other than the war. When Alistair tried to rise out of bed, however, he only managed to spill red wine all over the fine blanket.

  Father Molony picked up the empty goblet, and pulled back the blanket, saying: “It’s all right.”

  “It’s not all right!” Alistair snapped. “I’m a Partisan Ranger. I ought to be fighting you.”

  “I’m no soldier. I am not your enemy.”

  “Neither was Lucy or Cally. You damned Yankees murdered six girls.” Alistair decided to turn his rage back to something he had grown to hate. “You crippled my sister. That’s why we came to Lawrence!”

  That was a lie. Quantrill had been considering Lawrence for ages. Which was why he had sent Beans and Alistair to spy on the town. The prison collapse might have been the spark, but the fuel had been soaking in coal oil for months.

  “That was an accident, a terrible disaster, but not murder.”

  “It was murder. They collapsed that building on purpose. They killed a girl that I …” He stopped. Had he loved Lucy Cobb? He couldn’t even remember what she looked like, and then he heard her voice in his head.

  True, they tell us wreaths of glory,

  Evermore will deck his brow,

  But this soothes the anguish only,

  Sweeping o’er our heartstrings now.

  Only, it wasn’t Lucy’s voice, but Maura’s.

  Again, he lashed out at the priest. “There’s no wreath of glory for Beans Kimbrough. Nobody’s crying for him.”

  That priest, confound him, would not be provoked into a fight. He wasn’t fire-and-brimstone like the New Hope parson. He wasn’t easy to rile like Bloody Bill Anderson or George Todd. Instead, the priest again squeezed Alistair’s arm.

  “My son, you are crying for him now.”

  Texas

  Chapter

  Twenty-Five

  How he had ever managed that long ride south he would never understand.

  Father Molony had given him a horse, a twenty-year-old buckskin mare that had a smooth, if ponderous, gait. Anyway, nobody would suspect him of being a bushwhacker riding that old plug, and she had carried him all the way across Kansas and into Cass County, then south into Bates and Vernon Counties.

  Hardly anybody was left in that part of Missouri. He had ridden past burned farms marked only by blackened chimneys. Fields had been abandoned. Sometimes, he would come to an empty home where all that was remained was a dog. Folks had fled in such a hurry, they’d left their hounds behind. Those dogs would wail mournfully as he rode on south.

  He never stopped.

  General Orders Number Eleven had seen to all this.

  After Lawrence, Brigadier General Thomas Ewing had issued the orders, which, for the most part, banished everyone living in Jackson, Cass, and Bates Counties, and part of Vernon County. Oh, from what Alistair had heard, folks who could prove they were loyal to the Union could stay, but, criminy, who could do that? Or, rather, who would do that?

  When the war started, Cass County had twenty thousand residents. Now, perhaps six hundred or so lived there.

  His own home county, Clay, had been spared. More or less. Word had reached him in Spring Hill—how, Alistair did not know, but figured the Catholic priest had a hand in it—that his father had finally abandoned their farm, tired of Yankees paying visits. Likely, Able Gideon Durant didn’t want to get strung up the way Feds had hanged Frank James’ stepfather, so he had moved the family in with Grandma Agnes up in Daviess County. Understandably Cally could get better care in Gallatin than in Centerville, Grandma Agnes being a midwife and healer and all.

  Daviess County lay too far north, and Alistair wasn’t sure he was ready to see his family again. So Alistair had continued south, into Arkansas, then through the Indian Territory, and, finally, took Colbert’s Ferry across the Red River and reached Texas.

>   After Lawrence, Yankees had hit the boys, and poor Missouri families, hard. Orders Number Eleven made things even worse, bringing in more redlegs, who killed old farmers, stole what they could—what hadn’t already been stolen—and ran off widows. It was like Lane and Jennison all over again.

  Instead of helping the people of Missouri, Quantrill and the boys had retreated to Texas. But not before riling Kansans and Federals even more in October by striking Baxter Springs, Kansas. The boys had tried assaulting a little post there called Fort Blair, mostly log cabins and earthen walls, but the Feds had a cannon, so they had managed to hold off the boys. Another bunch of Yankees came in from Fort Scott, however, and Quantrill had caught those by surprise, leaving more than one hundred dead, including the band.

  That’s what Alistair thought about when he heard a horn blaring in the camp along Mineral Creek, less than twenty miles northwest of Sherman. Oll Shepherd stood as sentry, sipping corn liquor from a jug, and aimed a Dragoon at Alistair’s head when he eased the buckskin, by then worn to a nubbin, down the woods road.

  Alistair reined up, staring, not speaking.

  The .44’s barrel dropped like an anvil to Shepherd’s side. “I be damned,” Shepherd said. “Durant, be that you? We figured you dead like Larkin Skaggs.”

  Larkins Skaggs, Father Molony had informed Alistair, had been too drunk to ride off with Quantrill’s men. Federals, or maybe Lawrence citizens, had cut him down, the only bushwhacker killed during the raid.

  Replied Alistair: “Almost.”

  “Reckon you heard about Beans.” Shepherd held up the jug toward Alistair.

  “Yeah.” Ignoring Shepherd’s offering, Alistair eased the old mare past him, and headed toward the picket line of horses.

  * * * * *

  He tethered his horse, leaving the saddle and blanket drying underneath an elm, then making his way into camp, an ugly conglomeration of tents, picket houses, shacks, huts, trash, and drunks. Whoever had been tooting that horn had stopped. The camp almost fell quiet, except for a heated exchange in front of a log cabin, the only structure of any substance in the entire compound. Alistair paused, blinking. One of the men yelling, shouting the loudest, in fact, was Quantrill. The other man, George Todd, turned on his heel, right hand gripping the butt of a revolver, and stormed away.

  Quantrill cursed him, then cursed another man who had just walked from the shadows and stood in front of the cabin.

  “I’ll be happy to accommodate you, sir.” It was Bloody Bill Anderson, putting as much contempt into the sir as he could. He tossed a glove at the colonel’s feet

  “You ain’t no leader,” Anderson said. “You ain’t nothin’. Get back inside with your whore. Or make your play.”

  Quantrill started for his revolver, but stopped, staring, maybe sweating. From this distance, Alistair couldn’t really see.

  “I will discipline you later, Anderson.” The door slammed shut behind Quantrill, and, laughing, Anderson bent over for his glove.

  Which is when a large hand pounded Alistair’s back and almost doubled him over. He groaned, bending, grasping at his ribs, feeling the old wound throb.

  “Alistair Durant, by thunder, you do these old eyes a world … Aw, hell, I’m sorry, kid.” Cole Younger eased Alistair up, guided him to a cook fire in front of two huts and a stained, ripped tent. “Boys,” Younger said, “look who has returned from Purgatory.”

  Frank James grinned—it looked like the first time he’d smiled in months—and filled a tin cup with coffee. Younger eased Alistair onto a stump, still mumbling apologies, taking the cup Frank James held, and shoving it into Alistair’s hand.

  “I can sweeten that up for you,” Younger said.

  Alistair tasted the chicory. “No,” he said, “this is fine.”

  “Where you been?” Frank James asked.

  Alistair drank more. “Almost to hell,” he said. “What’s been going on around here?”

  “Welcome to hell.” Younger sank beside Alistair, making himself a cup of coffee. “You know about Beans?”

  “Yeah.”

  Silence.

  “Well?”

  When no one said anything, Alistair said: “I see the temperaments of Todd and Bloody Bill haven’t changed.” He was trying to make a joke, but no one laughed.

  Frank James spit tobacco juice into the fire. “Quantrill and Bloody Bill’s been going at each other. Todd, too. Things been turning bad since …” “Lawrence” went unspoken.

  “My bet is we’ll be splitting up before long,” Younger said. “Some with Quantrill. Some with Anderson. Some with … whoever.”

  Alistair looked at a kid in a bushwhacker shirt staring silently over the flames, wetting his lips, wondering if he should join the conversation. Jim Cummins came over and sat across the fire, but said nothing, nursing a bottle of rye. Alistair looked across the camp at other fires, other faces. “Where’s McCoy?” he asked.

  Younger shook his head.

  “Kennard?”

  “He’s dead, too.” Frank James shifted the tobacco to his other cheek.

  “But you recognize this kid?” Younger leaped up, grabbing the quiet boy’s arm, pulling him to his feet, rushing him closer to Alistair as if he needed spectacles.

  Alistair studied the face. It did look familiar, but he couldn’t place it.

  “Tell him who you are,” Younger said.

  The kid spoke: “Darius Kimbrough.”

  Alistair set the cup down. He tried to swallow, but couldn’t. “What are …?”

  “Yankees killed my brother,” Darius said. “They called him a butcher. They cut off his head. We don’t even know where he’s buried. There’s no monument over my brother’s grave!”

  Frank James spit again. “He made his monument while he lived. Like a lot of our boys.”

  Darius Kimbrough straightened. “I aim to kill as many Yankees as I can. I’ll avenge my brother.”

  Chapter

  Twenty-Six

  Alistair couldn’t finish the chicory. Couldn’t say hardly a word. He rose, stiffly, his chest still hurting, and walked toward the cabin.

  “Where you going?” Cole Younger called out.

  “Best tell the colonel I’m here,” he said.

  “What for?” Cummins slurred bitterly.

  * * * * *

  The cabin door was open, and Quantrill was outside again, holding a goblet of wine in one hand, shaking the other at Lieutenant William Gregg. “And where do you think you’ll be going, Mister Gregg?”

  “Shelby maybe. Some other command. I don’t want to be shot in the back.” His eyes narrowed. “By my own men. Or my commanding officer.”

  “Then be gone, and good riddance.” Wine sloshed across Quantrill’s shirt front, and he flung the goblet to the carpet of pine needles on the ground. “I …” He saw Alistair then, and raced past Gregg, running, smiling, his eyes even welling with tears. He stopped, breathing heavily, then reached out and pulled Alistair to him, kissing both cheeks, then pushing Alistair back an arm’s length, staring.

  “I feared you dead.”

  “No, sir.”

  “By Jehovah, you are a blessing to a weary heart. Come!” He put his arm around Alistair, and guided him past William Gregg, who did not speak, nor was spoken to, and into the cabin. The door shut behind him, and Alistair stared at the lavish plunder.

  Oh, the cabin was only one large room, but a four-poster canopied bed stood in one corner. There were trunks, cabinets, even a lawyer’s bookcase filled with volumes, the top covered with wine and champagne bottles, whiskey bottles, crystal glasses, china, silver. In the center, a woman in a blue satin dress sat at a cherry table covered with china, crystal, and plenty of food. Woman? Hell, she was barely in her teens.

  “Alistair Durant, meet Kate Clarke, my wife.”

  She glanced at him timidly, t
hen stared at the carrots and venison on her plate. She looked like a Missouri farm girl all dolled up.

  “Come, sit, dear lad, sit.” Quantrill dragged a chair across the earthen-packed floor to the table, waited until Alistair was seated, then looked around. “Damnation, this bottle of wine is empty.” He hurried to a cupboard, looked, grabbed a china cup, filled it with something from a crystal decanter, brought it over, and set it in front of Alistair. “Eat. Eat. You are thin as a sapling, and pale as cotton. Drink. This is a most excellent brandy. Well, the best one can find in a place devoid of civilization.”

  Alistair glanced around the cabin. “You seem to have done all right,” he said.

  Laughing, Quantrill slipped into his plush chair. The girl, Kate Clarke, still stared at her food, head bowed, unmoving.

  “Hard times have befallen our lot,” Quantrill said, filling a tumbler with brandy. “Hard times, indeed. Some are near mutiny. So it is divine intervention that you arrive at this time, Alistair. I need loyal men. Men who do their duty to me. Like you have always done. Like Beans Kimbrough, God rest his martyred soul.” Quantrill sipped brandy himself, then laughed. “But I will fight without Todd and Gregg and Anderson. I have not forgotten that those Kansas scoundrels killed my arthritic brother Franklin. I shall never forget how they treated Beans the Butcher Kimbrough in death. I had …”

  Alistair lowered the cup. “I thought his name was Thomas Henry?”

  Quantrill stopped, stared.

  “Your brother,” Alistair explained. “The one the jayhawkers killed.”

  The colonel’s eyes changed. “Thomas Henry was my father’s name. I would not ever mourn his passing. My father, that pathetic …” He stopped himself, smiled. “You are mistaken, lad. My brother’s name is … was … Franklin. Drink. Drink and eat. We have much to discuss.”

  Maybe. Alistair couldn’t be certain. These days, he hardly recalled his own name. He brought the china cup to his lips, started to taste the brandy, then lowered it. He stared, and his hand started shaking. He set the cup on the linen tablecloth. His heart pounded.