Hollow Tree

by Ian Neligh

  Butler hadn’t come to a solid conclusion—but he pressed his finger onto the soft computer touch screen anyway.

  A pleasant male voice with a hint of the Old West chirped to life, drowning out all of the other sounds.

  “All rightey, partners. Passengers, climb aboard and buckle up. Transit operator, please proceed to the operator’s booth in the front of the train to begin traveling procedures. All people are reminded to bring eye protection. While the train is heat resistant, the viewing windows may not protect you from those gol darn UV rays.”

  Butler ran to the train, grabbed a helmet from the wall, and looked around. He hit the “Activate” button at the front of the train. The doors closed and the interior pressurized. The car jerked forward and began rolling down the tracks, leaving the station behind. It was almost too good to be true; he was finally leaving.

  Just before the train left the facility and he slipped on his helmet, he thought he caught a glimpse of a woman with dark hair. She wore a tan suit and watched him from the platform. Then she was gone, his helmet was on, the train picked up speed, and the world filled with light.

  One

  January 1862

  For ten miles, 2nd Lt. Jacob H. Casey wondered if he was already dead. Shoeless, he trudged through knee-deep Virginian snow, without direction or purpose. Despite this, he continued to move, certain if he stopped to rest, he would freeze or finally succumb to starvation. His long blond hair hung carelessly in front of his eyes, matted with dried blood and dirt.

  Early on in the week he had identified the irony of his predicament. Those who deserted the army were immediately condemned to death by hanging or firing squad. He, on the other hand, had chosen a slow death from exposure to the elements. He laughed at this. With dazed blue eyes, he scanned the horizon. The snowy hills were covered in bunches of shortleaf pine and bigtooth aspen.

  A type of round, leafless bush jutted from the snow every few feet. They gave Jacob the impression that he was wandering through a giant graveyard. He’d never seen as many dead men as he had in the last year—he doubted anyone ever had.

  Before the war, he’d been a teacher in Maine and enjoyed the study of flora and fauna. Thinking about life before the war kept his mind busy. Awake and thinking was how he had been able to keep himself sane—if so bold a word could still be applied to him.

  He dared not sleep unless exhaustion overtook him. With sleep came the nightmares of battle. The sights of his former students lying in piles of their own limbs kept his bloodshot eyes from closing. The horrific imagery wove a sticky tapestry throughout his resting mind, serenaded by the sounds of grown men screaming like animals. Just like animals.

  He shook his head, trying to clear it. He must remember the five of them, and trying to do so had already cost him everything. Wind blew frosty clouds off the fresh snowdrifts. It whistled over the ground, reshaping parts of the terrain.

  Jacob hiked up a random valley, hoping to find shelter for the evening. Hobbling, he made his way to a large boulder. Finding the side out of the wind, he slipped on the wet ground and collapsed. His shoes had worn away to nothing weeks ago, and he tried to rub the warmth back into his feet. He wrapped them in rags now—anything to keep them protected from the snow and rocks. He closed his eyes and leaned back against the stone. Something was wrong with the whole world, he thought. It spun around and around on a madman’s finger. The nation was tearing itself apart like a pack of rabid dogs.

  He had joined to keep an eye on his students, out of a fatherly obligation he had developed for them over the years since he’d become a new teacher. But when they all died, there was no reason for him to stay with the army. When the last one had succumbed to a rifle, falling back, the boy pulled with him part of Jacob’s soul, clenched tight in dirty fingers. There, in the middle of the fight for Fredericksburg on Marye’s Heights, he became afraid to die.

  Standing frozen as men raced up and bullets raced down, Jacob turned and watched a boy die. Men screamed and rifle shots flattened into the ground around him. His gaze moved to the rest of the Union Army as they continued to march on. Mortars landed in the blue and silver line, clearing giant swaths of men from the ground like dead leaves. And yet the line marched on, and the guns kept firing.

  Jacob awoke. A thick layer of snow covered his arms and legs. Brushing himself off, he turned to look around and came face-to-face with another man. Eyes wide open in silent horror, the man lay frozen to the side of the boulder.

  “Well now, Reb,” Jacob said, eyeing the dead soldier in gray, too tired to care or move. “Honestly, I didn’t expect to find you way up here.”

  The snow began to fall faster. Large, heavy flakes clung to his eyelashes. The dead man was buried in snow up to his waist. Jacob had been so tired when he’d reached the spot he hadn’t noticed the man.

  It wasn’t unusual to find the dead miles from a battlefield. Men died on marches, got shot for cowardice, or were ambushed on their way to kill someone else.

  “It looks like we’re in for some nasty weather,” Jacob said, looking up at the sky. After a moment he added, “I don’t suppose you would loan me your shoes would you?”

  He pushed on the corpse in an attempt to lean it over and get at the shoes. It didn’t budge. He pushed harder at the body, and all of a sudden it came free from the snow, but there was no bottom half to the man.

  Jacob scrambled back from the grisly scene and stood. He stared around him for the first time and saw there were others. Hidden under drifts of snow, their faces were half-covered. His apathy turned to revulsion and finally to fear. A stinging wind blew down the mountainside, lifting the veil of snow from a man not three feet from where he stood. An officer in full regalia, boots and jacket. The man was missing his head.

  Jacob couldn’t begin to imagine what had happened. He checked the dead soldiers for shoes and found a pair that were too small, but he chose them for their good shape. He knocked the ice off on a nearby tree and slipped them over his feet. He put on the officer’s jacket and gloves, then used a broken sword to cut strips of cloth for kindling, which he put in a makeshift carryall. As he worked, he stole glances over his shoulder. Maybe, he thought, it had been some sort of munitions accident.

  He looked around for their weapons and didn’t find any. By a stunted tree he saw the remains of a half-melted fork, evidence that they were melting down real silverware collected from some farm to be used as shot in their small arms. Finished working, he stood, looking into the surrounding hills. It would be dark soon. He didn’t want to set up camp anywhere near this site. The former teacher, former soldier set off walking again, this time with purpose. But damned if he knew what it was. One thing was certain: he probably wouldn’t have seen another day if he hadn’t come across the dead men. Perhaps the Confederate soldiers had been caught in a storm and ravaged by some sort of animal after they perished?

  Jacob traversed the slope to its frozen ridge. There, he paused, breathing deeply, and looked out over the wilderness. As far as the eye could see, there were nothing but snow-speckled trees on rolling hills, valleys, and ridges. Eating a handful of snow for the water, Jacob looked to where he’d last seen the dead men. The site lay almost obscured in shadows cast by the sinking sun.

  Two

  He opened his eyes. Light glittered in through layers of pine needles and snow. It was morning; he had slept the night under a tree. It was the best night of sleep he’d had in weeks. Truly, he thought, it was no comparison to his bed at home. Home, where Connie waited. Jacob knew he could never return to his wife. His hands shook, and blood that was not his own lined their creases. He would never allow Connie to see what he had become. A coward and a monster. She was better left thinking he had died with his students. He remembered her red hair and smile and got up again to begin walking nowhere.

  The day was hard, and his renewed energy drained out onto the ground beneath his feet. He almost sat down to rest several times, but he knew this time there would be no getting
back up. The day passed and he walked. Nearing a patch of dead trees on the southwest side of a steep hill, he paused to eat another handful of snow, when he smelled smoke. A surge of sudden emotion filled his empty senses. He laughed out loud, startling a bird in a nearby tree. Moving faster now, he began trying to find its source. He tripped over a branch, scampered back to his feet, stopped, and changed direction. Down by a frozen creek he saw the flickering of flame. A campfire. He stumbled into the clearing and saw the crackling yellow blaze, with supplies and food. No one was in sight.

  “State your intentions,” came a voice off to his right. Jacob turned, on the verge of tears, and saw a man eyeing him down the barrel of a Whitworth rifle.

  “To warm myself a bit,” Jacob said, keeping his hand away from his pistol. “I guess.”

  “Where’s your regiment, soldier?” the man asked.

  Despite himself, Jacob laughed. “Sir, I suspect about three weeks to the east.”

  The rifle lowered ever so slightly. Below a stern gaze the man wore a thick black beard. He had the look of a trapper or a mountain man dressed in hides.“You run?” he asked.

  “I did, sir.”

  The man shook his head disapprovingly.

  “The name’s Matthew Barret,” he said after a long moment.

  “Mr. Barret, I am pleased to meet you. My name is Jacob Casey.”

  The man nodded again, his rifle lowering further.

  “I ’spect you want something to eat?” he asked.

  “I would like that very much,” Jacob said.

  “Soon as you drop that Colt Army on the ground there, we can talk about maybe getting you some food.”

  Jacob looked down at his pistol. It had been a gift from his wife. She had spent more than she should have on it. He looked back up to Barret.

  “No, sir, I think I’ll hang onto it for a while longer,” he said.

  The man raised his rifle back up.

  “I could shoot you down if you don’t drop that pistol,” he said evenly.

  “Indeed you could,” Jacob allowed.

  For a moment he expected to see his life end in a roar of thunder and smoke. Then, surprising him, Barret shouldered his rifle.

  “Don’t look like you’re in much shape to use that sidearm nohow,” the man said, motioning to the fire. “Have a seat.”

  Jacob watched him for a moment to see if he would change his mind. When he didn’t, Jacob limped over to the fire and took a seat on a log already cleared of snow. The heat, something he thought he would never feel again, brought life back into his body.

  Barret fiddled with some of his gear to the side of the fire, then took a seat across from him, resting the rifle across his knees. The trapper offered him biscuits, dried bacon, and a cup of coffee, which Jacob took gratefully in his trembling hands.

  “Where you from, soldier?” Barret asked, watching him over the dancing flames.

  “Maine.” Jacob started shoveling food into his mouth, ignoring that Barret had intentionally called him a soldier.

  Barret grunted in response.

  “Where are you from, mister?” Jacob asked.

  “I come from the old country,” Barret said.

  “You don’t seem to have an accent,” Jacob remarked, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.

  “No, I’ve lived here a long time. Long enough I’d say.”

  Jacob took another sip from his cup, nodding.

  “What do you do for the Confederacy?” Jacob asked.

  Barret looked surprised for a moment, then chuckled.

  “You mean this?” he asked, holding up the Whitworth in the fading light.

  “I have seen enough in the last year to know an issued rifle,” Jacob said.

  “I picked this up from someone looking to trade for jerky outside of Leesburg,” Barret said, putting the rifle back down. “But to be fair, I have done a little scouting for both sides.”

  “What brings you out here?”

  “Headed to Fredericksburg. I travel from one battle to the next,” Barret continued. “All across this damn land— it’s what I do.”

  “Any news of Fredericksburg?” Jacob asked.

  “The worst defeat yet,” the scout snapped. “What did you do in Maine, before the war?”

  “Taught mostly,” Jacob said. “So we lost?”

  Barret watched him closely, then, after several moments, took out a pipe.

  “It ain’t the end of the war by a long shot. Many battles still to go. Thank God there’ll be more. You smoke?”

  Barret asked, packing and lighting his pipe with an ember.

  “I’ve found that I don’t have the constitution for it,” Jacob said. The man’s cavalier attitude about the war made him feel ill at ease.

  Three

  Barret took a series of small puffs and Jacob watched as they sat in silence. Having rested and eaten, he was now able to gather better details of the strange man. Barret had a feral look to him that was hard not to ignore.

  Jacob had spent a year with some of the wildest men to climb and hack their way out of the American frontier, but none of them held a trembling candle to Barret. The giant man seemed to ebb savagery. And, for his part, Barret continued to regard him silently across the crackling fire. If he didn’t know better, the man was on the verge of losing his temper. Jacob began to feel that he might be in danger. A loud snap came from the center of the flames, causing him to flinch.

  “Tell me of yourself, Lieutenant,” Barret said, holding up his index finger. “What brought you so far from home, and why aren’t you going back?” he finished, tracking an invisible compass in the smoky air. “Unless you’re lost. Maine is in the other direction.”

  Jacob hesitated.

  “Please,” the man said, “indulge me. Months in the wilderness drain a man of his ability to understand what it means to be part of society.”

  Jacob put his cup down and spoke of the small schoolhouse on the hill and of the first students as they walked up, books in hand and barefoot. He recounted the children making Christmas decorations. The first dance, the roar of cannons, the spray of dirt, and the gag of fear.

  Jacob finished his story in Fredericksburg. He told the man how he ran to keep the memory and bravery of his students alive. With effort he pulled himself from his memories, which threatened to drown him. The mountain man stared at him through the flames for a moment and made a small choking sound. Then another. His choking turned into laughter.

  “Is that it?” the man wheezed.

  In shock Jacob watched his host fight down his laughter.

  “Is that it?” he asked again.

  Jacob could feel his face reddening.

  “Is what it?”

  “You went through all that so you could remember them?” Barret asked, kicking at the fire with his foot. “Isn’t that what the learned fellas like yerself call irony? All that punishment, just to meet me here in the woods and die?”

  He watched the giant man laugh and bounce his rifle in his lap. The forest seemed to move in around him, trapping him with the madman. Jacob gasped for breath, the fire’s heat becoming stifling. Barret howled like a dog behind the dancing flames. Jacob, holding his head, clamored to his feet and rapidly began backing away from the fire. Barret stood with him and followed, inching his way around closer.

  “Isn’t it only right the teacher follow his students to the grave?” Barret said with mock sorrow. “The children who pulled you away from home to see them die?”

  Jacob put his right hand on his pistol. Barret hesitated, then looked up, smiling again.

  “No, rather it was you who rallied them off to war, wasn’t it?” the scout said. “They followed you to their deaths, and once they were all dead, you ran.”

  “Liar,” Jacob screamed, pulling the colt from his holster. For the briefest moment Jacob thought he might stick the pistol to his own head. He blinked in surprise when he fired his last two bullets into Barret’s chest. The reports deafened him and filled the air betwee
n them with smoke.

  Staggered, the big man stopped, looked down at the two holes, and dropped his rifle. In the cold air steam rose from the bullet wounds. Barret then backed up into the dark of the woods. Jacob watched him until only the man’s eyes were visible. They seemed to take on the yellow of the fire. Jacob blinked and they were gone. His gun dropped from his fingers to the dirt. He went for the discarded rifle and tripped over the man’s personal effects. At his feet was an uncovered collection of Confederate-issued pistols and rifles.

  He dug through them and found a pistol still loaded. He had to kill Barret. Jacob didn’t know how the scout had killed all those soldiers he had come across earlier. He did know if he killed the man everything would be made right. Their deaths, his students’ deaths, and his life. So armed, Jacob stepped into the darkness.

  Moonlight trickled in through the tree canopy, helping him to see the man’s bloody footprints in the snow. He squinted in the darkness, aiming the heavy pistol from one shadow to the next. If he could just finish him off, it would be done. It would all be over.

  He followed the footprints to a heap of bloody clothing. The tracks continued, but they became strange, and the blood trail stopped. Jacob stared hard at the shadows, his mind playing tricks. The darkness stood, walked, and ran from tree to tree. He was delirious, and his mind wasn’t clear, he knew this—and yet he couldn’t find the body. He backtracked to double check the prints. Movement caught his attention, and he jerked the weapon’s cold trigger in response. The gun roared with a blossom of orange light.

  A tree’s flank erupted into splinters. Nothing was there. He made his way to a clearing in the woods and scanned the blue landscape. Nothing but snow and rocks. He almost turned to go, when one of the rocks stood, unfurling itself. Its yellow eyes glittered. It reared on two hind legs, blocking out the moon and the stars.