Echoes of Dark and Light

by Chris Shanley-Dillman

  My nose led me through the dripping pines to a clearing with a ragged log cabin, a small but snug barn and a rectangular kitchen garden put to sleep for the winter. A chicken coop sat tucked behind the cabin with a few hens clucking within, and a thick column of smoke rose from the rock-stacked chimney. The warm scents of baking bread and a hearty stew wafted out from the front door that stood wide open. My eyebrows arched in surprise and I surveyed the clearing from the safety of the forest cover. Most folks kept the door closed in this kind of weather; something was wrong.

  I leaned in a bit, tilting my head to give my ears the best vantage point. Nothing…no wait! A gust of wind carried a faint whimpering.

  “Great,” I grumbled, “more trouble.”

  For a long second, I contemplated the notion of slipping back into the trees and minding my own business, but I quickly pushed that cowardice thought aside. What would my brothers and I have done if Gran had turned her back on us? I couldn’t consciously walk away from someone who might need help, not if I could actually do something.

  “Robert,” I whispered to my brother, hoping he could feel my words, “please hang on, wherever you are. I’m coming, but I need to make a quick stop first.”

  I stashed my pack behind a tree and pulled my Colt out of my waistband. I kept clear of the window and open door, slinking alongside the rough-barked logs. Then I heard a voice.

  “Please, just let us be! We have nothing of value!”

  “Shut your mouth, woman!” A deep, angry voice barked out the order. “And keep that kid quiet! He’s chafing my nerves!”

  I eased around the corner, gun cocked, senses alert. Light from the kitchen hearth flickered out of the doorway and into the yard. I silently moved into the light. A tall, rounded man stood in the middle of the room with his back to me. He wore a ragged Union uniform and cracked boots with detaching soles tied on with leather straps. A musket balanced in the crook of his arm, halfheartedly aimed at the cabin’s residents. An older woman with graying hair pulled loose of its pins stood trembling by the warm fire. In her arms wiggled a one-year-old baby with tears streaming down his cheeks. Two little girls cowered behind the woman’s skirts. In the corner on a bed lay a sick-looking woman, her eyes red-rimmed, her skin pale, a hacking cough shaking her thin shoulders. Then one of the little girls darted out from behind the older woman and aimed a kick at the man’s shins. But before she could inflict any damage, the man backhanded her across the face and she crumpled in a ball on the floor.

  An angry fire exploded in my gut, almost causing me to fire a shot right into the middle of the man’s back. Almost. Instead I yelled, “Drop the musket and turn around!”

  The man’s shoulders stiffened at my voice and he slowly turned, but held on tight to his weapon. As his gaze locked with mine, the ground disappeared beneath me, my heart splattered into a million pieces, my breath caught in my throat as I stared into my own eyes.

  “Pa?”

  His face looked older than I remembered, a lot more than eight year’s worth. Deep lines etched his skin like quotation marks accenting his deep blue eyes, eyes that Robert, Robby and I had all inherited. His red hair lay longer and darker, streaked heavily with gray. Stringy and greasy, it draped his broad shoulders that stretched the seams on his uniform jacket. The sleeves rode a couple of inches above his wrists and the trousers pooled at the tops of his muddy boots.

  “You talk awful big for such a skinny kid,” he continued, not having heard my whispered recognition. He moved to aim his rifle. “You mind repeating your request to my face?”

  I moved quicker, raising my Colt to aim right between his eyes. “You might reconsider dropping your gun; I never miss.”

  He eyed me, weighing his options, contemplating my shooting skills. He wisely lowered his gun.

  My anxiety lowered a notch as well. I hadn’t been bluffing; I could have killed him, and I would have if necessary. But I felt relieved that my first killing of a man wouldn’t be my own father. At least not yet.

  “Is that better,” he sneered.

  “Not good enough. Slide it across the room.”

  As soon as he did so, the older woman handed the crying baby over to the blond girl standing next to her, and rushed to the side of the crumpled girl on the floor. She gathered her up and then all of them hurried over to the bed in the corner, huddling with the pale woman lying there. I squatted down to retrieve his weapon, my eyes never leaving his.

  “Hey pal, listen,” he began, attempting a jovial, friendly tone. “Think it over; let’s work together. There’s plenty chickens for the both of us. Besides, if we combine our efforts, we can search the property for any valuables in half the time—”

  “I already told you,” the older woman broke in, “we don’t own any valuables! The armies already took the horses and cow—”

  “Lady, I ain’t gonna tell you again to keep quiet!”

  I cleared my throat. “Um, seeing as how I’ve got the gun, I think I’ll be giving the orders. And rule number one, quit yelling! Now sit down.” I motioned to a wooden chair by the kitchen table, and then handed the musket over to the older woman.

  He narrowed his blue eyes angrily as he lowered himself into the squeaky chair. As he did so, the light from the fire that he’d been blocking hit me full force. I gratefully moved closer to the warmth, keeping the Colt aimed at him. I watched him studying me in the light.

  “You look kind of familiar. Do I know you?”

  I almost burst out laughing, a combination of taunt nerves and incredible disbelief. “You’re kidding me, right?” I asked as I stuck my free hand closer to the crackling flames.

  “What do you mean?” He rasped his fingers over the red-tipped whiskers.

  “Forget it. Now, what are we going to do with you?” I glanced over my shoulder at the family. “Is there a sheriff in town?”

  “No, wait, I’m positive that I’ve seen you somewhere before. Where? Two summers ago in Ohio? Or maybe five years ago in Canada?”

  “Try looking in a mirror,” I muttered.

  “Huh?”

  “Bloody bollocks, are you stupid or something? You’re my damn pa!”

  The room fell silent except for the baby’s hiccups and the settling of the logs in the fireplace.

  “No kidding,” came his only response.

  I glared at him with hatred, so wanting to pull the trigger, so wanting to inflict some pain on him for once.

  “So,” he mused after a moment, “which one are you?”

  “Which one am I?” My face flushed with rage as I tried to keep my voice from cracking. “You have so many kids that you can’t keep them straight?”

  He shrugged. “There’s a few running around out there.”

  I bit back my temper with a huge effort. “Well, it shouldn’t be that hard to remember as you named all of us the same thing, you conceited, filthy, stinking—”

  “Watch your tone with me, son! And of course, I named ya all after myself. But tell me, ya got my curiosity peaked now. Which one is your ma?”

  “Ella,” I whispered. “Ella Peterson Rivers; she had three children with you; she died giving birth to my little brother.”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, nodding. “I remember her, good cook, that one. So that would make you my oldest boy, Robert Rivers, Junior. Good to see you again, son.”

  I almost corrected him, but then thought better of it. Sure, why not?

  “And if I remember correctly, you had a sister, too.”

  “Roberta,” I growled.

  “Oh, yeah,” he said again. “I wonder what she’s been doing. Probably working in some saloon in New York City by now.” He grinned like he had shared some private joke.

  I’d never come so close to murdering another human being in my life.

  “Mama?” One of the little girls spoke behind me. “Are they going to kill us?”

  Her trembling voice jerked me back to the present. “No,” I murmured, “no one’s gonna be laying a finger on any
of you today. I promise.”

  “You know,” Pa jumped in, “maybe you should reconsider. What do you say, the two of us joining up together, father and son? We’d be unstoppable!” He stood up with his hand out to shake on the deal.

  “Sit down,” I ordered, re-aiming the gun at his chest.

  “Easy there,” he crooned, raising his hands in surrender. “You wouldn’t hurt your own kin now, would you?”

  “You did!” My voice cracked with rage.

  “What are you blabbing about, son?”

  “Don’t ‘son’ me, you abusive bucket of scum! You beat us all to a bruised and bloody pulp!”

  “Now don’t get carried away. Women and children need discipline.”

  “You call that discipline? You beat Ma so bad that she went into early labor and then bled to death. You killed her!”

  My chest heaved for breath, my heart pounded in my ears. When my brothers and I had lived with him, he had us so terrified that just the sight of him, even just the scent or sound of him had me cringing in the corner. Somewhere beneath the raging storm inside of me, I realized that fear had turned to hate.

  Somehow I managed to refrain from killing Pa in that family’s kitchen. Maybe the thought of him suffering on earth a few more years convinced me. I marched him into town and turned him over to the sheriff. Turned out he’d been wanted by the law for robbing the battlefields’ dead and wounded. I’d been right; the Union uniform hadn’t belonged to him. I didn’t ask the sheriff what would happen to him; whatever punishment he suffered wouldn’t be enough. I left with my back ramrod straight, my shoulders set; I didn’t say goodbye or even give him a second glance. I wished I could say the same about second thoughts.

  I returned to the Whitmore family home at their invitation. I didn’t feel like company, but even more, I didn’t want to sleep in the freezing mud.

  By the time I knocked on the now closed door of the Whitmore’s cabin, every inch of my body dripped with rain and goose bumps plastered my skin. The older Mrs. Whitmore dragged me inside and ushered me in the lean-to in order to shuck my wet clothes. I emerged into the warm main room with a worn quilt wrapped around me, and handed the drenched clothes to the eager girls waiting to drape them around the room to dry. The younger Mrs. Whitmore sat silently in her corner bed, her arms wrapped around the baby. A steaming bowl of black bean stew appeared in my numb fingers, and I slowly began to thaw as the rain pelting the window, black with night.

  The two little girls, one with a bruise across her cheek, sat on the floor near me, their eyes wide and curious. Obviously, they’d been warned not to bother me while I ate. As soon as I set the spoon down in the empty bowl, they pounced.

  “Was that man really your pa?”

  “Why didn’t he recognize you?”

  “How come he’s so mean?”

  “Did you get whipped a lot when you was little?”

  “Was your ma nice?”

  “Did your pa really kill your ma?”

  “What’s your sister like?”

  “Does your sister really work in a saloon in New York City?”

  “Girls! Enough! Let the boy breathe. Where are your manners?” Grandma Whitmore scolded as she handed me a steaming cup of mint tea and then dragged a chair over to the fire for herself.

  “It’s okay, really.” I gave a tired smile to the girls.

  “Is he really gone?” came the timid voice of the younger Mrs. Whitmore from the corner bed. “He won’t be coming back?”

  I turned to look at the pale woman, her face thrown into dancing shadows from the fire. “I don’t know what the sheriff plans for him,” I answered honestly. “But I doubt he’ll come back here.”

  The woman sighed a breath of relief.

  “But,” I quickly added, “that doesn’t mean someone else won’t. Desperate folk don’t care about the people they stomp.”

  Fear moved back into her eyes. “What are we to do?” she whispered.

  “Well, for one, you can learn to use that,” I pointed to Pa’s musket still leaning against the wall.

  That night I tossed and turned as I fought demons in my dreams. Nightmares I thought I’d long since outgrown returned in force and I awoke drenched in sweat. My eyes felt puffy and blood hot, and I knew my skin stretched pale over my face with bruised-looking half moons beneath my eyes.

  By the time I finished teaching the Whitmore’s how to use the musket, the sun had moved across the sky looking like a glowing yellow orb behind the thick gray clouds. I said my goodbyes, accepted the package of food, and ducked back into the woods. After reclaiming my pack from the bushes, still relatively dry inside due to the oilskin covering, I made my way back to the road and continued south. I had to be getting close to the front lines. Just the other day, I’d heard faint echoes of battle sounds, including musket shot and cannon fire. I guessed to be somewhere near Knoxville. I loved gazing at the Smoky Mountains; the wispy white clouds embracing the mountaintops eased my racing mind a bit, but I just couldn’t seem to shake the hold that man had thrown back around my heart.

  My feet dragged in the mud as the night’s darkness descended. I figured I try to get in at least another couple of miles or so before bunking down for some sleep. I hoped by then I’d be able to quiet my mind and—

  “Hold it right there!”

  I gasped and spun around to find a rifle aimed at my heart.

  “Put your hands in the air!”

  I stared in shock while trying to swallow my stomach back where it belonged. The fellow at the other end of the rifle stood straight and steady, his eyes in shadow, his mouth held in a hard line, a muscle twitching in his jaw. He wore a navy blue Union uniform, which sorely contradicted his strong southern accent.

  “Do you understand? Put your hands in the air!”

  I’d been so surprised, I hadn’t yet followed through on his demands. Though if he hadn’t had a rifle pointed at me, I wouldn’t care a hoot about his orders. I slowly removed my hands from my pockets and raised them into the chilly air.

  “Now, hand over your weapon.”

  I very reluctantly gave him my Colt, making a mental note to find a more discreet location to store it. The soldier didn’t ask for my knife, and I didn’t offer it.

  “Give me your name!”

  “Give me your name first,” I replied stubbornly.

  He glared at me, raising both his rifle and one brow menacingly.

  I sighed. “My name’s Bobbi Rivers.”

  “Turn to your right, Bobbi Rivers, and march!”

  This guy grated on my nerves. I turned, stumbling onto a faint path leading east through the shadowy forest. I managed to hold my tongue for about thirty seconds.

  “Where are we going?” I demanded.

  He only grunted in reply.

  “That’s all I get? A grunt? Come on, you stole my Colt, you’ve got me at gunpoint, the least you can do is give me an explanation.”

  Apparently, he disagreed.

  Complete anger washed over me for allowing myself to get captured. I felt ashamed and embarrassed at my lack of awareness of my surroundings, my total absorption in my inner demons. I blamed Pa for distracting me. With difficulty, I forced myself to swallow the bitter taste of hate so I could concentrate on how to get out of this inconvenient situation.

  Escape wouldn’t be too difficult. I could run fast, blend, hide, and most likely avoid his shot if I took him by surprise. But then a thought hit me. Hadn’t I come south to join the Union army? And now I had this armed escort handed right to me. What more could I have asked for?

  We walked for a half mile before the filtered sights and muffled sounds of a large army camp crept through to my eyes and ears. Red and orange flames of campfires danced and blinked as men moved around them, murmuring voices interspersed with occasional chuckles and grumbles. Horses shuffled and whinnied from the shadows. And then a hundred rancid odors assaulted my nose: burnt beans, unwashed male bodies, a nearby latrine, musty canvas, wood smoke and
horse manure. We began passing among the stained canvas, two-man tents pitched in row after row creating a checkerboard effect, filling up the entire clearing in the forest. Uniformed soldiers glanced up at us as we passed, then returned to their dinners, card games and conversations. My senses all reached out to snatch up each new piece of information, not working fast enough to satisfy my curiosity.

  The young guard motioned to the left and stopped outside a grouping of larger tents. “Captain Truckey, may we enter?”

  My eyes snapped over to his, zeroing in on his words. Did he say Captain Truckey? Surely he didn’t mean Emma’s pa, did he?

  “Enter.”

  The soldier pulled back the tent flap with the barrel of his rifle and nodded for me to enter. The inside of the tent appeared neat and ordered. A cot made up with wool blankets and a meager pillow sat against the right canvassed wall. Stashed beneath the cot, an empty knapsack sack lay folded, awaiting the next upheaval and move. Along the opposite wall, freshly pressed uniform trousers and jackets hung on pegs. Directly in front of us, a sturdy fellow with broad shoulders bent over a lightweight table studying a pile of papers. A lantern cast the tent walls into shadows.

  The soldier and I stood in the middle of the room, waiting for the man to turn and give us his attention. My hands started to sweat at the possibility that this man could indeed be Emma’s pa. Not that I’d ever met Mr. Truckey, but maybe Emma had mentioned me in her letters to him. To have come so far just to be squashed down in recognition from one man among thousands of strangers… My mind raced along with my heart for possible solutions in case this fellow did turn out to be whom I dreaded he very well may be. I could give a false name! No good, I reminded myself as the soldier with the rifle already knew my name. But before I could come up with anything else, the captain laid his pen down and stood up to face us.

  He was a formidable fellow with his long, dark blue, single-breasted coat hanging down a few inches above his knee. Dark blue trousers led down to his polished black boots, and the two stripes on his shoulder reaffirmed his status as captain. His mustached face held a somber mouth with deep lines etched alongside. The black felt hat and the dim light from the lantern shaded his eyes, but there was no mistaking that I’d seen that color before. My heart sank.