Paradise Park

by L Mad Hildebrandt

  CHAPTER 6

  He

  couldn’t get away from the war. Memories of battles, snatches of conversations with men long dead, and hellish images of torn bodies in the aftermath of an engagement haunted Muldoon. Even in the middle of the day some minor event could trigger a flashback. Nights were the worst. He had to make it through the dark hours, and talk like Graham’s brought raw memories to the surface. His dream began as they often did. Abrupt. Taking Muldoon back to the war—different times and places, but always locked in a helpless struggle with death. This time it took him back to October 9, 1861, and his first taste of war. He was back on Santa Rosa Island, Florida…

  A hollow thud dragged him out of one kind of darkness, and dropped him into another. For a moment, he couldn’t remember where he was, then with a swift movement William Muldoon grabbed his pistol. He rolled to the side as a lead ball ripped through his blanket. Half-kneeling on the sand floor of his tent, he pulled the trigger and the gun leapt in his hand. Its sudden flash lit the surprised face of the Rebel as his throat burst and he crumpled to the ground. The darkness was complete in the tent, and Muldoon figured it about two-thirty, maybe three in the morning. He couldn’t have been off watch long. Patrick Ryan sat upright, the gray woolen blanket twisted around him. Ten other men stirred in the tight confines of the Sibley tent.

  “Come on,” Muldoon said. “Johnny-Reb’s come to call.” He was glad he slept fully clothed, only pausing to take hold of his Minnie rifle and check for his Bowie knife in its sheath. The Regulars hated the Irish sleeping with their guns close to hand, but they didn’t trust Yanks much more than Rebs. Chaos engulfed him as he opened the tent flap.

  Night’s darkness tried to hide the running figures from his sight, but burning tents fought the shadows as men battled one another. It was oddly quiet, the sounds of fighting muffled in the night air. His tent was at the edge of camp, one of the first to be attacked. They would have to try to hold the Rebels back as the rest of the troops awoke. A gray-clad shoulder slammed into him, nearly knocking his feet out from under him. Friends and foes, both wore gray. He cursed with the realization as he wrapped his free arm around the man who’d run into him. The man screamed and shuddered as Patrick’s bayonet speared him. Letting him drop, Muldoon moved into the fray, and his tent-mates spilled out behind him.

  He didn’t have time to look into faces as he stabbed, but he tried to recognize the plain gray broadcloth of the 6th New York uniforms. They weren’t much different from the Rebel’s, and as blood poured freely the men looked more and more alike, clothed in red spattered gray. He and Patrick fought back to back. For all Paddy’s short size, there was no man Muldoon would rather have beside him. Raised on adjoining farms, they’d been friends all their lives. They’d tracked coyotes, and badgers, fox and bear. They’d hunted and adventured together. Now, they fought against the Rebs together. If he made it home, he’d ask Sarah Ryan to marry him, and then they’d be brothers.

  Shadows flashed eerily against the backdrop of fighting men. Out of that sea, Muldoon picked out a figure he didn’t recognize and squeezed the trigger of his Minnie. Its reassuring weight recoiled in his hands, and its bark filled his ear, temporarily blocking the higher pitched screams of men sounding their last cries. Instantly, he turned to deflect a thrust from a bayonet with the stock of his rifle. The blade slid past, lightly grazing his forearm, and his own red blood joined the mess on the battlefield. He stepped close and kneed the man in the groin, brought his own rifle around, and slid the bayonet in through the stained shirt.

  Each new kill brought an exhilaration he hadn’t expected. Red hot anxiety pumped through his veins as he engaged in the kill, or get killed, game. As each man fell before him, he felt a surge of triumph. In some detached corner of his mind he knew he ended the life of a brother, a son, a husband. But with certainty, he knew that man would just as easily have killed him. He didn’t have time to think about them. He could only parry and swing the deadly bayonet on the end of his rifle as if it were a scythe, harvesting a field of men.

  Muldoon couldn’t figure how the Rebs had made it past the sentries without an alarm. Yet, here they were. The camp was filled with them, more than their small contingent could begin to handle. Unfamiliar gray began to outnumber the familiar as the Rebels continued up the trail.

  Somewhere behind him the drum beat, and he knew Colonel Wilson had men formed up, waiting for the skirmish to reach them. They couldn’t hold the larger force, and slowly he dropped back to the Colonel’s line. Even then, Muldoon knew, the Rebels vastly outnumbered them. The 6th had been divided, some companies to the Keys, others to man Fort Pickens and its surrounding Batteries. Only three companies occupied their camp, two hundred some odd men against what seemed like a thousand.

  “Fall back!” Colonel Wilson commanded as Muldoon stumbled backward through the sand, parrying and stabbing, and then another step back. Fort Pickens loomed behind them. If they could just make it to the Gulf side, the cannons could let loose and break the Rebel onslaught.

  The Rebs didn’t follow them as they rounded a bend in the path. His opponent suddenly disengaged, spun around, and ran down the trail. They all just turned and went back the way they had come. Out toward the gulf, the popping of guns sounded. It wasn’t his battle over there, and he started to breathe easier.

  They halted in an open area between dunes. A man vomited, unable to contain the horror of the battle. Others stood dumb with relief, or bent over gasping for air. Muldoon collapsed on the sand and looked up at the sky. A thin veil of smoke muted the stars. The metallic smell of blood, mixed with the sharp scent of burnt powder filled his nose. He gulped the air, wondering if it would ever be fresh again.

  “William.” Patrick flopped down beside him, laughed shrilly. “Heh, do I look as bad as you?”

  “Worse.” Muldoon looked at his friend, who’d begun wiping blood from his bayonet.

  “You know, it’s just gonna get dirty again. Probably before it even gets a chance to start drying.”

  Patrick continued cleaning, swabbing the blade over and over, trying to clear away the red with a blood-soaked bit of cloth. He dropped the rifle and rag and stared at his hands. He began rubbing them, trying to get rid of the blood. And then he began to shake.

  Muldoon wasn’t sure what he was supposed to feel. He only felt a kind of elation, a sort of excitement from the battle, and an eagerness to get back into the fray. He looked at his friend, who sat shaking and staring wide-eyed at his bloody hands. He glanced down at his own hands, noticed the blood oozing slowly from the wound on his arm. He didn’t feel it. Later it would hurt, and maybe then he’d feel the emotions Patrick showed so plainly. ‘Maybe he’s a better man than I am,’ he thought.

  The sounds of battle echoed across the dunes. The distant popping of firearms reminded Muldoon of an autumn hunt. They’d flush the birds out of the brush, every gun would start blasting, and birds would rain out of the sky. But they weren’t shooting fowl, they were killing men.

  “They might be leaving. They didn’t follow us,” Patrick said.

  “Knock on wood for that one.” Muldoon tapped the butt of his rifle.

  “You letting your Irish show?” Jimmy Dolan sank down beside them. New York City born and raised, the man was proud to hail from Hell’s Kitchen, and he made sure everyone knew it. His small size belied his strength. Back home, he was a bricklayer and a fireman. Either place, he was one hell of a fighter. “I can’t tell what’s redder. Your hair, or the blood on your face.”

  “Long as it’s not mine,” Muldoon muttered and leaned back on his elbows, his Minnie resting across his knees. He’d reloaded, and she was in easy reach.

  “You make a good target, Muldoon,” Jimmy said. “Big guy like you should be the first shot.”

  “Damn you!” Patrick leaped toward the man. Muldoon grabbed him, and noticed the shaking hadn’t subsided.

  “Save it for the Rebs,” he said.

  “No, that’s a jinx, Willi
am! He’s gone and jinxed you!”

  “I didn’t mean nothing by it,” Jimmy said. “Son of a bitch… looks like we’re going back into it.” He gestured toward the Colonel, who was quarreling with Major Vogdes and Captain Hildt. They’d brought up a few companies of regulars, and if push came to shove, the regulars always won.

  “… we lure them into cannon range… ” Colonel Wilson argued. “We could win this damn campaign in one go round.”

  Captain Hildt had drawn his saber, and shook it, pointing toward camp, his face red with anger. Muldoon couldn’t hear his words, but knew he’d win the disagreement. Colonel Wilson might outrank the man, but he and his 6th New York Infantry were volunteers. The Regulars always won out. He dragged himself up from the sand. Within minutes, they had formed up again. Guns were loaded, and bayonets fixed. He felt a twinge of anxiety as they trotted toward the Rebel line. Not down the path, but straight across the snake and gator infested dunes.

  “AAAHHHRRRR,” he yelled, his voice mixing with the roar of his fellow Yanks as they charged through the ragged underbrush. Rattlers, Copperheads, Cottonmouth, he didn’t think of them as he ran, but almost stopped short at sight of the odd square the Rebels had formed up in. Like walls made of men. Shots came from the darkness beyond their formation, and some of the Rebs dropped dead. As the 6th approached their shouts seemed to grow louder. From somewhere deep inside, his anger swelled, poured out, and he wanted nothing more than to feel the dull slip of his bayonet into Rebel hide. His vision clouded red, and his sense of time blurred. Bodies dropped before him, and the enemy turned and ran from their onslaught. He followed, butchering anyone unlucky enough to cross his path. The Rebels ran for their boats, and safety across the short stretch to the mainland. He stood, roaring angrily at them from the beach, frustrated to lose them so quickly, yet joyous in the victory.

  As his rage subsided Muldoon looked at his fellows and recognized the ugliness. Battle lust distorted their features, their lips twisted with anger and eyes thinned to steely slits. He scanned their faces as he looked around for Patrick, but didn’t see him.

  The drums beat again, and he joined the mass of soldiers sorting themselves into their respective companies. The sergeant began calling names, marking them as present, injured, or dead. “Patrick Ryan!” he said. No answer. “Ryan! Anyone see what happened to Ryan?”

  Muldoon’s blood ran cold.

  He growled savagely as he kicked off the blankets. The blood froze in his veins as he threw himself to the floor. Push-up after push-up, he couldn’t drown the sounds of bullets whizzing, cannons roaring, and men screaming. The echoes of death filled him, drew him to the bottle, so he could finally drown the sounds in a black stupor. But he couldn’t give in to the darkness, he wouldn’t allow himself. With shaking hands, he drew on a pair of ragged pants, flannel shirt, and shoes. Outside he could run, like he did so many nights, trying to outpace the hounds of his own hell. Hours later, exhausted, he could return to his bed. Tonight, consumed with visions of the war, he thought of Kelly McAllister. He couldn’t lose another friend… a brother… not like this.

  CHAPTER 7

  April 17

  Muldoon

  snatched a few hours of exhausted sleep after his midnight run. He was bleary-eyed and sore, but not as bad as some days. He could deal with tired, but forget hangovers. He was done with them. The hard stuff called to him, but he hadn’t had a drink in months. The few hours of rest a bender could give him wasn’t worth the price. He couldn’t get drunk enough to forget the war, and his dulled senses made him feel sluggish and dumb. So, when the liquor beckoned, he lost himself in exercise instead, a hard run, push-ups past the edge of endurance, or pull-ups at the bar he’d installed in his bedroom doorway. And then he’d wrestle, working out his anger and aggression on the mat.

  He checked the clock on the mantle… it was too quiet. He couldn’t hear the familiar sound of a baby crying, or Bonnie Nolan yelling at her husband in the next room. They’d never been ideal neighbors, and once they had the baby, their fights got worse. The infant’s constant cry made the husband mad, and he’d demand that she shut the kid up. Then she would scream back, and finally start throwing things. Muldoon couldn’t tell whether he hit her. Mrs. Dunn, the landlady, must have given them the boot. She’d threatened to ever since the child came.

  Despite the Nolan’s, the boardinghouse was better than most, and he could overlook the clamor. The building was a good one, not like the ones farther south in the Bowery where he used to live. This place was almost to German Village. Many of the buildings here were newer and better kept. The streets were cleaner, and spring flowers had just begun to bloom in pots set out on windowsills. Pretty Irish lace curtains flapped in the breeze, windows open to let in the air. The distance wasn’t much, but it was a far cry from the squalor and filth he’d lived in since he’d returned from the war. He’d gone home to the farm first, but only ashes and burnt timbers marked the spot where the house had stood. His parents died in the blaze, and his brother hadn’t come back from the war. With nothing left to his name, he couldn’t support a wife and family, and he couldn’t bring himself to face Sarah Ryan. Not after losing Patrick. So, he left Belfast and joined the masses of poor, struggling Irish in New York’s slums.

  His stomach growled, pulling him back from his thoughts. Mrs. Dunn charged for breakfast and dinner, whether her tenants ate it or not. If he didn’t hurry, he’d miss it. He tossed the blanket up over his bed but didn’t smooth it, leaving it for the maid. The room had come furnished, but all the little things were his. The bedclothes and spread, the linens, things most men took little notice of. Green dominated the room, his mother’s favorite color. She would have said it was the color of Erin, but for him it was the color of his youth. He wanted the best of everything, and took care of what he owned.

  Several people were already seated at the dining table when he entered. Danny and Margaret Flannigan sat across the table, by the front window. Danny’s chair was pushed up against the heavy gold brocade curtains. Casper Biggs sat in the first chair, near the head of the table, and glowered at Muldoon as he came in. As the oldest man in the house, he made it clear that he felt the seat at the foot of the table was his due position. Mrs. Dunn had pointed out that her dining table was simply too small to seat Muldoon and two other people comfortably on one side. Biggs had acquiesced, but at each meal he would glare at him, and try to goad him with his conversation topics. Muldoon’s gaze slid over the man, and then noted the empty seat across from Biggs. Don Hardin hadn’t come down yet. Two empty chairs marked the absence of the young couple and baby. Mrs. Dunn’s seat at the head of the table was also empty—at least for the moment.

  “So where were you last night?” asked Mrs. Flannigan, as she turned to Muldoon.

  “I had a case,” he said. She moved almost imperceptibly closer and leaned one elbow on the table.

  “Can you speak about it?” she asked and winked conspiratorially.

  “Don’t be silly, Margaret,” ordered Mrs. Dunn as she swept into the room, a dish in her hands. The small figure of Betsy, the maid, peeked from behind her, a loaded tray held precariously in her arms. “We aren’t interested in what dismal goings on Sergeant Muldoon must be involved with! Scandalous behavior is not fit conversation at my table. It is unfortunate enough that the dear man must clean the gutters for us, but after all, it must be done. One simply doesn’t want to hear about it.” She lay the dish on the table, and then took her seat, back ramrod straight, and watched as the nervous servant girl placed dishes on the sideboard.

  “Well,” replied Mrs. Flannigan as she quickly removed her elbow from the table. “It’s not like we get any news here.”

  “No, we don’t,” Mrs. Dunn said. “Now that is enough of that. If you must have conversation with your meals, at least make it pleasant.”

  Mr. Biggs tried to hide his snide smile. He was an unpleasant fellow, thin and waspish. He kept the books at Lloyd’s Pharmaceuticals. Muldoon imagined
that sitting behind a ledger all day had turned the man sour. He almost wished Biggs had killed Schneider. He’d love to bring the man in. He could never have pulled it off alone, of course, but perhaps if he’d acted as part of a larger group? Muldoon had seen Biggs at wrestling and boxing matches. He, and his cronies, always backed fighters from New England. There was one in particular, a large boxer from Boston, he thought, but wasn’t sure of the man’s name. He looked across the table again with a new shadow of suspicion. After all, he thought, the man is blatantly Nativist. He shrugged off the feeling. What were the odds a tenant of his own boardinghouse could be involved in this murder?

  Mrs. Flannigan nudged her husband. Muldoon could see the tiny movement of her body as her foot swung toward the man, her upswept auburn hair bobbed as she motioned toward his chair. The man’s face grew pink as he tried, quietly, to move his seat away from the curtain. It was no use, the back leg was lodged on the brocade, and the fabric pulled forward as he moved.

  All eyes shifted to Mrs. Dunn.

  “If you would like to pay for that, Mr. Flannigan,” she said, “I would gladly refit the fabric to your bed. I’m sure the gold would do wonders to liven your room.”

  His complexion burned even brighter as the man turned his mild face toward the landlady. “Thank you, Mrs. Dunn. I’m sure I would love a new bedcover, but it does look so beautiful in here. Your decorating touch is superb. I know my wife would appreciate any suggestions you would care to provide as to the decoration of our room.”

  Muldoon glanced again at Mrs. Dunn across the table. She graciously nodded at the unfortunate offender, and then asked Biggs to say the prayer. The little man’s gaze slid across to Muldoon as though he expected a challenge to this responsibility, too. But he was Protestant, as was Mrs. Dunn. Like the Flannigan’s, Muldoon was not. Any prayer at her table wouldn’t be led by a Catholic. Surreptitiously the husband and wife quickly crossed themselves, their own prayers silent. Finally, the dishes were passed, and Muldoon took his double share. He paid extra for it, along with his rent, so Mrs. Dunn didn’t object.