by Jeff Mann
“Here,” she says, producing another bag, this one larger. “In here are new shoes for you, Private Campbell. Mr. Preston contributed them, and I do hope they fit. Your new shirts and jackets are in there too. Best put them on, for it’s brisk out. In the pocket of your jacket, Private Campbell, is a letter of introduction. If you get to New Castle, give it to my cousin, Don Pendleton, who’s the proprietor of the hotel there. He’s liable to show you soldiers every courtesy. In your jacket pocket, Private Conrad, you’ll find my husband’s pipe and the rest of the tobacco Sadie brought over. There are several extra pairs of socks in here too. And,” she says, producing the black felt hat and putting it on Drew’s head, “don’t forget this.”
“Ma’am…” Drew begins, but she gives him no time to continue. Muttering, “Dress. Dress now. I’ll be downstairs,” she flies through the door and down the stairwell.
I shuck off my old clothes and damaged brogans, shivering in the chill room, and pull on my new shirt, gray jacket, and shoes, all of which fit well. Drew dresses too, murmuring, “Warm. So warm.” We pack our old clothes away—one thing privation has taught us is to waste nothing that’s still of use—tie our blanket-roll packs over our shoulders, and grip our weapons. One last look at the tiny room that has given us such blessed shelter, albeit for a regrettably short amount of time, and then we edge down the stairs.
A tow-headed boy with a sun-browned face, dressed in tatters of gray, and barefoot, is standing in the lamp-lit front parlor. “I’m Tommy,” he says, extending his hand. We both shake it. He stands straight and gives us a firm salute. “I’ll be your guide.”
Mrs. Stephens appears from the back parlor, long hair tumbling over her shoulders, clutching her shawl to her breast. “Tommy will show you a safe way through town and down to the river. Union sentries are indeed patrolling either end of the bridge tonight, so be as quiet as possible. Wait until a cloud hides the moon, then launch off and row as fast as you can.”
“Mrs. Stephens, we—”
She cuts Drew short, rushing forward to give first him and then me hard, swift hugs. “Go now. Go!” she exclaims. Bursting into tears, she runs up the stairs.
“She’s sheltered a good lot of you,” Tommy says. “Always cries a little when soldiers leave, but this is the worst I’ve seen her. Well, y’all just grab your muskets and come along with me. Those mean Yanks are down at the tavern, and a few’s in the street, so we’ll just go ’long out back. Ain’t far.”
Drew and I follow Tommy out the back door and into the gusty dark, through shifting cloud-shadow and brief pools of moonlight. We move past the woodshed and into the trees, then along a narrow path at the mountain’s base skirting the backyards. In only five minutes we’re out of Eagle Rock, onto the road, and moving up river. Another five minutes of loping along the road—Tommy’s very fast and seems to know exactly where he’s going—and we cut to our left into woods, down a steep slope and through scattered boulders that line the river. The moon flashes off swirling water; a cold breeze rustles fallen leaves. “Here we are,” Tommy whispers. From behind a willow bush, a figure appears.
“Evening, gentlemen,” says the elderly voice. “I’m Mr. Preston. I have a rowboat for you.”
“Thank you, sir,” I say, shaking his hand. “And thank you too for the food. The folks of your town have been our salvation.”
“It’s a privilege, young man. And here. I almost forgot.” He proffers a metallic container that glints in fitful moonlight. “It’s applejack. Borrowed it from the tavern in last night’s commotion. You’ll need something to warm your innards up if you’re heading up Craig Creek. Try it.”
I take the flask from him, unscrew it, and take a sip. Strong and smooth, with a fiery edge. “Delicious,” I say, handing the flask to Drew, who takes a sip as well before replacing the top and sliding it into his pocket.
“You’ve all been mighty kind to us, sir. We shan’t forget it,” Drew says, shaking Mr. Preston’s hand as well.
“We shan’t either, especially with Brutus and Reverend Robertson out of business.” The old man chuckles. “Well, look downriver. Can you see the bridge and the lock? Now, look upriver. You see those branches against the sky? A big sycamore, it is. And the gap just below that tree, in the western bank? That’s the mouth of the creek, and beside it’s the road you need to follow. Just haul my boat up in the willows wherever you land, and I’ll have Tommy fetch it tomorrow. Y’all need to row as hard as you can, else, the river being high with rain and the current being as swift as it is, you might get too nigh the bridge before you’ve reached the far side and the Yanks there might use you for target practice if the moon comes out. A surly bunch, they are.”
Another round of handshakes from both Mr. Preston and Tommy, and we climb into the boat. “Here comes a timely herd of clouds. Good luck, boys,” Mr. Preston says. “Go with God.”
As soon as the moon’s swallowed, we push off the eastern bank and leave the sheltering overhang of tree limbs, I in the prow with our gear and Drew rowing hard over the black water. The scrap of an old song comes to me, one my mother was wont to sing as she peeled potatoes. I’d sing it as well if silence weren’t crucial: “The water is wide, I cannot cross o’er. And neither have I wings to fly. Give me a boat that can carry two, and both shall row, my love and I.”
The oars plash. Drew takes deep breaths. We move diagonally downstream, atop the James’s restless streaming, suspended between the dark bulks of mountains. Above us, amid gaps in flying cloud, glimmer the same stars and moon that look over my parents in West Virginia, Drew’s family in Pennsylvania, and the Union and Confederate soldiers facing off in Petersburg and all the other ruinous, bloodstained battlefields across the continent.
“Damn it,” Drew gasps. “This current’s mighty strong. We’re only halfway across, and already that bridge is getting too close for comfort. And those clouds are moving faster than I’d like. Might want to get your pistol ready, Reb. Just in case the moon comes out and—”
As if in perverse answer, as if someone had shifted a fire screen, as if a protective scrim of fog had lifted, silvery light bathes us. “Damn it,” Drew hisses, throwing all his strength into the oars. I pull my pistol. There’s the bridge, a few hundred feet downstream. In the bright moonlight I can make out the silhouette of a sentry on the bridge’s western end.
“Faster, buddy,” I whisper.
Just then a man shouts over the water. “Who’s that? What’s the password?”
“Shit.” Drew heaves forward and strains back. The boat shoots toward a riverside thicket. Only a few more hard pulls on the oars, and we’ll achieve the far bank.
Light flashes on the bridge. There’s the sharp report of a musket, the whizzing of a bullet, a watery blipping as the lead misses us by a foot, entering not our bodies or our borrowed boat but the James.
“Shit, shit.” Drew gives another huge heave. From the eastern bank rises a shout, a flash, another rifle’s cracking. This time the bullet ricochets off the oarlock.
“Damn, they’re good shots. Just our luck. Hold on,” Drew gasps. He musters yet another great straining at the oars, just as a third bullet embeds itself in the side of the boat. Our little craft flies over the last yards of river, faster than any horse I’ve ever ridden, shoots into a thicket-lined cove, and runs aground with a sandy slosh. I bound from the prow and tie the boat to a willow trunk. Drew tosses me our gear, then clambers out. Across the river there’s shouting, and horses’ hooves start clattering across the bridge from town.
“Goddamn them,” Drew snarls, following me up the bank and into the woods. “They’re coming after us. We’ve got to find someplace to hide. We’ve got to—”
Drew’s words are cut short. On a knoll above the town, there’s a white flash and a red flaring. Flames flicker, almost lazily, before rising into the night sky. We cling to sapling trunks, pant in the cold air, and gape. There’s a chorus of shouts; a bell begins clanging. The horsemen on the bridge wheel; their horses
rear. The flames snap and swirl, sparks wafting up to join the stars. Smoke streams upward; the buildings in the town below are bathed in red light.
“Is it—?” Drew gasps.
“Look!” I say, pointing. Spirals of fire curl, illuminating a white spike above. Glass shatters. Thicker flames pour from the gaps of windows. “Yes, it’s the church! Mizz Sadie…Mrs. Stephens said…”
“Lamp oil.” Drew emits a low laugh. “My God. Maybe even a few well-aimed splashes of Mrs. Stephens’s brandy. I’ll bet that fat preacher is ruing the day he ever crossed those ladies.”
“Damned fine diversion. I’ll bet they were poised with matches as soon as we stepped into the boat. Come on, boy,” I say, pulling Drew up over the bank and into a dirt road just beyond a border of shrubs. “This should lead us up the creek. I think that there’s the sycamore Mr. Preston pointed out. Follow me. We’d best get as far away as we can before those raiders have had enough pyrotechnic entertainment and decide to come after us.”
“Yes, sir!” Drew says, shouldering his pack. We hurry upriver along the rutted road lining this side of the James. Back in town, more shouts resound, then gunshots. We look back once, to see the church burning higher, casting a crimson glow over the hamlet and the looming mountainside above. The river’s black is sheened with the same restless red.
The chaos of Eagle Rock and the crackling glow of its fire recede behind us. Aided by intermittent moonlight, we lope along the towpath. Beneath the sycamore Mr. Preston pointed out, the water of a broad creek meets the James. We cross that creek over a flimsy bridge. Just yards past the bridge, the road forks, one branch continuing along the river, one branch veering left and disappearing into dark woods.
“This way, boy,” I say, pointing left. Drew gives my hand an encouraging squeeze. We shoulder our muskets and leave the banks of the James, following the narrow road that leads west along Craig Creek and up into rough highlands where winter still lingers, where God knows what adventures await.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The darkness among the trees is broken by slivers of moonlight. We’ve made it only a few hundred feet up the creek road when hoof beats moving fast from the direction of town alert us to pursuit.
“Hell, why can’t they just leave us be?” Drew snarls. Grabbing me by the arm, he jerks me off the road and into a thicket of evergreen laurel. Inside the even denser darkness there, we drop to our knees in a thick carpet of past seasons’ leaves, weapons brandished, and freeze.
Most of our pursuers keep to the river road. Only one chooses to ride up the creek. His gallop slows to a trot as he enters the forest’s black. He clops past us, stops, rides back, pauses a few yards from us, spits onto the ground—a dollop of tobacco, close enough to smell—then curses under his breath and trots back down to the river.
Drew and I stay in our concealing grove for a long time, until the last hoof beats have faded into distance, and the bells in Eagle Rock have fallen silent. Then we climb back up to the road. Clouds in the direction of the town are stained scarlet.
“Gone, goddamn them,” Drew growls. “I hope to God that Mizz Sadie and Mrs. Stephens are safe.”
“My guess is that they’ll be the queens of that hamlet now, if the grateful citizens have anything to say about it. That nasty minister’s been given his quietus. Looks like the moon’s coming out again. Let’s get on up this road as far as we can, big man.”
“Lead on, little Reb. I’m ready to walk a good ways. These shoes feel a damn sight better than being barefoot, and this cap keeps my head nice and warm.”
Sheathing our weapons, we pick our way farther into the wild. This close to the creek’s mouth, the road’s got an easy grade and the valley’s wide, hemmed in by moderate slopes covered with March-bare trees and swaths of pine. We walk for a good hour, passing in and out of moonlight, before the hump of a house on a rise above the creek catches our attention. Its windows are dark, the fences surrounding it in disrepair.
“I think this might be our refuge for the night,” Drew whispers. “Let’s see.”
Cautiously we approach. There’s no sign of an inhabitant. No buggy, no chimney smoke, no lamplight. When we circle the place, we find the barn a burnt shell and the granary roof fallen in. Only the woodshed seems solid.
“Ruination. Probably my brothers in blue,” Drew says, voice laced with bitterness.
“Or local raiders,” I say. “Lawless bastards in it for their own gain. Meanness comes in many colors. Let’s get closer.”
We creep up the front steps onto the porch. In the bright moonlight, we find a broken rocking chair, a headless doll, a black stain of what could be blood or could be molasses. The windows are broken.
Drew tries the door. “It’s unlocked,” he says, pushing it open. Inside, slants of moonlight reveal a shambles of shattered furniture and a hearth exuding the strong scent of wet ash. Past that, we find a kitchen equally wrecked and a staircase angling up into darkness.
“Smells foul. Stay here,” Drew says. Hunching over his great frame, he climbs the stairs and disappears around the turn in the stairwell. Overhead, his steps sound, then pause. He emits an exclamation of surprise. Then he retraces his path across the second floor and down the stairs.
“Come on, Ian.” Drew takes me by the hand and leads me through the broken angles of the house and out onto the porch. “Smells better out here,” he says, pushing a lock of hair off his brow. “Ian,” he says, taking my hand, “there was a body in there. On the bed. Set in a square of moon glow. Months dead, poor soul. A lady, from the looks of the garments. Holding what’s left of a child. Let’s sleep in the woodshed. Tomorrow we should bury ’em.”
“Damnation,” I gasp. “What could have happened here?”
“What you said before. Maybe renegade Federals. Like those curs back in town.”
“I doubt it, Drew. Soldiers murdering a woman? As unwelcome as your fellow blue-clad invaders have been, and as much destruction as men like Sheridan and Sherman have caused, well, who among them would stoop as low at that? More likely it was rogue Southern outlaws like those Mrs. Stephens warned us about.”
“Well, we ain’t ever going to know, I fear. Come on, little Reb. I’m tired and I’m cold, and I have a source of warmth right close I intend to take advantage of, despite the grim circumstances.” Drew pulls me down the porch stairs and through the high, brittle grass of the lawn to the woodshed.
“Too early for snakes.” Drew drops his pack, fumbles about, and gets a candle lit. “Let’s see now,” he says, pushing open the door with a creak. Ducking, he steps inside, shuffles around, then exits. “Not bad. Not much wood left. Nice carpet of sawdust. Smells like trees, not death. Wait here.”
Handing me his gear and the candle, he sprints over to the ruined barn. Soon he’s returned, moonlight falling over his shaggy hair and bearded smile. “Look here.” He’s carrying a heaped armful of something stubbly. “The fire spared some hay.
“Wait just a minute.” Drew ducks inside the shed again. There’s the rustle of hay, then he appears at the door, takes our blanket rolls, does more audible arranging within, and finally beckons me inside.
I enter, holding the candle high. My Yank has made a soft bed of strewn hay and blankets. “It’s a nest,” I say. “Hurrah!”
“Our homestead for the night. Here now,” says Drew, closing the door behind us and taking the candle from me. He drips down a puddle of wax atop a cylindrical section of split wood, then sets the candle upright in the cooling pool. The small flame flickers cheerily.
“Supper?” From my haversack I fetch the napkin-wrapped corn dodgers Mrs. Stephens gave us before we parted.
“Yes, please!” Drew says, licking his lips. “I’m famished. As usual.”
“Three apiece for now. I want to save the rest for tomorrow.”
I dole them out. We sit cross-legged on the blankets and devour our meal. They’re sweet with corn, chewy with flour, and rich with the bacon grease in which they were fried.
I remove my kepi and spectacles, unsheathe my pistol, placing it within arm’s reach, and climb eagerly beneath the blankets. Drew wraps an arm around me; I rest my head on his shoulder. We lie in candlelight only briefly before, sharply aware of how few resources we have, I extinguish the dwindling taper. The dark envelops us: thick, pine-scented, broken here and there by thin rays of moonlight falling through cracks in the sides of the shed. Outside, gusts of wind rustle dead grass.
“Why is it, Ian, that she’s lying in there the way she…in the condition she’s in, and we’re lying here together, alive, even after all we’ve been through?”
“Luck. Fate. Timing. We both could have been brought down on the battlefield too many times to count. If a ball had been aimed an inch or two in a different direction, if an artillery shell had been angled some other way…”
“But we’re here.” Drew unbuttons my uniform jacket. His hand rests over my heart. “Still breathing. Scarred up but whole. Kiss me, Reb. I need some comforting.”
I need no further encouragement. “Gladly, big man.” I roll on top of Drew, take his face in my hands, and press my lips to his.
“Oh, Ian,” he moans. “Thank God you’re here with me.” Our mouths lock together, wetly, hungrily. I run my tongue over his lips, his mustache, his bushy chin. Beneath me, against my thigh, his sex stiffens in his pants. Half frantic, I unbutton his new jacket and slide a hand beneath his shirt.
“I want to love you now, Drew,” I say, running my fingers through the thicket coating his belly. “It’s been so long.”
