Chase The Wild Pigeons

by John J. Gschwend

  Joe looked at him, but didn’t know if it was strange or not, so he didn’t answer.

  “I have a brother in the Confederate army,” Captain Varner said. “For all I know, he could come right up that there road and attack this very battery some day soon.”

  “I hope that doesn’t happen,” Joe said. He really meant it. He didn’t want Captain Varner’s brother killed, and from what Joe could see, if an enemy came up that road, he didn’t have a chance. “Maybe this war will be over soon, and you will see your brother again.”

  “Now that is a capital thought, Joseph.” He rubbed Joe’s head. “And I hope you see your father real soon.”

  “Captain Varner, can you keep a secret?”

  “Depend upon it.”

  “I want to go home. I want to find my pa.”

  “Maybe this war will be over soon and you will be able to.”

  “Oh no, Captain, I aim to strike out soon.” Joe set the kepi straight on his head.

  Captain Varner took hold of Joe’s arm. “Boy, don’t take this war so lightly. Virginia is hot with fighting. I’m sure your father would want you to stick right here.”

  Joe looked at the soldiers all around them. He eyed the big guns, then looked down at Fort Curtis.

  “Joe, I know what you’re thinking, but there may not even be a battle here.” Captain Varner made a sweep with his arm. “This may all be for nothing. Most of my men believe there is not a large Confederate army within two hundred miles, just a little cavalry keeping us bottled up scared.”

  “I want to see my pa, Captain. He’s all I’ve got left in the world, and I don’t even know if he’s alive. He was fighting with General Jackson, and now I hear Jackson is dead. I want to go home to the Shenandoah.”

  To the west, Joe saw cavalry coming down the Little Rock Road, the only road not blocked by the felled trees. The blue uniforms were coming toward Helena fast.

  Captain Varner yelled at a man standing in the long ditch. “Corporal, run over to that road and see what they have found.” The corporal saluted then bounded down the hill.

  A sergeant working on one of the ditches came up to the captain. “These here rifle pits are more than ready, sir.”

  Captain Varner watched the rear of the cavalry as it went below the hills and into the streets. “They are back soon, Sergeant.”

  “That they are, sir.” The skinny sergeant drew a dirty handkerchief from his shirt pocket, pulled his round glasses off, spit on them, and smeared the mud around on the lenses until they were fairly clean. Then he turned toward some soldiers that had followed him. “You men get back to work.”

  Joe didn’t see how the men could do any more to the trenches.

  Captain Varner turned to the sergeant. “What is your opinion?”

  “Sir, it could mean about anything. If the captain would like, I will fetch up one of them horse boys and find out.”

  “No. There is no need for that. I’m just being impatient. Corporal Stewart will be back directly.”

  Joe saw the captain was acting strange. He didn’t seem scared, but nervous. He looked the way Joe felt when his Aunt Alice would come on the cars to visit. Joe would watch every passenger leave the car, hoping none was his aunt, hoping she had missed the train.

  Shortly, Corporal Stewart raced back up the hill. He almost bowled Joe over when he slid to a stop in front of the captain. Joe probably would have hit the ground if Captain Varner had not caught him.

  The corporal was panting. “Sorry, boy.” He bent, placing his hands on his knees.

  They all waited.

  He straightened, and took a deep breath. He began to speak, stopped abruptly, and looked down at Joe, then back up to the captain.

  “Go ahead, corporal; if the Confederates are upon us, it’s not going to matter now who knows,” Captain Varner said.

  The corporal nodded briskly. “Sir, a trooper said they couldn’t get as far as Lick Creek. He said there is a large body of cavalry out there, bigger than anything they’ve seen, yet. They skedaddled on back here.”

  “Very good, corporal. That will be all.”

  “They're coming, Captain,” the sergeant said. They’re screening for the infantry.

  “Yes, Sergeant, I believe you can hang your hat on it.”

  Joe didn’t know what it all meant, but he knew Lick Creek was only about five or six miles west of town.

  Captain Varner squeezed Joe’s shoulder. “Joe, I think it is best you don’t come back up here for a spell.”

  “And boy, if the Rebels do attack, stay in that house,” the sergeant said.

  As Joe headed down the hill, he thought about what the sergeant had said: “If the Rebels do attack.” This was all madness. He liked these Yankees. They were like everyone else once you got to know them. However, most of the men who had lived in Helena before the Yankees arrived were now Rebels. The men in the Shenandoah Valley were mostly Rebels—his pa was a Rebel. Rebel, Yankee, Union, and Confederate—names, just a bunch of names. He looked back up the hill at the many blue uniforms. All of those men had names. The men in gray would have names, too. He looked at the cannons atop the hill; the hill was named Graveyard Hill. Graveyard Hill—that reminded him—tombstones also had names.

  ***

  Peter’s muscles were still aching when he stepped through the parlor door. Dr. Taylor was a good man, but he believed in hard work. Mending the gate wasn’t enough; he also had Peter clean all of the shelves in the store today. Katie Bea was darning socks when he dragged through the door.

  “Dr. Taylor had me working like a slave today,” Peter said as he piled on the sofa. When he faced his mother, her bottom lip was quivering.

  “Oh, child, don’t say such.” She put her hands close to her face as if in prayer.

  I’m sorry, Mam.” He hated more than anything to see her upset.

  “Oh, Peter, Dr. Taylor is so good to us.” She wiped her eyes with her apron.

  “I know he is, Mam.” Peter really didn’t know what he had done to upset her so.

  She went back to her sewing. She stopped crying and became firm. “Peter, long as Dr. Taylor alive, you be free.”

  “Yes, Ma’am.”

  “I don’t know what we could done if he had not took us in when your poppa died.” She smiled. “He liked your poppa so much. They’s good friends in Pennsylvania.”

  Peter loved to see her smile. She was a pretty woman, and when she smiled, she glowed with prettiness. When she told stories of his poppa, she always smiled. If Poppa could have lived, maybe she would smile more often.

  He had heard the stories many times. Peter’s father, as a teenager, had been a runaway, and Dr. Taylor’s family, while on a trip to Virginia, had found him sick, hiding in a ditch. They had smuggled him back to Pennsylvania. Years later, Dr. Taylor had been bitten by a snake, and Peter’s poppa had carried him across his shoulder five miles to help. There were more stories, and Peter loved to hear them.

  “Peter, we is going north, the first chance we gets.”

  He looked at her, but he didn’t understand. What did she mean they were going north? Dr. Taylor had not said anything about it. Peter had heard there might be a Rebel army on the other side of Crowley’s Ridge. It would be dangerous.

  “Do you hear me, boy?”

  “Who's going?”

  She put the sewing back down and took his hands in hers. “You and me is going.”

  “Us!”

  “Oh, Peter, I was a fool to come down here, to bring you down here.”

  But how could they go? He didn’t understand.

  “You is growed up to be a handsome, strong, young man.” She smiled. “You look so much like your poppa.” Her smile disappeared. “If something happen to Dr. Taylor, we be slaves down here.”

  “But we have our free papers and—”

  “Them papers don’t mean a thing. They ain’t worth a Confederate dollar. I’s got money, and I’s going to talk to Dr. Taylor. He will help us get back to Pennsylva
nia.”

  “Mam, we can’t go now. There is a Rebel army out—”

  “We can go!” She stood. “We is going. I’s been a slave. I’s lucky to be freed when my missus died when I’s just barely a woman. I don’t aim to be a slave again. If that Rebel army take Helena, where you think we go then?”

  He took her hands and tugged until she sat back down.

  “Mam, let’s do what Dr. Taylor thinks best. He is a very smart man. He loves us. He would not tell us wrong.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. “Peter, if something happen to me, promise me you will go north to Pennsylvania.”

  “Nothing is going to happen to you.” He squeezed her hands.

  “Promise me that, boy, you hear.” Tears made small streams down her pretty face.

  “I promise,” he whispered. “I will go to Pennsylvania. I promise.”

  ***

  It was late morning when Lucius and Theo began taking inventory in the small storeroom behind the store.

  Lucius watched the fat, red-faced man climb the ladder. He was dripping sweat, and it wasn’t even warm, yet.

  “I don’t know why he don’t get that damn nigger boy to do this,” Theo said. “Hell, he done gone and learned him to read and write like white folks.”

  “Dr. Taylor say we is to do it,” Lucius said.

  Theo wheeled on the ladder. “Shut your mouth, boy!” Theo thumped his forefinger on his own chest. “I’m the boss on this here job. Do you understand that, boy?”

  “Yessuh, Massuh.” Lucius grinned. “Lucius know his place.”

  “Just because you are a big nigger, don’t matter none to me. You understand?”

  “Yessuh, I understand.”

  “Good.” Theo turned and climbed to the top of the ladder. He pulled a rag from his hip pocket, wiped dust from a crate on the top shelf, and wrote something in his ledger. He mumbled as he scribbled, “Inventory July 3, 1863. Well, tomorrow is the Fourth of July, probably won’t be no fireworks around this dull place.”

  Lucius looked at the man, such a fat, lazy, worthless, white cracker that grunted with every move. He pursed his lips like a fish when he wrote in the book. Lucius wondered what the man would look like with a cotton sack dragging behind his ass.

  Theo started down the ladder. “Get me a dipper of water, and you best not spit in it.”

  “Oh, no, Massuh, I ain’t thought about such shines.” As Lucius went out the door, he thought he would rather put poison in the sorry man’s water.

  Theo made sure he was gone and rolled a barrel from the corner of the storeroom. He removed an old cloth, uncovering some bottles, grabbed one of them, pulled the cork, and turned it up.

  From a crack in the wall, Lucius watched. He smiled at the worthless jackass and turned to the well.

  Lucius cranked the windlass. Sweet well water, he thought—not the filthy ditch mud like they were drinking in the nigger camp. He ladled a dipper full. It was clear and fresh. White folks always had it sweet. Blacks had the scraps, like dogs. At least Dr. Taylor was allowing him to stay in the back room of the store; he could get some of the benefits like a white man. That Dr. Taylor was a strange one.

  As Lucius enjoyed the water, he noticed the change in the hills around Helena. He had not really left the store much in a couple of weeks, especially since he slept there, too, so he really hadn’t paid much attention to the goings on around town. Now he noticed the soldiers. They were thick as flies on the hills west of town. Something was about.

  What would he do if the Rebels took the town back? Swim the river again, that’s what. Try to make it to Memphis; there were freed slaves there, too.

  “Boy, you going to fetch me that water or not?” Theo yelled from the storeroom.

  Lucius rushed the water to him. Theo, waiting outside the door, snatched the dipper, spilling some on Lucius’s feet.

  “Massuh Theo, what is them soldiers doing up in them hills?” Lucius said, pointing toward Graveyard Hill.

  Theo chugged from the dipper, dribbling water down his shirt; he turned toward the hills. “They look like they are getting ready to fight.” He shoved the dipper back at Lucius. “I reckon they believe our boys are going to take Helena back. And with the way them Yankees have siphoned men to Vicksburg, our boys might just skip right in.”

  Lucius stared at the soldiers. He felt the muscles working in his face.

  Theo smiled. “Yeah, you niggers will all be dead. Well, maybe not. They might just herd you over them hills like a bunch of cows.” He snickered.

  Lucius endured the fat cracker’s laugh, but some day—some day soon, the bottom rail will be on top.

  Chapter 4

  The new barn is going to be capital, Joe thought. The new colt will love it better for sure.

  “Hand me that hammer, Joe,” his pa said, smiling down from the ladder. He always smiled when he worked. He was the best pa in the Valley, and he was good to Joe and his sister, Sarah. Joe would be like him some day.

  The Valley was so green this year. Wildflowers painted the hillsides, and the sky was as blue as Sarah’s eyes. It was perfect weather for romping, and that was just what Joe planned to do when the barn was finished.

  Joe heard his mother singing from somewhere in the house—birds could not sing prettier. She was probably combing Sarah’s silky hair; she always sang when she did that. Joe loved it, but he wouldn’t tell anyone.

  His pa drove the nail with the hammer: bang, bang—bang—bang—bang, bang—

  Joe bolted upright in the bed. It took only seconds to realize he wasn’t in Virginia—he was in Helena Arkansas, and the banging was coming from the hills behind the house. He threw the mosquito bar open and ran to the window. It was dark, but he could tell the shots were coming from the west side of Graveyard Hill.

  Joe heard the long drum roll. Soon Yankees were swarming like bees around a hive. Men were running below his window so close he could have dropped a rock on their heads if he had a mind to.

  There had been a lot of activity in the early morning for about a week now, but this was much more—now there was shooting. The Confederates had really come!

  He grabbed his clothes from the chair and scrambled to get them on. He tried to get both legs in one pant leg, fell to the floor, jumped up, staggered over to the bed, and finally lined everything out. If he didn’t hurry, he was going to miss it. He crammed his kepi on and headed down the stairs toward the kitchen. He reached the door, and Dr. Taylor caught him.

  “Joseph, go to the parlor. Now!”

  It was dark in the kitchen, but he didn’t have to see his uncle to know the expression on his face, nothing to do but follow his order for now.

  In the parlor, Katie Bea and Peter were sitting quietly on the sofa. They were like lost puppies. Joe eased down in the rocking chair. He desperately wanted to go outside, but Dr. Taylor stood watch at the window.

  A small lamp, turned low, barely illuminated the room. Joe looked at the clock. It was 3:30, a long time before sunup, and the time dragged as the shooting grew closer.

  After a spell—seemed like forever, Joe couldn’t stand waiting in the chair, felt like a tied coon. He slipped over to the other window while Dr. Taylor was preoccupied with the happenings outside his own window. It was dawning and a heavy fog blanketed everything. Joe could barely see the hill behind the house. Small flashes illuminated the fog atop the hill, like an approaching storm—eerie. First, he would see the ghostly flashes like small specks of lightning and a short time later, he would hear the reports.

  Suddenly the room quaked; the whole house shuddered as the cannons erupted atop the hills. Katie Bea screamed, and Joe felt his heart jump in his chest.

  “Joe, get away from that window!” Dr. Taylor said. “Peter, help me.”

  They dragged the sofa to the fireplace. Katie Bea placed a quilt on the hearth and frantically beckoned the boys to her. Dr. Taylor pulled two big chairs next to the sofa, making a huge barricade, surrounding them and the fireplace. He climbed
across the sofa and drew everyone near. He said nothing, but as he looked into Katie Bea’s eyes, Joe saw the worry.

  “What do it mean?” Katie Bea asked. She was trembling.

  “The Confederate army is trying to push into the town,”

  Dr. Taylor said. “The batteries up there are firing on them.”

  “Sweet Jesus!” Katie Bea said. She grabbed Joe’s hand and squeezed so tight that it hurt. “Do you think the Rebels will take the town, Doctor?”

  Dr. Taylor took her other hand. “The Federals were ready for this. That is why they have been up at 2:30 every morning, lately. They have four batteries up on the hilltops. I believe they can easily hold the town.”

  Joe believed it, too. He had seen those guns in the hills, and he had seen the big guns in the fort. He also knew that gunboats were always coming and going on the river. In fact, the Tyler was there yesterday and probably there this morning. It had some great-big guns. But, if the Yankees had big guns, surely the Rebels did, too. Then Joe remembered the trees the Federals had felled across the roads leading into town. The Rebels would have a hard time getting their guns across those obstacles.

  He couldn’t stand the sitting—too much was happening. The shooting grew hotter, like popping corn in a kettle. He stood to see over the sofa. He could barely see through the window. As the dawn grew, the sky flashed like a thunderstorm.

  Dr. Taylor jerked Joe’s arm. “Get down, boy! Do you want to get killed?”

  Another boom thundered, jarring plaster from the ceiling, then another, and another. The windows rattled, pictures fell to the floor, and the whole house seemed to shiver. Joe had never heard thunder as frightening as the big guns. Surely, the house would crumble any minute.

  Someone pounded at the door. “Dr. Taylor!”

  Dr. Taylor hesitated, crawled across the furniture, looked back, opened the door to find a Yankee private there.

  “Sir, Colonel Russell requests that you come with me.”

  “What about my family?” Dr. Taylor pointed toward the barricade.

  “He ordered me to bring only you.”