The Handsome Road

by Gwen Bristow

  “Them filthy bastards,” she said.

  “Now, Corrie May,” said Budge with soothing admonition. “You mustn’t say them kind of words. A nice girl like you.”

  “I’ll say what I think,” she flung at him fiercely. “Them taking you away from your place to make you fight for somebody else’s niggers. I’ll say it. I’ll say it out loud to everybody. I’ll say it this minute and I’ll slap anybody down that tries to stop me.”

  She started to run toward the bonfire. She ran half blindly, pushing her way through the crowd with furious haste. Let them fall down. It didn’t matter. Somebody had to stop this. Somebody had to shout out loud and tell these folks what they were fighting for. A child sat on a goods-box by the fire; she shoved him off, not heeding his yell or his mother’s demand of what did she think she was doing. She sprang upon the box and shouted,

  “Stop it! All you folks! Stop this yelling and singing! Go on back and mind your business and leave this war alone!”

  Around her she heard gasps of amazement. “Who on earth is that?” “It’s that Upjohn girl—her pa’s the preacher.” “Oh, him. Kind of touched, ain’t he?”

  “You think my pa’s touched!” cried Corrie May. “Well, he is. If his head had been on straight he wouldn’t be out fighting for them folks that own slaves. You shut up, all of you, and listen to me.”

  They listened, too astonished for the moment to do anything else. Corrie May jerked off her bonnet and pushed her tumbled yellow hair out of her eyes. She stood above them, mounted on the box, the light of the bonfire flashing on her as though she had drawn all its glow to herself, so that she was bright against the dark of the alley behind her as she shouted in her fierce ardor to tell them the truth.

  “You know what this war’s about?” she demanded. “I reckon you don’t because ain’t nobody told you. The Yankees want to come down here and turn the niggers loose. And suppose they do? Why should you care? You all ain’t got no niggers. Let them that’s got niggers fight to keep them! You po’ halfwits strutting in them fine uniforms—ain’t you grand! I could just bust laughing. Why ain’t you all got nerve enough to tell them to hell with their war?”

  “That there girl!” a voice shouted in the crowd. “Talking treason!”

  “I ain’t talking treason!” cried Corrie May. “I’m talking sense. I’m telling you the rich people want you to go out and get killed so they can keep their niggers! And if their slaves was free you’d all get better wages. Yes you would! You want the niggers to be free. You—”

  A clod of dirt hit her in the stomach. She gasped. “You poor silly—”

  “Shut her up!” cried another voice. “Put her in jail!”

  Another lump of dirt hit her. She staggered but kept on shouting. “I won’t shut up. I’m telling you what I know—”

  She felt a stick of wood strike her head. “Shut your damn mouth,” said a voice out of the dizziness. Corrie May felt herself falling down. She tried to scream. A blow in the mouth smothered her voice as the crowd surged around her, soldiers and older men and yelling women and children. They beat her and kicked her and dragged her across the ground. She fought like an animal, striking with her fists and biting their legs. From somewhere at an enormous distance she heard Budge crying out, “You folks leave her alone! She don’t know no better!”

  But she could not see Budge. She could not see anybody in particular; she only knew she was down on the ground and the whole mob seemed to be on top of her. They were tearing her hair out by the roots and blood was trickling into her eyes. Somebody’s foot gave her a kick in the stomach. A pain shot through her insides and she began to vomit. Above and around her, a long way off, she heard them saying this was how they’d treat all Yankees and all traitors who were paid by Yankees to come talk against the war. By this time she did not care any more. She was sick and bleeding and they were beating her. She could not even scream now. She could only choke and beg them weakly please, please to stop. But they would not stop. They were like wild animals tearing their meat to pieces. Then she couldn’t do anything but groan under the fists and feet, and then she could not do even that, for everything got black and there was a noise in her ears like thunder. She felt as if she were upside down and then right side up and then upside down again and something was pounding her body. At last she did not feel even that.

  2

  Deep in the pit of blackness where she was lying she slowly became aware of herself again. She shuddered, and her bruised mouth murmured, “Don’t hit me any more!”

  But to her amazement everything around her was silent. Corrie May thought they had pounded her ears into complete deafness. As her senses returned she felt pain all over her, in her head and arms and legs, pain gathering from everywhere and striking with increasing force as her mind awakened. She tried to open her eyes. They seemed stuck together. A long sobbing noise came out of her throat.

  From somewhere in the vagueness above her she heard a man’s voice. He was asking, “What’s happened to you, lady?”

  At that she became aware of what had roused her. Somebody was feeling her bruised body, trying to move her. With a vast effort Corrie May pulled open her eyes. On the ground by her was a lantern, and in its ring of pale light was a man in a policeman’s uniform. Above her she could just make out the crazy angles of the tenements. The walls seemed to lean over her, harshly silent.

  The policeman asked, “Can you get up?”

  She said, “I don’t know,” but the words sounded strange, and it hurt her to say them, for her mouth was so swollen with bruises that it could hardly form words at all.

  “I’ll help you,” he said.

  The sound of a friendly voice was so sweet that tears welled up behind her sore eyelids. She managed to say, “I thank you, mister.”

  He put his hands under her armpits. “Steady, now. You got caught in that riot out there?”

  “Yes,” she said, trying to hold her breath hard so she would not scream, for the agony of movement hit her from a dozen angles at once.

  “Too bad,” he was saying. “Too bad. Them beating up a girl.”

  Corrie May cried out as he lifted her in his arms.

  “There now,” said the policeman. “I reckon you better not try to walk. Don’t think there’s nothing broke, but you’s all cut up. Where you live? I can tote you—you ain’t so heavy.”

  She managed to mumble some directions. He started off. The streets were mostly deserted, for the people of Rattletrap Square dreaded the police and ducked indoors at the sight of them. Every step he took sent a jolt of pain through her, but she was so glad to be alive and on her way home she hardly minded. At the door of Mrs. Upjohn’s lodging he knocked with his foot. The door opened cautiously.

  “Who might it be?” Mrs. Upjohn inquired in a timid voice.

  “This here girl got hurt in the riot,” the policeman explained. “Says she lives here.”

  Mrs. Upjohn screamed. “Oh, my lawsy! Corrie May! Sure, come right on in, Mr. Officer. Lay her down here. Oh Corrie May, honey, is you bad hurt?”

  “I—I reckon I’ll be all right,” Corrie May murmured as he laid her on the bed.

  Mrs. Upjohn was bustling around. “How on earth did it happen? I heard the racket but was scared to go out.”

  “Well ma’am, I can’t say I rightly know just what did happen. Somebody started yelling sedition and the folks got to fighting. They sent some of us down to clear it up, but by the time we got here there was so much commotion we couldn’t do nothing but pile a few of the rowdiest in the wagon and take ’em down to jail to cool off.”

  He stood around while Mrs. Upjohn began to wash Corrie May’s cuts and bruises. “Terrible, terrible,” she was murmuring, “to beat her up like this.”

  “Yes ma’am, sure is. I found her in an alley back a piece. Guess she just fainted in the middle of it and they went on fighting each othe
r. This always was a tough part of town.”

  Though she could hear them talking, Corrie May did not pay much attention. Her mother bound up her wounds and brought her a cup of coffee. As she raised up to drink it she saw that the policeman was having a cup of coffee too. He sat in a chair by the stove.

  “It sho was kind of you to bring me home,” Corrie May said to him.

  “Well now, that’s all right. Always glad to help a lady in distress.” He sipped his coffee gratefully. “How’d it all start, miss? Was you there in the beginning?”

  Corrie May hesitated and swallowed a spoonful of soup her mother was offering her. His question had frightened her: the coffee had revived her sufficiently to make her understand that if she told this kind policeman she had started the riot he would be transformed from a kind policeman into an avenger who would take her off to jail for treason.

  “Corrie May,” said her mother reprovingly, “answer the gentleman. Ain’t you got no manners in front of company?”

  Corrie May wet her swollen lips. “Well—there was somebody talking against the conscription law.”

  “Oh,” said the policeman. He blew on his coffee to cool it. “Some fellow scared to fight, I expect. Belongs in jail, them kind of men.”

  Corrie May swallowed another spoonful of soup. “They’s really gonta conscript everybody?” she asked. “All the men?”

  “Yes ma’am, I expect so. Except the old ones, of course, and them that ain’t able to fight, and of course the big slaveowners.”

  She pushed the soup aside. The movement roused a pain in her shoulder. “Wait a minute, ma.” She turned her head to look straight at the policeman. “What was that you said about the big slaveowners?”

  “Mind if I pour myself another cup of this mighty fine coffee, ma’am?” the policeman was asking.

  “Go right ahead,” Mrs. Upjohn said in hospitable gratitude. “Help yourself. Don’t you want your soup, Corrie May?”

  “No, ma. I want to ask him—what was that you said about the big slaveowners?”

  “Oh yes, miss. The law says any man that owns twenty slaves or more is exempt from conscription. Somebody’s got to stay home and grow the crops, you see, and look out for the niggers.”

  “Oh.”

  Corrie May felt all the little strength that had returned to her flow out of her again. She fell back on the bed. The dingy room went swimming around her. Against the ugly walls she could see all in a whirl the silver doorknobs of Ardeith, the shining chandeliers, the marble mantels, the obsequious slaves, the columns behind the moss-hung oaks, and the triumphant faces of those patricians who in the moment of ordering a war to protect their luxury ordered also that they should not be required to wage it.

  Mrs. Upjohn sprang up. “Lord have mercy, Mr. Officer, I do believe the poor child’s fainted again! Will you help me tend to her?”

  “Sure, ma’am, sure. She tried to talk too much, I reckon. Shameful it is, them treating a girl so.”

  Corrie May began to mumble deliriously. Her mother had no time for awhile to pay attention to what she was saying. The policeman had to go back to his beat, and Mrs. Upjohn called in a neighbor woman to help her. Corrie May was feverish all night. She tossed and kept trying to talk. Now and then Mrs. Upjohn bent over her, hoping she was beginning to make some sense, but Corrie May kept beating on the bed and saying bad words, which her mother of course forgave her since she was clean out of her head, but she couldn’t understand why Corrie May should be saying such ugly things about the Larnes, those kind rich people who had given her work after her brothers died.

  3

  It was two weeks before Budge could come to inquire. By that time Corrie May was sitting up by the window, looking out into the alley. On the stoop Budge explained to Mrs. Upjohn that he had done his best to get there earlier, but they wouldn’t let him leave the camp.

  “They made us go back that night before I could find out what had become of her,” he said, “and then they made us drill extra time every day for getting mixed up in a riot. I sho hope she’ll understand how it is.”

  “Sho, she’ll understand,” Mrs. Upjohn assured him. “I’m glad you came to cheer her up, Budge. She’s been mighty low in her mind since she came outen that fever.”

  “How’s she getting on?” he asked anxiously.

  “Oh, she’s lots better. But she’s low in her mind. She don’t say much, just sits there by the window doing nothing. I tried to get her interested in her knitting again, thought making socks for the soldiers would get her mind off her troubles kind of, but she wouldn’t have none of it. I’m glad you came.”

  “Can I go in now?” asked Budge.

  “Sho, walk right in. It sho will cheer her up, seeing you looking so fine in your uniform.” Mrs. Upjohn opened the door. “Corrie May, you’s got company.”

  Budge came in, his hat in his hand. “How you do, Corrie May?” he inquired heartily.

  Corrie May sat by the window, a shawl over her knees. There was a patch on her forehead and she was thinner than he recalled, but otherwise she looked fairly well. Budge thought her eyes looked enormously big, but that was evidently because of the heavy black circles still under them.

  “Lawsy,” he said, “it was a shame what they did to you!”

  “I’m mighty glad to see you,” said Corrie May. “Sit down.”

  Budge took a chair, and began to explain why he hadn’t been to see her before. “I tried to get you away from them that night, but some fellow knocked me down. My head hit a brick. Kind of knocked me silly for a few minutes.”

  “It’s all right,” said Corrie May. “I ain’t blaming you. I ain’t blaming nobody.”

  Budge understood what her mother meant by saying Corrie May was low in her mind. She seemed to be talking without much interest, as if she had been struck so hard she was still insensitive. He had come prepared to sympathize with her, to be very tender and make it clear that while it was hardly right for her to say such things about

  the war he was not angry with her, even if he did wear his country’s uniform. But now he thought he had better post pone all that, and he rummaged in his head for something

  funny to make her laugh.

  “Now you just set and be comfortable, Budge,” said Mrs. Upjohn, “while I take my mending out to the stoop. It’s right pleasant in the sun there.”

  “Yes ma’am,” said Budge. He turned back to Corrie May. “Say, you oughta seen a fellow got brought into camp the other day,” he started. “Come from some place in the sticks out a ways from Baton Rouge, didn’t even know there was a war going on till the conscription officers come by to get him. He sho was a one. I declare, never had been to a town in his life nor had on a pair of store shoes. He didn’t look right bright to me, had a big wobbly head like a Jack-o’-Lantern on a stick—”

  He observed that he was doing well, for she had perked up a little and looked attentive. “Go on,” she said. “What’d they do with him?”

  “Well, he was so funny. He asked what these Yankees was we was going to fight—thought they was some kind of animal out West some place.” Budge laughed at the recollection. “He looked so cork-headed they was scared to trust him at first, and then they asked him if he’d ever toted a gun. And holy Moses, did he turn round at that. Toted one ever since he could walk, he said, could shoot anything that ever was in the woods, and will you believe it, they stuck up the ace of spades and asked him could he hit that, and he walked off so far you could hardly tell the ace from a fly-speck, and he put a hole right through the middle. So they told him well, he was in the army all right, and then they dressed him up—” Budge chuckled with glee. “Well, Corrie May, when he walked out in a uniform and army shoes and all, that was the proudest white man this side the Mississippi. You should have saw him strut. You’d have thought the whole war was just a fashion show for him to show off his new clothes. Only thing
worrying him was that his girl friend back home couldn’t see him all dressed up. So along about that time who should come strolling in but a fellow with one of them daguerreotype outfits, said for four bits he’d take anybody’s picture so he could send it to the folks back home. This here fellow ain’t never heard tell of no daguerreotype. At first he wouldn’t come near it, thought the whole outfit was gonta explode on him or something, but the fellows told him to come on, it wouldn’t bite. So when I left last thing I seed was him sitting up there to have his picture took, proud as a king but still kind of scared, holding that gun of his’n ready to shoot the fellow if the box started doing any monkeyshines.”

  Corrie May started to laugh, and Budge thought he must be cheering her up something fine, but all of a sudden her laughter choked in her throat and turned into little smothery sobs. Budge sprang up and bent over her.

  “Corrie May, sugar, what’s ailing you? Is you mad with me or something?”

  She shook her head.

  Budge kissed her. “Honey child, sho ’nough tell me what’s the trouble. You know I’ll do anything in the world for you, Corrie May.”

  She looked up, tears still on her lashes. “Budge, you can’t do nothing. Can’t nobody do nothing. They go get that po’ fellow that ain’t never even heard of Yankees and send him out to get shot! They get you off your piece of ground—”

  “Well sho, honey,” he answered dubiously, “but it’s a war. Like you said that time out at my house.”

  Corrie May sat forward, her eyes on him so intently it almost frightened him. “Budge, sit down. I want to talk to vou.”

  “Yes, honey.” He pulled his chair close to hers.

  “I been wanting to talk to you ever since that night I got beat up,” said Corrie May. “But that night I tried to talk to everybody at once. That was wrong. I reckon I ain’t so much of a talker, or they’d have understood what I meant.” She was not crying any more. She was talking very steadily as if this was something she had been saving up to say. “Budge,” she went on, “you said you’d do anything in the world for me. Will you?”