The Mountain

by David L. Golemon

  “You are John Henry’s friend, so that is why I will not kill you. I did not kill those bad men. No one on this boat kill them.” Gray Dog removed the embedded knife and then turned and left.

  “Uh, Colonel?”

  Taylor turned and saw Jenks being shoved into the galley at gunpoint. Sergeant Major Dugan once more had his pistol out and while still in a dressing gown that flowed to his ankles, he shoved the shocked Jenks inside. They were soon followed by John Henry. He was bare-chested and his suspenders were the only thing holding his blue pants aloft. He too was armed with a Colt.

  “Colonel Taylor, would you join me in my cabin, please.” John Henry uncocked the pistol and handed it over to Dugan, who was smiling at Jenks, who had been placed next to the man who had nearly beaten him to death four days before. They exchanged uneasy looks.

  Jessy stood. He reached down and took his last sip of coffee and then half-bowed to the colonel. “By all means.”

  * * *

  John Henry closed the door after leaving Dugan standing outside with pistol in hand. He walked to the small sideboard and then he shocked Taylor by pouring two glasses of whiskey. He turned and held one out toward the Rebel colonel.

  “You’re going to need this.” Thomas nodded as Jessy took the glass, and then he raised it. “To the president,” he said.

  “Yes, President Jeff Davis,” Taylor said with his own smile and then both men drank.

  John Henry set his glass down, and then just as Jessy lowered his, Thomas punched him with a roundhouse blow to the side of his head. He staggered into the hull, which held him upright. Taylor shook his head and looked up at his brother-in-law. He smiled.

  “’Bout goddamn time!” he said as he launched himself at Thomas. He struck the colonel right at belt level and drove him into the table still strewn with maps. The two men fell, and that was when the close-in fighting of the cavalry officers really commenced.

  * * *

  Captain Jackson was in a blue robe that had been a gift from his mother when he had been promoted at the early age of twenty-three to lieutenant commander. He was holding a carafe of water as he slowly moved back to the small makeshift cabin he had been in since offering his to Colonel Thomas. He was stopped and his sleepy eyes rose to the large man.

  “They’s fightin’, Captain,” Grandee said as his wide eyes went from a yawning Jackson to the smiling faces of Dugan and Jenks, who stood facing each other just outside the main cabin. The noise coming from inside his old cabin was like a hurricane ripping the place apart.

  “Now, now, this has been coming on for some time. Don’t get your knickers in a bunch,” Dugan said.

  Both Jenks and Grandee looked horrified, as they knew both men inside were in a killing mood for deeds done years before.

  “What do we do?” Grandee pleaded with Jackson as the young officer yawned once more and then started to move away toward his bunk.

  “This is an example of an army problem, cookie, not the navy’s.” He stopped only momentarily and said without turning back, “I am interested in the outcome, so see me in the morning and let me know who won,” he said as he parted the curtain and entered his small space. “Good night, gentlemen.”

  Jenks and Grandee looked at each other, and then without a word both turned their heads to see Sergeant Major Dugan smiling like this was the most marvelous thing since P. T. Barnum’s museum opened.

  * * *

  Dugan could not remember a fistfight lasting so long without someone calling for a doctor, or a mortician. The sounds of breaking furniture, glass, and the occasional “umph” ended only a few minutes later when the sergeant major was approached by Professor Ollafson, Claire Richelieu, and the ever-present Steven McDonald.

  “I demand this foolishness be stopped immediately!” Ollafson said to a smiling Dugan when they approached. Claire looked absolutely horrified that not one man belowdecks had made an attempt at stopping the two madmen from this disgraceful act that surely was not the way an American military officer should comport himself.

  “Sorry, Professor, orders were clear on this one. Until I hear a gunshot coming from that cabin, no one gets in.”

  “They could be killing themselves in there!” Claire said as her eyes went to the suddenly silent cabin door.

  “That, ma’am, is highly probable,” Dugan said, and then cocked his ear to the right. “Sounds as though they may be taking a small breather, or one of them is dead.”

  “Well, man, open the bloody door!” McDonald said.

  “You all just go back to your studies or beds. If someone in that cabin needs attention, the ship’s doc is standing by. Now go on, leave the two colonels alone to sort out their differences or this little fantasy mission will end before we reach Constantinople.”

  “This disgrace will be entered into the official report, I assure you,” Ollafson said as he turned and left.

  “Be sure you enter that little tidbit of information right alongside the entry about you allowing a French spy onboard.”

  Ollafson stopped, hunched his shoulders, and then continued on.

  McDonald, with one last look at the sergeant major, quickly followed just to get those beady little rat’s eyes off him. On the way he almost bumped into Gray Dog, who was waiting just underneath the stairs leading to the upper deck. Grandee was there also. Both were eating buttered bread from the galley.

  “What is this, a prize fight?”

  Both men looked at him. It was Grandee who summed it up the best.

  “Soldiers fight.”

  “Oh, of course, that explains all.” McDonald shook his head and then left the aft compartment.

  Dugan faced Claire, who wasn’t moving. She turned and pulled over a small stool and then sat.

  “I’m not leaving until you allow me to enter that cabin.”

  “Then I suspect we’ll be waiting together, Miss.”

  * * *

  For a reason John Henry couldn’t remember, he was staring at the polished tips of his boots. As he did, the left-side suspender attaching his pants to his body snapped. His head jerked as the elastic popped and stung his bare chest. Blood had coursed down from his left brow and dripped onto the floor. He managed to look to his right as Jessy was trying in vain to lift himself from the floor. The last time these two men had done battle with each other like this was back in their junior year after family day at West Point. That was the very first time that John Henry had seen Jessy’s sister, Mary, visiting with their parents from Mobile. Thomas had never seen a girl like her before. Her confidence obviously had been earned after so many years with her brother, but it was her kind eyes that John Henry remembered first and foremost. That night when he had mentioned it, Jessy went crazy and they ended up in just about the same positions they were in now. The remembrance was short lived as Jessy gave up and then slid back down the damp hull to sit hard on the deck.

  “You still hit like a flower-picking Yankee.”

  “Is that so? Well,” John Henry swiped blood from his mouth and then spit a mouthful of it out onto the wooden deck. “This flower-picking Yankee just put you on the deck.”

  “Ha! And just where do you find yourself, Colonel?”

  Thomas looked up at Jessy, who was also spitting out blood.

  John Henry tried to rise, failed, stumbled backward, and then sat heavily on the floor. He let out a breath and then rolled over and lay down. He suddenly became inspired and rolled to a spot he saw upside down in his vision. Once where he wanted to go, he retrieved a bottle and then rolled back to his section of hull, where he finally managed to sit up. He uncorked the bottle of whiskey and took a long, double swallow of the amber-colored liquid. It burned but it was a good burn; it let him know his nervous system was functioning just fine. He held out the bottle toward Jessy, who was still cursing a loose tooth that John Henry had managed to dislodge from his cheek. He took the offered liquor and held it up. He wiped the lip of the bottle with a dirty sleeve and then took a drink.

 
; “I loved your sister.” John Henry took the bottle back and then looked at Taylor.

  Jessy tried to stand again but this time he surrendered halfway up the hull and slid back. He closed his eyes and then reached out and snatched the bottle from Thomas’s hand.

  “The one man in the world I thought I could trust in protecting my sister failed me and her. Instead of leaving her in the east where most married men felt their families were safer, you brought her out to Texas. How did that work out, hero?” He took a drink while his eyes remained on his former brother-in-law.

  Thomas remembered the day he and his troop were led away from the small settlement of six ranches. He never in his wildest imagination thought the Kiowa could mount a murder raid on so many ranches on the same day. He had been outsmarted, and that more than anything had driven him mad and led to him leaving his assigned patrol area to pursue Kiowa who weren’t where they were supposed to be. Jessy had figured that out, and was the first of his troop to reach the ranch, only to discover he had been too late. The massacre had been complete. John Henry remembered riding up to the ranch after finding the small three-lodge camp of Gray Dog and his family. They had suffered the same cruelty as the settlements. Gray Dog had been shot in the shoulder with a Kiowa arrow and was riding behind John Henry when they came upon his home, the ranch that would allow him and his wife to live a life outside of the army. He had planned to resign his commission after 1859 and he and Mary would start raising children and cows on the Brazos River. But as he saw the smoldering house and barn, the outbuildings, and the covered bodies on the ground, he knew that his life for the most part was done. Until a few days ago he’d only seen Jessy one other time since he lost his wife. That was the day the regiment broke into two factions when President Lincoln had called for volunteers to fight the rebellious southern states.

  “Tell me, John Henry, how many mistakes in judgment have you made? Or was it just the one?” Jessy spit again and then handed the whiskey back to Thomas. “The one that cost me my little sister?”

  Thomas looked at the bottle in his hand. “Just the one.” He took a drink.

  “I don’t care, it’s been too quiet in there! Open the damn door!”

  At that moment Sergeant Major Dugan opened the door and backed in with a furious Claire Richelieu jabbing him with Dugan’s own cocked pistol. The sergeant major’s eyes were wide and his hands raised.

  “Now, Missy, you put that gun down before we have us an accident.”

  “If this gun goes off, Sergeant Major, it will be no accident.”

  Suddenly Claire tossed him the cocked weapon and Dugan almost shat himself as the gun landed in his bumbling hands, where he finally managed to secure it.

  “Goodness, we arrive at the capital of one of the largest and most unstable governments in the world and you two look like you just fought the battle of Bull Run all over again.” Claire reached down and started to dab a white linen cloth to John Henry’s eye. Then she heard Jessy start his slow descent to the floor once more from his sitting position. She grabbed the bottle of whiskey and before turning her attention to Taylor, took a long pull from the bottle. She placed it on the floor and then stopped Jessy from rolling completely over onto the deck. “Stupid son of a bitch,” she mumbled as both Taylor and Thomas looked at the woman who cussed just as well as Dugan, who was also standing wide-eyed at the woman’s harsh words.

  “What are you standing there for? Go get the doctor!” she said as she looked back to Dugan, who finally broke the spell the woman had cast by the use of her foul language. Dugan had obviously come up with newfound respect for the ancient-languages expert.

  “I hope it was worth it,” she said as she grimaced at the nasty cut on Taylor’s lower lip.

  “The only good outcome would have been me shooting him,” Taylor said as John Henry finally managed to get to his feet.

  Before Claire could berate Taylor for being foolish, a drum started pounding the call to general quarters.

  John Henry immediately broke for the door just as Commander Jackson came from his small space, placing a coat on. The man was completely dressed as if he had been waiting for the call to arms.

  “I was afraid of this,” Jackson said as he hit the stairs leading to the upper deck.

  “The French?” John Henry asked as Dugan tossed him a shirt as he too made the stairs.

  “I suspect the British aren’t too happy with us sneaking by Gibraltar without paying our respects.”

  They made the quarterdeck as men ran to their battle stations. They were met by Jackson’s first officer.

  “Battle stations manned and ready, Captain.”

  “Very good,” Jackson said as he took the long glass and scanned the horizon to their stern, and then his first officer pointed him in the right direction.

  “Not there, sir. Over there.”

  As Jackson brought the scene to their front into focus he held his breath. Aligned three ships abreast was the Royal Navy. They were at half-sail and moving toward them slowly. He scanned the gun ports on the first ship in line. They were closed and the deck activity looked to be minimal. Jackson lowered the spyglass and faced Thomas.

  “They’re just trying to get our dander up a little. They know if they raise those gun ports I’ll blow them out of the water. No, they’re not looking to fight—just showing us they are the Royal Navy.”

  “But what if those cannons are ready to fire behind those closed gun ports?” John Henry asked as he felt someone step up beside him. It was Jessy. Thomas handed him the spyglass.

  “Nah, those boys don’t want a fight. Jackson’s right, they’re just wanting to see what we will do. No, there will be no first shot fired from these boys.” Taylor lowered the glass and then handed it back to Jackson. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll let Miss Claire tend to my battle wounds.”

  Jackson raised the glass as he studied the three British warships in front of him. As he watched, the first started peeling off to the starboard, effectively making room for his two ships to pass. He lowered the glass and then looked at John Henry.

  “From our secessionist friend’s attitude, your little meeting of the minds didn’t turn out the way you had hoped?”

  John Henry finished buttoning the shirt and then started to turn away. He stopped and shook his head. “I was hoping to get the air cleared, but as in this entire war there’s been too much blood spilled, too much talk. No, Jessy won’t come back. He hates not only me, but himself.”

  “I don’t follow your logic,” Jackson said as he watched his men at their stations.

  “Colonel Taylor fails to realize that the area of responsibility for my wife’s death resides not only in my camp, but his also. He ignored my order to keep his troop in the vicinity and went after the Kiowa raiding party that killed the first family near where his troop was quartered.”

  “In essence he is as much responsible for his sister’s death as yourself?”

  “Yes,” John Henry said as he started to walk away. “No,” he quickly corrected. “I own that.”

  Jackson watched the army colonel walk away and kept his next question unasked. He knew why John Henry didn’t use that against Taylor; it was simply because one man accusing the other never solved anything. He could not imagine having that thrown in his face—that the death of his sister was his responsibility also. Maybe that’s why the hate was so deeply imbedded in the Confederate.

  Jackson watched as the British warship slipped past the Yorktown. He eyed the English captain standing at his station on the quarterdeck. He watched the man raise a hand toward him and he could swear he saw the smile from that great distance.

  “I’m sure we’ll meet again, Captain. I have no doubt.” He smiled and saluted also.

  * * *

  One hundred and thirty miles astern, the French navy, with a very angry Paul Renaud ensconced on the first warship, entered the Mediterranean. The entire world was now focusing its attention on the Aegean Sea as they entered the azure
waters of the once-mighty Greek nation. In a day and a half they would reach the departure point for their meeting within the Ottoman Empire.

  Ararat was growing ever closer.

  13

  CONSTANTINOPLE, CAPITAL OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

  The Yorktown was being tied up to the crowded dock. Many citizens of the empire’s capital had spilled out to see the American warship as she entered the harbor. The sailors and marines were surprised to hear the “Star-Spangled Banner” playing. A thirty-piece band had been secured to welcome the Americans and their kind but surprising gift of a railroad to the empire.

  As John Henry came topside he felt embarrassingly uncomfortable in his dress uniform. The bright red sash highlighted the saber in its polished sheath, and his boots had been cleaned and polished by the crew of the Yorktown. The one accoutrement that he despised was the helmet with its gold trappings. The braided plume that rose from the centerline spike made him feel more like a flamingo than an officer in the United States Cavalry. John Henry pursed his lips and then placed his white gloved hands behind his back as he awaited the others by the gangway.

  He was soon joined by Jessy, dressed the exact same way as Thomas, and he was feeling equally awkward in the Union colors. He hated the fact that his men down below had gotten a very good look at their commander as he quickly walked past them a few minutes earlier. Both men still carried the battle scars of their fight three days before. Claire and the doctor had done an admirable job of stitching and making the bruising look far less than it really was. As Captain Jackson joined them he had to smile at the uncomfortable way the two army officers waited for the others. Unlike the two men who stood before him, Jackson felt no discomfort whatsoever in his dress blues. The two-corner hat was a bit much, but he was still proud to wear the gold braid and tails of a U.S. naval officer. He’d had many more chances to become comfortable in his uniform than the other two frontiersmen.