Ghosts of Yesterday

by Jack Cady

  “Spirits on the edge of this world? Are they part of tales we hear about time? Are spirits from another time?” Charles tried to sound casual, but it was a failure. His excitement at getting new information got the best of him.

  “What is your experience?” Bester asked. “Something has misfired. Something is cockeyed. What’s the date?”

  “August 14th, 1879,” I replied. When one keeps a record, one always knows the date.

  “It probably is August,” Bester said, “because it smells like August. But what is this?” He fished in a pocket and pulled out a small piece of material. It was flat and hardened like fired clay, but without the graininess of clay. “Came from the sky,” Bester said. “Plunked into a stream. Rattled people.”

  The fragment showed cracks and a burn. It measured no more than two inches square, and affixed to it was a very small, colored cylinder with soldered wire.

  “A raven or a jay had to have dropped it, but what in blazes is it?”

  “Came from the sky?”

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Bester told Charles, “because I already thought my way down that trail. But only birds fly. It’s either a bird or a sky god.”

  “Fire on the mountaintops,” Charles said. “Always to the west?”

  “Up until now.”

  “And what comes from the east?” Charles looked toward the east. “I ask, because if we look west, it pays to know what’s at our backs.” He let the business of sky gods pass. Time enough to inquire about superstitions later.

  Toward the east the sun had cleared the mountaintops an hour after first light. Mist rolled into valleys and hollows. In two more hours sun would begin to drive the mist upward. The forest would lose some of its green glitter as mist dried from leaves and needles.

  “Ghosts and Yankees,” Bester said. “Dead Confederates. Ghosts come from the east. They also drift this way from Georgia.”

  “Have there always been ghosts?”

  “Here and there,” Bester said. “Lots more of them lately. They hover around men like you. And men like me.” Bester turned the broken fragment over and over in his hand. The colored cylinder, orange and blue, contrasted with his dark skin. “Men like you won’t believe this next, and I could give damn less, but tell you anyhow.”

  He told of buffalo ghosting along trails, although forest buffalo disappeared from these parts two hundred years ago. He told of Spanish adventurers in search of gold, and, although gold has been found in these hills the native people never valued it. He told of murder, rape, retaliation; told of the ghosts of history. “Sometimes,” he concluded, “it’s like three hundred years never passed.”

  “It’s always been this way?”

  “Only a little… lots more of late. Spanish came into these parts in the 16th century. Sometimes they’re still here. It’s like nothing is ever lost, which is unnatural.” Bester looked eastward, shrugged, and presented us with an explanation. His notion seemed simple enough, but none of us had thought of such a thing. Bester claimed that in normal history — as opposed to what was going on — every time you gain something, you lose something. Sometimes you lose something good.

  “You have new Springfields,” he said about our rifles. “You can extract and load in two seconds. I can load in ten seconds. You gain time, but you lose dexterity.” He looked toward our horses; two roans, two blacks, one with a white star. “Around here people picked up mobility when they got horses. Some folks can’t live without. Other people understood that they lost freedom if they adopted horses… which is why plenty people don’t have ’em.”

  He was correct, of course. Horses take too much time and care.

  “Which means,” said Bester, “that I’m quicker than you, and freer than you; and I live without horse dung and horse flies. You, on the other hand, can travel further and load faster.”

  “I understand,” Charles said, and he did. It was not a novel idea, only sensible. “What we have is handy in war and adventure, but limits us in everyday life. Gain and loss.”

  Bester looked at the fragment of unknown material which looked foreign in his hand. He looked west. “There are some gains a man don’t need. Something showed up during the war. I want it defeated. We can handle Spanish, be they ghosts or real, but fire on the hills and strikes in the forest….” He looked at Charles as if wondering whether we were good enough. “Somebody has to plug a leak in history. I’ll venture it, but could use some extra rifles.”

  We all looked west. One rifle, or four, seemed feeble if what we saw was what it seemed.

  “Keep explaining,” Ephriam told Bester. “Them explosions is matter for comment.”

  “If they are explosions we’ll know in time to turn back. I don’t fret the explosions. What I fret is whether you gents are causing the leak.” Bester laid a hand on Ephriam’s shoulder, like friend to friend. “You haven’t been here. All you know is you’ve lost a horse. I’ve been here, and the price of this lantern show has already gone from a plug-nickel to six-bits.”

  “And you’ll solve it with rifles?” Charles was intrigued. Our sense of adventure had brought us to this place, and so far there had been no adventure. I entertained doubts.

  “For defense and for game,” Bester said. “If history is skewed we scout and find the cause. If we can’t cure it we come back.”

  “Or not.” Ephriam looked wary, like a boat thrown ashore, and wondering what was to become of itself.

  Charles looked at me, at Ephriam. “We’re having little luck here.”

  “We got an extra horse,” Ephriam admitted.

  “Bring the horses, but be prepared to trade or lose them. Or trade them now,” Bester told Charles. “Shank’s mare before this finishes.

  “Why?”

  “This is mountain country and not a field of battle.” He pointed to the depths of the surrounding forest. “From lookin’ at your plunder, I expect you gents were damned fine soldiers, but stealth is wanted. It’s different territory.”

  “I’m a sailor,” Ephriam told him, and for the first time, in a long time, looked at ease. “Don’t lump me with these cannoneers.”

  “We’ll be ready in two days,” Charles said. “Rendezvous day after tomorrow.”

  ……

  Our second visitor stepped from the forest so quietly we did not know she was there. A horse whinnied. Stomped. Then stilled. An old, old woman moved toward us. She wore copper ornaments and a cape of raven feathers. Her face, though heavily wrinkled, showed relationship to the young woman we had met at the fish trap. I would have wagered this was the grandmother. It was as if the young woman had turned ancient. The grandmother, doubtless.

  She carried a polished and ornamented stick, possibly for use as a cane. Possibly ceremonial. Possibly both.

  We extended full respect. This woman lived in ways made possible through the seclusion of these hills. Either that, or time truly was bent. From her world the Cherokee, far, far back in time, had derived. She was not Cherokee, but the mother of the Cherokee; an important fact. These Indians trace family relationships from the mother. A few of the women are reputed to have great power. This woman could live in ancient ways because she was so strong she needed no gun, no steel knife, no missionaries.

  “You walk west,” she said. “What do you know? You better know a lot.”

  I could nearly feel Charles’ thrill. Here was a person who we had traveled far to see. This woman could tell every custom, every tale, of the world of the 16th century. This woman’s world differed in no large respect from the world when Hernado DeSoto landed in 1539.

  “I know a little bit,” Charles said. “You know more.”

  If an experienced man looked at our horses and outfit with disdain, we would be alarmed. Bester, though, had thought well enough of them. This woman looked at our camp and was displeased. “Bester is plenty smart. You do what Bester says.”

  When he left, Bester had disappeared to the south. This old woman came from the north. It was unlikely the
y had met. Her opinion of our camp caused me to worry.

  Our rifles were stacked. She looked at them. “You don’t want better guns. You want no guns.” She looked west. “Plenty guns there.” From the forest came a loud snort. A bear. A big bear.

  “Thunder lives there. Thunder can take care of himself. Don’t go troubling Thunder.”

  Charles looked at me, and the look meant — don’t miss a word. Document everything.

  “War lives there,” the woman said. “He moves this way. You stop him.” Her wrinkled face remained tranquil, but her eyes belied the face. They were afire with anger. “War has plenty medicine,” she told us. “I have plenty medicine. I send medicine with Bester. You do what Bester says.” She walked back into the forest.

  Charles stood irresolute. He wanted to follow her, and knew he should not.

  “What did she mean?” Ephriam asked. “No guns. What in raging hell did she mean?”

  “We now have strong evidence that time is skewed. Surely, that woman cannot be of the 19th century.” Charles looked west. “Better guns? No guns? If time is misfiring, do we see the future in the west? He shook his head, as if to relieve himself of crazy thoughts. “Impossible. Impossible. In that direction madness lies.”

  “No guns at all,” Ephriam insisted. “What in the name of all that is wonderful did she mean, ‘no guns’.”

  “If necessary I will fight to defend us,” I said, “and I expect I’ll fight to defend her; but by all gods great and small do not expect me to initiate an attack.”

  I could see by their manners that my comrades agreed. In an ugly past, Charles and I stood side by side watching men fall before our cannon. At long range we loaded shot, and as range closed we loaded canister. When we ran out of canister we loaded broken glass, rocks, and horseshoe nails. Our field piece was like a giant scattergun.

  When overrun we met bayonets with clubs and knives. Ephriam, although he does not discuss it, had waded through scuppers running with blood, had seen blood splash so high that it discolored sails.

  “The man is a Reb and dangerous,” Ephriam said about Bester.

  “And I’m a Northern and dangerous,” I told him.

  II

  That night after the old woman left was a night of dreams. Charles took the first watch, I the second, and Ephriam the chill hours of night to dawning. The forest seemed alive with movement, and our fire at the mouth of the cave drew cold air from within. Chill circled our backs.

  When I settled in the dreams began. I once more saw men run through smoke from our guns, saw the twist and fall of bodies, heard Rebel yells sharp as the call of eagles. I relived my own most horrible event of the war.

  It happened on a wet day in mud. Rain had stopped. Sun glared hot as a forge, and muggy heat pressed white smoke from black powder to the ground. Smoke clung to earth like thickest fog. Rebel yells sounded an attack, and our supporting riflemen fired into the smoke as we loaded canister. Out there in the smoke men died by hundreds and we were glad. We saw little. Mostly, we only heard them dying. What we saw was smoke, and mud as liquid as a hog pen.

  Tongues of flame leapt from our guns, and we had occasional glimpses of falling men, like spirits in sweltering mist. Mud threatened to silence our cannon, foul the fuse, and our cannon kept trying to bury itself on recoil. Mud sucked at the gun as I lifted it. Only my great strength kept it free and pointed.

  Further down the line came the sound of a breakthrough and Rebel cheering. Then, through smoke, we heard the panting of attacking men. They were not yelling now, but sloughing through mud with bayonet and sword and pistol. They pressed forward in the face of canister, and canister swept holes in their gray and tattered line. One by one our guns stopped firing, felled either by mud or Confederates.

  Then the Rebs were on us. An artillerist’s hell. Charles stood with pistol and sword, and I emptied my rifle. A man jerked and fell, his face twisting in astonishment. There was no time to reload. I used the rifle as a club.

  A boy, hardly more than a child, appeared out of smoke. He was small, tow-headed, with brown and excited eyes. He wore a red rag at his throat, a lucky piece probably torn from a scarf made by his mother. In his right hand he carried a cavalry saber. His left hand spurted blood; fingers gone. The boy was not yet aware that he was wounded. He stumbled from the smoke, stopped amazed when he saw me, and for a moment, hesitated. In the dread heat of battle I must have looked like a giant risen out of smoke and ancient tales. He was entitled to run. He was fourteen, at most. He was too brave.

  I struck with the rifle butt, slamming it sideways against his left arm. He spun, nearly dropped the saber, nearly fell from the blow. He staggered, looked at his left hand, and looked at me in disbelief. He believed it was I who had wounded him. The wound pumped blood that spattered and mixed in mud. He was already as good as dead but seemed not to know it.

  He staggered forward with saber pointed, a dead boy trying to kill a still living man. With the butt of the rifle I broke his skull and saved him having to watch his life flow away into mud.

  A boy. Fourteen, at best. A boy no doubt dead because of cheap romance. He had imagined he would excel in war. He had imagined himself a victor. A boy, and not a very big one. Nothing to be done about it then. Nothing to be done about it later. Men running through smoke, ghosting through smoke. It was war; and may Abe Lincoln and Jeff Davis, and all abolitionists and slavers, and all cotton men and industrialists, roast in everlasting hell.

  When I awoke, jerked out of dreams by terror and no small guilt, the sun had not yet walked the top of the eastern mountains. My head hurt. I watched my companions. Subdued. No one talked about dreams.

  I almost trust Charles, almost. His judgement was sound during battle, and surely it was sound on this occasion. Ephriam almost trusted Charles. Neither of us trusted Bester.

  Charles had allied with Bester, and Bester was a Reb. Perhaps Charles could forgive the war but I could not. Hard to tell about Ephriam… likely, with Ephriam, it was the same.

  And, Bester, part Indian and part Afric, was not necessarily of a mood to cherish the company of Yankees. It would be hard for him to forgive the rapes and fires and total destruction of the war. Besides, Bester was an enigma. Why would a man of his race have done battle in behalf of the south?

  It was with large suspicion, and larger misgiving that I spent the day helping to cache supplies in the fond hope they would not be stolen. We then loaded a bit of salt, sugar, and flour on the horses. We packed a few items for trade, steel knives and, more desirable, flat files to keep knives sharp. We struck south to the Cherokee village where we were first greeted in sullen silence. When the purpose of our visit became clear, the Indians professed friendliness which we knew was a lie.

  We traded for Indian tobacco — strong as a drug and used as medicine — and for other medicines. We returned to camp knowing that each would carry only a knife, a rifle, a revolver, a blanket, Lucifer matches waterproofed with paraffin, coffee, a little tea; a pot or a skillet. Additional gear would be packed by mule, but we did not know how long we would own horses and mule.

  “And so,” Charles said at sundown, “we commit to chance, or God, or a Johnny Reb who may be saint or rascal.”

  “You can commit to him all you want,” Ephriam told Charles. “Me, I’m still figgerin’.”

  “Rascal, no doubt,” I said, “but no damned saint.”

  The fire before the mouth of the cave glowed with small but positive energy. From the western hills came the rumble of Thunder.

  In the second night of dreams strange beasts appeared, winged and fanged and unlovely; beasts of the apocalypse. Hordes of people fled along trails. From the depths of forest came echoes and strange cries, the sound of weeping, wails of such high pitch one thought only of wounds.

  Disembodied faces appeared, fleshy, smooth-shaven, speaking harsh language. Jowly faces with cruel eyes. Then the faces grew bodies and uniforms, generals and tyrants, epaulets and medals dangling; those symbols of
ribbon and brass that power awards itself, symbols intended to persuade the foolish that there is merit in much that is damnable.

  I awoke to the sound of a heavy body crashing in the forest. My first thought was of the horses, but knew that Ephriam would be alert and attending. The heavy sound seemed somehow comforting. I stirred coals and rebuilt the fire; venison, biscuit and coffee. Charles and Ephriam packed remaining gear for the long road. Not much said. We listened to occasional crashing in the forest and stared into mist.

  “If we go to defeat war,” I said, “then I’ll play the game.” I did not explain why I said it, and my comrades did not ask questions. “If this was just a pleasure jaunt I would not.” They still did not ask.

  Bester appeared from the forest as naturally as a stream runs. We heard no sound. The horses gave no alarm. He still carried the muzzleloader but was now dressed in deerskin. We, having no deerskin, had packed waterproofs. He looked over our gear even before greeting us. Bester was not a man given to wasting words.

  “An old woman visited.” His was not a question. He squatted before the fire, refused food, accepted coffee that was boiled and black. “Panther piss,” he said with satisfaction, and by way of compliment.

  He seemed less a creature of mist or history. These woodsmen are practical fellows, but their stealth often makes them seem insubstantial. “The old woman said what?”

  “She sends strong medicine with you,” Charles told him. Charles searched the forest. “I don’t understand medicine. Do you carry it, or is it with that bear?”

  “If you saw it,” Bester said, “it would likely look like a bear. I think you’ll never see it.”

  “Medicine?”

  “She commands nature,” Bester told us, “and don’t ask how because I don’t know.” On this day his voice did not sound like the white aristocracy of Virginia. His voice held the same quiet, but with little accent. He sounded like a man wise in his job, but also wise enough to use caution. I wondered how cautious he felt he had to be around us.