“I ought to have confessed my fault in order to relate the story of your magnanimity; it might have procured you a pardon. A hundred times I resolved to do so, but shame prevented. Besides, your sentence was just and righteous. Well, Heaven forgive me! I said nothing, and my regiment was soon afterward ordered to Tennessee and I never heard about you.”
“It was all right, sir,” said Brune, without visible emotion; “I escaped and returned to my colors—the Confederate colors. I should like to add that before deserting from the Federal service I had earnestly asked a discharge, on the ground of altered convictions. I was answered by punishment.”
“Ah, but if I had suffered the penalty of my crime—if you had not generously given me the life that I accepted without gratitude you would not be again in the shadow and imminence of death.”
The prisoner started slightly and a look of anxiety came into his face. One would have said, too, that he was surprised. At that moment a lieutenant, the adjutant, appeared at the opening of the tent and saluted. “Captain,” he said, “the battalion is formed.”
Captain Hartroy had recovered his composure. He turned to the officer and said: “Lieutenant, go to Captain Graham and say that I direct him to assume command of the battalion and parade it outside the parapet. This gentleman is a deserter and a spy; he is to be shot to death in the presence of the troops. He will accompany you, unbound and unguarded.”
While the adjutant waited at the door the two men inside the tent rose and exchanged ceremonious bows, Brune immediately retiring.
Half an hour later an old negro cook, the only person left in camp except the commander, was so startled by the sound of a volley of musketry that he dropped the kettle that he was lifting from a fire. But for his consternation and the hissing which the contents of the kettle made among the embers, he might also have heard, nearer at hand, the single pistol shot with which Captain Hartroy renounced the life which in conscience he could no longer keep.
In compliance with the terms of a note that he left for the officer who succeeded him in command, he was buried, like the deserter and spy, without military honors; and in the solemn shadow of the mountain which knows no more of war the two sleep well in long-forgotten graves.
HIGH TIDE
JOHN P. MARQUAND
ONCE DESCRIBED BY Life magazine as “the most successful novelist in the United States,” John Phillips Marquand (1893–1960) was a prolific short story writer, mostly for The Saturday Evening Post, one of the most popular and highest-paying magazines in the country.
After graduating from Harvard, he began his literary career as a reporter for the Boston Evening Transcript, followed by a time in the magazine department of the New York Tribune. He took a job as copywriter for the J. Walter Thompson advertising agency, replacing Richard Connell, the outstanding author of numerous stories, including the relentlessly anthologized “The Most Dangerous Game.”
Marquand turned to the longer form with serialized novels (again in The Saturday Evening Post) and novels, many of which were social satires largely set in the somewhat claustrophobic atmosphere of upper-class Boston society. He had delivered a manuscript to his literary agent, which she called a “humorless fantasy,” advising him to put it in a desk drawer and forget it. After being serialized in The Saturday Evening Post in 1936–1937, The Late George Apley was published in book form in 1937 and won the 1938 Pulitzer Prize as the best novel of the year. He soon followed that success with H. M. Pulham, Esquire in 1941, which was nearly identical in structure and tone to The Late George Apley.
His earliest commercial success had come from his series about Mr. Moto, a Japanese spy. The first book in the series was No Hero (serialized in The Saturday Evening Post in 1935 and published in book form the same year; it was later retitled Your Turn, Mr. Moto to capitalize on the famous name of the recurring character). Four more Moto novels followed in the next eight years but, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 6, 1941, the publication of Last Laugh, Mr. Moto early in 1942 put a halt to the series. Marquand did publish one more Mr. Moto novel, Stopover: Tokyo, in 1957.
The books inspired a popular series of eight motion pictures starring Peter Lorre, beginning with Thank You, Mr. Moto (1937), though they bore small resemblance to the novels. An often cold, ruthless spy in the books, he was morphed into a mild-spoken Charlie Chan–like detective for the films. A late addition to the series, The Return of Mr. Moto (1965), starring Henry Silva, was not successful. The last Moto novel was filmed as Stopover Tokyo (1957), but eliminated the character.
“High Tide” was first published in the October 8, 1932, issue of The Saturday Evening Post; it was first collected in Thirty Years (Boston, Little, Brown, 1954).
HIGH TIDE
JOHN P. MARQUAND
SOMETIMES, in the sultry warmth of summer at Deer Bottom, Scott Mattaye could remember the high tide; and sometimes, when he was feeling in the mood, he might even tell of how he went through a hostile country to find an army which was lost, and how the Battle of Gettysburg might have been wholly different if his horse had not gone lame. At such an hour, after his second glass, the old man would sit straighter at the table, and his voice, slightly cracked, but soft and gently drawling, would rise above the whirring of the moths which kept fluttering around the guttering candles like incarnations of the quiet sounds from the warm, dark night outside.
“You follow me, gentlemen?” he would say. “I’m referrin’, of co’se, to the lack of cavalry in the opening phases of that engagement—cavalry, the eyes and ears. And I’m referring, above all, to the temp’rary absence—an’ I maintain the just and unavoidable absence—of our cavalry general, on whose staff I had the honour of servin’. I’m referrin’ to that immortal hero, gentlemen, Major-General J. E. B. Stuart—Beauty Stuart—in the Army of Northern Virginia of the Confederate States of America—the ve’y greatest cavalry commander in that army, gentlemen, which, of co’se, is the same as sayin’ the greatest cavalry leader in the history of the world.”
He meant no exaggeration when he said it. Some impression had been left upon him which transcended time. He would smile beneath his drooping white mustache as though he had a secret, and he had the secret of his days. Strange, unrelated moments were flitting before him like the shadows of the moths upon the wall—plumed hats, boots of yellow leather that came above the knee, girls snipping buttons off grey coats, eggnogs, Virginia hams, black boys dancing the buck and wing beneath the lantern light, a kiss, a lock of hair, the Bower, Frederick, Winchester, high tide.
“High tide,” he said: “it was all accident and time.”
It was clear what he was thinking, although his words had a way of wandering when his mind was groping in the mazes of his vanished world. He was going back to the hours when the tide of the Confederacy lapped over the Potomac to reach its high-water mark of the war. He was thinking of Rowser’s Ford and the captured wagon train at Cooksville—twisted iron rails, staggering horses, men reeling in the saddle, drunk with sleep. He was thinking of a spy, and of Stuart’s last great raid. The Army of Northern Virginia was pouring into Pennsylvania. Lee and Longstreet were arguing over plans.
“Sammy,” he said to the cook’s small boy, “bring refreshment to the gentleman….Now, Gettysburg—of co’se, we should have whipped ’em if Stuart had been there. I should have fetched him—yes, indeed. If that horse had not gone lame near East Berlin, why, sholy I’d have fetched him. If I had not stopped by the stone house near the road. A matter of a spy, you understand—a foul, ugly matter….I share in the responsibility, gentlemen. It all was accident and time.”
He did not add that he had nearly died in cold blood in that square stone house.
* * *
—
He could see the beginning, and he knew that the hand of fate was in it, though it happened more than sixty years ago. Stuart had been stroking his fine brown beard, as he did w
hen he was troubled. It was in the cool of an early summer morning, the first day of July. The horses’ heads were drooping, and faces were blank from lack of sleep.
“Mattaye,” Stuart was saying, “I’m lost. Early’s gone. Everybody’s gone. I’ve sent off three officers already. You go out, too, and find the army. You see this map? We’re here. Ride out towards that place Gettysburg yonder. Keep riding till you find it.”
It was a fine day, he could remember. The fields were green and fresh from early summer, and the land was richer than the land at home. It was a country of fine, rolling fields of pasture and wheat and corn, of neat hedges, neat houses and compact, ungenerous trees. It was a land uncompromising in its plenty, without warmth of welcome. But the dead weight of weariness was what he remembered best. After two days of steady march, men were lying exhausted with bridles in hands, watching horses that stood too tired to eat. There was food in the Yankee wagons they had taken. He could see the white tops of the wagons down the road, but there were many too tired for food.
Scott Mattaye was made of iron and rawhide then, but he was very tired.
“The army, sir?” he said. “Which army, sir?”
His question made Stuart laugh, and the sound of it came back across the years. He was in a hostile country with his column too tired to move. He was lost and he was worried, and he had not slept an hour in the last three days. Yet the general seemed to feel none of the lethargy of exhaustion. The way he wore his sash, the tilt of the plume in his hat, the angle of his cloak about one shoulder made his equipment look as fresh as when he had started. Nothing ever wilted in the general.
“Which army?” he said. “Well, I’m not aiming to encounter Federal troops in force this minute. I’d prefer to meet the Army of Northern Virginia, General Robert E. Lee commanding, now engaged in invasion of Pennsylvania, and due to end this war. I’m out of touch, and I don’t like it—not right now. They’re somewhere over there—somewhere.”
He waved his arm towards the south-west, but there was no dust or smoke or sound; nothing but open rolling fields, stretching to the horizon in the tranquil light of early morning. The very peace was like a disturbing suspicion that something had gone wrong. It could only have been anxiety that made Stuart speak so frankly.
“The corps should be coming together,” he said, “and we should be in front. There should be word, you understand?…Your horse all right?”
Scott’s horse was a light sorrel caked with sweat and dust.
“He’s worn down, sir,” said Scott. “But he’s as good as any in the column, I reckon, sir.”
“Take your blankets and saddle off,” Stuart said. “Kill him if you have to, but report to General Lee, you understand? Ask for orders and a new horse to take you back.”
“Yes, sir,” said Scott. “Where will I find you, sir?”
“We’re resting here two hours,” said Stuart. “Then we’re moving on to Carlisle. Watch out for cavalry, and don’t get caught. We’ve lost too many on the staff. Good-bye.”
Only the impression of small things was left to Scott Mattaye, and the touch of all the great sights meant much less, until all his memory of camp and bivouac came down to little things. Bodies of men, the sound of marching troops and firing were a part of his life, and were blurred into the monotony of days, but the smell of bacon grease in smoke, a voice or the squeal of a horse would be like yesterday. He remembered how his blankets sprawled over the tailboard of the headquarters wagon, inertly, like a dead man’s limbs. As they did so, he had a glimpse of fine grey cloth among them. It was his new uniform coat, which he had planned to wear in Washington City, certain they would take Washington.
An impulse made him put it on which was composed of various thoughts—the idea that he might never wear it, through accident or theft, the desire to appear in an enemy country like a gentleman, and the conviction that a staff officer should look his best. The coat had the buff facings of the staff. Though it was wrinkled and still damp from a wetting in the Potomac, it was very well cut. He strapped his belt over it, with his sabre and his pistol—a fine, ivory-handled weapon which he had taken from a Yankee colonel in Centerville. His saddle was a Yankee saddle; even his horse had a U.S. brand, but his coat was Richmond, bought with two hundred and fifty dollars of his country’s notes.
“You, Jerry,” he said to the horse, “step on. We’re bound to go.” Then he remembered that the animal sighed almost exactly like a man.
He went down the road past the picket at a trot, and half a mile farther on he met a patrol, riding back. He knew the officer. He was Travis Greene, from Maryland, and Scott had always liked him. He liked the way he handled horses; there was something in him which Scott had always trusted—a candour, a vein of sympathy.
“Trav,” he said, “seen anything out there?”
Trav shook his head and grinned. The corners of his thin mouth wrinkled.
“No,” he answered. “Where yo’ headin’?”
“Message,” said Scott.
“Seems like the general’s getting nervous,” Trav said. “Nothing but the staff with messages. Yo’ won’t get far on that old crock of yours. He’s powerful near through.”
“Why, boy,” said Scott, “this animal can go a week and never drop. Why, he just craves to run. Why, boy, you’ve never seen a raid. This is only triflin’ up to now.”
“Where we headin’?” the other asked. “I reckon you don’t know.”
Scott felt the importance of his knowledge and smiled. “Don’t you wish you knew?” he said. “Where Beauty Stuart wants. That’s where. Come to think of it, seems to me you’re always asking questions.”
“Saucy, aren’t you?” said Trav. “I reckon you’re out calling in that new coat of yours. I’d take you for a damn Yank if it wasn’t for that coat.”
“Would you?” said Scott. “Well, you ask Beauty Stuart where I’m going. No doubt he’d just delight to tell you, and call for your advice. I’ll be seeing you. Good-bye.”
Then, almost without thinking, he pulled his watch from his breeches pocket. It was a fine, heavy repeater.
“You, Trav,” he called, “keep this, and if I don’t get back, send it on to Deer Bottom, and I’ll be much obliged.”
He could still hear their voices, low and pleasant, and could recall the way Trav started as he reached and caught the watch.
“To Deer Bottom? Certain sure! I’m proud of your confidence,” he said. “Good-bye!”
Scott Mattaye loosened his revolver in its holster and put his horse to a trot again, not fast, for he had to save the animal’s strength, and the horse was tired.
“You, Jerry,” he said, “take your time.”
Then, as he spoke the word, he knew that he had made a blunder. He had three hundred dollars in Confederate bills in his pocket, which would have been more useful at Deer Bottom than a watch; and now, because of a sentimental impulse, he had no way of judging the distance he was travelling, except by instinct and the sun. He knew that one could conceivably ride all day through an opposing army with a good horse and a knowledge of the road. He had seen enough in the raids around McClellan and Pope to have gained a contempt for Yankee horsemanship. He could get safe away from a regiment of Yankee cavalry.
But now he could detect a difference. He had been in a friendly country on other rides alone, where there had been a careless tangle of woods and grown-over fields. Friendly people had waved to him; girls had brought him milk. His horse beneath him had been like a reservoir of untapped strength, but now his horse was tired. There was no spring in the trot, nor a trace of willingness to increase the pace, and the country itself was foreign. There was a plenty in the Pennsylvania fields, like the rolling land along the Shenandoah, but there was no generosity in that plenty. There was the same sinister threat in the meticulous furrows and the abundance of that earth which he had seen in the armies that sprang
from it.
There was a menace in that hostile land, for everything was watching him. He could feel a hatred in that country rising against him like a wave. The sun, glinting on the windows of small farmhouses, made those windows look like eyes, reflecting the hatred of unseen faces, staring towards the road. And the uncertainty of time was weighing on him, because he did not know the time. The uncertainty made him remember Stuart’s own uncertainty. “Time,” the hoofbeats of his horse were saying, and the humming of the insects and the rustling of the corn were speaking of that flowing, unseen principle which connected life and death.
A sound made him draw his reins, and his horse stopped, obedient and still. It came, a swift, metallic click, from behind a clump of small trees near a bend which shut out his vision to the right. His revolver was cocked in his hand, while he sat staring, listening. He did not know that he was speaking until he heard his voice.
“Pshaw,” he heard himself mutter.
A man in overalls was hoeing a potato patch just around the bend. He turned and stared at Scott.
“Morning, friend,” said Scott. “It looks like a right fine morning.”
The man spat on a potato hill. “I ain’t no friend of yourn,” he said, “nor any of your kind.”
Scott laughed. “Why, mister,” he said, “I mean you no harm, and that’s why I say ‘friend.’ I only aim to ask you if you can let me know the time.”
“Would it give you comfort,” the other asked, “if you was to know the time?”
“Why, sholy,” Scott said, still smiling. “I’d like right well to know.”
The man’s voice became louder.
“Then I’ll die before I tell yer, ye n———-tradin’ thief! Two of my sons has died, and I can die before I raise a hand to give one mite of comfort to your lot! I only hope your time is short, and I may see your carcass rotting! Now git on!”
The Big Book of Espionage Page 79
