Anita Mills (3 page)

“We won’t hurt you if you come out!” he answered, banging on the door.

“Go away!”

“Either you come out, or we drag you out!”

“I’ve got a double load of buckshot waiting for anybody fool enough to try it!”

“Stoneman’s orders, ma’am—you gotta get out before we set fire to the house!”

Sweat was pouring from her forehead, dripping from her hair. Blowing a wet strand out of her eyes, she gripped the shotgun more tightly. “You’re all a bunch of blue-bellied cowards making war on women and children!”

She saw the doorknob turn and heard shoulders hitting the solid oak door. The facing splintered from the force, but the pile of furniture in front of it didn’t budge. Amid a flurry of curses, somebody shouted the other way, “Door’s blocked—it ain’t opening!”

“Break it down!”

She couldn’t tell whether it was the men or her temples pounding as they threw themselves at her door. Leveling the Colt, she cocked the hammer and pulled the trigger. As the bullet tore through the wood, a man yelped, and a cloud of gun smoke filled the room.

“She shot me!”

“Go round back! Go in and drag her out by her hair if you have to!”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a bluecoat coming by the window, and she fired again. He dropped down and crawled back to the riders out front.

The tone turned conciliatory. “Ma’am, we don’t like hurtin’ women, but we got orders to get everybody out of here. You come on out, and we’ll see you get into town.”

“Get off my property!” she yelled again, cocking the Colt’s hammer. “If anybody leaves, it’s going to be you!”

“Ma’am, we’ve got no choice. Just do what you’re told, and nobody’ll hurt you. You’ve got the word of an officer and a gentleman.”

“You’ll have to burn me with my house, ‘cause I’m not leaving! That ought to make you real proud of yourselves!”

“Go round back!” she heard somebody shout again. “She can’t get all of us!”

Her heart thudded painfully beneath her breastbone, but she managed to keep the bravado in her voice. “Come on in!” she challenged them. “There’s enough guns in here for an army, and every one of ’em is loaded! So which one of you Yankee cowards wants the first bellyful of buckshot? You come through that door, and I’m cutting you in half with it!”

“She’s bluffing! Go get her!”

She caught a glimpse of blue creeping low, trying to get around the other side of the house. She got to Danny’s window in time to get a good look at his blue-covered rump. Taking aim at it, she pulled one trigger of the shotgun. It sounded like an explosion, and the recoil threw her into the wall as the shot shattered the window. Clutching her shoulder, she wasn’t sure the scream she’d heard was hers or his, but when she dared to look through the jagged glass, she saw the soldier jerking and writhing on the ground. The buckshot had torn through the back of his pants, and his backside looked like raw meat.

“Dear God, forgive me, but I had no choice,” she whispered, stunned by what she’d done. Recovering, she called out, “Anybody fool enough to try that again?”

“Throw the torch! Burn the bitch in it!”

Moving just out of Danny’s door and into the front room, she listened intently, trying to guess which way it’d be coming, and she saw the rider raise the burning brand. “Please, God, don’t let me miss,” she prayed fervently as she leveled the Colt and fired.

The horse reared, then went down. As the torch hit the ground, the flames shot up, frightening the animal further. It fought to regain its legs, then bolted. The rider picked himself up and limped after it
,
cursing loudly.

Regrouping at a safe distance, the raiders disputed among themselves, but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. Taking aim at a branch of the old oak tree above them, she fired the Sharps, hitting it, and they scattered. Wheeling their horses, they charged, giving the house itself a wide berth, going around the other side of the barn to torch the pile of hay there. As flames shot up above the roof, they circled to set fire to the coop and smokehouse, then came back to retrieve their wounded before they rode off.

She tried to open the kitchen window, but the rope stuck. With thick, choking smoke filling the air, and dry wood popping and crackling, she had to watch helplessly while flames consumed the barn. Then the chicken coop caved in.

The realization that the soldiers were gone, that she’d survived sank in slowly, followed by an awareness of her aching fingers. When she looked down, she had the Colt clutched so tightly that she couldn’t turn it loose. Still holding it, she leaned her head against the wall and let the tears flow.

When she finally regained her composure, she wiped her streaming eyes with the sleeve of her faded dress, then she looked outside again. A raw spring wind was carrying live coals out toward the thicket of wild plums and bittersweet.

It could have been worse, she told herself. If Jesse’d been there, he would have put up a fight, and they’d probably have killed him and taken Old Dolly. While she’d lost the outbuildings, she still had her husband, her house, and a plow horse.

T
he rain poured over the brim of Spence’s hat, soaking through his coat and shirt, chilling his weary body all the way to the bone. Beneath him, the roan horse plodded slowly, its hooves sucking at the mire with every step. The muddy road was deeply rutted, still scarred by the passage of Sherman’s heavy artillery wagons two months ago. Now the ragged remnants of a beaten army were walking it home.

As they’d passed the skeletal remains of charred chimneys and burnt farmhouses, seeing endless miles of fire-blackened fields, the relief most had felt at war’s end was gone, replaced by angry bitterness. Exhausted, footsore, and hungry, former butternut soldiers had themselves become foragers in their own land, fighting each other for food, horses, or enough money to get them to their own devastated farms and towns farther on.

Straightening in the saddle, Spence shrugged aching shoulders and fought to stay awake. He’d hoped to be in Georgia by now, but he knew it was still a long way to the state line. Between bad roads and worse weather, he’d be damned lucky if he made it to Charlotte tonight. If he could get there, he had enough money in his boot to pay for a place to sleep. If he couldn’t, he’d have to stay awake. He’d already witnessed barefooted infantrymen pulling a careless cavalry officer from his saddle, taking his horse, his money, and most of his clothes. The fellow had been damned lucky to escape with his life.

But as bad as things were, the war was over. Dispersing the wounded from field hospitals to other facilities had taken precious time from Spence, but with the last transfers done, he was finally going home to the wife and son he hadn’t seen in more than eighteen months.

He had a lot of time to make up, and maybe things would be awkward at first, but he couldn’t wait to see Liddy. In his mind’s eye, he’d pictured his homecoming a thousand times. She’d be waiting for him on the columned porch, smiling through her tears, and they’d just hold each other. Josh would be hanging back until Spence held out some of the horehound candy he’d stashed in his coat pocket, then he’d be glad to see his daddy. Now he could spend the summer getting acquainted with his boy. He’d take him fishing, teach him to ride, play games with him on the wide, lush lawn at Jamison’s Landing.

He’d finally be the husband Liddy wanted. He wouldn’t have to lie on a hard army cot, burning for her, anymore. Now he could give free rein to his memories of her whispered words, of the intoxicating scent of her skin, of the ecstasy of fulfilled desire. After four years of hell, he was going home to heaven on earth.

But right now, the spectre of violence still hovered, fed by despair, humiliation, and a desire for revenge on the gloating, swaggering Yankees who’d plundered and burned the heart of the South. Just yesterday, a drunken bunch of bluecoats had blocked the road, telling butternuts they had to salute the Stars and Stripes before they could pass. Provoked, the former rebels had linked arms and sang “Dixie” at the top of their lungs, and forced their way through the jeering Yankees. When the ensuing fight was over, two Union soldiers lay dead in the road, and a dozen others were running for their lives.

He kept trying to think of the good things, but his mind was wandering, scattering his thoughts like buckshot. He was so tired, but he couldn’t stop. At Charlotte, he’d write Liddy, letting her know he was on his way home, then he’d sleep as long as he could.

As unsettled as everything had been in those last weeks before Johnston surrendered to Sheridan, mail delivery had been pretty spotty, with little getting through. The last word he’d heard from her had been more than two months ago, but the tone of it had been better. Ross’s presence had been a big help.

“Get his gun!” somebody yelled.

Before he realized what was happening, a figure darted out from a copse of trees to grasp his horse’s bridle, and suddenly he was surrounded. As his hand sought his own revolver, he felt the cold steel of a gun barrel. against his neck. Jerking away, he kicked at the bearded man reaching for his coat.

“Hold your fire, or I’ll shoot!” Spence shouted, reaching for his gun.

“Grab his arm! Don’t let him get it!”

His horse reared, nearly unseating him. As two men rolled away from flailing hooves, he pulled the trigger. His first shot missed, then the gun jammed. Unable to fire again, he clubbed an attacker with the barrel, and kicked his horse’s flank hard. As the animal lunged forward, he was pulled from the saddle and struck from behind. The world went black before his face hit the mud, and he floated in a downward spiral toward oblivion.

“You all right, mister?”

A distant voice penetrated the fog in Spence’s brain. For a moment, he was on the battlefield, and the ground beneath him was cold and wet. He must’ve been thrown from the ambulance wagon when a cannonball hit it. But the guns had gone silent, the only sound now that of rain pelting the earth next to his ear. The wagons had gone on, leaving him for dead.

“He ain’t moving.”

“Wonder where he’s from—looks like they took his coat, but he’s got butternut pants on. Put that gun away, Will—he ain’t a Yankee.”

“He ain’t no soldier neither, Jack—he ain’t barefooted.”

“Come on—we gotta get goin’—ain’t no way we’ll be home iff’n we don’t get goin’.”

“Just wonder who he is, that’s all.”

“It don’t matter, I’m tellin’ you. I got a ma and pa to worry over, Will—I ain’t got no time to be carryin’ nobody anywheres.”

“It don’t seem right to be leavin’ ‘im like that.”

“We gotta. We ain’t got no horse, and he can’t walk anywhere like that.”

The voices floated off, leaving him in a fog of pain.

His fingers dug into the mud, hanging on. He’d fallen into a hole somewhere, and when he felt better, he’d crawl out.

It was either night out, or he’d gone blind, Spence decided, opening his eyes into the rain. He couldn’t place where he was, and he wasn’t sure how he’d gotten here, but he vaguely realized he had to get up.

His head throbbed to the beat of his heart, and the rest of his body felt as though he’d been thrown and kicked by a mule. With an effort, he rolled to sit, trying to figure out what had happened to him. The last thing he remembered was falling. Holding his chin up with his palm, he reached up to touch the back of his head. When he drew his fingers back, they were wet with something other than rain. He knew that feeling—it was congealed blood.

“Hey! What’re you doing sitting in the middle of the road, mister? As dark as it is, somebody’s liable to ride right over you.”

Looking up through his wet, dripping hair, Spence saw the halo of a lantern moving toward him. Then he could make out a tall, gaunt plow horse as gray as the fog itself. A man swung down to take a closer look at him. Behind the lantern, a wide-brimmed hat and an oiled canvas coat materialized.

“I’d say you’re in a heap of trouble, or you wouldn’t be out here like this,” the fellow said, dropping to his knees beside Spence. Holding the lantern closer, he said softly, “Well, I’ll be damned.”

“I already am. My head feels big as a pumpkin, and I could swear something kicked it.”

“You don’t recognize me, do you?”

“I can barely see,”

“Name Taylor mean anything to you? Jesse Taylor?”

“I don’t know.”

“Army of Tennessee,” the man prompted. “It was after the battle at Franklin that you saved my leg.” When Spence didn’t respond, he asked, “You remember Danny Lane, don’t you?”

“Yeah.”

“He was my wife’s brother. He was hell and be-damned to bring me in, but I knew if I did, I’d be losing m’ leg for sure. Whether you remember it or not, you cleaned out the hole and set it—it healed up real nice, Doc. I always felt sorry about holding that gun to your head, but I figured if I didn’t, you’d start sawing.”

“Yeah, I remember. If I hadn’t set it, you were going to hell with it.”

“That’s right. Looks like somebody bushwhacked you, Doc.”

“They wanted my horse—that’s all I remember. I was riding home, and they surprised me, then the damned gun jammed.”

“How long have you been out in this rain?”

“I don’t know—long enough for it to turn dark.”

“The bastards took your coat.”

“It was butternuts.”

“Hell of a thing to do to somebody that’s served with you, but there’s some like that.”

“Too many.”

“Well, I’m not about to leave you here like this. Come on,” Taylor said, catching Spence under his arm. “That’s it—you just come up real easy.” As the
light illuminated Spence’s black hair, the man observed, “I’d say you took a real whack on that head of yours. When I get you home, I’m going to have my wife take a look at it. If it’s as bad as I think it is, she’ll have to stitch it up for you.”

“It’ll be all right.”

“It’s a good thing you don’t have eyes back there— that’s all I can say. If we were still fighting the war, one of those army docs would be wanting to trepine that for you.”

“You don’t have much faith in us, do you?”