Billy Boy (6 page)

“Where's your regulation knife, Private?”

Billy winced, blinked his eyes. He tried to swallow, but his throat was too dry. He slid his hand down the side of his coat, felt the solid lump in the pocket, reached in, and pulled out the knife.

Behind him, a soldier moaned fitfully about the heat and fainted to the ground, noisily scattering the tin utensils in the air.

Major Gardiner shook his head in disgust at both Billy and the collapsed soldier and lashed out at Captain Mathers before he turned and marched away.

At last it was over. In spite of everything, Billy felt proud when Adjutant General Hodson presented the regimental colors and he marched in the formal dress parade, passing in review before his senior officers.

The night sky swirled orange as Billy stared at the rows of campfires throughout Camp King. It felt good to be with his friends.

“Rum's been flowing all through this camp tonight,” said Charlie.

“Don't nobody feel much like goin' to bed,” said Leighton. “Our last night on good ol' Maine soil for a long time.” He turned his head to the raucous privates at a nearby fire.

Jeb shook his head. “I ain't never seen folks so liquored up.”

“Looks like you're gonna get your chance to see a drunkard up close,” answered Harry. “Ol' Lars Soule is staggering this way.”

Reeking of tobacco and rum, a burly, disheveled Lars leaned over and passed his bottle to Jeb. “Hey, Berwick boy? How 'bout a little drink?”

Billy watched as Jeb reluctantly accepted the bottle and took a short swig. He quickly handed it back. The private grunted in approval and looked around. Billy lowered his head.

“Hey,” Lars yelled, stifling a large belch. “Ain't you one of them dumb cusses in the Awkward Squad?” Billy shuddered as Lars shuffled toward him.

“Here—take a drink.” He belched again and laughed.

Billy turned his head away from the bottle. “Pa says drinkin's a curse.”

“Well, your pa ain't here now, is he?” Lars leaned his face into Billy's.

“Ain't wantin' to.”

“What a whimpering little toad.” Lars turned and hollered to his buddies at the next campfire. “Hey fellas, we got us a real sissy boy here. Says his pa don't want him to drink.” Hooting and laughter erupted.

Billy hung his head, ran his fingers through his hair, then tore at a fingernail.

“Looks like we got us a Sunday soldier. You know what a Sunday soldier is, boy?”

“Reckon I don't.”

“Well, see here … A Sunday soldier is a name we give you dumb little cusses—”

“Shut your mouth, Lars.” Leighton's face was raw with anger.

“Oh, look, it's another fool from the Awkward Squad.”

Billy heard Harry leap to his feet, saw the heels of Harry's boots charge at the drunken private. “If you're looking for a fight, you can start with me. Seems to me we should be getting along, Lars, but if it's a fight you want, I'll take you down right now.”

Harry yanked off his sack coat, tossing it to the ground in an angry flourish. Lars raised the bottle and rushed toward Harry, rum spilling over his head and shoulders as he swung it around in midair. Harry ducked his head and lunged forward, grabbing the private's arm and twisting it hard against his back. The bottle fell onto one of the rocks that circled the campfire and shattered, the strong scent of rum fouling the air. In seconds Lars was on his knees, wincing in pain as Harry held his grip, preventing the private from striking back, his free arm dangling limply at his side. Out of the darkness, Lars's drunken friends shouted and lurched for Harry. Leighton jumped to his feet. Charlie picked up a piece of broken glass. Unsteady on their feet, the privates retreated, staggering back to their fire.

Harry waited a few moments and then released his hold, pushing Lars to the ground with his foot. “Go on now, back to your friends.”

Wincing in pain, Lars pulled his arm into his chest. He struggled to his feet. “You fellas ain't heard the last of this!” He turned and spit on the ground. “Especially the Sunday soldier,” he shouted from the shadows.

Billy's head fell to his chest. He got up, moved slowly from the campfire, and disappeared into the tent. He lay still as his friends slowly entered the tent, rolled out their blankets, and settled onto the ground.

“You okay, Billy Boy?” Harry tapped him on the shoulder. Billy rolled onto his back but said nothing.

“I know you ain't asleep.”

“Wonderin' is all.”

“'Bout what?”

“Wonderin' mostly—just who the enemy is.” He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand.

“Aw, them fellas are a bunch of bullies for sure, but they'll be all right after a time. It's just the liquor talking.”

“Wish I was like you, Harry.”

“Billy Boy, I like you just the way you are.” Harry leaned close and whispered, “Besides, want to know a secret?”

“Reckon.”

“Always wished I was as tall as you.”

“You mean that, Harry?”

“You betcha. If I was taller … Well, thing is, I had to learn to fight my way through things, what with me being so short.” Harry paused and took a deep breath. “All the blustering I do? It's just so folks will take notice.”

Billy stared in astonishment.

“Anyway, don't you worry none. We're in this army together. I'm right by your side, just like I told you. Go on now and get some sleep.”

Harry slipped across the tent floor and disappeared beneath his blanket. Propped on his elbows, for several moments Billy stared at his long legs stretched out across the blanket. Wiggled his socked toes. Maybe things were going to be all right after all. Settling back down, he waited for sleep, for dawn, and for the troop train that would carry him far from home.

Chapter 5

E
lijah was in a run for his life, and only his callused bare feet could save him. He ran hard over the rocky field with only the dim light of a quarter moon as his guide. Ol' Joe said five miles west was the railroad, the steel rails north his path to freedom. Fear swelled in Elijah's throat. At the edge of the field he ran into the forest, growing more anxious with every step that took him deeper into the darkness and his own uncertainty. His foot caught on a protruding root and he stumbled, collapsing on his hands and knees. He took long, deep breaths, gulping down air.

Dawn was approaching. He knew he had little time to rest—only a fleeting moment to summon his will. He listened for his pursuers. The muffled hooting of a great horned owl was the only sound in the stillness of the night.

With his short frame and wide, strapping shoulders, Elijah was growing up just like his pappy; that's what the other slaves said. And, at the age of just sixteen, he was the strongest slave in the county. That's why he was sold to Mastuh Fowler for fifteen hundred dollars.

Elijah shook his head. That's when things changed. The new mastuh owned a large tobacco plantation near Danville, Virginia, far away from his pappy on the Ramsey farm. Tears welled in Elijah's eyes as he remembered hugging Pappy good-bye. Mastuh Fowler had yanked out his whip, cracked it in the air, and struck him hard across his back. “You're my property now, nigger,” he had shouted. Wrenched from his pappy, Elijah had crawled into the back of the wagon, filled with loathing for
his new mastuh. But Pappy ran up to him, and before Mastuh Fowler could push him away, he had whispered in his ear. “If he keep hurtin' you, my boy, then you run. Run like the wind.” Three months later, Ol' Joe, he told Elijah the same thing.

Elijah startled.

He waited. Listened to the darkness. There it was again! The distant, hoarse-ringing bay of bloodhounds.

He prayed his pappy's strength still ran through his veins. He needed it now to stay alive.

He shot a glance in either direction and then ran to higher ground, low branches whipping his cheeks until they bled. A small open space at the top of the hill offered a view of the surrounding forest. Elijah studied the nearby ridge and the rocky ledges on the other side. The faint line of morning rose pink and yellow along the eastern horizon, reminding him of Ol' Joe's warning—
Run by night, sleep by day
. He needed to find a place to hide soon, safe from the bloodhounds. He ran deeper into the woods toward the nearby ridge, hoping its narrow ravine would offer shelter and a place to hide.

His strength waned; bile rose in his throat as he ran across the forest floor, and he tried to ignore the sharp shooting pains from his feet, the calluses now raw and bleeding. He summoned God as he ran, mindlessly pleading for mercy if Mastuh and his bloodhounds found him alive. He reached the ridge and gasped with relief at the ravine below. He fled down the steep embankment.

The bays of the bloodhounds echoed off the rocky ledges. Their fierce howls startled him, and he lost his footing. Half tumbling, half running, his body weightless, he tucked his shoulders and rolled, landing in a mass of ferns. He crawled on his hands and knees, cool stagnant water oozing between his fingers and toes. Bullfrogs croaked and clamored out of his way.

Elijah struggled back to his feet and scanned the bog. A shallow stream ran through the middle of it. Barely a few feet wide, the water cut an easy path through the dense woods. The water was only up to his ankles as he stepped into the middle of the creek, grateful for the sandy bottom that soothed his stinging feet. He made his way downstream, not caring about his direction, his only thought to elude the slave catchers. He had heard stories of escaped slaves overtaken and torn to pieces by the bloodhounds. Only when it was safe would he think about the Blue Ridge Mountains and the rail lines north.

He moved quietly down the stream until the sun poked a fiery head over the treetops. He stepped anxiously onto the muddy bank and scanned the dense thicket around him.

The sound of fast-moving water caught his attention. Not far ahead, the stream emptied into a wider river, big enough that the bloodhounds would lose his scent. Too frightened to cross the deep water, Elijah hugged the banks, walking ankle-deep, grasping at branches hanging low over the water. Before long he spotted an uprooted oak half submerged, its wide trunk and gnarled roots sprawled across a sandy beach. Sunlight blinded him. It was time to hide. Dropping to his hands and knees, Elijah crawled beneath the tangle of tree roots and burrowed in the damp sand.

He wondered how far away he was from the Fowler plantation, surely the biggest farm he had ever seen. Ol' Joe said Mastuh owned nearly a hundred slaves. His old mastuh used to work in the fields beside the slaves, but not Mastuh Fowler. His three sons rode their horses up and down between the tobacco rows, watching, taunting the slaves, and snitching to Buckra, the overseer. Suddenly Buckra's beady dark eyes flashed in front of Elijah's face. He winced, trying to muffle the low moan rising in his throat.

Right off, things had been bad with Buckra. Ol' Joe said the overseer feared Elijah's strength, unusual for someone so young, and worried that Elijah might cause trouble. That's why Buckra tried to break him like a wild horse. Elijah shook his head to scatter the horrifying images that raced through his mind. He couldn't let the slave catchers find him. If the bloodhounds didn't tear him apart, Buckra would.

Ol' Joe had saved Elijah's life last night. It was only a few hours ago now. Elijah was asleep when a hand fell over his mouth.

“Hush now, boy, and listen up,” Ol' Joe whispered to him. “You be in trouble. Mastuh and Buckra be in the curin' barn tonight. Mastuh say he sell you at the auction block. Now Buckra all worried Mastuh Fowler see what he done to you. Ain't no white folk pay money fo' you now. So Buckra, he gon' come after you tonight. He evil, boy. He do sumthin' bad so Mastuh don't see what he done.”

Elijah asked the old man what to do.

“You gotta run, boy.”

“Where to?” he had asked.

“Run to them Blue Ridge Mountains in the west, 'til you come to the railroad goin' north. That be the way of the Drinkin' Gourd. Git yo'self to Maryland, place called Sandy Spring. Quaker folks there help you git to Canada. Then you be a free man. Hide in the day and run by night. Go on now.”

Elijah ran.

Huddled now in the upturned trunk, he prayed the bloodhounds had lost his scent. He needed to sleep, to escape from his thoughts. He stretched his legs, rolled onto his back, and settled down in the sand. In an instant, pain shot up and down his spine like bolts of lightning.

He screamed.

Granules of sand had penetrated the flesh of his lacerated back. Wincing, he rolled onto his belly and buried his head in his arms. Pain overwhelmed him, and in seconds, everything went black.

Elijah wakened several hours later, the burning in his back lessened to a dull throb. Hunger gnawed at him. Crawling out from his hiding place, he inched across the sand, cupped his hands, and drank from the river. Fearful the slave catchers would search up and down the river, he no longer felt safe at its edge. He needed to run west, to the Blue Ridge Mountains, and find that railroad going north. He turned from the river, raised his face, and studied the landscape where the sun dipped behind the distant hills. He hurried up the grassy bank and ran; ran like the wind.

Chapter 6

I
n the gray and humid September dawn, Billy gazed out across the Potomac River. The bivouac at Fort Dupont, high on the Anacostia ridge, offered quite a view. All of Washington lay below. As he buttoned his flannel shirt, he heard his friends talking about some soldiers who had disappeared from the fort during the night.

“Deserters,” Leighton grumbled under his breath. He took a huge gulp of air, sucked in his stomach, and squeezed into his light blue trousers.

Balancing on one leg, Josh hopped across the grass and slipped his socked foot into his boot. “Them two privates ain't got no clothes 'cept these uniforms. Army's gonna catch them for sure.”