Marching As to War: A Post-Apocalyptic Novel (22 page)

John glared at me. Mary looked calm. She didn’t seem
surprised at all.

I kept watching both of them as I went out the back door.
Outside, I ran to the horse, unhitched it, and mounted.

Mary came out of the backdoor. She had the book in her hands
and walked toward me.

She said, “Just be gentle with the pages.”

“Thank you,” I said, putting the book inside my shirt. I
glanced up and saw John was watching through the kitchen window.

“Be careful,” she said.

“I will.”

I gave the horse a little kick, and it carried me out into
the beautiful summer morning. I was going to see Jane for the last time.

I went east, forcing the old horse to keep a quick trot. I
did not know how far I had to go, or how much time I had. I remember almost
nothing of what I saw along the roads that day. My mind was too full of
thinking about Jane.

We had all heard stories about the things the Government did
to prisoners.
Starvation.
Beatings.
No sleep. John was right to worry about my being taken prisoner. They could
break me.
Easily.
But Jane?
I
couldn’t imagine her strength failing her. I couldn’t imagine her crying,
begging for her life when she saw the rope.

My first year in the militia, I saw a man hung. It was some
drifter, who had raped and murdered a woman. When we caught him, his clothes
were still bloody, and he had the woman’s locket. There was no doubt about
it.
 

We weren’t any rougher with the man than we had to be. We
even made sure he had a final chance to get right with God, but the man just
cursed at the preacher who tried to help him. When the man saw the rope, he
bucked and squirmed, wailed and cried. We gave a chance to say some last words,
but all he did was beg not to die.

I even felt some pity as we sat him on a horse and put the
noose around his neck. I felt pity until I noticed again the woman’s blood on
his clothes. Somebody slapped the horse on the rump, and it ran.

Now, I have seen men die since then, and none went out with
less dignity than that piece-of-shit we hung. He was guilty as sin itself. He
did not even deny it. He was not sorry for it. He just did not want to get what
he deserved.

I didn’t care if they had broken Jane, even if she cried and
begged before the rope. She didn’t deserve to suffer or die. If she was guilty
of anything, no men, least of all the Government’s men, had a right to judge
her.

I didn’t care how Jane died. I could forgive any weakness in
her because I knew I was so much weaker. But I wondered if Jane could forgive
herself. If it came to that, I hoped she could. I said a silent prayer to God,
who had been so silent for so long, to help her, to give her whatever she
needed.

As I traveled, I saw more and more people on the roads, all moving
toward what I took to be the center of town. I followed them. For many, the
hanging appeared to be a holiday, a party. I saw some passing around bottles of
whiskey and wine. There was laughter and loud talk. I wanted to pull out my pistol
and make them be quiet. Instead, I rode on so I wouldn’t have to listen.

And there were soldiers along the road, sitting in their big
trucks, watching the people go past, waiting for trouble. I tried not to look
at them and to keep moving.

Finally, I came to the center of town. There was a
four-sided pillar of stone, fifty or sixty feet tall. I had never seen anything
like it and wondered what it was for. It stood at the western end of a big open
area, which sloped down to the east. There were also large buildings
surrounding the area. A couple had been gutted by fire, but most looked like
they were in use.
Probably by the Government.
Soldiers
with rifles and machine guns were on top of all the buildings, watching the
people below.

At the far end of the area, behind a barrier
of barbed wire, stood the gallows.
It was a broad wooden platform ten
feet high. Above was a big crossbeam. A single noose hung from the center,
waiting for Jane.

I tied the horse to a long fence on one side of the open
area. From the sun, I judged it close to
noon
.
The field was filling up with people, but there was room in front, close to the
gallows. I worked my way forward until I was five or six paces back from the
wire barrier and right in front of the rope. I just stood looking at that
noose, not quite believing what was going to happen.

Nearby in the crowd, a man started talking about hangings. I
couldn’t see him, but he sounded like the sort of man who liked to hear himself
talk. He went on about the hangings he had seen over the years and the
different ways to hang people. He said the fanciest way was to have a kind of
door in the platform right underneath the person. When the door opened, they
would fall.

“Snap!” he said with a sharp clap of his hands, “their neck
gets broke.
Dead.”
He said with a chuckle, “If you’re
gonna get hung that’s the way you want to go.”

He said what was more common was to stand the person on a
chair or sit them on a horse. When the time came, the chair would be kicked
away, or the horse made to run. This was like the hanging I had seen. If the
person on the rope was lucky, it was a quick death.

I wanted to ask the man which way they were going to hang
Jane. I didn’t, of course, but someone else did.

“You’d think they’d do it up right, do it the fancy way,
with the door in the platform,” said the old man, “but no. They’re gonna do her
the hardest way. Gonna put the rope around her neck and haul her up inch by
inch.” This was the way David Winslow had hung those men right after the
Plague.

The old man pointed out the rope went up through a pulley
and down to a hand-cranked winch. “Yes sir, gonna kill the bitch
slooooow
.” He made some choking sounds, as though the rope
was around his neck. Then the old bastard said, “I hope you didn’t eat much
this morning. You might lose it.” He laughed.

So Jane would die the hardest way of all. I looked up and
told God,
She did everything you asked of
her.
Everything.
And you let her die like this.

There was a rustle of movement in the crowd. Everyone was
pressing forward. It was beginning.

Three men came out of the front door of the building right
behind the gallows. They went up the stairs single-file and stood in a row at
the rear of the platform.

Two were dressed in long black robes. Maybe they were
judges. The third man was an Army officer in a black uniform. I guessed he was in
charge of their prison.

I was close enough to kill all three of them with my pistol.
They deserved to die. But I knew it wouldn’t save Jane. And if the soldiers with
rifles on top of the buildings were any good, I would be dead before I could
empty the pistol.

There was movement behind and below the platform. At first,
it was hard to see because everyone around me was standing on tiptoe, and
craning their necks this way and that. Then I saw her.

Jane wore a long loose gray dress. Her hair was cut short,
shorter than I had ever seen it, and she looked tired and thin. Sick. Her hands
were tied behind her.

She walked to the gallows. Then she took the stairs up to
the platform, slow, one step at a time, with her head down to watch her feet. I
had a feeling she didn’t want to trip, to fall, or to give the soldiers any
excuse to carry her to the platform. She wanted to show no weakness. They
hadn’t broken her.

When she reached the platform, she stopped and looked up and
out over the crowd come to watch her die. She looked as though she had come
onto a stage to sing a hymn or deliver a sermon.
To give a
performance.

She even had a little smile. But tears flowed down her
cheeks.

A soldier took her by the elbow and gently guided her to a
spot beneath the noose. She glanced up at it for just a moment, as if it held
no special interest, and then looked at the crowd again.

There was a lot of noise, a sort of roar, coming from the
crowd. But I can’t remember much about it. Perhaps some people were shouting
angry things at her. That would be what the Government wanted. The only thing I
recall clearly is her standing steady with silent tears.

The officer on the platform stepped forward and called for
quiet. Then he began to read something from a piece of paper. It was all about
how Jane had been properly tried for this crime and that crime. She had been
found guilty and been sentenced “to be hanged by the neck until dead.”

Jane never looked at the officer, and he didn’t look at her.

The crowd cheered when the officer finished. He let it go on
for a while before calling for silence.

I had expected them to give her a chance to say some last
words. But they didn’t. By now, they knew she would say something they didn’t
want people to hear.

Three soldiers walked over to Jane. One knelt, tying her
ankles together. The other two stood on either side of her as if to steady her.
But she didn’t need it.

Meanwhile, another soldier starting working the crank to
lower the noose so it could go around Jane’s neck.

Jane just continued to look out at the crowd, the tears
still flowing.

As the noose was lowered to Jane, I stood up straight as I
could, and then went up on tiptoe.
Look
at me Jane,
I
thought.
Please look at me. I’m here.

It was the least I could do for failing her, and for not
telling her how I felt about her. I just wanted Jane to know I was here, to know
she wasn’t alone. She had once told me that nobody ought to die alone.

Jane, I’m here,
I
thought.
Look at me.

Please God
, I
prayed.
Let her look at me
.

Then, she did. I believe she found me in the crowd, and she
smiled. As the noose was slipped over her head, I believe she smiled at me.

The soldiers made the noose tight around her neck. Two
soldiers now worked the crank taking the slack out of the rope. Jane looked up
from my face toward the sky and cried in a loud voice, “Oh, God!” Before she
could cry out again, the rope was lifting her.

She was on her toes for a moment, and then she was lifted
free of the platform. I remember the crowd making noise, shouting angry things,
taunting Jane, enjoying her suffering.

Jane’s body began a long struggle against death. The rope
made it impossible to breathe. Her body shook and jerked like a hooked fish
drawn from the water.

I thought of pulling out my pistol and shooting her, ending
her misery. I should have, but the plain fact is I did not want to die. I was
afraid.

After several minutes of shaking, Jane appeared to grow
still with only an occasional twitch. Piss and shit ran down her legs and
splattered on the platform. Her face went from red to dark blue. At the end, it
was almost black. Her tongue pushed out of her mouth, and her eyes seemed
almost to pop out of the sockets. She lost all resemblance to the Jane I had
known. The body twisted and swung in a light breeze.

I forced myself to watch it, to witness it all, to remember.
Even now, many years later, I can close my eyes and see it. God help me. I can
still see it.

Finally, the two judges and the officer left the platform.
Some soldiers let Jane down, took off the noose, put her in a tarp, and carried
her away into the building behind the platform. I wondered what they did with
her. Maybe they just threw her in a hole or dumped her in a river. Maybe they
doused her with fuel oil and burned her until there was nothing left. I’ll
never know.

Then one soldier came up on the platform carrying a bucket
and a brush. He scrubbed the spot where Jane’s piss and shit had stained the
platform. When he left the platform, it was empty and clean, ready for the next
hanging.

When I looked around, I saw I was the last to leave.

I found my horse, mounted, and let it take me back the way I
came. I didn’t pay much attention to where I was or where I was going.

It was already dark, and the moon had begun to rise when I
got off the main road and started to make my way on the side roads to Mary and
John’s house.

The horse noticed the sound first. It stopped in the middle
of the road to listen. Then I heard it. It was the rumbling whine of an army
truck.
Coming our way.
I pulled out my pistol and got
the horse moving again. We crossed a little ditch to one side of the road and
went behind some trees.

As the truck went past, I could hear the excited voices of
the soldiers. They were all talking at once. I couldn’t make out any of the
words, but I recognized the feeling. They were relieved. Something had gone
better than expected, and none of them had been hurt.

For a moment, I wondered what they had been doing. Then I
was kicking the horse into a gallop. I kept my pistol out, although I knew it
was useless.

The soldiers had smashed the front door off the hinges. The
house was dark. I jumped off the horse, tied it to the fence, and ran up the
steps.

John was face down on the floor in the front room. There
were several bullet holes in his back. To turn him over I had to step in the
pool of blood surrounding him. I closed his eyes. He probably died thinking how
I had betrayed them, how I had told the soldiers everything.

I went upstairs, leaving bloody footprints, and checked all
the rooms. Mary wasn’t there. I went downstairs into the kitchen. She wasn’t
there either. There was just one place left to look.

Before I went down to the cellar, I sat in a chair and
gathered my strength. Maybe Mary was hiding in the chamber behind the shelves. Maybe
she had been somewhere else when the soldiers came. Maybe she was safe.

Somehow, I knew she was not.

I lit a lamp and took it downstairs. I opened the chamber.
Mary was seated, slumped against the back wall. Her eyes were still open,
covered with the blood that had poured down from the big hole in the top of her
head. She had killed herself before the soldiers got to her.

I sat down there with her for a long time. It’s hard to
remember what I thought about. But I’m sure I thought about using my pistol to
follow Mary wherever she had gone. I still don’t know why I didn’t.

Finally, I carried Mary’s body upstairs and laid her beside
John. I found her violin, Mr. Jacob’s violin. I put it by her side and closed
her eyes. I wondered again if she had ever taught her son to play so the music
could be passed on.
Too late to ask.

I stood and looked down at their torn bodies. I wished I had
known their real names so I could say goodbye properly. So I could tell them I
had not betrayed them. But it was no good wishing for anything, not anymore.

I stood there until the desire to do the next thing came to
me. I picked up the lamp and hurled it against the far wall of the room. The
glass shattered, and the oil caught fire. In seconds, the entire wall was
ablaze.

I walked out the front door. Still tied to the fence, the
horse was frightened by the fire and smoke. I had to lead it down the road a
little and calm it before mounting. Then I sat and watched the fire until
roaring flames came out all the windows.

I turned the horse and rode toward the mountains.
Toward home.

When I stopped to rest, I discovered I still had Mary’s
book. I took it out and turned the pages, turning them gently as Mary had told
me. Then I shut the book and put it back inside my shirt.