Purgatory: A Novel of the Civil War (30 page)

Hours pass. Sounds of a harmonica, some boys singing,
then all that dies down. It’s very late. I curl up against Drew,
listening to the continuing blessing of his breath. I’m on the edge
of a doze when he shifts, groans, and whispers my name.

“Here. I’m here.”

“Water,” croaks Drew. He rises on one elbow, sways,
then lies down again. “Ian? Water? Ian?”

“Here, here!” I say, reaching for the canteen. “Let
me help you.” I slip an arm beneath Drew’s head, angling him
upright. He sips. Then he gulps. Then he coughs. Then he gulps some
more.

“Put me down,” he sighs. “Dizzy. Need to lie
down.”

I lower his head onto the oilcloth. “Here, Drew. You
need food. You’ve been roughed up pretty bad, and you need to get
your strength up. We have a long march tomorrow.” I fumble for the
food-bundles in the dark. “See, Rufus and Jeremiah gave you this
from their own rations.” I break off a bite of hardtack and hold it
to Drew’s lips. “You need to eat, buddy.

Drew sniffs, then takes a tiny bite. He gags. He
rolls away from me and vomits onto the ground.

“No food.”

His arms are shaking in my grip as I help him stretch
out again. I sit cross-legged beside him and ease his head into my
lap.

“Why’m I so s-sore? Where are we? Why’s my head hurt?
An’ my arms and legs? An’ my back? An’ my mouth?” His pale eyes
stare up at me in the dimness of the smelly tent. His words are
slurred. Did the bayonet damage his tongue?

“We’re in my tent, Drew. Don’t you remember today?” I
whisper, smoothing his shaggy hair.

“No, I don’t. Las’ I ’member was…”

Drew clutches my hand. “I can’t ’member. I’m afraid.”
A little sob breaks out of him. He rolls over, burying his face in
my lap.

“You’re sore because you were bucked again. And
George, he…cut you. Don’t you remember? He cut you on your back.
You lost a fair bit of blood. And he tied a bayonet in your
mouth.”

Drew shakes his head. “I don’t. I don’t. I don’t
’member. How could I forget? Wha’s wrong with me?” His hand
squeezes mine till it hurts. “Oh, my head!”

“Here, I think, is what’s wrong.” I touch his bruised
temple. “I think someone struck you here. Men lose their memories
sometimes in battle when they’re hurt in the head. Do you remember
your name?”

“Yes.” Releasing my hand, Drew rolls over again,
looking up at me. “Drew Conrad.”

“And you’re from…”

“Penns’vania.”

“And you do know me, right? You used my name.”

“Yes, Ian. I know you. Ian Campbell. How could I ever
forget you? You’re…you’re my lover.”

Even in these circumstances, to hear him say the word
makes my heart leap. “Do you remember what we did last night?”

“You…we listened to that boy crying ’cause his
brother died, and you hel’ me, and I felt sorry for tha’ boy, and
his brother who died, but being close to you made me feel
safe.”

“And, a little while back, you promised me what if I
helped you escape? It was something very important.”

Drew’s grin is a white crescent in the darkness. His
hand squeezes mine again, more gently. “My, my ass.”

We both laugh. “I guess your mind’s pretty much all
right,” I say. “Except we have to march to Purgatory tomorrow.”

“I don’t think I can, Ian. I don’t.” Suddenly Drew
tries to rise. “Help me. I needa piss. Lemme see if I have the
strength to…”

I help Drew up onto his hands and knees. He sways,
groans, crawls forward a couple feet, then drops to his elbows.
“Oh, no,” he says. He vomits again, this time on the oilcloth.

“I’m so sorry,” he sobs. “I’m so, so sorry. It’s
nasty.”

“It’s all right, boy. It’s mostly water. Here.” I
wipe off his bristly chin, then the soiled oilcloth.

“Piss. Gotta piss,” he gasps. “Please help.”
Trembling, he crawls with my aid out of the tent. “Something loose
in my head. A drum in there, and a bell ringing. I’m so dizzy and
weak. Please help me up.”

It takes us a long time to get him upright. Slowly he
rises, with many a wince and a groan. The lower limbs of a nearby
pine lend support. I can’t help but laugh at the difference in our
sizes. “Sometimes I really wish I were the big one and you were the
small one,” I pant, leaning against him to steady him as his cuffed
hands fumble with his trouser buttons.

“Tha’s how it feels, halfa time,” Drew says, pissing
in the needles. “You’re big, I’m small.” His words are still
slurred, as if he’d had too much to drink. “When you hol’ me, I’m
small and safe.” He staggers, throwing his weight against me to
keep from falling.

“You surely don’t feel small right now,” I say. “You
feel like an avalanche. Uhhhhfff! Why did I choose a Yankee giant
to fall in love with?”

“Don’t think there’s much choice in it, Reb.”
Finished, Drew sinks to his knees, cock still hanging from his
opened pants. “Okay, okay, done.” Stiffly, he crawls back into the
tent. I follow him into our fetid little cave.

“Drew, you really need to eat. Tomorrow you’ve got to
walk a long way. Sarge said—”

“Sleepy,” he mutters, collapsing onto his side. “No
food, or I’ll puke. No, no food. Gotta sleep. Tired a’ hurting.
Thanks for helping me. So tired all a sudden.”

By the time I’ve tied the tent flaps, he’s snoring. I
sit there in the combined odors of vomit and urine and watch him
slumber. I want to wake him and tell him he’s got to walk to
Purgatory tomorrow or he’ll get a bullet in the head. I want to
shake him awake and force him to eat. Instead I lie on my side and
take his limp cock in my mouth. I suck it gently, nibbling tenderly
on the foreskin. I take one ball, then the other, then, with some
difficulty, both into my mouth. Then I return to his cock. It
smells and tastes like piss, sweat, and stale body musk. It smells
and tastes wonderful.

“So sweet,” Drew whispers. His hands find the back of
my head. His penis grows half-hard. He thrusts into my mouth. “Love
you, Ian,” he mumbles. “Lil’ Reb. So sweet.” Then his hands fall
away, his cock goes soft, and his snores start up again. I lie
there, his limp flesh filling my mouth, and think. Unless I come up
with something fast, this will be our last night. If we break camp
tomorrow, Drew is doomed. He’ll never make a long march in this
shape. If he could be given just one more day to recover, then…

Somewhere nearby a horse nickers. And then I know
what to do.

“You’ll be all right here,” I say, as if he could
hear me, gently slipping his cock and balls back into his pants and
buttoning him up. I head out to the fire. Rufus is curled beneath a
blanket near the dying embers. Here and there, other men sleep
soundly beneath ratty oilcloths. I bend, giving Rufus a shake.

“What?” he mutters. “It ain’t time yet for breakfast,
damn you.” He rubs his eyes, then smiles sleepily. “Oh, it’s you,
Ian. What’s going on?”

“Shhhh, Rufus! Will you help me with something?” I
whisper. “It’s really important. But it’ll be risky.“

“Well…sure. What is it? If it’s important, well,
sure.”

“Wait here. I’ll be right back. I need to ask
Jeremiah something first.”

“Okay. I’ll be right here. Don’t rush.” Rufus nods,
lies back, and closes his eyes. “This fire surely does feel
fine.”

Overhead, the stars are glittering. I use their light
to pick my way as quietly as possible through camp and out into the
woods to find Jeremiah.

I hear his voice before I see him. “Who’s that?” he
says. “What’s the password?”

Cut against the night is a lean silhouette. No doubt
his pistol is aimed right at me.

“It’s Ian,” I say. “Jeremiah, please help me. I
really need your help.”

_

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

_

Yankee guns pop above me, on the crest of the hill. I
lean against the stone wall, biting a cartridge open before
stuffing it into my musket and tamping it in. An enemy bullet
embeds itself in the earth by my bent knee, throwing up a little
explosion of shredded leaf mold. Another bullet chunks into a tree
trunk behind me. Smoke drifts across my eyes and climbs up my nose.
Coughing, I aim and fire. The musket kicks back into my shoulder.
Another wave of smoke envelops me. Above, a shell screams and
explodes in the forest behind me. On the hill high above, little
fires flash and fade, like a field of love-drunk lightning bugs,
another rain of balls pocking my stony shelter of a wall. There’s
an aching in the back of my skull, a black space, a sticky mud
puddle, a patch of tar. The blue’s rolling down the hill like
floodwaters, like an angry sea’s advance no one can stop. I look
around for help, but none of my company’s near. I’m surrounded by
the gray of smoke and tree trunks, not my Rebel buddies. I fumble
in my cartridge box, but it’s empty. Then the smoke thickens, opens
its maw, and takes me in. I hack and retch, eyes asquint, stinging
and watering. My hands are too weak; the gun drops from my grasp. I
fall onto my side; the ground’s soft with brittle leaves, hard with
broken rock that bites into my ribs. I roll over, groaning. With
one hand I reach back to rub the tar from my scalp. Someone grips
my shoulder, shouting. Smoke stuffs my mouth, a filthy rag.

“Ian!”

I open my eyes. I’m looking at dead oak leaves and
amber pine needles, a rock green-gray with splotches of lichen, and
young grass blades glimmering in sunlight. My skull’s pounding. I
lift my hand into my vision; the fingers are smeared a vague pink.
I groan again, curling myself into the frightened ball Drew’s made
of himself so, so often. Then hands touch me again, rolling me onto
my back, wedging something soft beneath my head.

“Wait here now. I’ll fetch you water.”

I know that voice. Someone I used to play with back
home, search the dells for May apples and bluebells and dog’s tooth
violets down by the river in the spring. Sweet to see naked in the
water. Wet pale gleam of his lean hips, wet dark gleam of his
dripping belly hair. Friend for years. And, last night, his big
gift. The risk he took for my sake, and Drew’s.

It’s morning. We’re still here. We’re not yet on the
road to Purgatory. I smile, rubbing more blood from my scalp,
feeling the hard swelling beneath my rumpled hair. I roll onto my
belly, I locate myself here, by the campfire—breathing in its smoke
must have awakened me—then look over toward the paddock where our
few, slowly starving horses were kept. Yes, they’re gone. And by
the empty paddock, the cart, listing and useless. One big wheel
missing.

“Here now.” It’s Jeremiah, my savior. He helps me sit
upright and lifts a cup to my mouth. Cold water. Good. It feels
good in my dry mouth and throat.

“Did we do it?” I whisper, looking around to find no
one within earshot. “Is Drew all right?”

“We did it. Everyone believes that last night the
camp was almost bushwhacked by some roaming Feds before you and I
heroically chased them off. And Drew’s fine. He’s still sleeping in
your tent. Sarge and the others are too busy trying to find the
horses to bother him. In fact, you and I are the only ones in camp
other than your Yank. Everyone’s scouring the woods, even Rufus,
who’ll hopefully lead ’em away from the spot where we hid the
wheel. Sarge is furious, and you should have heard George cussing.”
Jeremiah gives a low laugh and lifts the cup to my mouth again.
“Want some breakfast? Rufus made coffee and fried hardtack before
he left.”

“Surely,” I say, gingerly massaging the lump on my
head. “You certainly made this look convincing. It certainly
feels
convincing.”

“You told me to hit you hard. So I did. It wasn’t
easy, bringing a musket butt down on a buddy’s head, even at his
request…but I think we saved your bluebelly. He’s already had
breakfast.”

“Really? He has an appetite? Last night he threw up
everything, including water.”

“I think our little delaying tactic has saved his
Northern ass, Ian, just like you’d hoped. With any luck, by the
time they find the horses and someone heads off to fetch another
wheel, Drew will be in good enough shape to make the march. Just be
ready to lie to Sarge as good as Rufus and I did.”

The hardtack tastes good, softened somewhat by its
hot bacon grease bath, though the coffee is another sad substitute
made from roasted grains. Jeremiah and I share a cup, making
occasional faces of displeasure, before I rise unsteadily, head
pounding, and make my way to the tent where Drew waits.

“Boy?” I say, crawling inside. Drew’s on the cot,
asleep. I bend over him, touching his bruised cheek. His blue eyes
open. He smiles. Reaching up, he tugs on my chin-beard, then softly
explores the back of my head. I wince and grimace.

“Big damn bump. Jeremiah told me what you three did
last night while I was unconscious. He also told me why: that your
devil-kin was going to have me shot if I couldn’t march. Guess I
owe all of you now. Hurts, huh?”

I nod. “Some. Not too bad. Small price to pay.
Jeremiah had to make it look like Yanks had knocked me out.
Otherwise I’d be first on the list of Sarge’s suspects.”

With a clanking of shackle-chain, Drew rolls stiffly
off the cot and onto his knees. With his cuffed hands and big arms,
he makes a circle I slip inside. I wrap my arms around his waist
and lean my head against his naked chest. We hold one another for a
long time before he swallows hard and whispers, “I’ll make it now.
Thanks to you.”

“Are you sure? How do you feel?” I look up at him.
His eyes, still swollen and blackened from past abuses, are tired
but clear. “You were so confused before, but now you seem yourself
again.”

“My head’s better. My arms and legs ache from that
long bucking…as usual. My back and mouth are torn up.” The corners
of his weary smile, I can see, are still oozing blood. “I’m pretty
weak. But the food and the sleep helped. If we march tomorrow, I’ll
be ready.”