South of Shiloh (37 page)

“You going to tell the Tennessee cops about talking with Marcy?” Rane asked.

“Not sure yet.”

Rane gave a soundless laugh. “Afraid they’ll rob you of your moment?”

“That was uncharitable, John,” Beeman said heavily as he returned to his chair, flopped down, and signaled for Rane’s glass. After he filled it and topped off his own, he raised his glass in a toast: “To all the invisible shit.”

They clinked glasses and took a drink.

Beeman shook his head and waved his glass at the darkness. “What I got in front of me is all this invisible shit. You look out there all you see is rain and dark. Me? I see these ruins, like arches of Roman aqueducts marching across the countryside. Spend your whole life looking at the ruins and trying to make ’em come out right. Well, it wouldn’t be a complete set of ruins without catacombs. And that’s where we are, John; down in the catacombs of Corinth. The living and the dead are all present.”

Rane expelled a breath. “You lost me. ’Course I’m at a disadvantage. I didn’t learn English and history at Ole Miss.”

Beeman blinked and cleared his throat. “It continues to amaze me how a shallow Yankee puke like yourself picks up on all the details.”

“Like, ah, the wedding ring right in there on the kitchen table?”

Beeman looked away, so Rane stayed silent for a moment. Then he said, “We’ve come up short on details to go on. All you have is fragments, from a freaked cokehead lawyer and a scared cheating wife.”

“And a couple text messages, a blown mailbox, a picture window, and some dead catfish,” Beeman mumbled.
“Now,”
he said with more energy, “if I was one of those detectives in the books down in the den I’d have this figured out. Guess I just ain’t haunted enough.” He giggled, raised a hand, and fiddled at thin air. “They see the sunlight strike the fuckin’ trees a certain way and they start free-associating about their drinking demons, flashbacks to some heavy shit in Korea or Vietnam and dozens of gorgeous women they screwed. But it ain’t like that.” Beeman slowly shook his head back and forth. “Half the time I think we see about one-tenth of what’s in front of us. And most times, when we scrutinize the tenth we do see, we smear it up with our fingerprints…”

Rane laughed out loud. “I’ve taken pictures of some of the guys who write those books. The scariest thing most of them ever survived is a tense faculty meeting in a college English department.”

Beeman leaned over and slapped Rane on the knee. “Damn, you just laughed for the first time. That’s progress.” He stayed pitched forward, masked in shadow. “The quietest man I ever seen,” he said under his breath. “What about you? You got any demons stirring around in all that quiet?”

Rane gently reached over, removed the glass from Beeman’s hand, and set it on the table. “You’re shut off, partner. You’re working tomorrow.”

“C’mon,” Beeman persisted, “any demons explain why you’re down here, with me, in the fuckin’ dark?”

“No demons, some pictures I’ve taken, maybe,” Rane said, feeling light with alcohol, “a veil…”

Beeman pushed up to his feet. “So what’d ya see through your veil? You’re the professional peeper.”

Rane floated a hand loosely through the air. “Could be you’re right, somebody’s manipulating you toward an outcome.”

“Redneck’s birthright is to be manipulated,” Beeman said with deliberation. “It’s getting trickier. Used to be simple. They’d get us to look down on the niggers to divert our attention from the shit wages they pay us.” He raised a hand apologetically and spoke to the darkness, “Sorry, Paul, I know, shouldn’t say that.” He turned to Rane, perplexed, “but they was ‘niggers’ for three hundred years, only been ‘black’ since…”

Beeman hitched up his belt, fingered his deputy’s badge, and peered back into the night. “I don’t mean it like my daddy did.”

“Only comes out one way,” Rane said.

Beeman shook his head. “Daddy’s generation of lawmen meant hang ’em, burn ’em, blow up their kids in church…”

Rane let it go, exhaled, and sagged in his chair. “We’re going to be a fine pair tomorrow…hungover and looking for an iceberg that’s nine-tenths submerged.”

Beeman turned, smiled, and asked: “Where your people come from?”

Rane shrugged. “Father was German, mother Norwegian.”

Beeman grinned. “That’s your Norwegian ancestors talking, John. Iceberg’s a winter image. Submerged? Repression ain’t our style. We tend to be outgoing, to include acting out violently. It’s the hot climate and all the Celtic hooha about honor, chivalry, and blood debts. All that shit’s still twitching…”

“To poisonous snakes that hold their ground,” Rane said, raising his glass.

“Amen. And chase you out of pure meanness,” Beeman said.

52

KEEP BUSY.

Jenny’s house resembled a beehive hung in black crepe. Neighbors and acquaintances buzzed in, bringing pies, brownies, and cakes, which stacked the kitchen counters for the visitation after tomorrow’s service. An aura of cloistered intimacy swirled around them. Damp-eyed, they hugged her and kissed her and squeezed her arm. Jenny thought of a power failure, when people huddle with candles, except behind her visitors’ sincerity she detected a discreet assurance that, for them, the power hadn’t really gone out.

Patti Halvorsen called to verify Jenny was on track. Jenny assured her she was.

Bluff Vicky had assumed the function of Il Duce, making sure the funeral trains ran on schedule. Mom took a supporting role, overseeing questions pertaining to food and dress.

Miss Vanni, Molly’s piano teacher, whom Paul had helped, two years previously, with a tangled insurance dilemma involving her house, donated her time to help Molly master the bridging of the “Moonlight Sonata.” She would sit beside Molly tomorrow at the service and carry her through the difficult piece. They were in the alcove now, practicing.

At a quarter to one, Jenny approached Vicky, who sat at the kitchen table, going over a detailed checklist on a legal pad. She had charted out the family activities up to the service at eleven a.m. tomorrow morning. Midway down the list, she’d entered a scheduled item:
Jenny, three hours personal time—1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Jenny pulled on her coat, picked up her car keys, and signed out with her sister. As Jenny went out the door, Vicky bore down with her pen.

Check.

She drove east on Highway 36 to the Bayport turnoff, where she curved around the brick-and-chain-link baffles of the sprawling state prison. Then she turned onto 95 and slowed to thirty-five miles an hour as she entered Bayport and passed Andersen Windows and the winking tower of the King Stack. She continued south along the river to the entrance ramp for eastbound I-94. Past Hudson, she checked her directions on the seat next to her. The Mail Lake turnoff was fourteen miles ahead.

She wore a tidy white cotton blouse and clean jeans with the creases showing on her thighs. No lipstick, no mascara, no jewelry. Her face was set in a practical mask.

To get to sleep last night she’d struggled past an image from Ridley Scott’s opulent movie
Kingdom of Heaven
, which she had seen with Paul. The king of Jerusalem wore a fixed silver mask to conceal his leprosy-ravaged face. What would happen if the mask dropped and Molly learned the deception in which Jenny, Paul, and Rane were complicit?

She had fallen off to sleep huddled against Molly, counting her shallow breaths.

Jenny blinked and realized cars were whipping around her. One driver threw her a stare as he went by. She had let her speed slip to forty-five and everyone was going damn near seventy.

Her eyes slits of concentration, she turned off on the designated exit, negotiated the turns until she crept along an unpaved road looking for a red fire number sign. She found it, stopped, backed up, and turned down a winding gravel driveway. She passed a tree with a yellow sign posted:
NO HUNTING. NO TRESPASSING
.

Karen Morse stood on the porch, trim and iron-gray, in comfortable denim and a green flannel shirt. The balanced strength and wit in her eyes reminded Jenny of Patti. As the red Forester crunched to a halt, she came down the steps with her hands extended.

“It’s been a long time,” Karen said. Jenny didn’t think either of them had planned to hug, but they did. “This way,” Karen said with moist eyes, “Mike’s on the back deck.”

As they started through the house, Jenny paused and said, “I remember the piano and the photograph of Rane’s parents.”

Karen smiled. “I believe John still plays.”

Then Jenny followed Karen out a sliding patio door to the back deck, and a man of medium height, with all his gray hair, stood up slowly, favoring his knees. Still broad-shouldered, he had an aspect of ruggedness collapsing inward. He extended a leathery hand.

“Jenny, I’m Mike. It’s been a while.” They shook hands. He opened one creased palm and indicated a chair. “Please sit down.”

“Can I get you coffee?” Karen asked as Jenny sat down.

“Yes, please. Black,” Jenny said. As Karen went back in the house, Jenny turned to Mike. “I don’t have a lot of time, so I have to be blunt.”

Mike cleared his throat, and his lined face remained calm, but his clouded gray eyes tightened. He raised one hand and opened the fingers expectantly.

“Until last Saturday afternoon I hadn’t spoken to John face-to-face for eleven years.”

There were blind spots in the gray eyes that explored her face. “We only know a little about one side of that. Go on,” he said.

“What has he told you about me?”

“Not much. That you had a daughter and you got married.” He shrugged but his occluded eyes stayed tight on her face and felt cold on her skin.

Jenny drew herself up and turned her head slightly as the flare in her eyes got away from her. “And about
my husband
?”

“Johnny was tight-lipped about it. Don’t even know his name. Your married name, I mean,” Mike said deliberately, still meaning to be polite, helpful.

Karen appeared, holding a ceramic mug. Seeing her husband’s expression, she asked, “Is anything wrong?”

Mike’s hand sliced up, a crisp gesture to silence his wife.

“My husband’s name was Paul Edin,” Jenny said. “He was killed in Mississippi, at a Civil War reenactment battle last Saturday. His funeral is tomorrow morning.”

“Shit,” Mike muttered, pitching forward in the chair.

From the corner of her eye, Jenny saw Karen react to her husband’s abrupt movement. Her hand shook, she spilled steaming coffee on her wrist, sagged, and carefully placed the cup on the porch rail.

“Karen,” Mike said immediately, calmly, forcefully, “kindly bring me the phone and Johnny’s cell number.”

As Karen hurried back into the house, Mike scoured Jenny’s face with the hard, cold spots in his eyes. “I guess we both have to be blunt. Do you know where he is?”

“He went to Mississippi. He took my husband’s Civil War uniform. There’s a cop down there, a Deputy Beeman, who thinks Paul was killed by a sniper who shot at him and hit Paul. He suspects the sniper might try again, this weekend at another Civil War event. Rane’s hanging out with the cop. So it’s a story…”

Karen returned with the phone and a slip of paper. Dots of sweat appeared on Mike’s forehead as he pushed in the number then waited long enough that Jenny knew the signal had gone to voice mail.

“Johnny, this is Mike. Whatever you got in mind you stand down. You lied to me, Johnny. And you took my rifle. You better call me pretty damn quick.”

When he lowered the cordless phone, Jenny noticed the liver spots on the loose skin on the backs of his rugged hands, and that his hands were shaking ever so slightly. He let the phone drop into his lap and stared out into the middle distance over the placid lake.

“Mike, what is it,” Karen’s voice caught.

“I didn’t just give him the damn Sharps, Karen. I gave him match-grade ammunition for it. I took him out to the range and let him snap in. Remember, years back, when I was in that North-South Skirmish Association? We shot at targets on teams? He told me he was researching the Skirmish for one of his projects…he didn’t say anything about
this
.”

He swung his head, and when Jenny saw his eyes, the cold fix had broken and now they were tense with concern. “You have a way of contacting that cop?” he asked.

Jenny nodded and realized she was hugging her arms to her chest.

“Then you better call him,” Mike said.

“Why?”

“Because Johnny’s natural talent for taking pictures makes him one of the best snap shots with a rifle I ever saw under three hundred yards, and I’ve seen them all,” Mike said, leaning forward.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean this is not an academic question, Jenny. In Iraq, in ninety-one, he started out to take pictures and wound up in a fix. You might have noticed he’s been on the remote side ever since.”

Jenny’s fingers cupped her throat. Felt the vulnerable pulse quicken. “What kind of fix?” she asked.

“The kind where he had to kill a bunch of people.”

53

RANE WOKE UP FUZZY-MOUTHED, WITH A HEAD
that throbbed every time a raindrop splashed on the patio stones outside the basement door. The bedside digital clock read 10:30. They’d slept in. He stood up, jockeyed for balance, and inspected his trembling right hand.

A hot shower knocked the top hackles off the hangover. He wrapped a towel around his waist, climbed the stairs, and found Beeman, hair disheveled, wearing only undershorts, sorting through a pile of Confederate and Union wool uniforms on the living room couch.

Hydrate. Rane opened the refrigerator, found a bottle of spring water, and drank the whole thing. Then he poured a cup of coffee from the pot on the counter and saw the bottle next to the pot, so he tossed down two aspirin with his first swallow of black coffee.

“How’s your head?” Beeman grumbled.

“It’s been better. What are we doing?”

“We got to dress both ways: gray today, blue tomorrow.”

Rane took a second pull on the coffee and studied the dull sparkle of the wedding ring, still on the kitchen table. He walked into the living room and pointed to the old scar that trailed over Beeman’s ribs. “What happened there?” he asked.

“Fella with a knife in the Waffle House parking lot, up on 72; long time ago,” Beeman said.

“And there?” Rane said, turning and pointing at the wedding ring on the table.

“You know, John,” Beeman said evenly, “we got to get ready.”

“And you know,
Kenny
,” Rane said just as evenly, “we’ve been hanging out for two days and I haven’t seen you on the phone to your wife and kids.”

Obstinately, Beeman ignored the question and picked up three small drawstring cotton bags. “These go in your pack. Shake a leg, it’s time to bring up your gear.”

Rane backed off, for now; but as he descended the stairs he wondered why Marcy, Sheba, even the Kirby woman, all cranked a little extra torque into their conversation around Beeman. Maybe he was reading too much in; maybe Southern women just naturally showed more tail feathers.

More important things to do, John
. He shut the bedroom door and unplugged his cell from the wall charger. He listened to make sure Beeman was still upstairs and then removed a sandwich-size Ziploc from the bottom of his duffel bag. The baggie contained ten rounds of live ammunition for the Sharps, wrapped in a paper packet. He opened the baggie, undid the packet so the rounds were loose and easier to get to. He removed the notebook, the light meter, and the spare wool socks from the leather ammunition bag and set them aside. Then he unsealed the pack of baby wipes, took most of them out, inserted the baggie, and stuffed the wipes back in on top. After he resealed the baby wipes, he put them back in the cartridge box and shoved the light meter and socks on top.

He pulled on the itchy blue trousers, the rumpled flannel shirt, and buttoned the suspenders. Then he put on the wool socks, slipped on the leather brogans, and laced them up. The hobnails skittered on the linoleum floor as he hoisted the duffel and walked to the stairs, where he paused to get centered.

Didn’t work. Blinking, he held up his right hand and watched it tremble. The hangover had sandblasted the edge off his reflexes, blurred his vision, and ignited a parched thirst in his chest.

Okay, what did you expect? If you’re going to walk a mile in Paul’s shoes, you can’t have it both ways. No protective gimmicks would accompany him to Shiloh.

He joined Beeman in the living room and dropped the duffel.

“Okay, this is not a battle we’re going to. Gray and blue will be apart. No lining up and shooting at each other; they’ll put on demonstrations in the separate camps. What you call a Living History.”

Rane nodded. Like Dalton explained back home.

Beeman, on the surly side himself, sorted Rane’s tangle of leather belts, straps, and pouches and put them on the couch. “Okay, blue pants and the shirt is fine and the shoes. Keep the sack coat and hat for tomorrow. Take off the belt buckle.”

“What for?”

“Turn the U.S. insignia upside down, that way it’s acceptable fashion in the Reb camp. Do the same with the badge on the cartridge box. Tomorrow you can switch them back.”

When Rane had made the adjustments, Beeman handed him a gray sack coat and cap. Rane put on the jacket and flexed his arms to make sure he could move freely.

Breakfast was spring water and leftover pizza at the kitchen table with the wedding ring marooned, unmentioned, between them. Beeman talked on his cell to the Tennessee cops.

“I’ll meet you on 22 where it crosses from McNairy into Hardin County. I’m leaving my cruiser at home. Look for a red Jeep with Minnesota plates. I’ll just bring my personal weapon which I will hand over when we meet. So all I’ll have is a radio. That suit you? Okay. Say about one?”

Rane had emptied his haversack and was checking out his camera and lens. He looked up.

“You got film in that thing?” Beeman asked.

“Digital.”

“Right. Where’s your rifle?”

“In the Jeep.”

“We have some time. You want to clean it up?”

Rane flipped his hand in an “irrelevant” gesture. “What for? It’s just going to get wet.”

“Jesus,” Beeman shook his head, “okay, fill your canteen and let’s square away your pack, blanket, and poncho. You’ll need the overcoat tonight.”

They carried all the gear to the Jeep and as they loaded it, Beeman perused the big pack of water bottles in the back. “One thing for sure: we ain’t gonna run out of water.”

Tennessee Highway 22 cut a shiny black ribbon through curtains of rain. The fog hugged the budding thickets and it was a good day to stay indoors. Rane said, “This isn’t working out the way you thought.”

“Nope. I was planning on slinging that M16 under my greatcoat,” Beeman said. “Now I’m going in naked. Fucker could be out there with a scoped deer gun.”

Rane said, “My uncle Mike was in Vietnam. He used to say the map is not the terrain.”

“Ain’t that the truth. No plan survives first contact with the enemy,” Beeman said. Then he turned, with a less-than-copacetic smile. “About the ring?”

“Yeah?”

“Last Sunday when all this started to look like a grudge bout between me and Mitchell Lee my wife gave me a choice: I go to Tupelo with her and the kids or else. I told her I had to see this through.”

A couple miles went by in silence. Then Beeman ruminated, “They had rain, just like us. The roads were just tracks through the woods and soon they were churned to slop. Forty thousand men marched from Corinth. Albert Sidney Johnson figured he’d surprise Grant at Pittsburg Landing. Most of them were rookies; it took them three days strung out in the mud. We’ll do it in half an hour.”

Rane sat behind the wheel, staring straight ahead through the slap of the windshield wipers, intent on the road.

“One thing I regret is I didn’t get to talk to Paul more.” Beeman sighed. “Feel kind of bad, actually; I threw him this verbal elbow to back him off. Figured he was going to start right in with the Slavery Lecture…”

“Sure, I can see that,” Rane said, not taking his eyes off the road. “If I had to make it come out right I’d put that way down on my list.”

“Wasn’t that simple,” Beeman frowned.

“Right, have it your way. How about the reason your Rebs were marching in the mud is you guys fired on the American flag.” Rane looked out at the rain-swept woods. “They should have stayed home. All Shiloh accomplished was create Grant and Sherman as a team.”

“Jesus,” Beeman breathed. “I liked it better when you didn’t talk.”

“That them, your cops?” Rane nodded to a police cruiser parked beside the road ahead.

“That’s them.”

One cop actually. A Hardin County deputy, who was a little pissed off, called in to work his day off. After introductions, they sat in the Tennessee cruiser; Beeman in front, Rane in the back. As Beeman handed over his pistol, the cop said, “Not my idea, Beeman. You ask me, this whole thing is a damn snipe hunt. Bunch of gossip outta Mississippi.”

“Hope you’re right, I really do,” Beeman said.

“Okay. Here’s the setup. We printed up fifty of these pictures Alcorn forwarded.” He held up the picture of Mitchell Lee that Rane had memorized. “They’ve gone out, with a description of his truck, to our guys, the park rangers, and key folks participating in the event.

“You put your radio on our frequency,” the cop said. “SWAT is in a tan Chevy van, they want to keep you in line of sight at all times. Try and work with them. Four of our people are wearing plain clothes, mixed in with the spectators, they’ll shadow you. Then there’ll be uniformed officers and park rangers on normal patrol. Anything pops, you go to ground and let us handle it.”

“Lousy assignment,” Beeman said.

“You got it. Crummy weather and muskets and cannons going off. Civilians wandering all over the place. All we can do is keep our eyes open and react. Smart move would be to call it off but since the Kirby Creek incident was ruled an accident, the Park Service bent to pressure and let it go on as scheduled.”

Then they got out of the Tennessee car, returned to the Jeep, and followed the deputy.

They entered the park and drove slowly through patches of woods and open fields studded with dark granite markers and black rows of cannons. Event monitors wearing orange aprons waved them toward a parking area roped off with yellow tape. They pulled in next to the Tennessee cop, who parked alongside a light brown van. Three men and a woman in jeans and parkas huddled in the light rain, talking to the van’s driver. One of the plainclothes cops carried a long bag on a strap over his shoulder. The canvas bag, designed to carry a folding chair, probably contained a short automatic weapon.

Rane stood back while Beeman met with the cops and discussed radio procedure. His eyes automatically scanned the surrounding area, which was a security nightmare. If a muzzleloader were to discharge at this instant in the nearest tree line, the telltale smoke would be lost in the fog.

Then his eyes drifted to a tiered monument directly across the road, where three robed, blackened figures hung their heads in a stylized pantomime of grief. This, Rane understood, was the Confederate Memorial. Beyond the statues, people gathered by a bivouac of white pup tents. A double line of men in gray had formed. They lifted their muskets. An audience of spectators applauded when they fired a volley in the air.

As the echo rolled along the trees, Rane opened the Jeep’s passenger door, reached in the glove compartment, took out the crumpled fate card, and slipped it in his trouser pocket.

Beeman left the group by the van and returned to the Jeep. “C’mon, time to suit up,” he said. They opened the rear hatch and pulled out their gear. “Second time I done this in a week,” Beeman muttered as he helped Rane sling the cartridge box over his left shoulder, then cinched the belt with the cap box over it. Then Rane shouldered the pack and slung the haversack containing his camera over his right shoulder along with the canteen. Finally, he pulled the rusty rifle from the canvas sleeve. Beeman yanked the shapeless gray forage cap down over Rane’s eyes, grabbed his own rifle, and handed Rane a folded Shiloh brochure. The park map on the back was marked with dotted arrows in ballpoint.

Beeman traced the map with his finger. “We’ll skirt the Sunken Road, cross this big field, then the Hamburg-Purdy Road, walk between a Confederate burial trench and the Shiloh Church and wind up here.” He indicated a faint blue curling line marked “Shiloh Branch.”

They set off, Rane carrying his rusty rifle squirrel-hunter fashion over his shoulder. As they breasted the monument, he paused to study the three mournful statues. Head downcast, the Grecian-robed woman in the middle relinquished a victor’s laurel crown to the hooded, deathlike specter on her right. Another hooded figure hovered on her left.

“Our Lost Cause Madonna,” Beeman said without irony. “Victory Defeated by Death and Night.”

They walked past the monument toward a broad field, falling in step, shoulder to shoulder. Beeman’s eyes softened as he gazed across the battlefield, and he said, “When I was a kid my dad would bring me here to go fishing and he’d have me drag my fingers in the dirt. Back then it wasn’t hard to find what we called Civil War lead, minié balls. We’d tie ’em to our fishing line as sinkers.”

Their hobnails crunched on pavement, then muted as they walked onto the wet grass. The van slowly paced them on the road. The four undercover cops split in twos and strolled wide to either side, mingling with sightseers, who trailed across the fields in bright red, yellow, and blue rain jackets. Here and there kids dashed ahead of their parents. From the corner of his eye, Rane caught a man pointing Beeman out to his wife. The couple followed them at a distance.

Rane shivered in the drizzle and looked into the trees. Shiloh brooded back at him in gray and black.

Like dripping acid on a Civil War wet plate.

So this is what it feels like being out in the open, unprepared. This time someone else could be gauging the distance, measuring the angles, and picking the time.

Instinctively, he brought the Sharps off his shoulder and carried it slanted across his chest. Should have loaded it back at the parking lot. No time, too many people watching. He was calculating the time and motion of digging into the cartridge box and opening the baby wipes when Beeman asked, “What’re you thinking, John?”

“If he’s out there, watching,” Rane answered.

Beeman asked, “How would you do it? You been to that school?”

Rane’s eyes scoured the trees. “Just common sense. If he’s not dumb, he’ll wait for the show to begin; when stuff starts going off, use the racket and smoke for cover to get away.”

Beeman nodded. “That’ll be in about an hour when they have a demonstration on Hurlbut Field. Problem is, what if he ain’t concerned with getting away…”

“Then it gets more difficult,” Rane said.

“Exactly,” Beeman said with a stiff smile, reaching out and tugging Rane’s sleeve. “So stay tight on my elbow. No disrespect to Paul, but this Mitchell Lee has a habit of missing me and hitting Minnesota.”