The Last, Long Night (#5 in the Bregdan Chronicles Historical Fiction Romance Series) (52 page)

“
That
desperate?” Eddie asked, hope sparking in his heart.

“Sho ‘nuff is,” Abraham replied.  “I listen real close to eberthing out there.  Things going bad for the South.  Don’t reckon it gonna be long before Grant busts through them lines down at Petersburg.”  He glanced around.  “No, suh, I reckon I ain’t gonna be here long.”

Eddie glanced at the windows letting in bits of air and light.  “Can’t happen soon enough for me.”

Abraham looked around to make sure no one was watching, and lowered his voice even more, barely moving his lips.  “Been a right lot of people lettin’ theyselves out of Castle Thunder.”

Eddie stared at him and was certain he didn’t understand what Abraham was saying.  Something pushed him to be sure.  “You mean escaping?”  He leaned closer, using his body to block Abraham’s lips from anyone who might be watching.

“Yep.  Like I said, I listen real good.”

Eddie shook his head.  “I didn’t think it was possible,” he murmured.  He kept his head and voice low, his eyes scanning the area for guards as they talked.  If a word of this was overheard, it would be grounds for execution, but he was desperate to hear more.  He had given up any thought of escape when the guards told him that if he tried, his wife and children would be hauled in and lashed as he had been.  But now…  He didn’t know whether his body could hold out much longer.

“It be possible,” Abraham confirmed, his eyes steady.  “Some men done climbed out a window.  Some climbed down a pole onto one dem outbuildings and got away.  I heard ‘bout some more that dug holes right through the walls and got out.”  He paused.  “Course, they didn’t have nowheres to go, so a bunch of them got caught and brought back.”

Eddie thought about the gunshots coming on a regular basis from the back of the prison.  He already knew what an escapee’s punishment would have been.

Abraham looked around and continued in a low voice.  “I also done heard they be plannin’ to take all the prisoners up to Danville on the train.”

Eddie gasped.  “So they really believes Grant will take the city?”

“Don’t see nothing that can stop that from happening,” Abraham replied.  “I actually feels sorry for dem boys fighting down there to try to stop him.  A bunch of them soldiers not looking much better than you, and you looks like death sho’nuff.”

Eddie’s mind began racing as he absorbed Abraham’s  information; then he stood up and walked away before any guard entering the room saw them together.  He’d begun to formulate his plan, and he wasn’t about to take any chances now.

Eddie watched as a sliver of moon appeared in the tiny crack of the window in the huge room he shared with more than one hundred black inmates.  When it disappeared from sight, it would be time to make his move.  He fought to keep his breathing steady as he worked the plan through his mind over and over.  He knew if he were caught they would probably just kill him on the spot, but he’d decided he wasn’t going to be taken to Danville.  He wouldn’t get any further from Fanny and his kids.  This prison had stolen two years of his life.  It was time to take it back.

Unusual activity in the prison all day had kept guards more tense than usual.  After talking with Abraham, Eddie knew something was about to happen.  If he didn’t make his move now, his chance would probably be lost forever.  He was ready to take the risk. 

He lay quietly watching the moon; when it edged from sight, he stood and slipped from the room into the darkened hallway.

“What are you doing, boy?” a guard snapped.

“I just gotta go, sir,” Eddie said meekly, glad the darkness covered the anger on his face as he adopted a subservient tone.

“Be quick about it,” the guard growled.

“Yessuh,” Eddie replied, ducking into the room with the pot that was emptied daily.  He breathed a sigh of relief when he heard another guard call to the one he had just spoken to.  He listened carefully as he heard the first guard’s footsteps disappear down the hall.  He knew he didn’t have much time.

Now that he had decided to do it, he was amazed how simple it was.  He leapt forward and soundlessly opened the only window.  No guard had secured it; probably because no one thought a prisoner would jump from a window three stories high. 

Eddie had roamed inside Castle Thunder all day, moving slowly so he didn’t attract attention.  He’d looked through other windows so that he could scout out the best one to crawl through.  He knew he risked a nasty fall, but now that he had made up his mind, nothing could stop him.

He almost didn’t have the strength to pull himself up to the edge because he was so weak.  He gritted his teeth and silenced his grunt as he finally pulled his skinny body through the small window, glad for the first time in two years that his body had been starved down to almost nothing. 

As his body slid through the opening he groped for the pipe he knew was there from his earlier explorations, listening for any sound behind him that would indicate the guard had returned.  His breath came in gasps as his heart pounded against his ribs. 

As soon as he grasped the pipe he swung out.  He knew there was no time to do things carefully; he had to keep moving.  He gripped the pipe tightly with both hands while his feet searched for the narrow ledge he had seen earlier that day.  His heart lurched as his body dangled.  He took a deep breath when his body stopped its free fall, and then he slid down the pole smoothly, bracing his feet against the brick wall to slow his descent and praying the pipe wouldn’t rip away from the building. 

It felt like hours, but he knew it really took him only seconds to reach the bottom.  Knowing that any second the upstairs guard would come back to check on him and then sound the alarm, he scrambled back into a dark shadow.

He peered out from his dark hiding place, his heart dropping when he saw two guards talking together at the edge of the yard.  He estimated how far he could move forward in the shadows without being detected and started to creep toward the wooden fence, wondering whether he had enough strength to pull himself over it if he got close enough to make the attempt.   Failure would mean certain death.

He was barely breathing as he drew to within ten feet of where the guards stood talking.
              “Sounds like we’ll be out of here tomorrow,” one said.

“That’s what I hear.  We’re going to move all these prisoners up to Danville - unless we kill some of them off first,” he added with a harsh laugh.  “Sure would make it easier if we didn’t have so many to move.”

“Maybe we could offer to take care of it,” the other said roughly.

              A sudden call exploded through the night air.  “Prisoner escape!  Prisoner escape!”

Eddie shrank back against the rough brick wall, his body shivering in the cool spring air, and looked up wildly to see the third floor guard yelling from the open window.

Both guards he had been listening to stared up at the window and then leapt in that direction, their guns drawn.

Eddie quit thinking.  He simply acted.  It would take only seconds to find him in the shadows.  He jumped out of his hidden position and leaped at the wooden fence, grabbed the top, and began hauling himself up.  His arms screamed, but his mind screamed even louder, somehow giving him the strength to reach the top. 

“Hey!  Stop!” 

The guard’s angry voice bellowed behind him as he launched himself over the fence and slammed to the ground, the impact shooting pain through his emaciated body.   The sharp crack of bullets slammed into the fence above where he lay.  Eddie sobbed in fear, tightened his lips, and hurtled himself forward into the closest darkness he could find. 

He heard pounding feet as he took off running, his weakened body weaving as he staggered down the road.  He knew he had the advantage of knowing the area like the back of his hand.   He had thought of nothing else all day as he had made his plans. 

He ran down Cary Street, turned onto 18
^th
Street, expecting a bullet to take him down.  He kept running, slipped into a darkened alley he knew was just past the livery, and then pressed forward to another narrow alley behind the little pharmacy.  When he had run for ten or fifteen minutes and was gasping to catch his breath, he finally collapsed onto the ground behind the black church; sure that he had eluded the guards. 

He knew the black section of town would be the first place they came to look for him; where else would a black man go who was an escaped prisoner?  But he figured he had until morning, and he had to let Fannie and the kids know he had escaped so they could go somewhere safe until the war was truly over.  Visions of their being lashed with the whip made him willing to do whatever it took to warn them.  He waited a few minutes more to make sure he didn’t hear the sound of pounding feet, and then slipped back into the shadows and headed for home.

He’d only gone a few hundred yards when he realized how he stood out in his prison garb.  He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw wash on a line that someone had neglected to bring in for the night.  He sorted through it quickly, finding a pair of pants that were much too short and a shirt that was much too large, but they would have to do.  He didn’t figure people were too particular about clothes right now; they were too focused on survival.  He hoped whoever he had snagged them from wouldn’t feel the loss too much.

Now that he was dressed, he could relax enough to appreciate the feeling of freedom.  He took deep breaths of the chilly March air and breathed in the scent of trees and dirt.  After two years of being crammed in a sweaty room reeking with urine, or freezing through long nights on hard concrete, freedom felt as wonderful as he thought it would.

The sharp report of a gun jerked him back to the reality he was a wanted prisoner.  He took a deep breath and turned into another alley that would take him directly to his home.  He walked quietly, listening for anything that would warn him of trouble. 

The night was quiet as he stood in front of his house and stared up at the windows where his children slept, and then he let his gaze linger on his and Fannie’s room.  He could hardly wait to see her face when she saw him.  The thought of it gave him the courage to slip around the back and rap lightly on the door.

A minute or so later, he heard footsteps and then a man’s gruff voice.  “Who be out there?”

Eddie blinked in surprise and then relaxed.  Fannie must be renting some of the rooms out to make extra money.  He was glad she had male protection.   “My name is Eddie,” he said softly, standing as close to the door as possible.  “This is my house.  I’m here to see my wife.”

The door swung open, and a strong arm reached out to pull him in. 

“What…?”  Eddie began to ask as he stared into the eyes of a man much shorter than he was, but with a stocky build that said he was strong.

“You’re in Castle Thunder,” the man growled, holding up a lantern to stare at his face.  “How’d you get here?”

“I escaped,” Eddie said quickly.  “I don’t got much time.  It ain’t safe for anybody for me to be here.  I come to warn Fannie and the kids.  They need to go somewhere safe till the war be over.  The guards might come looking for them.”

Silence filled the kitchen as the man just stared at him, his face filled with an emotion Eddie couldn’t identify.

“Don’t you hear me, man?” Eddie demanded impatiently.  “I need to see my wife.” He moved to pass him and head up the stairs.   At that moment, a sleepy looking woman walked into the kitchen, holding a small boy by the hand.

“What’s going on?” she asked, fear radiating in her voice.

“I’m here to see my wife, Fannie, and my kids,” Eddie said firmly, fear beginning to churn in his stomach.  Something wasn’t right.  He stared at the man and woman gazing at him with a look he had finally identified as pity.  “Excuse me,” he said firmly, moving to pass them.

The man put out his hand and grabbed hold of his arm.  “They ain’t up there,” he said heavily.

“Where are they?” Eddie asked sharply.

The man shifted his eyes away and shuffled his feet.

His wife stepped forward and took Eddie’s hand.  “Fannie’s gone,” she said softly.

“Gone where?” Eddie asked, fighting to deny the truth he saw in her eyes.

“I worked with Fannie at the Armory,” she began.

Eddie wanted to slap his hands over his ears, wanted to stop what he knew was coming, but he had to know.  “What happened?” he whispered.

“There be an explosion.  The same day you was caught and got took to prison.”  She wiped at the tears in her eyes.  “Fannie didn’t make it.”

Eddie stared at her, pain ripping through his entire body.  “My Fannie is dead?”

“I’m so sorry.”

Eddie stood frozen in place, staring at the couple as numbness crept into his mind.  He’d survived two years in prison to get home to Fannie and the kids.  “The kids,” he gasped, tears choking his voice.  “Where my kids?”

The woman shook her head.  “I don’t know.  I does know they be with Opal.”

“Opal?”  Hope moved in to replace some of the pain.  “My kids is still alive?”

“They was the last we know,” the man replied.  “Eddie, I’m so sorry.”