The Storm Before Atlanta (25 page)

Lars was unusually calm. He clenched his teeth, opened his eyes, and looked down at his body. Then he tried to move his right leg and winced.

“How long was I out there?”

“Four days,” said Dulcie.

“Four days? And no one came looking for me?”

“They did,” said Dulcie. “But they couldn’t find you.”

“I need to write a letter.”

Dulcie went and found him a pencil and a piece of paper, but she wasn’t too surprised that when he tried to take hold of the pencil his fingers wouldn’t close around it.

“Write it for me,” he said.

“I can’t,” said Dulcie. It was a problem she’d run into several times while tending wounded soldiers. “But if you tell me the letter I can remember it.”

He looked at her like she was crazy.

“Just tell me,” she said. “You can tell me the address, too. I’ll remember it all, and someone else will write it down for you.”

Jeremy found his messmates playing cards by a fire that had died down to embers. A pot perched in glowing coals had a little coffee simmering in it, but there was nothing else to cook. The rations had been slow in coming in since they’d moved away from the railroad line. General Sherman meant for them to live off the land, but it was hard to feed a whole army off of the land, especially when the land objected. Nicholas had managed to get a chicken yesterday, but the lady whose house he foraged it from fired off a
shotgun and nearly took his head off—Nicholas had showed them all the nick in his kepi.

“Pull up a piece of ground,” said Nicholas. “Who’s your friend?”

“His name’s Charlie,” said Jeremy. “We found Lars!”

The men sat upright and laid their cards facedown. “Alive or dead?”

“Alive! Well, for now, I mean. His leg is a mess. They’re taking it off now, I think.”

“Poor old cuss,” said Dave.

“I should probably get over there and help,” said Seth.

“I think Dulcie’s doing it,” said Jeremy. This earned him a sour look from Seth, and Jeremy realized Seth might be jealous of Dulcie. “It was Charlie here who found him, really.”

“Nice work, Charlie,” said Nicholas. His usual casual friendliness seemed somehow pinned on, as if he didn’t really mean it.

Jeremy realized he should say something now, mention that, incidentally, Charlie was the enemy. But what would happen then? Would they take Charlie prisoner? Would Charlie end up getting shot because he was mostly in a Union uniform and therefore, according to the law, a spy?

“What regiment you with, Charlie?” said Nicholas.

Jeremy looked at Charlie uncomfortably. But Charlie just smiled and said, “Not any of the ones you know, I reckon.”

“Ah,” said Dave.

“Hmph,” said Seth.

“Jeremy,” said Jack, “that there’s an enemy. You might not understand this, but in a war you got your own side, and then you got the enemy.”

Jeremy felt his face burning. He couldn’t look at his messmates, and he couldn’t look at Charlie. It wasn’t Jeremy’s fault Charlie had insisted on coming to meet his messmates.

“Stow it, Jack,” said Nicholas. “Charlie’s been savin’ Lars.”

“Probably shot him too,” said Jack under his breath, not loud enough for Nicholas to hear.

“Jeremy, why’ncha help Charlie to some coffee,” said Nicholas. “ ’Tain’t fresh, but there’s a little in the pot there.” He nodded at the fire.

“I’d be much obliged,” said Charlie. Jeremy found a dipper beside the fire. He pulled his cuff down over his hand as a pot holder and took the pot off the embers. A sour smell of burnt coffee came up to his nose when he poured, but then coffee always smelled pretty bad, as far as he was concerned. He handed the dipper to Charlie. They sat down on the ground.

“What did Lars say? Was he conscious?”

“Not hardly,” said Charlie. “He didn’t rightly say anything.” Jeremy noticed that his pronunciation was not just northern but York State. In fact, he sounded like he came from the Northwoods. He sounded like Jeremy. “I found
him over our way, but it seemed like he’d have a better chance if your surgeons worked at him.”

Nicholas nodded, accepting this.

“Not that our surgeons are
bad
, only they’re out of everything.”

“I heard them Reb surgeons like to experiment on Yankee prisoners,” said Jack.

Charlie shrugged. “ ’Tain’t true.”

“Maybe not, but you’d send him to one of your prisons like Andersonville and he’d die anyway,” said Seth.

“I heard your prison up to Elmira is pretty bad,” said Charlie with a smile.

“You want to go and see?” said Jack.

“Jack, Jack, the man’s a guest,” said Nicholas.

Charlie sipped his coffee and looked like he was struggling not to make a face. “Ah. That’s the real Simon Pure, that is.”

“I heard youse make coffee out of sweet potatoes,” said Dave.

“Sweet potatoes, chicory, roasted rye—’bout anything, really.”

“How’s that taste?”

“Brown,” said Charlie. “You cook anything long enough it’ll be brown, and you can make a drink that’s brown. Course, so’s mud.”

Charlie still sounded like a born Yorker. It was giving Jeremy a headache listening to him.

“How many soldiers youse got over there?” Seth nodded toward the woods.

“Fair number.” Charlie took another sip of the coffee.

Seth laid his cards down again. “I’m folding. I can see Jack’s got two kings there.”

The other men laid their cards down as well. Jack looked furious.

“Those two kings are from another deck,” said Seth. “Ink’s lighter on the back.” He turned to Charlie. “So how much longer are youse going to fight for?”

“I don’t know,” said Charlie, to Jeremy’s surprise. “I don’t have slaves myself, and I’m tired of fightin’ for other men’s. Most the men just want to get home to their wives and sweethearts, and they don’t care if school keeps or not.”

“Whush,” said Jeremy. “If everyone feels that way why are we still fighting?”

He remembered when he’d first met Charlie, Charlie had told him the Rebs were going to chase the Yankees right back out of Georgia. Lately Charlie hadn’t seemed so sure of that.

“Don’t know if everyone feels that way,” said Charlie. “Just a lot of folks. And we don’t know what happens if we surrender, either. Are we enemy soldiers or traitors?”

“Don’t see how you can all be traitors,” said Dave. “Wouldn’t be enough rope.”

“And there wouldn’t be no folks left in the South,” said Nicholas.

“There’d still be the blacks,” said Seth. “We could give the land to them to farm.”

“See, that’s what folks are worried about,” Charlie explained. “Are you going to respect our property or not?”

“Not if your property is people,” said Nicholas.

The other men nodded slowly. Jeremy thought of No-Joke, and just for an instant it seemed like No-Joke was sitting among his messmates, pleased with their response.

“I don’t see why we should respect their property, anyway!” said Seth. “They’re a lot of thunderin’ traitors!”

“Well, yeah, that’s the thing, isn’t it,” said Charlie.

“You admit it!”

“I admit that’s how you folks see it. That’s why we wonder what’ll happen to us.”

“Should’ve wondered that before you started this dog-and-pony show,” said Seth.

“A smart lot of rich men started it,” said Charlie, looking at his hands. “Told us we had to stand by the South. Then they went home to their families, to watch their slaves makin’ money for ’em.”

He said it like he was thinking out loud, and for the first time since they’d met Jeremy had the impression that Charlie was saying exactly what he thought and nothing else.

“That’s pretty thin, bein’ in a war that you don’t even know why you’re in it,” said Jack.

“Seems to me if I was from the South,” said Dave, “that would mean something to me, standing with the South. That’d be reason enough.”

“Seems to
me
,” said Nicholas, “that we’ve wondered our own selves why we’re in this blamed war.”

Jeremy remembered that conversation. He remembered No-Joke being the only one who was sure that the war was to end slavery. He wondered if his messmates felt differently about that now.

“I’ma go check on Lars now.” Seth reached for his crutches. Charlie sprang up and handed them to him, and then held them steady as Seth used them to pull himself upright.

“You manage right well on those crutches,” said Charlie. “But wouldn’t a wooden leg be easier?”

“A wooden leg! A wooden leg! I thunderin’ well never thought of that! A wooden leg!” Seth thumped off, and Charlie looked after him, nonplussed.

“He ain’t ready for one yet,” Nicholas explained. “The stump ain’t all healed yet. I’ma make him one when he is ready.”

“Nicholas carves wood really well,” said Dave.

Jeremy hadn’t known why Seth didn’t have a wooden leg. “Doesn’t the government give them out?”

“Nah, they say if they did that, they’d be in the wooden leg business and never do nothin’ else,” said Dave.

“Oh.” Charlie looked around him. “Well, it’s been a pleasure making y’all—youse’s acquaintance, but I had better be going back before they shoot me for desertion.”

“Better see your friend out of the camp,” said Nicholas.
“Case he should run into anybody less hospitable than ourselves.”

Jeremy remembered the man at Resaca who had casually spoken of using up twenty-three Reb prisoners. He didn’t want Charlie to run into anybody like that. And then he remembered that No-Joke had thought that that man was right. He wondered what No-Joke would have thought of Jeremy being friends with Charlie.

“Reckon this is where it turns into our territory,” said Charlie, when they reached a patch of woods that looked exactly like the woods they’d been walking through. “ ’Less the line has shifted while we been visiting.”

Jeremy stopped. “Well, I’ll see you …”

“… when you see me,” said Charlie, raising a hand in farewell. Then he walked away.

He didn’t say anything about the next river or about Jeremy bringing him some coffee beans or anything. Jeremy felt rather hurt by this.

When Jeremy returned to the campfire, his messmates’ eyes were all on him. He had the feeling they were not pleased.

“We were just discussin’,” said Nicholas, “whether you knew your friend there was a spy.”

“A spy?” Jeremy was astonished that they could think this. “Charlie ain’t no spy!”

“Oh, really? He’s an enemy soldier, he came into camp wearing our uniform.…”

“Even a U.S. belt buckle!”

“He’s got a C.S. belt buckle!” said Jeremy. But he had only noticed that when he’d first met Charlie. He wasn’t very good at noticing small details usually. Seth and Dave were both good at it. They had that kind of eyes.

“Said U.S. to my eyes,” said Dave. “And he speaks with a York State accent, except now and then when he forgets to.”

“How long have you known him?” said Nicholas.

“Just—since before Resaca.”

“Resaca. Uh-huh. And what-all have you told him?”

“I don’t know! Nothing important! He never asked me anything important! He’s been—friendly—” It didn’t sound very convincing, now that he thought about it. Why wouldn’t a spy be friendly? But Charlie wasn’t a spy! “He saved Dulcie from the river when I found her.”

“Dulcie’s probably worth at least six hunnerd dollars to him.”

“Well, I see I shouldn’t have brought him to meet youse! But he was only over here because he helped me bring Lars! I could never of done it by myself.”

“Why didn’t you come and get us, then?”

“Because—because he was right there. It was him that found him. Besides, it was in enemy territory.”

“What were you doing in enemy territory?”

“I was lost!”

Nicholas stood up and took hold of Jeremy’s arm. For the first time, he looked very schoolmasterish, and Jeremy
would have liked to step back if he could have, because this was the way schoolmasters looked when they were about to reach for a hickory stick. “Listen up good, Jeremy. This is a war, not an excursion trip. Your friend Charlie is just as loyal to his side as you are to yours, and if he finds out anything from you he will use it against us.”

“Didn’t you hear what he was saying?” Jeremy cried. “He just told us he doesn’t care if the South wins or loses!”

“He told us what he thought we’d want to hear. What I want to know is, what did you tell him? Anything about the route we were taking? How many of us there are? What supplies we have? Weapons?”

Jeremy looked at the ground. In the course of their conversations all those things had probably come up. It seemed like he remembered Charlie asking him things like where the army was headed next, where they were going to cross the mountains or the rivers—but Jeremy had thought it had been so that they could meet up again. Had he told Charlie anything important? And he
had
had his doubts about Charlie; again and again he’d had them.

“Just think about it,” said Nicholas.

He let go of Jeremy’s arm, and Jeremy rubbed it. He didn’t look at the other men. He turned around and walked away. He didn’t
want
to think about it.

TWENTY-TWO