Woe to Live On: A Novel (5 page)

“That is disgusting,” Babe Hudspeth said, although he laughed. “But why would she do it, anyhow?”

Jack Bull once again exhibited his education.

“Why, to set one whore apart from another, Babe. It is a harlot’s brand of showmanship.”

Daily bobbed his head and drank. “It is a damned fine show, too. I could see it again and still be interested.”

I reckon we laughed at this, for Mrs. Daily came in and snatched up the jug. She had plenty of hair herself and it was in glum disarray.

“I will not have you gettin’ drunk in my home,” she said. “I am a Baptist and drunkenness is not something I will tolerate.”

This embarrassed Daily. He slumped for a moment, then stood and snatched back the jug. “I am not drunk,” he told her. “I am entertaining our company.”

She put her hands on her hips in that wet-hen way they have.

“You are drunk, Claude. It is ever so plain to me that you are drunk.”

“Nah,” he bleated. He bent and set the jug in the middle
of the floor. “Nah, I’m not drunk, Sal. I’m barely happy and not drunk at all—could a drunk man do this?”

Several feet of bare planking surrounded the jug, and Daily began to dance on the open floor. He jigged closer and closer to the jug, kicking at it, his toes whiskering past, big feet thwoking down, raising dust, demonstrating his sober control. As the dance went on he stamped as near to the offending spirits as a second skin would have been. His boots banged out a steady cadence. There was more spring in him than expected. The whole house rocked.

Mrs. Daily watched him. Her expression was nowhere near one of approval.

Finally Daily was flushed and satisfied and ended the jig with a tight, proud whirl. “Does that prove it? I never nudged it.”

“You shame me,” she said. “Only a drunk man would dance around that way.”

This stunned him.

“Aw!” he went. He then lifted the jug and handed it to me.

I inspected the gift, then said, “It is uncracked, totally.”

There was a pause and the woman used it to leave us again. But her purpose had been served. We passed the good cheer around one more circuit, then called it a night. We didn’t want to sour a marriage by bad example.

Me and the boys rolled up on the floor but Daily would not go to bed. He hemmed and hawed fiercely for a while then went onto the front porch, with the jug, alone, and may well have drunk it all in his sulk.

It stymied me. I just didn’t understand how it worked with a man and a woman. There was so much mystery involved. I hoped there could be a way around it.

In the morning every stream was high and the road was deep in cumbersome mud. We slopped through, all splattered and cranky. Our mood was foul and not unusual.

Gay birds perched about on wet, black branches, tweeting out their childish lullabies. Despite the muck, the day had a fresh feel to it. The sky was washed clean of clouds and the sun followed us like a smiley drummer peddling cures at half price.

But we were foul and not having any.

Poor Turner Rawls was swollen in the jaw, bloated up severely. He was alert but in constant pain. He would not complain, but as his horse clumsy-footed along he groaned pretty regular.

My finger root ached and ached still, but I had grown accustomed to it. In honest fact I was fond of the nubbiny wound, for I thought it might heal into something glamorous.

I felt a bond with these men. Where they would go so would I, where they fought I was dangerous and where they died I was sad.

I did not have it in me to ask for more. If my coffin is built longer than five feet and a half, the undertaker is posting me to Kingdom in my high-crowned slouch hat. For I am not large, but I have never felt too small to be of use. If I was handsome then, it was a secret, but I prided myself on looking
good enough
in tight spots.

McCorkle’s farm came into view before morning had expired. Pickets challenged us and we answered correctly.

“Who are you?”

“Messengers of Good Work.”

“Your banner?”

“The Black Flag.”

In the camp we found a larger group of comrades. George Clyde had rendezvoused with us, doubling our numbers. Clyde was a stout, blocky man, with a strong Scot face. He was exceedingly popular, as he fought at the front when going that way, and the rear when backing up. His boys were good devout fighters and reckless.

Babe Hudspeth found his brother Ray and they hugged each other up. Ray had some slight scratch on him but it was a painless thing.

After our horses were staked out to graze, Jack Bull and I strolled the camp, checking the faces for those that were no longer there. Bill House was dead, killed in the run from the Rawlses’ home, as was Pete Kinney, Dave Lane, Jim Martin and Cass Woods. Helms and Lawson were fried beneath the bed. The fight in the bush had claimed one more man, though not one I knew much. Two men were hurt bad enough to die but they likely wouldn’t. They were tended to in the shade.

The guess was that we had killed six or eight Federals and wounded as many more. That sounded high to me. Our surprise had been so nearly complete that only divine good fortune had kept us from annihilation.

Cave Wyatt was whole, and clapped my back, generous with affection, a big grin on his broad bearded face.

“So glad you made it,” he said. “I thought I would have no one left to pick on, but now you are here.”

“Many aren’t,” I answered.

“True. But they died in the good fight. That is the best way to go.”

I nodded, for this was the only sort of philosophy a freedom fighter could have if he was to avoid insanity.

“Let us hope we don’t all go ‘the best way,’ ” said Jack Bull. He was glumly staring about camp, no doubt brooding over the losses this war had already claimed from him. He would be wealthy no more, and, as he had been raised in that state, it was a bitter fate for him to accept.

It hurt me to see his manly face so forlorn, but I could not alter it.

As the day wore on I familiarized myself with Clyde’s men. They had a surprise for us Ambrose Boys—four Federal prisoners. They had taken them from a mail convoy near Kansas City.

The Federals were tied more or less like yearlings, linked together by a thick rope, anchored to a tree. They trembled a bit and were skittish with their glances, not wanting to look too boldly into our faces.

Several of Clyde’s group sat on the ground watching the prisoners, torturing them with bad jokes.

“Are those good boots, Yank?”

“I don’t know. Could be.”

“They seem to run a mite slow.”

“This time they did.”

“Well, there won’t be any more races for them with you standing in them, will there?”

“I would reckon not.”

“Ho, ho, ho. You are a shrewd reckoner, ain’t you?”

One of the men who lounged there was the oddest comrade thinkable. It was George Clyde’s pet nigger, Holt. He was always called Holt, and he carried pistols and wore our garb. It was said that he was an excellent scout and a useful spy. He looked about like any other nigger but spoke less and had a narrow quality to his face that gave it an aspect of intelligence.

Clyde’s reputation served to protect Holt, but the nigger’s actions also gradually gained him some esteem. He almost never spoke to anyone but Clyde, as he knew his opinions would be scorned. As with most niggers his life was puppeted by slender threads of tolerance at all times.

He was a good field cook, that was proven.

“Holt,” I said to him as I stood.

His eyes came up to mine and held there steady, then he nodded once. There was a shiny effect from his gaze, as though some awful fire was in him. He did not speak.

“Jacob, oh, my Jacob,” someone said to me. I slowly looked for the source and found it among the prisoners. There, hogtied to his poorly chosen comrades, was Alf Bowden, a neighbor of Jack Bull’s and mine from near Waverly.

“Hello, Alf,” I said. “You are in a fix.”

“It seems so,” he said. “It surely does seem so.”

Gus Vaughn, an able bushwhacker, said to me, “You know this man?”

“Certainly,” I said. I walked over and touched Alf on the shoulder. He seemed grateful for the display. His face was haunted by accurate expectations. “His little place was just downriver from the Chiles’ place. Hemp grower.”

Alf was sunken-chested and twig-thin. It was not uncommon to thus meet enemies who had not been so in gentler times. I had helped Bowden raise a barn once, and danced with his sister ’til her face flushed and we both sweated, but I was not in his debt, nor he in mine. It was a good war for settling debts via the Minié-ball payback or the flame of compensation. Many debts were settled before they had a chance to be incurred, but thin-skinned fairness rarely crabbed youthful aim.

I looked down at Alf. It seemed my presence was raising his hopes. Jack Bull Chiles then joined us, and Bowden strained his pale face, trying to summon up a grin.

“Jack Bull,” he said.

Looking down his nose somewhat Jack Bull barely raised his chin in recognition. “Bowden,” he said. “Any news of home?”

The little man started out shaking his head, but the gesture picked up momentum and soon his body shuddered entirely.

“No, no, no,” he said. “It all goes on. It all just goes on. Some may have died, not most.”

“What of our mothers?” Jack Bull asked.

“Well, now, well,” said Bowden, his eyes angled down, “they are watched. All the secesh are watched.”

“And my father?” I asked. I was vaguely interested in news of the old, exotic gent, but not frothy about it.

“He comes and he goes, like he always has. He ain’t bothered by no one. No one hurts him. But, you know this, you must know the whole town knows you boys are out here, Black Flaggin’ it.” He finally glanced up. “Some friendliness may have been lost for your kin.”

“Have you been fed?” Jack Bull asked.

“Not so’s you’d notice.”

“I’ll look into it.”

We left our old neighbor then, under the watchful eyes of Holt and the others. The camp was engaged in frolic. There was no rain on the wind, only the smell of thawed mud and early blossoms, but the boys were lazied by the previous days and made a carnival of the camp. A ball of leather was trotted out, and men of both groups began to boot it here and there. Their stomps turned the mud into a glue that sucked down boots and held them there.

“Will he be killed?” I asked Jack Bull.

“The odds are long in favor of it,” he replied. “Unpleasant work, but necessary. Unless they can be traded. It seems Lloyd and Curtin got themselves took as prisoners at Lexington. A swap may well be in the works.”

“Oh,” I said. Usually we were shot on the spot, so the notion of a prisoner trade had not occurred to me. I looked back at the hog-tied Unionists, and sure enough, Alf Bowden watched me still. It would be sad to see him killed, but sadness was on the flourish in such times.

Each team of boys booting at the ball seemed determined
to win at the game. They flung themselves into blocks and shoved each other harshly. I suppose the tameness of such sport was comforting. But the whiskey had run low and this raised tempers. Little Riley Crawford, a mere boy, but one comfortable with grown-up moods, threw a kick of vigor that had no chance to contact the ball but plenty to shin Big Bob Flannery. And that is what happened. Flannery yowled, then cuffed Riley on the ears—you could see them redden smartly. Riley kicked him again, this time with no pretense of sport at all. After a yowl superior in emotion to the first, Flannery slammed a big, bony fist at the boy’s head. He missed, though, and I saw steel in Riley’s paw just as he slashed beneath Big Bob’s armpit. A nice burst of blood patterned Flannery’s shirt and he took a stagger backward.

Riley instantly knew he had done wrong. He began to walk away, hiding the knife.

“Oh, no,” he said.

“I’m goin’ to hurt you, boy!” Big Bob shouted. “You have forced me to it.”

The youth turned back to him, his face a torture chamber of sensations—fear, shame and some pride showed.

“I’m sorry, Bob,” Riley said. “It was a reflex. An instant thing. And you are
so
big.”

“Hah!” went Flannery. “You ain’t sorry yet!”

Big Bob headed toward the campsite, walking gingerly through the mud, holding his armpit, with Riley hopping after him at a safe distance. The boy was desperate to make it up to his comrade.

“I never meant it, Bob. I’ll fix it for you. I’ll fix it myself—
I know how. It’s just a slash. Just a damn slash, your shirt took most of it. I
never
meant it to happen.”

A number of the boys came forth to intercede. They reminded Flannery of past trials the two had shared, and the devotion they had shown one man to the other.

I watched the spectacle, curious about the outcome. It could be bad or beautiful. In a few minutes the peacemakers stood back. I could see the boy and the big man clearly. They stood next to each other, gazing like brothers into opposite eyes. Soon Big Bob pulled his border shirt up over his head, baring his white chest and thin red wound, and Riley spread a blanket on the ground.