Ashes in the Wind (27 page)

Urging every bit of speed he could from the wearied nag he rode, Saul came on a frantic race toward the cabin, waving his hat and yelling, “Dey’s coming! Dey’s coming! Far as de eye can see, dey’s coming!”

Alaina pressed a trembling hand over her pounding heart and stared at the gasping man as he threw himself onto the porch.

“Dey’s got wagons and men as far back as yo’ can see, Miz Alaina!” He paused a moment to catch his breath. “Ah seen ’em! A little ways past the creek where ah was huntin’.”

“Are they coming this way?” she questioned in a restricted voice.

“We’re bound to see some of ’em, Miz Alaina. Dey’s sending out patrols right and left.”

“Then we’ll stay close to the cabin until they pass.” Her hands were clenched into fierce, desperate fists. “Pray God they’re not bent on burning.”

It was the twentieth of March before Franklin’s infantry slogged their way as far as Cheneyville and nearly noon before the van of the 19th Corps entered the small hamlet on the northwestern corner of the Avoyelles prairie. Cole arranged to be absent
for the afternoon and joined a cavalry patrol that was leaving to scout in the general direction of the Briar Hill plantation. The patrol had gone a little more than two miles when the road bent sharply to the west where it came into conjunction with a creek. A narrow dirt lane led off to the right, and some distance down a crowded group of rather large, sprawling shanties could be seen. All of them bore the appearance of having been assembled of whatever material was at hand and at whatever whim struck the builder. The inhabitants, at least those who were visible, seemed to be white, although the color of the local soil, which was liberally affixed to random portions of unclad anatomy, made that a doubtful observation. As the patrol passed, several naked tots
were snatched from the mud of the lane where they had been playing and were quickly taken out of sight. The older children and adults made no effort to approach the road. In fact, they seemed to prefer a goodly distance between themselves and the mounted strangers.

A little farther along the bayou road, several well-built cabins stood in a neat row. Most of them appeared deserted and had apparently been ransacked, for shattered pieces of splintered furnishings were strewn about the yards. Weeds sprouted where once small gardens had been tended, and doors hung askew from broken hinges. Cole noted that a cabin at the far end of the row displayed the only sign of habitation. A thin wisp of smoke curled from the brick chimney, and on the front porch a large black man leaned lazily against a post while he watched the approaching Yankee patrol. Beyond the
cabins, another lane penetrated a dense, wisteria-tangled hedge of briars, and the steep roof of a sizable house was visible amid the tops of towering live oaks. A broken sign, dangling from a post near the entrance, still bore the faded letters ________
HILL
.

Alaina watched through the dirty window as the Yankee patrol splashed along the muddy road. The two officers who led the short column were almost identical with their Hardee hats and the gray-blue slickers that protected them from the misting rain. But the one on the near side rode taller and straighter astride a roan that was just like—

Her eyes lifted to the man’s face, and she used the heel of her hand to clear a spot on the grimy pane. Then she gasped and flattened herself against the wall beside the window.

Cole Latimer! The name flared blindingly bright in her mind. How could he have known where she was? How?

Cole lifted a hand to his companions to signal his departure from the patrol and reined the roan into the front yard of the dogtrot cabin, stopping near the porch where the black stood.

“You belong to this farm?”

“Ah did, but ah is free now,” Saul stated. “An’ dere ain’ nobody ’round here to say any different.”

“Have you seen anything of the girl who used to live here? The one they call Alaina?”

The black scratched his head. “Lawsy, Mistah Yankee, it was a while back when she left. All dem white folk what lived in the big house is either dead or skedaddled. Ain’ been a white soul ’round here in
a long time. Jes’ dem Gilletts down de road apiece. But dey’s mean folk, an’ gen’rally it’s trouble when dey comes a-callin’. Massah MacGaren didn’t cott’n to dose people ‘tall.”

“Are you sure you haven’t seen anything of the girl?” Cole pressed.

Saul chuckled and shrugged his massive shoulders. “Mos’ everybody what stops here asks de same question, Mistah Yankee, and ah tell ’em de same thing.”

Cole glanced about in frustration. The black would have no reason to trust one garbed in Yankee blue, and Alaina was too stubborn to come out of her own accord. Yet Cole had hoped for the improbable.

“If you do happen to see the girl, will you tell her that Cole Latimer was here asking about her? Tell her—I’m not going to give up so easily.”

The black peered at him closely. “You lookin’ to fetch up dat reward for yerself, mistah?”

“Just tell her. She’ll know what I mean.”

Wheeling his horse about, Cole guided the roan into the overgrown drive and rode toward the house. Beyond the tall hedge, it was like entering a different world. He sat the back of his mount, thoughtfully surveying the house and grounds. He could understand Alaina’s hatred of the people who had snatched away her world and reduced her to the level of poverty. Indeed, he was considerably amazed that she had controlled herself well enough to masquerade in the midst of her enemies for better than six months.

The huge, moss-draped oaks rose high above a wide, thickly grassed lawn that almost echoed with
the laughter of children at play. For a moment he could imagine a slim, tomboyish girl playing tag with her brothers. The vision faded to be replaced with one of tear-filled gray eyes and the remembrance of a lithe, young form in his arms, then of another time when an all-too-feminine shape flitted past a moonlit window. It seemed he would never be free of those ghosts; they haunted him wherever he went.

Drawing closer to the house, Cole saw that the lower windows and doors were boarded up. A handbill fluttered on the front door over a boldly painted red cross. It was this that roused a feeling of anger in him. Good lord, the girl could hardly bear the sight of blood! How could they condemn her as a murderess?

He urged the roan on into the back yard, bringing a muttered curse from Alaina. She flew to the back door of the dogtrot cabin and carefully slipped out, clutching the wool coat close about her neck. She ran along the line of cabins until she came to the row of magnolias that bordered the yard. At the back of the house, she crouched behind some shrubs where she could watch him as he looked about. She was not about to trust a Yankee, no matter how intimately she had known him.

Cole’s eyes flitted over the stable and carriage house. As warranted, they were still intact, though both stood open with sagging doors. Behind these buildings, at the edge of a wide field, more sheds and barns stood, some of them in a sad state of repair. He halted his mount at the gate that opened on to the field and gazed about him, suddenly plagued by a feeling of sadness that he had missed meeting the MacGarens as a family. To have nurtured such an
interesting individual as Alaina, he could only consider that they had been well worth knowing.

As he turned his mount away from the gate, his eye caught an odd shape in one of the sheds. Curious, he drew rein and dismounted to inspect the tarpaulin-draped conveyance. It proved to be a glass-sided hearse complete with coffin inside and well splattered with dry, red mud, the same with which he had lately become overly familiar. Yellow flags hung from the staffs at each corner, and Cole knew the portent that they carried. Reaching a gloved hand in, he lifted the lid of the coffin. Much to his relief, the thing was empty. He grimaced and dropped the dusty canvas back into place. At least he wasn’t ready to ride in one of these contraptions yet, or, he hoped, anytime soon.

He passed his hand reflectively over the mud-crusted wheel, then slowly returned to his mount. An image taunted his thoughts and began to jell into a firm belief. He could almost see the yellow-bannered hearse emerging from the mists of his mind with its small, slim driver. Disguised as a boy, came the answer that settled his long-unsatisfied question; she was wearing britches again.

He swung onto the roan’s back. The patrol was far ahead by now, and he would have to hurry to catch them. Lone Union officers were not particularly popular in these parts, and Briar Hill roused memories that were best put aside for the time being.

Alaina held her breath as he rode leisurely past her hiding place. He seemed in no rush to call back the patrol, and it was only after he had gained the main road that he kicked his horse into a gallop.

She could not resist going back to check on the hearse, and on the way passed the shed where she had stabled the horses before Saul had moved them to a hidden copse in the swamp beyond the fields. A small flutter of white high on one of the doors caught her eye, and when she drew near, she saw it to be a folded piece of paper wedged into a sheltered crack. Unfolding it, she stared at a handbill that announced the pending sale of Briar Hill and which gave her name in bold print as a renegade. Turning it over, she found a penned message.

C.L.
”

“What was dat Yankee pokin’ ’round here for, Miz Alaina?” Saul questioned as he hurried toward her.

She refolded the note and tucked it within her bodice. “I guess he was just curious about Alaina MacGaren like everyone else is.”

“He sounds a mite more determined ‘an mos’,” the black grunted.

Alaina nodded in silent agreement. This was one Yankee she had the feeling she wasn’t going to shake so easily.

T
HE
war ground inexorably on. The armies in the east still faced each other across the Rapidan and prepared for the spring offensives. The same Butler of New Orleans fame, led an army up the James to threaten Richmond. In the central theater, Sherman refined his tactics on a march through northern Mississippi to Meridian and back, while Steel set out from Little Rock toward Shreveport to divert some of Kirby Smith’s forces away from Banks’s thrust up the Red River.

For the South, there was little to cheer about. General Forrest led his small band of cavalry on a raid northward through western Tennessee and Kentucky. Bragg, having been driven back across the Chickamauga, was relieved of his command and replaced by General Joe Johnson, who proceeded to fight a flawless retreat to Atlanta. In Louisiana General Dick Taylor reluctantly fell back ahead of Banks and bided his time waiting for reinforcements.

General Banks, on the other hand, proceeded quite leisurely in the execution of his campaign. After he dallied in New Orleans to attend the inauguration festivities, he joined his troops in Alexandria, arriving by steamer, and ordered them to march on the twenty-ninth, while he himself, an
ex-politician, stayed to witness the April first election. He chose the easier form of travel once again and joined his men the evening of the second. Finally, on the sixth, General Banks and his troops marched out of Natchitoches on what was designed to be the last leg of their journey. Their aim was to take Shreveport and it was obvious to Banks, and he said as much, that the Confederacy could field no army capable of defeating his thirty thousand-plus, tried and true, brave and blue.

But Dick Taylor had reached the end of his tether and refused to leave his state without a battle. The place was Sabine Crossroads, and many a Union soldier would remember the name henceforth with a shudder. It was here that Banks allowed his lengthy column, the units separated by two- and three-mile-long wagon trains, to be attacked by a determined force of some nine thousand Confederates. The gray army executed well, rolling the long blue lines back upon themselves until the battle became a rout. Darkness gave Banks a breather, and he collected his dispirited force at the small village of Pleasant Hill where he braced himself in readiness. The next afternoon before dusk Taylor launched another attack on the Union’s left flank in a left-wheeling movement. On the verge of another rout, the Confederates were caught on their own right flank by A. J. Smith’s veterans and were themselves set to flight. It was a repeat of the day before, but in reverse, and as on the prior day, darkness put an end to the
conflict.

Banks was elated with his success, but his generals advised retreat, all but Smith who had to be
ordered to cease his pursuit of the rebels. Across the field of conflict, Taylor retreated to the nearest water and made camp, only to be roused in the early morning by his superior Kirby Smith who, having learned of the defeat, ordered Taylor to withdraw his force to Mansfield. Thus it was that both armies retreated from the battlefield, Taylor in disgust, Banks in disgrace.

The Union Army withdrew to Grand Ecore and the protection of the heavy guns of Porter’s fleet, that same which had suffered a severe chastisement from the Texan, Green, and his western horsemen as the flotilla tried to force its way up Loggy Bayou. The blueclad soldiers proved much swifter on the counter-march and reached Natchitoches in a single day, but it was a wry footnote to the battle that most of the nonwalking wounded had to be left to the tender mercies of the Confederates as some unthinking soul had ordered the wagons back before the onset of the battle and sent the medical supplies with them. It was this predicament that caught Captain Latimer between the crue1 jaws of fate from which he was not to escape unscathed.

A diet of catfish, chicken, eggs, and an occasional snared rabbit had sufficed for the occupants of Briar Hill for three weeks or more. The thought of the sugar-cured hams hanging in the Gilletts’ smokehouse whetted the palates but gave no sustenance to the body. A planned foray to the Gilletts’ curing shed seemed the only way to satisfy their cravings.

Alaina reapplied the butternut stain with as much repugnance as when she had dressed the part of Al.
Saul fetched one of the horses from the hiding place in the swamp, and the two miscreants set out as dusk descended on the land. Some distance away from the Gilletts’ dwellings they left the mount securely tied at the edge of a stand of trees from which, if necessary, a rapid flight could be made. The approach to the smokehouse was made stealthily, for the members of the loose-knit family were given to wanderings at odd hours. The sun continued to sink, touching the horizon, as Alaina and Saul snaked their way beneath thick brush and found shelter behind a fallen log at the edge of the Gilletts’ poorly defined back yard.

A dozen feet away stood the sturdy log structure that served the clan as a smokehouse, and beside the waist-high door, lazed the redoubtable figure of Emmett Gillett, that selfsame one whose proposal to Alaina a year earlier had roused such mirth as to cause her to laugh in his face before she got down to the matter of driving him away at gunpoint. He also had the honor of being the one who had reported her as a spy to the Yankees.

A door slammed, and a cheery whistle wheedled its way through the deepening darkness as a smaller, slimmer lad drew near, bearing a lighted lantern which he hung on a pole near the smokehouse.

Emmett straightened and hitched up his pants. “Wha’cha doin’ out hyar, Tater?” he demanded authoritatively.

“Brought ya a light.” The lad adjusted the lantern’s wick until the flickering stopped. “Yer pa didn’t want ya to hurt yerself in the dark, an’ all.”

Emmett eyed the youngster suspiciously, but failed to pin down the insult. He decided his neophyte
needed to be impressed by a recount of his derring-do. He sucked in his sagging belly, drew back his narrow shoulders, and rocked up on the balls of his bare feet.

“Yassuh, Tater. Ah jes’ ’bout captured this hyar Yankee all by m’self.” The young man strutted and patted the black Union holster belt that fitted tightly about his broad waist.

“Ah, Emmett! Ah knows ya seen dat Yankee a-floatin’ in a boat down on the bayou this morn’n, and you comed arrunnin’ up hyar screechin’ fer yer pa.”

“Ah didn’t screech!”

“Did so! I heerd ya.”

“You listen, Tater Williams. Pa gived me this gun ’cause ah captured this here Yankee.”

“Aw, Emmett, yer pa jes’ let ya wear it for a lil’ bit whilst ya watched the door, so’s ya wouldn’t squall so loud ’bout being in late fer supper. Why, if dat Yankee comed out hyar, yer skin’d fall empty right here in the dirt ’cause you’da outrun it.”

“ ‘Tain’t so! I ain’t skeerd o’ no Yankee. Y’all jes’ watch!” Emmett picked up a heavy cane pole and, thrusting it through the narrow slot in the door, whipped it around viciously, then bending low, he called in, “Hey, Yankee. You awake in there?”

The stick jumped and jerked inward a little bit as if someone weakly tugged on the other end. Tater whooped and Emmett seized the thick butt of the pole with both meaty paws lest it be snatched away from him. A split second later, his eyes flew wide as he was hauled smartly forward. His forehead slammed against the rough logs of the smokehouse, and he let out a bellow of pain as his knuckles were scraped hard
against the narrow slot and the cane pole disappeared within. Before he could gather himself and rise from his knees, the pole reappeared with a vengeance, catching him in mid abdomen and throwing him backward into a slickery puddle of mud.

“You open this door, toad,” a hoarse voice rasped from inside, “and I’ll show you just how wide awake I am.”

Behind the log where she crouched, Alaina’s hand tightened on Saul’s arm. Glancing at her in wonder, the black saw her face taut and rigid in the meager light. Her lips barely moved as she whispered savagely, “We’ve got to get that fool Yankee out of there.”

“Miz Alaina?” Saul whispered back. “We don’ need no ham dat bad. Let’s go find us some nice chickens.”

Angrily Alaina turned to stare at Saul, then she realized he had not read her mind and did not comprehend her reasoning. She rolled over and leaned her head against the log. “No. Forget the ham. I mean we got to get that Yankee out of there.”

Emmett got to his feet with a curse and sucked his skinned knuckles, glaring toward the slot in the door. “You jes’ better watch it, Yankee,” he mumbled above Tater’s uproarious guffawing. “I might jes’ shoot you clean through with this here gun.”

“Yer pa said if you so much as pulled that pistol outa that holster,” Tater reminded his cousin breathlessly, “he’d strap yer backside good.”

“You get yerself up to the house wid the rest o’ the chilluns,” Emmett barked. “Ah is got mah work to attend to, an’ ah cain’t be jawin’ wid no youngun’s.”

Tater seemed willing to comply, and the evening grew still as Emmett strove to ignore the drying mud on his backside. In the darkening shadows another form soon approached, and a young girl of rather startling proportions moved into the circle of light cast by the lantern.

“Hi, Jenny.” Ernmett waxed more cheerful. “Ya want me ter bring the Yankee out fer a look?”

“Yer pa said ain’t nobody to touch that door,” the girl informed the young man tersely.

“Uh—Jenny—uh, ya want to go over behind the smokehouse an’—uh, talk fer a while?”

“Ya knows ah is spoke fer, Emmett. Willy’ud break yer head fer jes’ sayin’ that—if’n he knew.”

“Aw, Jenny, he don’t have ter find out.” The young man scuffed his feet in the dirt.

“Anyway, yer ma sent out some soppin’s an’ a glass of milk ter tide ya over.” Jenny held out a mug and a tin plate heaped with biscuits and gravy.

“Cain’t ah come in and eat supper now?” Emmett moaned.

“No! Eddie will be out to spell you in an hour or two,” the girl replied.

“An hour or two! Why, I’ve been here all aftahnoon!”

“You ain’t been out here no more’n hour as yet, an’ yer pa says ter keep walking so’s yo’ don’s fall asleep standin’ up.”

“Well, guarding this Yankee is hard work!” Emmett protested.

“Hard fer you, maybe. Course keeping awake is hard enough for you.”

“Hain’t nobody else working this hard,” Emmett called after her departing form.

The last of the brief twilight faded, and Emmett was alone with his charge. The chore was wearisome and he yawned until his jaws fairly cracked. He paced back and forth well out of reach of the cane pole. The clouds were thick overhead, and the lantern’s weak light made long, eerie shadows shift and move as it swung in the light breeze. Small sounds came with the darkness, and the young man struggled with an imagination that filled the night with stealthy Yankees. He wished heartily that his pa hadn’t been so specific about taking out the Remington pistol. He could have used the succor of the well-oiled butt in his hand.

He jumped as a small, scuffling sound came from the shrubs, and he thought he caught a glimpse of a fleeting skinny shadow. “Tater? That you?” A long silence answered him. “Tater Williams, y’all come out here, right now! Don’t you hassle me none, you li’l pinkie. Ah got a dangerous chore to see to.”

There was only more silence, and the man shrugged, trying to whistle through dry lips. He turned to resume his strolling, and a trembling gasp choked in his throat. An immense black giant who towered head and shoulders above him, stood less than an arm’s length away. The ogre’s eyes flashed with yellow fire in the reflected lantern light, and massive arms raised up to seize him. With a quaking squeal, the terrified Emmett wheeled and fled a full four paces before he measured his length solidly and with a meaty thunk against the unyielding wall of the smokehouse. Slowly, languidly, he sagged into the dust, having escaped his demons the hard way.

Saul bent and rolled the limp form over, nodding his head in relief as he took in the slow, shallow breathing and the rapidly swelling knot on the young man’s forehead.

Alaina came to Saul’s side like a flitting shadow and gestured for him to take the holster and pistol from the still form. She bent at the door, struggling to shift the heavy log propped against it, then stepped aside quickly to avoid the sudden threshing of a bamboo pole.

“Here! Stop that!” she hissed into the slot. “We’ve come to help you.”

She tapped Saul on the shoulder and pointed to the log. He moved it away with an easy swing of his powerful arm, then the black returned to the task of binding the slumbering Emmett while she pulled the low door wide, knelt, and gestured for the occupant to come out.

Cole Latimer dragged himself through the half-sized portal and leaned weakly against the outer wall, sucking deep breaths of clean, fresh air into his lungs, while his benefactors gagged the erstwhile guard and thrust the trussed one into the dark hole he had just evacuated. The smaller of the pair entered the smokehouse, and a moment later reappeared with a ham. The door was closed, and the log propped carefully back into place.

Saul took Cole’s arm over his shoulder, while Alaina followed with a leafy branch, carefully erasing all signs of their presence. They passed across spongy ground, through a thick grove of trees, and came at last to where the horse was tethered. Cole was hoisted unceremoniously onto the steed’s bare
back and given a handful of mane. Saul led the horse out across open fields and Alaina came behind, rearranging sod, replacing twisted grass, brush, and otherwise disguising their passage.

They pushed through a thick hedge where the smell of magnolia blossoms was heavy in the air and to the back side of a large, unlit house. There was something familiar here, but through his feverish haze Cole could not quite place it. He was lifted down, and the small one led the horse away to a hiding place, while the big one again took his arm and half carried him into the deserted structure. After a while the little one returned, and there was much scrabbling in the darkness. There was a rasping scratch of a match. A candle was lit, then another. The dim forms of his companions moved about the meagerly furnished room. The two came to squat beside him, then the small one began to laugh, while the large one, whom he saw now as a black man, joined the mirth with a broad white-toothed grin. Cole could not find the joke, and stared at them in confusion until the smaller one reached up and snatched off the hat, shook out the dark hair of a short yet unmasculine length and turned so the light could strike her face.