Sisters of Shiloh (15 page)

Josephine wanted to tell him that she felt like a tortoise in a shell, the shell of Joseph, and would welcome the blow of a hammer or the rasp of a saw.

Wesley was looking at her, smiling a little. “You know,” he said, “that you and your cousin aren’t fooling a soul.”

She felt her stomach clench.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re so young, you don’t even shave. I say you’re both probably sixteen or so. Lewis says fifteen if you’re a day. So what is it? You can tell me. You know any secret of yours is safe with me.”

Josephine slumped in relief. So that was it. Her true disguise was still safe. That blessing and that curse.

“Sixteen,” Josephine said at last.

“Ha!” said Wesley. “I knew it.” He punched her lightly on the arm. “Well, you’re brave, all right. I ain’t but twenty, and I only went ’cause everyone else was going.”

He looked back down at the turtle, which remained hidden inside its shell. “Wish I had one of them shells,” he said. “I’d hide in there and wait out the war. Ever think of hiding somewhere, Joseph, until the war is over?” He was looking at her intently, the same expression she’d caught him throwing at her during drills and around the fire. She was unsure of which answer to give.
I
am
hiding somewhere,
she thought.

“You don’t have to answer me,” Wesley said. “It’s a dangerous question.”

He watched the turtle pick up speed as it plodded through the pine straw toward the safety of the shadows.

“By hiding, do you mean deserting?” Josephine asked.

“I suppose.”

“My cousin thinks deserters should all be shot. He says that if you leave the Southern cause, you’re the worst kind of traitor.”

“My brother says that, too. But plenty of folks are doing it. They go to Canada or hole up somewhere. If they get caught, well, you saw what can happen. But most of them don’t get shot. They have to wear a barrel shirt or a sign that says ‘Coward.’” He seemed to flinch at the word and then continued. “They brand some of them with a ‘C’ on the hip or the face. Of course, the one on the hip don’t show. But if you get one on the face, you’ll have a lot of explaining to do back home.”

Wesley’s eyes had changed, like the wounded men at the Taylor Hotel when the nurses’ washcloths moved lower. He sat down under the dogwood tree and held his rifle across his lap. Somewhere in the branches, a whippoorwill called into the wind, haunting creatures to the west. The torch threw a caul of yellow light across his face. He spoke again. “Men desert for many reasons. Some need to get back to a sick wife or sick kids or sick crops. Some are just sick of the war. And some are afraid they might die in battle. So they’re chicken, I guess.”

He stood up by the torch, watching her as he spoke. “Joseph, what if a fellow isn’t just afraid he might die, but sure that he will? Running seems like a choice of common sense, in that case. Don’t you think?”

Josephine thought for a while. Heavy things seemed balanced on her answer.

“I suppose in that case, a man could be forgiven for running. I don’t know. I get confused about this war.”

Wesley’s confession came out in a rush and bent the flame of the torch. “I ran once, Joseph. I deserted. Now you know. But I came back. Don’t forget that.” His voice ached, like the song he’d sung around the campfire. An endless apology directed at the past.

Josephine could only nod. Wesley’s secret was juicy and broke like huckleberries between the teeth. And yet she tasted nothing. She wanted to move the torch so that only its softest light fell on him. Search the forest for gentle things to put in his pockets. And then have him search the forest for her.

“Tell me what happened. I won’t tell anyone.”

Wesley passed his hand over the torch, slowly enough to make him wince. “I’ve witnessed strange things. Men will die in battle without a single scratch on them. God just takes them whole. Farmers who live but half a mile from a fight won’t hear a thing. Or you’ll see lights in the woods not connected to nothing. Or a friend will tell you he saw a falling star and then die the next morning.”

Josephine said, “Our cornfield back home was haunted by a ghost made of blue light.”

“Yes, ghosts are everywhere. And once in a while, a man starts to feel like a ghost himself. It’s an omen, you might call it. He knows he’s about to meet his maker. My own uncle described that feeling in a letter he sent from out west, and the Comanche killed him the next day. The night before we fought at Mechanicsville, I got that feeling. I knew I was gonna die, sure as I know this torch is hot. So I ran away. The guards didn’t even see me. They were too busy drinking brandy. I cut through the woods until I came to a deer path. I followed that for about two miles and then stopped. I turned around and went back.”

“Why?”

“Don’t know. I guess because I never was nothing before I joined the army. Just a blank. And the first color I turn ain’t gonna be yellow. I’d rather be killed.”

“But you weren’t.”

“True. I didn’t die. But the feeling wasn’t wrong. Feelings are never wrong, like God is never wrong. I didn’t die because I didn’t fight in that battle.”

Josephine waited for the rest of the story. It would come out of its shell if she just left it alone for a while.

The torch had eaten a quarter ration of wood before he spoke again. “My arm was in a sling. That’s why I didn’t fight. Lewis broke it. Not because I deserted. He was the one who told me to run, even though he thinks deserters are lower than dogs. He just wanted this dog to live and breathe. When I came back, he was angry. He said, ‘I gave the guards a good bottle of brandy for you. Now you get your ass out of here like we planned.’”

“I told Lewis I’d made my peace. He said, ‘Suit yourself, you little jackass,’ and before I could blink, he broke a board over my arm—my right arm, which connects to my right hand, which connects to my trigger finger. Floyd thought Lewis hit me out of plain meanness. That old man ran around the whole camp flapping his lips. There wasn’t a damn thing I could say about it, not in my position. Lewis didn’t say nothing either. So I ended up a coward of a different sort. A lighter shade of yellow. But yellow just the same.”

He tucked in his pants with his free hand, a small act of appeasement for an unseen martinet. “I’ve got a letter folded up in my washing kit that explains the whole thing. It shows that Lewis broke my arm out of nothing but love. If I die in battle, I want you to read it out loud.”

“I’ll do that for you.” She wanted to touch his face, run her fingers through his hair. Kiss the side of his face and his mouth. Go kiss his brother for saving him.

He turned around to spit, and she noticed the seat of his pants was stained from the wet ground. She stamped her feet to keep them warm.

Broad slats of torch light moved down the trunks of the trees. She inched forward so that the light included her. She wanted to roll up his sleeves, find that naked bump, and cover it with the tip of her finger so it would not hurt him. He was looking at her again. She wondered how far he could see. Confederate gray to the alabaster of her gender to the murky, vague color of her guilt. Perhaps he expected her to tell a secret of her own. Trade was common in the army, tobacco for flour, socks for gloves, typhoid for smallpox.

“I’ve got a secret,” she said at last, having chosen the mildest of them.

“Go on, then. Tell me.”

Josephine looked both ways, as though General Jackson might be lurking among the trees, sucking cold lemons and sniffing out disloyalty. “I lied to my cousin. I told him I tried to shoot my gun, when really I didn’t. I just couldn’t do it.”

“You’re joking, right?”

“No.”

Wesley stared at her and then laughed. He grabbed his stomach, locus of true hilarity, then almost bent double. “That’s the craziest thing I ever heard.”

She waited for him to stop laughing. “You yourself said you had nothing against the Yankees.”

Finally he collected himself and straightened. “That’s true. I don’t. And I’d just as soon we all put down our weapons. I don’t think neither side knew what they were signing up for, or they would have worked all this out beforehand. But listen, Joseph, if someone’s gonna shoot at me, I’m gonna shoot back. If it’s him or me, it’s gonna be him, plain and simple.”

“I understand what you’re saying. I just don’t have it in me to shoot a man.”

“Why are you even here, then?”

“I have to protect my cousin.”

“Seems to me like he can take care of himself.”

“You don’t know him very well.”

“I just don’t see how you’re gonna protect him if you won’t shoot your gun. And now I’m gonna worry about you. The other side’s gonna take their shots, regardless of whether you do or not. And if the sergeant finds out, you’ll get in big trouble. Court-martialed, probably.”

“You won’t tell on me, will you?”

“Of course not, Joseph.” His voice had softened.

“Thank you.”

He shook his head. “Well, if I ever desert again, I hope you’re on the firing squad.”

Wesley pulled the torch out of the swampy mud. It made a sucking sound, startling the turtle that lingered in the shadows, and the tiny beast disappeared inside its shell.

He held his hand up to the flame.

“Are you cold, Joseph?”

“Yes.”

“You know what’s good in cold weather? Coffee. And I don’t mean that rye garbage. I mean real coffee.”

“Even if you had coffee, how would you heat it? We can’t have fires.”

“We have the torch. You hold your tin cup over the flame. It takes a while, but it’s worth the trouble.”

Josephine had never drunk coffee before joining the army, but in this cold weather, its warmth and kick were irresistible traits.

“Where would we get coffee?”

He glanced at her and smiled. “It’s another secret. One I’ve never told anyone. What do you think? Can I trust your sixteen-year-old secret-keeping heart?”

She nodded.

“Then, follow me.”

Wesley led her down a twisting trail, overgrown with bushes and thorns. Every now and then his feet would pull out of his oversize shoes, and he would have to stop and put them back on. The trail ended but Wesley kept walking. The ground was sloping downward. Josephine started to lose her balance and grabbed the cold branch of a tree to steady herself. “Are we allowed to go this far?” she asked nervously.

“Don’t be silly. Of course not.”

“Wesley . . .”

He put a finger to his lips and motioned her along. When they reached a small clearing, Wesley pushed her down behind a hedge. “Stay here,” he ordered in a whisper, and kept walking. Josephine peeked around the hedge to watch him. He came to a narrow creek that flowed swiftly from the heavy rains.

“Hey, Yank!” he called into the darkness.

Josephine froze.

“Yank,” Wesley hollered, “are you there? Or you already on your way back to New York, where you belong?”

A deep voice came out of the silence. “How about you, Reb? You knitting your surrender flag?”

“Sure I am. Out of your crinolines.”

“You got any tobacco?”

“Sure enough. Got any coffee?”

“A little.”

A soldier in a blue uniform emerged from the gloom. He trudged along slowly, his feet sinking deep in the muck and the leaves, stopping at his own side of the creek.

Josephine’s mouth hung open.

The Yankee stared into the swollen creek. “I’m getting a little tired of this rain,” he said.

“It’s better than the dust, I guess,” Wesley said.

“It’s always some kind of hell, isn’t it?”

“I got someone for you to meet.” Wesley motioned to Josephine, who shrank back behind the bush.

“He’s a new recruit,” Wesley continued in a calm voice. “Our army’s got plenty of them. If you could count the men in our army, you’d just give up.”

“I’d just count the lice and divide by a thousand,” said another voice. Josephine peeked out again. Now two Union soldiers stood side by side, their rifles resting in their arms. Their boots looked warm.

Wesley climbed back up the steep grade to Josephine’s hiding place. “Don’t be a spoilsport, Joseph. They’re not gonna hurt you.” He led her back down to the creek bed as she tried not to slip on the leaves. “This here’s Joseph,” Wesley said, putting a hand on her shoulder to steady her. “He is a fierce warrior. He can shoot the boil off a Yankee’s ass at three hundred feet.”

The first Yankee laughed. “He ain’t but a boy. Give him a drum and let him beat on it.”

“He’ll beat on
you.
”

Josephine shivered uncontrollably. Her knees were weak. She was afraid she would faint from her terror.

“Your friend speak at all?” asked the other Yankee.

“He’s a man of few words.” Wesley reached into his pocket, drew out a package of tobacco, and tossed it across the creek. One of the men caught it. The other withdrew a small sack from his pocket and tossed it back to Wesley, who opened it eagerly and stuck his nose down in it.

“Ahhhhh,” he said. “Real coffee. Not rye, not cane seed, not chinquapin, not lizard eyes. I’ve got half a mind not to shoot you next fight.”

The Yankees were dividing the tobacco. “You in for a little poker tonight, Reb?”

Wesley glanced at Josephine. “What do you reckon, Joseph?”

Josephine shook her head.

“Come on, Joseph. Trying to keep the Yanks from cheating will warm you up.”

Josephine stared at their guns.

“Your guns make my friend nervous,” Wesley said. “He’s new to the army. Wonder if you can put them aside for a while?”

“Fine,” said the Yankee. He and his friend set them up against a tree. “Now you do the same.”

Wesley motioned for Josephine’s gun. He laid their guns across a fallen log.

“There,” he said to her. “No one is armed.”

“But, Wesley . . .” Josephine pulled him close and whispered in his ear. “Are we allowed?”

“To play poker with the enemy? Of course not. That don’t mean it’s not done. I heard of some Tarheels who took a Union boy to town with them, introduced him to all the girls, and had him back to his unit before dawn.”

Josephine hesitated. The Yankees still terrified her, as did the thought of what Libby would do if she ever found out. “This is our secret, Wesley, right?”