The Curse of the Buttons (2 page)

“Gather ’round,” Uncle Hugh bellowed, his brothers Oscar and Dan joining him on the wide back porch. “Soldier sons, our dear wives, darling daughters.”

“And Ike!” Ike hollered.

“Hush!” said Father.

“And Ike,” Ike mumbled to Barfoot.

“An occasion such as this brings to mind all the great sojourns of the Button clan,” Uncle Hugh began. “We remember California’s rivers of gold, and subsequent successes there, affording the fineries we enjoy within them there walls.”

Ike nudged Susannah. “California.”

Susannah shrugged. “We all know it was Uncle Palmer, rest his long-gone soul, went to California and got the gold. And look at this dress. Finery? I think not.”

Uncle Oscar gave his daughter Susannah a look. “There was the great traverse from the east,” he said. “The arduous trail of adventure and mayhem that brought the Button brothers to the banks of the Mississippi River and settlementation in Keokuk, Ioway.”

“I could traverse arduous mayhem,” Ike whispered to Susannah.

Susannah shook her head. “No you couldn’t. Besides, it was only Illinois, and Mother says they were stranded here because their horses were stolen and only Palmer had the fortitude to continue.”

“Even so,” he said too loudly, “from the east!”

“Quiet!” said Father.

“And now,” Ike’s father continued, “on this momentous day of June, eighteenhundredandsixtyone, after weeks of drills and military activities within the gentle arms of our beloved city, we and our sons tomorrow depart these shores. We will venture south, on commission of Governor Kirkwood, to preserve the union of these United States for our children, and our children’s children, and so forth and so on, just as Lincoln has called us to do.”

Soldier sons cheered, piling onto the porch and beating their drumsticks on the rail.

Ike was surrounded by little girls clapping and squealing, while aunties bounced screaming babies. Mother sat at the yard table weeping while Susannah patted her back.

“They could be maimed!” Mother wailed. “Or
killed
!”

And up on the porch, the Button men. Not tall, but sturdy, and smartly dressed, with silky mustaches and hair sharply parted and greased. They stepped back and gathered their sons around them. The boys seemed to swell in size up there in front of the family. His family. His father and brothers. His uncles and cousins. Iowa First, Union army. Ike ached with pride. He should be on that porch, too.

“To war, men!” Father declared.

“To war!” Ike cried, starting toward them, but Mother nabbed his shirt and held him back.

“A song! Lead us in a farewell song, Susannah!” Uncle Oscar said, beckoning her to the step.

Susannah grabbed Ike’s arm.

“ ‘America,’ ” she said to him. “Sing it slow and maybe they’ll be satisfied with just one.”

Ike glanced over his shoulder at the men, then out at the women and girls.

“My country, ’tis of thee,” they started, but on two different notes. They stopped and Susannah hummed a note to Ike and began again. She sang loud, he mouthed the words, and the family joined in, loud and off-key. Barfoot dipped his head and whinnied along.

Ike lay awake between Leon and Jim, who were arguing loudly over the affections of dashing Kate from Kentucky. A mosquito buzzed overhead and Ike swatted at the air, then scratched at the bites on his ankle.

“She intended that photograph for my pocket, and you looked the fool snatching it from her hand,” Leon said to Jim.

“One look at your sour face and she would have run had I not been there to accept her sweet offering with the dignity of a departing hero,” said Jim.

“Departing hero?” scoffed Leon. “Caught a lot of rebels with that drum, have you?”

“Many as you,” said Jim.

“Quietyou’llwakeyourmother!” came the voice of their father through the window. He and the uncles were at the yard table, talking in low voices.

Leon and Jim went silent, but Jim reached over Ike and socked Leon. Leon smacked back. Ike sat up between them to block further attack.

His brothers seemed older. They’d had their leaving baths, so the sweat and straw smell was washed off them, and Uncle Hugh had trimmed their hair. Jim had had to pack two of Father’s shirts because his shoulders popped the seams of his own. Leon had fuzz over his lip and his voice was deepening.

Ike put his hand to his own lip. Smooth as the edge of a penny.

“I want to go with you,” he said.

“You’re not mustered,” said Leon.

“The
Jeannie Deans
is big enough for one more man,” said Ike.

“Man!” Jim laughed. “You’re not going, remember, because you’re eleven. Man!”

Ike moved to the foot of the bed. “You’re not men, either,” he said. “You don’t even have guns. Drums. I could manage a drum as well as either of you.”

“You didn’t seem too eager to manage a drum when we were waking up for drill at four and a half every morning,” said Leon.

“But that was just here in Keokuk. Everyone said it would be over before you got called up.”

“Everyone was wrong,” said Jim. “And you’re not trained.”

“You can teach me,” said Ike.

“You don’t have a drum,” said Leon.

“I have drumsticks.”

“Twigs,” said Jim. “Not actual drumsticks.”

“What if you get lost?” said Ike. “I’m good with directions.”

“How could we get lost?” said Leon. “We’ll be with the whole company.”

“Besides,” said Jim, “the river goes south. Can’t get lost next to the river.”

“Do you have a map?” said Ike. “Albirdie says in the South you can’t depend on the river.”

“What does your girlfriend know about the South?” said Leon.

“Albirdie is not my girlfriend. And she does know.”

“She knows cheating is what she knows,” said Jim.

Leon laughed. “Poor Jim. Bested by a twelve-year-old checkers fiend.”

Jim kicked Ike aside and wedged Leon’s head into the crook of his elbow.

“I could carry your drum,” said Ike, helping Leon pull free. “I could set up your tent.”

“Forget it,” said Jim.

“We got no say in it,” said Leon, clapping a mosquito between his palms. “You’re too young. You can’t go.”

“But what if —”

“Stop, Ike!” said Jim. “Let us enjoy our last night on a real bed.”

“But I —”

“Quietyou’llwakeMother,” Leon and Jim muttered. They rolled their backs away from Ike, and within a few lengthening breaths they were snoring.

Ike stood on the bed, stepped over Jim, and jumped to the floor. He went to the window.

Three cigar tips glowed in the dark. Bottles clinked. The familiar rhythm of the men’s nightly banter rose and fell. Ike rested his elbows on the sill and leaned out to listen.

“. . . is nearly gone. All of it.”

Ike breathed in the swirl of smoke that drifted up into the warm night, savoring the low rumble of the men’s voices.
Gone? What’s gone?

“The money was Palmer’s, anyhow. He would have wanted us to live well, all the trouble he went to.”

“Living well’s done, brothers. Captain Hinman put a notice in today’s paper:
You and each of you are hereby notified
and such and so.”

“Never mind Hinman. He just never had faith in the possibility. And he’s on the river more than home.”

“Hinman won’t throw ’em out while we’re away. A fellow what’s defending his country, that’s a man people respect.”

Throw them out? Them who?

“He’s right. We’ll come back respectable and start up a proper business. Likely we’ve loafed long enough.”

“Indeed. All this war talk has got me stirred up with ambition. This time I’ll get me a nice little shack and shod horses.”

“I’m thinking a saloon.
Button Bros.
Fancy the business heroes bring in. I wonder how much it’d take. I wonder —”

“Details, details. You boys sound like Palmer, all your
I wonder
this and
What if
that. Never letting up. It’s no use, I tell you.”

“He’s right. It’s always turned out before.”

“What I mean is, there’s no point in making plans. Losing Palmer was a curse upon us. There ain’t no way for a Button to distinguish hisself without Palmer.”

“Palmer,” said Uncle Hugh. “Wily old Palmer. The lot of us mudheads, and him taking aim and firing true.”

“Palmer,” said Uncle Oscar, laughing. “Truth is, we could use us a Palmer right now.”

“Point us in the right direction,” said Father.

“If he were going with us —”

“I hear you, brother.”

The men sighed.

“Ah, Palmer!” The bottles clinked again and there was a long silence, followed by a single belch.

Ike stood up and bumped his head on the window sash.

“What was that?”

“Just a noise. Calm yourself, man. There’s more than noises where we’re going.”

“Enough of this talk. Big day tomorrow. Go on, brothers.”

The men snuffed out their cigars and said their good-nights.

Ike stood just inside the window until he heard the back door click shut.

Ike waited until he heard his father tromp up the steps and close the door across the hall, then he went to his shelf and studied it in the moonlight:

If he were going with us . . .

They meant Palmer, of course. But why not Ike, who was right here?
If Ike were going with us . . .

. . .
taking aim, firing true, direction . . .
Hadn’t he just today shown them his perfect aim? Couldn’t he point the way?

Ike took the photograph to the window. He could barely make it out, but he knew the details by heart. They were younger, thinner. All four had cigars in their mouths. Three wore bow ties.

First was his father, seated, with the fullest mustache obscuring his mouth.

To his left was Hugh, high forehead, narrow mustache, nearly a smile.

Oscar stood behind them, solemn, eyebrows and mustache drooping like his mouth.

Then Palmer. Not younger by much, but fairer, leaning forward, just a wisp of upper-lip hair, cigar dangling out of the middle of his mouth. Straight tie.

If he were going with us. If Ike were going with us.

Ike set the picture down and fingered the California bear. He didn’t remember his dead uncle, but he’d imagined him plenty. An adventurer. Probably with a swift horse and a worn map. Pockets bulging with gold. A rifle. Perfect aim — like Ike. Good with directions — like Ike. If Palmer could go to California by himself, surely Ike could go south in the company of the Button men.

Ike rearranged the shelf, putting to one side a leaving collection, things he would take if he
were
going, considering economy of space as well as potential situations: