David Strong was not and never had been much of a one for taverns. He found the rank stink of tobacco and the wall of noise that fell on you like a blanket in such places, were reason enough for a sane man to stay out of them. He said as much to Dan Holmes when his neighbor met him on the street in Culpeper and suggested they drop into Fulton’s for a tankard of ale.
‘Hell, David, what’s your hurry?’ Dan said. ‘Not as if anyone was waiting for you at the farm, is it?’
‘Well,’ David said, wishing he could think of an excuse for saying no. He liked Dan Holmes, who had been his friend for many years. Dan was a big, good-natured bear of a man whose face fell if you turned him down, just like a big kid refused candy.
‘Come on, man!’ Dan urged him. ‘One drink won’t hurt you.’
David shrugged his acquiescence and they walked down the street towards Fulton’s. David lifted a hand in friendly greeting to ‘Uncle Wash’ Fitzhugh, the town blacksmith. He wondered if Wash was still finding sales for those dirks he’d made out of files for the Little Fork Rangers at the beginning of the war.
The tavern was packed. A din of talk met them like a wave. Federal blue or Confederate gray, the tavern keepers and the brothels make their money, David thought.
After the Confederate soldiers had moved away that summer, there was a lull, which seemed to David to have lasted about six weeks although it might not have been that long. He was getting a little vague about time. The streets of town looked strangely deserted and the torn countryside abandoned. Then the Federals arrived and with their coming all show of courtesy and understanding disappeared. On July 18 the swaggering, egotistical General John Pope issued a set of General Orders, intended to show the iron fist without any pretense of a velvet glove. Order Number Five decreed that Pope’s Army of the Potomac should live off the country, giving vouchers for supplies taken. These vouchers would be redeemed at the end of the war, providing their owners could present proof positive that they had been consistently loyal to the Union since the date of receipt. The next order gave the same freedom to the cavalry, and Order Number Seven notified the population that it would be held directly responsible for guerrilla activity of any kind, for the repair of damaged roads or railways, cut telegraph lines or blown bridges. Anyone apprehended after firing upon a Federal soldier would be shot.
In short order, livestock all but disappeared from farms; crops were torn half-grown from the ground and consumed. Storehouses were broken into, their contents, like everything else that could be carried away, disappearing into the vast maw of this locust army. Storekeepers were relieved of their entire stocks, their only payment worthless Federal vouchers redeemable on that distant day when war would end. Factories were emptied of their contents: boots, suits, powder, ball. The Confederates, God knew, had not left a great deal. But what there was the Federals took.
If Johnny Pope had deliberately set out to alienate the civilian population, he could hardly have found a better way of doing it. Many of his soldiers were immigrant lads from Ireland or Germany or the dregs of the northern city slums. To such men every Virginian was a Rebel and anything owned by a Rebel was booty. Pope’s orders removed any faint stirrings of guilt they might otherwise have felt and they stole without compunction.
Then, as if his earlier orders had not sufficiently violated the rules of decency, Pope issued the infamous Order Number Eleven, which required officers to arrest immediately all disloyal citizens of Virginia within reach. These citizens were to be given a choice: take the oath of allegiance to the Union, or be deported to the South. If anyone took the oath and later violated it, he or she would be shot. If, after being deported to the South, a man came back across the lines he would be treated as a spy, and likewise, shot.
The only difference between the Federals and the Confederates, David observed sourly, was that if anything, the Federals were dirtier, sloppier and ruder. Just looking at them now, packed shoulder to shoulder in the tavern tap-room, aroused his anger.
‘Thieves, every man jack of them!’ he muttered.
‘David!’ Dan Holmes said, alarm showing on his open face. ‘Guard your tongue, for God’s sake!’
‘I’m too damned old for that, Dan,’ David retorted, sipping his ale. ‘I’ve had fifty years of speaking my mind freely and I don’t propose altering my habits now.’
‘You turned your barn into a hospital, I hear?’ said Dan, changing the subject hastily. Talk like David’s could get you into a lot of trouble.
‘That’s right,’ David said. ‘The stables, too.’
‘How many men have you got in there?’
‘Forty, fifty. They’re going to be moved soon. They’re prisoners of war now, not patients.’
‘When?’
‘I don’t know,’ David smiled ruefully. ‘They don’t confide in me. But soon, I imagine.’
‘They say Jackson is on his way north,’ Dan said. ‘There’s talk of a big fight.’
‘There always is.’
‘You hear about Ed Maxwell’s boys?’
‘I’d probably be the last man on earth to hear anything from Ed Maxwell,’ David said. ‘Has something happened to Paul and David?’
‘Both missing, presumed killed. Some place called Seven Pines, on the Peninsula.’
‘Missing, presumed killed,’ David whispered. Somehow it was worse than knowing they were dead. You could come to terms with death, after a while. It was hope that killed you. He tried to imagine how he would feel if he and Andrew were both killed in the same battle, on the same day, at some nameless junction of roads in an unmapped wilderness. It would finish me, he thought. ‘Poor Edward,’ he said.
‘Don’t feel too sorry for him,’ Dan said, finishing his ale and looking longingly at the bar. ‘He goes around saying that any sacrifice is worthwhile if it means the overthrow of slavery.’
‘He’s always been an extreme man, ever since I’ve known him.’
‘Well, he’s extreme, all right. He’s taken up a political position somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun. He claims that the Confederacy is finished.’
‘How does he make that out?’
‘He says with Albert Sidney Johnston dead, the South is doomed.’
‘Hasn’t he heard of a gentleman named Robert E. Lee?’
‘Apparently he doesn’t rate Lee. He was willing to bet me money the war would be over by Christmas.’
‘You should have taken the bet,’ David said.
‘Not me,’ said Dan, rolling his eyes theatrically. ‘I don’t want any truck with Ed Maxwell. He’s got that crazy look in his eye, like a holy roller. He never was what you’d call a reasonable man. Now that he’s got this job in army civil affairs, he’s unbearable. I was told he actually tried to arrest some people under the provisions of General Order Number Eleven.’
‘But even the military think it’s unenforceable.’
‘Nevertheless,’ Dan went on, ‘he’s thrown a few people into jail and kept them there till they took the oath of allegiance. He’s acting as if he were a crazy man.’
‘Best keep away from him, then,’ David advised. ‘You want another, Dan?’ The big man grinned hugely and thrust forward his tankard. ‘Thought you’d never get around to asking,’ he said. David smiled and pushed his way through to the bar. Phineas Croker, the tavern keeper, sweating profusely, beamed across at him.
‘Well, David. How are you? Have you heard from your boys?’
‘No.’
‘It’s not often we see you in here,’ Croker smiled.
‘Can you wonder why?’ David said with a grimace of distaste towards the soldiers three deep around the bar. ‘This rabble would make any sensible man walk a mile to avoid them.’
Phincas’ expression changed from a smile to a look of panicked alarm. As it did so, David felt someone grip his arm and he was spun round to face a Federal officer, a thick-set, glowering man wearing the insignia of a captain.
‘I’ll have your name, mister!’ the soldier growled.
‘You want to talk to me, then let go of my arm,’ David snapped back. The soldier’s face darkened.
‘You’d better watch your step, Reb!’ he said. ‘I heard what you said just then!’
‘Since I wasn’t talking to you, I don’t see that it’s any of your damned business what I say!’ David retorted. ‘Now will you let go of me?’
‘Not till I get your name,’ the soldier insisted. David saw now that he was an infantry officer, a man about forty, with malicious eyes and broken veins in his cheeks and nose that indicated he liked his whiskey.
‘My name is David Strong.’
‘Where you from?’
‘I live just outside town.’ David forced himself to be civil. For some reason he found himself vastly angry with this arrogant Yankee.
‘You heard of Order Number Eleven, Mr. Strong?’ the infantry captain sneered. All conversation around them had ceased. Across the room, David saw Dan Holmes’ horror-stricken face in the crowd. He heard a burst of laughter from another room: somehow it made David feel very vulnerable.
‘Yes, captain,’ he said, his chin coming up. ‘I’ve heard of your Order Number Eleven. And I think it not only violates the rules of decency but the rules of war itself!’ There were gasps of indrawn breath as he spoke the words. David saw malice stain the soldier’s eyes.
‘All right, Strong,’ he said. ‘I think you’ve said enough!’ His voice was quiet now, as though David’s outburst had soothed him. Just damned well stuck my head right into it, David thought, didn’t I? He was angry with himself, but even angrier with this malicious Yankee for provoking him.
‘You!’ the captain snapped, startling a young lieutenant to his feet. ‘Get two men and march this damned Rebel down to the guardhouse. Turn him over to civil affairs for disposition under Order Eleven.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the young lieutenant snapped, saluting smartly to impress the senior officer. He turned and laid a hand on David’s shoulder. ‘Go on, you,’ he said. ‘March!’
The shove put a match to the powder keg of David Strong’s anger. Without warning he turned, putting all his strength into a blow that came up from about the level of his hip, and smashed the young lieutenant backwards into the watching crowd, arms flailing. He landed in a tangled heap with two other men, his mouth a smear of mashed flesh. There was a sudden, total stillness in the room. It lasted for perhaps a tenth of a second. Then someone let out a shrill Rebel yell and all hell broke loose. The room became a seething, churning mass of fighting men, locked together in combat. The meaty smack of knuckle on flesh and the grunt of someone hit hard in the body mingled with the crash of breaking furniture and the white sound of splintering glass. David saw the thick-set captain of infantry lurch at him. I’m too old for this, he thought, hitting him as hard as he could. The big soldier grunted but did not fall. David felt sick, weak. His whole body was trembling. He tried to hit the Federal soldier again, but the infantryman blocked his blow as if it were a child’s. David saw his arm move and …
When David awoke he felt as if every bone in his body was broken. His face felt stiff and out of kilter. He was lying on a hard cot in a strange room with bars on the window. Besides the cot the room contained two chairs, a small table with a Bible on it and a bucket in the corner. Jesus, I’m in the lockup, David thought. He lurched dizzily to his feet and staggered across to the door, hammering on it until he heard footsteps in the stone corridor outside and the jangling of keys. The door swung back and David was confronted by a gray-haired man in the uniform of a colonel of infantry, who regarded him without sympathy. Behind the officer stood a corporal, holding a rifle pointed at David.
‘Mr. Strong,’ the soldier said. ‘Shall we sit down?’
David nodded and went across to the table, sitting in one of the upright chairs. The colonel took the other. The eagles on his shoulder epaulettes were tarnished and there were buttons missing from his uniform jacket. He looked old and tired. Garrison officer, David thought. He must be damned near seventy. David did not fail to note that the corporal still had his rifle pointed at him; they must think I’m a real hellion, he decided.
‘Mr. Strong,’ the officer said. ‘My name is Wilkerson. I am commander of the garrison here in Culpeper.’
‘Colonel,’ David acknowledged. ‘What the devil am I doing in the lockup?’
Wilkerson looked startled as though that was the last question in the world he had been expecting.
‘You have been placed in confinement, sir, in the interests of your own safety, pending a hearing by a military court.’
‘On what charge?’ David asked, although he knew already what the answer would be.
‘I’ll give you a selection to choose from, sir, if you like,’ Wilkerson said pompously. ‘Striking an officer of the United States Army, starting an affray, riotous behavior, disturbing the peace, conduct likely to be prejudicial to good order, seditious utterances—’
‘All right, all right.’ David held up a hand. ‘I haven’t the remotest idea of what happened in that tavern, you know. There was a captain of infantry who was particularly … irritating. He goaded me into making remarks that would have been better not said. So I hit him. I seem to recall he hit me, too.’ He touched his face, feeling the bumps and swellings. Pretty hard too, by the feel of it, he thought. I probably look like a bad potato.
‘Mr. Strong,’ Wilkerson said, acid disdain in his voice. ‘You underestimate yourself. You did indeed strike Captain Hornby. In fact, sir, you broke his jaw. Your action precipitated an affray, sir, a brawl in the course of which three men received broken bones and several others injuries requiring medical attention. Something in the order of twenty arrests were made. The damage at the tavern is estimated to be in the region of two hundred and eighty dollars. And all, sir, because you were … irritated!’
‘So you threw me in the pokey.’
‘There was no option,’ Wilkerson replied. ‘In fact I would go so far as to say, sir, that your life would not have been worth a brass button had we not done so. Captain Hornby is a very popular officer and his company are incensed that a civilian – and an avowed Confederate sympathizer to boot – should have broken his jaw.’
‘I’m not a Confederate sympathizer!’ David said. ‘Who the devil told you that?’
‘You will give me leave to doubt it, sir.’
‘I tell you I am no Rebel!’
‘If, sir, you live in Virginia and talk like a Rebel; if you dispute the authority of the Federal Army and insult the general whose orders you challenge; if you strike a Federal officer after telling him that his army violates the rules of decency and war itself; then, sir, I put it to you that people in general and the army in particular will regard you as someone with pronounced Southern sympathies.’
‘It’s not true!’ David said. ‘Dammit, man, I have a son on General Grant’s staff.’
‘And one with Stonewall Jackson, I believe,’ Wilkerson said. ‘Which proves nothing, either way. You, Mr. Strong, have uttered treasonable statements and struck a Federal officer in time of war. I would not wish for a moment to encourage you to believe your actions will be viewed lightly by the powers that be.’
‘You said there will be a military court?’
‘That is correct, sir. You will be provided with a lawyer, of course. One has already been selected for you. His name is Darby, Major Simon Darby.’
‘I don’t want a lawyer,’ David said.
‘You have no say in the matter,’ Wilkerson’s voice was soft, as if he were almost too tired to talk. He made a gesture with his hand as if to say, it doesn’t matter what you say. David remembered something he had heard once: that military justice was to justice as military music was to music. They had made up their minds to try him and that was that. Military justice: well, so be it.
After Wilkerson left he prowled around the cell. If he stood on a chair he could see out of the little barred window. Outside there was an alley but he could not see where it led. He sighed, sat down at the table and picked up the battered Bible. He turned to Kings and began to read. He especially liked the story of David and Goliath: he had imagined himself in that role many times as a child.
Major Darby arrived a few hours later. He was tall and thin with a head that seemed triangular, a wide forehead, narrow chin, pained expression and thin voice. His uniform was very smart and very clean. Not by any manner of means a fighting man, David decided. You could always spot the veterans. There was a gauntness about the face, a certain kind of line around the eyes and a battered casualness about the way the uniform was worn that did not admit imitation, although plenty tried. Major Darby was a desk soldier. He did not look or sound as if he had ever heard a gun fired at all, let alone in anger.
‘Well, Mr. Strong,’ he began, after the introductions. ‘I’ve been assigned to defend you in this matter.’
‘You don’t sound too enthusiastic,’ David said. Darby looked up quickly, the pained expression on his face changing to one of confusion.
‘Now look here,’ he said. ‘You are accused of serious offences, Mr. Strong. I intend to do my very best for you within the law. I can do no more than that.’
‘I’m sorry,’ David apologized. ‘I guess I was expecting sympathy.’
‘We’re a little short of that right now, Mr. Strong,’ the lawyer said. ‘Shall we begin?’
He took a sheaf of papers out of his case and laid them on the table. Then he laid his hands flat on top of them and looked at David.
‘There are four main specifications, Mr. Strong. There could have been others but they’re confident of a conviction on the ones they’ve got.’
‘What are they?’
‘Striking an officer and causing him grievous bodily harm; occasioning an affray which resulted in injury to eight Federal soldiers; uttering seditious and treasonable statements; and giving aid and comfort to the enemy.’ He looked up and David could see plainly that he was uncertain how to proceed. He rubbed his eyes, playing for time.
‘Go ahead, Major,’ David said, softly. ‘Bite the bullet.’
Darby swallowed. ‘I have to tell you, Mr. Strong, that the court will seek the most severe penalty for your offences.’
‘You mean … they want to hang me?’ David whispered.
‘I’m afraid so.’
‘Bu – why? why?’
‘I think there is a phrase, sir,’ Darby answered. ‘Pour encourager les autres.’
‘Voltaire.’
‘Is that who said it? I didn’t know that,’ Darby said, hitching his chair nearer the table. ‘See here, Mr. Strong. I have been given very little time to prepare your defense. I think we had better go over the charges item by item. You will tell me everything you can in rebuttal of them. Do you agree?’
‘I suppose so,’ David assented. ‘Do you know when they plan to hold the trial?’
‘As soon as possible, I would think,’ Darby said, in that prim manner he had. ‘There is a war on, you know.’
‘Yes,’ David said. ‘I’d noticed that.’
He smiled and Darby smiled back. He may be human underneath that pained expression after all, David thought. He’d better be: he’s the only hope I’ve got. ‘What happens in a military court?’ he asked.
‘It’s pretty much the same as a civil trial,’ Darby explained. ‘Except, of course, that there is no jury and no spectators. The hearing is held before two or more military judges, presided over by a senior officer.’
‘Do you know who they will be?’
‘Yes. The two judges are Major John Carlson and Major Daniel Alley. I know them both well. The president of the court will be Brigadier-General Dennis Moore. He’s a bit of an old woman, but he’s fair.’
‘And the prosecutor?’
‘A local lawyer,’ Darby said. ‘I’ve never met him. He’s a captain in the provost-marshal’s office.’
‘What’s his name?’ David asked.
‘Maxwell,’ Darby replied. ‘Edward Maxwell.’