CHAPTER 33
Steam from the boiling pot mingled with the heat of the cooking shed as Emily waited for Ginny to return from the root cellar with turnips for supper. Supplies were adequate, if only just. Emily pulled the edge of a second knife over the sharpening stone. The rapid sound of horse’s hooves and a muffled scream from Ginny broke into her reverie. Dropping the knives into the deep pockets of her work apron, Emily stepped into the open.
Three Union soldiers rode into the yard. Reined in so close that Emily stumbled back, their bony horses pawed at the dirt. Their dusty blue frock coats hung loose across their thighs, and each man carried some variety of small arm. The sergeant in the lead, shorter than the other men, but clearly in command, wore a side pistol and light saber engraved with oak leaves. Across his left shoulder hung a repeating Spencer carbine.
Ginny attracted scant attention from the soldiers, other than the glance they threw her when she uttered her stifled scream. They had ridden past her as if she mattered not at all.
Emily’s mouth went dry as cotton as the soldiers towered over her in the late-morning sun. The children had taken their pails and gone with Samantha in search of wild berries at the edge of the woods. They would not return for at least another hour. Emily fingered the knives in her apron pocket. Ginny stole past the men and stood close to her.
The commander rose in his stirrups and slung himself onto the dusty earth almost in Emily’s face. She retreated a step and slid a finger along the blade of one of the knives.
“Well, ma’am,” the sergeant said with a mocking courtesy, “we find ourselves in need of extra rations. Looks like your cook had an apron full before she scampered back here to your protection.” He waved in Ginny’s direction without taking his eyes from Emily’s pale face. “Perhaps she’ll be good enough to cook something for us. We’ll see to the rest of your cellar after we’ve been satisfied.”
Emily did not stir. She lifted her head and fingered the knife again. Ginny shifted her weight and backed away.
“I’m assuming that you heard me,” the man said, “and that you both speak English. These men are hungry. Now get to work.” He turned to Ginny. “I’m talking to you, nigger!”
“Nigger, is it? Ain’t you supposed to be the ones here to emancipate us? Bring freedom and respect to us darkies?”
“I’m risking my life to liberate you and you had best act as if that matters.”
“You ain’t liberating me. You way behind on that. I been freed before you come along, thanks to this lady and her abolitionist father.”
“Abolitionist?”
“Yeah, you look surprised as you want, but we got us some Mississippi abolitionists. Judge bought up every slave he could. Over a hundred. Educated us against illegal and tried to make us free.” Ginny looked from one soldier to the other. “Yeah, I see your faces, all three your faces. They’s things you know and things you don’t.”
“Nonetheless, we are risking our lives to liberate slaves. Free or not free, you know why we’re here in this godforsaken place.” The sergeant’s voice was vehement. Over his shoulder, the third scout glared at her.
“I tell you what I know. I know,” Ginny emphasized the word, “you here to steal our food. Now how I’m gone be liberated if I can’t eat?”
The sergeant had lived a principled life, had entered the nightmare of this war on good intentions. In his mind he carried nothing but ideas of white cruelty, lashings, beatings, and an inhumanity that must be destroyed if it cost him his life. And he had seen firsthand the proof of those evils. He had seen the abomination of slavery. Now, here was this ignorant black woman, confronting him and his motives. A curious group of hands had gathered, staring. The sergeant was aghast, his anger fueled by the witness of his men.
“Shut your mouth, woman,” he snapped. “Now, you get my men and me some water. And not from the well, from the cistern over there. And you make sure that water is clean!”
“You thirsty?” Ginny said. “I expect them horses thirsty, too. I’m watering them first. They don’t care about no clean water. You”—she pointed at the one still mounted, young, boy-faced, and at a loss—“get down.”
“I didn’t give you orders to dismount!” the sergeant snapped. “The horses can wait.”
“And, so can you,” Ginny said, reaching for the closest set of reins.
The sergeant grabbed her wrist. “We’ll keep charge of our own horses. Now, get that water.” He pushed her aside.
Emily leaped in front of the man. She stood very still for a moment and took a deep breath. “I believe you gentlemen should leave,” she said to the soldiers. “And as for food,” she continued, “we haven’t much. And what we have is to feed those you have come here so courageously to liberate. What we have would do you little good and would deprive these free blacks.”
“Ma’am, I find myself at a loss.” The sergeant fidgeted.
“We will give you water, not because of your orders, sir, but because you are thirsty. We will water your horses for the same reason. And we will give you some turnips for your supper. The same as we are having. There is no need to steal them. However, if you steal from us, you clearly see the faces of the people from whom you steal.”
Benjamin and Lucian led the horses to the trough. Samantha went to the cellar and returned with the turnips Ginny had dropped in her fright. Ginny brought a bucket of fresh water from the cistern. As the men wiped their faces on their coat sleeves, Ginny retrieved the gourd dipper from the boy-faced soldier and handed him the turnips.
“Get your horse, Stapleton,” said the sergeant. “Stop staring and put those turnips in the saddle bag. Mount up, Jamison.” The sergeant tipped his cap to Emily and turned his horse. “Madam, you may expect a good number more like me. They will not be intimidated nor so docile in accepting your turnips. Captain Beckwith of Colonel Grierson’s division is close behind us. And you, madam, will soon be hostess to both Captain Beckwith and his men. I assume you have turnips and more to spare.”
The captain arrived within half an hour. Alongside him rode the three scouts. Emily stood at the gate, waiting. She licked her dry lips and nodded.
“Madam, I am Captain Warren Beckwith, in charge of the 4th Iowa Cavalry of the Union Army of the United States. My men require food, water, bandages, and other such supplies as you may have in your possession. Sergeant Digby here tells me you have generously offered us turnips for supper. I fear that will not do, madam, in spite of information that you and your family are Southern abolitionists. I have encountered such sympathies before. I assume you would also then be a Unionist and eager to provide for these men who are risking their lives to bring that abolition and Union into permanent reality.”
Emily looked out across the array of bedraggled troops, studying the captain’s small, tight face.
“Sir, we are doing our best in hard times. There is little extra. I entreat you to spare us.”
“We are also doing our best in hard times, madam. My men have been in the saddle two full days and a night without rest. No one is spared in this conflict.” He motioned to the officer nearest him. “Sergeant, prepare the men to pitch camp. Set out a watch. Designate six men to take inventory of this property. You can be sure the cache will be ample. See to the horses. Enlist whatever help you need from the hands on this place. Conscript the men themselves if you see fit and find them willing.”
Captain Beckwith regarded Emily, who had not moved from the gate.
“Madam,” he said, “I shall require an invitation to dine at your table this evening. On something other than turnips. Perhaps one of those chickens I hear cackling. I shall expect you to sit at the table with me. We will dine at eight o’clock. Thank you for your kind invitation. I accept.”
In the field, tents were already flapping in the wind. Emily could not imagine how many. The air pulsated with the shouting men and the pounding of stakes into the ground. The rank smell of their accumulated sweat and grinding filth gagged her. She stood transfixed as the transformation in the field took place. Ignoring her, the captain passed by and stooped to enter a large tent already nearby. The flap dropped behind him.
“Ginny,” Emily said, “bring me the ax and catch the smallest chicken you can. Set some water on to scald.”
Ginny did as she was told. With the exception of giving Emily an ax. She and Jessie chased down a small hen. Propping the ax beside the stump, Ginny laid the chicken’s neck across it. Emily jerked up the ax. Ginny straightened.
“What you doing, Miss Emily?”
“I am killing a chicken for that Yankee, Ginny. You heard the menu, chicken and turnips.”
“Yes’m, I did. Now hand me that ax.”
“And to that,” said Emily, “we will add a cake of cornbread and pot liquor. Do we have any greens?”
“Got some collards. Maybe tough, but they’ll do.”
“All right. Put that chicken’s head back on the stump, Ginny.”
“Miss Emily—”
“On the stump, Ginny. And get your hand out of my way.”
The ax came down. The chicken’s head fell to the earth. Ginny fought to hold the jerking body, aiming the spurting blood away from Emily, who dropped the ax and covered her face.
“You be ready,” Ginny said to Benjamin, who had slipped into the scene.
He stood behind Emily. She lifted her face, standing still. Her breath came in violent shudders.
“Get this chicken out my hands, Benjamin. What’s wrong with you?” Ginny handed off the still-twitching body and came up behind Emily. “Tell Jessie get that thing scalded and plucked.”
She turned Emily around.
“Why you do that, honey?”
Emily wiped the back of her hand across the front of the apron. Slowly, she withdrew the knives hidden in her pockets. “I expect you will need these,” she said, between breaths.
“Yes’m.” Ginny studied Emily’s white face.
“You can go on now, Ginny. I am not going to faint or go crazy.”
Ginny turned. Emily reached out and caught her hand. Ginny stood for a moment, their hands holding one another. Then she walked away, a knife in each hand.
* * *
“A fine table for turnips and chicken.” Captain Beckwith gave Emily a slight bow. “I appreciate this dinner, Mrs. Slate. And your help in provision for my men, who are much fatigued.”
“I find myself unable to say that you are welcome, Captain Beckwith.”
Beckwith examined the room with its sparse, well-made essentials. The table, the chairs, the china and silver Emily had hesitated to use, silver that had been her mother’s. He saw her look.
“My commander, Colonel Grierson, is a gentleman, Mrs. Slate. A music teacher, actually. It is a matter of some puzzlement that he became a soldier, let alone the cavalry, let alone the leader that he has become. He is also a just man. We are under firm orders that there be no violence against civilians, no looting, no thievery—although you may consider our conscription of food and necessary supplies to be just that. Your silver is safe in my presence and that of my men. Our focus is on the preservation of the Union and the liberation of slaves. To that end, we are only interested in the destruction of railways, depots, armories, and strategic weakening of rebel forces.”
The captain drew the chair for her to be seated.
“Now, Mrs. Slate,” he said, settling himself opposite her, “in spite of discovering you in the midst of preparing turnips, which I expect you do to preserve supplies, you would not expect me to believe that you do not have ample reserves. This is a rather large plantation, and I presume your servants are experienced hands at husbandry and farming.”
“We have suffered ill weather for crops, sir, as I understand you have suffered ill weather for war.”
Captain Beckwith noted the twitch at the corners of her mouth. He took a sip of water. Jessie entered with the platter of chicken, four pieces fried to perfection, and set it before him. Ginny followed: in one hand, a bowl of turnips with greens, dotted with shining drops of bacon grease, in the other, a plate of fried corn pone. She set the dishes in front of the captain. He did not seem to know what to do.
“Please serve yourself, Captain.”
The forks clinking against the china sounded startlingly loud. Emily cut a leg and thigh apart. With her fingers, she raised the drumstick to her lips. Beckwith looked up in surprise, his knife and fork poised over the chicken breast. He hesitated, laid the silver on the plate, and picked up his piece of chicken. Emily was aware of his scrutiny. He would have cut every bite, she knew, forked it morsel by morsel to his mouth, as she would have in other days.
“Did you volunteer?” she said.
“Yes, ma’am. I did.”
“Why?”
“You are very straightforward, Mrs. Slate.” Beckwith cleared his throat. “I believe in the Union. And the freedom of all men under our Constitution.”
Silence. Emily did not divert her eyes.
“I was young,” he said at last. “I was idealistic. I believed in a number of lofty ideals. I still do. And I had no notion of the grim realities of war.”
“Are you married, sir?”
Beckwith returned the directness of her gaze.
“Yes, I am. Less than a year now.”
“And where is your wife?”
“At home with her mother.”
“And her father? Is he fighting also?”
“Yes, he is,” Beckwith said.
“And what will she do, sir, in case you do not return?”
“I intend to return, Mrs. Slate.”
“We all intend something, Captain.” Emily put her napkin alongside her plate and sat back.
“And your husband, ma’am, is he—”
“Dead. My husband is dead. My father is dead. My brothers are dead.” Emily halted. “Except one whom you may wind up killing if you reach Vicksburg. He is there fighting against my father’s cause.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Slate. This war—”
“They did not die in this war, sir. They died in a much more Biblical way. Cain and Abel and greed. They died at war with themselves.”
Beckwith shifted in his chair and pushed back from the table.
“Ginny will wrap the rest of the chicken in paper,” Emily said. “You will want it tomorrow.”
“Mrs. Slate, I wondered at something today and feel I might not be too bold to ask. You are so exceptionally forthright.”
“What do you want to know?” she said.
“I was watching today when you killed the chicken.”
“Oh,” said Emily. “And you want to know about that.”
“Your servant seemed in distress. And afterward I saw why. It has troubled me and I must say, it has been difficult to eat this meal.”
“I had an unfortunate experience as a child with the killing of a chicken, Captain. It left me scarred inside. I was falsely protected from a great deal after that. It was all a great delusion. My life has consisted of a number of great delusions. The time has arrived for me to move past them, sir. You have witnessed my first killing.”
He regarded her and then stared out the window.
“You have much in common with my commander, Colonel Grierson, Mrs. Slate. As a child, the colonel was kicked in the head by a horse. He lived, but was blind for some time and grew up with a terrible fear of horses. Now he commands seventeen hundred men of the 6th and 7th Illinois and the 2nd Iowa Cavalry regiments. He lives on a horse.”
“Well, Captain, I hope I shall not have to live on my chickens, although they do their part.” Emily rose and extended her hand.
“There are many kinds of courage, Mrs. Slate. I salute you.” He clicked his heels and bowed.
She withdrew her hand. “Good night, sir. I hope your young wife will see you come home.”
* * *
Before dawn, the Union forces broke camp. Some confusion rose at an apparent desertion by one of the scouts, overshadowed by the urgency of Beckwith’s mission. Left behind was the stink of unwashed bodies, vomit, and worse. Lucian stared at the open latrine, slick with excrement. Flies already swarmed around it; the putrid soil jumped with fleas left behind from the troops. He considered their deprivations, the filth and disease they suffered. Lucian wondered what made men endure the march they were on and the fight to come. He leaned on the shovel and closed his eyes. Supposed to be about us, he thought, and shook his head. Men is men, he thought. Just ’cause they trying to do good, don’t mean they’s good. His head swirled with the brutal memory of the night before.
Nathan touched his elbow. “You ready?”
Lucian turned away and spat. He gazed into Nathan’s face, a face he could trust, all blinders gone. “Yeah,” he said.
The two men set to digging, Nathan with a longer shovel and the lopsided stance he had adapted for his one arm. Neither spoke. As the trench of the latrine grew deeper, Nathan stopped to readjust his leverage. Lucian glimpsed in the face of this man beside him, a mirror for the unexpected alterations that had befallen them both. Here was another man who forever might or might not recognize himself. Life can do that to you, Lucian thought. You just don’t see it coming at you till it’s too late. He lifted another load of the muck and studied the deepening hole. The earth sucked against the shovel as he dug.
“That’s enough,” Nathan said.
Lucian jabbed at the side of the hole and threw another shovelful to the side.
“Come on now, Lucian,” Nathan said. “It’s time. Gone soon be too light. Folks’ll be coming.”
Lucian thrust the shovel into the mound of earth and led the way into the barn. The two men reemerged, dragging between them a heavy load wrapped in a length of homespun, taking on the color of the earth as the mud slathered onto it. They dropped it into the gaping latrine. Without speaking, they shoveled the muck back over their mysterious load. The task done, they leaned on their shovels to catch their breath and watched the dawn soften the sky. By the time a few more hands joined them in the field, there remained only the rest of the latrine to cover. Talk among the men focused on the soldiers who had come and gone out of their lives, on the visceral realities of the military and their mission, on who among themselves had followed after the troops. They speculated as to what these men, whatever their cause, actually felt about the coloreds they encountered. Lucian walked toward his cabin. A few of the men stared after him. The latrine was closed, the stench barely diminished.
* * *
A skillet, half full of bacon fat, sizzled on the back burner. With a piece of scorched quilting, Ginny clanged open the fire door and shoved in a stick of wood, jabbing at the coals. As she backed up, Ginny stumbled against Rosa Claire, who straddled a small pan, stirring some make-believe concoction with a piece of kindling.
“Rosa Claire, what you doing in my way? You gone get us both burnt up.” Ginny exhaled as she hiked the child onto her hip. Her apron strap drooped. She yanked it back with her thumb. As she turned toward the door, the sizzling grease stopped her. She yanked the skillet off the burner. Rosa Claire squirmed, whimpering and then wailing, as Ginny jerked her away from the stove.
“Jessie,” Ginny shouted across the empty porch to the yard where she spotted the other woman, lugging an armload of kindling to the wash pot. “Get this child off me. And see she don’t harm herself. And nobody else neither. I got okra to fry and she all over my kitchen underfoot. Gone trip me up sure.” Ginny tugged Rosa Claire from her hip. “Where your young’uns’, Jessie?”
“Gone with they daddy.”
“Gone? Gone where? You know it ain’t safe ’round here.”
“I don’t know. Said he had something he had to do and the childrens could go and play along the crick.”
“You don’t know where he gone? With them children? And you let him? All them Yankees round about? And who knows what Seceshes spying for runaways? And what about playing at the crick by themselves? Ain’t you got one lick of sense, Jessie?” She handed down Rosa Claire. “Somebody gone wind up dead.”
“Nathan just say he had to go. Said it was time and he be back.”
“Well, don’t be letting this one go off nowhere. I got work to do.”
* * *
The inventory of foodstuff seized by Beckwith’s troops from the hidden reserves trailed three pages in Emily’s ledger. Freedom felt scant now. Ginny was withdrawn and sullen. The quarters teemed with disgruntled complaint and gossip: Who’d gone missing to follow the Union troops? Who had headed North? What was to be had from abandoned cabins? How to make crop, short-handed? In all thirty-eight people from the Matthews place had disappeared in one direction or the other.
Three days after Beckwith’s unit marched off to the west, the sheriff rode into Emily’s yard. She gripped the porch railing as she watched him approach. Though she knew this man’s integrity, the sight of him evoked unbounded agony in her. She steeled herself to stand still. As Mason dismounted, he surveyed the place and nodded, almost imperceptibly. He stood at the foot of the steps, holding the reins loosely in his hand.
“I’ve got news, Miss Emily,” he said. “For you and your man Nathan.”
Puzzled, Emily motioned him onto the porch and sent Ginny to fetch Nathan. Mason declined a chair and stood.
“Mrs. Slate,” he said, in his slow, deliberate way. “I’ve been wanting to speak to you plainly for some time now. I just didn’t quite have the gumption. I didn’t know how you might receive it.” He hesitated. “I know it’s nothing you need, just the opposite, most likely, but it’s something I need right badly. I failed you, ma’am. I’m sorry and I need you to know that.” Mason stared at a fragment of brown leaf caught in a crack between the floorboards. “More than sorry. I’m full-out grieved.” He waited to find his voice. “I couldn’t stop your brother’s mob, and I couldn’t go off to arrest him in the middle of the Confederate Army. Couldn’t ever pin anything direct on Conklin, either, but maybe justice has a route of its own. I know in reason I couldn’t have made it different, but knowing it don’t help. My failure haunts me. Lots of nights I don’t sleep much and when I do, I’m pestered with nightmares. Wake up in a sweat. But you don’t need to know all that, Mrs. Slate.” Mason raised his face to hers. “I just need to tell you straight out how deep my regret goes.”
Emily bowed her head. She did not respond. She wanted to, but nothing came.
“Sheriff,” Nathan said, running up the path. His eyes narrowed. “Ginny say you need me, sir.”
“I got some news, Nathan. Not sure quite how you may take this, but I figured it was important for both of you to know. Holbert Conklin is dead. Old slave found him hanging from the rafters in his barn yesterday.” He watched Nathan as he waited for Emily to absorb the shock. “He’d been hoarding contraband cotton, against regulations. Useless to the troops when what they need is rations. Appears they headed over there when they left here. He wasn’t the only one hereabouts. Been smuggling it over to Bankston to the cotton mill. All gone now. Looks like Grierson set fire to the future on his way through. Damned near burned Bankston to the ground in the night. All but a handful of Conklin’s slaves loaded up and tailed the Yankees. Only ones stayed are too old. Conklin’s wife took their boy and a pair of slaves last week before the Yankees came and headed for Winona. Seems she’s got people there. Maybe she’d had enough of Conklin and the war both. Anyway, one of the old slaves left behind found Conklin yesterday morning. Had some kind of injury to the head, bad blow, looked like, maybe from the troops, maybe not, but looks like suicide, so that’s what I’m calling it.”
“Suicide?” Emily said. “What about the Yanks?”
“Could’ve been the Yanks. Could have been somebody else. Could’ve been someone we’d least expect. Head injury’s right bad, bad enough to’ve killed him, but I’m calling it suicide. Wouldn’t want to call it anything else. Justice, maybe. Man should’ve been hung a long time ago.” Mason slapped his hat against his leg. “Anyway, I thought you both should know. Especially you, Nathan.”
Mason mounted his horse and nodded. “Oh, and keep a sharp eye for a Union deserter. Probably long gone by now. But just in case. Can’t be too cautious.”