Devil's Dream Part 7

Zeb finished the tune and dampened his strings. "Bound to go, ain't you," he said to Ben.

"Man got rabbit in the foot." Nancy had her back still set firmly to Ben, so it was more like she was talking to everybody, or herself, or to n.o.body. "Lawd, don't I wisht he would stay here by me. Y'all know I I ain't goen. I got chillen here. Chillen ain't goen. Ma.r.s.e Forrest ain't invite no gals no way." Another communal murmur went round, mostly among the women this time. ain't goen. I got chillen here. Chillen ain't goen. Ma.r.s.e Forrest ain't invite no gals no way." Another communal murmur went round, mostly among the women this time.

"What if I want to see the elephant?" Benjamin said softly.

"Ben," Zeb said. "They ain't got no elephant. That just a story they tells to tempt folks. Elephants is in Africa. Here they got blood, and they got death. They ain't got nothen else."

"I know that," Ben said. "But maybe I still want to see it."

Zeb moved his hand over the strings without sounding them. He peered over at the wood in Ben's lap. There was scarcely enough light to see by this time.

"What that you maken?"

"Don't know ..." Ben was carving now entirely by touch, gazing out into the night sky, over the limbs of the hackberry tree. "Won't know till I get there and see."

"Well," Zeb said. "I reckon that's you."

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

April 1862 LICK C CREEK was a lovely spot-clear water running over reddish rock, and as they waited for their orders, Henri and Matthew rolled up their trouser legs and waded, their calves soon going numb in the bright cold water. Matthew seemed to have a sixth sense for which stone had a crawdad underneath (and Ginral Jerry was following on with a gunnysack, bagging all the crawdaddies Matthew could uncover). Henri was more interested in the creek stones themselves-so smoothly rounded by the long caress of water that they scarcely even hurt his feet, and some were bright and intricate as jewels, though if he raised them from the stream they soon went dull. was a lovely spot-clear water running over reddish rock, and as they waited for their orders, Henri and Matthew rolled up their trouser legs and waded, their calves soon going numb in the bright cold water. Matthew seemed to have a sixth sense for which stone had a crawdad underneath (and Ginral Jerry was following on with a gunnysack, bagging all the crawdaddies Matthew could uncover). Henri was more interested in the creek stones themselves-so smoothly rounded by the long caress of water that they scarcely even hurt his feet, and some were bright and intricate as jewels, though if he raised them from the stream they soon went dull.

Matthew caught his upper arm and held him back, pointing upstream where something dark came turning through a notch between two of the reddish boulders-a stick, Henri thought, but then he started when he saw it twisted, swam of itself, undulating in the silvery threads of the stream. The snake was more than three feet long, and patterned with two tones of chocolate diamonds.

"Mista Mossakin ..." Jerry said through a gap between his blackened teeth. He straightened, stiffly, laying a hand on the small of his back. The burlap bag trailed in the water to keep his catch alive. To the east, in the direction of s.h.i.+loh Church, was the thunder of cannon and cras.h.i.+ng of small arms. General Johnston had launched his first attack on Grant there at dawn.

Henri moved forward, toward the next bend in the creek. Beyond the red rocks was a long oval of still water, its blue so darkened he knew it was deep. There he might swim at his full length, perhaps even dive. The water would be so cold his vitals would shrink within him when he first submerged- Forrest was walking on the bank, stalking rather, slapping his hat against his thigh, muttering irritably under his breath, I don't see why I cain't git no orders if they's anybody hyar as is FIT to give orders ... them eggsuckenlowwalkenyallercurdogs. ... I don't see why I cain't git no orders if they's anybody hyar as is FIT to give orders ... them eggsuckenlowwalkenyallercurdogs. ...

Henri shook his head and headed to sh.o.r.e. He sat on a boulder, trying to dry his feet with his bare hands before putting on his socks and boots. Matthew was hopping toward the main body of their men, barefoot still, his shoes swinging round his neck by their laces. Only Jerry kept on upstream, watching for snakes and stopping for crawdads.

Forrest had drawn himself up before his company. "D'ye hear that racket over yon way?" he said, waving a pistol in his left hand toward the north, where artillery grumbled around s.h.i.+loh Church.

A few men piped up-Sh.o.r.e we do.

"And do you know the meaning of all the s.h.i.+varee?" Forrest called. do you know the meaning of all the s.h.i.+varee?" Forrest called.

This time silence returned and the men looked at each other.

"Them's our boys gitten shot full of holes over yonder right now whilst hyar we set watching over a G.o.dd.a.m.n crik-and this here regiment wa'nt never called for that-this here regiment ain't never been known for that-I will be d.a.m.ned d.a.m.ned I will be I will be G.o.dd.a.m.ned G.o.dd.a.m.ned I will be I will be double-dog-d.a.m.ned double-dog-d.a.m.ned if I stop and wiggle my toes in the water when they's a good fight a-waiten on us yonder way and plenty Yankees to be kilt. Now come on boys, what do ye say!" if I stop and wiggle my toes in the water when they's a good fight a-waiten on us yonder way and plenty Yankees to be kilt. Now come on boys, what do ye say!"

The yell went up and around them all like wildfire blowing over a gra.s.sland. The men got up and bounded for their horses.

"Boots and saddles." Forrest said. "Let's get after'm."

Henri rode in a pocket with Matthew, Kelley, Willie Forrest on his other side. In a few minutes they had come onto a high section of the Corinth road below s.h.i.+loh Church, with the Tennessee River just out of sight on their left. It was an inauspicious place to halt, as Federal cannon were dropping sh.e.l.ls on the road and all the horses s.h.i.+ed. Forrest found Cheatham, who had just been driven back hard from his attempt to charge the Federal artillery posts, one in a blackjack thicket and the other in a peach orchard on the far side of the field west of the road.

"We cain't stop hyar," Forrest said. "I cain't leave my boys under this fire. It's go back or go on. What say we get up a charge all together?"

Cheatham gripped a sore shoulder and looked around at his wounded men, slumped against wagon wheels or stretched on the torn gra.s.s below the east side of the road. "I cannot give you any such order," he said. "If you charge it will be on your own order."

Forrest looked at him. In the thicket of his beard one side of his mouth turned up and the other down. "Hit don't bother me!" he said, with a gesture of the six in his hand toward the thickets.

"Luck to you, then." Cheatham sighed. "It's a regular hornet's nest over there."

Forrest tightened the reins on his side-stepping horse and swung his arm down. His riders swept down the bowl of the field, horse hooves hacking up divots as they descended. Though the day was bright it had rained for several days before and the bottom of the field was a swamp. The Federals were hauling their guns around quickly to address the new targets and some of Forrest's horses were going down to their hocks in the slough.

"G.o.ddammit," said Forrest. "Git out of this!" His own mount uprooted itself from the mud and he cantered straight for the peach orchard, followed by Willie and about half the regiment, at the same time that he signaled the others to go the other way, toward the scrim of hardwoods at the other edge of the field, on the flank of the blackjack thicket where the other battery was. Henri started off that way-this direction put him at longer range from the enemy cannon, at least at first.

Matthew was still with him, and Major Strange now-he didn't see Kelley anymore. When they slammed through the tree line he felt a sting as if a snake had bitten his thumb but in a moment he had forgotten that. He could hear Forrest howling, half a mile off, as they fell upon the rear of the battery in the blackjack thicket, scattering the gunners and driving off the horses, some still dragging the caissons behind. A handful of Federal cavalry rode back with their sabers flas.h.i.+ng above their heads, and Henri gritted his teeth and ducked his head and spurred straight into them, remembering Forrest always said a six-gun was worth a dozen of them overgrown cheese-slicers-jest wait till ye're not but one short hair from the point a-tetchen ye and a-tetchen ye and-Henri fired and the first man went down-again and another empty saddle went by. The next blade scored into the shoulder of his coat but hadn't cut flesh before Henri had shot this Federal cavalier from such near range he saw the powder blast of his pistol stain the blue coat. Empty air before him and he still had three shots left! The fourth Federal, wheeling to return, would have split his skull with a stroke from behind except that Matthew shot him down and rode on through, face buried in the chocolate brown mane of his horse.

Cheatham's infantry was pounding up, shouting out gleefully as the men took charge of the captured cannon. They joined Forrest at the back end of the peach orchard.

"Hit's a hornet nest sh.o.r.e nuff and we done busted it!" he hollered. "Boys, we have got'm on the run." Forrest's chest heaved. A man ran up and caught his saddle skirt.

"Captain," he cried out, "give me a gun. This battle hasn't got no rear!"

When Forrest registered his blue uniform he put his hand on the Federal's shoulder. "You're a prisoner, boy," he said. "I reckon ye done laid down yore arms a'ready. Yore crowd may not have no rear but ourn is thataway."

He laughed out loud when the prisoner had gone, then suddenly went still. "Where's Willie."

No one had an answer to offer him. Forrest turned a semicircle to survey the ground they'd just pa.s.sed over, where still warm bodies lay anonymous, blue or gray. Snarls of blackjack closed the view in most directions that he looked.

"Ole Miss'll have my hide if-" Forrest seemed to bite his tongue. His face had lost all of its color, only the two small pitted scars glowed red above his eyebrow.

"Henry, Matthew. Go hunt for Willie, y'all. Don't stop till ye find him neither. Rest of us got to keep up the skeer." He turned his horse, a speckled gray. "Come on, let's get after'm."

The battle sweat cooling on Henri's skin had an unpleasant bitter tang. He raised his throbbing thumb to his mouth. During their careen through the thickets a thorn had run up under his nail and snapped off where he couldn't reach it. He tried and failed to grasp it with his teeth; the effort sent a jolt of pain to his elbow.

"Be d.a.m.ned to Willie," Matthew was grumbling, as their horses picked through the thicket back the way they had come. Henri stopped himself looking at corpses too closely. He only wanted to find Willie alive.

"You don't wish him dead," he told Matthew.

"I never said that." Matthew twisted in the saddle to stare back at him, eyes ringed with white. "Do you think he'd've sent Willie out of a fight to hunt for me?"

Henri didn't much think so, in fact. He was still hesitating when Matthew burst out, "I don't mean to miss this one-not when we're whuppen!" He spurred his horse in the direction Forrest had gone, toward the not very distant crash of artillery.

Henri rode in the other direction, though really he felt concerned for Matthew more than for Willie now. The white son was likable enough, but often reckless, and it was true he took a great many things for granted. Henri came into a clearing where some stragglers from Cheatham's regiment were stripping dead Federals of their tunics. Jerry was trudging diagonally across, gunnysack slung over his shoulder, still damp.

"Seen Willie?" Henri called to him, and Jerry replied without turning his head, "No I ain't."

Henri licked at his transfixed thumbnail. It didn't help. Ahead of him Benjamin sat on the box of the ammunition wagon he drove. His mule had lowered its head to crop at a patch of spring gra.s.s and wild garlic that somehow had survived the recent trampling. When Henri asked him after Willie, Benjamin merely shook his head. The mule dragged the wagon a wheel turn forward, pursuing the path of its grazing. Henri bit at the splinter again, and winced.

"Let me see that," Ben said, and reached for the hurt hand. His touch was gentle, warmly soothing. Henri became aware of the breath of his horse between his thighs. Ben's head c.o.c.ked to one side as he inspected the wound. Henri looked at the scar that crooked out of his close-cropped hair and struck down like a lightning bolt across his temple and down past his ear.

"This'll smart," Ben said, unfolding his razor-sharp whittling knife from his bib pocket and in the same arced motion splitting Henri's thumbnail above the buried thorn.

"Bleu diable," Henri hissed, just managing not to s.n.a.t.c.h his arm away. How ashamed he felt to be whimpering over a splinter while other men were getting their limbs blown off by grapeshot, just over the next ridge. Through a rip that opened in his mind he saw General Joe Johnston climbing through the mist toward the dead tree on the crown of the bare hill, still holding in his right hand the tin cup he'd used to direct the latest Confederate attack. Henri hissed, just managing not to s.n.a.t.c.h his arm away. How ashamed he felt to be whimpering over a splinter while other men were getting their limbs blown off by grapeshot, just over the next ridge. Through a rip that opened in his mind he saw General Joe Johnston climbing through the mist toward the dead tree on the crown of the bare hill, still holding in his right hand the tin cup he'd used to direct the latest Confederate attack.

A long s.h.i.+ver ran from Henri's heels to his head.

"Huh," said Ben, displaying the b.l.o.o.d.y splinter he had drawn. "You got the sight."

Henri looked at the bubble of blood rising where Ben had cleaved his thumbnail. The new pain was fresher, brighter, somehow less troubling. It occurred to him that if Willie were dead he probably would have seen that too.

"Thank you," he said to Ben. As he spoke he saw Willie coming toward him among a couple of other young Confederate blades, herding a coffle of Federal prisoners, calling orders to them and smiling in the pride of his authority. Henri was too far off to hear what Willie said, but he realized he didn't really need to go closer.

Henri rode north over from one glade, thicket or pasture to the next, toward the hills above the Tennessee River, scanning the s.h.i.+fting horizons for Matthew. No battle lines had been clearly drawn anywhere but there appeared to have been hot fighting everywhere. It was late afternoon, the light beginning to turn amber, when he rode into the remnants of the peach orchard. Half the little trees were shredded by shrapnel and the ground was carpeted with pink blossoms that s.h.i.+fted, rustling, as Henri rode through. A little further on he pa.s.sed a solitary riding boot standing by itself in a shallow ravine where Isham Harris had poured it empty of Joe Johnston's blood.

Henri set his teeth and rode toward the rumble of cannon on the ridge. Soon he could make out the gray horse's speckled and bluish hide moving along the slope below the Federal battery. A little nearer to him he saw Matthew sitting his horse and shading his eyes with one hand against the setting sun. When Henri rode up, Matthew lowered his hand and blinked at him.

"Go tell him Willie's all right, if you want," Henri said.

Matthew's face rippled as he thought it over. Then he steered his horse up the hill. Henri watched him claim Forrest's attention, saw Forrest briefly lay his hand on Matthew's shoulder. When the contact had broken, he rode up to join them.

"Did ye happen to see General Johnston back thar?" Forrest inquired.

Not exactly, Henri thought.

"Polk? Beauregard? Anything at all as looks like a commander?" commander?" Forest squinted toward where some fifty Federal cannon were fisted tight together on the ridge. "G.o.ddammit! I can smell the river. If somebody would just send me a few more men we could tumble all them b.a.s.t.a.r.ds over the banks afore dark." Forest squinted toward where some fifty Federal cannon were fisted tight together on the ridge. "G.o.ddammit! I can smell the river. If somebody would just send me a few more men we could tumble all them b.a.s.t.a.r.ds over the banks afore dark."

But instead the order came for them to fall back, and Forrest, grumbling bitterly, obeyed it. They camped a short way south near the banks of the river, just out of range of the gunboats that had sh.e.l.led their retreat from the ridge of Pittsburgh Landing, where Grant's army was making what looked like a last stand. As dusk thickened, those closest to Forrest's bedroll ate crawdads hot and pink from Jerry's skillet, too ravenous to bother picking meat from crunchy sh.e.l.l.

Jerry dressed Henri's hurt thumb with spiderweb. At moonrise, Forrest clothed him and Matthew and Major Strange in blue coats salvaged from the dead during the day, and sent them to reconnoiter up the river. They met one post of Federal pickets who let them pa.s.s with scant examination. In the vague moonlight s.h.i.+ning on the slow flat surface of the river they could see the brushy southern tip of the oval island opposite Pittsburgh Landing. Henri covered a bullet hole in the captured coat with the ball of his hurt thumb. It felt like all the crawdads he had swallowed had woken up to scrabble around the inside of his gut. Fresh Federal troops were ferrying across the river by the thousand.

"We got to jump'm afore day," Forrest said when he heard the news. "Else they'll do us like they done us at Donelson." He thought for a moment. "Like we done ourselves."

He left the camp alone and was gone for hours. The moon had traveled half the sky when Henri propped up on an elbow to hear Forrest muttering mostly to himself.

"Cain't find n.o.body to listen to me." Air puffed out of him as he settled on his back. "This battle's our'n to p.i.s.s away, and we done p.i.s.sed it."

TWO RAIN-SOGGY DAYS LATER, General William Tec.u.mseh Sherman and his infantry command set out in pursuit of Rebel soldiers retreating down the road from s.h.i.+loh toward Corinth-abandoning all of the ground they'd won in the first phase of the battle. The Federals were four miles out of their camp when they came upon a long wide hollow strewn with timber. The trees had been felled in this long swale the year before but never hauled off to the sawmill. Bark flaking from them, covered with a fresh growth of spring vine, the logs lay every which way, crisscrossed just as they'd first fallen.

On the ridge beyond appeared a couple of Rebel hors.e.m.e.n. Sherman raised his gla.s.s to his eye. The riders didn't altogether look like white men, and that puzzled him for a moment, but they were Rebels sure enough. He had no way of telling how many cavalry lay on the far side of that ridge, but it hardly mattered. The swale of fallen timbers would make a charge impossible; his foot soldiers would certainly have the advantage there.

"Yankees," Matthew called, trotting his horse down toward Forrest. "Lots of them."

"How many?" Forrest reined his gray around, pulled down the brim.

"Fifteen hundred and maybe more," Henri said. "I don't know. They're still coming out of the trees."

Forrest coughed. "That's five to one on us. I wonder where in h.e.l.l they keep coming from." He had a hundred fifty of his own men on hand and two hundred other hors.e.m.e.n Breckenridge had a.s.signed to him for the rearguard actions of the day. He began dismounting these men now and ordering to the cover of trees or boulders along the top of the ridge.

"Yankees can't ride for ... beans," Matthew piped up. He was still astride his horse and exposed on the open backbone of the hill.

"Git down from thar, and mind out for sharpshooters," Forrest snapped. Then he stopped to look down the hill. "No, wait a minute."

The blue skirmishers below were losing all semblance of a line as they began picking their way across the mossy logs. And the Yankee horses balked at every timber, though they were only going at a walk.

"They cain't ride worth a good G.o.dd.a.m.n, kin they?" Forrest whispered, grinning at Matthew and Henri. And then in a shout: "Mount up, boys-let's go find'm."

THAT BLASTED CATERWAULING-Sherman couldn't get used to it; much of it as he'd already heard, it still raised the hair on the back of his neck. Or maybe it was the impossible disaster spread before him: two or three hundred Rebel horse flying down the ridge into the swale where his men blundered among the logs, flinging up great gobbets of mud from their hooves and leaping among the fallen timbers as nimbly as giant cats. His skirmish line had already been slashed to pieces; and now his regular infantry was on a stumbling run to the rear, with the Rebel riders hard after them. One of the Rebels, tall in the saddle, pistol in one hand and blade in the other, came riding far out ahead of the rest, guiding his speckled gray horse with his knees as the animal jumped one log after another, gaining speed as he reached open ground and bore down on the infantry battle line Sherman had hastily regrouped two hundred yards behind his skirmishers.

As the speckled gray's pumping shoulders smacked into the troops, a segment of the blue line collapsed and began to boil. Forrest had knocked down four or five Yankees with rounds from his Navy six before it clicked empty. The saber in his left hand whirled around and around like the blade of a windmill, till it snagged on a Yankee collarbone and sprang free with a jolt that numbed his fingers for a second. He drew a foot-long knife from his waistband-better for close quarters anyway. His horse made a tight turn on bunched hindquarters and now Forrest saw that his men had not followed him ... perhaps because they had better sense. He was alone amid a thousand of the enemy, still cutting relentlessly with his left hand and using his empty pistol as a club.

"Kill that man," Sherman screamed, standing up in his stirrups so abruptly the horse s.h.i.+ed under him and he almost fell. Others nearer Forrest were also shouting kill him kill the Rebel kill him kill the Rebel and then a trooper pressed the muzzle of his carbine against Forrest's side and squeezed. The m.u.f.fled concussion was blunt as a fist banging into him, but Forrest felt his right leg go numb. That infuriated him more than ever, for what if they'd really done him some serious harm? He dropped the empty pistol into his pocket and used his free hand to s.n.a.t.c.h the scruff of the man who had fired and drag him up behind his saddle, while the left hand slashed at the fingers of a hand that had grasped at his knee. and then a trooper pressed the muzzle of his carbine against Forrest's side and squeezed. The m.u.f.fled concussion was blunt as a fist banging into him, but Forrest felt his right leg go numb. That infuriated him more than ever, for what if they'd really done him some serious harm? He dropped the empty pistol into his pocket and used his free hand to s.n.a.t.c.h the scruff of the man who had fired and drag him up behind his saddle, while the left hand slashed at the fingers of a hand that had grasped at his knee.

"Will no one kill that madman?" Sherman howled. Forrest had now broken into the clear, and Sherman saw that his men were holding their fire in fear of hitting one of their own, whom Forrest had hauled up behind him to use as a s.h.i.+eld. When once out of range he threw the little man down, shook his fist at him, spurred up and rode on.

Sherman hurled his hat on the ground. "How did you let him get away?"

One of his troopers raised a hand to explain, waggling stumps of two of his fingers. "That was no mortal man," he said. "That's the Devil."

"SIR, ARE YOU HURT?" Kelley called as Forrest cleared the ridge. The gray horse streamed blood from so many wounds it was hard to tell where Forrest himself was bleeding.

"I'll live," Forrest said, through his clenched teeth. "Effen I don't die."

Cowan came toward him. "Will you get down and let me see to your wound?" he said. "That leg's not right."

"I know it ain't right," Forrest snarled. "Let me oncet git to Corinth and then ye can pick at it all ye want." Forrest snarled. "Let me oncet git to Corinth and then ye can pick at it all ye want."

"Will you not ride in a wagon at least?" Cowan said.

"d.a.m.n straight I will not," Forrest said. "That'd hurt a lot more than it already does."

Cowan broke from him and came toward Matthew and Henri.

"How bad is it," Matthew blurted.

Cowan glanced back at the b.l.o.o.d.y man on the bleeding horse. "By the look of that leg he's been hit in the spine." He paused. "I wish you two would ride ahead and send for Mrs. Forrest to come to Corinth."

"As bad as that?" Henri said.

"Mary Ann's the only one can talk sense into him," Cowan said. "And if not, she'll want to bury him, of course."

ARRIVED AT LAST in the Corinth square, Forrest made to turn his horse back the way he had come. in the Corinth square, Forrest made to turn his horse back the way he had come.

"What are you doing," Kelley asked.

"I believe that d.a.m.n Yankee has done me in," Forrest said. "I need to go back yonder and kill him."

Kelley snorted. "You've done all the killing you're going to for one day."