by Robert Hicks
“Tea?”
I nodded, despite myself.
“Tea then.” He rapped his knuckles three times against the door and the yellow-faced man appeared. The two whispered in their odd French, and then the servant disappeared.
This was not the kind of situation I liked. I was used to being the one with the information, with the intelligence, the man who possessed the power of knowledge. Now I was no more than a penitent in this man’s house of sin, an entrant into the lion’s den, helpless except for the possibilities contained in the little slip of paper. I patted my breast pocket and assured myself it was there. The tall man returned with the tea in a silver pot, flanked by two chipped porcelain cups. It was too dainty for my taste, but I took it anyway.
“Have you been here before, General Hood?”
“No.”
“You cannot have missed the hoi polloi milling about down there, of course.”
“No.”
“They are fools.”
I almost nodded in agreement, before realizing that the little man might be insulting me. The little man seemed to know what I was thinking.
“You are not a fool, of course. I know of your wager, and your ticket. You have bought one ticket, just one, for a drawing that occurs only twice a year. Most men buy as many chances as they can, but you have only bought one. I am curious. Why? You are not a stupid man.”
I would not tell this stranger of my dreams, of my prayers, of my conviction that I had put my fate into God’s hands and that God would not fail me.
“It was only for amusement, Mr. Dauphin. I have no hope of winning, of course.”
I hope beyond hope that I will win.
“I see. But then, why spend so much, and why wager on the biggest prize? Surely it would be just as entertaining to risk only a little for one of the small prizes. You are not,” he said vehemently, gesturing down at the crowd, “like them. They are dreamy and superstitious men.”
I didn’t answer, and Dauphin broke off his questions.
“Let us take in the spectacle, shall we?” Dauphin said, waving his hand out toward the crowd and the stage at the opposite end of the hall.
A negro, a dark and giant man stripped to his waist, pushed and pulled at the handle of a giant glass wheel while the men at the front of the crowd hooted and urged him on. I noticed how the negro contorted and expanded his body with precision, neither speeding up nor slowing down despite the exhortations of the men who stood close enough to touch the wheel themselves. None of them dared. Off on either side of the stage stood two men with rifles, watching them close. I wondered where they had acquired those rifles, and whether they had been taken to the war, and whether the men carrying them had ever been under my command. This was a notion that often possessed me now, that any man who passed me on the street could have once been subject to my whim, my orders. Nobody owes me that anymore. Got to quit thinking about it. No one is going to walk into fire for me, not ever again. Hell, it’s damned hard to get a man to cross the street for anything but money. Money is honor now. Money is courage.
I admired the organization of the drawing, the symmetry of the stage, and the discipline of the negro turning the wheel. I was about to congratulate Dauphin on his achievement when the two boys walked out onto the stage. I closed my mouth.
They were young, perhaps thirteen or fourteen, I didn’t know. They wore identical uniforms of blue cotton trousers, white collarless shirts, and heavy black boots. They look like they can’t barely lift those boots. Why are they so thin? The two boys moved slowly, at first holding on to each other and grimacing each time the shouts got loud. Finally they lost contact with each other as they stumbled into chairs and tables that seemed to surprise each boy as he fell to the floor.
“Hurry it up, boy, get us our numbers!”
“Who you looking at? Get to work.”
“See your daddy? He just right over there. Right there.”
I recognized the uniforms now, I had seen boys and girls like this around the city every once in a while. When one of the boys turned his face up toward the back of the hall, as if beseeching me for his help, I knew I was right.
The boy’s eyes were, from that distance, almost perfectly white. I knew that if I were closer, I would see the faintest hint of a pupil beneath the haze of whatever foul thing had grown over the boy’s eyes. The boys were blind and had been orphaned because of it.
“Mr. Dauphin, why are there boys from the asylum here?”
“They are here to assure our patrons that the drawing is perfectly square, and unable to be rigged. This is why so many people give us their money, they know that when they lose it they’ll lose it fairly. Why it matters I do not know, but it does.”
“Those boys look like they’re the entertainment.”
“There’s that, too. It is a spectacle, after all.”
I had a mind to beat the little Creole down, but knew this would cause more trouble than I could handle now. Remember the money. But I could not let this spectacle go unchallenged.
“Do you think they are funny?”
“No.”
“Do you think it is amusing to watch two blind boys stumble and fall over themselves, for no fault of their own?”
“They share some of the blame, as they volunteered for the job. I pay well, and the blind boys at the asylum know this. But no, I do not find it amusing.”
“I believe you think it is funny, sir.”
“I only know that they think it is funny,” Dauphin said, sweeping his hand out over the crowd. “And they are everything.”
I massaged my bad arm. Then I was up and on my feet, my coat off, showing the little Creole my stump, pulling up my trouser leg so that he could see the fine wood. I moved so suddenly, Dauphin half leaped over the back of his chair.
“Perhaps I should be down there on the stage, sir, giving your patrons their amusement,” I said. “Would this be funny also?”
The little man got control of himself and took his seat, gesturing for me to take mine again. I was on fire, breathing out my nose like a horse, but finally I calmed and took his seat.
“It would not be funny, General Hood.”
“No.”
“But I have thought of you on that stage. It’s why I asked you up here.”
* * *
The drawing ended for me up in Mr. Dauphin’s overlook with the last number drawn by the blind boys. It wasn’t mine, and when I looked down at it I realized it wouldn’t have mattered anyway: the ticket had disintegrated into a pulpy mush in my hot, tight hand. No salvation. Why should I have expected different? Did I really think God had told me to gamble? That God would fix the game for me? Why? Why me? Why, because it’s always for me, isn’t it? The great general! Damned fool. God is not my lieutenant. I have no lieutenants.
I looked out over the rail and watched the gamblers shuffle out of the hall, kicking little clouds of paper into the air as they went. I watched Generals P. G. T. Beauregard and Jubal Early collect up the money that remained, seal it, and carry it together out of the room.
“I believe General Beauregard and General Early will be joining us momentarily,” Dauphin said. “You know them, of course? Yes, I’m sure.”
“I know them both quite well.”
“Well then, a reunion! Wine?”
“I think not.”
Dauphin was silent for a moment. Finally he turned square to me and leaned over, so that we were face-to-face.
“May I be so bold as to talk business, sir?”
“I am a man of business.”
I looked for the smirk, but found none.
“Yes, I know you are a man of business. And thus I feel free to discuss matters with you directly.”
“Proceed.”
“Yes. The generals. Messieurs Beauregard and Early. They are fine men, yes? Men of honor? Respected men? Valiant men?”
They were. And this little man knows nothing of how they were on those battlefields, swords drawn, riding the lines. He do
es not know how they slept on the ground with their men, how brilliant they were over campaign maps, how bold they were to face death most days, and even in the pit of fear and sorrow and longing for home, how they still rode the lines. They gave men the courage they had even when they had none for themselves. And now they lived in peace and they could not survive.
“I know them both from the war, yes.”
“I employ them, of course. They give the proceedings a certain distinction, the promise of honesty. They are like the blind boys.”
That was the most sensible thing the man had said to me. They were precisely like the blind boys. They were wounded. They were dancing monkeys. They were entertainment. My God, if we had known such men would dance about onstage like harlots, would we have even bothered to fight?
“I pay them thirty thousand dollars a year to appear here, twice a month.”
Perhaps we would have fought harder.
“In addition to their reputations, they also are adept at keeping control of the crowd, as you saw.”
There had been a disturbance just before the end of the drawing, but I had been too far away to see much before the crowd collapsed on what I assumed were troublemakers. Disgruntled losers, I thought. The only peculiar thing I had noticed was the pockmarked man moving out of the crowd as everyone else was moving in. He had been expressionless.
I had admired the way Early and Beauregard had commanded their few troops to bring order to the crowd. So few men, and yet they had commanded as if they had been a division, waiting for precisely the right time. It had been impressive. It was the only impressive thing. Down below, the only evidence that there had been any disturbance was a dark streak on the parquet, like a smudge on clean glass.
I said nothing. But now I looked the little man square in the eye. Thirty thousand dollars was a fortune, it would make me a wealthy man, or at least a man who could keep his wife and children in a manner befitting a general and continue the work I had begun with Father Mike. The work would not be hard.
“I would like you to join them. The same terms.”
Here was the offer that had been coming for hours. I had known it. I stared at the little man. There was a knock at the door and the tall Creole let Beauregard and Early into the little room. I stood slowly, and each of the men patiently waited until I had reached my full height before extending their hands. They still know what honor and dignity is.
“General Beauregard. General Early.” I inclined my head and shook their hands. The two returned the greeting, and as if we had all arrived from our own far-flung command posts to receive orders, we sat down as one, on the edge of our chairs, spines straight, hats upon our left knees.
Mr. Dauphin stood, put his cigar back in his mouth, and put his own hat under his arm.
“Gentlemen, I’m sure you have much to discuss, so I will excuse myself. General Hood, it’s been a pleasure. You are a remarkable man, and you deserve remarkable things. This is a generous city for the smart man, a brutal one for all others. I’m sure you know this. I look forward to our next meeting.”
Before I could say anything, the door had been pushed open by the unseen hand of the tall Creole assistant, and Mr. Dauphin had slipped out into the dark hallway. The three of us surveyed the great hall’s floor, strewn with the lottery’s waste, and remained silent. Early looked distinctly uncomfortable and fiddled with the brim of his hat. Beauregard looked sad. He turned his eyes to me.
“We’ve made a mess of it, haven’t we?”
“What do you mean?”
Beauregard was no longer the expansive, joyous master of ceremonies. He was drawn inward, brooding, but also in no mood for coy games.
“Oh, Hood, for God’s sake. I have to say it, eh? All right: I am broke. So is Early here.”
Early turned to Beauregard in anger, but did not immediately contradict him.
“Bone-dry, Hood, my friend. Without a nickel.”
“I was not broke,” Early said. “Just poor.”
Beauregard nodded his head. “I speak hastily only because we all know why we’ve been gathered here, and I’m eager to make the situation perfectly clear.”
I rubbed my knee and looked past the two men, to the windows far above them. It was blue turning to orange. Sunset.
“I understand,” I said.
“I lost nearly everything for that war. I will not speak for Jubal, he can tell you his own story. But it is not much different. We came back to our country, to our people, and we did not know them and they did not know us. They knew money, and what did we know? How to dig entrenchments? Maneuvering to enfilade? The likely range of a cannon? How to feed ten thousand men maggoty tack and make them like it? That was useful knowledge once, and no more.”
Beauregard began coughing and waved his hand to keep anyone from speaking while he hacked.
“And yet, we were the generals. You are one of us too: the proud warriors, the brave and honorable losers. We are an example to these people,” he said, swinging his hand out over the empty hall, “even if we don’t like it, even if we only want to hide. We cannot hide. Which means we cannot be poor.”
“There can be honor in poverty,” I said, surprised he’d said what he’d been thinking, and almost sure for the first time that I believed it. I had reservations. What do I know about the honor of poverty? I came here to win a fortune.
Beauregard hung his head and shook it. Early stood up and leaned against the rail, watching the negroes sweeping up the mess.
Beauregard measured his words. “There may be honor in poverty for them,” he said, again pointing out to the hall. “But what of us? How much humiliation must the Confederacy take? What will they force us to? To the sight of our generals sweeping gutters, or robbing men in the Vieux Carré at night? Is that the price of losing, of all that blood that was shed for, as we might have put it once, honor? I do not mind picking cotton. But I do mind a Confederate general picking cotton.”
I understood perfectly. I had thought the same thing before. No longer, but there was a time when it had driven me entirely. Part of what had once made me desperate for money was this, this horror at the idea of failing the Cause by becoming an embarrassment. But I had also wanted the money because I wanted to be comfortable, and I wanted my family comfortable. I wanted status. And I knew Beauregard wanted all of those things too. I just didn’t think that anymore. I wanted money for other things now.
“You want me to join you in the lottery.”
Now Early spoke, Beauregard having exhausted himself. The old Creole soldier patted his forehead with a handkerchief and watched me with dark eyes.
“We want you to consider it, John,” Early said. “I myself have found few ways to make a living for which I am suited. I see no reason that the reputation I built, over many years of fighting and suffering, should not now be the source of my reward. I have worked for it.”
“You worked for the victory, for the nation,” I said, again surprised that this is what he, apparently, believed.
“That is true, and as a result I am left with this reputation that is mine.”
“It is not yours. It belongs to the Confederacy.”
Early’s eyes widened.
“I did not think you were naïve, John. Do you truly believe that? That anything belongs to the Confederacy now?”
“It does not belong to you.”
“I am patronized for it.”
“You have sold it.”
Beauregard sighed, picked up his hat, and stood.
“I told Dauphin it was no use, General Hood, that you would be too vain to put on a show for the crowd. This is what I told him. But what I was thinking, is that you’re too pigheaded to do what is right for you and your family and the rest of us. I may be wrong about that. I hope that I am.”
And Beauregard left.
Early stared after Beauregard. Then he sat down in the chair across from me and closed his eyes, as if he were waiting for something.
He is waiting for me to d
ecide. He thinks I will change my mind.
Was there honor in poverty? Here was an opportunity to provide, and live in comfort, for many years. How could I make this decision for my family? I was a failure. I did not know how I would make a living now. Beauregard was right; he had only one thing to offer anyone, and that was his place in history. He knew that this was the only thing he could sell, the only thing of value he had to sell. It was all anyone wanted from him anymore, and why shouldn’t he give it? To do otherwise would be to live with uncertainty and, yes, perhaps poverty, for the rest of their lives. I have no lieutenants.
“You will die in the poorhouse, John,” Early said.
I will die in the poorhouse. And where did all my men die? I have lost count of all the places. In fields, in woods, in creeks, in muddy trenches.
“You will never be offered something like this again,” Early said. “This is it.”
I will never have my leg again, and yet I still walk. I have some blessings still. Those men, my men, they do not even walk now. They are lost.
“You are a prominent man, there is no shame in taking patronage,” Early said.
I was their patron, and they died. I am owed nothing. I owe much.
“John?”
I stood up and faced Early and smiled grimly. I got my cane set, and put my hat on my head.
“Thank you, Jubal, but my answer is no. Will you tell Mr. Dauphin?”
Early nodded his head and seemed relieved.
“I knew you would say that, John,” Early said. “Not everything has changed, thank God. You’re a bloody fool, but you’re our bloody fool.”
Outside, I felt the last warming moments of the sun on my face, before the shadows swallowed the rest of the street. When my carriage lined up for me, I pulled myself in and took time settling in. This may be one of the last times I get to ride like this. Donkeys after this.
I was elated. My life stretched out ahead of me, dark and perilous, but not yet over.
“To the poorhouse,” I told the driver.
CHAPTER 22
Eli Griffin
But that was not how I remembered it, and sitting there in that kitchen with Rintrah crying over his lost brother the priest, and then later riding out into Terrebonne Parish to do whatever the hell it was I was going to do with Sebastien Lemerle, this is how I remembered that day at the lottery.