by John Jakes
“You’re looking well, Captain.”
“Considering all the action I’ve seen since last year, I feel remarkably fit. I was informed that you were one of our few casualties. A guerrilla ball caught you, did it not?”
“Yes, sir. The night we landed. The wound wasn’t serious.”
“That’s good news.” Bent’s sly expression said just the opposite. “Well, Lieutenant, I’m confident we shall encounter each other again. When we do, perhaps we can reminisce about our days at West Point.”
Captain Place’s brows drew together in a frown. He could sense the tension. But Orry was the only one who understood Bent’s remark. His spine tightened with apprehension as Bent waddled away, his hand self-consciously placed on the Phrygian helmet pommel of his sword. He was just as fat as ever, and just as poisonous.
“You knew that bastard at the Academy?” Place asked.
Orry nodded. “He was in the class ahead of me. Have you served with him?”
“Never, thank God. But everyone’s heard of Captain Bent of the Third Infantry. His regimental commander, Colonel Hitchcock, makes no secret of his contempt for him. He says Bent’s afflicted with uncontrollable ambition and is determined to climb upward—on a ladder of bodies, if necessary. Be thankful you no longer have any involvement with him.”
But I do, Orry thought as they walked on.
Perry’s cannon proved too much for the defenders of Vera Cruz. On March 29, under surrender terms arranged with General Scott’s staff, the Mexican garrison struck its colors and marched out through the Merced Gate. Moments later, while American batteries on shore and on shipboard thundered in salute, the Stars and Stripes rose on every flagstaff in the city.
The victory had cost fewer than a hundred American lives. George and Orry were shocked to learn that, back home, politicians and a certain segment of the public were unhappy that casualties had been so light. “They calculate the importance of the victory by the size of the butcher’s bill” was the way George put it. “And then they wonder why nobody wants to stay in the Army.”
Scott was pleased with the progress of the war. The surrender at Vera Cruz came on top of Taylor’s stunning February triumph at Buena Vista. Scott once again reorganized the army for a march on the capital.
On April 8 Twiggs’s division started inland. Patterson’s division followed the next day. General Worth’s men were awaiting orders to move forward in support when word came that Santa Anna, once again elevated to the presidency, had taken a position at Jalapa, on the National Road to Mexico City. On April 11 and 12 units from Twiggs’s command clashed with enemy scouts and lancers. Outside Vera Cruz the drums and bugles summoned Worth’s command for a forced march to join Twiggs at the village of Plan, del Rio.
During the early hours of the march, heat felled dozens of men at the roadside. Close to fainting himself, Orry risked the censure of his superiors by dropping back and propping up a stumbling soldier who had the makings of a fine noncom if the climate, disease, a Mexican ball, or homesickness for Brooklyn didn’t overcome him first. After twenty minutes the soldier was able to walk by himself again.
By dusk, four men in Orry’s platoon were sick with diarrhea. So were scores of others in the column. The ditches along the road stank and swarmed with green flies. But dysentery wasn’t the only malady to be feared. For weeks officers had worried aloud about the coming yellow-fever season. Outbreaks of the disease decimated the low-lying seacoast every year. Scott had wanted to move his men into the highlands before the season began, and the alarm from Twiggs had enabled him to do it. When a corporal complained about marching so far so fast—the distance was slightly less than sixty miles—Orry was quick to say, “As soon as we reach General Twiggs, you’ll be a lot better off.”
“Better off dodging greaser musket balls? Begin’ the lieutenant’s pardon, I don’t believe that.”
“But it’s true. You’re much less likely to be felled by a ball than by the vómito.”
Over the cook fire that night, Orry noticed that the smoke was climbing into clear, haze-free air. Cooler air. They were already above the coastal plain whose sometimes pestilential climate reminded him of home. He pointed out the change to the corporal, but the man remained unconvinced.
Sergeant Flicker arrived. He reported the sentinels posted according to Orry’s orders. He squatted by the fire, took out a piece of biscuit, and began picking weevils from it. He observed that the odds now favored a major engagement with the Mexicans; things had been quiet for too long. Then he said:
“By the way, sir. I never had a chance to ask you ’fore this. Did you get close to any of them senioritas in Vera Cruz?”
Orry was astonished at the noncom’s cheek. Flicker probably figured his length of service gave him certain privileges when dealing with officers. “No, Sergeant,” he answered. “I have a girl back home.” It was a convenient if painful lie.
“Oh. “ Flicker’s expression said he didn’t understand why one thing excluded the other. “Mighty accommodating, some of them ladies. ’Course, I had the bad luck to visit one of their establishments the night a captain from the Third foot got rough with the girl he’d paid for. She screamed bloody hell, and the head whore almost closed the place.”
“The Third, you say? What was the captain’s name?”
“Bent.”
Quietly: “I’ve heard of him.”
“Sure, who hasn’t? Butcher Bent, his men call him. It was a scandal what he did in Monterrey.”
“I didn’t hear about that.”
“You passed through the town last fall, didn’t you? Then I ’spect you remember the layout of the fortifications on the east side. The Black Fort on the main approach an’ the redoubt named for a tannery a little ways on? Bent was in Garland’s column, it headed in past the Black Fort. The fire was pretty fierce. When the column turned, fire from the redoubt damn near blew away the left flank. The men started runnin’, figuring to take cover in the streets close by. But those streets wasn’t safe either. A greaser pistol or rifle was blazin’ away from ever’ window and garden gate, seemed like. Things went crazy for a couple of minutes. The only way out was to move to the next streets, where there wasn’t so many of the varmints hidin’. That would get Bent an’ all the rest out from under the worst of the fire from the forts, too. But Butcher Bent didn’t care about savin’ anybody. He decided to be a hero and knock out the tannery redoubt. He sent a platoon to storm it.”
“Did they take it?”
“’Course not. It was impossible. Bent lost more’n half the platoon. Afterwards, I heard they found at least two men with bullet holes in their backs.”
“You mean they got shot running away from the redoubt?”
“They got shot runnin’ away from Captain Bent.”
“Godamighty. Why doesn’t someone report him?”
“He kisses a lot of backsides, Lieutenant. And some of the idiots in charge of this here army don’t give a goddamn about the way a man gets results, just so long as he gets ’em. They do say Bent’s got a passel of friends in Washington, too.”
Orry could have verified that but he didn’t.
“Nobody knows for certain that he shot those men,” Flicker went on. “I mean nobody can prove it. I did hear Bent’s threatened to court-martial anybody who raises questions about that little operation. That says somethin’ to you, don’t it?”
Orry nodded. “So his men aren’t talking about him?”
“Damn right they aren’t. They’re too scared. God knows how many he’ll send to their deaths before they catch him—or he gets ’lected President, which is prob’ly more likely. Jesus, can’t they find us some decent food?” He leaned forward and spat a wiggling weevil into the flames.
Later, Orry located George’s company at the roadside. Orry reported what Sergeant Flicker had told him.
“I believe every word,” George said. Carefully, he placed a stone on a thin sheet of paper on which he had been writing in pencil. There were e
ight or ten sheets beneath the partially filled one. Another letter to Texas, Orry presumed.
“I’ll tell you this, Stick,” George continued. “If the good Lord ever turns against me and arranges for me to be transferred to Bent’s command, I think I’ll kill myself before reporting for duty. By the way—I just learned that in our batteries at Vera Cruz there were some pieces cast at Cold Spring.” And he was off into the enthusiasms of the ironmaster.
Orry had trouble sleeping that night. He was bothered by memories of Flicker’s story, and of Bent’s eyes.
The evening before Cerro Gordo, George drank a third of a bottle of Mexican wine smuggled in by his company commander, an Academy graduate named Eños Hoctor. George didn’t like Captain Hoctor very much. He was too serious, too prone to worry aloud—and at length—over West Point’s reputation.
George didn’t share Hoctor’s concern about the Academy, but he was happy to share his wine. He would have invited Orry to join them, but his friend said he wanted to spend some time rereading Scott’s Infantry Tactics. Poor Orry, yearning for his first taste of battle. If George never heard an enemy ball whistling by his ear, he’d be perfectly happy.
To continue the march to Mexico City, the Americans had to clear away the enemy fortifications at Cerro Gordo on the National Road. On Telegrafo, a fortified peak some five to six hundred feet high, Mexican batteries were trained on the ravine through which the road ran in a westerly direction from the American camp at Plan del Rio to Cerro Gordo.
Enemy guns were also in place on a second hill, Atalaya. But Captain Robert Lee of the engineers had discovered a mule trail leading around the northern flank to this hill and had reportedly distinguished himself for bravery doing it. Earlier today—it was the seventeenth of April—American sharpshooters had slipped along the trail and in three hot charges had cleared Atalaya. Cannon were now being moved into position to rake Telegrafo.
When the main engagement commenced tomorrow, Twiggs’s division had the task of driving through the hills above the highway and outflanking the Mexican defenses. Worth’s division, which included George and Orry, had been rushed forward, then held on the National Road in case Twiggs needed reinforcement. In George’s view, Orry faced disappointment once again; the division might see no action at all.
After drinking Hoctor’s wine, George went to sleep without difficulty. He was up long before sunrise, when an artillery duel commenced. Smoke and a red glow were all he could see from the place where he and his men awaited orders. Then over the ridges came the crackle of gunfire, and drumming and bugle calls, and an occasional protracted cry of pain. George’s men stopped their whispering and exchanged silent looks.
George had long ago given up hope of knowing much about the strategy of any battle in which he took part. He was just a lieutenant of the line, a small cog in an immense machine. Besides, all that really mattered to him was doing his job and surviving. Orry was different. He was fascinated by strategy because that was the stock-in-trade of a career officer. George could see his friend farther up the line with his platoon, and he hoped Orry was able to grasp something of the grand plan of the day. It might compensate him for missing combat yet again.
The battle lasted a little more than three hours. At half past nine, drums thudded and bugles blared close at hand, and the men of Worth’s division began making the usual nervous jokes as they prepared to march. Their mission, as it turned out, was to rush along the National Road for ten miles, pursuing the beaten Mexican army. Santa Anna had sworn publicly that he would triumph at Cerro Gordo or die. But the Napoleon of the West had often put survival above promises. When defeat loomed, George learned later, Santa Anna had cut a horse from his presidential coach and galloped away into the chaparral.
Corpses already bloating in the sunshine lay along both sides of the National Road. Most were Mexicans, but there were a few American dragoons among them. The stench of dead flesh and emptied intestines made George so sick that he finally vomited in a ditch. He wondered what Orry thought about the glories of war now.
Other debris of the Mexican retreat—dead horses, overturned artillery caissons—littered the approach to the pass of La Joya. Two miles this side of the pass, musketry suddenly exploded from the rocky slope above the north side of the road.
“Take cover!” George shouted, drawing pistol and saber. The command was superfluous; his men were diving to the right and left. All but two went fast enough to avoid bullets.
Crouching below the road, George saw one of the two still moving. He squinted at the white puffs of smoke erupting on the hillside. He swallowed twice, then started climbing up the sloped side of the ditch.
“Get back, Lieutenant,” Captain Hoctor shouted from the left. But George was already halfway to the wounded corporal, whom he lifted and carried back to the side of the road while balls from the hillside peppered the ground around him.
He lowered the wounded man into the ditch and jumped after him. An American artillery piece opened up on the hidden snipers. After three rounds of grape, there was no more firing, just cries and moans.
“You exposed yourself needlessly,” Hoctor growled at George as litter bearers took the wounded man away. “Your duty is to your men.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” George retorted. “I believed I was carrying out my duty.”
Unfeeling son of a bitch, he thought. He doesn’t care about that soldier—or that I was scared out of my wits. If West Point was graduating many like Hoctor, it deserved the criticism it received.
That night George commandeered a horse and rode back to the field hospital to check on the corporal. The boy was in good spirits and would recover. On the cot next to his lay a red-bearded sergeant whose midsection was wrapped with brown-spotted bandages. That meant an intestinal or stomach wound, the worst kind. Listening to the man complain to an orderly, George heard Bent’s name.
“Excuse me, soldier. Are you talking about Captain Elkanah Bent?”
Instantly wary, the noncom replied in a weak whisper, “Pal of yours, sir?”
“Just the opposite. I despise the bastard.”
The sergeant scratched his beard. Surprise and suspicion kept him silent a moment or so. Finally he decided it was safe to continue the conversation about another officer:
“How do you know Butcher Bent?”
“We were at West Point together. I saw him damn near kill half a dozen plebes. What were you saying about him? Is he dead?”
“No such luck. Bent cost me the best platoon leader I ever had. He sent Lieutenant Cummins up Telegrafo against a redoubt that a brigade couldn’t have taken. Of course Bent stayed to the rear, well protected, just like always. A stray shell from our guns on Atalaya blew the lieutenant and his detail to pieces, and a lot of Mexicans with it. So the Butcher, he led the rest of us up through the smoke and ordered us to spend ten minutes sabering greasers. Dead ones.”
“Jesus,” George breathed. He could almost see Bent’s round, waxy face during the incident; he was sure the captain had been smiling.
In the lamplight, fiery pinpricks showed in the wounded man’s eyes. “What was left of Cummins they put in a canvas bag. But you know who’ll get the decoration.”
“Tell me, Sergeant. If Cummins knew the attack was foolhardy—”
“’Course he knew. We all did.”
“My point is, did he question the order?”
“No. ’Twasn’t his place to do that.”
“Did anyone question it?”
“The platoon sergeant. He’s—he was a crusty old coot. Twenty-year man. Not too impressed by officers—’specially ones from the Academy.” A cough; a belated realization. “No offense intended, sir.”
“None taken. Go on.”
“The sergeant, he spoke right out. He said that sending men against the redoubt was practically murder.”
“How did Bent react?”
“He put Sarge in the detail too.”
“And still Cummins said nothing?”
; “Because he was a good officer! And I ’spose he didn’t care to wind up with one of Bent’s bullets in his back. At Monterrey—”
“Yes, I heard about Monterrey. Seems to me that if Bent keeps doing things like this, he may get shot himself. By his own men.”
Weak as the sergeant’s voice was, it had a cold edge when he said, “Not if I get him first.”
“Get him? How?”
“The minute I’m on my feet again, I’m goin’ to divisional staff and tell the whole story. If there’s any justice in this goddamn army, they’ll put Butcher Bent on trial and cashier him.”
“You mean you’re going to charge Bent with a definite act of wrongdoing?”
“I’m sure—” The sergeant coughed a second time; it clearly hurt him a great deal. “Sure as hell going to try.”
“But if you’re the only one making accusations—”
“I’ll get nowhere, that what you mean?” George nodded. “Well, it won’t be me alone. I got witnesses from the platoon. Half a dozen, maybe more.”
“Are all of them willing to testify?”
“They’ve all been here, and that’s what they told me.”
“Any officers in the group?”
“No, sir.”
“Too bad. It would add weight to your charges.” Only after George said it did he notice the intensity that had come into the sergeant’s gaze.
“Yes, it would, sir. Will you help? Will you testify to what you know about Bent? I gather you think he’s a bad lot.”
“I do, but—”
“He’s got to be punished. He’s got to be stopped. Help me, sir. Please.”
George drew a deep breath. He was almost surprised when he heard his own response:
“All right, I’ll do what I can.”
Later that night he found Orry with his platoon. He took him aside and described the conversation with the red-bearded sergeant whose name he had learned at the close of the meeting: Lennard Arnesen.
When George finished, Orry shook his head. George bristled. “Don’t you believe Arnesen’s story?”
“Certainly I believe it. But I have trouble believing you’d involve yourself in something like this.”