XXIV
The relationship between himself and Seneca MacBean worked to the immediate benefit of Nathan Dreyfoos and those close to him, but also it was a grain of reassurance for the rawboned printer from Galena. A strength like the strength Nathan had to offer (and would retain in considerable degree if he followed the direction of a more seasoned man) was another stud in the bludgeon which Seneca MacBean planned to fashion for wielding at some future date. Nathan had manual dexterity—Sen was not surprised when he heard that Dreyfoos could play the fiddle—and as a barber he was a success promptly, although at first he worked too slowly to make much profit. . . . Food, MacBean urged him, that was the thing. Try to get food first of all. Rice, barley, root vegetables, bones, salt: a stew was the thing. He knew; he lived mainly on stews, and he was keeping his grip. If a man couldn’t pay in food, try for some article which you might barter for food. Nathan Dreyfoos was a willing pupil in the grim curriculum of stockade erudition, and he emerged with other talents peculiar to himself.
For example, Sen smiled when he noticed the hook-nosed sergeant’s activity during periods when there were no customers for haircuts. He would look up from his scrubbing and wringing, to see Nathan toying with one of the tent poles he had bought. The pole was of hickory—light, smooth, tough, springy. Seriously with his penknife Dreyfoos was working one end of the pole into a short sharp point. Well, Seneca thought, he’ll learn in time. Learn that it doesn’t pay a man to twiddle himself by mere whittling—not in here. Too many other things to do: assemble firewood, swap, build a fire, cook, keep the vermin down. He was bitterly amused further when he saw Nathan toasting the sharpened end of the pole over a fire. What’s he doing—pretending he’s got a sausage on a stick at a pic-nic?
Not long afterward two of the worst characters in camp sauntered near—a pair of sailors named Bill Rickson and Al Munn. Close behind drifted a group of six or eight, the inevitable pack of hyenas.
Hi, Sergeant. Come here. We’d like to talk swap.
Don’t move, said Seneca in a low voice. They carry brass knucks.
But Dreyfoos was advancing on the sailors, the slim tent pole similar to a cane in his hand.
Like to swap them scissors off of you. Now, I got a gold watch that—
A club came out of a pant-leg, another out of a sleeve. Blows were aimed and delivered on empty space. Munn bellowed and clapped his hand to his side where his sailor’s blouse was ripped and his flesh torn. Rickson bored forward silently, wheeling his club; then he stopped, then he began to give ground. That pointed pole was everywhere, threatening his belly, jabbing at his throat, whipping right, left, up, down, in, out. It raked his hairy arm, the club flew. Munn circled, crouching, arms swinging wide, to take Nathan in the rear, but Seneca MacBean was there by that time, doubling his fists.
Oh, come out of it, Billy. Munn moved away, not looking back, examining his skinned side as he went.
The valiant cohorts had already disappeared, and people were crawling out of the shade of their shebangs to observe. Two or three rocks flew. One very nearly struck Nathan instead of striking the man for whom it was intended. The silent Rickson, now without a club, joined Munn in retreat. He stopped to rip a post from a shebang which he passed, tried its strength in his arms, the post snapped like a candy stick.
Hell, Billy, come along with you.
They went away; folks gazed wide-eyed. Usually an encounter with raiders ended in a manner different from this.
Nathan Dreyfoos stood watching the sailors as they pushed their way down the slope. Will they come back?
Not in daylight. It’d pay to be on the lookout at night; they might try to cut your throat for revenge. Sen MacBean slapped Nathan heartily on the buttock. To think I thought you were frittering your time in idle whittling. Always whittle from yourself and then you’ll never cut yourself. What you call that thing—a spear?
Only a pointed stick.
How you handled it.
Well, you see, Seneca, I began the study of fencing when I was eleven.
Ever fight in the prize ring?
Never. But I have experience in boxing.
Dreyfoos, it’ll take time but— Let’s get back to work. I’ve got a pair of dirty pants half washed, and the owner has naught to hide his nakedness until I dry them. Now I think you’ll get more customers to your barbering. Why? Because they’ll feel safe from the raiders, merely being near you. By gum. MacBean brayed with one of his nasal peals of laughter. You handled that weapon (he called it wee-pon) like I’d handle a line gauge.
Nathan Dreyfoos messed apart from Sen MacBean and slept apart from him as well. He felt his obligation to the boys of the Eighty-fifth, though some of them were intractable, many would not be buoyed up . . . they had a fierce mistaken notion that their discipline ended with their imprisonment, and they only snarled at Nathan and others who attempted to set them to rights. But most daytime hours were passed at the combination laundry and barber shop. It grew to be a center of community interest, a meeting place and gossip mart. Nathan wore his knapsack to work each day, and carried off to his own shebang such articles as he had acquired for pay during the day. His ration of corn pone he broke up and put into the eternal stews. Every two or three days he had to spend some hours on shopping tours, bargaining his way along Main Street or to the sutler’s shack, trading off rawhide shoe-laces or shirt buttons or tobacco for vegetables, sometimes even for meat. At times he went calmly to South Street, which was definitely raider territory, but always he carried his homemade spear. He was attacked once more in daylight; after that the raiders looked the other way. The thought of night did not worry Nathan Dreyfoos severely. Ten of them slept in a wide shebang made of their coats and blankets, and it was a rule that at least five must remain at home at all times, day or night, armed with knives, spoon daggers and clubs. Sarsfield’s Raiders made an attack there one afternoon; the five housekeepers fought savagely until others of their regiment could lend a hand. Sarsfield got only one poncho for his pains, and it was announced that one of his men had been stabbed in the belly by Private Allen, the boy who had burst into tears the morning he landed in the stockade (it was rumored that the man died later as a result, but perhaps that was but a rumor).
Way I look at it, said Seneca MacBean. Oh, there’s heroisms and heroisms, but more than heroism is going to be necessary to clean up this mess. It’s like you’ve said and like I’ve thought: concerted action.
Often I do not understand you, Sen. Your speech . . . you speak much of the time with the—forgive me—rural dialect of so many Americans. You employ army slang and colloquial words. The average boy in my company would not use words like concerted. Or overture.
Seneca studied this. Well, my father was a schoolmaster but he died before I was born. My formal education was poorly come by. But I’m a printer, and my grandfather was a printer before me. Printers get to know language. We’re faced with words, editorial-wise and otherwise, which we mightn’t face were we mechanics. . . . No, Brother Nathan, to proceed as I was going: concerted action is the only answer. Discipline, organization. I’ve friends who feel the same way, and one of them is a better organizer than I could be. That’s Key, from the Sixteenth Cavalry—fellow who was just in here awhile ago, fetching this old blue shirt. He’s also a Sucker, from Bloomington. Big courageous-looking man, isn’t he? I warrant you he’ll be courageous too, if the time ever comes. And take that fellow who looks like a red Indian—comes from the Sixty-seventh Illinois Infantry—you cut his hair a-yesterday—
They call him Limber Jim.
Limber Jim—that’s he. And Ned Carrigan from Chicago. And Johnny McElroy—he’s little but he’s determined. They’ll all fight, and fight well, but it means organization and thought and planning. It means a campaign to be mapped out, and troops to be selected and raised and mustered.
Nathan Dreyfoos gave his slow wide smile. It seems that you people are rel
ying chiefly on your fellow Illinoisans. Can this be partisanship?
No, exploded MacBean sharply. And then . . . after a pause . . . well, could be. Now, take you. You’re Eighty-fifth New York, but mighty un–New Yorkish. I suppose your life abroad has given you a kind of universalness.
Universality.
Thankee. Where’s my sand bucket? Ah . . . trouble is, we ought to rely on Westerners. I’m one, I understand them, they understand me. Most of your New Yorkers—saving the raiders—and Pennsylvanians— They stick by themselves. Even the New Jersey boys tend to cleave together, and dog bite the man on the outside. Did you ever see anything like the way Massachusetts folks hang tight? And so with most of New England. Now, Michiganders are something like them—but I’d say humanized. Westernized New Englanders? Is that what you’d call them? They talk much the same way. Say I be instead of I am. But they’re more awake, more Western.
Nathan Dreyfoos felt a lack and ignorance. This is my country. I was born in it; Corley and Stevenson taught me that I must attempt to live for it and die for it. Yet I know so little about it. He said, It must be like the difference between Catalonians and Madrilenos and Andalucians.
I don’t know any of them, but it’s doubtless the same. Take the people from Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas—some of the Minnesotans—there aren’t too many—and some of the Missourians too. Cut off the same bolt of goods. Sometimes you’d think that if one studied McGuffey they all studied McGuffey. If one studied Ray’s Arithmetic they all studied Ray’s Arithmetic. They think—
MacBean hunted for the word. They respond alike, he said.
—If we need police, and we do need police—
—I’m not condemning Easterners solely because they’re from the East. A lot of Easterners could help, and a lot of them probably will help us out, if we get started—
—I’ve talked with Limber Jim, and Key, and you. Haven’t talked to the others, but Key’s been sizing everybody up. In due time—
—There’s dire need of police right now. But Jerusalem wasn’t built in a day.
Rome.
Thankee, Brother Nathan. Rome.
The friendship grew like a seedling in a frame under glass under strong sun; it might have been manured by the manure of Andersonville, which was everywhere. The metaphor occurred to both men, separately and singly (it was inescapable) but neither would have defamed the friendship by citing it.
It was an attraction and trust of opposites, a mutual reliance on men identical in faith and sanity. The straitened horizon of Galena and Chicago and the few other towns where Seneca MacBean’s fingers had streaked from upper case to lower case— It stretched to include the picturesque cities where he had never walked and probably never would walk. The young man who’d had no roots to let down into the soil of his birth found himself anchored increasingly, attached by invisible tentacles to loam of the Middle West which he had never trodden or dug or scented.
MacBean had had no confidant in his life, except his grandmother, his grandfather, and one young woman whom he’d adored in Chicago a year or two before the war. (She was frail, her heart hurt her. Her mother worked on occasion, part time, folding printed sheets in the shop where Seneca slugged the galleys. Generously and thoughtfully the elder woman invited the lonely young man to Sunday tea in rooms which she and her daughter Phoebe occupied. After that he was there each evening, and in time contributed to their support. There came a cold sleety morning when a little boy pounded on Sen MacBean’s door at his lodging house and presented a note which read Dear Friend Seneca. Can you come to me at once. Phoebe has died in her sleep.)
Sen became garrulous at times, talked of his ambitions in civil life, said that he’d like nothing better than to be the editor of a small town newspaper. . . . Bet you I’d raise the fur along their spines. Always something which needs correction in any town: sidewalks, sewage, corrupt officials, or maybe a new railroad or canal. A newspaper editor never need look far for a stone on which to grind his axe. . . .
How did he come to join the cavalry?
That was an oddment. It began when he was a little boy, dragging those willow baskets of washings along the even east-and-west streets of Galena or—much worse—up and down the nearly vertical north-and-south streets of Galena. There was an older boy named Clovis Tibbetts and he had a black pony with a red saddle. The sight of this pony drove Seneca into fits of jealousy, quiet spasms of envy. In solitary imaginings he owned not a pony but a horse; the horse was as high as a house, and not merely black but black and white; the red saddle was crusted with gems on the saddle-bow. (I guess, said Seneca, that the stirrups were solid gold.) But this was mere wishful illusion: no creature except a rat ever dwelt in the MacBean stable during Sen’s boyhood, no nervous fairy hoofs twinkled along the driveway. (I didn’t want to be Clovis Tibbetts, he said. I just wanted a pony—or a horse—as good as his or better’n his.) Acutely he recalled one hot afternoon when he was lonely, he had nothing to do, he had no work to do, no one to play with; his grandfather snored in a stupor; his grandmother was ironing clothes. Gran, he said, I wish—
What do you wish, lad?
Wish (he whispered it) I had a pony.
What would you do with a pony, laddie?
I’d ride it.
She said brightly that she would prepare a pony for him. He must remain inside the house, he must not peep out until she gave the word. He waited, his throat dry, his breath coming fast; he hid himself in a closet so that he might not be tempted to disobey her command. When at last she chirruped from the lawn outside he came dashing. . . . What magic was here? She had said that she would fix a pony for him. Did she know a neighbor from whom a pony might be borrowed? Had she—? It was a pain and jabbing but— Had she borrowed Clovis Tibbetts’ pony?
The woman had done her best. She had rolled a cask from the woodshed—a decrepit wooden barrel which had been salvaged from somewhere and was to serve as kindling. On this cask she had folded a makeshift saddle made from a shawl, and she had attached reins of faded ribbon. Now, lad, she said, bestride your pony, and ride far far away. Ride to the ends of the earth. . . . Sen nodded, he thanked Gran in a murmur, he waited until she was gone back to her work, and then reluctantly he climbed astride the barrel. It did not look like a horse, it did not smell as a horse smelled, it was a miserable makeshift, it did not feel between his legs as a horse must feel.
And damn, he said. Soon I looked up—might have heard a noise out in front, along Bench Street—and there he was. Riding past. Clovis Tibbetts on his pony. Red saddle and all. Right then was when I joined the cavalry.
Ah, yes. I understand. I have never been poor—I might be a wiser man had I been poor. But I understand.
Never rode a horse until I was grown, except— Oh, once in a while, bareback to water, on somebody’s farm. But I had the notion.
I know. Anyone who’s had dreams would know.
Then I was working away off, hell to yonder, when they fired on Fort Sumter. The paper I worked for was edited by a man who hated Abolitionists, and he declared that only Abolitionists were rattling the sword. Maybe I had absorbed some of his teachings—you know, putting his notions into type. He had a fine style with words, somewhat like Thomas Carlyle. And equally opinionated! So it took me a while to make up my mind.
...Funny what this prison life does to a body, Brother Nathan. I never told anyone about that heretofore, except one lady. But this awful place makes a man talk at times. And dream.
Nathan said, A man escapes in his dreams. I go far, even though I have not been here long.
Well, I can guess what you mean. Paris, Rome, England—all those lands where you’ve been. But take care you don’t go too far. Man can’t live sole alone on dreams.
I shan’t go too far.
Not far enough to lose those qualities of leadership. They’ll be needed. You’ll be needed.
No
, I shall not go too far.
Seneca MacBean said that he had a hero who demonstrated qualities of leadership. . . . Perhaps from the time his young fingers first plucked type Sen MacBean had been possessed of a desire to tell his own story in his own way. Between the ens and ems of his occupation had risen the legendary skill of the campfire yarn-spinner, the cracker-barrel raconteur. He loved a good story for the story’s own sake, and told stories well; but when his own emotion or experience was involved he could rise to a simple dramatic height. He chewed the words with wide jaws, there was slyness in his eyes as he talked, he seemed meditating between sentences; yet the pauses were urgent in their very silence. Any listener would wait with eager ears and soul, his attention would not wander until the nasal Western voice carried along the narrative and made it march and shine in the telling.
So Sen had a hero. At home they called the man Cap, because one time he had been a captain in the army. He was not at all the embattled swordsman of antiquity, like the Gillies MacBean described by Seneca’s grandfather. John MacBean said that forever any youth should be proud to wear the name of MacBean; the youth had only to think of Gillies. Gillies MacBean stood alone in some old Highland war, to guard a breach through which the enemy must advance. He fought until he became a martial saint; at last he was killed; the dead lay piled. Gillies MacBean was the subject of a lament which the wrinkled Scottish printer could recall only in part: And each day the eyes of thy young son before, shall the plaid be unfolded, unsheathed the claymore.
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