“So there’s Ensign Bowater, fresh from the Navy School, looks clean and proper, like a little sailor doll you’d buy for your daughter. He’s in command of this little paddle wheeler ’cause her proper captain’s assigned to the battery ashore. They figured that was the real work, let the green-horn take the barges back and forth.
“We’re bringin our barges on and off the beach, ain’t no thing. Made the last run of the day, sun’s goin down. We got about five miles to steam back to the fleet. They was anchored around that island the Mex call Sacrificios.
“Halfway there, and one of them Mex northers come rippin through. You ever experience anythin like that?”
Taylor nodded. “I know about them northers.”
Tanner nodded as well. “Then you know, they come right outta nowhere, come tearin down like a bull gone mad. Right in the middle of that big bay, and a norther come down on us, just as it was getting dark. First ya feel that blast of cold air, then the wind starts fillin in. Next thing we know we takin green water over the sides, fillin faster than we can bail. Seas gettin bigger and bigger, and mind, them barges warn’t nothin in a seaway in the gentlest of times. Rain’s comin down, lightnin flashin around, and ol’ Ensign Bowater jest drivin that little schooner for all she’s worth, right for the fleet.
“But a mile from the fleet and I start thinkin, ‘Damn, we may live through this after all.’ Then, sure as hell, the hawser parts, right at our bow. We was the last barge in the line, see? So away we go, twirlin around downwind, jest like a leaf in a damn stream. Last I seen of the schooner and Ensign Bowater, he’s jest steamin along still. I don’t reckon he even knew we was gone. And I jest shake my head, don’t even bother to cuss him out, on account of I didn’t reckon we could expect much more, and him a boy right outta school.
“For about an hour we bailed like hell and some prayed and some was cussin and finally we hit the surf, due south of where we lost the tow. It was full night by then-dark comes quick when you got one of them northers-and we didn’t know we was on the beach till the barge grounds out. Two good hits and it breaks all to hell and all us sailors on board, there was about twenty of us, we all in the water.
“’Bout fifteen of us managed to get ashore, the rest drowned, or was beat to death by the surf. Some of us managed to snatch up rifles and even some cartridge boxes and we kept ’em dry, and that was a good thing. See, the Americans was nearly surrounding Veracruz, but surrounding the Americans was all these gangs of Mex irregular cavalry, and guerrillas and any damn Mex got his hands on a gun and reckoned he’d kill and rob him an American soldier.
“So we didn’t know what in hell we was going to do, but we set up some kinda defense, there on the beach, ready to fight off whatever Mex comes at us. Didn’t take too damned long, either. We’d drifted way south of the American lines, right in Mex territory, and them guerrillas come on, just like sharks. Didn’t know they was there till we hear rifles and one of our boys jest falls dead.
“You got to understand, it was dark as hell. Couldn’t see a thing. And most of our powder was wet, and us sailor boys, we ain’t so good at loading and firing in the rain, not like them infantry sumbitches. We figured we was done for, and it was only a matter of time. I seen that first one go down, and I figured that was it. Never reckoned to get it on no damned Mexican beach.
“Then, right out of nowhere, we hear a steam engine! Steam engine, there on that beach, and we don’t know what the hell it was. Then there’s a flash of lightning, and there’s the paddle-wheel schooner, with them barges still behind, but they’re empty now, and backing down into the surf. I never thought no one would come for us. Twenty sailors? On a night like that? Didn’t reckon anyone would think it was worth it. Then I reckoned someone musta relieved Bowater of his command, ’cause I sure as hell didn’t think that toy sailor’d do it on his own.”
Taylor took a last gulp of whiskey, refilled his glass and Tanner’s. “And?”
“And I was wrong. Once Bowater realized our barge was gone, he called for volunteers amongst the other barge crews to go after us. Happy to say they all volunteered. Then Bowater, he jest let the paddle wheeler drift downwind and current, reckoned he’d fetch up where we did. Damned stupid thing to do, but he didn’t know no better. Then he sees our gunfire. Drops anchor, backs the paddle wheeler down on the beach until the last of them barges is right in the surf. He had ’em tied together, see, to form sort of a bridge. All we had to do was climb over ’em.”
“So that’s how he saved your sorry ass?”
“Nope. Problem was, those Mex had us under fire. We tried to go back across the beach, they would have come out and slaughtered us. So after a while, Bowater figures this out. Next thing we know, here he comes, leadin the barge crews, with whatever weapons they got, climbin over them barges and into the surf, and right up to where we was hidin. The Mex is firin at us, and we firin at the Mex and some of those poor bastards is getting shot down. But we held ’em. All night, in the damned rain and the wind, we held ’em off.
“First light we starts movin toward the barges. We had half a dozen of the fellows was United States Marines, and they was the only ones knew how to cover a retreat, like. So they organized the thing, and we backed off down the beach, got on them barges, and all the while we can see the Mex gettin closer, firin the whole time, and we’s nearly out of ammunition.
“’Course, as cap’n of the steamer, Bowater’s duty is to get on board her, get her ready to get underway.”
“That what he done?”
“Nope. He wouldn’t get off that damned beach until all of us was. Stupid bastard, and I told him so, but he wouldn’t go. Me and him, we was the last ones off that beach. See here…” Tanner bent over, pulled up his right pant leg. The lantern light shone on the smooth, hard skin of a scar that wrapped itself halfway around his calf.
“That was a Mex bullet I took just as we was gettin in the barge. Warn’t nothin would kill me, but I sure as hell wouldn’t have got off that beach if Bowater wasn’t there to help. None of us would. He never asked for permission to do what he done, just done it.”
Taylor nodded. “Very impressive. It must have been a tearful reunion, you two, up there at Norfolk, all huggin and carryin on about old times. Be enough to make a body puke.”
Tanner shook his head. “Bowater don’t remember me, and that’s how I keep it. I seen him on and off, over the years. Then when I seen him in Norfolk, and fightin for the South, then I said, ‘Wherever that sumbitch is goin, that’s where I want to go.’ That’s when I finagled my way on board, here.”
“All right. So Bowater saved your flea-bitten hide oncet. That’s got nothin to do with me.”
“No, it don’t. All’s I’m sayin is this. You think Cap’n Bowater’s a fancy, upper-crust sumbitch, got a broomstick up his ass, and I ain’t saying he don’t. But the man’s got grit, you hear? Kinda grit it took to come get us off that beach, that ain’t somethin a man loses. It’s somethin you born with. You seen him go after the fleet back there at Hampton Roads, seen him march right through them shells at Fort Hatteras. You may not like him, but he’s a man deserves respect. That’s all I gots to say.”
Taylor was silent, chewed on his cigar. “All right. You done said it.”
Tanner picked up the whiskey bottle, examined it, drained the last vestiges of whiskey. “Good night, Chief,” he said.
“Good night.”
Tanner opened the galley door. The wind whipped in, made the hanging pots clang against each other like bells on a buoy. Then he stepped out, closed the door, and it was quiet again.
Taylor remained sitting, looking at the door. Tanner was a good man. He had respect for a man like Tanner.
Well, goddamn… he thought. This sure as hell complicates things.
32
…I care not what they say of me there so long as it is evident here that I am trying my best to get ready to strike the enemies of my country and of mankind. That I will hit them hard when ready, if pos
sible, I promise you.
– Lieutenant Isaac N. Brown, C.S. Navy
For the second time in his life, Jonathan Paine woke up to find himself staring up at Bobby’s face. He shifted his eyes. The ceiling behind Bobby was not the ceiling of the sitting room at Miss Tompkins’s. Jonathan remained still, looked back at Bobby.
“Where am I?” he asked in a soft voice. He was afraid.
“You in de Mechanics’ Institute. You done fainted.”
“How long have I been out?”
“Not more’n five minutes.”
Jonathan nodded. Five minutes? It felt as if he had been unconscious for hours. He could feel the sweat on his forehead. He felt disconnected, as if he was viewing the world through field glasses. “I think the fever’s back,” he whispered.
“Sure enough. We gonna git you back to Miss Tompkins, jest as soon as we can.”
“I need to write. To my father…”
“Oh, you gots a father now? Lord, don’t the army provide a power o’ things! This mornin you didn’t have no father at all.”
There was a bustle in the room and Jonathan opened his eyes and two men laid a litter on the floor beside him. They picked him up, feet and shoulders, and shifted him onto the litter and lifted him up. His head spun around. His breath was coming shallow and fast. They carried him out of the War Department building, laid him on the back of the buckboard at Bobby’s instruction.
The fever took hold on the jostling, bumping, agonizing ride back, and it did not relinquish its grip for two more days. And when Jonathan finally kicked his way up from the delirium and the sweats and the nightmare images, Bobby was there, and once again the black man was the only real thing in his world.
The fever broke at last, and Bobby helped him sit up in bed and he said, “Missuh Jon’tin, you wants to write to you daddy?”
Jonathan nodded.
He wanted to write. He had to. He had no remaining brother. He was it, the last of the Paine boys, and his parents would have no idea what had happened there at the Bull Run River. He had to tell them, in his own way. It was no longer a matter of wanting to go home. He had to. Now.
Bobby went away, returned with paper and pen and the Bible on which to write.
Dear Mother and Father,
When I wrote before, I was not aware of the tragic death of Robley Junior at the Battle of Manassas. As you grieve for the loss of your sons, so I too grieve for the loss of my brothers.
My last letter, written from this place, must have been something of a mystery to you. I will not relate the particulars here of the great sacrifice that Nathaniel and Robley Junior made on the field of battle, but rather will tell you all that I know when we are once again together. I am at Miss Sally Tompkins’s on Main St. in Richmond, Virginia. I am wounded with the loss of a leg but have recovered, and long for nothing more than to return home. If you will have me, I beg you send some money to this place, enough for me to pay my passage home. Until then, I will dream every day of being reunited with you, my loving parents, and will remain
Your obedient, humble son,
Jonathan
Jonathan folded the latter, sealed and addressed it, handed it to Bobby.
“I don’ know what you wrote, Missuh Jon’tin, but it sure seems to a done you a power a good!”
“I wrote to my daddy. Reckon you never thought to hear me say this, but it looks like I’m going home.”
Bobby smiled and Jonathan smiled. Home. The word did not mock him now. It sounded in his ear the way the word was supposed to sound, evoked those things that home should mean. He felt something he had not felt since that first bullet slammed into Nathaniel, sent him spinning down to the ground. He did not know at first what it was. It was only later that he realized. It was hope.
Bobby took the letter, carried it to the post office, paid for the postage. For three weeks the letter made its tortured way south, by rail, by steamboat, by coach, until at last the postmaster at Yazoo City plucked it from a pile on a big oak table, read the address, and shook his head. He carried it over to the pigeonhole marked 26, which was Paine’s box, and with some difficulty made a space in the mail already accumulated there and stuffed the letter in.
And there it remained. Because Robley Paine was not around to retrieve his mail, and would not have retrieved it anyway, even if he had been there. Because Robley Paine did not believe that there was any person from whom he wished to hear. Robley Paine had given up on this world, abandoned everything except his fight against the Yankees and his hope of heaven, and there was nothing that could come through the mail that he might care about.
At the very moment that the postmaster was forcing Jonathan Paine’s letter in among the demands from creditors, the letters to Katherine Paine from sundry relations, the reports from agents in New Orleans and England, Robley Paine, Sr., was tapping his fingers with frustration on the top of the big wooden wheel of the Yazoo River.
After shelling Pope’s ships, they had returned to New Orleans, heroes all. Kinney, his hand bound in a bloody rag, conned the boat up to the wharf at the foot of Beinville Street. The deckhands made the vessel off to the pilings and bollards, Engineer Brown shut the engines down, and then they all deserted, en masse, the entire crew, marching off the battered stern-wheeler into the cheering crowd and were never heard from again.
Frenzy time. Robley was all over the docks, looking for more men, more guns, more munitions, another chance to drive the Yazoo River into combat.
He found nothing. Kinney and Brown were well known along the waterfront, knew everyone, knew everyone who knew everyone. They spread the word about Robley, and it wasn’t good. Madman. Lunatic.
Kinney might even have brought Paine up on charges for blowing his fingers off, had he not been guilty of what could be construed as mutiny. As it stood, he was lauded as a great and wounded veteran of what the New Orleans Daily True Delta was calling “a complete success, and perhaps the most brilliant and remarkable naval exploit on record.” So Kinney contented himself with modest acceptance of the praise due him, and silence regarding the particulars.
Robley Paine came in for his share of the praise, but he wanted none of it. He wanted nothing but a competent crew to man his vessel and help him drive it into harm’s way, and that was the one thing he could not find.
He appeared one morning at the offices of Daniel Lessard, was greeted with a certain deference there, a reception almost like fear.
When the clerk hurried off to alert Lessard, Robley glanced at himself in a decorative mirror. Not an encouraging sight. He had not shaved in a week, could not recall the last time he had eaten. His eyes stared out from dark hollows, the stubble on his cheeks was drawn in tight where his face was pinched. His clothes were dirty and stained and torn in places. Over it all he wore a cape. He no longer bothered to hide the Starr hanging from his belt.
I have got to clean myself up…got to do something… But for all of the wild energy he directed at manning and outfitting his ship, he could not manage even the slightest interest in himself.
“Robley, sir, come in, come in, it has been far too long!” Lessard’s voice was smooth as river stones but he could not hide the quick, appraising glance up and down, the uneasy smile he hoped would look genuine.
“Good day, Daniel.” Robley let Lessard lead him into his office, shut the door, which Robley did not recall him doing before. He gestured for Robley to sit and sat himself behind his desk.
“Your fame has spread, sir. Your bold action at the Head of the Passes, and your attack on the Union ships down below Pilot Town…they have made you quite famous.”
“Humph. It was a start, a weak effort. Damned Hollins did us no favors, claiming to have sunk one of the Yankees. Should have. Didn’t.” Hollins, on seeing the Yankees abandoning one of their ships, had assumed her sunk, and reported her so. It detracted from their accomplishment when it was ultimately discovered that the ship was not sunk at all.
“Still, it was a singular victory. Th
e papers…”
“See here, Daniel…I’m not blind. Or deaf. I know what’s being said. ‘Paine’s mad…trying to kill himself…’”
Lessard raised his hands to protest, but Robley cut him off. “Don’t deny it…I know it’s true. You think I’m mad as well, I can see it in your damned eyes. And you know what? I don’t give a goddamn. Hell, maybe I am mad. Got reason enough. But I can’t get anyone to ship with me. Damn engine is broken down again, I can’t get an engineer on, I can’t engage a pilot. I’m stuck here. Got an armed ship and can’t get in the fight and all the while the damned snake, squeezing tighter, squeezing…”
“Well, Robley, it is not you. It’s the war. All the available men are off with the army or the navy. Everyone is scrambling to find…”
“Here’s what I need. I don’t want to get men to fight the ship. Never find ’em. Need navy men. I see that. What I want now is an engineer to get the engines working, a pilot and crew to get the ship up to Yazoo City.”
Robley’s voice took on a plaintive tone, and he tried to fight it but he could not. He felt so lost there in New Orleans, surrounded by cowards and thieves. Yazoo City was becoming his personal El Dorado, a fabled city, his quest-to reach it. If he could get to Yazoo City, free from the corruption of New Orleans, then he could regroup and fight in earnest.
“That’s all I want. To get to Yazoo City. No fighting. Just help me get to Yazoo City, where folks know me, and I’ll get my men and fit my ship out there. I’ll pay in specie. Gold.”
Lessard leaned back and pressed his fingers together and his expression was very different. “Robley…that, I think, I can arrange.”
The engineer showed up at nine-thirty the next morning, and he was no Chief Brown. Clean and groomed, well-spoken, he had an air of competence and professionalism that made Robley furious. The good men were available to take gold for keeping out of harm’s way, it seemed. But Robley said nothing, because the goal was Yazoo City, and he did not wish to compromise that.
Glory In The Name Page 34