“And that,” I asked, “is why I have been sent here? Because these forty Negroes have been murdered?”
The truth is that their tale chilled me deep in the belly, for I know more of massacres than I like. Careful I was to keep my voice restrained, though, for great folk do not need our small emotions.
Both men looked up, and both began to speak. Then Sherman paused and let Grant take the lead.
“No,” Grant said. He sat enshrouded by tobacco fumes. “Not exactly. You must have been well on your way when they killed this batch.” He glanced at Sherman, briefly locking eyes. “The first two massacres go back about a month.”
“LEW WALLACE’S SLOWPOKES found the first bunch,” Sherman said. His lungs did seem a bother to him. “Maybe a dozen of them, all males that time. We didn’t think much of it. That was well north of here, the army was still moving. Few weeks later, we turned up nineteen or twenty more. Hard to tell exactly how many, the way they were cut to pieces. That was just downriver. My boys found that pack, too.” He grimaced, with a glance at his superior. “That’s when General Halleck was contacted. He passed the matter along to Washington. Isn’t that right, Grant?” His withering eyes cut back to me. “Every time we find another massacre, it’s bigger. Somebody’s waving a bloody rag in our faces. And God only knows what it’s about.”
Oh, yes, I thought of India again. And of a hundred things that I had seen, only to wish I had not. The Mutiny had begun with brown barbarity. It ended with the white man worse than a savage. It is a dreadful thing for a man to say of himself, but I believe I was less shocked than either of the generals.
Less shocked I was, but likely more alarmed. By selfish fears. I had no wish to see my past revived beyond the sorry business of the battle.
“Perhaps,” I said, “the Confederates are killing runaway slaves they catch as they retreat? As vengeance for their losses? It would not be the first time men misplaced their senses in a war, see.”
“Nonsense,” Sherman said. “That’s the damned thing. I’ve lived with the men of the South. Served with them. Taught their sons. Oh, they can be sonsofbitches, and stiff-necked bastards, all right. But this doesn’t make sense.” He carved his mouth into a bitter smile and scraped his throat clear. “They’ll hang a nigger now and then. To set an example. But they’d no more butcher ’em wholesale than they’d shoot their farm animals. The African’s valuable property. And forty of ’em that last time. Figure the money involved. Say, the fifteen men at eight hundred to a thousand dollars a head, maybe an average price of six or seven hundred for the women . . . of course, prices are down with the war . . .”
Grant put in, “It may be the work of Southron renegades. The cracker sort, low breds. They’re good haters. And they don’t much like a black hide.” He looked at the man with one less star on his shoulder boards. “General Sherman’s been dealing with the gentry of the Southland. My experience has been a little farther down the pole.”
I was befuddled. “By your leave, sir. It sounds a pitiful matter, but I do not see my role in this. Not if it is a Confederate affair. Although I find our Union’s concern for these Negroes admirable . . .”
Sherman laughed out loud, though Grant did not.
“Oh, we’re concerned,” Sherman said, once his mirth and coughing subsided. “We’re concerned to hell and high water.”
“You understand,” Grant interjected, “that all this is told to you in trust, Major.”
“The hell now,” Sherman drove on, “I’m no friend of the institution of slavery. Understand that, Major. It’s filthy and foolish, and you can’t refine it. Corrupts good men. I’ve seen it. But this business isn’t about these runaway slaves.”
Twas thus I went from befuddled to bewildered.
“Look here, Jones,” Grant said. “This war’s bad enough. And we’re still a sight from finishing it. Hard enough to do, even without more abolitionist howling. Myself, I’d be glad to do away with slavery, if all I had to do was clap my hands. But even my own wife has other sentiments. And this war is not being waged to free the Negro. We’re fighting to preserve the Union. Slavery can wither on its own. It can’t endure in a modern age. But that’s not our business. First, bind up the country. Then see what comes.”
He rustled his fingers over his beard again, hands uneasy in between cigars. “If the men and boys of this army thought they were down here fighting to free the black man, half of them would desert tomorrow and call the war one big swindle. Other half might be glad of it, but we can’t fight with fifty percent. As it is, we’re flooded with runaway darkies looking for protection. Blocking up the roads, stealing provisions. Clinging to the army like leeches. And they’re still private property under the law and have to be treated as such.”
Grant fit a new cigar between his teeth and did not wait to light it, but sucked so hard the wind whistled through his teeth. “As it is, I’ve got officers and men hiding runaways until they can smuggle them north. Others are only too glad to round up every Negro in sight and turn them over to anybody who shows up with a pair of shackles. Even claiming reward money, some of them. Make it the official policy of our government to offer protection to escaped slaves, and military operations would grind to a halt.” He glanced at his subordinate. “Isn’t that right, Cump?”
“First win the war,” Sherman said. “Then worry about the Negro.”
“We’ve kept these . . . occurrences . . . quiet,” Grant went on, “though it’s getting harder. Can’t have something like this splashed across every newspaper in the North. The abolition crowd would get the upper hand back East, and the administration could be pushed into declaring against slavery. Then we’d lose half the states between the Ohio and the Missouri. Maybe all of them. The sentiment for war wouldn’t hold together. Just ask Sherman’s brother up in Congress. This country is not ready to fight on behalf of the Negro.” He grunted. “It may never be.”
“The killings have to be stopped,” Sherman said in a January voice. “Before the newspapermen find out about them.” He made a face as if served a rat on a plate. “I’d hang the ink-stained bastards, if I could. I’d rather see them strung up than some poor niggers.”
Grant stirred the papers on the desk, but could not find the item that he sought. He muttered and shook his head, then lifted his pale eyes. “I sent a note through the lines to General Johnston. Over a week ago now.” A shadow swept across Grant’s face. “I suspect he had other things on his mind, if he even received it. Died on the field, the first day, if the prisoners are telling it right. Good soldier. Now he’s gone. In any case, I haven’t had a reply from him, or from his successor. Who, I believe, would be General Beauregard. Unless Bragg supersedes him.”
“If Southron renegades are behind this,” Sherman said, “it’s in the Confederacy’s own interests to stop them. Protect their property. Their reputations. They’ve got to see that.”
“Indeed,” I said, for I had been thinking, “there is the property issue. But there is a greater thing they must put to themselves, see. They will not want their image tarnished abroad. With their efforts to draw England into the war beside them. The Anti-Slavery Society in Britain would make much of such doings, were tales of Negro massacres to appear. Richmond would lose the sympathy of all Europe.”
Grant and Sherman stared at one another. Surprised, they were. Twas clear they had not thought so far as foreign repercussions. But those were diplomatic matters, the stuff of Washington intrigues and plots up in New York and icy Canada, as I had learned through not a little pain. These men were fighters on the war’s frontier and could not bother their heads with distant niceties.
“Damn it, that’s a point that’ll stick,” Sherman said. “If I know Beauregard. Rather be a European himself, that puffball.”
I trust I did not show it to the generals, but I was vexed. I wanted no part of massacres, no matter their cause or consequence. But we must do our part when we are called, and speak what we think is true when speech is wanted.
The man who flees his duty has no worth. We must have faith and push through, even though we might well wish us elsewhere.
Grant sat back and sighed as men will do when they must summarize. “For all we know, it could be runaways killing each other. Plenty of them on the loose, and I suspect some of them are savage enough and crazy enough to do anything. But if I had to bet, I’d put my money on some sort of backwater white no-goods. They hate the Negro with a passion. Saw it in Missouri, where the feelings don’t run half as strong as here. Thing is, it’s got to be stopped. Whoever’s doing it. The guilty parties must be identified and punished. But quietly.” He looked to where I sat in amber shadows. “It appears Washington understands that.”
“Whoever did it has to hang,” Sherman said. “Even if they’re white. Give ’em a hard lesson. But keep it out of sight.”
“It’s difficult enough,” Grant said, “not to start hating your enemy. After such battles. Incidents like these . . . give those prone to hatred more excuse.”
“The South has to be punished for this war,” Sherman added with a hack. “But within reason. We have to remain soldiers, and not become vandals. Can’t stoke the abolitionist fire. It’s just waiting to burn out of control as it is. Too much hatred, and the breach with the South won’t close for a hundred years.”
Grant stood up and limped the little way to the window. Holding his still-unlit cigar, he stared into the day.
“Jones,” he said, standing in a lovely flush of sun and speaking to the distance, “I want you to contact the Confederates. In person. As my emissary, provided with a safe conduct. And I want you on your way before General Halleck arrives.” He turned his shoulders, then shifted his injured leg so he might face me. The sunlight drew his outline. “He’s a brilliant man, General Halleck. Perhaps the greatest soldier of our age. But he’s cautious, and I’m not sure we have much time. I want you to go immediately. I’ll take the licking, if there’s one to be served.”
I noted Sherman made no comment on General Halleck. But then he come of a political family, according to those newspapers he hated. Such men do not antagonize the great. Now, you will say, “We read in those same papers that Sherman acted the madman the autumn before. And you say he was temperate, Abel Jones?” But I will tell you: Madness is like courage, taking a different course in every man. And madness is a measure of the times.
“I will not have the war lost because a couple dozen runaway slaves got themselves hung,” Grant said suddenly and firmly. As if he needed to justify his actions to an invisible presence. Then he mused for a moment, uncomfortable with the need to say so much. Softening his voice, he drew on that wry smile. “You’re not to let the Rebels know that, of course. Present them with the business as a crime, and a shameful one. Play that England card you talked about. That’s a hard, black ace.” He stepped toward me then, despite my stench. “Find the guilty, Jones, whatever it takes. And clear the way for us to win this war.”
NOW, I WAS STILL NEW to detection matters, with but two affairs behind me. Unless you count that time in India when Molloy made off with the regimental silver. Yet, I had got a brace of lessons solid, and knew where to begin, if not where to finish. I was not fully master of my heart, but I kept my wits about me.
I looked at Grant, then Sherman, and back again. “Well, sir, I am ready. Though I would not mind a wash and a change of uniform.”
“Rawlins can see to that,” Grant said, and seemed about to summon the man.
But I pressed on. “And before I go to parlay with the Rebels, I would see things done in proper order.”
“How’s that?” Sherman asked, ever impatient. His bandaged hand had come up.
“I would see the spot where these murders happened,” I said. “For there is no place to begin like the beginning.”
Sherman regarded me with failing confidence. “The first murders must’ve been sixty miles north of here. Fifty, anyway. You’d lose days.”
“There is sorry I am,” I said. “I was not clear in my words, sir. The place where last you found them was my meaning. The site of this killing of forty. That may do.”
But Sherman was a stubborn fellow, sure that he was right. “There’s nothing there, man. I had them buried.” Then a shocked look dressed his bone-hard face. “You . . . don’t mean to dig them up? Good God . . .”
“No need of such doings, sir. Not yet, at least. But I would see the place and do things proper.”
“And just what good would that do?” Excited, his lungs took a wracking.
Grant set his words between ours. For he knew when to set a business straight. “Cump, get him out there and let him have his look. We know our business. If Washington sent him all the way down here, he probably knows his.”
Sherman came around instantly. Not as a dog to his master’s command, but as a man who trusts another’s judgement. A loyal man, no lackey. He nodded. “I’ll have Lott and his pack take him out. They know their way, and aren’t like to forget it. The way Lott carries on about freeing the niggers.”
He turned to me. “That’s Micah Lott,” he said, with a twist of the lips. “Calls himself ‘Captain Lott,’ though I’ve never seen the commission. Odd bird. Bible banger. Too damned radical to have any man-to-man sense. But he knows his scouting business. Has a dozen or so men who ride with him. Most of them from these parts, Union loyalists. Abolitionists with fire in their bellies and too much preaching between the ears. They’re the ones found the last bunch of niggers.”
He shifted his attention back to Grant. “They can take him south from there. Cut over to the Corinth road. Give him a white flag to carry so the Rebels can see him coming. Lott will know how far to take him and when to turn him loose.”
“All right?” Grant asked me. “We’ll get you out to the site of the killings, then on the way to Beauregard or whoever’s in charge down there now. Without getting you shot, I trust.” A trace of wit crossed his lips. “I do worry that the Confederate pickets might be a little edgy after the events of the last few days. I hope we won’t need to trouble Washington for a replacement for you, Major.”
I let him have his joke, for truth be told, I read it as a mark of confidence and not of fear. Grant had a lovely sense of humor that few saw, although I only got to know it later.
Sherman stood up, clipping his chair with a spur and shifting the phlegm in his lungs. “I’ll be off then, Grant. Round up Lott and his pack. God knows where they are at the moment.” He shook his head and wheezed. “Don’t I wish that we had one regiment of decent cavalry?”
“I’ll send the major along. As soon as his papers are drafted. And once we have him scrubbed sufficiently clean for the delicate nostrils of our Southron friends. Send Rawlins in, would you, Cump?”
Sherman picked up his hat, waved his bandaged hand in a half salute, and was gone.
Grant looked at me and shook his head again. He did seem worn. “Been a soldier, haven’t you, Jones? I mean a real one.”
“I have served under the colors, sir.”
“British army?”
“Indian service, sir.”
An odd light touched Grant’s eyes. Rendering them luminous as a cat’s.
“If I may ask, sir,” I said, “how did you know? That I had served?”
I thought he would make mention of my bearing, for I am vain enough to keep my rigor.
“The handle of your pistol,” he told me. “And the holster, for that matter. You’re filthy as a river rat. But your weapon’s clean as a silver dinner fork. Only a man who’s fought would give his first attention to his arms that way.” He stepped toward me, curiosity quick in those eyes. “Have a look at that cannon of yours?”
I drew my Colt and passed it to him, though reluctantly. I am ever embarrassed by the inscription my Pottsville boys put on it in farewell. Siney the Jeweler’s son did the work and did it lovely, fine with filigree. I wept to hear of his death at Seven Pines. But the loss was yet to come, so let that bide.
Grant turned
the pistol over in his hands. “Captain Abel Jones,” he read aloud, “Hero of Bull Run.”
“It is a terrible exaggeration, sir. I only did my duty, and that poorly.”
“Well, somebody thought it made sense.” He handed the revolver back to me by the barrel.
“I saw General Sherman at Bull Run,” I said, to turn the subject. “He was a colonel then. His brigade formed up in square as it withdrew.”
Grant laughed, though not imprudently. “Well, that’d be just like old Cump. Should’ve mentioned it to him. Got a rise out of him. Say ‘Bull Run’ around him and he gets wild as a mad skunk.” He passed a hand across his beard, measuring his smile. But he kept his eyes upon me, pale and steady. “You must’ve been in the thick of things down at the landing, too. You smell worse than my father’s tan-yard—and I always thought nothing could stink worse than that.”
At this odd recollection, his eyes lost their confidence. His gaze turned vague and lowered to the floor. An ancient, wounded look possessed his features.
“Your father was a tanner, sir?” I asked him. Only because it seemed I should say something. I have no skill in social repartee. My words come even slower than my thoughts when most I need them. It is a hard fate for a Welshman, for talk is our cakes and ale.
Grant nodded. “I never could abide the tanning business. Blood and death, and nothing but. Anything but that, I told myself. Still can’t stand the sight of beef, unless it’s black as cinders.”
“I have worked in a tannery myself, sir,” I said, for want of greater wisdom. “As a boy, see. A dreadful place it was.” Oh, I remembered. The day the Reverend Mr. Griffiths sent me packing from his doors and all that I held dear, an orphan set to an apprenticeship amid the hides and bristles, the blood and stench and cauldrons. How I loved my little bit of schooling and wept to leave my books and Mr. Hughes. And worse to leave my shining Mary Myfanwy. But let that bide.
Of a sudden, Grant stepped closer, almost the way a friend will when sharing a confidence. “Your father a tanner, too?”
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