Call Each River Jordan

by Ralph Peters (as Owen Parry)

  “Well, I was set to be made. Molloy is trouble.”

  Mick stood up and crossed his arms, with his Irish stubborns upon him. I thumbed out my braces till my trousers rode up and deviled me. Like two great roosters facing off we were.

  “Oh, for pity’s sake . . . is that your great Christian charity speaking, then? Is that all there is to your redemptions and mercies and promises of forgiveness? Are there to be no second chances, then, not even in America?” Mick conjured up a sound like a dog provoked. “And you have the gall to mock Socialism . . .”

  “Molloy is trouble. He always has been trouble. And he always will be trouble.”

  Mick made a scolding face at me, as if I had delayed his revolution. “And didn’t he save your life in India? Oh, didn’t you get the brag up over that, bucko? And didn’t you tell me, all puffed up and proud, how Molloy went running off to New York when you needed help with your ghosts and goblins? ‘Leaving a prospering business behind him,’ you said. ‘A true friend.’ And now listen to you.”

  “The business was a low saloon. And there is friendship and friendship. Annie Fitzgerald is a good girl, who deserves a decent, God-fearing husband, even if he is to be a Catholic. Molloy is trouble, I tell you.”

  “But he did save your life. Did he not?” Hard Mick bore down. “And doesn’t every man deserve a chance? Just tell me that. Doesn’t every last man deserve a chance?”

  I shuffled and rustled and growled and grumped. For the truth is I was shamed by Mick’s remonstrance.

  Look you. I saw that he was right. At least on the matter of chances. Twas only that he called my Welsh pride to account, see. I am a man who thinks he knows what’s best. It is a fault of mine that wants a humbling. I was given to picturing Jimmy Molloy as the thief he had been when he stole the regiment’s silver, and not as the man he might yet make of himself. Unworthy of my friends I was, and still less of our Savior, who saw more in a thief than Abel Jones.

  I am too hard. I know it. And cold hearts are a curse upon this earth. Jimmy Molloy had come a mighty progress. And if he still had far to go, the same thing might be said of someone else.

  “Well, he’ll bear watching,” I muttered, for my meanness would not go down in a single gulp. “And if he pains the girl, I’ll teach him manners.”

  Mick laughed to wake Kate. The Irish know a fool when they behold one.

  DEAR MRS. SCHUTZENGEL had written to tell me I was invited to the nuptials as a guest of honor, if I could but arrange my coming by. Of course, I had judged it a trick of Molloy’s to lull me until he had his wicked way. And now I had to wonder if the fellow might not hold me in affection.

  I do not understand why people like me, though glad of it I am, as you would be.

  And Mick just stood there grinning, as if he could see through me like a window. What was the difference between Molloy and me? Oh, I had rigor. But Molloy had heart. I always had to give the fellow that, though his morals were never the best. Loyal he ever was, and brave as Mr. Shakespeare’s noble Harry. Kind to women and children, and always merry. Nonetheless, I hoped Mrs. Schutzengel had not lent the fellow money.

  Mick took the letter I had written to my Mary Myfanwy. Unsealed. For the Rebels must examine it for secrets. Thus I had to temper what I wrote. With my heart longing to pour out of the pen. Oh, wouldn’t I have stuffed myself inside the very envelope to have a moment’s look in my love’s eyes?

  I told her I was well and not to worry. And that she must be careful to make dresses only for respectable ladies, to insist upon deposits, and to keep strict accounts. I suggested she read aloud from the Gospels to little John. For though he might not understand a great deal, there is many a grown man who understands no more than a child.

  And then we said goodbye. I was properly dressed, so I allowed myself a brief embrace of good old Mick. Nothing vulgar or low, you understand.

  That rogue elephant Barnaby come swelling and swaying and rolling across the yard toward us, derby on his head and a great floppy slop of a hat in his hands for me. He bore a lacquered cane with a brass ball, too.

  “Don’t be a bigger fool than you can help,” Mick told me. “For the likes of you are ever in short supply.” He turned away most sharply then, and got on his horse and rode off. A patrol waited in the street to escort him northward. He touched at his eye as he went. Twas dust, most like.

  “Smack of a morning, ain’t it?” Barnaby asked, shielding me from the light with his mighty figure. “Are we all right, sir? Are we all right? Well, here’s a handsome stick, in case you’re wanting of one, and a topper to keep a gent’s brains from off the boil. Finest quality. Feel the nap, sir. And the proper color for the summer season.”

  He thrust his cargo upon me, then reared back. As if he needed distance to get a clear look at a fellow.

  “Are we all right, then, sir? Oh, you won’t weep when you see the breakfast beefsteaks in the pan. Fit for a lord, by the sniff of them, fit for a very lord. Almost helped meself, though it ain’t mannerly. Oh, there’s nothing like a beefsteak in the morning, I always says, sir. Me governor would’ve et nothing else, if you let him, and he lived to be fifty. You’ll be fine, sir. A proper beefsteak puts a fellow right.”

  I ANGERED BARNABY’S MASTER. We sat at table, lacking the general’s presence, for he had sparred with the Madeira the night before. Officers came and went, eating with vigor. Lieutenant Raines was the only one who put down his knife and fork between bites.

  The young fellow asked me how we would begin. I waited until we were alone, then told him.

  “That’s impossible, sir,” he declared. He did not speak with Beauregard’s bluster, but in a tone that covered steel with velvet.

  “And why is it impossible, Lieutenant?”

  “It’s just impossible. And . . . unseemly.”

  “Is it now? And why would that be?”

  “Billy—Captain Barclay—does not receive, sir. He has withdrawn from society.”

  “Well, I am not society, young man. You may be. But I am not. And we must go to this plantation of his.”

  It was plain that his eating was done. He stared at me, eyes a queer mix of anger and something akin to fear. An egg, unstaunched, bled gold over his plate.

  “What earthly good would it do to bother Billy Barclay? Lord knows, he’s suffered enough.”

  “I know he has had a terrible injury. But the Negroes were his property, were they not? The murdered Negroes?”

  “Billy wouldn’t know anything about their murders.” He paled. “Sir . . . you’re not suggesting . . .”

  I finished chewing a crust I had spread with preserves. “I do not suggest anything, Lieutenant Raines. It is too early for suggestions. First we must learn a few things.”

  “What could you possibly learn at Shady Grove?”

  “We must wait and see. Look you. I have been to the scene of the murders. And little enough I found. So now we must go backward. To where and when these slaves were yet alive. It is how the thing is done. We will not bother your Captain Barclay a moment longer than necessary.”

  In the distance, church bells rang. I wondered who would go.

  “Billy won’t see you.” The young man’s eyes were brown and big as a milkmaid’s. “He won’t see anybody.”

  “But will he not want to know who killed the Negroes?” I asked. “As they were his property?”

  Raines turned toward the curtains and showed his profile. Light poured over a sideboard and flecked the china. The bells pealed on, and I wished that I were elsewhere.

  “I don’t know what he wants,” the young man said. Moodily. “Nobody does. But he’s suffered. More than any man should. He wants to be let alone, I do know that. That wish should be respected.”

  I finished a great wet rasher of bacon. The notion of a beefsteak in the morning is extravagant. No Methodist would succumb to such indulgence. Bacon will do for an early-rising Christian.

  “Many will suffer,” I said. “For that is war. And I will no
t insult your Captain Barclay, or annoy him beyond what is required. But visit him we will. To see what we may learn. Unless you wish to complain to General Beauregard?”

  He sat full proud before me. Containing all the rage of youth at elders who will not see. If he lived ten years, he would be master of himself, revealing only what he chose to show the world. But he was young, and still unlearned in falsity.

  “You will excuse me, sir,” he said, folding his serviette. “I must look to my horse.”

  Well, I thought, best get it over now.

  “A moment, please. Sit you down yet, Lieutenant.”

  He had begun to rise, but lowered himself again. He did not put the cloth back on his lap.

  “Yesterday,” I began, “I was not master of my situation. I had no choice but to overhear the words that passed between you and Captain Wylie after the race. Think you what you will, but I must ask you: Am I to understand a woman was involved in this affair? A woman among the slain, I mean. For whom one of you may have . . . harbored an affection?”

  “I know nothing about a woman,” he said quickly. “And you are immodest, sir.” I had been wrong. His eyes had already begun to learn the knack of lying. “You will excuse me.”

  “Sit you down, Lieutenant. And listen. I am as fond of good manners as any man. For they save us many a hurt. But this is not a matter of society. It is about murder. About many murders. Forty, I am told. And your general has sanctioned this investigation. If you cannot support it, say so now. I will ask him to find another officer to accompany me. And the next time you lie to me”—how he winced at those words—“our relationship will end. I am sent to find the murderers of those Negroes, and that is what I will do, if do it I can. If such matters are beneath you, get you gone. Otherwise, we are going to this Shady Grove of Captain Barclay’s.”

  “You don’t understand,” he said. In a weakened voice. The bells had stopped and the world fell burial still.

  “That may be so. But I will do my best to correct the situation. And if you are the gentleman I think you are, you will help me. For crime unpunished dirties us all. Off to your stables now. And when we ride away, we will leave this talk behind us.”

  He rose. Jarred by my bluntness. His Northern schooling had not prepared him for everything. He wanted to answer me, but hesitated between the possibilities jumbling in his mind.

  His lips began to form a word, but I did not want him to say anything rash.

  “We have had talk enough for now,” I told him. “Go you and think on what I have said. For we must pull together. Or the doings are senseless.”

  Out he went with a grace few men possess, lifting his sword belt from the corner and sweeping it around his waist. Twas an odd business, see. I sensed he wanted to visit this Captain Barclay far more than I did, but had to be forced to the doing of it. That wanted consideration.

  I sat alone, drinking an odd-tasting beverage that may or may not have been coffee, when Barnaby rumbled in.

  “Sampled the beefsteak, sir? Lovely, ain’t it?”

  “Mr. Barnaby, if you please . . . what exactly am I drinking?”

  He bent his bulk down and took himself a sniff. “Chicory, sir. A New Orleans speciality. The coffee bean’s gone rare, it has. With the blockade, sir. But we makes do.” He lowered his eyes. I could not tell if the fellow was downcast in spirits or if he was eyeing the breakfast leavings. “Begging your pardon, sir?”

  “Yes?”

  “I couldn’t help overhearing your words, sir. Them what passed between you and Master Francis.” The big fellow seemed profoundly discomfited. I was surprised. He had struck me as the sort born to an aplomb even the gallows would not disturb.

  “And?”

  “He’s right, sir. Right as sugar in your tea.”

  “About what, Mr. Barnaby?”

  The fellow’s gaze dropped lower still. For the first time, his belly seemed to sag. Doleful eyes peered down his mighty nose.

  “How as you don’t understand of the matter, sir. It’s all terrible complicated between Master William and Master Francis. He ain’t disagreeable, Master Francis ain’t, but it’s all terrible complicated. And that’s what Barnaby B. Barnaby has to say, sir, and mum’s the word hereafter.”

  He cleared his throat with the bark of a great polar animal. “Begging your pardon again, sir. But if you was to help yourself to another of them beefsteaks and leave it on your plate, sir . . . seeing as no one’s about, sir, I might help meself to it all legitimate like.”

  I forked a slab of meat onto my plate.

  “Oh, Barnaby’s in your debt, sir,” he cried. “Barnaby’s in your debt! ‘He’s a proper gent,’ I said to meself, the moment I laid me eyes on you, sir. Dirty drawers and Welshman notwithstanding.”

  As I left the room, I saw him provision his coat pocket with the beefsteak. Then he grasped a fistful of bacon to stuff on top of it.

  After the performance of a few necessities and the collection of my documents from the general’s clerk, we mounted our horses and rode through the busying day. I wished there were time for chapel, but there was not, and there’s a pity.

  The black pranced under Raines. Though plagued by flies as ever, Rascal seemed in gentle Sunday spirits. I kept my wits about me, though. And I pitied the poor creature upon whose saddle Barnaby enthroned himself. I do believe the horse’s back sank by inches when the fellow got up.

  As we left the town, the wounded men still lay in the rail yard.

  FRANCIS DRAKE RAINES had the gentleman’s art of restraint. While even gentlemen may have a temper and speak unguardedly in the heat of the moment, they do not let their anger rule their days. We had not ridden far when it became clear that my escort had accepted his situation. Indeed, now that the matter was resolved he seemed more anxious than me to reach our destination. His horse danced out in front.

  Twas a handsome April morning, and Raines called, “This weather’s more like it. That run of heat was out of season. Hard enough to get the planting in, with the men gone to the army.” He pulled up his horse to wait for me and peered across a spread of greening fields.

  “But don’t the Negroes do most of the work?” I asked. Bobbing along on my backside. If you will excuse my bluntness.

  He reined in close to me. The brim of my new hat flounced up and down, hiding his face from my eyes then revealing it again.

  “On the plantations. Or the better farms. This is poor-white country, by and large. Man with even a handful of Negroes counts himself rich.” A blue bird sailed across our path. “Lot of the acreage up here is cut for one man and a mule. Barely able to feed a family. There’s tenantry, as well. It’s a hard life.” With a shake of the head, he continued, “You’ll find good enough land in the bottoms. But the up-country doesn’t give much return.” He scanned the horizon. Fields, groves, low ridges. “Fair hunting, though.”

  Barnaby rode some lengths behind us, heedless of the dust, chewing his bacon.

  We passed a country church, with tethered mules and buggies sparse in the yard. A sturdy voice complained of slack devotion, loud enough for passersby to hear. The road entered a stretch of forest and air fresh as rainwater chilled my skin. The horses slowed to drink where a stream snaked across our path. Raines let the animals ease their thirst, but not too much. Soon, he clucked at the black, and Rascal followed. Barnaby still lagged us on his bay.

  “I had imagined the South otherwise,” I said to pass the time. “I thought there would be houses grand as palaces. And fine plantations.”

  “Plenty of those, Major. Maybe not palaces. But fine enough houses.” He thought for a moment. “Houses men dreamed into existence. Dreams in brick and painted boards. Down our way in Natchez. And on along the river toward Baton Rouge. Things run a good bit smaller up here.”

  “So I am not like to see any of these plantation mansions?”

  “Oh, you’ll see a few two-story houses. Nothing to be ashamed of. But the people up here aren’t house-proud, as a rule. Most any
roof will do.” He thought for a moment. Judging what he might say. “You’ll see half of a great house, though. A little more than half.”

  “And how is that, sir? The consequence of a fire?”

  He laughed. The sound was small and dark, unlike him. “No. At least not the kind of fire you mean. I’m talking about Shady Grove. Billy’s—Captain Barclay’s—place. Would’ve been the grandest house north of the Big Black, had it been built to a finish.”

  “Financial difficulties?” I asked. “If that is not too indiscreet a question?”

  Raines looked straight ahead. Into the depths of the forest. I felt the sudden change in him. He already had said more than he intended. Telling himself I had tricked him, he would blame me for his fault. That is how men are, see. Even the best of them.

  “He was building it for his wife,” Raines said in a flattened voice. “She is no longer with us.”

  He get-upped his horse and let it run ahead. The woods we passed through next smelled of decay.

  SUNDAY THOUGH IT WAS, some worked their fields. Women, boys and mules, and slow-paced Negroes. Furrows ran askew by dreary cabins. Roofs and porches sagged. Arms as thin as spokes clutched broken fence slats, as silent children watched us ride along. The few Negroes abroad quickened their labors when they spotted us, and their glances measured our progress. Twas as if man and nature had agreed to a truce that suited neither party. It was a world let go. Or never grasped.

  Even when the sun could climb no higher, the day remained pleasant. Barnaby kicked his martyred mount up beside us.

  “Master Francis,” he said, “begging your pardon, sir. But ain’t the master hungry? A journey do work up an appetite.”

  “Next cabin, Mr. B.” A sullen trace remained in the young man’s voice.

  But when we reached the next dwelling, I assumed my escort would continue past, for it appeared to be the residence of Negroes. Pickaninnies, as I believe they are called, yipped about the yard in carefree levity, and everywhere I looked disorder ruled. A goat, disdainful, wandered between the children, eyeing mismatched curtains blown out a window frame. Broken chairs sat on a broken porch. Just behind the shanty, a woman of imposing bulk bent over her washing, head got up in a turban like a Hindoo.