“Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E Minor.”
“That’s a strange name. The tunes I know are church hymns or have names like ‘Wildwood Flower,’ or ‘Cotton-Eyed Joe.’”
She cut the long hair off my forehead. “It was written a long time ago in Europe. Do you know where that is?”
“Yes, Ma’am . . . Mary. I learned how to read and write in a school we had up home. I liked history. But not much time for reading in the militia. I miss it.”
“I’ll find you a book.”
“Thank you. That’d be nice.”
She clipped the hair around my ears.
“Your husband must enjoy listening to you play,” I said.
“John tolerates it. But we’re not married. We’re just together.” She paused. “Does that shock you?”
It did, but I said, “It’s not my business to be judging.”
She went back to cutting my hair. “I was married. My husband was killed.”
“I’m sorry. Was he fighting the Government too?”
“No. He wasn’t in the Underground. He believed you could change things with words, with talking and writing. He was wrong. The Government arrested and murdered him.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Then I joined the Underground.”
“You have children?”
“A son.” She paused. “We’re not going to talk about that.”
For a while, we didn’t say anything. She kept cutting my hair. Then she said, “Tell me about Jane.”
“Well, we told you about the war,” I said. “What else would you like to know?”
I expected Mary to ask if Jane really talked with God. Instead, she said, “Is she your woman?”
“No. It’s not like that.” I felt myself blushing.
“I see. But you’re risking your life for her. Why?”
“I . . . we can’t just abandon her.”
“I understand. But what you’re trying to do is impossible.”
“Jane did the impossible for us. If it weren’t for her, the Government would have our land.” I remembered Jane’s smile as she stood above Waynesville, watching it burn. And I remembered her screaming in my face, telling me to attack. I pushed those thoughts away.
“She must have been remarkable.”
“She is. I’m always afraid. I’m afraid right now. But I don’t think she’s ever afraid.”
She stopped cutting my hair. “My husband was like that. No doubts. A pure faith.”
She started cutting again and said, “Who am I to talk? Fighting the Government is hopeless. They’re too strong.”
“But you’re fighting anyway?”
“Yes,” she said.
She kept cutting my hair. After a while, she asked about my family and our farm. I talked about that until she finished.
She handed me a mirror with a carved wooden handle. I was surprised by what I saw. My beard was trimmed close and even, and my hair was short, short as Jane’s when I first saw her. I felt strange. “So how do you like the new you?” she said.
“Well, I . . . well, thank you.”
She was laughing. “Don’t worry. You’ll get used it. Now get your friend. It’s his turn.”
I thanked her again and went downstairs to get Riley.
“Damn,” he said. “Is that you?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Your turn.”
Riley stared at me a moment longer and swallowed hard, as though he were nervous. Then, without a word, he got up and climbed the stairs.
I sat on my bedroll and rubbed one hand over my hair, enjoying the strange feel of it. When I was a boy, my mother used to crop my hair real short as soon as the weather turned warm in the spring. For a day or two after, I would rub my hand over the fresh cut hair, just for the small simple pleasure in it, just as I was doing now.
When I was a boy, I thought. That seemed a long time ago. Before the militia, before the blue-eyed man, before Jane, before this. I wondered if any of that boy was still in me. I wondered if any of that boy would make it through what came next.
Late in the afternoon, John came into the house. He pulled something out of his coat pocket and handed it to me. It was a newspaper, just like the ones from before the Plague.
We all went to the kitchen and sat down at the table. The front page had a picture of Jane. Walking on either side of her were two big soldiers. There were shackles around her wrists, and her hair was longer and wilder than I remembered it. She looked right at the camera. There was no fear in her eyes.
It was so good to see her, even this way. She was alive.
Next to the picture, was an article, “Terrorist Goes On Trial.” I read the first part aloud for Riley.
Jane Darcy, leader of the “Hillbilly Terrorists,” will go on trial today at the Western North Carolina Military District Headquarters, near Asheville. Darcy, 18, who claims to be the “Messenger of God,” is charged with multiple counts of murder, terrorism, using explosive devices, and destruction of federal property. If convicted, Darcy will be executed.
“This self-styled prophetess, this terrorist, will get her day in court,” said James Corcoran, head of the Federal prosecution team, “but justice will be done.”
I stopped reading. It was just what Hobbes told me they would do.
“What do they mean by terrorist?” Riley said. “That was on the government signs about Jane. Never understood that.”
Mary said, “It used to mean someone who attacked innocent people for some political cause. To frighten them. To terrorize them. But now, anyone who fights the Government is ‘a terrorist.’ John’s a terrorist. I’m a terrorist. So are you.”
“But they attacked us,” Riley said.
“You’ve got to understand,” John said, “facts don’t matter. Even the Government’s own laws don’t matter. They’ll find her guilty, no matter what.”
“There will be a trial with judges, testimony, and evidence,” Mary said. “They might even let her have a defense attorney. It might look like a fair trial. But they will convict her. And they will execute her. They always do.”
“So it’s all just a big show,” I said.
“Yes,” Mary said. She was looking at me, hard, and I had the feeling she wanted to say more, but couldn’t.
“There’ll be more about Jane on the evening radio broadcast,” John said.
“Radio broadcast?” Riley said.
“Yes,” Mary said, “it’ll start in an hour.”
John went out to do some chores before dinner. Riley went downstairs. I lingered at the table with the newspaper. My eyes looked at the words and pictures, but I didn’t really see. I could only think about Jane. I thought of Jane chained up in some dark room, Jane’s fearless gaze in the newspaper picture, Jane closing the eyes of that dead soldier, Jane’s touch on my arm, Jane shouting and shaking her head at me, telling me not to do this.
The hour passed and John brought the radio, a black box, into the kitchen and put it on a table. He worked the crank on the side for a minute and then turned a knob on the front of it. After a “click” sound, a man’s voice came out of the box. The voice said, “. . . tonight’s low will be 52 degrees with partly cloudy skies and a 20 percent chance of rain . . .” The voice went on about the weather, what it would be tomorrow, and the next day.
Riley came upstairs and walked into the room. He gave me an uneasy look. Now, people our age knew about radios. I mean, we had heard old-timers talk about getting music from a radio, but I had only heard the radio Jackson had played for Jane, and that was just for a minute. Riley looked at this one with suspicion, as if he thought it might do something else, like explode.
“Relax,” I said, “all it does is make noise.”
He motioned me away from the radio. When I was next to him, he said in a whisper, “If we can hear that feller’s voice, can he hear us too?” He cast a wary look over his shoulder at the radio.
“There’re radios like that,” I said. “But this ain’t one.”
“Sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
He gave the radio another suspicious look and said, “OK.”
We sat down and began to listen.
The radio-voice stopped talking about the weather and started talking about factories and food harvests, about tons of corn and wheat, about percentages, records, quotas, and so on. I didn’t understand much, but from the sound of the voice, I guessed all this was good news.
The radio-voice started talking about how the Government army was fighting against “terrorists” and “separatist forces” in places like Ohio, Maine, and Miami. Then there was the voice of some General saying it was “just a matter of time,” until these places were “fully secure.” There was also a report from New York City about the arrest of forty-two “high-ranking members of the terrorist ‘Underground.’”
This went on for a while. Riley said, “I don’t know much about much, but I think this is all bullshit.” Then he apologized to Mary for saying bullshit.
She laughed. “They say this kind of stuff all the time. No one believes it.”
I was beginning to wonder whether there would be anything about Jane, when the radio-voice started talking about her. It said pretty much the same things as the newspaper had and listed all the crimes she was accused of committing. Then the voice told us about “recorded excerpts” from the trial.
Then a new voice came out of the radio. I guessed it was the voice of a judge. It said, “Jane Darcy, you have heard the charges against you. If convicted, you may be executed.” The voice paused for a moment, and then said. “Jane Darcy, how do you answer? Are you guilty or not guilty of these crimes?”
“Not guilty.”
It was her voice. It was Jane. She was alive. I had a picture of her in my mind. She was looking straight at that judge. I was happy, and yet I was full of grief and shame. She was alive, yet she stood before men who would kill her. And they had this chance because I had failed her.
Riley put a hand on my shoulder. Only then did I realize my cheeks were wet. Tears.
“Come on,” Riley said.
John and Mary were watching me. I didn’t care. I wiped my eyes on my sleeve and tried to concentrate.
The radio-voice came back and talked for a while about how terrible Jane was. The voice made it seem Jane had started the war against the Government because she was a religious fanatic out to destroy all that was decent and good.
Then we heard Jane again.
Another voice asked Jane a question. “You claim to get messages from God. Tell us, does God hate the Government of the United States?”
Jane said, “I don’t know if God hates your Government. But I know its soldiers will be driven from our land, except those that leave their bones here.”
The first radio-voice came back and called this “a chilling statement by the defendant,” and said the trial would continue tomorrow. John got up and turned the knob. A click and the radio went silent. Mary said she would call us for dinner.
Riley and I went downstairs and sat on our bedding without talking. I thought about Jane’s voice on the radio. So clear and strong. I wondered what else she had said. Probably a lot. Jane was never one to hold back.
I wondered too, if I would ever hear her voice again. Riley and I might die trying and still do her no good. When I thought about this, a sorrow came on me. It wasn’t a sorrow for myself, although I wanted to live. It was a sorrow for Jane, whom I had failed. It was sorrow for Riley, who wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for me. And it was a sorrow for my people. They needed Jane. But all they had were fools like Winslow and Jackson.
That’s what I was feeling when I heard footsteps, heavy ones, coming down the stairs. It was John. He told us to come on up to dinner.
At the start, we were quiet. I sure didn’t feel like talking. Mary got out a jug of red wine and poured some for each of us. Then she asked Riley about some story he had told her about his kin. That started Riley telling his funny stories.
I knew the stories, of course, and laughed some, but John laughed very hard. His face got almost as red as the wine. Mary drank only a little wine and smiled at Riley’s stories.
After dinner, Mary asked if we would like some music. John and Riley said they would and drank a toast to the violin. I just nodded.
We sat in the front room, and Mary stood to play. Her eyes were closed as she made the strange music. At first, I thought she was playing as if on a stage, playing for many people, people who loved this music. I realized she was alone with the music. The music carried her away from our world of dark and narrow choices.
Her long fingers moved over the strings, and I recalled how those fingers had closed around a pistol aimed at me. Watching her, I knew, knew for a fact, she would have pulled the trigger. She would do what was necessary. For some reason that made me feel better.
When she was done, we clapped and thanked her. She put away the violin and went into the kitchen to clean the dishes and do other chores. Riley and John had one last drink together. Then John went out back to check on his horse. Riley, a little unsteady, went down to the cellar. I went into the kitchen to help Mary.
We stood side by side. She washed, and I dried the dishes. I could see our reflections in the glass window over the sink. For a time, neither of us spoke. Finally, I said, “How did you learn to play music like that?”
She kept washing and said, “Oh that’s a long story. If you don’t mind, I’m too tired to tell it now.”
“I don’t mind,” I said, but I had the feeling being tired had nothing to do with it. The story was private, like talking about her son.
We washed and dried in silence, except for a few words about where I should put the plates and such.
We finished up. I thanked her for dinner and turned to go.
“Wait,” she said and went into another room. I heard her move things around. After a minute, she came back carrying a small book that looked very old. She held it out to me with both hands. I had the feeling it was special to her.
I read the words on the spine. “The Old Man and the Sea.”
“Have you read this?” she said.
“No. What’s it about?”
“A man who didn’t give up.”
“Is it a made-up story?”
She smiled. “Yes, but made-up stories can be true.”
I didn’t know what she meant but was embarrassed to ask. So I just thanked her, wished her a good night, and went downstairs.
Riley was asleep. He had left the lamp burning just enough for me not to trip on him. I was tired, but also curious about the book. So I stepped over Riley, turned up the lamp, and sat down on a crate to read.
In the morning, Riley had to wake me. For a while, I just sat on my bedroll, weary from the night and thought about my dream.
I had been in a boat, like the one in the book, but there was no water. Instead, I sailed skimming the treetops, riding the waves of mountains and ridges, dipping down into the hollows and riding up again on the wind.
This would have been wonderful, but I felt confused and lost, not knowing which way to steer, thinking my destination was one thing, then another, then something else. I was also afraid, because I knew the black-clad soldiers were out there, amid the trees, down in the hollows, over the next ridge, waiting for me in the dark.
Sometimes, Maggie was in the boat with me. I didn’t see her directly but only in a reflection from the water around us, which wasn’t water, but trees. Yet I could see her, and she was trying to tell me something, something I couldn’t understand.
“Feeling poorly?” Riley said.
I must have been sitting there a long time remembering the dream, turning it over, thinking about it.
“No,” I said. “Didn’t sleep well.”
Upstairs, Mary gave us some tea and bread. As we were finishing up, John came in from working outside. He bustled about putting away freshly chopped wood. When he sat down across the table from us, I could see all th
e good cheer of last night was gone.
“Got a message,” he said. “Tonight I take you to your next contact. Be ready to go at dark. Bring your pistols and any ammunition you have. Nothing else.”
“Why not my rifle?” Riley said.
“Just do as you’re told,” John said.
“A rifle will attract attention from soldiers or informers,” Mary said.
I could tell Riley didn’t want to leave his rifle. It had been in his family a long time, but he nodded.
“We’ll be ready,” I said.
John got up and went over to his coat. From the inside pocket, he pulled out another newspaper. “More about Jane.”
He put it on the table. There was another picture of Jane on the front. Because of her clothes, I guessed it had been made soon after her capture. She sat hunched and chained to a chair. She had the desperate look of a trapped animal, a wildcat.
I read it to Riley. There was some about Jane’s trial. Mostly, the newspaper talked about all the terrible things Jane had done. It included what Jane had said about soldiers “leaving their bones here.” I guessed they liked that because it made her sound mean and crazy.
“Damn,” Riley said. “I didn’t know we was mixed up with such a bloodthirsty woman. Lucky Jane didn’t cut us up for a thrill.” He got up, stretched, and went down to the cellar. He would get his gear ready and then go to sleep. I should have done the same, but for a while, I kept trying to read the newspaper. But my head was too full of Jane to read about factories, harvests, and such. It was all lies anyway.
The day passed slowly. Down in the basement, I checked and rechecked my pistol. For a long time, I lay in the cellar listening to Riley snore, thinking about what might happen tonight.
So I turned up the lamp and read more of the book Mary had given me. For a made-up story, it was very good. The man who wrote it used simple words so it was clear. I could see in my mind what the words said, except for the things about baseball and someone named DiMaggio. But I liked the old man. He was like one of our old men, one of the good strong ones who had not ruined themselves with whiskey and grief, the ones who knew the mountains well, but were always learning.
Marching As to War: A Post-Apocalyptic Novel Page 17