Watcher in the Piney Woods

by Elizabeth McDavid Jones

  Paralyzing fear shot through Cassie’s body. Her brain froze.

  “What you doing here?” The man’s voice was angry.

  He pulled Cassie’s arms tighter behind her, nearly wrenching her shoulders from the sockets. White-hot pain yanked Cassie’s brain back to life.

  “Quit! That hurts!” Cassie jerked her head around fast to see who had hold of her, but he was faster. He tightened his grip on her.

  “Turn me loose!” Cassie said. She kicked at his shins. He buckled. She tore one arm free and wriggled like a night crawler to pull away the other arm. His grip on her arm turned to iron, and his fingernails pressed into her wrist. His other hand, Cassie saw, was on the hilt of a knife strapped to his belt.

  “I wouldn’t do that again, missy,” he said. “Wouldn’t try to run neither, if I was you. I ain’t killed a young’un yet, but my pappy claimed there’s a first time for everything. Don’t do anything stupid to make this my first time.” The man released Cassie with a shove. “Now tell me what you doing here,” he said again.

  Fear made Cassie’s knees weak, but she turned and forced herself to look at the man, to look him over good. He wasn’t tall, but he was built stocky, with broad shoulders and a wide chest. He looked like he had once been muscular, but now he was gaunt, with sallow skin. He was dressed in a dark homespun butternut, like half the Southern army. His britches were torn off at the knee, and sores oozed where his brogans cut into his ankles. The front of his uniform was ripped, and—Cassie’s breath caught in her throat—some of the buttons were missing off his jacket.

  “You best speak when you’re spoke to,” the man was saying. “You best answer me.”

  Cassie kept her silence. She didn’t owe him an answer; she didn’t owe him anything.

  “Cat got your tongue, has it?” The man took a step closer. He stank of sweat and swamp water. “Tell me, girl. What you doing out here in this swamp?” He spit the words in Cassie’s face. His fists were balled. “Answer me!”

  Cassie’s pulse was pounding in her throat. “It’s a shortcut home,” she said. She prayed her voice didn’t betray her fear.

  “Home.” The man’s lips parted in a menacing grin. His yellow teeth gleamed. “Now where might that be?”

  “None of your durn business!” she cried.

  He backhanded Cassie across the face. “Mind your manners when talking to your elders, girl. Ever’ one of my eight young’uns got better manners than you.”

  Tears leaked from Cassie’s eyes, but she blinked them back. She couldn’t believe this stinking polecat was somebody’s pa.

  The man spit, then glowered at Cassie. “Now I got to figure what to do with you,” he said, “being as how you’ve a mind to see me shot for desertion.” He seated himself on a tree stump and propped one bony leg on the other. “Being as how you’ve discovered my little homestead here.”

  “What you better do,” Cassie said, “is get yourself on out of these woods ’fore you get caught. Don’t you know there’s soldiers swarming all over this county? I seen a passel of soldiers up at Sloan’s store yesterday.”

  “Them soldiers ain’t going to come near this snake-infested pit,” said the man. “It’s just me and the rattlers here, and I like it that way. Ain’t nobody bothered me yet, nobody but a busybody young’un.” He pulled his knife from its sheath and plunged it into the stump. “What kind of ma you got,” he snarled, “that she didn’t learn you not to poke your nose in other folks’ business? Good-for-nothing, ain’t she?”

  At that insult to Mama, Cassie’s hackles flew up, and words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. “One thing she learned me was the difference between a good soldier and a yellow-bellied coward!”

  Cassie’s chest went tight as she realized what she had said. Alarmed, Cassie swept her gaze to the knife, expecting to see the deserter’s fingers closed around it. But he surprised her. He took his hand off the knife. The corners of his mouth turned up. Cassie might have called it a smile, if it hadn’t chilled her to the bone.

  “Got me pegged a coward, do you?” he said. “Well, now, I wonder what you’d do, little lady, when the shells started flying and the bullets started zinging past your sweet little ears. And men was screaming in pain and dying all around you. What would you do?” His fingers went back to the knife and tapped against it.

  Cassie’s heart pounded. She couldn’t have spoken if she wanted to.

  After what seemed forever, the deserter dropped his hand. “Reckon,” he said, “you might just turn and run, like I done. You might. If you was smart.” The deserter laughed in a queer, crazy-sounding way. “Are you smart, gal?”

  But he didn’t wait for an answer. His eyes narrowed, and his voice turned grim. “It don’t bother me none to kill, if I have to.” He paused. “But not for generals no more. Understand that? Reb or Yank—it don’t matter to me.”

  Fear flashed through Cassie’s body like a fever. Where on earth was Hector?

  Struggling against panic, Cassie forced herself to speak. “Listen, I reckon you can’t be blamed for deserting.” It was a bald-faced lie, but Cassie figured God wouldn’t fault her too much for lying under the circumstances. She rushed on. “My pa got drafted to fight with General Lee, and my brother got killed. I sure wish they’d deserted, so they’d be back here with us. See, I understand. You can turn me loose and I won’t breathe a word to nobody that I even seen you.”

  A glint came to the deserter’s eyes. “No menfolk around your house, huh? And you got chickens and hogs, I reckon, and a cow. Wouldn’t a big old slab of bacon taste fine, after living off roots and rabbits all these weeks? Where you live, girl?”

  Land’s sake, Cassie thought, what have I gone and said? The man was going to rob them of every lick of food they had, and likely cut all their throats to boot.

  How could she undo the damage she had done?

  “Danged if I ain’t lost,” she said. “Fact is, I live miles from here. Besides, you wouldn’t get no bacon at our house. Yankee foragers hauled off ever’ one of our hogs last year. And my brother Philip’s a dead shot with a rifle, and my dog Hector, he’s mean and he’d tear you up if you come near our place.”

  “Hah,” the deserter said. “Reckon I can handle a scrawny old dog. Ain’t a-going to mess with you anyways. Not if you do like I tell you.” He stood up. “Take me to your house is all, and fork me out a few necessaries to tide me over till the army clears out of this vicinity.” Then he clenched Cassie’s arm and prodded her in the back with the knife.

  Cassie struggled to break away. “Crazy coot! You think I’d—”

  Suddenly the deserter screamed and jerked backward like a dragonfly snatched by a frog. Cassie saw a streak of red fur and a flash of teeth. It was Hector!

  Hector sprang and jumped back, sprang again, snarling and snapping, ripping the man’s clothes and sinking fangs into flesh. The deserter was yelling. If Hector knew anything, it was how to fight. Wasn’t he the best coon dog in the county? The deserter didn’t stand a chance. Hector would tree him like a coon or run him off. Cassie knew the best thing she could do was run.

  She raced into the woods, but stopped, suddenly, when she heard Hector yelp. Then there was a thud, and dead silence. No sound but the cackling of a crow in the tree above her.

  “Hector!” Cassie cried out. Her voice rang through the silence. Frantic thoughts barreled through her mind. Hector hurt, maybe dead … Turn back, try to save him. Yeah, and get yourself killed. Keep on running—there’s nothing you can do.

  Cassie wrenched herself away and started running again. Behind her, she heard the deserter crashing through the trees. She picked up her pace, but he was still back there, gaining on her. She could never outrun him; she had to hide. Where … where?

  CHAPTER 4

  HOME

  Next thing Cassie knew, the ground started sloping downward, and she smelled water—the creek. Like a crack of thunder, it came to her. She could hide in the caves hollowed out in the creek
bank!

  Quakers had dug the caves to hide runaway slaves before the war. The Quakers had all left, gone north when war broke out, but the caves were still there, their mouths hidden under tree roots or in canebrakes. If a person didn’t know where the caves were, he would never find them. But Cassie knew where they were, every last one of them. Myron had showed them to her and Jacob and Philip a few years ago when they were fishing with him. Myron was a Methodist, but his wife’s people were Quakers, and he’d helped slaves escape before the war.

  Cassie sprinted down the slope, purple with violets, and there was the creek—the clear, quiet creek—flowing through the shade of overhanging branches draped with yellow jessamine and bullace vines. Cassie scrambled down the bank and plunged into the water, up to her thighs because of all the recent rain. The icy water stung her belly as she leaned forward and began to swim.

  She glided along, quiet as a water moccasin, heading for the black willow tree whose roots were thick as her waist. The roots hugged the bank, and between them was the dug-out cave, smaller than she remembered. She squeezed through the opening, into the darkness. The air smelled damp and musty. She could just barely turn around and face the mouth of the cave. She didn’t want to be snuck up on from behind. She lay still and listened to herself breathe. The cave’s mouth sliced the daylight into a circle, and shadows played on the walls inside.

  After a while, the shadows disappeared, the circle got dark, and she heard thunder, then rain battering the creek bank and plunking into the water. A storm! The creek would rise more, covering her tracks. Maybe the deserter would give up hunting for her altogether.

  Cassie hunkered down and got comfortable, as comfortable as a person scrunched up in a cave could be. Didn’t the rain, she thought, sound like it did on the roof at home? Her eyelids drooped. After everything she’d been through, she felt exhausted. She thought how the storm would keep Philip from getting his corn planted. And that’s the last thing she remembered before she fell asleep.

  Cassie jerked awake in a pool of cold water. Inky darkness surrounded her. Her clothes were soaked, and she shivered. Pins and needles darted through her arms. She slithered along her belly through the standing water, toward the mouth of the cave.

  A scummy gray sky hung over the blackish forms of the creek bank and trees. Dawn would break soon. It was still raining, but only a drizzle. Below her the creek roared, loud as the beating wings of a flock of geese off a lake.

  Cassie dangled her arms from the lip of the cave, and her fingers touched rushing water. She pulled herself farther out of the cave and plunged her whole arm in to test the water’s speed. It was fast, very fast. Cassie could swim, but she wasn’t sure she was a match for that current. If she dawdled much longer, though, the cave might flood.

  Cassie hung on to the willow tree’s roots while she eased her legs into the water. The current sucked at her as if she were a licorice drop in the mouth of a giant. Dread thickened inside her. How could she ever make it across? Yet she knew she had to try. If she stayed here, she risked being drowned.

  Cassie tore her fingers off the willow roots. Her feet pushed against solid creek bottom. The water covered her chest, almost to her shoulders, and its chill numbed her. She slogged into the torrent. She struggled to keep her balance, taking slow, measured steps. The water pushed and tugged, and several times she lost her footing and nearly panicked. But she locked her eyes on the opposite bank and pushed herself on.

  Finally she was close enough to the other side to grab hold of a willow limb that jutted out over the water. She hoisted herself up the steep bank. At the top, she stood for a moment, catching her breath, cold raindrops falling on her face. She thought of the button and felt for it in her pocket. It was gone. She’d lost it in the creek, or maybe in the cave or in the deserter’s camp. What difference did it make? The button was the least of her concerns now.

  By this time Mama was liable to be worried half to death over Cassie. And what about Hector? Should Cassie go back after him? Her stomach knotted at the thought of going back into that swamp. Besides, she didn’t think there was much use. She had an awful feeling that Hector was dead.

  And the deserter, where was he? How far had he followed her? Maybe he gave up when her trail disappeared into the creek. Or maybe he walked along through the creek looking for her. Maybe he was looking for her still …

  The idea made Cassie shudder. Then she grew cold all over as an even worse possibility occurred to her: maybe the deserter had given up on Cassie … and gone looking for her farm.

  A sense of urgency hammered at Cassie. She had to get home and warn Mama. She prayed it wasn’t already too late.

  Cassie set off at a trot into the woods, her every sense honed to detect any hint of motion that could mean the deserter was nearby. Darkness hung thick in the trees, but the wrens were warbling; daylight wasn’t far away. By the time Cassie neared home, the sun was rising over Oak Ridge. It was pink at first, just a tinge on the horizon, and lavender clouds were laid out above like long rows of woolen socks. As the pink deepened, bobwhites began to call out from the woods that edged the field.

  Cassie crossed the road, cut through the skirt of pines to the pecan grove, and came up the back way, through the cow pasture, behind the barn and privy. Her nostrils filled with the privy’s pungent odor—warm and musky and not unpleasant. A few of Mama’s chickens were already scratching for worms in the rich soil behind the privy.

  Next to the privy was the barn, and Cassie could look straight through the barn’s open doorway and see Philip inside getting ready to milk June, their cow. Just like normal, Cassie thought with relief. The deserter had not found the farm. Not yet anyway.

  Philip’s back was turned. He was tying June to the milking ring on the wall and muttering—muttering about Cassie. Cassie hugged the corner of the barn and listened. She couldn’t help herself.

  “I swear,” Philip was saying, “Cassie worries Mama more than all the rest of us put together.” He jerked hard at the knot he had just tied, then took the milking pail from its hook and set it beneath June’s udder.

  Cassie’s conscience stabbed at her. Was it true? Did she worry Mama that much?

  But Philip was going on, stroking June’s neck, calming her before he sat down to milk. “Always hell-bent on her own way, that girl is, never giving a thought to the consequences of what she does. She’s just like Jacob. Just like him.”

  Anger instantly replaced Cassie’s guilt. How dare Philip talk that way about Jacob! She stormed into the barn. “Durn right I’m like Jacob,” she said, “and proud of it.”

  Philip was startled. He jumped. June was startled, too; her ears twitched and she stamped her feet. Philip swung his head around and studied Cassie up and down, then turned back to June and seated himself on the stool at June’s side, as if Cassie weren’t even there. He laid a shoulder into June’s hindquarter and squeezed a teat with each hand, sending two streams of milk zinging into the pail. “Where you been all night?” he finally said.

  Bitterness filled Cassie’s throat. “Is that all you got to say? Is that all?” She had had a fool notion that Philip might have been worried about her.

  Philip’s hands dropped. He turned around on the stool and faced her. His eyes had dark circles under them. “What should I say, Cassie? You run off and stay away all night. You get Mama worked up to a frenzy fretting over you. You give nary a thought to the rest of us; you never have. Like Jacob. You’re like him in that.” A pause. “You two and your devil-may-care attitude. It like to drove Pa to distraction.”

  Hurt shot through Cassie, but it quickly changed to anger. “You got no business bringing Pa into this,” Cassie said. “You’re just jealous of me and Jacob. You always was—’cause Jacob picked me to share his secret thicket with instead of you.”

  “I don’t care beans for your stupid old thicket,” Philip snapped. “’Tain’t nothing but a tangle o’ weeds, and it’s pure foolishness to make such a fuss over it.”

/>   The thicket? Foolishness? Cassie was deeply stung, but she refused to let Philip know. “You sure pined away long and hard,” she shot back, “when Jacob wouldn’t let you see that tangle o’ weeds.”

  Philip looked injured, and Cassie felt guilty—but only a little. Then, to hurt Philip like he had hurt her, she added, “You’re jealous—admit it, Philip—’cause me and Jacob got along so good and the two of you never did.”

  After a long silence, Philip said, “Jealous? Maybe.” For a moment Philip rested his forehead on June’s flank, then lifted his head and went back to milking. “Jacob was my big brother, too. I worshiped him, same as you did. Like you still do. Me, I can see his faults now. Don’t you recollect all the taunting we took ’cause Jacob couldn’t make up his mind whether or not to soldier? Jacob was the only boy in the county who didn’t hightail it out to volunteer, and everybody was calling him a coward—”

  “Jacob wasn’t no coward!” Cassie broke in. “You got no business saying so.”

  “I wish you’d quit putting words in my mouth, girl. I never said he was a coward, only that the really important things, he never could take a stand on one way or another.”

  Philip’s criticism cut Cassie like shards of glass. “That ain’t true. Jacob did take a stand. He joined the army and fought as good as anybody else—better. You heard that letter, how brave he was and all.”

  “Yeah, so brave he got himself killed. A lot of good it did him.” Philip started at the second set of teats, squeezing, pulling, squeezing, pulling. Cassie felt as if her heart were being squeezed with each movement of Philip’s hands.

  Then Philip made it worse. “Jacob only took a stand finally,” he said, “’cause Emma dared him to.”

  Angry tears sprang to Cassie’s eyes. “You shut your mouth, Philip. How can you talk like that about Jacob?”

  “It’s the plain truth, Cassie,” Philip said. The streams of milk rang against the side of the pail. “You was too close to Jacob to see how he was.”