by John Jakes
They talked for another hour. At the end Grierson knew a lot about Charles’s personal life. He knew about Orry, the surrogate father; about Charles’s trouble with Elkanah Bent; about the horrifying impact of Sharpsburg, the loss of Augusta Barclay, the frantic search for their son. Finally, Grierson put his notes away and shook Charles’s hand. It struck Charles as more ceremonial than friendly. The colonel was still reserving judgment.
“My adjutant will tell you how to prepare for the written test. You should have no trouble with it. The review board is another matter.” Grierson walked him to the door, smoothing his beard. “Do something about your appearance. It works against you. Either trim the beard or get rid of it.”
“Yes, sir.” He stressed the second word, the old West Point way, then snapped his right hand outward in his best cadet salute. Grierson returned it and dismissed him.
After the door closed, Grierson went back to the desk. He gazed at the ambrotype for a moment or so, then started a letter.
Dearest Alice,
I may have got a good one today. A former reb who wants to exterminate the hostiles. If I get him past the examiners, and harness his wrathful impulses, the regiment may benefit, for I have yet to meet a quality officer who did not have some demon driving him …
In front of the pocket mirror Duncan loaned him, Charles gazed at his soaped face. He hadn’t shaved in months. The dangerous edge he’d honed on Duncan’s razor pulled and tore when he attacked his beard.
He thought of Grierson’s warning about the review board as he pulled the razor down with reckless haste. The edge bit through his beard to rasp the skin. As he stroked, sections of his beard fell around the basin. A new, almost unfamiliar face appeared. More lines. More of time’s markings.
“Ahh!” He grabbed a towel and pressed it to his bleeding jaw. When the gash clotted a little, he flung the towel down and attacked the other side of his face. Thinking of Wooden Foot, Boy, Fen, he cut himself deeply a second time, but scarcely felt it.
_____________
In general, the relation of the Anglo-Saxon race with inferior races, all the world over, is a most unpleasant matter to contemplate. Whether it is with the Hindoos, or the Australians, or Jamaicans, or on this side with California Chinese, or Negroes, or Indians, the uniform habit and tendency of this “imperial race” is to crush the weak. … The dealings of this nation toward the Indians form one of the most disgraceful chapters in modern history. We first drive them from their land, and then suffer them to be poisoned with our diseases and debauched by our vices. They are steadily driven back to the region of the buffalo, and now even in the wild mountains bordering on that region, the miners are destroying the game and breaking up the solitude on which their support as hunter depends. …
Editorial comment,
The New York Times
25
BRIGADIER DUNCAN TELEGRAPHED THE pardon request to the attorney, Dills, and transferred funds to a Washington bank. He dispatched a carefully worded letter to General Sherman at Division, stressing Grierson’s need for qualified officers and the outstanding ability of one Charles August. Charles wondered how Sherman would react if he knew “August” was the unkempt trader he’d met on the prairie.
Charles took a room in Leavenworth City but returned to the post every day, trying to get reacquainted with little Gus. The boy would be two in December. He was walking, talking in rudimentary sentences, and still had a certain reserve in the presence of the tall, gaunt man who took him for walks and called himself Pa.
Maureen usually went along on the walks. She continued to disapprove of Charles as a parent—he was, among other things, merely a man—but since his return, he had shown her a new and unpleasant side of his personality. He showed it again as the three of them came back from a stroll along the river one sparkling afternoon. Hand in hand, Charles and little Gus were marching like soldiers. The boy loved the reviews and evening retreats at Leavenworth, and he liked to imitate them. Charles obliged. The two of them moved briskly down the path ahead of Duncan’s housekeeper.
A certain number of Indian men always congregated at frontier posts. These hang-around-the-forts subsisted on handouts and menial work. They spent their money for whiskey and let the whites bestow contemptuous names on them, like Sausage Nose, Lazy Man, Fat Woman.
Fat Woman, an obese Sioux in filthy old uniform pants and blouse, appeared on the path, coming toward Charles and his son. Fat Woman stopped, blinked, and reached out to tickle the chin of the smiling boy. Charles whipped up his fist and knocked him down.
Fat Woman yelped and crawled away. Gus hung on to his father’s hand, but gave him a wary, scared look. Maureen couldn’t keep silent. “That poor defenseless man meant no harm, Mr. Main.”
“I don’t want red scum like that touching my boy.”
“Fa, Fa—” Gus tugged his hand. “March.”
“No.” Charles yanked his hand away, then seized Gus’s shoulder, forcing him along the path. “No more marching.”
Later, when Charles had ridden back to Leavenworth, the housekeeper confided to Duncan as he sat soaking in his zinc bathtub. “His moods are as changeable as the weather. Some kind of demon’s in him.”
“He went through a hideous ordeal. Would you scrub a little lower, my dear? Ah, yes—”
“I realize he did, General.” Even in bed she addressed him formally. “But if he doesn’t get over it his son will despise him. Augustus is nearly terrified of him now.”
“I’ve noticed.” Duncan sighed. “I don’t know what to do.”
The room at Department headquarters looked west over the parade ground. Charles’s table faced the undraped windows. No accident, he decided. Nor was the hour. Half past five by the loudly ticking wall clock. Blinding light streamed into his eyes, making it almost impossible to see the five men facing him at their table in front of the windows.
General Winfield Scott Hancock, U.S.M.A. 1844 and commander of the Department of the Missouri, chaired the examining board. Tall, handsome, composed, he’d greeted Charles cordially at the door and wished him well. How strange, Charles thought, to shake hands with a man who probably had shaken hands with Cousin Orry.
On Hancock’s left sat General William Hoffman, commander of the Third Infantry, and of Fort Leavenworth as well. Duncan had said Hoffman loathed the idea of Negro regiments.
To the left of Hoffman sat the officer Charles feared: Captain Waldo Krug, slight, severe-looking, and bald, although he was not much older than Charles. Attached to Hoffman’s staff, Krug wore the silver star of a brevet brigadier and was addressed as general. He watched Charles with unconcealed hostility.
To Hancock’s right, Captain I.N. Barnes, and, completing the panel, a major named Coulter, a schoolmasterish man wearing oval spectacles. Directly to the left of Charles, a row of chairs was set up for spectators. Only Duncan and Grierson had chosen to attend.
Hancock’s glance to the right and left signaled for quiet. “Gentlemen, this is the application hearing of officer candidate Charles August, who has successfully passed the written examination. With nearly perfect marks, I might add.”
Krug immediately said, “General Hancock, I move to adjourn the hearing. The candidate is unfit by reason of previous service with the Confederacy.”
Grumpily, Hoffman said, “Second that.” He was U.S.M.A. 1829—Lee’s class—an old campaigner from the Seminole and Mexican wars.
Hancock set the motion aside, saying that the candidate had shown good faith by signing the oath and applying for a pardon, as General Lee had. That made Krug explode.
“Robert Lee will never be pardoned, no matter how many times he applies. That’s fitting for any man who betrayed his country, and I include the candidate.”
The scholarly Coulter pushed his glasses down his nose. “I had the impression that hostilities stopped over a year ago, and we were all Americans again. I think we should put the war behind us and—”
“No, sir, I will not put my brother�
��s death by starvation behind me for one moment,” Krug said.
Hancock rapped the table to restore order. “Warden Wirz paid for his war crimes on the gallows. He was, and probably will be, the only Confederate officer so punished.”
“I’d hang a lot more of them,” Krug said, with his eye on Charles.
“Captain,” Hancock said, “you will have to desist or disqualify yourself. This hearing will go forward on the basis of the candidate’s qualifications.”
Krug muttered something unintelligible. Hancock cleared his throat and opened Charles’s file. Although it was autumn, the light beating in Charles’s eyes felt fiery. He was as nervous as he’d ever been on the eve of battle; certain he’d trip up somehow.
He forced himself to think of Wooden Foot, glittering beads heaped on his eyes. His pulse slowed a little. He sat up straight, straining until his back ached.
“State your name,” Hancock said.
“Charles August.”
“I have before me the statement of Colonel Grierson which says you served four years with the army of the Confederacy. Please state your unit and rank.”
“Scout corps, Wade Hampton Legion. That was later absorbed into larger cavalry divisions during several army reorganizations. But the scouts remained irregulars, without rank.” The lie came out smoothly.
“Are there records to prove that?” Barnes asked.
“Yes, I presume, in Richmond.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Krug said. “Richmond! Everybody knows the rebs didn’t leave a single piece of paper in Richmond. They burned everything. We don’t even know how many traitors mustered under their colors, and we never will.”
Sharply, Hancock said, “Captain.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I am against this. Completely and utterly against it.”
Hoffman raised his hand and Hancock gave him leave to speak. Bitingly, Hoffman said to the panel, “If we can’t examine the gentleman’s records, he will have to supply information. I would like to know his political affiliation.”
Charles was unprepared. Grierson and Duncan watched him anxiously. “Why—Democrat, sir.”
“Democrat.” Hoffman smiled. “Of course. Every unregenerate rebel calls himself a Democrat. Every man who murdered Union prisoners calls himself a Democrat. Every traitor who mixed dangerous compounds to blow up Northern cities or invented hellish schemes to introduce yellow fever to those cities is now merely a Democrat.”
Amused, Coulter said, “The general is quite familiar with the campaign oratory of Governor Morton of Indiana, I see. But that election speech you just quoted was meant for civilians, sir. Does it really have a bearing on these proceedings?”
Caught in his plagiarism, Hoffman fumed. Hancock said, “No. I, for one, think that Mr. August is being quite forthcoming. We know there are already hundreds of former Confederates in the United States Army under assumed names.” Duncan’s start made his wooden chair squeak. Grierson grew interested in the ceiling. “I want to ask the candidate about any military experience prior to the war. I see nothing in the file.”
Charles’s throat tightened. Was sweat showing on his forehead? Did the sun on his face reveal deceit? Colonel Grierson shifted his scrutiny to the brightly polished toe of his boot. Hancock frowned.
“Mr. August, our time’s valuable. Answer promptly, please. What about service prior to the war?”
Charles weighed two murders against another he and said, “None, sir.”
It continued for a half hour, interrupted by an occasional angry objection from Krug or a question from Hoffman that quickly turned to Republican cant. Charles was limp, tired, perspiring heavily when Hancock excused him. He and Duncan and Grierson went out and shut the door.
“They’ll approve you,” Grierson predicted.
“No, they won’t. I botched it.”
“To the contrary. You did well. But I must say something that I’ve already said to Jack. If you’re ever found out, I won’t be able to help you. I won’t compromise the regiment. It comes first. In every other circumstance you can count on me to go to the wall for you.”
“Thank you, Colonel. I don’t think it’ll be necessary for you to worry about—”
The door to the hearing room opened. Ike Barnes, the junior man, stepped out.
“Three to two in favor of commissioning. It’s conditional on War Department approval and a pardon.” Beaming, Barnes stuck out his hand. “Welcome to the Tenth, Mr. August.”
Charles crossed the Missouri on the ferry and rode to St. Louis in leisurely stages, savoring the tangy air and the crimson and gold of the leaves. The calendar kept Willa from making the reunion a physical one, but they slept warm in each other’s arms in her bed at the New Planter’s House.
When morning came, they kissed and murmured words of affection. Before he dressed, he lathered his face to shave away yesterday’s stubble. He whistled while he plied the razor.
“That’s very pretty,” Willa called from her dressing table. “What is it?”
“This?” He whistled five notes. “Just something that came into my head last year. Whenever I think of Mont Royal, of everything that I loved before the war, I hear that tune.”
“There’s a piano at the theater. Would you hum it when we’re there, so I can write it down for you?”
“Why, yes, of course.”
And she did.
“That’s my tune?” he asked, staring at the notes, which made no sense to him. She nodded. “Well, if you say so. It’ll be a keepsake.” He folded the paper carefully. “Maybe I can stop thinking about the past. I’ve found something better to take its place.”
He leaned over and kissed her forehead. She closed her eyes and held his arm.
While she attended to theater business for a couple of hours, he strolled through the bustling streets. Today he wasn’t at all troubled by the risk in the strengthening attachment; he was too full of excitement about the commission—an excitement Willa shared until they walked along the levee later, and he told her the reason he’d rejoined the Army. Although he spared her the obscene details, he described the demise of the Jackson Trading Company, and the hatred it had generated.
Willa had a strong reaction. But she kept it to herself, putting her feelings for him above her conscience. She’d never done that before, at least not so far as she could remember.
In her rooms that night, she showed him what she called her prize. It was the large framed photograph of the two of them taken the year before, Willa on the velvet settee with her head in the invisible clamp, Charles with his hand on her shoulder. Amused, he said they looked like figures in a waxworks. She swatted him and said she would retaliate for that by forcing a copy of the picture on him. He said he’d be glad to have it, and halfway meant it.
Over breakfast he learned something else about her. Her birthday was December 25. “Easy to memorize but hard to get anyone to celebrate with so much going on. I’m a horrid cook, but I can do a simple cake and icing. Most years, I even have to buy my own candles.” He laughed.
Charles stayed in St. Louis for three more days. He attended a performance each evening. Then Brigadier Duncan summoned him back with a telegraph message. The pardon had been granted.
Willa cried when they said goodbye. She promised that she and Sam would be touring soon, and she’d find him. And love him properly, as she couldn’t this time. He was in good spirits as he rode away.
A light drizzle started as Willa walked from the hotel to the theater. She was so preoccupied with Charles, she almost forgot to open her umbrella.
She knew so much about him, yet still knew so little. She sensed a coiled anger within him, an emotion quite different from last year’s war-induced malaise. He had an enemy now. That was why she hadn’t told him about taking the initiative and starting a local unit of the Indian Friendship Society.
There were six members. A Quaker couple, a Unitarian preacher, an elderly headmistress of a private school patronized by the children of weal
thy German merchants, the theater’s aging juvenile, Tim Trueblood, and herself. Charles wouldn’t have liked to hear about the memorials they had already sent to Congress and the Interior Department.
She reached the theater and found the stage deserted, though she heard Sam’s voice somewhere. She closed her umbrella and laid it on the prompter’s table. The stage manager shot from behind a flat.
“Not there, not there! If he sees it, he’ll go wild.”
“That’s right, I forgot. No umbrellas on the prompt table. I can’t remember all the superstitions. What’s he doing?”
“He’s behaving a bit strangely. He’s been bustling about with Prosperity’s feeding dish, and now he’s rehearsing in the green room.”
“He does insist on doing Hamlet.” She and the stage manager exchanged tolerant smiles, and she followed the sound of Trump’s resonant voice as it proclaimed Yorick’s infinite jest and excellent fancy. She almost stumbled on a crockery bowl of milk. She saw Prosperity curled up nearby, uninterested. She frowned. The bowl smelled peculiar. She picked it up and sniffed it again.
She marched the bowl to the green room, interrupting Sam’s rehearsal in front of a long mirror. Despite the lacing of his corset, his black tights couldn’t hide his corpulence. He looked silly in that costume, and more so with a wilted yellow chrysanthemum pinned to the front.
“Dear girl—” he began, one thumb hooked in the eye socket of a prop skull. He lost color when Willa extended the bowl at arm’s length.
“I’ll feed the cat from now on, Sam. You must have mixed up the bowls. She won’t touch this one.” Willa passed it under her nose with a stagy sniff. “Cats don’t like sour mash whiskey.”
Trump almost fell in his haste to get the bowl. “It’s nothing. A mere nip to brace me up today.”
“And every day for a week. I’ve wondered why you were so excessively cheerful in the morning.” She put the bowl on the table, saying sweetly, “Don’t touch it.”