Then out of the blue, after not talking, just walking, Jimmadasin said, “I ’pologize for bein’ harsh. I wasn’t goin’ to whump ya, just potectin’ ya.” His voice was still soft and low and grumbly.
“I know,” I said.
He nodded and said, “Den show me whey is my marsters.”
“How would I know where they are?”
“You know.”
“No, I don’t.”
“You plays wid dem.”
“Only once in a while, not today.”
He looked down at the ground. I could see he was disappointed. “Den I’m taking you home to be safe, an I’ll find ’em myself. Don’ stop here, we godda keep walkin’. The solders behin’ us, we just saw a few a dem, but der’s an army comin’.” And he whispered, like under his breath, but so as I could hear, “A ’ntire fuckin’ army.”
“Whose?” I asked.
“Gen’l Jackson.”
“Did you see him?”
“I jus’ know, dat’s all; now are you gonna tell me whey is my marsters, or am I gonna take you home? I should prob’ly do dat anyhow.”
He took hold of my arm, gently but tight, and I figured I’d better appease him, so I said, “I’ll take you to the places I know, but it’s gonna be like finding a needle in a haystack.”
“We can do dat.”
And so I really did try; I took him to all the places I knew around here that Harry and Allan liked best. As they always got everything they wanted, and had their own muskets, I used to go hunting with them. (Of course, their muskets overshot everything, but once you got used to them, you’d have a fair chance at hitting something.) Sometimes they’d let me shoot wild pigeons or doves or partridges, and I used to like their dogs that would always go along. So I took old Jimmadasin to Neil’s Dam and to the woods where we always had good luck and a few other places with pretty good views, where they’d probably be if they were anywhere; and Jimmadasin started getting nervous, as he thought we were getting too close to danger, and started to talk to himself in a tiny, high voice like he was his own mother scolding him.
I asked him about that.
“You think I’se a dumb nigger fuck, don’ you, but I ain’t. You’se white an’ don’t got to worry ’bout nuthin’. If you was colored, you’d understan’ quick, believe me.” He laughed, but he was talking mean and quiet. “An’ you also thought I mus’ be a dumb, crazy fuck, Marster Mundy, whan I was lookin’ for my boys in the woods. But dem solders ain’t goin’ to shoot what dey think is a dumb nigger wid a mamma’s voice, now ain’t dey? Nidder da ’Federate or da Yankee solder. I ’ready proves ’dat to you. If I was hidin’, an’ dey caught me, dey’d shoot Jimmadasin’s ass dead. An’ maybe shoot you wid me just for good measure or by mistake.”
I owned that was possible.
“So maybe come a time when Marster Mundy learn dis nigger’s tricks,” Jimmadasin said, and we both started laughing because now we knew something nobody else did. And as we walked all over hell looking for Harry and Allan McSherry, the fighting got worse and worse, and we had to back off and keep going up toward Cedar Creek Road near where it meets the Valley Turnpike by the tollgate, which was near Abraham’s Creek. I knew the creek, and so did Harry and Allan, but I knew that if they were here, they wouldn’t be that far away from the fighting, which was behind us in the woods and fields between Cedar Creek Road—the lower part—and the Valley Pike near the Opequon Church.
Damned if Jimmadasin wasn’t right; we saw our ’Federate boys marching across from the Pike along two routes. We were above it, but this wasn’t no skirmishing; it was war. We could hear so many volleys of cannon that it just turned into one continuous roll, like the kind of thunder that seems to keep going on and getting louder after each flash of lightning. Seemed that now there were soldiers all around us, Yankee soldiers, and without saying a word we just ran, and I must admit I was glad to have Jimmadasin holding onto my hand. Everything seemed to go fast and slow at the same time. I know that sounds crazy, but that’s how it was. Everything was happening inside of a second, yet it was slow too. Ah, I don’t know, that’s just how it was.
There was smoke everywhere like there was a fire, and I could smell powder, it was sharp and hurt my nose like I had breathed in pepper and iron filings; and there was an explosion nearby that nearly knocked us down and pieces of metal and trees were flying through the air; and Jesus Christ, I thought I saw a bloody hand falling with all the dirt and debris; and there were men screaming for help and calling for their mothers, and then sonovabitch if another shell didn’t explode like lightning striking the same place twice, and clots of earth and leaves and branches were flying, it was like the whole world was flying up in the air; and there were more screams, probably our own, too, and I stepped on something that seemed to burst under my foot. It was part of somebody because my foot was bloody and sticky, and I remember screaming then, I don’t know why because in a way I wasn’t scared, it was like I was off to the distance watching Jimmadasin and myself running like fools, and everything got dark and cloudy and everyone was shouting and shooting, and Jimmadasin was pulling me along and we were both shouting; and then suddenly it was over and we just sat in a field together breathing heavy and I was so exhausted that I upchucked a little before I could even catch my breath. I could still feel whatever it was that I had stepped on, and I rubbed off what I could of the blood with dirt and leaves.
“Get the hell outa here, boy,” shouted a Yank soldier up ahead of us, and I couldn’t tell if he was yelling at me or Jimmadasin, and behind him ran a standard bearer, who didn’t look like he was much older than me. I should have been fighting the Yanks, but Poppa wouldn’t have none of that, and maybe I should have run away to join the militia, but I figured he would have stopped it anyway. Mother would cry that I was a baby every time I brought it up. I was old enough to be a drummer, at least. You could be twelve and be a drummer, and fourteen and be a soldier. “Move it out,” someone shouted, and again, I didn’t know if he was talking to the soldiers or to us, but Jimmadasin and I moved. More Yanks were moving down to meet our boys, thousands it looked like, marching down a mud road that wasn’t much more than a path; and they were moving everything, including cannon. I thought we were safe hereabouts, but then we came upon a bluebelly who looked like he was asleep against a tree. One leg was stretched out straight and the other one was pulled up to his chest, which was a good comfortable way to sleep. Except he had a mess on his lap that looked like sausages.
“’Testines,” Jim said, pulling me along. “Musta been from dis mornin’ ’cause dey so swollen. Big guns do dat, just ’splode all over like we seen.”
I was feeling a little sick, but once we walked right through the Yankee ranks, as if we were passing them on the street in town, I felt relieved and ashamed. Relieved because I could see town people around here on the hills who came to watch General Jackson shoot the asses off these Yankee invaders. Ashamed because now we were behind Yankee lines, under the protection of General Shields, who was the enemy, and I figured that was only a coward’s reason to be comfortable.
I can’t remember how long we remained just standing around, as if we were lost and trying to get our direction back, but it seems that it must have been a while because I was hungry, which was probably what was making me sick all along. Still, the sound of cannon and musket echoing around the hills was a continuous roll, and I thought then that there must be thousands getting shot and blown up and killed. It wasn’t that many, but I learned quick that once you’ve been right there with all the dead and dying soldiers, Confederate or Yank, you feel the same if it’s two or two hundred. I didn’t know that, then, though. I was jittery-nervous, like I was in a dream where one minute you’re here and then one minute you’re somewhere else, and I had a metal taste that sometimes almost choked me whenever I swallowed; and something else. Everything seemed pressed together somehow, and maybe because it was exciting, but even with the all dying and screaming I felt a strange and ho
rrible sort of happiness.
Once I saw those people from Winchester standing around, people who I’d seen before but didn’t really know like Mr. Rosenberger, who was on the town council and knew Poppa, and Doctor Baldwin, and the dentist whose name I can’t remember, I knew where we’d probably find the McSherry boys. The fighting was all going on in the woods and fields on and around Sandy Ridge, mostly where we’d been, and I pointed out some likely places to Jimmadasin. Most of them were taken up by spectators trying to get a good view, but Harry and Allan were nowhere to be found. I told Jimmadasin we had to go back down a ways closer to the fighting if we were going to find them. He said no, but went anyway—he sure as hell loved those two boys—but he scolded himself in his high, scared voice all the way back. I didn’t expect to find them; I just wanted to get close to where I could see and get away from the other spectators, but we found them anyway sitting on a stone fence with a near perfect view of the Federal regiments.
“Hey, Mundy, you come to the right place to see the fight,” Harry McSherry said, ignoring Jimmadasin, but looking uncomfortable nevertheless.
Jimmadasin screamed for them to come down from there because of how dangerous it was. He ran right up to both of them, pulled them down from the stone fence, nearly breaking their bones, and hugged them. They tried to escape, but, as I said, old Jimmadasin was strong; and it didn’t seem that he’d ever let go of them again.
“Yo’ Mamma’s sick wid worry o’re you, both of you.”
“Lemme go,” Harry said. His brother Allen didn’t struggle; he just looked scared of everything. He was eleven, more than a year younger than Harry and me. “Momma knows we’re watching the battle,” Harry said. “We went early this morning. She gave us permission, you ken go an’ ask her.”
“I don’ hafta ask nobody, ’cause she tole’ me to bring you home safe ’n’ soun’, dat’s ’xactly what she say. An’ dat’s what I’m goin’ to do right now.” Jimmadasin started marching them around the side of the fence and turned to me, expecting me to follow, but Harry begged to stay just for a few minutes more, and explained that it was safe here and Jimmadasin could see that, for there were no dead bodies here or nothing.
Jimmadasin allowed five minutes.
We could see the Federals hiding behind stone fences, and between them and General Jackson’s army were trees and small brush and more fences. There were woods down a ways to the right and a ravine, but there was nothing straight ahead beyond that stone fence but empty field, and our Confederates throwing everything they had at the line of Federal soldiers. The Federals were shooting back, of course, mostly cannon somewhere off to our left, but mostly they were getting shot at and shelled. It was loud, and much of the time that we all sat there together on the fence, we couldn’t hear ourselves talk. Harry was wrong about one thing, though: there were dead soldiers all around here. I could see them when I looked hard. They were covered with dirt and filth and blood that looked black, and they blended right into the ground and woods and brush, which were all torn up anyhow. Even though I don’t care a wet shit about Federal soldiers, it half made me sick to see them dead and lying around all over. Course, I just figured they were Yanks. They could’ve been our own men.…
Well, then all hell broke lose, and we almost got killed by our own ’Federate shells, which exploded in the trees right behind us; and it suddenly seemed that you couldn’t be safe nowhere. A head torn right off at the neck rolled right in front of Allan’s foot, as if it was a pumpkin or something; and Allan screamed. Course, I don’t blame him for that, especially since I could swear that the lips moved. Jimmadasin made some sort of a sacred sign with his hands, then there was another explosion, and Jimmadasin and Harry and Allan McSherry were gone.
It was like I woke up and they were gone, but I remembered what happened only afterward. Jimmadasin had grabbed Harry and Allan with those big hands of his and tried to do the same with me, but I was running before I could even think about it, not necessarily away from Jimmadasin, but running just the same, and I didn’t stop until I was in a little grove of brush and young trees. There was noise all around me, and I could hear men groaning and breathing and reloading their muskets. I got to know the rattle a ramrod makes when it’s pushed down into the barrel.
I had run the wrong way, and I didn’t dare move, and how I wished that Jimmadasin had grabbed me, damn him, because I was right in the thick of the fighting. I could see pretty good, too, and then even more bluebellies came running into the battle, replacing the Federals who had been killed—and they were lying everywhere, like it was a game and couldn’t be real, and when I didn’t see pieces of flesh and smears of blood, that’s the way I was thinking it was. The fire from both sides was devastating. Not even the stone wall could protect the Federals from that terrible hail of shot and shell, and I imagine our own boys were dying just the same on the other side of the wall. There were more Federals to my left, and I could see that they were the Eighty-Fourth Pennsylvania. One of their officers waved his sword and shouted like he was giving a speech, “Hold your ground; stand solid; keep cool; remember your homes and your country; don’t waste your powder,” and the damn fool was standing right out there in front of his men, leading them forward until someone called him to fall back because he was exposing himself unnecessarily. But he didn’t pay any attention and advanced with his men right into the fire of our boys. More bluebellies were falling than advancing, it seemed; but when I saw that officer fall, even though I felt sorry for the poor bastard, I thought right then that, yes, we were going to win, that General Jackson was going to kill so many Yanks that General Banks would have to retire back to where he came from and get the hell out of Winchester for good.
I crawled forward, emboldened by the killing, I guess, although I wasn’t being smart, just curious, and I’ve leaned better since then.
Now I could see our army down below what was a hill or maybe more like a ravine, and the bluebellies were charging right down there through galling fire; and you had to hand it to the Yankees, they were determined. I watched two of their color bearers fall, and saw the flag lifted up again each time. But our guns were too much for them, and the right side of what looked like a thousand Yanks just gave way, and the Bluebellies were running right back in the direction they came, but like flies around honey, more soldiers just seemed to swarm in, then the Yanks let out a terrific shout, something like a wolf howl; and Yankee and Reb were killing each other with bayonet and fighting hand to hand and getting all mixed up with each other. But the Yankees got past the stone fence, and sonovabitch if they didn’t turn our own boys, route them, and I remember saying to myself that this was only one little tiny piece of the fight, that our boys were pushing the Yankee soldiers back everywhere else, but I could feel that wasn’t true. I just felt sick and sort of paralysed, and suddenly I wanted to get home, even though I would be in big trouble. If you want the truth, and I’m ashamed to admit this, but I wanted my mother. I wanted to smell rabbit stew and all the fixings. I wanted to feel the warmth of the hearth and all that. And all this would just be sort of like a dream I would forget, or just remember like you remember a good story.
I could tell by where the sun was, or the smear that was the sun behind the clouds, that it must be close to twilight. As I probably said already, everything seemed to be going fast and slow at the same time, even though I know that’s impossible; and somehow the whole day had gotten swallowed up in a few minutes. But I was going home, that’s all I knew; and so I just walked in the opposite direction of the fighting, back up toward where Jimmadasin and I had gone to get out danger before. I didn’t know better then, but I thought that nothing could be worse than seeing all those dead and wounded soldiers laying all around like they were dolls or something. I had to keep my eyes open and be alert, but I found I could ignore seeing the dead soldiers and the wounded ones too; only thing I couldn’t ignore was their cries, and so I gave some of them water, which they all begged for; and even now that I think of i
t I’m ashamed I didn’t try to do more for them. But I just left them.
Well, I couldn’t have done anything much for them anyway, except keep them company when they cried for their mothers and give them a little water.
I should’ve stayed with them.
But I wanted my mother.
So I pretended it was all going to be all right and took the straightest route home, not even thinking that I might step into more fighting. I just figured if I ran straight ahead, big as life like old Jimmadasin taught me, I’d get home safe and sound. Which I did. It was just before dusk when everything looks bluish and pretty, and the fields and woods were all shadowy like they were sunk in dark pools of water or something; but if you looked out at the mountains you could sometimes see parts that were sunlit, and you could sometimes see rays coming right out of the sky like a painting in the Bible. That’s how it looked when I reached our farm; but even before I could see the family house, I knew something was wrong, because I could smell burning and hear terrible screaming and crying, and I could tell my Mother’s voice, and Poppa’s. Poppa was screaming more than anyone, and then he stopped and there were other voices I didn’t recognise. I ran right through the woods to get to the front yard of “the Big House,” as we called it, as if we had a hundred slaves like the Barton’s from Springdale, who Poppa knew. But that doesn’t matter, and I’m just keeping away from telling you what happened.
The Dog Megapack Page 62