“Oh, no, you ain’t!” Zeb barked right back. He let out a weary sigh, staring beyond the girl and her brother, watching smoke pour out of the barn and house. His head started spinning, and he thought he might reel out of the saddle.
Ebenezer shouted, “What did y’all do?”
“I set everything afire,” Luansy said matter-of-factly. “Now we best ride before the McCutcheons or the Becketts come to investigate.”
Zeb refused to budge.
“You listen to me, Zeb Hogan,” she said. “The Mississippi River’s blocked, so the Confederate Army has been using the Tombigbee to send supplies and troops down to Mobile. Bedford Forrest is around these parts, and I don’t think you want to run into him, being a fugitive Yankee soldier and all.”
Turning savagely, Zeb glared at that big-mouthed Ebenezer Chase.
Ebenezer returned the look meekly before dropping his head down in shame.
“I know this country,” the girl continued. “I can get you across that river. I can get you to Meridian, just over the border in Mississippi. You’re bound for Vicksburg, and that sounds like a good spot for Petey and me.”
“What about your pa?” Zeb asked.
“What about him?” Never had he heard such venom in a female’s voice. “If the devil had a brother, it’d be our daddy. I want to get Petey as far away from him as I can, before he kills him . . . or the both of us. Now, you want to sit here and argue, or do you want to ride?”
* * * * *
After watching a dozen hard-riding Confederates thunder past, galloping too hard even to notice the riders hidden in the trees, Zeb, Ebenezer, and the Taylors forded the Tombigbee. The river was swollen, but they swam their horses across it easily and trotted a few miles before slowing to a walk.
Later they rode through Livingston, a little burg of mostly frame buildings and a few old cabins, stopping to water their mounts at an artesian well in the center of town that Luansy said they called the Bored Well. Ebenezer filled their canteens, and they moved on. Nobody paid them any mind.
On the road to York, they saw two boys fishing underneath a covered bridge that crossed the Sucarnoochee River. Petey squealed with delight over the sounds the horses and mule made when they went through that bridge. Zeb found himself smiling. Little Petey acted like they were just going for a ride, and that took Zeb’s mind off the war going on all around them. Later, they skirted around York, and by dusk, Luansy told them that they had to be in Mississippi. By then Petey was worn out, so they pulled off into the woods, and made camp for the night.
When Luansy pulled salt pork and scones from her cantle bag, Ebenezer clapped his hands in delight. “Aren’t you glad you brought her along now, Zeb?” he asked.
They all think they’re on some joyous ride! Zeb spit. “I didn’t bring her,” he said stiffly. He ate two scones and a hunk of salt pork, however, and enjoyed it.
Yet any fondness he was feeling for Luansy Taylor died after supper when she approached him, and said, her voice plain bossy and full of gumption, “Take off your pants.”
“I ain’t doing no such thing.”
“I want to look at that leg.”
“You ain’t seeing my . . . You just get gone, Luansy Taylor.”
Shaking her head, she let out a laugh. “If it hadn’t been for me, you wouldn’t have that leg, Zeb Hogan. It was about to mortify, would have had to come off . . . though I don’t know how we’d have managed that task. More than likely, we’d just have had let you rot and die. Now, I’ve seen your leg plenty of times when you were delirious.”
“I ain’t delirious now.”
“Come on, Zeb. I practically raised Petey, changed his diapers after Mama was called to glory, given him baths more times that I can count. I got another brother, and a worthless daddy. No need to be bashful.”
With that, her bony fingers latched onto the waistband and started yanking down his pants that slipped off easily, being too big in the waist. He tried to fight her off, but he remained weak, especially after that long ride. He kept yelling: “Help me, Ebenezer! Help me!” But the slave just laughed, slapping his thighs. Then those pants were down.
She pulled back the bandage she’d wrapped around Zeb’s leg, studied the healing wound, and at last announced: “You’re mending.”
“You done?” Zeb demanded.
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m just admiring the view.”
That caused Ebenezer to howl even louder, and Petey, he started laughing, too, though he didn’t know why.
Zeb jerked up his pants, calling Luansy Taylor “a brazen little harlot,” but she didn’t seem to mind that one bit. By the Eternal, Zeb thought, I don’t reckon she would.
“You’re blushing, Zeb Hogan,” she said as she walked away.
* * * * *
Zeb knew what they would find in Meridian. Same as they had seen in Atlanta. He dreaded it.
He hadn’t taken part in that fight. When Meridian had burned, Zeb was still in Wisconsin, or maybe on his way down the Tennessee River, but some of Sherman’s bummers had later told him how they’d laid waste to that town. It was a fairly new city, founded only five years earlier, where the Mobile & Ohio Railroad intersected with the Southern Railway. A corporal named Allison with the 15th Iowa, whom Zeb had befriended on the march to Atlanta, had informed him how Sherman had given the orders to wipe Meridian off the map. “And that’s what we done,” Allison had said. Federals spent about five days in February of ’64 in the town after the battle, turning railroad tracks into Sherman’s hairpins, tearing down bridges, burning locomotives and cars and buildings—both businesses and people’s homes. Corporal Allison said the troops got paid in full for what they did, too: salted meat, fresh pork, fresh beef, flour, and salt. They took all that grub with them when they marched back to Vicksburg.
Riding into the remains of Meridian, Zeb thought: From the looks of this city, I don’t think many people have had much to eat since Sherman come along.
“My word,” Luansy said as they passed a burned-out shell of a home, nothing left but the white marble columns in front of what once had been a mansion. A tent was pitched in the front yard, and from inside came a baby’s bawling and a mother’s frantic words for the child to “hush, please, hush.”
One man wearing the shell jacket of a Confederate infantry captain hobbled off a freshly built boardwalk, using his hands as crutches because his legs were gone right below the hips. He begged for money, but they rode right past him, unable to answer his pleas, unable to look him in the eye.
* * * * *
Traffic on the road became heavier with civilians, their wagons loaded down with supplies, fighting the mud, all of them heading west. Once Zeb asked a gent in dungarees how much farther it was to Vicksburg. The man just shrugged, saying, “Never been out of Newton County since they carved it out of the Choctaw lands after the Treaty of Dancin’ Rabbit Creek.”
Several wagons had bogged down to their axles, and Zeb could feel those travelers staring at them as they rode on, envious of their mounts. Nobody said much.
The forests here seemed practically solid, the lumber thicker and taller than anything Zeb or Ebenezer had seen since South Carolina. Like we’re traveling in a cave, Zeb thought. Can’t hardly even see the sun.
They came out of the woods abruptly the next morning. Trees had been cut down, splintered, about five to eight feet from the ground.
“What happened here?” Luansy asked.
“Battle,” Zeb replied.
They kept riding and eventually came to a little clearing. Two cannons lay at the edge of the road, spiked, the spokes of the wheels hacked away. Beyond that, wild hogs rooted in the mounds, and Zeb’s stomach turned queasy. A big razorback stood on top of a mound of dirt, snarling, daring the riders to get a closer look. Zeb shuddered, picturing Sergeant Major Engstrand’s body lying in some shallow grave back in Florence, wondering if the wild hogs had unearthed his body, ripped his dead flesh. That thought made him want to ride on, find Sergeant Ben
DeVere in Vicksburg.
And kill him.
“Dearest God!” Luansy tried to cover Petey’s eyes, but Petey wouldn’t have any of that.
Tears streamed down Luansy’s face. Ebenezer slapped the mule’s rump, hurried them out of that clearing, away from the battlefield, back into the woods.
Luansy was still crying. “Couldn’t they have buried them properly?” she demanded, and slid from the saddle, depositing Petey on the banks of a bar ditch, while she leaned over, gagging, coughing, spitting up.
“You . . .” Zeb stopped. He was about to tell her that she should have stayed back on their farm. He couldn’t tell her that. Nor could he explain to her what she’d just seen.
“They were soldiers,” she said, still crying.
“They were men,” he told her, and dismounted.
“Rebs or Yanks?” Petey asked, still looking at the mounds, at the feral pigs.
“I don’t reckon it much matters,” Zeb said, and repeated, “They were men. They deserve better, but in war . . .” He shook his head, and squatted beside Luansy. “We need to keep riding,” he said, and gently gripped her arm. “Can you keep going?”
She shook free, staring at Zeb as if he were to blame for what they’d just seen. She rose, stumbling, snatched up Petey and shoved him in the saddle, then climbed aboard the mule behind him.
That night, they didn’t eat, just rode off into the woods and made a cold camp. Nobody was hungry.
* * * * *
The weather had warmed as they bypassed Jackson. By afternoon, they were sweating. When they stopped to water their horses at a creek flowing through the forest, Ebenezer shed his quilt vest, securing it behind the saddle, and fished out the map from his haversack. He studied it for a minute before looking at Zeb.
“We’ll be splitting up soon, Zeb.”
Zeb answered with a nod.
“You sure you want to do what you got planned?”
“It’s my duty. I’m honor bound.”
Ebenezer studied him, wanting to say something—argue, Zeb suspected—but he kept quiet.
“What are y’all taking about?” Luansy asked.
“I’m going to Vicksburg,” Zeb told her. “Got to see a fellow. You and Petey can go along with Ebenezer. He’s going to Dallas.”
“Dallas.” Luansy spit out the word like it left a bad taste in her mouth.
“That’s where Lizzie and Tempie are,” Ebenezer told her. “My wife and daughter.”
“Who’s waiting for you in Vicksburg?” she asked Zeb.
Zeb didn’t answer, just kicked his horse into a walk.
* * * * *
The land turned hillier, and they kept passing more and more people. Families in wagons. Slaves. Men riding alone. All bound west. Trying to flee this war. Zeb had stopped looking at the faces, seeing how sad they were, how heartbroken, miserable. Some of them were sickly looking. The only person he wanted to see was Ben DeVere, and he knew his trail was coming to an end. Vicksburg was less than a day’s ride away.
Ebenezer rode right alongside Zeb. Luansy and Petey trailed behind a few rods. Zeb would never make it as a cavalry trooper, but despite how stiff his legs and backside were, despite how much his back ached, he kicked his horse into a little trot. He was desperate to reach Vicksburg.
“Slow down.” Ebenezer’s words rang out behind Zeb. “Zeb Hogan, slow down! You hear me?”
Reluctantly Zeb reined up, shot Ebenezer a menacing look, and said, “What do you want, Ebenezer?”
The slave pointed a long arm down the road at Petey and Luansy, about two hundred yards behind, urging their mule, trying to catch up.
“I didn’t ask them to come!” Zeb snapped.
Ebenezer started to say something, words he would probably live to regret, but it was then that he spotted the wagon on the side of the road, with the red lettering stenciled onto the canvas tarp.
Chapter Fourteen
Without thinking, licking his lips, Ebenezer swung from the horse and stared at the wagon. Behind him, Zeb Hogan muttered a curse and started to ride on, but something stopped him. Breathing heavily, he wheeled the horse around and headed back to Ebenezer.
“What is it?” Zeb asked.
The slave pointed at the wagon.
“I can’t read,” Zeb griped.
“Says Hall Farms and Plantation. Dallas County, Texas.”
Another mule-drawn wagon churned up mud in the road, the driver cursing, so Zeb and Ebenezer eased their mounts out of the way. By that time, Luansy and Petey had caught up with them.
A white man crawled from underneath the wagon and, pulling himself up, said, “What you young ’uns want?”
He was broad-shouldered, wearing trousers and shirt caked with mud and grease, holding a wrench in his right hand, a porkpie hat resting beside the wheel. He had hazel eyes, a receding hairline, and a flamboyant black mustache that matched what hair remained on his head.
“What you want, I say? What you doin’ here?”
“Looks like you need a hand,” Ebenezer said, handing the reins to Luansy.
Grumbling, Zeb also dismounted. He wrapped the reins around a bush and nodded at the white man. For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why he had come back. He should have just ridden on, left Ebenezer and the Taylors. The name Hall, however, rang a bell, and he knew Dallas, Texas, was where Ebenezer hoped to find his wife and daughter.
“Wheel’s busted,” Zeb said.
Distrust showed on the white man’s face. “What you want?” he asked again.
“Just helping,” Zeb said.
“Why?”
“It’s called Christian charity.” Luansy had answered the question, and now the man looked away from Zeb and at the girl on horseback.
He stared at her longer than he should have, and Zeb didn’t like the look on the man’s face.
“Wheel won’t fix itself,” Zeb said.
The man’s eyes left Luansy and locked on Zeb. “Why ain’t you in the war?” the man asked.
Zeb laughed. “Mister, I ain’t but fifteen years old. Not a full-growed man . . . like you.”
The man lifted his wrench. “Watch how you speak to me, boy.”
“No offense meant,” Zeb said, smiling, lying again, because he certainly had meant to offend this ornery cuss.
“We just wanting to help, sir,” Ebenezer said, thickening his accent.
The man stared at him for a moment. He jutted his jaw at the slave. “He yourn?” he asked Zeb.
“My manservant,” Zeb answered. Another wagon lumbered by. Zeb gestured at Luansy and her brother. “This is my sister, Luansy, and my brother, Petey.” By the Eternal, Zeb realized, they look nothing like me. “Half-sister, half-brother, I mean.”
They waited. The man didn’t move, just watched them.
“You can’t fix that wheel by yourself,” Zeb said.
“Can’t pay you nothin’,” the man said.
“We’re not asking for anything,” Zeb said. “You’ve had some trouble.”
“Little bit.” The man lowered his wrench.
Zeb held out his right hand. “Name’s Zeb Hogan.”
“Charley Prescott. Bound for Dallas, Texas.” Reluctantly he moved the wrench to his left hand, and shook Zeb’s hand.
“Let’s get to it,” Zeb said.
“Can’t your darky fix it?” Charley Prescott asked.
Zeb stopped. His fingers balled into fists. For a second, he considered taking a swing at Charley Prescott’s nose. It would not have been the first time that nose had been punched, but a half-dozen Confederate cavalry troopers trotted past, and Zeb smiled at Charley Prescott. “He can’t do by himself.”
Ebenezer stepped forward. “We’s all gonna have to do some work, Mister Prescott.”
* * * * *
Fate, providence, divine intervention, God’s plan, just plain luck. Whatever one called it, Ebenezer didn’t know how to explain it. They had been riding along, probably would have ridden right past Charle
y Prescott’s wagon. It was as though God stopped us, right there. He directed my eyes to that wagon tarp. He . . . Ebenezer shook his head.
“I work for Major Clyde Hall,” Charley Prescott told them that evening, after the spare wheel had replaced the busted one. “He lives in Dallas most times, but he also got himself a cotton plantation on the Pearl River in Hancock County, way down south on the Louisiana border. That’s where I’m comin’ from.”
Charley Prescott had found his voice, and had loosened it considerably with the liquor he was drinking from a jug.
“Yanks control the Mississippi River these days.” Prescott burped. “Rebs tried to recapture Natchez back . . . oh, I reckon it was early winter in ’63 . . . but couldn’t do it. Anyway, the major sent me back to fetch some of his valuables from his Pearl River Plantation.” He had another long pull, swallowed, and wiped his mouth. “Sent me alone. Didn’t mind that so much, ’cause I got me a woman in Hancock County. That’s where I used to spend all my time . . . workin’ on the Pearl River Plantation . . . till Yankees took over most of Mississippi.” Another drink. “But I tell you, it ain’t no easy trip, taking a wagon from Dallas to Hancock County, and back again.”
“I reckon not,” Ebenezer said. “What with Yankees all over the place.”
Prescott snorted, tried to push himself up, but his legs wouldn’t cooperate. “Yanks ain’t half of it. You’s got to keep your eyes peeled for scavengers.”
“What are they?” Luansy asked.
“Deserters mostly. Quit the Confederate cause. Now they’s just fightin’ for themselves. Road agents, they is, preyin’ on wayfarers from Mississippi to Texas.”
“Great!” Petey shouted, and his sister told him to hush.
“Maybe we should tag along with you then,” Ebenezer said. “Could help each other out. After all, we’re bound for Texas, too.”
Zeb glared at Ebenezer. He wasn’t going to Texas. He had an appointment with Sergeant Ben DeVere in Vicksburg, and after that . . . After that . . . what? Well, it didn’t matter. First he had to find that traitor, and kill him. But Texas? Texas sounded a million miles away. Texas was full of wild Indians, burned-over desert, poisonous plants, killing water, vicious rattlesnakes, and savage renegades. Or so he’d heard. He felt the blood rushing to his ears, his anger at Ebenezer Chase rising, but Charley Prescott’s grunt got his attention.
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