Which is how Ebenezer Chase felt in Major Hall’s parlor.
His mouth hung open, and again the pain became intense, too deep and horrific to cry out. The major’s lying, he tried to convince himself, but suddenly the major stopped laughing, and the drunkard began sobbing, blubbering like Ebenezer thought he should have been doing.
“Yellow fever,” he heard Major Hall say. “Last October . . . late in the season. The outbreak . . . claimed thirteen lives . . . including . . . my . . . wife . . . Annie Mae. If only I’d . . . been here . . .”
The major might have said more. Probably he did. Ebenezer just couldn’t hear. Couldn’t hear a thing. The chandelier and the wainscoting started spinning around like they were caught in a tornado. A hand touched his shoulder, and Ebenezer knew Zeb Hogan was speaking to him, but Zeb’s words made no sense, didn’t mean a thing, and then there was a scream. Ebenezer’s.
Finally he had found his voice. The chandelier and the wainscoting turned black, and Ebenezer slipped into that welcome darkness.
* * * * *
“Ebenezer?”
His eyelids fluttered, and Zeb Hogan’s face slowly came into focus. Zeb’s eyes looked red, as if he had been crying. Ebenezer tried to tell himself that this had been a dream, but Zeb broke the illusion.
“I’m plumb sorry, Ebenezer. I . . . well . . . I ain’t got the words to say . . .”
Zeb’s head hung down, shaking sideways. Behind him rose the yellowing canvas tarp of one of Captain Taneyhill’s Murphy wagons.
“What happened?” a far-off voice asked. Ebenezer recognized the voice as his own.
“You fainted back at that walking whiskey keg’s house. We brung you back here.”
“Where?”
“Wagon yard. We’re spending the night. Lighting out at daybreak tomorrow.” Zeb sniffed. His next words came out with urgency as he looked at Ebenezer. “It ain’t fair. It just ain’t right. It . . .”
“Nobody ever said life was fair, Zeb. Or right.” Ebenezer pushed himself to a sitting position, and the pain hit, like it finally hit him that time Eleanor kicked him so hard, like the time when he had slipped off the wagon and knocked the air out of his lungs. He saw sweet little Tempie and poor young Lizzie, and he knew that he would never see them again, not in this world, that they were dead, had died long before he had ever run off from Hall Plantation. Ebenezer started bawling, crying so hard he felt his whole body shaking. Wheezing, choking out sobs, he experienced a pain worse than he had ever felt. He felt Zeb’s strong hands pull him close, hold him so tightly, and then he heard Zeb’s moans, knew that Zeb was crying, too.
The muleskinners and the captain—and other wayfarers spending the night in the wagon yard—watched, but none said a word, nobody made any jokes, nobody even bothered to offer a prayer. They just let Zeb and Ebenezer cry it out.
Eventually Ebenezer sucked in a lungful of air, held it a spell, and slowly exhaled. Zeb released his hold, took the time to wipe his eyes with his grimy shirt sleeves. His lips kept trembling, but he managed to ask: “You all right?”
“Yeah,” Ebenezer said. “It hurts, though.”
“Hurt when James died,” Zeb said. “Hurt like blazes. Same when Sergeant Major Engstrand died, maybe even a bit worse, him being like a pa to me. You don’t ever really get over it, but it gets . . . well . . . the pain won’t hurt this much always.”
It’s one thing to lose a brother, a friend, Ebenezer thought, but it’s an entirely different pain to lose a wife and daughter. Still, Ebenezer gave Zeb a steady nod, wiped the snot hanging from his nose, rubbed away the tears. “Thanks, Zeb,” he said.
Zeb shook his head as if to say he hadn’t done anything, but he had. He most certainly had. He had been there for Ebenezer. Ebenezer hadn’t realized what a friend he had in Zeb Hogan. They had been at odds for most of the journey, tolerating each other, depending on one another, often despising the other. No, they had never been real friendly, even after saving each other’s bacon a time or two, but Ebenezer guessed that you don’t come through all they had come through without forming some type of bond. He wasn’t sure if Zeb considered him a friend, but Ebenezer knew he would never have as good a friend as Zeb Hogan.
Spurs jingled and, smelling the hay and dust of the wagon yard, Ebenezer and Zeb looked up to find Captain Taneyhill walking across the yard from a campfire, holding his hat at his side.
He knelt in front of the two boys. “Y’all feel like eatin’?” the captain asked.
Ebenezer shook his head, and Zeb said, “We ain’t real hungry right now, Captain.”
“You’ll need your strength,” he said.
“Maybe in a bit,” Ebenezer said, just to say something.
Taneyhill placed the hat on his head, pushed up the brim. “Amado’s takin’ half the wagons back to Jefferson in the morn,” he said. “Loaded with cotton. I’ll be leadin’ the other wagons to Franklin, and across the border to El Paso.” The captain looked grim. “Ebenezer, you’ll be goin’ with Amado.”
“No,” he said, and thought to add, “sir.”
Zeb gave the runaway slave a curious look.
The captain stared hard at Ebenezer for the longest while. “The wagons I’m takin’ are loaded with gunpowder. It ain’t gonna be an easy trip.”
“I’m going on. Zeb . . .” Ebenezer let the words die. Me and Zeb come this far, he thought. He could have abandoned me countless times, and I reckon I’ve floated my stick alongside his all this way. Besides, Zeb might need my help when he finally meets Sergeant Ben DeVere. Then another thought struck him, rocked him: There’s nothing for me in Jefferson. Nothing for me . . . anywhere.
The captain sank to sit on the ground, his legs tucked inside each other. He pushed his hat back. “There’s a munitions factory in Dallas, been manufacturin’ gunpowder and the likes for the Confederate Army,” he said, “and for some of the rangerin’ bands posted around Fort Belknap when the Comanch’ and Kiowa would start actin’ up.”
“Like Selma,” Ebenezer said, and the captain stared with a blank expression.
“They was making powder at Selma, Alabama,” Zeb explained. “Or so me and Ebenezer heard. Making it from ladies’ pee.”
“What?” For the first time, Taneyhill looked shocked. He turned his head while Zeb explained about the ladies of Selma donating their chamber-lye to the war effort.
“Well,” the captain continued, “I don’t know about that, but the mayor and the owner of the factory have decided they don’t want this gunpowder to fall into Yankee hands. They’d rather have it go to Maximilian.”
“Who’s he?” Zeb asked.
“Emperor of Mexico. He’s got his hands full fightin’ a bunch of rebels down south.”
“Shucks,” Zeb said. “Seems to me that Texas ought to be supplying them Mexican rebels with that powder. Seems to me you would think this Maximilian fellow is a lot like Abe Lincoln.”
The captain managed to stop the smile creasing his face. “Well, he ain’t. But the fact is Maximilian isn’t popular with his people. Not popular with a lot of folks. The United States government won’t recognize him. Maybe that’s why a lot of Confederates have been saying they’ll cross the border and fight for him, though I don’t care much for him, either. So if . . . and that’s a big if . . . if we make it to Franklin, cross the border, and meet Maximilian’s emissaries, there’s a good chance we’ll have a rough go gettin’ those wagons delivered to his troops.”
“We’re coming with you,” Zeb and Ebenezer announced in unison. Zeb kept talking. “Nothing’s keeping me from settling up with Ben DeVere.”
“Comanches might. Bandits might.” Taneyhill shook his head. “What I’m tryin’ to get through those thick noggins of yours is that there’s better than a fair to middlin’ chance that we’ll be bushwhacked for that gunpowder long before we ever reach Franklin. I never knew anybody in Dallas who could keep a secret, especially that verbose mayor. Way I figure it, word’s out what we’re haulin’, and Comancher
os, gunrunners, and just about every b’hoy from the Nations to the Nueces Strip will be after it. If we get to Mexico, then we’ve got the Juaristas . . . those are the Mexican rebels wantin’ Maximilian’s head on a platter . . . to worry about.”
“Then why do it?” Ebenezer asked. “Especially if you don’t like this emperor fellow, either?”
The captain shrugged. “They’re payin’ me good money to try.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Texas turned hard. Everything about the country got tough: the land, what grew on it, what slithered across it, and what flew overhead across a big, blue sky. Long gone were the forests and swamps of the South, and Zeb grew to miss those long-leaf pines. Out here, it seemed, the only thing passing for trees were scrawny old cedars here and there, more along the river bottoms—when there was a river, and that was rare—and pesky mesquite. Mostly only cactus grew out of the chalky hills. Even the water was hard. Sometimes it tasted like pure brine, but more than likely it went down like iron.
By the Eternal, Zeb thought when they were two days out of Fort Worth, never thought I’d feel this . . . not after all them rivers we crossed in Carolina, Georgia, and all . . . but, criminy, I miss all that water.
Ten days later, they reached Fort Belknap, where they filled water barrels and canteens. After that, they saw only a big emptiness as they followed the trail John Butterfield had laid out for the Overland Mail Company before the war broke out. Since then, the US government had moved the trail out of the South, but Captain Taneyhill said the old trail was still used by some Texian entrepreneurs and the jackass mail.
Zeb had to take the captain’s word on that. He hadn’t seen anybody, other than members of the wagon train, since leaving Fort Belknap. Not even Indians, and he had a hankering to see a warrior.
Typically Zeb rode either on the point, usually alongside Captain Taneyhill, or brought up the rear, riding some distance behind the wagons skinned by Sweazy, Pruden, Severo, and Gonzales, with Ebenezer assisting the latter.
Ten miles a day proved lucky. Eleven or twelve was unheard of. Eight became good. They averaged six. Captain Taneyhill took no chances, not with all that gunpowder. They kept the cook fire away from the wagons, and after they ate supper, they would move on another mile or two before making camp.
“Best way to travel through Injun country,” Sweazy told Zeb.
Zeb didn’t mind playing things safe, though it irked him. Slow as they were traveling, he felt he would never get to Franklin. Sergeant Ben DeVere might have flown the coop by the time they reached that town.
* * * * *
Scanning the horizon, standing in the stirrups on a ridge top, Zeb let out a whistle, and Captain Taneyhill loped his horse over to the youngster.
Eagerly Zeb pointed up the trail, yelling: “Comanch’! Maybe Kiowa!” He fumbled with the Sharps.
“Easy does it,” Taneyhill said, studying the riders.
“But they’s Indians.”
“You won’t see a Kiowa or Comanch’ unless they want you to spot them,” Taneyhill said. “As for me, I got no particular interest in seeing one on this here trip. Those are white men.”
“Bandits?”
“Rebs.”
Slowly Zeb relaxed. A few minutes later, he could make out their gray shell jackets and brown hats. Still, it had been so long since he had seen Secesh, he practically gawked at the seven riders. By the time the Rebels began climbing the ridge top, the wagons had caught up with the captain and Zeb.
“Keep that Sharps handy, Zeb,” Taneyhill whispered. “Just in case.” Turning in the saddle, the captain motioned at the muleskinners to relax, but be ready.
The leader, a sergeant with a gray goatee, held up his right hand, and the six Rebs behind him reined up. The sergeant kicked his bay horse—so skinny her ribs looked to be about to poke free—into a walk, and he trotted up to the captain and Zeb.
“You heard any word about General Johnston? Or Smith?” the Confederate asked.
“I haven’t, Sergeant,” Captain Taneyhill said, “but the war’s over. You’ve heard about Lee, I take it.”
“Yeah.” The word came out like a curse. The sergeant turned in the saddle, waved his men forward. As they rode up, he faced the captain. “We were down south, near Brownsville. Turned back the Yanks at Palmito Hill.” He shifted to ask one of his men: “When was that, Marcus?”
“They had us whupped on the twelfth,” a raw-boned kid, who looked younger than Zeb, announced proudly. “Then Rip Ford come along with us the next day, and we beat the devil out of them.”
That was May 12 and 13. General Lee had surrendered to Grant on April 9. “What a waste,” Zeb heard himself say.
The sergeant shook his head. “It was the Yankees’ fault. We had us a truce, but the Yanks broke it. They just wanted some jubilate, the vainglorious fools. Colonel Ford figured the Bluebelly leader desired to get in one more fight before the war had ended. After that little ruction, we heard the news about Lee. I still . . . it’s just . . . I can’t believe it.”
“Believe it.” Captain Taneyhill spoke with authority, and the sergeant and the dusty, weary, bleary-eyed soldiers seemed to sit a little straighter in the saddle. “The war’s over.”
“Most certainly it’s over for them dead Yanks we left at Palmito Hill, and the hundred or so we took prisoner,” the rider with an eye patch said, and the pockmarked man riding beside him laughed. The others didn’t find humor in his remark. Nor did Captain Taneyhill.
“Colonel Ford, he led us back to Brownsville after the battle, not that it was much of an affair,” the Rebel leader said. “Some of the boys talked to him, said we’d done our duty, that the war was pret’ much over, that maybe it was time for us to go home. Colonel Ford, he just nodded his head, said he wouldn’t stop us. So me and the boys decided to come on up this way.”
“Back home,” the raw-boned boy said, and tears welled in his eyes.
“Home.” The sergeant choked out the word.
“No news from General Smith?” the boy asked.
Captain Taneyhill’s head shook.
“Then there’s still hope,” the one with the eye patch remarked. “If Smith and Johnston can combine their forces, we’ll lick the Yanks yet.”
“It’s over,” Captain Taneyhill said. “Smith and Johnston likely have surrendered by now. Go home. We lost. The time for fightin’ is over. Now’s time to start rebuildin’.”
“Yeah,” the sergeant said.
“Y’all seen anything on the trail?” Taneyhill asked.
“No, sir,” the sergeant replied. “Just a church at Phantom Hill. Figure that one out, eh. How about y’all?”
The captain shook his head. “We’ve seen only one stagecoach, heading east, since we left Belknap. No Indian sign. Been smooth since we left Dallas.”
“It’ll be good to see Gainesville again.” The sergeant saluted the captain, and rode on, followed by his men.
* * * * *
Three days passed, but the country stayed the same. They rode underneath a mesa, the wind blowing hot, the sky cloudless. The sun baked the riders, mosquitoes pestered them, buzzing by their ears, biting their necks.
The captain had sent Zeb back behind the train, and he had fallen maybe a quarter mile behind Pruden’s double-hitched wagons. His left hand slammed the back of his sweaty neck, missing a mosquito, when there came a loud crack.
It was a sound Zeb had heard often. It came from an Enfield rifle, and none of Captain Taneyhill’s men carried Enfields. He kicked the roan into a lope, hanging onto the Sharps and reins, bouncing in the saddle as he put the horse into a gallop. Another report echoed across the valley, then another. Urging the roan to run harder, giving the gelding plenty of rein, Zeb somehow managed to pull the Sharps’ hammer to full cock.
His mouth turned dry as he crested a little hill. Flames consumed Pruden’s wagon tops, his two lead mules lay dead in the traces, and Pruden was sprinting to where Sweazy was forming the other wagons into what mig
ht pass for a circle. Pruden had cut loose the remaining mules, and they were loping down the road, not bothering to stop in the fort Sweazy was organizing.
The road narrowed as the roan carried Zeb down the hill toward the burning wagons. Those bushwhackers, whoever they were, had picked a good spot. They had stopped Pruden’s wagons at a narrow spot in the road, pretty much blocking any chance the other wagons had of retreating.
Holding his breath, Zeb guided his horse toward the burning wagons. Heat from the flames singed his hair. His right boot scraped against the rocky wall, but he managed to get past. He had to get past—before all that gunpowder blew up. A bullet zipped past his ear as he saw Gonzales waving at him, urging him on. Dust kicked up a few rods in front of Zeb, but he never heard that shot. Gonzales stopped waving, and lifted his rifle. Smoke belched from the barrel, obscuring his face, then came a deafening roar behind Zeb. Heat blasted his back, and Zeb found himself flying over the roan’s head as the little gelding stumbled.
He landed with a thud, felt the Sharps boom underneath him. Rolling over, Zeb used the Sharps as a crutch to push himself to his feet, thinking it a wonder that he hadn’t blown his head off with his own rifle. The roan limped away, and Zeb staggered toward Gonzales. His hat was gone. His ears rang. His knees burned from scrapes and tears, and he tasted sweat, blood, and dirt. He made it a couple of steps when a second blast knocked him off his feet, but he came up again, quicker this time, pushing forward through the smoke and dust as he watched Gonzales ram a rod down the barrel of his rifle, cap the nipple, bring the stock to his shoulder, and squeeze the trigger. A bullet whizzed past Zeb, and he recognized the sound he had heard much too often, the sound of a bullet striking flesh. Behind him, a man groaned, and Zeb shot a glance over his shoulder to find a black man dropping to his knees, falling on his side. Zeb looked back and dived, crawling under the caboose of Gonzales’s wagon, coming up inside the perimeter of the circle. Gonzales had already reloaded his rifle, and Zeb began readying the Sharps.
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