by Crowe (epub)
The soldiers exchanged looks, ranging from shock at having their deaths proved right in front of their eyes to sadness to something akin to relief.
“Come on,” shouted one of the soldiers, shoving the others aside. He affixed his bayonet to his musket and tromped over the top of the hill. The ghosts behind the hill heard gunfire erupt as they watched the top of the hill where the brave soldier had stood. For what seemed like an eternity, nothing happened. Then, the brave soldier’s head popped back over the hill and called to his mates. “You boys comin’ or am I gonna have to do this all by myself?”
The men began whoopin’ and hollerin’. Someone took up the rebel yell and the soldiers poured over the top of the hill and onto the train tracks. The Union guns fired, but their shots did nothing to stem the tide of troops headed straight up the tracks for them.
“Come on fellas,” Johnny called over his shoulder. “Let’s rout ‘em out!”
The Confederate officers held their ground, watching and waiting in silence as the Union soldiers filed past them along the railroad tracks. Johnny had instructed the officers to keep their men back in the shadows and to hold them still. Colonel Morris smiled, but there was no humor in it. It’s a good plan, he thought. I don’t know if they’d see us here even if they were looking for us. We’re no more than shadows ourselves. But the Union soldiers weren’t looking for them. Their focus was fixed on the little hill to the south, where Johnny lay in wait with a small unit of men, oblivious to the fact that they were marching into the waiting arms of the Confederates. It’s a good plan.
When Johnny sprang up and waved his hat, the sunlight reflecting off the bronze plate in his head, they marched forward, making no effort to be quiet. It was too late to worry about that now, the Union soldiers were caught and it didn’t matter if they heard the Confederates closing in on them or not. Still, the Federal troops were blind to their movement. Johnny had drawn their attention and their gunfire, which masked the sound of what was happening in the woods on either side of the tracks.
Colonel Johns raised his hand and halted his men. He was a good leader and even though they were dead, he could still read the mood of his men. While Johnny led the soldiers down the hill and onto the tracks, Colonel Morris counted in his head. Eight, nine, TEN!
“Fire! Fire! Fire!” Morris shouted. He heard the order being repeated up and down the line on the eastern side of the tracks and knew the same order was being given on the western side. Smoke filled the woods on either side of the tracks and the men took up the rallying cry. Again, Colonel Morris smiled. It’s a good plan.
Colonel Johns realized too late that it was a trap. The men at the front of the line had ceased their firing and had run, not in orderly retreat but in full-scale panic. The Colonel had tried to hold them in formation, but the men around him scattered when the first of the troops from the front ran past them. The edges of the battlefield blurred, more rebels pouring out of the trees on either side of the tracks, firing and yelling as they charged. By the time Colonel Johns ordered the retreat, most of his army was already well behind him.
The Colonel had heard the rumors that had spread throughout the camp in the past few days. He had passed it off as superstitious rot. Now, watching Johnny lead the rebel soldiers up the tracks, he realized how wrong he had been; the Confederates did have a demon among them and now he was leading the attack.
“Get ‘round of ‘em,” Johnny shouted to Colonel Morris. “Get between ‘em and Washington.” The Colonel nodded and moved his men further to the northeast. Left on their own, the panicked Union soldiers would follow the tracks all the way back to Alexandria and then back across the Potomac River to their capital. For their plan to be successful, they would have to drive the Federals to the northwest, away from D.C.
Johnny turned around too late, a Federal soldier lunged forward and plunged the blade of his bayonet between Johnny’s ribs, directly into his heart. Both Johnny and the soldier looked down at where the blade passed into the side of Johnny’s chest.
“Go on,” Johnny hollered, flapping his hand at the ghost. “Get out of here.” The soldier dropped his musket, turned tail, and ran.
Cut off, Colonel Johns realized, seeing the rebel soldiers lined across the tracks. There was a break in the trees to the northwest and that was where the Colonel ordered his men, though they were already headed that for the clearing on their own. Perhaps they could make it to Harper’s Ferry, but then what? No time to worry about that now, the Colonel thought. I just need to get these men under control and safely out of here. We’ve got the numbers. We just need to pull together and ---
Stepping into the clearing, Colonel Johns froze. Around him, the Union soldiers did the same, their terror forgotten as they looked to the northwest. Two long columns of ghosts marched toward them; the closest line was the shorter of the two, but the troops gathered in the clearing hardly registered that fact. What had stopped the men in their tracks was the sheer number of ghosts marching to meet them. It was the largest collection of spirits that any of them had ever seen.
Johnny and Colonel Morris reached Johns at the same time. They looked off into the distance where the Union leader was staring. The lines of ghosts would be here in no time at all. They needed to act fast.
“You see that?” Colonel Morris asked. “They’re coming to reinforce our position.”
“My God,” Johns whispered, looking on the faces of the men. The closest were indeed Confederate soldiers.
“Do you surrender?” Johnny asked, trying to hide the urgency in his voice.
“Yes,” said Colonel Johns, his voice weak. He turned first to Colonel Morris, then to Johnny. “I surrender.”
The Confederate ghosts surrounded the Federals, who had been stripped of their weapons more out of a show of dominance than because those guns could actually do any harm. Off to the side, Colonels Ambrose and Johns negotiated the terms of the surrender, which didn’t take long, seeing as how neither one wanted the other side to perish.
“So, you’ll take your men here and head back across the Potomac,” said Ambrose, “and in return, we promise not to pursue you. Neither side is to take up hostilities against the other again. You’ll be free to live… er… spend the rest of your existence as you see fit and we will be free to do the same.”
“Agreed,” said Colonel Johns, relieved that he and his men were being granted reprieve from annihilation. The two ghosts signed the document spread out before them, then rose and shook hands. When they did, the document rolled in on itself from the edges and blinked out of existence. Both sides cheered. Johnny watched Union and Confederate soldier alike celebrate the end of the battle.
When the two columns of troops arrived from the northwest, everything had been settled. Colonel Johns laughed to see that not all of the new ghosts were Confederates; in fact, most of them were Union soldiers. It had been a good bit of strategy and a gamble that had paid off well for the rebels, but weren’t both sides relieved now that the fighting was ended? The new soldiers were greeted and told of the terms of the surrender and they, too, were glad to find a little peace, especially after the horrors that they had witnessed and been victim to in the fighting near Sharpsburg, Maryland --- what the northerners called Antietam.
With Colonel Morris’s help, Johnny finished handing out the envelopes. By the early afternoon, the canvas bag was empty. Johnny breathed deep, filling his lungs with the cooling September air. His duty was done and, like these ghosts, he was free to go.
“Looks like you’re all finished here.” The Colonel nodded at the bag.
“Yeah,” said Johnny. “Guess so.”
The two stood in silence a moment. Even though the surrender had been signed just before noon, most of the ghosts had hung around, reveling in the battle’s end. No one was in a hurry to make anyone else leave, or in a hurry to head home just yet.
No one
except for Johnny.
“So, what now? You headed back to Richmond?” Colonel Morris asked.
“Nope.” Johnny gazed to the west, knowing that just beyond the horizon lay the blue mountains, and beyond them, the Valley. “I’m goin’ home.”
As the sun sank from the sky, the ghosts broke up, moving into the shadows alone or in groups of two or three. Some were headed the same direction and thought they might keep one another company, at least for a while longer. Before they disappeared, each turned and saluted the silhouette dragging his thin shadow along behind him, the only one on the battlefield that day who could still do so.
Johnny journeyed on while summer faded and gave up its hold to autumn. The days were shorter and the air cooler. Trees burst forth in a dazzling display of color, painted in all different shades of red and yellow and orange and gold. He walked north from Manassas Junction, passing farmers pulling in the last of the fall harvests and readying the winter gardens. Signs of the war could be seen all over the land, whether it was where countless soldiers had trampled the land bare or in the pockmarked fields where folks still came to collect the shells and shrapnel from the fighting. The land and the people, everything and everyone was preparing for the winter to come. Johnny spared a thought for the soldiers on both sides; how would they spend their winter? Johnny, was thankful that he would not have to experience winter in camp or on the march. His one goal was to make it home, back to Anna Lee, before the frosts set in.
Johnny stuck to the roads and the rails where he could, arriving back in Leesburg in late September. He sought out Norman’s farm just west of town. The memory of being chased down the road as the rats swarmed in from the fields did little to upset him. After all that he had seen and experienced since then, Johnny was beyond being frightened by a few hundred rats. The kind old farmer made a place in the hay barn, just like he had before, asking Johnny about the war and the fighting he had seen. He asked Johnny about losing the use of his left arm and about the plate in his head, which Johnny was reluctant to answer, so the old man didn’t press the issue.
Johnny recounted his adventures the best he could. He told about Mr. Ackles and catching the train to Richmond, though he left out the part about the mysterious trunk with the initials J.C. It was the first time he had thought about that old trunk since joining the army and Johnny reckoned that he’d never find out who it belonged to now. He talked about the Honor Guard and camping outside of the city and about marching out to cover the retreat from Williamsburg, where Johnny was shot and lost the use of his arm. He told about serving alongside General Stuart and working as a messenger for the War Department these last couple of months. The farmer nodded, satisfied enough with the answers he was given, knowing there must have been more to the stories that Johnny wasn’t comfortable telling.
For his part, Johnny asked about Mr. Ackles and if Norman knew what had become of old Bart. The farmer told Johnny that Mr. Ackles had passed away in the late spring or early summer. There had been an auction bill printed in the local newspaper after he had died, but Norman didn’t recall seeing a mule listed. Johnny sighed and reckoned that the sprint to catch the train had been too much for the old mule after all. Norman sat back and took a long draw from his corncob pipe, then told Johnny that once or twice that summer he had seen a wild mule running loose over his fields. Whenever the farmer had tried to get closer, the mule had kicked up and disappeared. By mid-summer, it had gone altogether. Norman reckoned that it might have been Bart and that if he’d have known that the mule might still be hanging around then he would have tried harder to catch it and added it to his stable.
As the evening wore on, Johnny noticed Norman’s head bobbing, the old fella trying to be polite and listen to his stories. He roused the farmer and thanked the old man once again for his hospitality before tucking in for the night. Norman took his leave and promised Johnny a big breakfast before seeing him off first thing in the morning.
Worn out though he was, Johnny had trouble falling asleep. He wondered whether Bart was out there right now, running free, and whether he might even have made it back home to Devil’s Knob. A smile touched his lips when he thought of walking up the path to Green Hill and Anna Lee rushing out to meet him, leading the old mule. It was a pleasant thought, but, drifting into a restless sleep, it was the last one he had that night.
He was aboard a train again, headed God-knows-where this time, except Johnny had an idea that God knew exactly where this train went and didn’t approve much of it. The air was thick and stank of sulfur. Red light throbbed through the slats in the walls like an infected wound. In his dream, Johnny was helpless to stop himself as he walked over to the nearest wall to peek between the cracks, hoping to see what was causing that red glow. He placed his good hand on the wall, then jerked it back. The wall was burning with fever.
A hand fell on Johnny’s shoulder and he spun around in surprise. He looked up into the face of the biggest tramp he had ever seen. The same man he had met on the train once before, only the dream version of the tramp was different. His flesh had melted away, revealing a white skull and red, bloodshot eyes. A line of tobacco-stained spit still dripped from his beard.
“Best not to touch them walls,” said the tramp. “If you was to come up missin’ or busted, well, that’d make it rough on all of us that ride these rails.” The man threw back his head and shrieked with laughter. The howling was taken up by the other vagabonds, who stepped out of the shadows and circled Johnny; skeletons dressed in rags reaching out their bony hands toward him.
Johnny backed away from the howling tramp. Something heavy hit him in the calves and Johnny sprawled over, tripping over something in the middle of the floor. He sat up and looked at what had caused him to fall. It was the trunk, the initials J.C. burning with a light from within the trunk. Unable to move, Johnny watched the clasp open and the lid shoot up, spilling red light into the train car. In his horror, Johnny realized that the light inside the trunk was pulsing in time with the light outside the train car. Unable to stop himself, Johnny crawled over to the trunk, grabbed the sides, and peered in. At first he couldn’t make out anything in the pulsing red light. His head throbbed in rhythm with the light and Johnny closed his eyes, wishing it would go away. That helped, but only a little. Johnny opened his eyes and looked deep into the trunk, past the floor and beyond, down into the bowels of the earth. A lake of fire swirled inside the trunk, the churning maelstrom causing the light to pulse and throb. A cloud of acrid smoke belched up and Johnny felt himself choking and gasping for air. His head swam, and before he blacked out, Johnny felt himself tip into the open trunk and fall, flailing toward the lake of fire below.
A couple of days later, Johnny made his way through the blue mountains that bordered the Valley. Already snow had fallen in some of the higher elevations, making the going difficult and dangerous. He spent more nights than he had wanted to alone among those high peaks, listening to the wind blow through the cliffs, afraid to fall asleep; afraid of what nightmares may come. Eventually, Johnny came down from the worst of it and saw the hills rolling away from the cliffs and toward the farmland beyond. A lone peak jutted up from the floor of the Valley, looking as lonesome and out of place as Johnny had remembered it to be. It was early October and Johnny had made it home.
Anna Lee had seen less and less of Mr. Samuels, she refused to call him Saul like he had insisted, and that was fine with her. Her stepmother had urged Anna Lee to spend every waking moment with Mr. Samuels. She said it was good for Anna Lee to get to know him as a suitor and potential husband. Even Mr. Samuels had objected that, explaining that he needed his time alone to “prepare the heart, mind, and soul to do the Lord’s bidding”. She had no intention of marrying Mr. Samuels, even if her stepmother told her to think about it and pray on it before giving her answer. Anna Lee didn’t think that any amount of thinking would change the fact that she was in love with Johnny and when she prayed, it wasn�
��t for help in making her decision, it was that the good Lord would bring her Johnny back before she was forced to give her answer.
It was no secret to Anna Lee or the Reverend what it was that Irma wanted her to do. From the start, Irma had been entranced by Saul’s stories of his travels abroad and of his business. He spoke at length of conquering the Persian savages and showing them a better life through working for him. To Anna Lee, the stories always seemed a little off. They sounded as though they were being told by someone who had only ever read about these places and people in a book but had never actually been there or met the people he spoke about. Whenever she would start to ask a question about one of Mr. Samuels’ stories, the portly man would cut her off and change the subject.
At times, Anna Lee thought that she saw her father questioning the validity of the tales, but then her stepmother would take his hand at some particularly exciting part, and his resolve would melt away. On those occasions, Mr. Samuels would finish his story, look about the kitchen for a moment, then ask some question regarding their land or their home, or even the former President Washington, though Anna Lee couldn’t fathom why. It seemed Mr. Samuels had some sort of fascination with the first president. Other times, his questions would turn to matters of family wealth.
“Oh, I understand,” Mr. Samuels would say, or something like it. “The shepherd mustn’t appear better than his flock.”
“Mr. Samuels ---” the Reverend would start to reply.
“Please, call me Saul.”
“Saul. We are no better than any family in this valley or outside of it.”
“No, I wasn’t implying…” Saul would say, then trail off with a wave of his hand.
Thankfully, those encounters had all but ceased.