by Ward, Marsha
Christmas had come and gone, celebrated here in this cell. He had not had anything to give to his son. Mary had produced a tin whistle and told the boy it was from Papa and herself, but Rulon felt the sting of uselessness.
He suppressed a groan as he lay back and drew up the sheet. He had never thought about how well his body had worked until his vitality had been stripped away in that horrible moment on the battlefield at Tom’s Brook. Now he struggled to make it perform simple tasks.
All he wanted on this New Year’s Eve was enough strength to hold Mary and make love to her. He’d been resting all day and thought he was ready, but how would she receive his advances? Would she reject any attempt to begin a connubial interlude because of concern, or would she be repulsed by his scars?
An hour ago, Mary brought the boy in for nightly devotions, then tucked him into bed in the next room. He’d listened to the murmur of their voices as she told him a Bible story. It had sounded like Abraham and Isaac, because Roddy asked about the ram in the thicket. Mary told him about miracles. Rulon wondered when his own miracle would come and he could tell his boy the stories. Ma had been their family’s storyteller. Maybe that was Mary’s role.
He sighed. After the boy had quieted, Mary returned to the kitchen downstairs. Had she turned left or right at the foot of the stairs? He didn’t even know the rooms of his dwelling place.
The light behind the curtained window faded. Sundown. How long would Mary remain below, tidying up her house? Was she putting away Roddy’s toys? Papa Hilbrands had found a toy bugle for the boy, which he tooted endlessly, except when he used the tin whistle. From the sounds during the day, he also galloped around the parlor on some sort of horse.
Rulon smiled. A horseman like his papa.
Was that Mary’s tread on the stairs? He held his breath, listening to be sure. Yes. She paused on the landing. Gave a little cough. She wasn’t coming down sick, was she? He’d have to— Have to do what? She was the nurse and he, the patient.
No. Not tonight. Tonight he would become a husband again.
Excitement thrummed through his veins. Mary came through the door, carrying a lamp. She set it on the washstand, then left the room again.
“Mary?”
She was back almost before the words died, carrying two mugs. She smiled. “These aren’t Mama’s fancy glassware, but they’ll do for raspberry wine.”
Raspberry wine? Strength flowed to where he’d hoped it would.
“It’s New Year’s. I thought a little celebration was in order.”
Indeed. He felt a grin rise.
She handed him one of the mugs. “Roddy wanted a taste when I brought out the bottle, but I told him Papa would have to approve. He seemed satisfied to wait until you speak to him.”
She drew the chair forward and sat at the bedside, her knees pressing against the mattress tick. He heard the rustle of the corn husks as she adjusted her position.
“I don’t mean to keep you up until midnight,” she said, smiling with a hint of mystery. “A toast and a wish will have to do to ring in the New Year together.”
“Together,” he muttered, feeling the burn of desire.
“Our first New Year’s.” Mary’s smile quivered. Perhaps it was a trick of the light. Perhaps she bore a strong emotion. “Shall you make the toast?” she asked.
Rulon cleared his throat and extended his mug toward Mary’s. “To our family,” he said. “To being together again.”
“To our family,” she repeated. “Together,” and tapped her mug against his.
Rulon lifted the mug and took a swallow. The wine was sweet, as he’d expected. No sweeter than Mary’s lips, he imagined. He looked over the rim at her.
She sipped the wine sedately.
“A kiss?” he proposed.
“Of course.” She leaned close and pecked his lips. Before he could put his hand behind her head, she withdrew.
“Mary.” The word came out sounding rougher than he had intended. She didn’t seem alarmed, and he went on. “I want a true celebration.”
“Of course.” The huskiness in her voice told him all he needed to know.
She stood and took his mug and set it, with her own, on the washstand. She didn’t come back right away, but stood blocking the light of the lamp, wisps of her hair creating a halo around her head. Something occupied her attention for some while.
He finally decided she was undoing the buttons of her bodice. That would take time. Women used too many fastenings.
She turned at last, doffing pieces of attire. When she approached the bedside, he caught his breath. She was clothed in naught but lamplight.
“Husband,” she said as she slipped under the bedding.
He kissed her as he had dreamed for so long of doing. She responded with verve. But before he could accomplish his goal, the daunting enemy, exhaustion, overtook him. His disappointment was mirrored on Mary’s face.
“Are you unwell?” she whispered as he groaned and turned onto his side.
He trembled from the weakness that encompassed him, could not give her an answer.
“Rulon!” The sharpness in her voice pricked him.
“I’m well enough,” he muttered, “but I have no strength.” He watched fear and concern battle on her face until she cradled him in her arms and rocked him as she would a babe.
“There now,” she crooned. “You must rest.”
Rulon could only cling to her, disheartened by his body’s betrayal.
Chapter 28
Rod — March 1, 1865
Rod held the torch to the flooring timber at the end of the bridge, grumbling to himself, because the air was so damp due to the continuous rain that nothing was catching fire. General Rosser wanted this bridge down. Sheridan was on the march again, and even if the cavalrymen’s actions only slowed him down a bit, it was something.
He looked up when Wylie called him.
“Captain, it’s slow to burn,” Wylie said.
Rod thought a moment. “Hmm. Take your knife and pare down the wood, but leave it hanging,” he said. “Make it like kindling.”
Wylie did as he suggested, and Rod took out his knife to follow his own suggestion. The wood finally blazed up, and Rod and his men retreated down the covered bridge, leaving dancing fire in their wake.
He heard a shot, and dashed toward the south end of the bridge, heart pounding. They’re here! He and Wylie made it to the road leading out from the bridge as a volley of firing sounded to the west.
Evans rode up with Rod’s horse in tow and said, “They’re swimming the river, captain. It’s Custer.”
Rod flung his torch onto the bridge and mounted. His horse reared from the excitement, and he brought it under control with difficulty. While he worked to settled it down, he shouted, “Cut them off when they come up the bank.”
He and his men rallied to the other horsemen, and fired a second volley at the Yankees emerging from the river. The Yankees kept coming across the river through the water. Now they were also on the bridge, fighting the blaze.
An eerie, high sound from many voices echoed in the void under the bridge’s cover. The Union horsemen charged across the burning timbers and into the open, still yelling.
“Back, back,” Rosser yelled, gesturing to the woods, and Rod rode in that direction, urging his men to follow.
They’d done all they could here, but the numbers were on the enemy’s side. It was time to retreat.
~~~
Ben — March 1 through 2, 1865
Even though several months had gone by since Ben had left Ella Ruth, he continued to sleep badly, haunted by guilt. He’d been attempting to pray every night since he had been caught in the trap of lust. It wasn’t any good. God already knew of his great transgression. He felt the disapproval and sorrow from the heavens every minute of the day, and all night long.
As he lay one evening staring into the stars, he finally came to the conclusion that he must confess his sin to someone who could guide him through
the process of making amends for his act of ultimate robbery. Who could help him? Mr. Moore? He and the minister had never hit it off well, so he didn’t really want to approach him. Besides that, he didn’t know if the Yankees had let the man loose yet.
Perhaps he could speak to the Catholic priest who came around whenever they camped near Harrisonburg. Ben wondered if the man would refuse his assistance unless he converted to the faith. Who else might be suitable to help him cleanse his soul? He could think of no one. Would he have to venture toward repentance all on his own?
He supposed a first step would be to write to Ella Ruth and beg her forgiveness. He wondered what her response would be. She had been the one who had planted the seed of the idea, who had insisted they were married by virtue of them stepping on and over a broomstick in the dark. She sincerely believed they were wed. He knew they were not. Did that leave Ella Ruth blameless? His mind quivered to think that perhaps not. Perhaps her soul was in as much everlasting peril as his own.
He bore the ultimate blame for giving in to his passion. Under her coaxing, he had done so more than one time. Now he had to own up to the fact that they had sinned against each other, and against God.
He groaned, thinking about how far he had wandered from grace. Ma would be devastated. What a blow it would be upon her God-fearing heart to know that her son had distanced himself from his Creator in such a tawdry fashion. Could he bring himself to write to Ma, to beg her forgiveness, as well? Would that give him any relief from the chains of sin he felt tightening around his soul?
He felt the Testament digging into the small of his back. He needed to move it into a pocket, he thought, then refrained from doing so. Perhaps he needed a goad, a reminder of his fault, until he took steps toward making his soul clean.
After a long period of thinking, he arose and went to the campfire that had burned down to embers. Ella Ruth had given him a pocketbook with a sheaf of writing paper within. In addition, a lead pencil was affixed under the flap. He drew the object out of his pocket, and by the puny light of what remained of the fire he wrote,
My darling Ella Ruth,
I hope you are well, as I am not. Great sorrow weighs me down every day since we erred against our Maker in committing the sin of lust and acting upon our passion. We should not have done so, my dear girl. I forever regret that I was driven by unseemly appetites to rob you of virtue, and I cannot forget my wrong.
I cannot return to you that wich I stole. I can merely ask your forgivness for what I did to you. I pray you to grant me that favor, at leest - To forgive me as I forgive you.
I am weary of battle. The yankees have more men than we. They have provisions were we have none. We run short on munitions. They have all they need. Even so, I fight on for my dear Country until the end, whether it be the end of the fightin or the end of me.
I love you as man has never loved a woman before. I despise the thot that I have become a low sort of man, unable to keep myself strait with God. I beg your forgivness. Set my mind at ease so I mite petition God for His Grace and Forgivness.
Keep this note from the sight of strangers.
Your unworthy suitor, Ben
A bit of an old hymn ran through his mind as he signed and folded the letter. “Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.” Yes. He had left God, had run away to an enticing episode of carnal satisfaction, blinded by thoughts and acts of fleshly desire. How had he sunk into such depravity? How could he rise from it again?
He started writing a letter to Ma.
Julia Owen
Owen Farm outside Mount Jackson, Via.
Dear Ma,
I hope all is well with you. We are retreating before an overwhelming host, but my dread is that I won’t be able to send this note before we come into another battle.
It pains me to tell you that I have done wrong. I sinned in givin in to lust. I let my pashun carry me into the forbiden gardin with a girl I know. She is also known to you, but I will not divulge her name unless forced by circumstances. How I regret my sinful acts!
Unable to formulate more words at the moment, he tucked away the pocketbook and, having made a start to his atonement, slept soundly for the first time in months.
The next morning, he gave the letter meant for Ella Ruth into the hands of the adjutant, hoping he could find a way to post it, but because he had not finished the one to Ma, Ben kept it in his pocket book.
Later that day, he found himself trudging south up the Valley, falling sleet threatening to freeze upon his face. Ole Jube Early had sent his larger force of infantry toward Lynchburg, but Ben was marching with his company to Waynesborough, a bit east. Sheridan would chase after one of the ragtag armies. Ben hoped he would go to Lynchburg.
He stole a glance over his shoulder, wishing for a sight of a long-gone comrade’s countenance. So many had been cut down in the months behind them. Now Sheridan was chasing the Confederates with a vengeance. All the armies could do was march to a place of resistance, somewhere they could stand their ground against Federals who wanted them dead.
“Company, halt,” came to his ears. They had approached the outskirts of the town. Here on the west side, a little ridge rose before them. Would that do for a defensive ground? He didn’t pretend to know strategies or tactics. Those were up to the colonels and captains to figure out. He was merely cannon fodder, a foot soldier doing his best to keep a hold on a little piece of the Southern dream. What was that dream? He could scarcely remember the long discussions at the home table about freedom of conscience and state’s rights, and fighting for home and country.
Virginia was his country, and when it had joined the great secession, the Confederacy had become his country. But how much longer could he arm his weapon, raise it to his shoulder, and fire upon other men?
Now the order came to dig rifle pits. Weariness overtook him, but he dropped his gun and haversack, received a pick that was passed to him, and advanced to the appointed line. Heave. Swing. Heave. Swing. Heave. Swing. The rhythm caught him, and he continued blindly to heave and swing until told to stop.
How long could this defense last? Rain sluiced down his face. He could hear the roaring waters of the South Fork of the Shenandoah behind him. If the Yankees overran them, they were stuck between the enemy and the river without a place of refuge. What was Jubal Early thinking?
He hadn’t been thinking well for a while, Ben mused. Even General Lee thought so. The General had been stripping away bits and pieces of Early’s command, until now their strength was about 1500 or so, he’d been told. How could they stand off Sheridan? The Yankee general had more than ten thousand troops with him. Ten thousand!
He was told to pack the dirt beneath his feet and prepare to defend his pit. Yes, they said “dirt.” It wasn’t dirt, as any fool could see. Tromping the mud with his almost bare feet, Ben felt it squishing between his toes, clammy clay. He wondered if it held good fishing worms.
Fishing? Well, the river wasn’t so far off. If he weren’t a soldier priming to fight off a hoard of enemy invaders, he would go fishing. Or swimming. No, the river was too high for either leisurely pursuit.
Jerusalem crickets! When had he last had leisure? Time to himself for reflection? He had spent the last such moments sinning as though there was no tomorrow! Maybe there was no tomorrow for him. Maybe his sin had doomed him to Hell forever. He had to finish the letter to Ma, to confess his sin and express his regret, to seek forgiveness.
Someone, possibly Ma, had told him in the dim past that Jesus had died for his sins. Why then did he feel so forsaken for having been with Ella Ruth? The moments should have been sweet. Instead, the Jaws of Hell yawned open beneath him, and he couldn’t shake a sense that his time was running out.
He knew the Federals had caught up to them when a shell screamed overhead, followed by a bee’s swarm of balls. He ducked into the rifle pit and steeled himself for the fight to come.
“Oh dear God, forgive me,” he whispered, popping up from the ho
le to fire his rifle at the attackers. “Lord Jesus, forgive my trespasses. Come and save me from my sins!”
The battle soon became a thunder of artillery pieces interspersed with the rattle of rifles in a frontal assault. Then a bugle sounded to the left of the line of breastworks.
That’s not our bugle.
Shortly afterward, a hoard of yelling men broke from the trees on the left flank, firing rifles they didn’t have to pause to load. Spencers. Repeaters. Seven-shots. At the same time, artillery shells pinned Ben’s company in place. Surely Hell could be no worse than this.
A man next to him shrieked briefly and lay still. Another lifted his rifle and shot toward the Yankees approaching on the left. A ball caught him in the face, and he fell into the pit at Ben’s feet.
“I’m not staying here to die,” said another soldier, and slithered out of the pit on his belly toward the river. He crab-walked a few feet, stopped, then began again to move toward the rear. After he was out of rifle range, he stood and ran. Other men copied his thinking, and soon, the field was full of men running to the rear.
Emboldened by mass escape, Ben tried the same moves. He knew he had miscalculated the distance the Spencer rifle could shoot accurately when he felt himself being lifted off his feet by a round striking his body.
When he hit the ground, Ben lay unmoving on his side in a crumpled position, wondering why he didn’t feel any pain in his leg, as he could see it had suffered a wound. He tried to dig his other heel into the ground to get himself onto his back, but it would not obey his thought.
A man from the regiment knelt beside him for a moment, grabbed him under the arms and dragged him toward the line of trees bordering the river. He gave him a drink from his canteen, and said, “Lie still, Owen.”
“Help me up,” Ben begged. “Take me with you.”