“I must add that I believe that some, for perverted reasons, saw this as a means of seizing power, no matter what the ebb and flow of politics, fearing perhaps they would soon be voted out of office. And the sickest crime of all is that—to paraphrase Milton, who in Paradise Lost once wrote of Satan—they felt it was better to reign in the hell they created than to serve in heaven. To a world, to Americans who lost so much but still survive, to personal friends, I must ask you: Should such as they be allowed to continue on in power? I point no finger at one political view or another; our petty arguments of left or right, liberal or conservative, seem so inane now in contrast to what we endured together. Regardless of what we once felt on such things, I believe we are united with these revelations that we must stand together to ensure that government of, by, and for the people shall not perish from this earth.
“In conclusion,” Bob finally said, “I can only speak now as a private citizen, having resigned my commission in order to be free of what any might construe as a military coup. All men and women in uniform must now make a choice. If you are an officer, remember your oath is to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. It is your choice to decide if those in Bluemont are enemies of our Constitution and then act accordingly.
“I am asking that any force commanders in possession of nuclear weapons go to a full lockdown and vow that under no circumstance whatsoever will they deploy or launch such a weapon, except in response to nuclear weapons launched by another country against what is left of the United States, until a properly constituted government formed within the original guidelines of our Constitution has been re-created. Only after that takes place with a duly elected and morally guided government in place will those in direct charge of such weapons unlock them, strictly to ensure the defense of our country against outside threats.
“I am asking that those military forces directly attached to Bluemont, either defensively or currently moving toward offensive action to retake Site R, go to a full stand-down. I no longer have such power to order you to do so, but your unit commanders can.
“I am asking that any civilian-based military units within a hundred-mile radius of Bluemont move upon it now. I pray that there shall be no violence offered from our regular armed forces, who will instead join you in occupying Bluemont and placing under arrest any who are still there.
“Where I am located now, near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, is the underground shelter I spoke to you about earlier. Having resigned my commission, I have no power to act here, but I am requesting of the officer who is taking over in my place to ensure that the civilians who have lived here safely for two and a half years shall be protected. Our own Constitution makes clear that no family member can be punished for the crimes of a parent or spouse. However, if those in Bluemont do resist or attempt to seize this place by force, all civilians within Site R will be ordered to evacuate and find whatever shelter and sustenance they can in the outside world all the rest of us have resided in for the last two years. If that is indeed the tragic result, I ask that you show them more compassion than their leaders have shown to us.
“So what is next?” Bob asked, and he looked at the camera for a moment as if almost expecting to hear tens of millions of replies.
“I leave that to you, my fellow citizens. Our once proud cities and our once beautiful capital have been reduced to ruin and ashes. I see the land around Bluemont to somehow be accursed. I will therefore close with a suggestion. I ask that thirty days hence, five representatives from each of the surviving states come to meet here at this place. I ask that you good citizens decide how they shall be selected, as it was once done when the founders met to frame our Constitution. I ask that we reaffirm that Constitution and create a reunited Union of States.
“Why here?” He paused for a moment. “Within sight of this place I am now broadcasting from, our nation, once divided, fought the bitterest battle of a bitter war. And yet, fifty years later and again seventy-five years later, former enemies met as friends, standing on opposite sides of a stone wall on a place called Cemetery Ridge and shook hands in friendship. But a few hundred yards from that wall, President Lincoln stood before the newly made graves of those who gave the last full measure of devotion and proclaimed that ‘this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from this earth.’”
There was another long pause.
“In your hands, my fellow citizens, and not mine, now rests the fate of this nation. I ask that Almighty God grants us his peace and guidance in the days to come.”
He sat back in his chair, eyes still on the camera.
Phyllis waited for some sort of signal, but he gave none, and finally John whispered.
“That’s it.”
She reached across the board and threw a number of switches off and then looked over at John and began to cry. “I’m sorry I was ever here,” she whispered.
“Consider what you just did as atonement,” John replied. He stepped out from the narrow confines of the control booth and walked up to where Bob remained motionless.
“I guess all we can do now is wait and see what happens.” Bob sighed.
“‘We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth,’” he said as if to himself.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
TWO DAYS AFTER THE COLLAPSE OF THE BLUEMONT “GOVERNMENT”
“If I could order you to stay, I would,” Bob said, extending his hand.
John could only smile and shake his head. “I’ve had enough of it all, sir.”
“Come back as a delegate?”
“What was it that Sherman said?”
“‘If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve,’” Bob replied.
“Something like that.”
“They’re coming,” Sergeant Major, now Colonel Bentley, announced.
John looked back behind Bentley. A half dozen men and women of what had once been Bob’s command, which he had turned over to Bentley after promoting him to the rank of colonel before resigning his commission, came out of the tunnel bearing a flag-draped coffin. All came to attention, and even though Bob was no longer serving in the military, old instincts were still within him as he came to attention and saluted as Grace’s coffin was respectfully loaded into the Black Hawk.
Maury followed, limping and helped by Forrest, along with Kevin and Reverend Black. Earlier in the day, in honor of his friend’s request, Lee Robinson’s mortal remains were lifted by helicopter to what was truly hallowed ground in front of the iconic statue dedicated to the men of North Carolina who had advanced across a sun-drenched field in what would forever be remembered as Pickett’s Charge. Reverend Black had read from the Ninety-First Psalm, Lee’s favorite, and with full military honors, he was laid to rest in the ground he had often said, quoting Joshua Chamberlain, that here indeed was the vision place of souls.
It was hard for John to imagine life ahead without his stoic friend by his side. Together they had often joked if they had indeed lived 150 years ago, they would have faced each other as honor and duty demanded, but their bonds of friendship would have endured. John wished that a photograph taken of the two of them together had survived, but it was lost when his house burned in the war against the Posse. They had attended a historical event together and there posed for an authentic ambrotype, Lee in gray uniform, John in blue, Lee’s hand resting on John’s shoulder in a gesture of friendship and love.
So much was still in doubt. All thanked God that the military garrison at Bluemont had not tried to attack Site R. They had all gone to their barracks to wait it out. As to the elite located in a highly secured reserve area at the far end of the cavern? It was apparent that some attempted to flee via a hidden exit. They were met by a hovering Apache and fled back inside.
Some had urged Bob to personally lead a move either to arrest those within that special compound or to execute them summarily,
but he announced he would not do either once it was learned that a missile that was indeed nuclear tipped and had been moved into position at Wallops Island, Virginia, had been rendered inactive by troops there. The warhead atop the missile was seized and impounded by a team of Navy SEALs operating from a carrier off the coast, whose commander announced he would no longer accept orders from Bluemont, would remain in stand-down, and would await orders from whatever government in compliance with the Constitution was created.
Global reaction was compounding by the hour, some announcing that Bob should act as temporary dictator, president, or whatever he wished to call himself. China made clear it was occupying up to the Mississippi and again issued the threat that any action against their humanitarian aid being offered to the “stricken former United States” would be construed as an attack upon their mainland. But just this morning, word had come in via the ambassador in China—who had served under the Bluemont government but after Bob’s broadcast announced his allegiance to a properly formed government—that the Chinese foreign minister had informed him that as long as no action was taken against their occupation forces or their homeland, China would recognize the new government.
If anything at this moment, rather than a help, John saw himself as a liability for what Bob was attempting. In its dying gasps, Bluemont had played a recording of his conversation, heavily edited, to make it sound like he was indeed threatening to murder everyone inside of Site R. Unfortunately, no one had thought to record the conversation from their end, and John realized the best thing now was to distance himself from Bob until everything settled down.
But beyond that, he was weary and exhausted from all that had transpired, and the thought of yet more years of struggle to come had become overwhelming.
The turbines of the Black Hawk started up, and Bob motioned for John to step away for a moment. Bob reached into his breast pocket, pulled out a nearly empty pack of cigarettes, and offered one to John, who accepted, and Bob lit John’s and then his.
“Thanks for getting me hooked on these damn things again,” Bob said.
“Sorry, sir.”
“I might have to call on you, John. But for now, maybe it is wise you just head back home for a while. That doctored recording does make you seem like a hard-ass.”
“I saw it had to be done, sir, and I didn’t want you in that role. Better me than you.”
“Thank you, John.”
They both stood silent for a moment.
“A question, John.”
“Anything.”
“Would you have done it?”
“What?”
“Smashed the place apart and driven those thousands out into the cold to starve?”
John looked past him, gaze lingering on the distant hills of Gettysburg. All the sacrifice that happened there. All the sacrifice endured there and up now to this moment.
“Sir, don’t ever ask me that question again,” John whispered.
Bob nodded. “Understood, my friend.”
The helicopter rotor began to turn. The two dropped their cigarettes, John grinding his into the snow to put it out.
Bob held out the pack, offering the rest to him. John smiled sadly and shook his head.
“I once made a promise, sir.”
Bob looked at him quizzically and then seemed to understand and nodded.
“I’m quit now, quit forever. This is the final day.”
EPILOGUE
“May the peace of the Lord be with all of you on this most blessed of days of renewal and beginnings. I hereby declare the academic semester to be open.”
There was a scattering of applause as Reverend Black, newly appointed president of the college, stepped away from the lectern of restored Graham Chapel of Gaither Hall, the name having been changed in memory of an honored couple who had resided in Montreat for most of their lives and actually been married in the chapel in a long-ago age.
There was the traditional closing hymn, the school song, led by the choir, and as they finished, the congregation started to leave. But then a lone voice from the choir began to sing a song that struck John to the very core for all its symbolism. The lone female voice echoed in the restored chapel.
“Try to remember the kind of September when life was slow and oh so mellow.”
All stood frozen in place, and more than a few began to weep. John looked over at Makala, remembering the first time he had brought her to this chapel. A student up on the stage, unaware that she had an audience, had started to sing that song from The Fantasticks. It had become something of a theme of the time they had been through, a song of remembrance and loss.
Young Jennie was nestled in against her mother, having fallen asleep through most of the service, but was now stirring, looking up sleepy eyed at her father and smiling.
He put his arm protectively around Makala’s shoulder and walked with her out of the chapel into what was proving to be a glorious early May morning, the date symbolically chosen since it was exactly three years ago that the Day had struck them all. And now, phoenixlike, the school was again stirring to life.
Following old tradition, John gathered with the other faculty at the base of the stairs to shake hands with the students leaving and heading to class. Mixed in were members of the community. Maury was still a bit ungainly with crutches as Forrest helped him down the steps. Maury’s leg wound had become infected; Makala had struggled with it for over a month before finally conceding it had gone gangrenous and amputating it.
As he was helped down the steps by Forrest, who had become a dedicated friend to Maury during his long months of recovery, the two together reminded John of old photographs of Civil War veterans minus a limb helping each other along, sharing a bond that someone who had not been through their fiery trial could never understand.
Most of the students who shook John’s hand were “the survivors” as they called themselves, their features hard, wiry, hands gnarled from an early spring of putting in crops. Most had already put in several hours of labor in the fields before returning to campus. Until the harvest was in, there would be but three hours of class a day near noontime and then back out later in the day to resume work.
His daughter Elizabeth was mixed in with the crowd. Now the mother of two, she was not attending classes but had come for the ceremony honoring all those who had fallen with the reading of the names of all students, staff, and faculty who had given the last full measure of devotion. As “Lee Robinson, killed in action, Gettysburg,” was read off, John saw her lean in closer to her husband, Seth, Lee’s son, who bowed his head as she held him close. For John, the fact that his comrade’s son was registered in his class filled him with happiness and poignant memories as well. In a long-ago time, Lee would visit his class as a Civil War reenactor to talk about the equipment, uniform, and life of the troops. Seth, even as a ten-year-old, would proudly attend wearing a uniform handmade by his loving mother. He looked so much like his father and would forever be a reminder of one of the closest of friends.
John saw a man coming down the stairs who but a few years ago must have been full of the vigor of life, but on this day looked broken. He had arrived on campus only the day before. He was one of several dozen parents who across the months since the onset of a relative semblance of peace had made the journey to discover the fate of a son or daughter sent to this quiet, peaceful campus before the coming of the Day.
“We want you to stay with us for several days,” John said as he grasped the man’s hand. “There is so much to share with you about Grace, to tell you all that she meant to us, all that she did.”
John’s voice filled up. He had once thought of himself as being so stoic, able to contain his emotions, only letting them release when alone. Perhaps it was Jennifer that broke that in him. He had lost Jennifer; this man had lost Grace.
Grace’s father smiled but offered no reply either way. “I think I’ll go and sit with my girl for a while,” he whispered and then continued on. John watched the man walk d
own across the front lawn of the campus for the long trek to the military cemetery at the edge of town. John had taken him there the day before and was touched to see that someone was still thoughtfully putting flowers on her grave, suspecting it was Kevin, who had taken her loss in such a way that it was obvious that he had been deeply in love with her.
“You’ll be late, Professor,” Makala announced, and John looked over at her, smiled, kissed her lightly, bent over to kiss Jennie, who stretched up to him with chubby arms for a “smoochie” and laughed as he mussed her hair, blond like her mother’s.
He left his family and started on the short walk to his classroom. Then, as he so often used to, he stepped into a tiny octagon-shaped building just ten feet across, three of its eight sides open to face on to the bubbling creek that flowed down through the middle of the campus. It was the campus “Prayer Porch,” a favorite place where he used to often come to sit, to listen to the creek tumbling by, at times to pray, at times to just soak up a moment of peace and solitude before the start of a class.
The walls were covered in graffiti, without exception all of them touching, a brief quote of scripture, a “Thank you, God,” a heart with initials in it, but so many now “RIP, my love,” “I miss you, sweetheart,” and “I’ll see you in heaven.”
Several hundred names were written on the walls in long, orderly rows, the names of all those from the college who had died in the war.
Too many, far too many.
He sat in silence, looking at them. As years would pass, as it did with all wars, the pain would lessen, the aura and legends would grow as was so with nearly all wars, and memory of the names would drift into history.
The issues of this war were still in doubt. The day of the reopening of the school had been chosen because of all that was symbolized by this day in May, three years to the day since the start of the war.
The Final Day Page 37