The Tinsmith (38 page)

John's grip loosened. “You're lying!”

“Not an ounce of nigger blood in you, bright boy. But maybe there's some just born to be niggers anyway.”

John lifted one hand to his cheek. Caleb and Daney would have said if they had known. And they would have known. It couldn't be true. Orlett would say anything to . . . 

Then it was too late. The overseer bucked him off and rolled clear. When John recovered, he found the shotgun pointed at him, the doglike grin wider than ever. In the splay of light the blood shone in streaks on the overseer's face. His foul breath came rapidly. He swayed. There was a lot of blood.

“You missed your one chance, bright boy. Goddamn ignorant, white or black. For some it don't matter, I reckon.” He placed his arm against the wall for support but kept the gun fixed straight ahead.

John saw the motion at the same instant he heard the screams. It was a sound unlike anything he'd ever heard, closer to the shriek of a wildcat than anything human. The overseer shrank under it, the gun knocked clear. It clattered down the first few stairs. John did not spring for it. He was frozen at the sight of the two women's wild faces as they tore at the overseer's body. In seconds they had him on the ground, and seconds later they had his breeches down. Something dull-bright flashed in one of the women's hands. Orlett's screams were terrible.

John leapt forward. This was not how it was supposed to happen. This was not his revenge. It took all of his remaining strength to pull just one of the women clear. She scratched and flailed at him but stopped once the other woman, with a savage cry of triumph, raised a chunk of bloody flesh in her hand and ran down the hallway, her screams a kind of cadenced singing that descended to a moaning as she vanished from the lamp glow, the other woman running behind.

Screaming, his face dissolved with blood, Orlett suddenly called out, “Cray! Cray! Help me! Cray! Where are you?”

John should have watched without pity, with a pleasing sense that the overseer had received what he had deserved for so long. But he was not pleased, he was sickened. It had all happened so fast, like a whirlwind from those bible stories Motes had liked to tell. There was something unworldly about the women's revenge, something final that seemed to involve more than just the overseer. John found he could not remain near the place where the attack had occurred. Bile rising in his throat, he followed the overseer down the stairs and outside, watched him stagger into the barn. A moment later, the white charger galloped out, Orlett slumped in the saddle, arms wrapped around the horse's neck, the reins flailing over his shoulders. The sky was beginning to lighten. As the charger passed him, the boy saw that its flank was drenched in black blood. Orlett's weak cries for the mulatto hung in the festering air. John dropped to his knees, put his hands over his eyes. Not even a nigger . . . Poor white trash . . . But you're not a killer, John . . . Goddamn ignorant . . . Dat ain't your way . . . Not a nigger but a slave . . . 

He raised his face to the fading stars, the dead air cool on his cheek. It was the second day after the great battle and he did not even know who had won. But he knew where he'd felt the most victorious, he knew where there would be sanctuary for him, if there could ever be. But not yet.

Dazed, he went back to the house. He had no energy left, his body weakened with every step. He needed just a little sleep. And then he'd find his way back to the hospital and the doctor with Caleb's eyes.

He did not sleep long, perhaps an hour. At a sudden eruption from downstairs, he woke with a start and immediately crept to the head of the stairs. The dog was not barking in the shut parlour. Perhaps the mulatto had returned? John started down. All at once voices broke over the stillness.

“In here. Set the tables up. And for Christ's sakes drag that dog's carcass out. We don't need to attract any extra flies.”

He breathed easier, relieved that it was not the mulatto. A flurry of boot steps. He crouched on the stairs and watched men carry in stretchers of wounded. There were a great many stretchers. Doctors in stained gowns hurried about, shouting instructions. Many of the wounded wore grey uniforms. Had the enemy not left the field after all? But then he saw a number of blue-uniformed wounded and realized that the Union doctors were tending to both sides. As the moans and cries of the wounded filled the house and the strong smells of decaying flesh and chloroform floated up to him, he decided that it was safe to descend. His uniform, torn as it was, protected him, and in any case the doctors and soldiers were too preoccupied setting up the hospital to take much notice of him.

Without difficulty, he made his way outside. Just beside the back door lay the dog; it had been shot in the side. Flies crawled in the wound and along the muzzle. He could not take his eyes off its mouth, the bared teeth, the too-familiar human grin. But he looked away at last. The sun hung just above the tree lines to the east, the sky was pale blue. Out in the fields the troops moved, heading away from him. Closer, a single black wagon, pulled by a horse, bounced among the shell holes and rotting bodies. Closer still, a group of blacks with spades over their shoulders walked slowly across the battlefield. Other lone figures dotted the landscape. It was quiet except for the constant low buzzing of flies rising off the dog's bloodied fur.

He tried to let the daylight clear his mind. Too much had happened too quickly. He needed to think. The overseer had ridden off, likely with the sack of money on his person. The mulatto would come back. But to find what? With such a wound, Orlett would not have survived long unless he'd found help. Where? At a hospital. John looked to the north where the overseer had gone. It was the same direction in which lay the hospital where he had helped the doctor.

He began to walk to the north, but then stopped, frozen by the sound of a horse's hooves. From the other side of the barnyard approached a single rider. John did not need a closer look to know it was the mulatto. Now, more than ever, the doctor's sanctuary beckoned. He increased his pace, every second feeling Cray's hands around his throat; the mulatto would not hesitate in his vengeance. Every heartbeat became a pursuing hoof beat. He expected even the dead dog to rise up and sink its jaws into his flesh. He began to run, tripped and sprawled face down in the dirt. He got up and ran faster, the black of the woods a bobbing blur as he crossed the torn field, his blood thrashing in his throat and temples and his destination seeming to slip away each time he looked down to secure his footing on the blasted earth. At last, after ten minutes, he arrived gasping at the hospital.

The doctor stood at the operating table. No part of his smock was unstained. His beard and face were flecked with blood and pus. John approached. The doctor blinked at him, then smiled broadly. It seemed to take all of his energy.

“Ah, John,” he said. “Come to lend a hand again? Good man.”

And they resumed their work of the night before, and little had changed except perhaps his blood. Orlett had said he was white. Like this doctor. Could it be true? John put his finger on an artery and stared at the red blood flooding over his hand. It didn't matter. He had been a slave but now he was free. But freedom required more; it required a future. And that, he understood, would be possible only with money. If there was a chance of recovering that sack, he would do so. And then he would somehow put the mulatto and his own memories and Maryland itself behind him forever.

When the doctor clutched his stomach and said he needed to go into the field a moment, John slipped away. The sun was well up. It was already hot. His face dripped sweat. The battlefield became a buzzing blur as he searched among the fallen. The bodies had begun to bloat and turn black. He gagged on the putrid air as he looked into the dead faces and as he negotiated the shell holes. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a thin man in a clean suit approaching gingerly, a white cloth held over his mouth and nose. His hands were white-gloved and he wore a bowler. John stood motionless as the man stopped a few feet in front of him and lowered the cloth.

“You're searching for a comrade?” He sighed. His lips were wet and pink and he seemed to hold his breath as he spoke. “A sad duty. Very sad.” He dabbed the cloth to his shining brow. Little beads of sweat hung off the ends of his elegant moustache. “But perhaps,” he said almost shyly, “you'd be willing to ease the suffering of others even as you carry out your duty?”

When John did not respond, the man removed a small white card from his breast pocket and offered it.

“This is a coupon. If, in your searches today, you should find any soldiers with this card on their persons, you can earn a considerable sum by transporting the soldiers to that tent, just there.”

He pointed to a small, dark encampment in the near distance.

“My employer, Mr. Horace Greaver, is a respected surgeon of the embalming arts.”

John blinked, his hands twitched at his sides. The man, who had lifted the cloth to his nose again, lowered it and winked.

“A soldier must always think of his family at home. I'm sure you are no different. Wouldn't you like to be able to send more money to your beloved parents? Or, perhaps”—he smiled and the pink tip of his tongue emerged from between his pink lips—“your sweetheart? Listen.”

He stepped closer. His voice was hushed.

“I tell you this in confidence. The work's more than I can handle alone. There are so many valiant dead. Such a sad day.” He bowed his head briefly. “But why should a soldier not benefit from it? The sadness is a fact. But so is life. And life requires industry and imagination. I can tell at a glance that you are intelligent. I tell you this in strict confidence.” He leaned forward, his chin seemed to be propped on the air of decayed flesh. “Officers. My employer will pay handsomely for officers. North or South. If you transport them to that tent. And tell him that Tomkins sent you.”

John did not fully understand, but the thought of the money appealed to him. If it turned out that he could not find the overseer's body or that the sack of money was not on it, he would be happy for the . . . a sudden thought stopped the others.

“Are many bodies being taken to that tent?” he said.

“Oh, yes, there are others doing this work. It is a competitive venture indeed. But you are not, I can tell, a young man to shrink from competition.”

John considered. Perhaps the overseer's body was at the tent? He turned away from the man without a word and headed south, his eyes scanning the ground for the overseer just in case. Within five minutes, he came upon an elderly Confederate soldier lying on his back. His face was fine-boned, and powder burns had darkened the neatly trimmed white moustache. His large, brown eyes fluttered. As John bent closer, the soldier's lips moved, struggling to form words.

“Are you a soldier?”

“Yes, sir.”

The mouth opened again without sound. The eyes closed, opened.

“A federal?”

“Sir?”

“It doesn't matter. Not if you're a soldier.” The old man's eyes remained open. “You'll understand. I won't recover from this fight. I do not wish to survive if I cannot fight. Please.” His lips hardly moved. His blackened skin ran in rivulets of sweat. A fly crawled along one eyebrow. “Please.” A tear formed in his open eye.

John looked around. No one was within a hundred yards. He could do this. This was not the same as what he'd faced with the overseer. This was more like the feeling he had standing beside the doctor. But as he moved his hands toward the old man's throat, the horrifying image of Orlett's doglike grin appeared on the face. Nigger. Goddamn ignorant. John hesitated. He watched the old man's eyes close and not open. Then he knelt, gently pushed his arms under the old man's back and legs, and lifted. The corpse was light, easy to carry in a cradled position. He hurried toward the embalmer's tent.

•  •  •

An hour later, not far from the field hospital, he found the overseer in a neat line of dead Union soldiers. Jubilant, John searched the body. But the sack was not there. As he stood dumbfounded over the corpse, he had an overwhelming sensation that someone was watching him. Fearing it was the mulatto, he looked around wildly. Two hundred yards away sat the same single black cart and horse. A man stood near the cart, some kind of black object in front of him. John could feel the intensity of the man's stare; it burned two circles of heat into his brow. He thought quickly. If the overseer's body disappeared, others might believe he had simply left the area. The mulatto, especially, might believe it, he might leave to search. Without a corpse, John realized that he'd be safer. And the man staring at him would just think that he was carrying off a dead comrade for a private burial. Other soldiers were doing just that, either for themselves or for one of the embalming surgeons. And civilians also wandered over the broken field. His actions could not be regarded as suspicious.

He bent again to the overseer's body but reeled back in shock as his eyes locked on the face. It still wore its living grin. John waited for the taunting to start, but only the drone of flies rose from the bloated lips. He waited longer than was safe. The man by the cart would be growing more suspicious; he might even decide to come closer to investigate.

At last, John took the overseer onto his back and headed for the woods hunched darkly on the horizon.

PART FOUR

I

July 1881, Crescent Slough, British Columbia

Standing on the small black wharf just upstream from Dare's cannery, Anson knew almost immediately which of the three skiffs approaching over the darkening water had his old friend at the oars. It was the lead boat, the one putting so much distance between it and the others, the one that drew the last few crimson shreds of light around it. As the skiff came close enough to the wharf for figures to be distinguished, as the smooth, steady power of the oar strokes replicated the most efficient machine in the cannery behind him, Anson saw that the years had not greatly diminished his friend's strength. Dare pulled without pause, his shoulders level, his head raised. Anson could hear each quick grunt that accompanied the stroking, a natural sound, as of the day itself winding down with the light. Then the oars stopped.