Fight for Glory (My Wounded Soldier #1) (23 page)

Tom
Tanner

Chapter
Thirty

I took to following
the railroad tracks into the town where I’d seen Addie. I felt the tail of it
walking through that station, a wounded horse plodding behind me, and sometimes
he’d walk so close he’d nudge me along from my reverie…her little feet flying
to me, between those snorting engines, it was her steps stood out to me. Johnny
asking me…did I kill? I laughed at that. Guess I looked like I could do it, for
I surely had.
And Quinton, seeing how it was.

For three days we
followed the tracks then, walking alongside cause it was rough sometimes, and
he didn’t like it when a train was coming so off we went, and I spoke to him,
but when it’s in your mind like that, no talking takes it away.

Day four we
stopped at Rigsby. I met up with the sheriff there.
He
officed in a building no bigger than an outhouse except for that lean-to out
back.
Had him a man in there.
We went back and
forth. The army took the Gatlin, he said. They were through and fixing to
search these hills when they got done talking about it. They had interest in
me. They’d have to catch up to me first.

At the livery,
our horses were well cared for. My horse was glad to see me, and I stood for my
homecoming while he searched me over for a treat. He found the carrots and went
eager trying to work them out of my pocket. I didn’t know when they could go
home with that bridge out, but it would go in good time, but I had me a feeling
and William was in it.

I made provision
for the black. They were to see to him, and give the extra oats. I worked that
grease in the wound myself. He made him a noise, made me laugh wishing Jimmy
could hear it, like I was scratching his spot. I took hay in my hands and
worked him over then, and he leaned hard into me. I slapped his good flank,
though none too hard, and went for my own repast. But the feelings hit me I’d
held walking away from Jimmy. They were big in me, and I had me a spell where I
let it out.

When I was fit
again, I knew I needed to fill. Hated to do it, but the undertaker’s beans were
my manna that day, so I said thank you and left it at that. But he explained
the rails to me, all the way to St.
Louis.

I hopped first
one I came upon pointed in the right direction. I’d taken to wearing her
bandana again. I touched it eager. It would serve me. Guess I was like William
now. I wouldn’t be able to sit with regular folks. I’d cleaned up some, but it
wasn’t that. I needed the quiet…the open.

I watched that
country pass, some of it gently sloping, hopped one train, then another. I
listened to the talk around,
then
shut it out. Last train
I took went clear to East St. Louie. I hopped off and crossed the river by
ferry, then entered the shores of St. Louie proper.

This was a river
town, it’s landing filled with folks bringing in goods and loading onto barges.
I looked me around, and saw all walks. Smelled damp and fish, accents strange,
like in the war, and folks of every stripe. Soldiers blue, ladies hurrying into
the shops, men dressed well, dressed poor. Veteran begging, legs gone, and I
digged Monroe’s
money and put some in his cup. He wanted to talk but I played mute and walked
on. I wondered how Johnny would see such. Paving stones under my feet, shops
lined up with so
much
goods.

I walked some,
gawking, and not shy of it. They pointed me to the coach rental then. I picked
one could hold us all, and rented the horses to pull it, even the driver. This
was my moment, but there were still miles to cover. And so we took off, and I
let him know the general way…Shiloh Township.

“Shiloh Township.
Seven miles hanging onto St. Louis like a
baby and its momma,” was how he put it. He knew the store there, Varn’s
Mercantile. So it was I sat me back, folded my arms and all the patience I ever
learned had to be there now.

It was a grand
store. I would give Cousin his due. It smelled like starch and leather. Tack
and rope overhead, even chairs and pans. Then tables piled, shelves too, and
barrels with hardware and crackers. On the counter that pretty candy Allie
liked.

It was to be
Johnny’s…this place. Well, I could not take this easy. She would have all of it
now to make her choice. It was spacious and well cared for. He was not her
husband. He knew what he was about here and said as much. No wonder he longed
to take her. She was all he had missing. And he did buy in quantity no doubt. A
family was a good deal.

I tried to
swallow it.
Turning into the soldier again, the roses dying
in my hands.

The woman behind
the counter, Ma’s age I reckoned. “I’m Mrs. Cole,” she said, eying me head to
toe and thinking I was a vagrant, no doubt.

“Where
be
the Mr. Varn?” said I.

“He
be
at home, gathered there. If you need supplies best get
them for we’ll be hanging the wreaths soon. Who you
be
?”
she said.

“A dear friend,”
said I, trying not to grunt a laugh. But hanging the wreaths? “What ails?” I
said, “I’ve just crossed the river.”

“The mother,” she
said.

“What mother?” I
asked, the voice of reason leaving me.

“The widow Varn.”

“The old one?”

“The matriarch, widow of the deceased Charles Varn.”

I felt the rush
of relief bow my back. I had my hand on the counter.

There was nothing
I could buy them here he couldn’t give them and free. “I need me a shirt,” I
said.

She found me a
shirt and I gave her the dollar twenty-five cents. “How do I find the house?” I
asked, moving into the corner as I pulled the old shirt over my head.

Well, she looked
pretty shocked. There
was the wounds
, and some scars
along my ribs, and I knew my ma would take the butter paddle to me for showing
myself, but I cared not. “I’ve not seen them since the war.” Or before, or
ever, I said to myself regarding the matriarch.

So this Mrs. Cole
shook her head a little and brought her eyes back to mine. By her look I drew
her and repelled her. Repelled her mostly, I think, but she was watching me
like I was hiding goods in my britches.
Made my skin crawl a
little.

I pulled that
clean shirt over, and pulled the bandana free from round the neck. I tucked it
then, and her eyes flitted to my hands and back up.

“I shall draw
it,” she said, turning to a table filled with boots.

Boots.
Well there they were. “I need britches,” I called.
“And boots.”

Mine were
through, but I’d put the leather in them to cover the holes. Well these were
fair. I matched some to my feet. She was there again, measure in hand. “You….”
She cleared her throat and handed it to me.

“You got
drawers?” I said.

“Yes,” she said
so softly I said, “’scuse me Missus?”

“Yes,” she
blurted then.

Well I went back
to the corner. I was a beast, I admit. But I was a man in a hurry, she had no
idea. So she brought me drawers and I changed out for the shirt was long enough
to hide my willy, and she brought me britches, and I pulled them on, just
amazed they had all this, as if a cobbler and a tailor hid somewhere below
making them to order. Such modern times couldn’t wrap my mind. So when I was
changed out, all new and stiff with the freshness of so much at once, reminded
me of that uniform they gave me, that feeling I had then like I was in it now.

I had the house
number and spoke to the driver about it. We took some turns then, me gnawing my
lip, hanging my finger in that bit of cloth, then taking off my hat and working
my fingers through my hair. There was so much of
it,
reckoned it would always mark me wild. I shoved my hat back on.

I had to take a
piss of a sudden. I had him stop that rig and I ran for a tree.
Got back in quick as I could get those confounded buttons through
the tight new holes.

Oh glory to God I
was so close to her the hairs on my arms stood like a storm was coming. Oh God,
I loved her, that was the truth of it. It overtook me, and watered my eyes. I
wiped them then, even as he pulled before that mansion Cousin held her in, my
queen, and me there to storm these gates and pull her out.

I got out, my
steps measured like in parade, count and slow, pay attention. So I walked that
path to the door, and I saw it, the black circle hung there.
The
mother.
She had flown out of herself and left him. And I was here to
take the rest.

I had no pity for
Cousin, I said. He’d taken what’s mine soon enough. I balled my hand and
knocked upon that door. A girl in black dress, white bonnet answered.

“We not
be
taking callers,” she said, and even with my new clothes,
told me to go round back if I needed a drink before I left.

“I am here for
Miss Addie,” I said, to let her know it’s not the others I came for…the dead
Missus or her son.

He was behind her
then, dismissing her. He stood there looking me over. I saw the grief in him. I
made it worse, I knew.

His mouth
hardened, and the broken light in his eyes iced over. His lessons were coming
hard now. My guess was it had gone his way before me.

“Sorry about your
ma,” said I. I held my hat. I did not blink, and my jaw was set. We carried
grief, my kind, and we kept on. There was always living pushing at the times
when you wished to stop and quit, life pushed in rude, and you punched at it,
railed at it, but in the end it kept you living. He didn’t know. He’d hung the
wreath, but it wouldn’t stop life. I was life. And I was knocking, and if he
stood in my path I would keep coming, and in the end, if there was any heart in
him at all, he’d understand.

He stepped back
then, his eyes on the floor, his teeth working his jaw. Addie was further back,
in the hall, hands over her heart, her eyes so big. She had held back until he
stepped open turning himself from wall to door.

I made myself
tear my eyes from her, and I said to him, “Thank you.”

But it did not
stop my feet. I took some steps to her and stopped proper. She was looking up
at me.

“I will get my
hat,” she said. And so she turned from me, and my eyes followed her, ears
listened for her steps as she was going up.

I rolled my hat
over in my hands. I turned slow to him. He still held the door, eyes on my new
boots. “I’ll wait outside,” I said. He did not speak or look, and once I was
out, he closed the door.

But it was not
retreat, not nearly.

The door sprung
then, quick and wide, and there she stood, tying that bow under her chin. Her
eyes though, they were mine. She walked to me.

“Where are the
children?”

“Lavinia has
taken them,” she said.

I took her hand,
the lightning there like always, and I tucked her hand over my heart and drew
her against me.

“Where can you
marry round here?” I said to her before we took a step.

Her eyes were
rich with luster, like the black when I rubbed him with the
hay,
that
inky dark, layers of deep.

“You are ready
for me?” she said. Her mouth a red bow, lips so sweet pulling me into her
womanly shore.

“I am ready in my
body, like always,” I said. “But I am ready all the way through. I love you,
Lass.
From that time in the church.”

She would think
it was the time I took her boldly down that aisle. But I meant that first day,
first second I saw her and she rattled me.

“There is only
one for me,” said I, my arms twitching with the urge to crush her against my
heart.

She nodded. “For
me,
“ she
said, “…you.

I kissed her
then, holding back, but my lips on hers with a glowing heat.

When we pulled
back I said, “I’m here to collect. I can’t stay back…I can’t.”

She nodded. “It’s
time. I…pine.”

I took her hand
and led her to the carriage then. “We need a judge,” I told the man.

Tom
Tanner

Chapter
Thirty-One

In that buggy
ride, I got so addled, her next to me, all for me, hands vining round mine, her
eyes, and her smiles, Lord those lips lifting for me. Each little lash, the
flare of her little nostrils, did ever God make such a one.

We couldn’t
speak…or give guidance to that good driver who had been with me through this
most strange journey. He had caught our excitement. We rode to the courthouse
then, but they’d have to send for the judge, and he was at the saloon, but he
came out, something splattered on his vest, and him chewing, collar half
snapped open and him reaching plump hands to fasten it under what used to be a
chin but was now whiskers and flesh waddling with each curse as he messed with
that button buried in the turkey.

His cravat tied,
he stood before us and said the words, I do not know what they were exactly,
but I said, “I do, I do,” and he pronounced us, and said I could kiss her and I
never had another’s permission besides my own.

So I laid one on
her, gentle but pressing I tell you and the whole state of Missouri behind it.

Oh God, my
reveille was love.

She patted my
face. I had me no ring, but it would come later. And I would have her now. Well
I paid that fella, and he had to smile, he could see it, it was there, by damn
for
all the
world. I picked her up and carried her out
of there, her laughing and me feeling I could run up Jake’s ladder.

Then we needed
the boarding house. And that driver was laughing to beat the drum. She said I
compromised her, and I guess that’s true, for I kissed her a few times, and it
was not the kind ever seen in company.

She said I looked
drunk. And she would know. I laughed, I was drunk on her for sure, or my own
need, for it was there, the metal in me, oh yes.

We went in that
place and old spinster asked what we wanted and I said, “A room for me and my
wife. Mrs. Tom Tanner.”

And we were
hungry. So she said the diner was open for dinner, but we were getting to the
line. So I looked at Addie, and she looked at me and said, “I can wait.”

Well I knew our
time was narrow. The children returning, she said.

No dinner, I
said, paying for the room.

“I’ll send bread
and meat,” she said.

And I said real
quick
, “No. No one bothers us.”

“Water?” she said
like she never heard of a man and wife needing respite.

“No one bothers
us,” I repeated.

I picked up my
girl then. She was such a little thing. No telling how far I could carry her.

But I got my
answer. Top of the two flights I was breathing a bit. Got her to the door and
stood aside to let her get corralled.

Then I went in
swift and shut that door, and put the chair under the handle. She laughed at
that, even as she was taking off that hat, and setting it on the table there. I
threw mine across the room and went for the shirt. My pack was in the carriage,
and that fellow went for a drink, on me. Someday soon we’d have all the time we
wanted, but this here was
a
‘at long last.’ And I
meant to have her…and let her have me such as I was.

I pulled off the
shirt but kept on the bandana. “
Don’t pay these scrapes no
mind,” I said when she put her hand over her mouth and stared at me.

I went to her
then and my fingers went to that endless row of tiny buttons. “Let me,” I said,
my hands shaking some and having no precision. But this was a thing my mind had
been on…that I’d be the one to take off her dress this time.

So she stood
patient, looking at me, grin on her face but her eyes a little sad over the
wounds. And I bumped her under the chin a few times, once making her teeth
clack a little. “Sorry,” I said kissing her sweet, but I never gave up.

I needed to learn
such now, tiny buttons, and how those frills hooked and tied. Well I was
curious,
like it was this secret thing and now I had a
ticket in.

I was nearly done
when her hands went to my britches. I just stopped, looking at her hands
working them open. I forgot everything, but I was there, just there and
breathing, her hands small on me, but feeling like the biggest thing…on the
biggest thing. I was ready to burst.

I had to take her
hands away. Let us get to that bed I paid for at least. “Lass,” I said, having
some corset ribbons knotted now and thinking of my knife.

She took over for
me then, but I watched, such a sight, even as I stumbled out of my boots and
britches. I was so glad for those new drawers, but they were off me quick.

She was nearly
bare but for the bloomers, and those breasts, what was God thinking to come up
with this? How is it they fit my hands? “Am I hurting?” I said, afeared, that’s
all. I was rough. She was cream.

“I like it,” she
said, voice like thread running a seam through me, through me.

I kissed her into
the tick then, into it.
Just that, kissing and pressing on
her skin.
I had finished that time, her on my lap, carrying that in my mind
like a sin. But one I wasn’t sorry for. I wasn’t sorry for nothing with her,
and that was the truth.

Oh, she moved on
me, took me in her hand like I was hers and moved against me, and I said, “You
got to stop, I can’t rub on that velvet and last,” and I kissed her some more,
and my hands found her then and I pressed on her and moved. She wasn’t hard to
read, I felt her over, and she yelled out and I covered her mouth with mine and
oh God I kissed her.

I filled her with
my flesh, and I stilled in her. “Girl,” I said. “I’m so glad I lived.
For you an’ for this.”

She moved a
little, hunkered down and grabbed my backside. “Give…me,” she said voice so
deep, us so deep into one another. And I gave to her then, the way of it,
Lord…Lord, I made a sound, and something more let go in me than the rush of
life springing from me. I finished in her, and my heart, my God I felt so weak,
so limp I didn’t know if I could move. She had to help me, God’s truth, I could
not move on my own. I had waved that white flag, and surrendered to her.

She rolled me
onto my side, and I didn’t know I was crying too, it’s like everything came
free again, but I wasn’t sobbing like that last, just wet cause times had been
trying, I guess, and now we were together. We were man and wife.

We lay that way a
long time, me on my side, her lying in the bow of my arm, me looking my fill,
touching my fill while she talked then and played with her bandana still around
my neck. When she got going it poured out. Well, it was Johnny. He’d given her
a time and then some. He hadn’t wanted to come to St. Louis, but after they’d seen me at the
station it had all been downhill. He’d done some things… “Needs him a hidin’,”
is what I said cause I felt the need to say something, but truth be told I
didn’t know what to do about it. He had stuck his bare rear at her other day. I’d
of chased that rear to glory and tanned it good. That I did know.

I told her some
then about the wreck. Then I backtracked a little, but she got more upset, so I
eased off it, not wanting to bring it here. I felt ready for another go, and
she surprised me and got on me and sat back and in it went like a homing pigeon
to roost. Oh she brought some sounds out of me only a wounded man should make. But
Lord, I was beside myself. Marriage had redeemed me.