Stonewall Hinkleman and the Battle of Bull Run (17 page)

“My flask!” he gasps. “Give it to me!”

“Hold on a second, this could be tricky,” I say. The bullet hole is just under his back pocket, not an inch from his bottle of whiskey, or whatever it is. Shoot, in a movie the bullet would have hit the flask and Cyrus would be okay. But the flask is fine.

I try to ease it out of his pocket gently, but it still makes him wince. I try to roll him over a bit and my hand touches what feels like a pebble on his side.

“Ouch!” Cyrus hollers. “Give me that flask!”

He reaches for it, but I don't let it go. Instead, I touch the pebble again, and again he screams. “What in blazes are you doing?”

It's the bullet. It has traveled through his thigh and is lodged just under the skin.

This is the way it's supposed to happen
.

“Stonewall, please. I need something to dull the pain.”

Don't change the past. Don't change history
.

“Please, Stonewall,” he says.

But this is more than just history. This is Cyrus
.

I take a deep breath. “Okay.”

I uncork the bottle, but instead of giving it to him, I hold it to his lips to give him a small sip.

“More,” he says. “More.”

I ignore him and grab the knife that he was going to throw at Dupree. I pour a little of the alcohol on the blade.

“What are you
doing
?” he shouts. “The knife ain't hurt!”

“I'm sterilizing the blade,” I say.

“
Steri
—what?”

“Don't worry about it,” I tell him. “Just get ready.”

I slit open his pants and there, almost like a pimple, is the end of the bullet just under the skin.

“No, sir,” Cyrus says. “No, no, sir.”

I undo the knot of my authentic reenactor's rope belt and shove it into Cyrus's mouth. “Bite down,” I say. “Hard.”

His jaw clenches. Before he can say anything else, I put the knife to the lump and cut.

“Aaargh!” Cyrus screams through the rope.

Cyrus's skin splits apart, revealing the lumpy lead bullet. With the tip of the knife, I quickly flick the thing out of Cyrus's thigh. The wound starts to gush.

Cyrus yanks the rope from his mouth. “Now give me that durn drink!”

I uncork the bottle and begin to pour the rest of it over the wound. The alcohol burns, and Cyrus lets me know it with a string of obscenities. I didn't know some of those words had been invented yet.

I give him a shove and roll him onto his stomach so I can pour the rest of the bottle on his butt shot. More screams and cussing, but I don't care. He doesn't understand that by digging out the bullet and pouring whiskey on his wound, I may have just saved his life. At least, I'm pretty sure that's what I saw on the History Channel once.

Cyrus is starting to go faint, his face pale and eyes droopy. I've got to plug up the wound, but I've used up all the rags Ash left.

That's when I remember the neckerchief. That stupid, super-nerd, Boy Scout reject neckerchief that my parents made me wear, which, by the way, I haven't seen ANYBODY else wearing today in the real war.

I ball it up, pour the rest of the whiskey on it, and stuff it in.

This is way too much for Cyrus. He screams again.

I remember my gym teacher's favorite bit of advice. I think it might actually work here.

“C'mon,” I say, “walk it off.”

It's a struggle, but I get him up. He leans on me while I wrap strips around his butt as best as I can.

We start moving. Man, it's going to be a long walk.

Cyrus gasps and groans with each step. We stagger back toward the stone bridge. I need to get him to the field hospital. I've done as much as I can, but how are we going to make it that far? I'm not sure I can go that far by myself, much less dragging Cyrus. But I can't leave him.

We're almost to the bridge when a figure suddenly appears from the shadows beneath it and runs toward a low rock wall to the north. The figure is crouched so low to the ground that I barely notice it. It disappears behind the wall for a second, then jumps over the wall and starts running across the field toward the retreating Yankees.

“Jacob!” I cry out.

He whirls around with a look of surprise.

“It's me, Jacob,” I call. “Please help us.”

He seems to stand frozen forever. As if he's stuck in the mud and can't get out.

“Jacob, please,” I call again, as Cyrus's body starts to crumple to the ground. “I can't hold him anymore.”

Still he doesn't move. What is he doing? I need help!

Jacob glances toward the Union army and back again at the stone bridge. Now I see what he's doing. He's not just some kid running across a bridge and through a field. He's a slave trying to escape. Trying to make it to the Yankees. To his liberators. To freedom.

“Forget it! I'm sorry!” I yell quickly. “Just go! Go! Go!”

But it's too late. A unit of Confederates—new arrivals who haven't seen a bit of action yet—begins to cross the stone bridge. There must be two hundred of them in a long column.

Jacob runs toward us and slips his head under Cyrus's other arm.

“I'm sorry, Jacob,” I say. “I'm so sorry. I didn't realize . . .”

I look at Jacob, but his face is blank and cold. He could have been halfway to the Union army by now. He could have had a new life and I ruined it.

“I'm really sorry,” I say again, but by now we're at the bridge. The column of troops parts, and together, Jacob and I bear Cyrus across Bull Run and head for the hospital.

 

“Hang on, Cyrus. I can see the stretchers now. We're almost there.”

Up ahead is Wilmer McLean's barn. The wounded lie in rows on the ground beside it, waiting their turn for the surgeons inside.

Cyrus blacked out just after we crossed the bridge and has been dead weight for most of the mile we've trudged. But I haven't stopped talking to him the whole way, if anything just to keep me going. Jacob hasn't said a word, not even when we passed Mr. Robinson's house a little ways off to our right and up a hill. I saw the old man standing on his front porch with his hands on his hips and I waved as best I could without letting Cyrus fall. But he didn't wave back. He just watched us walk past.

I told Jacob he should go, but he didn't even glance at the old man.

Still, despite my bayonet wound—and how many guys at my school could claim that?—and the fact that my legs and chest burn from carrying Cyrus, for the first time today I feel kind of relieved. Cyrus has his butt shot, but I'm hopeful I saved his life, and that I haven't caused too many problems for the future.

Sure, we'll have to deal with Dupree back in the present, but at least his chance of mucking up history is over. Mission accomplished. My work here is done. I've still got to figure out something to do for Jacob, but all in all, I feel pretty good.

Until we stagger into the field hospital.

Bloodied soldiers lie all around us. Loud screams come from inside the barn. Stacked up outside the barn door is a small pile of amputated legs and arms. A man drenched in blood emerges from the barn's dark interior bearing another bloody leg while two others, who are hoisting a stretcher with a wounded soldier, pass him on their way to the surgeons inside.

Jacob and I lay Cyrus on his stomach on the ground in line with the other wounded. His pants and the back of his shirt are soaked with blood. I turn his head to the side to make sure he can breathe. Now all I can do is wait. I've done all I can for Cyrus. My head spins and I collapse to my knees and puke until there's nothing left to come out.

An orderly comes up and holds a canteen to Cyrus's mouth. The orderly pulls down Cyrus's pants a bit to inspect the wound.

“The bullet's already out,” I say.

“That's good,” the orderly says. “He'll be all right.” He looks up at me. “Is he your kin?”

“He sure is,” I say.

The orderly nods to Jacob, who hasn't moved or said a word since being relieved of his burden. “Is he yours?”

Of course we're not related, I almost say, until I realize what he meant. “Oh, no. He's nobody's. I think he's free now.”

The orderly makes a nasty sound. I guess it's a laugh, but it's an ugly one. “Well, he ain't free no more,” he says, clamping his hand on Jacob's arm. “We got plenty for him to do. Let's go, boy.”

“Wait!” I cry. The orderly looks curiously at me. I should have said Jacob did belong to me and then later tonight try to help him escape. I've got to do something. But all I can think of to say is, “His name's Jacob.”

The orderly looks at me even more strangely. “So?”

He begins walking off with Jacob in tow. I want Jacob to at least turn around so I can say good-bye.

“I couldn't have done it without you, Jacob,” I call after him. “I'm glad you were here.”

But Jacob doesn't even turn around. The orderly yanks his arm and they disappear into the shadows of the barn.

 

I sit at Cyrus's side the rest of the afternoon, waiting for his turn in the barn. The orderly left a canteen for us and every few minutes I hold it to Cyrus's lips and let some water trickle out.

From time to time, Jacob reappears from the barn carrying amputated limbs or toting in another wounded soldier. I see him out of the corner of my eye, but he doesn't look at me and I don't look too long at him. I managed to prevent him from doing the one thing he really wanted to do—escape. But hopefully what we did today will help lead to his freedom in a few years.

I try explaining all of this to Cyrus as we wait, but he's still passed out. After I say everything there is to say about Jacob, I tell Cyrus stories about the craziness of my father and his reenacting friends. How they spend most of their weekends traveling to Civil War battlefields and wearing old, scratchy clothes and sleeping on the ground. I tell him how half of the reenactors are so out of shape that they must stop after a few minutes of marching to catch their breath and eat a snack. I tell him about how the reenactors aim their muskets above the heads of the “enemy.”

And I tell him that if they could see what I've seen today, and what I'm seeing all around me right now, they would never dream of spending their weekends reenacting it.

The sun is setting behind the hills and a gray duskiness settles along the green fields. The smell of tobacco fills the air and campfires spark all around me as soldiers start boiling their coffee.

Finally, two orderlies appear with a stretcher and place it beside Cyrus. I'm glad Jacob isn't one of them. As they lift Cyrus onto it, I realize I won't see him again. It is time for me to go back and I want to say good-bye. But he is still out of it.

I think about writing a quick note, saying I am proud to be his great-great-great-great-nephew, but he'll just think I'm crazy. I reach into my pockets for something to leave with him and feel the five packets of McLean's tobacco I'd bought for him. I slip them into his pockets and pat his back.

“I hope this makes us even,” I say. And the orderlies carry him away.

I stand up, gaze around the field one more time, and unsling the bugle from my shoulder. Darkness is falling and the campfires sparkle like stars across the fields. I hold the bugle to my lips and feel relief that the cool metal quickly blazes with heat.

Without even thinking about what to play, I begin to blow the slow, mournful tune of taps.

“UH, TOM? Here's your bugle back.”

I'm standing at the entrance of Tom's Emporium on Sutler's Row. It's dark now and the stars are out. Inside the tent, a lantern glows. Tom's face flickers in the orange light. He puffs on a pipe. The tobacco smells sweet—too sweet for me. Exhaustion hits me, my head reels, and I start to faint.

In a flash, Tom is at my side. “Whoa, son,” I hear him say. He catches me with his good arm and helps me into his tent. He sits me down on his folding chair. Its coolness revives me. I open my eyes. Tom gives me a nice smile, a sympathetic smile.

He takes the bugle from my fingers.

“I'm sorry I had to do that to you, Hinkleman, but I'm too old to go back and so are most of these reenactors. I needed somebody smart, somebody who might pass for a regular soldier, and somebody who knew the stakes.”

It takes a second for this to sink in.

“So you knew what the bugle would do?” Now I'm not feeling faint. I'm feeling mad. “Why didn't you tell me? I could have been killed! I could have . . .”

“I know,” says Tom. He actually looks a little ashamed as he stares down at the bugle. In the lantern light, I see that the bugle has lost its shine. Once again, it's just a dirty, dented horn. “I'm sorry. But you seemed like a smart kid who could keep out of trouble.”

I pull my T-shirt up to show him the gash on my chest from Dupree's bayonet. I hold out my hands so he can see the bloody bandages over my palms. “It's not so easy keeping out of trouble in the middle of a freaking CIVIL WAR!” I yell at him. “I'm lucky I'm not dead.”

Tom puts down the bugle, reaches back into the old trunk, and takes out a small plastic box with a big red cross on it. A first aid kit.

Even with just one arm, he easily unwraps my nasty bandages and pops open the kit.

“Do you know what you're doing?” I ask, still ticked off.

He tears open an alcohol swab with his teeth. “One thing I do know about is wounds,” he says. “Hold on, this'll hurt.”