The Rebels: The Kent Family Chronicles (37 page)

He stared at his friend. It was impossible to conceal his hope any longer:

“I’ve thought a good deal about what you used to write in your letters. About the open country in the west—”

“It’s very different than it was just a few years ago, Judson.”

“The war, you mean.”

“Aye. We’re down to three settlements in Kentucky. Harrodsburg, Boonesborough and Fort Logan. All this past spring and summer, our people have lived like prisoners inside the stockades. When work parties go out to plant corn, other armed men go with them to stand guard. It’s not safe to hunt or farm your own piece of ground. Everyone’s taken refuge at the forts—”

George’s mouth set, almost ugly. “There’s a governor at Fort Detroit, Henry Hamilton, who’s paying British silver for every scalp cut from an American corpse.”

“I’ve heard of him.”

“They call him the Hair-Buyer. He understands how easily the whole Northwest Territory can be taken if the tribes are properly incited. He also understands the value of the land. Which is more than can be said for some of our elegant Burgesses sitting here in Williamsburg pinching snuff from their silver boxes. I came back to try to remedy the situation.”

Judson came closer to the issue: “Donald thought you might be raising a new levy of men—”

George Clark didn’t answer immediately. He scanned the room as if searching for possible eavesdroppers. But there was no one else present besides the two of them and the girl dozing on her stool by the fire.

George clacked his fork back on his trencher, used a finger to dab a smear of syrup from the corner of his mouth. He leaned forward in his chair:

“Donald guessed correctly. After a great deal of argument and some table-pounding, I persuaded the committee of the Burgesses to authorize the recruiting of three hundred and fifty Virginians for the defense of Kentucky. They’re giving me six thousand Continental dollars to buy ammunition and supplies.”

“Where are you going to find the men?”

“Anywhere I can. Here. Pittsburgh—”

“I’d like to be one of them.”

The sudden silence was strained. Judson thought,
He’s going to turn me down
—

George Clark picked up his fork, dropped it again. In the kitchen, a man and woman argued over who had broken half a crate of eggs. A wagon creaked in the street; a cow lowed, its bell clanking. The rhythmic slow swish of the sweep’s broom going over and over the same square of floor sounded beyond the arch.

George frowned. “When you said you’d ridden all night, I thought there was probably some reason other than a wish to see an old friend.”

“I want to go to Kentucky, George. I want to start again.”

“I don’t think you quite know what you’re asking.”

The words, gently said, almost broke Judson’s heart. An instant later, they angered him. He slammed the coffee mug on the table:

“So I’m judged and found guilty before the fact?”

George still looked troubled. “I’m not sure I understand.”

“You’ve listened to Tom Jefferson. And to Donald. You’ve heard how I failed at everything before and you’ve decided I’ll fail again.”

“Judson, for God’s sake! That’s a totally unwarranted accusation—!”

“Is it?”

“Yes!”

“Forgive me, George, but I think you’re lying. Maybe out of kindness, but lying all the same—”

If so, George concealed it. “You simply don’t realize—Kentucky is
not
the tidewater.” His supple hand spread eloquently over the griddlecakes, the syrup pitcher, the cornbread loaf. “There’s little or no food like this. Just a swallow of water from a canteen and a handful of dried corn from your haversack. On the trail, you live like that for days—maybe weeks.”

“I can do it. I know I can.”

Silence again. Finally George resumed:

“Judson, it’s difficult to say this—”

“A turn-down. All right, do it and be done!”

“God, they weren’t exaggerating. You’re angry at everything.”

Judson flushed. “I’m sorry.”

“Then hear me out. You’re my friend, Judson. The closest friend I knew when I was growing up. That can’t be changed by anything that happens. But because you
are
my friend, I won’t deceive or flatter you—despite your notions to the contrary. There is no peace in Kentucky! No freedom to roam, explore, settle where you wish. The tribes are raiding regularly from north of the Ohio. Killing and butchering any man they find alone. Or women and babies, for that matter. I hate to put it so bluntly, but I need soldiers, not gentlemen-adventurers.”

“Do you think you can locate three hundred and fifty who meet your high standards?” Judson blazed.

George stiffened, but he controlled his temper, and his voice:

“If I’m lucky.”

“And if you’re not, you’ll have to take somewhat less perfect specimens—”

“Judson, I can hardly stand to listen to this.”

“To what?”

“Your bitterness. What in the name of heaven has happened to you?”

“What’s happened, George, is that I’m dying.”

He said it swiftly; softly. But George rocked back in his chair, hammered by the ferocity and pain of the statement.

“I mean it, George. I’m dying by days and by hours and by minutes—”

“So are we all.”

“Not the same way. I’m dying from failing. Dying because I hold what seem to be the wrong beliefs. I’m dying from hating my father and being hated—”

“And dying from not being strong enough to overcome all that—and learn from it?” George asked quietly, with just the barest hint of condemnation.

Bleak-faced, Judson agreed:

“Yes. That too. But I have learned this much. I think I have just about one more chance left. One chance somewhere to pick up the litter of my life and prove I can be successful at something, however small or insignificant—”

George cooled visibly. “The defense of Virginia’s western counties is neither small nor insignificant.”

“George, I didn’t mean—”

“What happens out there in the next year will determine how much land America holds when this war is settled. It will determine whether we’ll be pushed back east of the mountains, forced forever to huddle here on the coast—”

“Believe me, I didn’t mean to suggest—”

Abruptly, George relaxed again. “I know.” A weary smile; a nod. “The fault’s mine. I haven’t been in the best of spirits lately—”

He picked up his coffee mug, drank. “However—that doesn’t change the situation I’m facing. I need steady hands. Sharp eyes.” He looked directly at Judson. “God forbid that I should sound like a Bible-thumper inveighing against the sin of drunkenness. But this much is the truth. In the forest, liquor will only get a man lost, or slain.”

The quiet statements told Judson more about what Jefferson or Donald had said to George; and much more about the immensity of the change in his friend. This George Clark wasn’t the young man who’d roamed the Virginia woodlands for sheer pleasure. He spoke like what he was—a military commander.

Judson gave George the answer he hoped his friend wanted to hear:

“Then I’ll swear off it that’s what it takes. Never another drop—”

“It takes even more than that.”

“What, then?
Goddamn it, I’m pleading for my life!”

Judson had tears in his eyes. He only realized it after he shouted. The outcry roused the serving girl on her stool, brought a gray feminine head peeping out of the kitchen, stopped the swish of the broom from beyond the arch. Judson drowned in a red wave of shame, his cheeks burning—

He kicked against the table’s trestle, shoved his chair back, frantic to leave. His red-haired friend was staring at him with a mixture of alarm and sorrow.

As Judson whirled toward the arch, George’s fingers clamped on his arm.

“Sit down.”

The sneer was unconscious: “What the hell for? I’m not the sort you want. Clear-eyed. Pure-hearted—”

“Sit down,”
George Clark said. “And if you really want to discuss it, stop that self-pitying whine.”

Judson felt as if he’d tumbled into an icy brook:

“Discuss it
—? Do you?”

“Yes. I think I’ve made it clear that it won’t be easy to gather the men I need. So I have—motives for possibly accepting your offer.”

Jubilant, Judson pulled his chair up again, planted his elbows on the table, pleaded with open hands:

“I’ll be sober as a damn saint, George! You always said I should see the western lands—well, maybe this isn’t the wrong time but exactly the right one. If you think there’ll be any problem about me taking orders because we’re friends—”

“I think that could be a very definite problem.”

“No, no, it won’t be, I give you my word.”

“The word’s easy. The deed’s hard. I want you to realize what you’re asking. Consider the effort just to reach Pittsburgh. It’s hundreds of miles—”

“I’m strong—you saw how I got here. I rode all night—”

“And walked in white and trembly as poplar leaves in a windstorm. I’m not trying to be difficult, Judson, or hard on you—I could never do that easily because of all the fine times we shared. But the truth of what my men will be facing can’t be dodged. Can you sleep in the open when there are ten inches of snow covering the ground?”

“Yes.”

“Walk till there’s no feeling left in your legs—then keep on walking?”

“I can, yes.”

“Do you think you could kill a man without making a sound?”

Judson tried to smile. “The first part is no problem. I’ll practice the second.”

George didn’t smile back. “The pay is negligible. Most of my funds will go for supplies.”

“I don’t care. Nothing can be any worse than the trap I’ve gotten myself into here.”

“Can you fire a rifle?”

“One of the long Kentucky models? I’ve never tried but I’m positive I can learn. I’m fair with pistols. Always have been—”

Suddenly George Clark unfolded his lanky frame, tossed coins on the table:

“Come on.”

“Where?”

“I’ll saddle my horse and we’ll ride out in the country and find out how expert a marksman you are.”

“With a rifle?”

“Yes.”

George Clark had a peculiar, almost secretive expression on his face. Judson noticed it but failed to understand its meaning.

Once more the tall woodsman surveyed the public room. Satisfied, he led Judson toward the side entrance. In twenty minutes, they were cantering along under arching limbs that streamed down yellow and scarlet leaves in the brisk morning wind. The road was alternately dark and dazzling with sunlight.

He had a chance. One chance. He dared not let it slip out of his hands—

The hands that were white from gripping his rein hard, so George wouldn’t see how he was trembling.

George Clark shucked his leather hunting bag off his shoulder, dropped his powder horn on top, then laid his gleaming Kentucky rifle on the pile. From a sheath sewn into the side of the bag, he drew a bone-handled knife. He set to work stripping a square of bark from the trunk of one of the trees in the isolated clearing where they’d stopped. Judson marveled at the swift, sure movements of George’s fingers—and silently cursed the continuing tremor of his own.

Kneeling in the thick layer of fallen leaves, George carefully inscribed a small circle on the moist inner surface of the peeled bark. He tucked his knife back in his boot, dug under the leaves, scratched up some dirt. He rubbed the dirt all around the circular cut, then blew off the excess. When he held up the square, the dirt still clung in the cut outlining a round target.

“Ought to be able to see that,” George said.

“Yes, I can see it fine.” Judson couldn’t remember when he’d been so jittery. Perhaps that was because the stakes had never been quite so high.

George carried the target across the clearing. He pinned it to a trunk with one stab of his knife. He left the knife humming faintly, ambled back through the rustling leaves. Off in the trees that ringed the clearing, their horses blew and stamped.

George waved Judson to his side. Both men hunkered down as George supported the long-barreled rifle on his palms:

“I’ll show you how to load one of these beauties. It’s slower than loading a musket, but your aim’s far more accurate.”

“So I’ve heard.”

Judson eyed the blade-pinned scrap of bark across the clearing. The bark moved a little in the brisk wind. Damn, he’d never hit it.
Never
—

Yes he would. He’d hit it if he never did another thing.

Patiently, George took him through the routine. First he filled the rifle pan with powder from his smaller priming horn. Then he picked up the second, larger horn, scraped down at the end so the cut-off tip fit like a cap. He pulled off the cap section, held it up:

“One of these is an exact measure of powder.”

He poured the coarse black grains into the barrel, then unlatched a perfectly polished, rust-free plate in the side of the stock.

“Greased patches in here. You lay one over the muzzle opening—”

He did so, then fished in the bag for a ball. He inserted the ball over the patch. He loosened the ramrod clipped to the rifle and handed the rod to Judson:

“You seat both the patch and the ball with a good solid stroke.”

Judson nearly dropped the ramrod. George smiled in a tolerant way. Judson got the ramrod positioned, shoved it down the barrel.

“More, Judson. More. Seat it all the way, good and firm. All right, that’s got it—”

He placed the rifle in Judson’s hand.

“Now cock and fire—and remember to use your sight. Keep reminding yourself that it’s not a musket. You don’t just shut your eyes and let ’er blow—”

He pointed to a spot on the perimeter of the clearing opposite the target.

“Try it from there.”

Feeling as if he were walking to an execution, Judson headed for the indicated place. When he got the rifle to his shoulder, it felt immense. Despite the fall air, he was sweating. The inside of his mouth tasted like brass.

Off to his left, George leaned on the ramrod. The wind fluttered the fringe on the hem and sleeves of his hunting shirt. Judson squinted down the blue barrel.
Dammit, why couldn’t he keep his hands from shaking—?