The Black Flower Read online

  Another blossom of smoke rose from the Strangers’ works. Bishop began: “Boys, I am inclined to think—”

  The shell exploded directly above them like a thunder clap. It was case shot, spraying musket balls and fragments in all directions, a lucky shot for the gunners over there. Someone cried out in pain and surprise, Bishop was knocked sprawling, the colors dipped and rose again and unfurled in defiance, and the line swept on.

  Someone was yelling. “Oh, sweet Jesus! Oh, sweet Jesus!”

  “Close it up!” the officers cried. “Close it up there, boys!”

  Meanwhile, great cathedral bells were tolling and clanging in Bushrod Carter’s ears. The concussion of the shell had staggered him. He nearly fell, righted himself, stumbled on dimly aware that some bad things had happened: Bishop was gone, somebody was hurt, the officers were shouting, the horizon was tilting. Bushrod heard the band—a remote, infuriating blur of brass and percussion across which moved the thin, keening wail of a human voice—

  Then he was sinking, down and down into a tangle of weeds and green water and liquid bars of sunlight to find Luther Falls again with his cloudy eyes and his long brown hair waving in the current of Little Spring Creek—

  “Bushrod!”

  He heard the voice, but it was Luther’s face he saw. It was swollen, tattered where the little fish had pecked it—

  “Bushrod!”

  His lungs were bursting now and he shot upward toward the little circle of light far above, broke out into the bright sunlight and the good air full of dust and milkweed and the chattering of blackbirds—

  “Hurrah!” he cried. “Drive the sons of bitches!”

  “Bushrod!” Virgil C. cried again.

  But Bushrod Carter was swept up in the red joy of life. His chest was swelling with it, his muscles aching with the power of it. He fairly danced with the desire to get his hands on something—a fat blue gunner, a general, a bandsman. The drums surged in his blood, beating in counterpoint to his pounding heart, and he might have broken into the charge then and there had not Virgil C. taken him by the arm and shaken him like an errant child.

  “Goddammit, Bushrod, what is the matter with you and where is Jack?”

  “Great God!” cried Bushrod. He looked about, saw Handsome Bob Wheeler to his right instead of Jack. “Great God! Is Jack killed?”

  Handsome Bob was about to reply when a familiar voice broke behind them: “Out of my way, you peckerwoods!”

  Handsome Bob grinned. “No, here is ol’ Jack now,” he said.

  Jack Bishop shouldered his way back into the line. He had lost his spectacles and his hat, a thin ribbon of blood ran down his temple and disappeared under the collar of his jacket. He was carrying his Enfield by the first band, dragging the butt along the ground. Bushrod took the piece while Jack adjusted his accoutrements.

  “By God,” said Jack, “I have lost my damn spectacles—blowed clean off me. Now what’ll I do?”

  “You’ll have to squinch up, I guess,” said Bushrod.

  “Bushrod Carter, you—”

  “Here,” said Virgil C.“Wipe your face ’fore your mama sees you.” He reached across Bushrod with the rag of a handkerchief even filthier than Jack’s own. Bishop took it and daubed at the trickle of blood.

  The bells had ceased in Bushrod’s head, but enough of the joy remained so that, for the moment at least, he did not have to be afraid. When Jack had shouldered his rifle again, Bushrod asked, “How is it with you? Is it a bad hurt?” He knew it was not, but asked just the same.

  “Mortal, I fear,” said Jack. “Tragic, ain’t it?”

  “Can I have your watch?” said Virgil C.

  Without thinking, they had fallen in step with the drum cadence again. The line moved forward, creaking and clanking, the tips of their bayonets bobbing in time, as if nothing at all had happened.

  They passed over the body of a young officer lying on his face, his hands flung out before him. There was a big hole in the back of the man’s shell jacket; from its tattered edges spread a wide stain glistening with flies that swarmed testily when the troops passed. Bushrod, careful though he was, nudged the man’s leg in passing and found it stiff, and the blood on his coat was old. Bushrod wondered what the man was doing out here, and when he might have been shot.

  “One of those staff fellows,” said Virgil C., as if in answer to his thoughts. “Bet he was scoutin about and a sharpshooter got him.”

  The man’s horse had been grazing near the body; now it trotted off a little distance and looked back expectantly. The line opened and passed around it. Bushrod had little use for staff officers, but there was something about this one—the way his hair was ruffling in the breeze, perhaps, or the lonely manner of his death—that touched him. Bushrod was glad he couldn’t see the man’s face.

  Now a rabbit leapt up from under Bushrod’s feet and bounded away, showing his heels to the Confederate army. “Bang!” said Virgil C., pointing his finger at the rabbit like a pistol. Up ahead loomed a great brick house and an oak grove; the skirmishers were already dueling with the Strangers for the yard.

  The joy that had possessed Bushrod’s heart was steadily leaking away. He couldn’t shake the image of the dead staff officer; he kept thinking about the man lying by himself in the field while his mount waited patiently for him to rise. Then another thought came to him.

  “Jack, how many was lost back yonder?”

  “Only one, that I saw.”

  “Who was it?”

  Bishop did not answer right away. He walked on, balling Virgil C.’s handkerchief in his hand. Then he pressed his fist tight against his teeth and bit, hard. That, Bushrod knew, was his answer.

  “The little general,” said Bushrod.

  Bishop nodded.

  They went on. The skirmishers had disappeared into the oak grove, from the sound of it they were having a sharp fight in there.

  “Dammit!” said Jack suddenly. “I wish I hadn’t—”

  Bushrod waited for his friend to continue, though he knew he wouldn’t. Young Jeff Hicks was gone for good, and taken all his nineteen years with him, and nobody could undo it with words that had no need for speaking. Wherever the boy had gone, he would already have plenty of company, and was likely to have plenty more before this time tomorrow, and there was nothing to do but let him go. So Jack Bishop shook his head, and passed the handkerchief back to Virgil C., and the line moved on.

  Bushrod looked at the ground and watched the grass pass under his feet. The dead staff officer and young Jeff Hicks passed with it: two more left behind among so many.

  Out of the corner of his eye Bushrod saw the regimental flag, its stars and saltier and the names of their battles painted on. He thought of the days when each company had a flag of its own, when a regimental line looked like something out of King Arthur with all the gay banners whisking silkily around their varnished staffs. It might as well have been in King Arthur’s time, so long ago it seemed now. When they went into the fight at Perryville, they were still carrying their beautiful Cumberland Rifles flag—there it was stolen from the dead hand of young Silas Kessler by a Federal cavalryman, and borne away never to return. Bushrod wondered wher it was now. Perhaps it hung in one of the Strangers’ state houses, or among ranks of trophies in the hall of an emporium: an object of curiosity, marvelled at by the citizens. They would not know about the Ladies of Cumberland who made the flag, nor about young Silas whose mother lost all three of her boys on the Kentucky campaign. They would not know that nearly all of the original Cumberland Rifles were dead or maimed or vanished now.

  So many gone. Some were home, hobbling the plank sidewalks of Cumberland with pinned-up sleeves or trouser legs, or lying in bed watching the darkness fall. Others had gone to prison camps, some had joined the cavalry, at least one had fled to Mexico. But most of them were dead, and Bushrod wondered what they were doing this afternoon. Were they watching? Did they know what was going to happen?

  The line was taking more fir
e now, plunging fire coming from somewhere across the river. A shell erupted in their front, spewing dirt and rocks and iron fragments—no field artillery, that. They walked through the smoke of it.

  Well, Bushrod thought, the dead were dead. They were gone, and took with them their faces and voices and whether they drank coffee or not and whether they believed in infant baptism or not and who they liked and who they didn’t—gone with all their years and all the baggage they carried: tintypes and handkerchiefs and luck charms, pocket knives and Testaments and playing cards and rheumatism and all the half-remembered images of their short and uncompleted lives—all flown up like blackbirds into that undiscovered country from whose bourn they would not return, not today nor tomorrow nor the next day, forever and ever, amen—

  Another big round shot struck the ground undetonated and bounded toward them like a ball; the boys parted to make way for it, and it bounced off toward the rear. No question now, the Strangers had guns across the river, too. Well, well, there was never any end to the troubles. But by this time tomorrow all the guns would be silenced and they could go down to the river and build a good fire and make some coffee: Bushrod and Jack and Virgil C.—and Uncle Ham too, Bushrod decided. In fact, he might go through the camp tomorrow and gather up all the old boys from Cumberland and they would all reunion down by the river among the willows. There would not be many; they would not need more than one fire.

  What a long way they had come since Cumberland, and all of it, save for that first larking trip to Corinth on the cars, had been afoot. Bushrod wondered how many miles they had walked all told, counting drilling and marching and charging and retreating; counting sentry and foraging and scouting and pacing up and down before the fire, nights; counting strolling with girls and going for water and hunting for comrades after a fight. Bushrod supposed they could have walked to California and back by now, though none of them had ever had any clear idea what it was they were walking toward. Victory, they had thought, once upon a time—more likely it was only the little river waiting up ahead, or some river beyond that. Well, there was no time to look back now. They were pressing on, to the urging of the immortal drummers, hurrying toward whatever destination each man carried in his fate. For Bushrod, the river would do for now. Perhaps tomorrow they could rest a while and consider the long way they had come and rehearse what they would say about it to children in the distant, unimaginable years.

  For the last time, Bushrod looked up to see his army spread out across the plain. What he could see of the brigades and grand divisions still advanced in order; had there been no Strangers, no fatal purpose, no guns or muskets across the way, they might have marched on forever under their bright banners and gleaming bayonets. But already behind the ordered lines the fields were dotted with rags of the Departed, and the smoke was rising, the white smoke that soon would hide them all. Bushrod knew it was only the smoke of the guns, but for a moment it seemed as if it might have risen from the long way itself, like the mysterious fogs that crept from the ditches and hollows in the lonely country nights, that were cold on the face and made saddle horses run wild. Well, no matter. The smoke was rising; into the smoke the long lines passed, and Bushrod knew he would see them no more. “Goodbye,” he said aloud. “Goodbye, goodbye.”

  The great brick house was close now; Bushrod figured they would stop soon and realign before beginning the attack. He entertained the hope, as he always did, that Adams’ Brigade would go in reserve.

  The band was still playing; Bushrod noted the fact with irritation, though at least they had found another song. “Listen to the Mockingbird,” it seemed to be, though it might have been anything. Bushrod allowed himself to wonder about the band and what zeal had possessed them to follow the brigade so close under the guns of the Strangers. He thought about the only member of the band he knew personally: Calvin Jones, once a professor of music at the Cumberland Female Academy, who had joined them just before (or after—Bushrod couldn’t remember) the fall of Atlanta. Bushrod recalled an extraordinary fact about Professor Jones. It was known widely in Cumberland that the Professor, in times of distress, came under the influence of an unusual delusion. Bushrod did not pretend to know what distress could enter the life of a professor of music, but at such times Calvin Jones ceased to be Calvin Jones and became, for reasons known only to himself, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Fortunately, the Professor lived with an old-maid sister who nursed him through these fits, calling him Your Grace and Your Eminence and bringing him tea until he recovered, which he always did. Now the Professor was back there in the band, and Bushrod had to smile at the thought. You could hardly top a battle for distressful times, and Bushrod wondered what His Eminence would think to find himself going into the fray blowing a saxhorn.

  “Prepare to halt!”

  The command was passed from brigade to regiment to company, and the men tensed as they always did before a command of execution. “Oh, hell,” said Virgil C. “I hate to stop once we commence.”

  “You are never satisfied with anything,” said Jack.

  “Halt!”

  The line swayed to a halt, and the band ceased.

  The regimental adjutant, a boyish major in a butternut frock coat too big for him, stepped out in front and gave the commands that brought them down to order arms, and the men once more planted their brass butt–plates on the soil of Tennessee. Bushrod thought it might be a good sign. “I bet we are going in reserve,” he said.

  No one answered.

  “I bet we are going in reserve,” he said again.

  “Mister Carter?”

  Bushrod Carter turned to the man behind him—Eugene Pitcock, once a Tennessee River steamboat pilot, who still clung to the dream of his former life, as if any moment he might be called upon to spar a great packet over the Muscle Shoals. Eugene was particular in his habits. He called everyone “Mister.” His hat was a fine beaver that he still kept brushed; in his haversack (Bushrod had seen them) were a pair of white gloves and an ivory toothpick case. But the fortunes of war had begun to have their way with Eugene Pitcock. Lately he had been grounding harder and harder on a dark shoal all his own. He spoke very little now, ate almost nothing, and slept nearly all the time. In camp, when he was awake, he had taken to wandering off by himself; Bushrod had found him once sitting under a pine tree, stroking the white gloves and talking to them. Bushrod had always liked him, used to seek him out to talk about boats and the river. Now he made Bushrod nervous, like a piece of unexploded ordnance.

  “Hey, ’Gene,” said Bushrod cautiously. “How is it with you?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Well, didn’t you say my name?”

  “I did, but that don’t mean there’s anything the matter.”

  “Well,’ Gene, I only—”

  “But I will tell you anyhow,” said Eugene Pitcock. He inclined his narrow, finely-sculpted face toward the man on his left, Nebo Gloster. “You might better see to this orphan,” Eugene Pitcock said. “I have tried and tried myself, but. …well, you can see how it is.”

  Bushrod could indeed see how it was. Nebo Gloster was still standing rigidly at right-shoulder-shift, the knuckles of his hand white where they gripped the musket butt. He was pouring sweat, talking to himself and nodding in reply.

  “Nebo?” said Bushrod.

  The gaunt face whipped around. “I ain’t done nothin!”

  “Nebo, we are at order arms now.”

  Nebo Gloster clawed his musket down to order arms. His eyes darted fearfully to Eugene Pitcock, but that gentleman had fallen asleep on his feet. Nebo looked at Bushrod. He spoke in a harsh whisper, as if his throat were closing. “Bushrod, can I tell you somethin?”

  “Yes, indeed,” said Bushrod.

  “You won’t tell?”

  Bushrod did not see how they could share a secret standing cheek-to-jowl with the entire army, and especially with Virgil C. Johnson already taking in every word. But he said, “I won’t tell, honor bright I won’t.”

&nb
sp; “You won’t sure enough?”

  “Honor bright.”

  Nebo looked around, edged closer. He smelled like moldy leaves. “All right,” he said. “Bushrod?”

  “Yes, Nebo?”

  “Bushrod, I can’t remember if my gun is loaded or not.”

  Jesus and Mary, thought Bushrod, and at once a brilliant sarcasm leapt to his tongue, a little gem to make the boys laugh. Bushrod opened his mouth, drew the very breath to speak—

  But he did not speak. The bon mot withered, and its paltry soul fluttered away, and Bushrod Carter thought how, of all the sights he had seen in the long war, few had been so dreadful as the look on Nebo Gloster’s face. It was pale, of course—that long, unhappy face was always pale—but now it glowed with a fear that Bushrod understood completely because it was his own. Nebo’s smoke-reddened eyes were looking far into an unknown country, into the great Mystery which no heart could comprehend, and he thought that Bushrod Carter, of all people, could explain it, could shape words around a thing more intricate and impossible than the riddle of the soul itself.

  So Bushrod was ashamed, and looked away. He felt transparent, as if he had no more substance than water in a gourd, and the knowledge came to him that even Nebo Gloster believed he stood at the center of the universe. When Bushrod finally spoke, he said gently, “Well, never mind, old fellow. It happens to everybody. Run your ramrod down the bore—you can tell that way.”

  “Thank ye,” said Nebo. “Thank ye kindly.”

  Bushrod nodded and turned his face to the front.

  Virgil C. nudged Bushrod in the ribs. “That clay-eater beats all I ever seen,” he said. “Can’t he do anything for himself? Why, a little thing like—”