My Old True Love (21 page)

“I don’t know who started the plundering. Mayhap it was on all our minds. Anyways, we started going in the houses and taking stuff. Me and Little Johnny went in this big white house and this little woman commenced to screaming like a hellcat. We paid her no attention ’cept to tell her to shut up. Then Ned Woods come in with five or six of them boys off of No-Fat and he hollered that this was Lawrence Allen’s house. I told him I didn’t give a good goddamn whose house it was. We went upstairs and they was a little nigger girl setting on the floor right at the top of the steps. Little Johnny had never seen one, I reckon. He knelt down in front of her and she sort of shied back from him. He licked his finger then reached out and rubbed her face and she squealed like a stuck hog. We could hear young’uns crying at the back of the house. We started down the hall and here come that woman and them boys from No-Fat right behind her sort of herding her up the steps.” He glanced at us. “Her dress was tore at the front. I reached out and took her by the arm and she commenced to fighting me. I shoved her in behind me and told them boys to leave her alone.” He shrugged. “We searched about upstairs and took some stuff, clothes, some more blankets. Then we left.”

He looked at me. “Reckon I could have another glass of buttermilk?”

Carolina was already up and crossing the floor before I could even move. She fetched the crock and set it on the table. None of us said a word as he tipped it to his mouth and drained the whole thing.

“They’s a little something stronger if you want it,” Larkin offered.

“Maybe after a while.” He dropped his face into his hands and scrubbed as though trying to get the blood flowing. “We hightailed it out of there, heading hell-bent for the Walnut Gap. We crossed through picking our way by starlight since they weren’t no moon to speak of. But, hell, we’ve hunted all through there so I knowed the placement of every rock and chug-hole. We got back to Shelton Laurel afore daylight, and you could hear hunting horns blowing all up and down the creek.

Pete signed. “I wished you could’ve seen the look on Mommie’s face when I give her that salt and blankets and stuff,” he said.

Here Pete was telling us this big tale and I was setting there having to swallow one big mouthful of hot water after another. Just at the mention of a damn sack of salt and I was almost drooling. That’s what we had come to, friends. I had to make myself go back to listening.

“It snowed for three days and everybody stayed in. You folks got more than we did, I believe. Anyway day ’fore yesterday it turned off cold as hell, and the snow was really coming down good and hard so it was starting to pile up purty good. I was out hauling Mommie in some wood when I heard the horns blowing. I knowed they was bound to be trouble, and I reckon I ought to have left home right after we got back. But I was trying to help Mommie a little, you know what I mean? Since Daddy died she hadn’t had really anybody but me and Edison.

“Word got passed along that it was Lawrence Allen’s bunch. His blackguard cousin, that James Keith, had crossed over Sugar Loaf and was coming down the other side. All up and down the creek we hid out in the laurel hells. They was out in the open and started shooting blind. I thought fer a while that we was gonna run them out. Then they hit us with the cavalry, and it was just a matter of time afore we had to break and run. They weren’t shooting blind no more, ’cause they shot and killed six of us. He rode out with a few of his men. The rest of them stayed on. At the time, we thought they was fixing to quit and go somewheres else. But that weren’t what happened.” He give a great heaving sigh. “I’ll take some of that whiskey now, if you don’t care, Lark.”

He took a long long pull from the crock before he set it back down real careful-like. “You might want to take a drink. It ain’t been pretty up to now and it’s fixing to get worse.” He looked at me, and what I saw on his face I hoped to never see again. “You might want these young’uns to go to bed, Arty.”

And Carolina spoke up and said, “We ain’t young’uns no more, Mommie.”

I did not argue with her and let them stay.

Mary went to the sideboard to get cups and he waited till she was back in her place.

“Allen got back the next day. We knowed by then about his sick young’uns, and that his little girl had died. Some of our number had been took already. Morris Franklin, his brother Paul, and Mermon Shelton went to Marshall and give themselves up. They sent all of them on to Asheville. It were like Allen and Keith went crazy after that. They’s going up and down the creek ordering people to tell them where we was. Why, they weren’t about to tell Allen ner his men where
we’s hiding out. So Allen started whupping people, hanging ’em up by the neck till they turned blue and was almost dead, then they’d let them down and ask them again where we was. They whupped Mary Shelton acrost the back till it busted open.”

“Lord have mercy.” Mary whispered as she lifted the cup to her mouth.

Pete swung in Mary’s direction. “Mercy?” he said and his voice was bitter as gall. “They was no mercy this day.”

“They held Ott Tweed’s girl, Hannah, down and—” he looked sideways at my girls. “She’s about the same age as you, Abigail. They took turns at her.

“We followed ’em down the creek shooting at ’em, trying to kill as many as we could. But they was too many of them. By the time they caught me, Edison, and Little Johnny there at Paul’s place, they had took ten other prisoners.” He snorted. “Prisoners! They had old man Joe Woods, who was seventy year old if he was a day, and little David Shelton who was but a boy! They did have six er seven of us what was in Marshall that night. Rest of ’em, though, was innocent as Julie here. They made camp that night on Paul’s place, and I told Edison and Little Johnny that I aimed to try to make a run for it. Now, they’d told us that evening afore they put us in Paul’s shed that they’s gonna take us into Asheville for a trial. But I saw the look in Allen’s eyes that evening. They was red and flat as a snake’s during dog days. Edison allowed as to how I’d get myself killed or maimed, and I told him I figured that was better than what Allen aimed to do to us.”

I thought Pete was going to set into crying then, but he did not.

“I let on like I needed to go to the woods. Finally made such a ruckus that one of the soldiers let me out and took me to where the
trees started at the edge of the barn lot. I squatted down like I aimed to take a shit and felt around under me till I found me a good-sized rock. Hit him in the head with it and run. I knew if I could make it up to the laurel thicket, they’s no way they could catch me. Hell, they didn’t even send nobody after me. I sneaked back about daylight and when they pulled out, me, John Kirk, and Hersh Cantrell counted thirteen prisoners. One of them had got away. I knew hit weren’t Edison. I could see his red hair in amongst them that was being led off. We watched till they was gone and then there come Little Johnny sneaking out of that shed, purty as you please. I whistled and he come straight as a shot.

“We set out after Allen, keeping to the ridge. When they got down to the flats at Hickey’s Fork, they stopped and Keith commenced to giving orders. We eased on down the mountain till we got to where we could hear him. Six of the fellers they had rounded up was jerked out into the open field and they commenced to beating them till they was all on their knees. Then Keith hollered for some of his crowd to shoot ’em. They was all right still and quiet. Then Keith hollered that if they didn’t shoot, then they could join the prisoners. Old man Joe asked for time to pray if they were going to kill them. Then Keith dropped his sword and they fired. Killed five of ’em. And Edison.” Pete swiped at his eyes. “Edison was begging fer them to let him go. That soldier raised his gun and shot him.”

Pete reached for the crock but it was empty and he put it back down on the table. Larkin reached down beside his chair, brought up a full one, and handed it to Pete.

I knowed Abigail was crying before I even looked at her. Though she was just twelve, her and Edison had set together twice during church and we had all deviled her about it. He was the sweetest thing,
and I was certain he would have been asking to walk out with Abby this coming summer. But that would never be now, and my heart just broke with the knowing of it. I reached out and took her hand in mine and was just about done in when I noticed it were as big as my own.

“Then they made the rest of them kneel down and shot them too. They gathered up and rode out then. Us there on the mountain didn’t dare come off till the next morning. We loaded the dead on Nance Franklin’s sled. Had a time digging the holes. The ground was like flintrock.

“After they was buried, I lit out. Struck out by myself. They won’t catch me if I’m on my own.”

Larkin got up and went over to the fire. He squatted down and laid on three logs and stirred up the red embers until flames caught the dry wood. Pete hunched forward and laced his fingers together on the table. “One of the reasons I stopped in here was to see if Hack was home.” His voice seemed loud in the quiet room.

“No,” Mary said. “He deserted from Allen’s regiment back in September. We ain’t heard nothing since. For all we know,” she swallowed hard, “he might be dead.”

“I don’t reckon. Not unless he died in the last week.” Pete said.

“You seen him?” me and Larkin said at the same time.

“Seen him? He was with us up till a week ago. He lit out right afore Allen and Keith showed up. I figured he was heading here.” Pete rose from the table and stretched. “I’m going to sleep down in the hayloft, if you don’t care. I won’t sleep in the house. I’ll be gone before you milk in the morning.” He stopped at the door. “Thank you. I won’t forget this.”

“Larkin?” Mary whispered.

“I’ll see what I can find out.”

When Larkin come back in, all he told us was that Hackley had gone to Marshall with them and Pete hadn’t seen him since. Something was just not right so I went to the barn before daylight the next morning to ask Pete myself, but he was already gone, and I never saw him again.

Later on that day, Larkin come by the house. “Hackley,” he said, staring at the floor, “he’s been laying out over on Shelton Laurel since September.”

I did not even ask what the woman’s name was. I did not want to know.

M
ARY WAS WORRIED TO
death after that, and she was at my house more than she was at her own. Poor little thing. They was many a morning that she’d show up when I was milking the cows and she would be there when I went to milk that evening. She was still foolish over Pearl, and playing with her seemed to take her mind off her troubles.

My precious Pearl was truly a jewel. She was black-headed and black-eyed but did not have the dark skin like you might think she would. The only real pearl I had ever seen was the one that Wade Hensley had give to Vergie, and I swear to you that my Pearl’s skin looked just as smooth and, well, pearly, I guess you would say. She had great big slanty eyes and little features like her daddy’s people and was singing up a storm by then, even though it was all in baby talk and you could not understand a word she was saying. And she was not spoiled, though it would have been no fault of all of us. By all rights that young’un should have been rotten. She was a real friendly young’un, too, and never knowed a stranger. And
Lord, she loved Mary and would go running to her the minute she saw her.

If I could have got my hands on Hackley I would have slapped him halfway to Sunday. Some men ain’t worth killing, but I would have pure-D relished the chance to choke my brother senseless right about then. The least that man could have done was to have wrote to Mary and told her he was still among the land of the living. I was always watching for a line or two from Zeke, and bless him, he never let me to wonder long. I got many letters from him during that damn war and I still have every one of them today.

Mary got five letters from Hackley during that whole time.

Right after the killing over on Shelton Laurel, she asked me if it felt like to me that Hackley had just fell off the face of the earth.

She was a strong woman, Mary was. But even the strongest of us has to lay that heavy yoke down every now and again. I knowed beyond reason that she was having a struggle and comforted her the best I could, and I would have worried more about her if I had not knowed her people. They was a strong bunch of women that she was cut from. And she was young, and youth is a blessing when you are going through a hard patch. The very lack of having something to measure against can be a good thing. She would come every morning saying, “This will be the day I hear something,” and when it was not she would say, “Well, mayhap tomorrow.” Is that not the way of it? But she was awfully lonesome, too. And she’d had plenty of time laying with a man whose hands was not just able to bring pretty songs from a fiddle. She was missing that, just as I was and every other woman I knowed.

But the rest of us did not have a big strapping man around that looked at us with eyes as black as night and full of love. I think that
had started to wear on her as much as anything.

Truth be known, it was right about this time that Mary began to harbor a different sort of affection for Larkin, too. But I, for one, knowed my brother would pop back up. And he did.

L
ARKIN COME TO ME
late up in the evening and I knowed the minute I seen his face that something was wrong. I guess I was primed for bad news as I had got a letter from Zeke that day.

I want you to rite to me as soon as you git this letter. Arty I saw you last nite very plain. O that it could hav been so this morning. Arty I think if I liv to git back we will liv and injoy ourselves better than ever. I will be of more use to you than ever before.

I cried my eyes out while I was writing him back. My heart was just broke. I did not have an inkling how in this world I was ever going to be able to live and stand it.

Larkin said he’d been down in the barn milking when the awfulest-looking man ever was had come up on him. Said he was nasty and had the worst smell about him you could ever wrap your nose around. I give a big sigh and said, “Where did you hide him?” because I knowed right then that my brother had come home to roost. Larkin did not even ask me how I knowed. He just said up in the cave and I said that was as good a place as any. I started gathering up quilts, an old coat of Zeke’s, and snatched up what was left from supper to take up there. While I was putting it all in a sack, he said he’d had a time keeping Hack from going to the house to see Mary, but he had finally convinced him that it would put her in harm’s way if she knowed where
he was. I said, “Larkin, you must tell her.” But I knowed he would not. He could not even look me in the eye when he muttered around saying how he would have to study about it, that he had to protect Mary. Poor Larkin. He knowed when he told her it would take what little part of that girl he had managed to wrassle away for himself.