Shades of Gray: A Novel of the Civil War in Virginia (9 page)

Some of the men gazed with a sense of admiring
awe as their eyes traced the path of her recent flight. “Sinclair, you crazy
fool,” one of them yelled. “By gravy, you must be the luckiest sonbitch I ever
seen!”

“I thought you was food for powder, sure,”
another said incredulously.

“Kicked up a little dust is all,” Andrea joked.
It was well known that Virginia roads were either dust or mud, depending on the
season, and the dry version was not what clung to her at the moment. She was
covered in a spattered layer of juicy earth, accumulated from the bed of
fathomless mire through which she had galloped.

Andrea looked up to see J.J. stomping toward
her, and gave him an exaggerated salute despite clear signs he was not in a
joking mood.

“Follow me, Sinclair.” J.J. turned and tramped
away without the waste of any more words. Andrea heard the men behind her talking
in hushed tones as she limped after him. Now that she was out of danger, her
ankle throbbed and her legs trembled. She was dizzy with pain by the time she
reached the stone mill that J.J. occupied, and opened the door.

“Damnation! Are you trying to get yourself
killed, or does it just appear that way?” J.J.’s breath came in gasps as he
patted the perspiration off his head with a handkerchief. The pop, pop, pop of
gunfire from the upper floors of the mill echoed through the room as
sharpshooters continued to find targets.

“For the love of liberty, if you wish to commit
suicide, I will supply the gun,” he roared. “You needn’t provide target
practice for the enemy!”

“Obviously they are in need of practice,” Andrea
replied matter-of-factly. She loosened a drying clod of dirt from her arm and
watched it explode into little pellets as it hit the floor.

“Where have you been?” J.J. bellowed over the
din. “From what I witnessed, your tardiness isn’t due to your horse being lame
or your spurs being broke.”

Andrea almost smiled at the use of the two most
familiar excuses used by cavalrymen, but decided by his expression that humor
was not his intent. “I was … detained.”

“Did you forget my orders?”

This question stumped Andrea for a moment
because she rarely ever committed his orders to memory—therefore she could not
have forgotten one. “No,” she replied honestly. “I did not forget your orders.”

“Did I not tell you to come through the other
pass?”

“Oh-h yes . . . but this one was faster—”

“Faster? For what? Dispatching you to your
heavenly creator?”

J.J. paced up and down, stopping only long
enough to pour himself a drink, which he emptied with a shaking hand.

“A little early for that isn’t it?” Andrea
stared at the empty glass, thinking she would not mind having one herself.

“You did not answer my question.” J.J. slammed
the glass down. “Do you believe yourself immune to death or are you trying to
get yourself killed?”

Andrea shrugged. She had never seen J.J. quite
like this. Although it was common practice for her to seek forgiveness rather
than permission, J.J. did not seem predisposed to either one today.

“Is your affection for danger so great that you
must amuse yourself with it? I believe you would jump off the face of a cliff
with the intention—and the hope—of growing wings on the way down!”

“J.J.” Andrea sighed heavily again as she pulled
out a chair and sat down. “Duty is ours, the consequences are God’s. If a
bullet finds me, it will be according to the order of Providence.”

“It will be according to whether you have any
sense or not! Holy Jerusalem! I would have thought your horse’s life, at least,
had a little value to you.”

“Please, Colonel,” Andrea said, chafing at his
tone and manner. “Perhaps from your vantage point you could not see, but the
incline was too steep. They were content with firing over my head.”

“Oh, you have that right.” He walked over and
pulled off her hat. “They were indeed shooting over your head!” He pointed to a
ragged bullet hole she had not known was there. “Why do you seem to get the most
enjoyment out of life when you are within an ace of losing it?”

Andrea stared uneasily at the hat as she spoke,
but did not allow her voice to betray her. “
I
only did what I thought was best, considering the—”

“Did it ever occur to you
not
to think?
To just follow orders? Was your mission not clear? Were my orders not
explicit?” Must you persist in your obstinate refusal to obey?”

“You evidently did not follow your own orders,
Colonel,” Andrea said as sulfur smoke, sinking down from the upper floors, began
to fill the room. “I am apparently not the only one to have taken the wrong
pass.”

“I never
intended
to be at Hopewell. I
intended to keep
you
away from this Gap and the enemy, and thereby out
of trouble!”

Andrea
blinked in disbelief, realizing for the first time he did not trust her.

“Blazes,” J.J. said, running his hand through
his hair. “I’m going to have every blasted officer on this side of the Bull Run
Mountains demanding my report on this.”

“I believe you’d be less likely to criticize my
actions were I a man,” Andrea countered, her voice rising in anger.

“You’d be
imprisoned for insubordination if you were a man! And if you still carry any
notions about going to Richmond,” he said, standing directly in front of her
now as if she couldn’t hear his yelling from across the room, “then I can’t
help but fear the voice of reason has entirely abandoned you.”

Andrea’s gaze jerked back to his and she rose to
her feet, but he held out his hand for her to be silent. “My scouts tell me
Hunter squeezed through our lines and has returned to wherever he came from, so
there’s no use deliberating over it now. You are dismissed.”

“Sir, with all due respect—”

“I
said
you are dismissed.”

When Andrea turned to exit, she nearly collided
with an officer striding through the door. “Ah, there you are, boy. Never saw
anything like it. How about you, Colonel?” Colonel Dayton dragged Andrea back
into the room by her shoulder. “Did you ever see anything like it?”

“Can’t say I ever have,” J.J. said. “Seems to me
only a fool or a madman would attempt extinction in such a manner.”

“Colonel, surely you mean dis-tinction,” the
officer exclaimed. “Why, I can’t begin to fathom how this young man got through
that pass, knowing darn well those hills were full of Rebs. Then to have
Delaney move in behind—mercy but it was incredible. Splendid piece of work
turning the tables on Hunter himself. Wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t
seen it with my own eyes.”

“I’ve … not had time to be briefed on the full
account,” J.J. said, staring thoughtfully at Andrea.

“What’s your name anyway, son?”

“Sinclair, sir.” Andrea locked her gaze on the
floor.

“Well that was well done, Sinclair.” Dayton
slapped her on the back so hard she stepped forward to remain standing.
“Devilish clever!” He turned to leave, and Andrea turned to follow.

“Sinclair!” Andrea stopped at the sound of
J.J.’s voice, but did not turn and did not answer. “Get some sleep and then
report back to me. Get something to eat too. You can’t live on mudpies.”

Andrea departed the room with the relief of one
who has escaped the scene of a scalping. Heading for a quiet spot near the
stream, she wrapped herself in a discarded blanket, laid her weary body down on
the cold, wet ground, and fell instantly asleep.

Chapter
9

 “The same canteen, my soldier friend, the same canteen,

There’s never a bond, old friend, like this!

We have drunk from the same canteen.”

– “We Have Drunk From the Same Canteen,” Civil War Song

When Andrea awoke a few hours later, the inside
of her mouth felt like it was caked with mud, and her throat itched as if ants
had taken up residence there during her slumber. She coughed and spit, trying
to force herself into consciousness. Looking down at her clothes, she
remembered her earlier ride, and the events the night before—and her meeting
with J.J.

Rising stiffly from the wet ground, she heard
the familiar buzz and hum of shouted jests floating in the breeze from
somewhere downstream. She limped to the stream and splashed the sleep from her
eyes, gasping when the cold mountain water hit her face. Cupping her numb
hands, she drank its delicious coolness, then stood as a voice behind her
beckoned.

“You awake, Sinclair?”

She turned to see Boonie making his way down the
bank to the stream’s edge.

“My eyes is open, ain’t they?” Andrea wiped the
water off her face with her coat sleeve.

“That don’t necessarily mean you’re awake.”
Boonie stared hard at her. “Guess you seen we got a regular powwow going on
here.” He nodded toward the mill.

Andrea turned her stiff neck. Tethered in front of
the millhouse were a dozen horses, obviously those of officers and their aides.
“What the plague is going on?” she asked, somewhat curious, but not really
giving a hoot. For all she knew or cared, they were up there drinking wine,
smoking big, fat cigars, and discussing world politics.

“What’s going on?” Boonie stared at her, looking
dumbfounded. “They’re here about your little escapade near’s I can tell. They
say Jordan’s fit to be tied.”

Andrea looked up at Boonie and then back to the
mill, but simply shrugged at his remark. “You don’t say.” She sat down and
tried to detach her boot from her swollen ankle.

“You don’t say?” Boonie’s voice got louder. “Is
that all you got to say?”

“Well, as to the Jordan part, I was already
fully aware, ’cause he’s already given me jaw about it,” she said. “As to the
other, I doubt my little escapade was of enough consequence to draw the
attention of all those officers.”

“Well, they ain’t here for nothin’,” Boonie
said, shaking his head. “I heard tell a dispatch came in from the division
commander and your name was in it.”

Andrea did not answer. Camp rumors no doubt.
Once something like that got told, it took wings and flew. But her mind was no
longer on the officers in the mill or what they were there for. Instead, she
thought of how she should have had the sense to remove her boot before going to
sleep, because her ankle had swollen tight against the leather again. She knew
J.J. would never consent to giving her another pair if she cut this one off.

“We’re getting a card game goin’,” Boonie said.
“Wanna lose some money?”

“In a minute.” Andrea wrestled again with her
boot and grimaced at the slow progress she made.

Boonie walked over and gently helped her pull it
off. “Still bothering you, huh?”

“A little,” Andrea croaked, when he pulled her
to her feet. She held onto his coat for balance, half-walking, half-hopping
toward a circle of soldiers.

“That was sho ’nuf some ride this mornin’,
Sinclair,” a man named Leroy said in a voice louder than necessary. “If that
warn’t some tall fun to watch, then I’m no judge.”

“Colonel Jordan didn’t think it was too fun to
watch.” Andrea sat down and banged her boot on a rock, sending clods of dried
mud flying.

“You about scared the bejeezes out of him,”
Boonie said, shuffling a deck of cards. “You can’t hardly blame him, plumb
crazy as it was.”

Andrea frowned at her friend for taking the
colonel’s side, but did not bother to defend herself. She was still tired from
her ride and exhausted from the excitement of the previous day’s events.

“Bejeezes?” Leroy laughed. “You could’ve knocked
the colonel over with a lick of spit before you come riding through that smoke.
He thought you was headin’ for the boneyard sure.”

“Yea, I have to say, I thought you had your
passport to paradise,” one of the others said.

“Passport to paradise or permit to purgatory,
one or the other.” Boonie’s’ voice was full of sarcasm as he began to deal.

Andrea shifted her gaze from the soldier who had
spoken and placed it on Boonie. “I look forward to the former and I’m already
in the latter.”

“All right, break it up you two. By George, you
look like you got a bad case of locked bowels, Sinclair.” Leroy pulled a
canteen out from under a rock. “Have a drink.”

Andrea looked around at the circle of flushed
faces. All, with the exception of Boonie, appeared to be in sparkling good
spirits. “You boys intoxicated on patriotism or bad whiskey?”

“Bad whishkey!” Jasper Clemons, the youngest of
the group, yelled, confirming that they were well on their way to being
disgracefully inebriated.

“Blazes, keep your voices down.” Andrea hit him
in the knee and reached for the canteen.

“Don’t worry, the colonel’s got other things on
his mind today,” Jasper said. “Heard tell there’s to be a full-blown inquir-ee
into that crazy ride this morning. Look at all them officers up there. They’re
thick as flies on a goddam warm carcass!”

The group turned their heads toward the mill
and, seeing the horses thus tied, erupted once again into waves of laughter.
Andrea frowned, wondering how everyone in camp knew what was going on but her.
Dismissing the idea that she really cared, she considered getting beastly drunk
along with her comrades. If nothing else, a couple good belts would give her
the good night’s sleep she desperately needed. “Better get myself properly
prepared then.” She took a long draw on the canteen, closing her eyes as the
fluid hit her throat, and smiling when she felt its surging warmth in her
veins.

“Easy with that! You don’t want to get stumblin’
drunk.” Leroy grabbed the canteen.

“Oh, go dry up,” she said, swiping the back of
her hand across her mouth. “Who made you the campfire authority?”

“I’ll be bound, I don’t even think you’re old
enough to drink. How old are you anyways?”