“Well,” Bobby said brightly, “now you surely can do that.”
“Sure enough.”
Go home… The words burned and tore like the bullets that had grazed and lacerated him. Go home… He had no home now. His parents would never wish to see him again, after the horrible thing he had done. And even if they did welcome him back, out of Christian charity, he could not face them. He could not face Robley, who would come home a hero and would, for the rest of his life, hold Jonathan in smoldering contempt for disobeying his orders and getting their brother killed.
So what was there for him? He had no money, beyond the family fortune, which was lost to him now. He had no skills, no way to earn a living, even if he was not a cripple. A beggar on the streets, one of these broken, wretched creatures such as he had seen by the docks in New Orleans, that was all that was left to him. He felt the tears well up. Paine Plantation and all its goodness gone, like being denied heaven. He was lost among strangers who, when he first came to them, did not even know his name.
That thought sent his mind wandering down another road. If no one in the 33rd Virginia knew who he was, then no word of his fate would have been sent to his parents.
No doubt Robley would have written, told them about how he had led Nathaniel off to the fighting. He hoped someone had found the note he had stuffed in Nathaniel’s jacket and honored the request. He hoped Nathaniel’s body was at peace in his native Mississippi soil, in the family plot surrounded by the iron fence, overlooking the Yazoo River.
But they would not know what had become of the third Paine boy.
Most likely they do not care…
Still, he had to send word. Loathe him or not, his parents should know what had become of their youngest son.
“Bobby?” Bobby was putting the last wraps of a fresh bandage on Jonathan’s stump.
“Yeah?”
“Is there someone here can write a letter for me? I don’t think my arm’s up to the task, yet.”
“Sure enough,” Bobby said. He eased the stump of Jonathan’s leg back down on the bed, pulled the sheet over him. He walked off and came back ten minutes later leading one of the white nurses, whose name was Douglas, and carrying a pencil and a few sheets of white paper and a Bible for a desk.
“All right, go on ahead,” Douglas said, settling back onto the stool by the bed.
“Very well…” Jonathan was surprised Douglas had his letters. He had never struck Jonathan as the brightest of fellows. “Dear Mother and Father…By now you will have heard of what became of…”
“Hold on there, hold on, partner…I’m a little out of practice here.” Douglas’s pencil moved with deliberate strokes. “…‘and Father’…all right, what all’s next?”
“By now you will have heard…” Jonathan continued on, slowly pronouncing each word, as if he was talking to someone just learning English. Douglas’s lack of skill was no great handicap; there was not much Jonathan had to say to his parents in any event.
When he was done, Douglas handed the letter to Jonathan and Jonathan held it up and read it.
Deer Mother and Father,
By now yo will have heerd from Robley and he will have told yo the sirkem stanses…
Jonathan wished that Douglas’s pride had allowed him to ask for the spelling of some words.
…sirkemstanses of Natanyals deth. All I can say is I am sufering as yo are, and alweys will. I am woonded but am likly to liv. I jest thot it my duty to tell yo that.
Your son,
Jonontan
Jonathan nodded his head. “Thank you, Douglas, that is fine. If you could fold it and seal it and perhaps you can help me address it, that should do. There’s money for postage in…my knapsack. Bobby, is my knapsack here?”
“Yessuh. It’s under you bed, along with what’s left of yer uniform and such.”
“Is that a fact? Can you help me sit up?”
Bobby gave Jonathan his hand, helped pull him up to a sitting position, stuffed pillows behind his back. The bright room whirled around Jonathan’s head and the dream state washed over him and he thought he would pass out. He closed his eyes, sat very still, and soon it passed and slowly he opened his eyes again.
Bobby was standing beside him. “You all right, Missuh Jon’tin?” In his hands, Jonathan’s knapsack, a battered square canvas bag coated with rubberized paint, which was glossy black when it was new, but now was dusty and muted and cracked.
“Yes, yes…may I see that?”
“Sure t’ing.” Bobby handed the sack to Jonathan, and Jonathan took it as if it was an ancient relic, which it was, to some degree. A relic of a life now gone.
He fumbled with the buckles and managed to get them undone and flipped the flap open. The contents were just as he had last seen them, more than a month before, though it seemed much longer than that. His toothbrush, his hairbrush, deck of cards, extra shirt. His copy of The Soldier’s Guide: A Complete Manual and Drill Book, with which he would sneak off to a private place and study, more intently than he had ever studied a lesson as a boy. He never wanted the others to see him at it, to think that he lacked any confidence in his soldiering ability.
He shook his head as he thought of it. What did any of us know of soldiering? Why did I think anyone would believe I knew any more than they did? Why did I care?
There was the Bible his mother had put in his knapsack without his knowledge, as she had in Nathaniel and Robley’s as well. He picked it up, ran his fingers over the embossed gold cross on the black leather cover. He flipped the book open. The delicate pages fluttered by, stopped at a piece of paper inserted between them.
Jonathan pulled the paper out and unfolded it, unsure what it was. He read the words.
Dear Mother,
I am sorry that I have not written more, as I know I should, but they drill us here, night and day, and with guard duty and inspections and such it is hard to find a minute. We are still at Camp Walker, waiting for something to happen. We are all well but many here have the measles. Robley thinks that
It ended there. Jonathan recalled now. He had finally sat down to write it when a fellow from Company C had told him that a cockfight was about to commence at the south end of the camp. He had tucked his mother’s letter away, put off writing to his mother to watch a couple of damned chickens killing each other.
Why not? There was plenty of time to write. That was how he had felt. Plenty of time. He was just a boy, and so were his brothers. They had their whole lives.
He leaned his head back on the pillow and felt the warm tears roll down his cheek, and a moment later he heard Bobby walking softly away.
27
If I have erred in all this matter, it is an error of judgment; the whole affair came upon me so suddenly that no time was left for reflection, but called for immediate action and decision.
— Captain John Pope, USS Richmond, to Flag Officer William W. McKean, Commanding Gulf Blockading Squadron
It was October, but it was sweltering in the captain’s sleeping cabin of the U.S. steam sloop Richmond , and Captain John Pope could not sleep.
He lay on top of his blankets, still wearing shirt and pants, but with buttons undone. He considered getting undressed, could think of no logical reason why he should not, but he made no effort to do so. He felt too vulnerable undressed, too unready. In that place, the Mississippi River, the Head of the Passes, within the boundaries of the Confederacy, he felt vulnerable enough even in full uniform. He did not need to compound his disquiet.