"What is that work?" asked Custer with a droll smile. "Blacking Stanton's boots? Serving refreshments to Stanton's darky visitors?"
The captain said, "Kissing the secretary's fundament on demand?"
"Damn you," Billy said, and went for him.
Even Custer reacted with dismay. "Captain Rawlins, that goes a bit beyond —" Billy pushed Custer aside and flung a fist at the, captain, who was a head taller. It glanced off the man's chin. Others in the tent were up and shouting like cockfight spectators.
"Give the gentlemen room!"
"Not in here," the sutler protested, waving a billy. Everyone ignored him. The captain unfastened his collar, a loose grin pushing up his cheeks. Stupid of me, Billy said to himself as he clenched and unclenched his hands. Plain stupid.
Someone entered the tent and called his name. But he was focused on the captain sidling forward.
"I'll accommodate you, you little piece of Republican dung." His fist zoomed up, landing in the center of Billy's face while Billy was still raising his hands.
He spun away, fell across the counter, blood threads trickling from each nostril. The bigger man aimed another punch. Billy pushed upright, locked his hands, and struck the forearm of the fisted hand, diverting the blow. The captain drove a knee into Billy's crotch, and he went down on his back. Grinning, the captain raised his boot over Billy's face.
"There you are," the familiar voice said from behind the other men crowding in.
Custer exclaimed, "That's plenty, Rawlins. He may be a nigger Republican, but he deserves fair treatment."
"The hell you say." Down came the boot. Billy started to roll, knowing he was too slow.
Suddenly, mysteriously, Rawlins tilted backward. The boot intended to stomp Billy's face made funny, jerking motions in midair. Billy elbowed himself from the dirt, blinked, and saw the reason. Lije Farmer was holding the captain's shoulders, his face full of fury. He flung Billy's adversary. Captain Rawlins sat down so hard he squealed.
Lije pulled Billy to his feet. "Conduct yourself out of this iniquitous establishment." No one smiled. Given Lije's size and the way he let his eye rove around the ring of McClellanites, no one had the nerve. To Rawlins he said, "It would be foolish to invoke rank in this matter. If you try, I shall testify against you."
Billy took his kepi from the counter and walked out. A few steps from the tent, he heard Custer laugh again, joined by his friends and even by his barking dog.
Billy's bruised, bloody face felt hot. Lije touched his sleeve. " 'But whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn on him the other also.'"
"Sorry, Lije, I couldn't do it. He hit low, then tried to mash my face with his boot. 'Course, it might have improved my looks — What do you think?"
Farmer neither smiled nor answered. Billy sobered and probed some tender spots. "Officers like that are tearing this army to pieces. I'd heard others say it, but I didn't believe it until tonight."
"It's to be expected. The general possesses a profound knowledge of the military arts, but he also possesses a profound and raging ambition. It can be read in his orders, heard in his orations to the troops, seen in the nature and demeanor of his staff."
"That curlylocks lieutenant is one of them."
"Yes. I have noticed him before. One cannot help it. He dresses to draw attention."
"I know I was a fool to fly off that way. But they made remarks about my brother George that I couldn't tolerate. I thank you for pulling that captain off me. One minute longer and there wouldn't have been much left of my face. Your timing was remarkable."
"It was not entirely coincidence. I have been searching for you. We are ordered to move out before daylight. Let the others fight the political wars. We've our own to wage, and it will keep us busy enough."
Thinking of the tangly forests through which they had hacked a path with axes, of the roads they had planked and the streams they had bridged, Billy said a heartfelt, "Yes. I still thank you, Lije." He felt the same warm regard for Farmer that he had felt for his late father. The older man bucked him up with a clap on the back, then fell to humming "Amazing Grace."
No wonder the atmosphere on the peninsula was poisoned, Billy thought. They were practically at the door of the Confederate capital, which was defended by inferior numbers, yet the campaign dragged on, indecisive and costly. Tonight he had run smack into one of the reasons. Billy feared that before the campaign ended, scores of men might be sacrificed needlessly because of the general's ambition and feelings of persecution. He would not care to be one of them.
55
By the last week in May, the end seemed near. Each morning Orry confronted that fact as he rose and drank the foul brew of parched corn the boardinghouse served in lieu of coffee. Since New Orleans fell, there wasn't even sugar to sweeten it.
Like everyone in Richmond, while he went about his daily routine Orry listened for resumption of the heavy artillery fire that shook windowpanes all over town. He was glad Madeline had so far been unable to join him; his mother was recovering too slowly. News of her seizure had struck him hard when he first read it in a letter. McClellan's guns had magically changed a sorrow to a blessing.
How ironic to recall that in February local papers had bragged about military success in the Southwest and the creation of the Confederate Territory of Arizona, whose boundaries not one person in a hundred thousand could define. Of what earthly use was a southwest bastion after Forts Henry and Donelson fell — and Orry's friend and superior, Benjamin, slid over to the State Department because someone had to be blamed. Benjamin had survived, but barely.
George Randolph replaced him. An earnest man, a Virginian with impeccable family background, an outstanding legal reputation, and recent military experience — he had commanded artillery under Magruder — Randolph held the War Department portfolio but could do little with it. By now everyone knew the real secretary of war lived in the President's mansion.
Island No. 10 had gone last month, a major weakening of control of the lower Mississippi. The Yankees had Norfolk, too; in desperation, the navy had sunk the already legendary Virginia to prevent her capture.
April had brought another, even more dire, indication of the Confederacy's plight. Davis approved a bill conscripting all white males from eighteen to thirty-five for three years. Orry knew it was a needed measure and grew angry when the President was cursed by street vagrants and state governors alike. Two of the latter said they would withhold as many men as they pleased for home defense, law or no law.
McClellan was close now, feinting toward the city. Though his strategic plan was not apparent, his mere presence plunged Richmond into a time of trial. Davis has already packed his family off to Raleigh. Jackson was still performing brilliantly in the valley, but that did little to mitigate Richmond's fear of the pincers that might snap shut from the peninsula and from the north at any moment.
The terror had become acute on a Thursday in mid-May. Five federal vessels, including Monitor, steamed up the James to Drewry's Bluff, within seven miles of the city. Winder's thugs dragged men off the street and out of saloons to build a temporary bridge to the fortified side of the James. The windows of Richmond rattled from cannonading that eventually drove the federal vessels away. But the city had whiffed the winds of defeat for a few hours, and no one could forget the smell.
After Drewry's Bluff, Orry had trouble sleeping more than an hour or two each night. With the crisis building, he questioned whether his duties were appropriate to a supposedly sane man. As a favor to Benjamin, he went to General Winder in search of a house servant who had disappeared while Winder's bullies were recruiting bridge builders at gunpoint. The provost marshal denied such tactics and shelved Orry's inquiry without answering it or bothering to hide his animosity, which was now deep and vicious. The two had quarreled at least once a month ever since Orry's arrival.