Peter Abrahams - Last of the Dixie Heroes

That made Roy smile too.

Jesse began walking back and forth across the clearing, head down.

“What are you doing?” Gordo said.

“Can’t deny anything if they find a bullet.”

Jesse was one of the smart ones that the nonsmart ones should listen to, no doubt about that. At the same time, Roy didn’t care at all about finding the bullet. You fired bullets in battle, didn’t hunt around for them after. He helped search for it anyway out of duty-they all did except Lee, who lay on the log, eyes closed-and found nothing.

“Probably melted,” Gordo said. “No one else will find it either.”

“What about DNA?” Dibrell said. “We must of left DNA all over the place. That’s how they got me the last time.”

“For what?” said Gordo.

Dibrell shook his head. “Just a crazy chain of events.”

“Never heard of that crime,” said Gordo, still with that grin on his face.

Dibrell moved in front of him. “What’s that sposta mean?”

Jesse stepped between them. “Soldiers,” he said. “Form the squad.”

Nobody moved. Roy saw they weren’t going to do it. They were hot, tired, angry, confused; even Gordo, no longer smiling. Plus they weren’t soldiers, a strange observation for Roy to have, but he knew it was true. Dibrell had the makings of a soldier but was too fucked-up inside. Gordo would never be a soldier: he was a mama’s boy and Brenda was mama. Roy even thought he understood the anal sex thing, all part of Gordo’s childishness.

Roy said: “Yes, sir,” and took his place near Jesse, stood motionless with his gun across his chest. He didn’t say anything, but that voice inside him, the one with the broad accent and no self-doubt, was talking: Form the goddamn squad.

They formed the squad.

Down below the land went hazy blue and slowly darkened, but the sun still shone on the Mountain House. The Irregulars sat outside their tents, eating Slim Jims and hardtack. Gordo sent a flask around, and so did Dibrell, but whatever they had wasn’t Old Grand-Dad. Roy took a sip of each and no more. He didn’t want it. Even food wasn’t a necessity. The water from the creek was all he needed. Hazy darkening blue rose up the mountain, but without any hurry. Watching evening come and breathing were enough for Roy. Not that he was tired, although he could see the others were. He himself felt as strong as he had in the morning, maybe stronger. Time stretched, sagged, formed the shape of a bowl, accommodated itself to him. A short life span didn’t mean life was short; a long life span didn’t mean it was long. Roy liked 1863. He took wonderful deep breaths of its air.

The hazy blue had crept halfway up the meadow when Roy heard something. He rose, gazed down from the edge of the plateau.

“What is it, Roy?” Lee said.

“That sound.”

“I don’t hear anything.”

“Listen.”

None of them heard it.

“The cops?” Dibrell said. Gordo tucked his flask in his back pocket, like that would make a difference.

“Can’t you hear it?” Roy said.

“What? Hear what?” Except for Lee they were all looking at him funny, like he was losing it, or maybe already had. Lee wasn’t looking at him at all; she was getting her gun ready.

Was he losing it? “That,” he said. “Drumming.”

“Drumming?”

But Lee said: “Yes.”

Rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat, soft and steady, from somewhere down in the gloom. The sound grew louder, sharper. Lee stepped behind a tree, musket trained down on the meadow. Rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat, and out of the deep blue haze and into the soft angled light of the setting sun marched Sonny Junior in his uniform, a long gun over his shoulder. A drummer boy, also in gray, marched beside him. Rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat: crisp and steady. The drummer boy’s slouch hat was a little too big, drooped some over his forehead, which was maybe why Roy didn’t recognize him until he and Sonny had almost reached the top of the meadow. Should have been the other way around, that too-big hat, should have been a clue reminding him of the too-big helmet on number fifty-six.

”Did I do wrong?” said Sonny Junior.

The fire glowed bright in his eyes, more dully on the buckles and bayonets of the Irregulars. They sat around the fire under a sky more starry than black, Roy on one side of Rhett, Sonny on the other. The question-like all the details that had come tumbling out of Rhett’s mouth, and Sonny’s-didn’t really penetrate. All that penetrated was that first, and only, embrace with Rhett, who was actually sitting a little closer to Sonny right now.

And the details? That part reminded Roy of his last year of high school Spanish, the year when English wasn’t spoken in class and he’d had to make guesses, island-hopping over fuzzy seas. Roy made his guesses: guessing that Rhett hated the new husband, his school, the tutors for English and math after school; hated Bermuda, or the cruise to Bermuda, where hated ties were worn at dinner, even by eleven-year-olds; hated Park Slope, New York, the kids and the way they talked; hated his mother. Then came a fuzzy patch with a call to Roy, where Sonny’s number had been left on the machine; a call to Sonny’s; and after that: action.

The action Sonny took: a bus ticket? a plane ticket? Sonny went and got him? The stories they told didn’t quite match. And on the crucial issue of whether Marcia had been told anything, and if so, what, Roy found out that Rhett had left a note, or Sonny had talked to her, or some other not very credible connection had been made. Roy didn’t care: the meaning of crucial was changing. Even under the old meaning, what harm could there be? It was only for the weekend, or a little longer.

“You did right,” Roy said.

Sonny Junior grinned, patted Rhett on the back. Rhett, staring into the fire, didn’t seem to notice.

“More to eat?” Lee said.

Rhett nodded.

“Hardtack or Slim Jim?”

“Slim Jim.”

Lee passed him one. They all watched him eat it, even Gordo and Dibrell, both half-drunk. The boy, in his uniform, leaning back on his drum, his skin smooth and golden in the firelight: they couldn’t take their eyes off him.

“He’s a natural,” Sonny Junior said. “Learned practically all the drum calls on the way up.”

“You know the drum calls, Sonny?” Roy said.

“Guy in the store showed me-basic stuff.”

“What do I owe you for the gear?”

“Don’t insult me, cuz.”

A flask went around again. Gordo, Dibrell, and Sonny drank; the others did not.

“I mean it,” Roy said.

“Me too,” said Sonny, taking a second hit, then another.

“Hey, new guy,” said Dibrell. “Save some of that for your superiors.”

Sonny gazed at Dibrell on the other side of the fire. He took one more swallow, longer than the others. “Superiors?” he said. “Way I count, you and me got the same number of stripes on our arm.” He flipped the flask through the flames to Dibrell, who made no attempt to catch it.

“You going to straighten him out, Lieutenant?” Dibrell said.

“It’s not a question of straightening out,” Jesse said. “There’s no way Sonny could know that changes in rank are voted on by the full regiment, and all recruits enter as privates, barring the odd exception.”

“I’m a private?” said Sonny Junior.

“Like Roy and Gordo,” Jesse said.

“And the little guy here?”

“Lee’s a corporal.”

“And I’m a private?”

“For the time being.”

“That sucks.”

“War means sacrifice,” Jesse said. His jacket was unbuttoned and the Star of David had worked free and now hung on the outside, picking up the fire’s glow. It caught Sonny’s eye. Roy saw he was about to say something, but at that moment Rhett slumped sideways, in Roy’s direction, fast asleep. Roy caught him, picked him up, carried him into the Mountain House.