Tyler showed up at my elbow as I watched the silhouettes of the two men, backlit by the setting sun, talking through a haze of smoke.
“Where were you?” I asked.
“Checking out that grave.”
“You didn’t go inside the crime scene tape, did you?”
He shrugged. “I didn’t touch anything.”
“Tyler! What were you thinking? It’s not there for decoration. Bobby Noland will give me hell if he finds out you were there.”
“Don’t tell him.”
“You mean lie if he asks?” I shook my head. “Just stay away from it, okay? I don’t want to catch you there again.”
“All right. Sorry.” He bowed his head, repentant. After a moment he said, “I guess you told that Vitale guy, huh, Lucie.”
“Trying to sweet talk me now, are you?” I said, as he reddened. “I didn’t tell him anything. You can’t persuade people who stand on the moral authority of the Bible to change their mind. They’re too self- righteous.”
Tyler waved his book. “Read this and people like him won’t bug you so much.”
“He doesn’t bug me.”
He looked at me over the top of his glasses.
“Okay,” I said. “A little.”
“Then stop letting him. Deny your emotions and you can free yourself from the pain and pleasure of the material world.”
“Where’d you get that? You sound like a television evangelist.”
“It’s Stoicism. Marcus Aurelius was a Stoic. They were into all kinds of denial not to feel things.”
“Sorry, a painless world would be nice, but not one without pleasure. Besides, what’s the point of living if you don’t feel anything?”
Tyler tapped the book’s cover with its hollow-eyed bust of the philosopher set against a stark black background. “Vitale got under your skin not because of what he did, but because of how you reacted to him. Same with you getting mad at me just now. What I did was no big deal.”
“I don’t agree it was no big deal, but what’s your point?”
“Aw, come on. I’m just a harmless kid.” Tyler grinned a rogue’s grin and indicated the crime scene tape. “I’ve heard things, Lucie. I know it’s none of my business but you need to stop letting everything that’s going on get to you. Don’t worry about what other people say. It doesn’t matter.”
I wanted to ask him what other people were saying, but perhaps it was better that I didn’t know. Instead I said, “Maybe I’ll have to borrow that book.”
He pushed his glasses up his nose. “Anytime. Too bad I can’t talk Quinn into reading it. He’s the one who could really use it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means Quinn isn’t someone who stifles his emotions. Especially when he’s mad.”
“Quinn’s got a lot on his mind right now.” I studied Tyler. “Are you trying to tell me things aren’t good between the two of you?”
He shrugged. “I guess they’re okay.”
“You guess they’re okay?”
Tyler bent his book back and forth into a U-shape. “He got mad at me when we were topping off the barrels and I overfilled one of them.”
“How mad?”
“He yelled a lot. Plus he thinks Chance or I lost that stirring paddle. The
Was it my imagination or did Tyler seem uneasy discussing Quinn? Funny thing was, I would have pegged Quinn as a Stoic like Marcus Aurelius, someone good at keeping his emotions bottled up. What had changed? Was he losing his temper at Tyler and the other men because those pent-up feelings finally were boiling over?
“Hey, Lucie.” Tyler kept his voice low. “Here come B.J. and Vitale.”
“I don’t think we’ll have any trouble working around that tornado damage, Lucie,” B.J. was saying. “We’ll have to move some of the campgrounds into the woods, but that shouldn’t be a problem. Depends, of course, on how many people show up.”
“How many do you expect?” I asked.
Vitale puffed on his cigar. “We cut registration off last weekend. Four hundred total.” He gave me a stern look. “How much longer will that area be a crime scene?”
“I’m sure the tape will be down by next week,” I said. “The remains that were found there were removed today.”
I saw one of B.J.’s eyebrows go up, but all he said was, “Why don’t we head over to the battlefield? I’d like Ray to see it before it gets too dark.”
“It’ll be faster if I drive you,” I said.
“No one’s going to drive us on the day. I’d like to get an idea of the terrain,” Vitale said. “We’ll walk.”
“Be my guest,” I said, and caught Tyler’s eye. “Whatever suits you.”
Vitale exhaled a cloud of smoke and Tyler coughed.
“Confederate bug spray,” Vitale said. “Better get used to it, son. The whole camp’ll be smoking cigars all weekend to keep down the mosquitoes.”
“Except the ladies,” B.J. said. “They use lavender.”
“Lavender doesn’t work for beans,” Vitale said.
By the time they climbed into the Mule fifteen minutes later, I had to turn the headlights on. All that was left of the sun was a bright line of light illuminating the undulating curves of the Blue Ridge. A few stars glittered in the blue-black sky, but everything else—bushes, trees, rocks—was now absorbed into the velvety dusk of a warm summer evening. A few tree frogs sang, accompanied by the usual serenade of the cicadas.
“Pity we’re not really going to take full advantage of that creek,” Vitale said from the backseat as I drove down the south service road. “I hope this doesn’t turn out to be a farby event, B.J. If we were doing it hard-core, you can bet a lot of soldiers would get wet.”
“What’s farby?” I asked.
B.J. swallowed and I could see his Adam’s apple bob. “It’s reenactor jargon. Stands for “far be it from me,” and it refers to reenactors who do or wear something that isn’t correct or isn’t period. “Far be it from me to criticize that inauthentic whatever—jacket, trousers, shoes, even eyeglasses—since they didn’t wear that in the early 1860s.’”
“It’s amateur.” Vitale’s voice rose like it was a punishable crime. “I personally don’t participate in farby events.”
“This one’s going to be unique, Ray, and you know it,” B.J. said over his shoulder. “It’s never been done as a water-based reenactment around here before. We’ll attract hundreds of spectators.”
“What are you going to do about the creek?” I asked. “Are you going to have Union soldiers swimming downstream after the battle?”
“Too dangerous, plus it’s hell on everyone’s uniform and equipment,” B.J. said. “Though we will be demonstrating the Union panic as their soldiers retreated down the bluffs to the river.”
“And we will be using boats,” Vitale said. “Three canoes.”
“Why only three?” I asked.
“That, Miss Montgomery, is historically accurate,” Vitale said. “Two eight-man wooden skiffs and a sixteen- man metal lifeboat.”
“That’s why so many died or drowned,” B.J. said. “It’s why the Union lost Ball’s Bluff. Not enough boats.”
My headlights caught Ray Vitale’s car in their wash as I turned into the winery parking lot, illuminating a pair of bumper stickers: “You can have my gun when you pry it from my cold dead fingers” and “Gun control is using two hands.”
