to help his friends.
Duane was one of a handful of new kids they’d taken under their wing. He’d been puny to begin with, and came into the prison without shoes or a hat. He told them he’d been grateful to be captured. His regiment had run out of supplies and had taken to hunting in the woods for squirrels and rabbits. Of course, squirrel and rabbit sounded like gourmet dining after a week at the prison. The only meat they got here was generally already rotting. Cal figured the boy had weighed maybe a hundred and twenty pounds when he’d arrived, and Andersonville certainly hadn’t fattened him up. There was a time when Cal would have been able to pick Duane up and sling him over his shoulder like a newborn calf.
He followed Joe until he saw other prisoners running and he joined them, losing sight of his friend in the crush of skin and bone. The crowd had gathered as close to the southern perimeter fence as it could get. It was the section of their little village where criminals were herded. Hundreds of prisoners surrounded a bare spot in the dirt where Duane was facing off against two emaciated men. The men were caked with dirt and their bones pressed against their flesh from inside. Their hair was long and dark and filled with mud and it swung from side to side as they moved. They were so starved that they moved slowly. But everyone was starved and everyone’s perceptions had changed. The action seemed quick to Cal. One of the two men had a stick that was sharpened to a point at one end, and Cal wondered, for just a moment, where the man had got a knife to sharpen it. He realized that the man had probably rubbed it against a rock for days on end and at the same time he realized that it didn’t matter. The stick was pointed at his friend Duane.
Cal glanced up at the guard tower that jutted out of the perimeter fence above them and to the east. The guard was close enough for Cal to see the color of his eyes: pale grey, almost as colorless as the sky. The guard’s rifle rested casually on his shoulder, but Cal knew it was a pose. Grey Eyes was ready to shoot the instant anyone stepped over the dead line onto the eighteen feet of bare earth that was off-limits to prisoners. Crossing the dead line put a man too close to the fence and guards were authorized to shoot, no questions asked. Duane and his attackers were within inches of that line. Cal searched the crowd for Joe and found him near the second of the two attackers, dancing around, out of reach of the homemade spear.
“Bring him back, Joe!” Cal nodded his head toward the guard tower. Joe winked back at him to let him know that he’d heard and understood.
Cal punched the nearest attacker in the ribs and the man staggered backward. Cal’s fists lacked the strength they’d had before Andersonville, but the other man’s rib cage was a xylophone and there was no padding of fat or muscle to protect him. He could tell the blow had hurt. From the corner of his eye, he saw Duane stumble and fall dangerously close to the dead line. And he saw Joe grab Duane’s feet and pull, dragging him slowly away from the line.
The second attacker had wheeled around and was approaching Joe with his spear. Cal reeled toward him, his adrenaline rush fading already and his energy reserves dangerously low. But as weak as he felt, he knew the others were faring the same or worse. He could see that Duane’s attackers were running out of steam now that they’d encountered resistance.
But Duane didn’t realize that the fight was winding down and he twisted away from Joe, staggering to his feet. He pulled his jacket tight around him and lurched across the dead line.
“My jacket!” he said. “Mine.”
The first shot hit Duane in the shoulder and spun him around. He went down on one knee, and for a split second his eyes met Cal’s. There was no understanding in them, just an unspoken question. The puzzlement of a loyal dog. The rifle report bounced off the high wooden planks of the fence, and the sound of the second shot was lost in the echo. The top of Duane’s head disappeared in a purple spray of brains and gore.
Cal looked up at Grey Eyes. The guard had already slung his rifle back over his shoulder and stood casually watching, leaning on the stock. When he saw Cal, he smirked.
Cal swallowed hard and looked around him. Everyone else-the attackers, the crowd, even Joe-had disappeared, had quietly slunk back to their shebangs and their chess games and their endless grooming rituals. Cal and Grey Eyes and Duane were three lonely points in a triangle.
Cal clenched his fists and looked down at Duane’s body. The boy’s foot still twitched. The jacket he had tried so hard to keep was drenched with blood and would be stiff and useless within a couple of hours. Cal couldn’t even move the body because it was over the dead line and out of reach. There was nothing he could do for Duane.
He turned and walked away, and he could feel those grey eyes watching him with every step he took.
–
The gates opened and the dead wagon rolled through at ten o’clock. Duane’s body had been stripped and he lay naked in the mud.
Cal and Joe had divided his clothing between them. The extra layers would help keep them alive during the deadly cold nights. It was the only good thing that could come from Duane’s death. They had tried to wash Duane’s blood out of the jacket, but the waste in the river water had only made it worse. They’d buried the jacket instead. In a few days, they hoped to be able to dig it back up and use it to help fortify their shebang. By then, it was possible the smell might fade.
There were only seven dead this morning. Some mornings there were as many as a hundred bodies waiting for the wagon. Cal waited for the others to pile their dead friends on the wagon, then he and Joe each took an arm and a leg and swung Duane onto the hard planks of the wagon bed. It was a struggle. Duane didn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds, but it was dead weight, limp and unyielding, and they were weak.
The driver shouted to the horses, and the wagon turned around and rolled back through the gates. Cal and Joe followed after. They had volunteered for wagon duty this morning. It was a coveted job because it got them outside the fence for a few minutes.
Cal walked past Grey Eyes. He could feel the guard watching him. Cal’s fists clenched and unclenched, but he kept walking, kept his eyes glued to the ground. And then he was outside the stockade.
He took a deep breath. The air smelled different out here, away from the crush of unwashed bodies, the shallow holes where the men buried their waste, and the stretch of river that leached filth from the surrounding mud. The clean air was almost solid, like something he could eat if his teeth were sharp enough. He gulped it in. For a moment, and only for a moment, he felt like a man again.
The wagon led them to a long shallow trench, and they unloaded the bodies, pulling each dead man onto the ground with a heavy thunk, hefting him between them and swinging him gently. They gave Duane an extra swing, getting him as high in the air as they could manage before letting go. They watched him fly free, his bony arms and legs twisting gracefully before disappearing over the lip of dry earth to land somewhere out of sight atop yesterday’s dead. Neither Cal nor Joe looked into that trench. Each of them knew the odds. They’d be down among the dead men themselves one day. Maybe soon enough to keep Duane company.
When it was empty, the wagon rolled away. It would return in a couple of hours with the day’s bread rations, stacked where the bodies had been. Cal knew that the wagon wouldn’t even be swept out before the bread was piled in.
Grey Eyes gestured with his rifle, and they turned back toward the stockade. Men rarely tried to escape. They were too weak, from hunger, from thirst, from lack of sleep, and from the parasites living under their skin. They were no match for a rifle.
Cal gulped clean air one more time before passing through the gate. He held it in his lungs and listened as the doors swung shut behind him. He looked at Joe and saw something new in the other man’s eyes. Watching Duane fly had changed something in Joe. He reached out to touch Joe’s shoulder, expecting the ready smile and the wink, some sign to indicate that Joe would be all right, that the prison hadn’t broken him. But Joe only shook his head and walked away.
Cal watched him go. He opened his mouth and finally took another breath and let Andersonville fill his lungs.
–
Cal woke early, but the sun was already peering over the horizon and pale light shone through the flap of the shebang he shared with Joe Poole. Cal had heard something, some noise that had awakened him. He looked over, but the old shirt that Joe used as bedding was wadded and abandoned in the corner. Cal rubbed his eyes and struggled out of the low shebang on his hands and knees. He stood and stretched and groaned and looked around. Few prisoners were moving about yet.
