The Black Train

“That’s better.” The younger man held up the check. “You call me when ya wanna go again.” And then he turned and walked off.

He strode right out of the clearing into a path between the high grass not even shoulder-wide. Dissolving words faded behind him:

“I love you…”

Shee-it…

He strode faster, to get away. Walking was fine. He liked the fat man’s car—a new Caddy, with some fine a/c—but when he got in these mushy moods, shit—

I’ll walk.

Another step and—

Damn it to hell!

—he stumbled and fell. His knees thunked, and when he arched around to see what he’d tripped on…

His mind quieted.

A brown skull, half buried, looked back at him.

He wasn’t squeamish but then he did believe some of it. He’d seen some things, for sure—out here, and at the house…

A quick chill rippled up his sunbaked back. He knew the skull was very old. He also knew it was likely the skull of a slave, not a soldier killed in the field.

The skulls were actually all over the place.

CHAPTER TWO I

“You’re right,” Collier said to the old woman. He marveled over one of many glass display cases. “Your inn is like a mini-museum.” Below his gaze lay an array of Civil War-era implements. Each one was labeled. MESS PAN— 1861, MORTISE TWIVEL—1859, .36-CALIBER SELF-COCKING STARR REVOLVER—1863.

“Just you take a look at the Gast Museum downtown and tell me what we got here ain’t a lot finer’n more interesting,” Mrs. Butler bragged.

The next case sported gloves, belts, and footgear. “Brogen?” he asked of the clunky black shoe.

“That was the standard combat boot back then. They were as important to a fella’s survival on the battlefield as his rifle.” She leaned, pointed to a different styled shoe. The gesture caused Collier to run his gaze across the sweep of her bosom, after which he blinked hard to sideswipe the distraction.

“But this ’un here,” she continued, “was the cream’a the shoe crop. The Jefferson shoe, or bootee as it was called. Mr. Collier, you could put that shoe on right now and it’d fit better than any fancified Gucci you might buy today.”

Collier looked at the high-top leather shoe. Save for a few scuffs, it looked in excellent condition. The label read: FEDERAL PATTERN JEFFERSON BOOTEE—1851—WORN BY MR. TAYLOR CUTTON, RAIL INSPECTOR FOR THE EAST TENNESSEE AND GEORGIA RAILROAD.

“Everything here was found on this premise at one time or another,” Mrs. Butler said. Now she stood back proudly, crossing her arms under her breasts, which made them appear even larger. “I get a tax break through the state historical commission by displayin’ it all…and by keepin’ that blasted portrait of Gast hangin’ up there.”

The most evil man to ever live here? Collier was amused. It was likely just promotion. “If this man was so evil,” he baited, “I suppose the house is haunted, huh?”

“Only by the memory of that low-down bastard,” came the strange response.

Collier changed the subject, back to the Jefferson shoe and its long-dead owner. “But I’ve never heard of this railroad. Was this prewar?”

“They started in 1857 and finished in 1862,” she said. “It was Gast’s railroad. He put down track from here to the middle’a Georgia, the perfect junction from the main roads that branched into town. He built it with a hundred slaves and fifty white men—not a bad feat for back then. That’s a lotta rail to lay.”

The notion impressed Collier. They had no machines to do it back then, just hard-muscled humans lugging iron rails and driving spikes with hammers. Five years…Collier suspected that the hardest labor he ever did was carrying groceries from the car to the house.

“And this?” he asked.

ASH CAKE—1858

“Ash cake is what they used for soap back then,” Mrs. Collier went on. “Weren’t no Ivory or Irish Spring, you can be sure.”

The grayish cake was the size of a hockey puck. “How was it made?”

“They throwed a bunch of animal fat in a barrel of boiling water. Horse fat, mostly. Never pork or beef ’cos them was good for eatin’. So they boil the fat and slowly add ashes—any kind: leaves, grass, plants. Boil some more, then add more ashes, boil some more, then add more ashes, like that all day long. By the time the water’s all cooked off, the fat’s broken down and mixed with the ashes. That’s when you cut your cakes and set ’em out to dry.” Her old finger tapped the glass. “Works as good as anything they make today in fancy factories. It’s rough but gets you cleaner than a whistle. See, people didn’t wash much back then, only every Saturday before the Sabbath, and not much at all during the winter—back then a bath could give you pneumonia. Ladies would clean themselves a bit more than fellas, though, with hip baths.”

“Hip baths?”

“Just a little tub with leg cutouts. You lower your privates into it. We’ve got one here—upstairs right next to your room’s a matter of fact. I’ll show it to ya.”

Collier couldn’t wait to see the hip bath.

“So much about the old days folks just got the wrong idea about. About the South in general.”

The next objects in the case seemed bizarre: six-inch-long metal implements with coiled springs on the end. NAUGHTY GIRL CLIPS—1841. “What on earth are these? They look like clothespins.”

Mrs. Butler smiled, and reached for the cabinet.

Collier’s eyes widened as she leaned forward. He just couldn’t keep his gaze off her bosom…

“Stick your finger out, Mr. Collier,” she instructed.

“What?”

“Go on. Stick it out.”

Collier chuckled and did so.

The tines squeezed down and began to hurt at once.

“See, when little girls were naughty, their daddies put one’a these on their finger.”

Only five seconds had passed and Collier was wincing.

“How long the clip’d stay on depended on how bad the little girl was, see? Say she didn’t do her mornin’ chores, for example; then she’d likely get the clip on for fifteen seconds.” The old lady’s eyes smiled. “Hurt yet, Mr. Collier?”

“Uh, yeah,” he admitted. It felt like pliers on his finger.

“Or say she stole a piece of rock candy from the general store; then she’d probably get a minute…”

Collier’s finger was throbbing in pain, and he’d only done twenty seconds so far.

“And if she ever dared talk back to her momma or daddy—two minutes at least.”

Collier chewed his lip a few seconds more, then insisted, “Take it off!”

Mrs. Butler complied, clearly amused. Collier’s crimped finger was red above the joint. “Aw, but you barely done thirty seconds, Mr. Collier.”

He wagged his hand. “That hurt like hell…”

“I’ll bet’cha it did. That’s why little girls didn’t act up much in the good old days. A couple minutes with the clip was all the discipline they needed. Wasn’t uncommon for a little girl to wear it five minutes for usin’ profanity, or gettin’ sent home from the schoolhouse.”