pouch.”
“It was me.”
“Why?”
“You’re asking why I don’t want you firing live rounds?”
“You hadn’t done that, we’d have won up there, and I’d still have Rhett.”
“Can’t be sure.”
“We can,” Roy said. “I’m deadly.”
“I know that, Roy. I’m sorry for that part, about Rhett.”
“Don’t worry yourself. Things’ll be different tomorrow.”
“They will?”
“Lee’s got bullets-unless you took them too.”
“I didn’t,” Jesse said. “Wasn’t aware.” He glanced at the barn, a massive shadow in the night, opened his mouth to say more, stopped himself.
“Then we’ll be fine,” Roy said. “You’re a good officer.”
“We’ll see.”
They sat by the well, the night quiet, the sky full of stars. Roy tried to find the Milky Way, failed. After a while, he took the diary page from his pocket. “What went on at Fort Pillow?”
“Why do you ask?”
Roy pictured Curtis’s dark hand on the last page in the diary: Now theys thinkin twicet bout not surrenderin but we has our orders from Forrest and they was to- “Just tell me,” Roy said.
“It’s not so easy,” Jesse said. “Forrest took the fort. There were about six hundred Union troops inside, half of them black. It was a slaughter, but so were a lot of battles. There’s controversy whether killing continued after the surrender, controversy whether the black soldiers were singled out. The evidence is inconclusive. Does it matter?”
Roy held the paper close to the candle. kill the last God damn one of em. Was what Forrest says. Theys runnin down the bluff in thur uniferms, throwin down thar guns hands in the air, fallin on thar knees. Too late. We stood em back up and shot em back down. I shot some swimmin away in the rivr too, one at a rainge of for hunnert yard, mebbe more, the nigger in his uniferm. An Zeke I had to shoot Zeke too for desertin in batle.
There was more, but Roy didn’t read it. He held the paper over Jesse’s candle. It browned, curled, blazed up, burned away. Roy ground the ashes under his heel.
“What’s that all about?” Jesse said.
“You were right,” Roy said, getting up. “It doesn’t matter.”
He went back into the barn, lay down beside Lee. He kept telling himself it didn’t matter. But it had mattered to someone, maybe some black Hill, mattered enough to pass that casket down the generations. Maybe Ezekiel was right all along: maybe the casket had held the ashes of Roy Singleton Hill. And that line from the bio Jesse had sent him, about his one son. What was the wording? Who may have died in infancy. Something like that. Roy wondered where the line between the white Hills and the black Hills was drawn.
“Milky White Way” started up in his mind at last, took him down, his last thought of sons dying in infancy.
THIRTY
Sonny Junior shook him awake just before dawn. The visual world was starting to materialize, but Roy knew who it was just from the strength.
“Got a problem, cuz.”
Roy sat up. Sonny stood by the mattress. He had hold of Jesse by his bad arm.
“Caught him down at his car, Roy, going for the phone.”
“Can’t have you firing real rounds,” Jesse said.
“Real rounds, hell,” said Sonny. “I’m takin’ the AK.”
Lee stirred in her sleep. Roy rose. “Let him go,” he said. Sonny released Jesse’s arm. They went into the main part of the barn, stood near a window. The light was getting stronger now, but Roy couldn’t even make out the house; the temperature drop had brought fog, as thick as any Roy had seen.
“Who were you calling, Jesse?” he said.
“Chattanooga police.”
“Did you get through?”
Jesse shook his head.
“You lying to me now?”
“Why would I? If anything, I’d lie the other way to stop you.”
Roy thought that over. Was it a trick? He wasn’t clever enough to know, never would be. It didn’t mean he couldn’t lead.
Roy called Lee over.
“How many rounds have we got?”
“Three.”
“Don’t forget the AK,” said Sonny. “Plus I got a shitload of other guns, comes to that.”
“Corporal,” Roy said, “get your weapon and take the lieutenant outside. Keep an eye on him. Sonny and I have to talk.”
“Why should I keep an eye on him?” said Lee.
“The lieutenant is going on leave.”
Lee took Jesse outside. Roy and Sonny stood by the window. “Gonna have to shoot him, Roy?”
“Where’s his phone?”
“Taken care of.”
Roy gazed at his cousin. His lip was puffy, but healing already, the blood around his ear all dried up and scaly: he didn’t look too bad, even somewhat rested. The chopped-off hair effect was going to take getting used to, the way it made Sonny resemble a huge version of his father. Roy wondered whether his father’s eyes had looked like that, red flecks in the blue.
“The AK stays behind,” Roy said.
The red flecks seemed to get brighter, like they had some separate connection to a source of power. “You tellin’ me what to do now, cuz?”
Sonny seemed to come a little closer, although he might not have moved at all. Behind him, a strange pattern of knots on the barnwood wall came into focus, like a sun with two moons. The sight didn’t bring everything back, but enough. It had happened by this window, two little boys rassling, but Sonny bigger and much stronger, holding him down while Roy screamed to get up. There was also something about a corn cob, lost to memory. Didn’t matter: he wasn’t afraid of Sonny, wasn’t afraid of anyone now.
“You’ll do what I say or you don’t come,” Roy said.
Their eyes met. Roy knew how Sonny would go for him, right for the throat, also knew how he would counter, how he’d lay Sonny out. He had no fear at all. At that moment, something came into view from above: a black spider descending on its thread, a delicate black spider, quite small, coming between them. Sonny jumped back with a little cry.
“Jesus Christ,” he said. “I can’t stand when that happens.”
Roy took the spider in his hand, opened the window, let it out. He turned back to Sonny; the red flecks were almost gone.
“There’s always the Glock with the pump action-” Sonny began.
“None of it,” Roy said. “We got there, Sonny. Now we have to do it right.”
“Got where?” said Sonny.
“Where we want to be.”
Sonny nodded. “Makes sense. Mighty happy to have a cousin deep as you, Roy. I feel a little bad about taking the farm and all. It wasn’t quite as clear-cut as maybe I made it out to be, tellin’ you before, the Cheetos and
