Brave Enemies (11 page)

“We will have to dig the graves,” John said.

A spade and a pick leaned in the corner at the back of the church. John took the pick and handed me the spade, and we walked out to a high place above the other graves. From there you could see the creek through a break in the yellow hickory trees.

John took off his coat and began loosening the ground with the pick. I shoveled aside the sod he'd broken loose and dug down under the top-soil into the red clay. We dug three holes by moving back and forth between them. He loosened the hard clay and rocks in one and moved on to another while I shoveled out the clods.

“Why are graves always on high ground?” I said.

“Maybe the dead can see farther and clearer than the living,” John said. “And their ground is set aside forever and shouldn't take up good farmland.”

I soon had blisters on my hands. By the time we got the holes dug my hands were sore as my back.

W
HEN HE PREACHED
the funeral, John talked so quietly I had to strain to hear what he said. I sat on the back row as I had the night before. The three coffins lay in the floor at the front of the church. There was hardly room for them, for the little building was full. Word had gotten around and it appeared people had come for miles. I hoped nobody from across the river was there.

“A sad occasion brings us together here,” John said. “It is an ugly time, a time that tries faith and tries hope. It is a time of testing. I didn't know the Fielders well, but I know they were people just like us. They worked the land and raised their cattle and sheep. And they were raising their son. We know they have gone to a better place, away from the trials and tribulations of this valley.”

John paused and looked out over the gathering in the little church. “But what can we learn from their deaths?” he finally said. “What is the lesson, my friends, of these lives cut short?”

John paused again, as if he could hardly go on. And then he opened his black book, the one he carried in his coat pocket, and he read, “‘In the midst of life we are in death: of whom may we seek for succor, but of thee O Lord?' The death of the Fielders can teach us that death is always with us, that death comes like a thief in the night in such an hour as ye think not. And the death of the Fielders teaches us that we must love one another. That is the new commandment.”

In all the times I'd gone to church as a girl, I'd never paid much attention to the sermons. They all sounded alike. They were about heaven and hell and how awful people were. But when John talked, everything he said made sense. Everything he said seemed to come from the heart. When he spoke it was like he was speaking to me, and answering questions I'd thought about.

“Even the oldest among us live only a few years,” John said. “Young
Phillip's life was still at its beginning. My prayer is that he knew the joys of childhood, that he ran and played and swam in the creek, and that he gave his mother and father joy.”

John looked out over the congregation in the dim light. He was so tall he almost touched the beams of the roof. I'd never seen a man so pretty, a man whose words meant so much. What he said seemed to be what I wanted to hear, what I needed to hear. His words comforted me like nothing else had.

John paused again and gazed out over the congregation. He looked right at me on the back row. Then he bowed his head and closed his eyes and prayed.

“Death is not the end but the beginning,” he said. “Death is the doorway to the long ages and the ageless days. Guide us through the dangers. Help us to see the sunlight and the far mountains, and the welcome path ahead.”

When the service was over we carried the coffins out to the graveyard on the knoll. We had to make three trips, for it took six to carry each coffin. A breeze rattled the leaves on the oak trees above the graves, and purple-colored leaves soared out across the sky. As we assembled beside the holes and got ready to sing, a man on horseback rode out of the woods. He rode right up to the graves, and he had a handkerchief tied over his nose.

People stepped back a little from the graves to give the horseman room. And they stepped back a little from John. Some of the men had brought guns, but the rifle guns were leaning in the corner in the back of the church.

The rider didn't say anything for a minute. He just looked at the graves, and he looked at the little congregation. I wondered if he was there to rob us, or was he there to claim the bodies.

“You are welcome to join us, friend,” John said finally.

“Reverend Trethman,” the horseman hollered. “Them that give comfort to the Tories and aid the Tories will be treated the same as traitors. Don't matter what kind of collar they wear.”

The man turned his horse and rode away. We watched the horse and rider disappear into the woods as if we had been slapped in the face. All the good feeling of the sermon was smashed by his hateful voice. John watched the masked man ride away, and I thought he was going to call after him. But he never did. Instead, he said we would sing “Jesus, Lover of My Soul.”

It was a song of dignity and peacefulness. It was the perfect answer to the threat and anger of the man's warning. A song brought people together in harmony. It's hard to be angry while you're singing. After the hymn John prayed again, and then we filled in the graves.

As the crowd was breaking up Mr. Satterfield told John he was afraid for him. “You go unarmed from church to church in these fearful times,” he said.

But John said it would not help him to be armed. For though he carried a weapon he might still be ambushed or waylaid. “My message is my only armor. A weapon would only invite violence,” he said.

“You must at least not travel by night,” Mr. Satterfield said.

“Brother Satterfield, if the devil would find me he will find me,” John said.

By the time the graves were filled it was afternoon. John and I were left to finish the job ourselves. I had blisters on my hands, so I wrapped pieces of a sack around my right palm as I shoveled the clods into the last hole and heaped the turf in a mound. John put a cross made of hickory sticks on each grave.

“Why were the Fielders killed?” I said.

“I'm not sure,” John said. “The rumor was they gave a horse to the redcoats and let them bivouac on their property. They may have given corn or hams to the royal soldiers.”

“And for that they were hanged?”

“As scores of others have been,” John said. “Many have been killed for less.”

“And now they are gone,” I said.

“Perhaps a stonecutter will one day makes stones for these graves,” John said.

We placed the pick and spade back in the corner of the log church. I knew it was time for me to announce I was moving on. It was time for Reverend Trethman to dismiss me and go on to the next church on his circuit.

“Brother Joseph, what are your plans?” he said as he washed his hands in the branch and dried them on his coat. I washed my hands and dried them on Mr. Griffin's coat.

“I've thought about going to the mountains,” I said, and paused. I couldn't tell the preacher what had happened to me. I couldn't tell him that I'd murdered Mr. Griffin.

“Do you have family there?” John said. “Do you have business farther west?” He looked into my eyes and put a hand on my shoulder.

“I don't know,” I said, and hot tears came into my eyes. I didn't mean to cry, but my eyes got damp and light swelled in them. If I cried he would see I was a girl and send me away.

“You are sorely troubled,” John said. “You are welcome to travel with me if that will lighten your burden.”

“It will,” I said.

“I have no horse and no cart. I hoof it from congregation to congregation. But you are welcome to walk with me and pray with me. It's better not to walk alone in the world.”

More tears came to my eyes, but I turned away so he couldn't see them. I followed him on the path past the Fielders' burned house.

T
HE NEXT DAY WE
walked from the cabin on Pine Knot Branch to the settlement at Crowfoot. Crowfoot was at the edge of the mountains, farther west than I'd ever been. It was at the edge of the Cherokee country, half a day's walk from the cabin.

“The Cherokees don't come into the valley,” John said, “but they claim all the mountains.”

John said the Cherokees had sided with the Crown and killed any patriots that came among them. Tories hid out on Cherokee land, in remote valleys in the mountains.

“Why would the Cherokees side with the Crown?” I asked.

“They have signed many treaties with the British,” John said. “Perhaps they feel they have to honor those treaties. And they hope the king will prevent settlers from taking their land.”

The road was just two ruts of cartway across the hills, what people called a topsoil road. There were puddles and rocks in the way and logs had fallen across the ruts in places. The road led down through muddy swamps and sinkholes along creeks. My shoes got dirty and I skipped to keep up with John's long strides.

“Why don't your churches give you a horse?” I said.

“My flocks are small and just getting started,” John said. “They have no treasuries. A flock must grow before it can provide for a minister. A preacher must give before he is given to. Besides, I have nowhere to keep a horse and nothing to feed a horse.”

I'd never met anybody like John Trethman. He gave himself to working for others, to encouraging and spiriting up others. He was tall and strong as any man, yet he thought more of songs and sermons than of profit from his work. He stepped forward with strength I found hard to follow. Yet I was happy to follow him.

“How many live at Crowfoot?” I said.

“Sometimes eight gather there for the service,” John said. “And in good weather sometimes ten or twelve.”

Where the road forded a creek we took off our shoes and rolled up our pants and waded across. John carried his Bible and songbook and prayer book, and I carried the lantern we'd need for the service and the walk back at night. The creek was so cold it stung the bones of my feet and shins. We sat on the other side and put our stockings and shoes on.

“We are like Paul and Silas,” John said, and laughed.

“Who was Silas?” I said.

“Silas was Paul's friend,” John said. “They traveled together and sang together.”

We stood up and started walking again on the rocky ground. Briars picked at my pants and Spanish needles stuck to my coat. I tried to step around puddles. There were hills ahead of us and white clouds floated so bright you could hardly look at them. John looked up at the clouds and started to sing. His voice echoed off the trees on both sides of the road and I joined him.

I
T WAS NEAR DARK
when we got to Crowfoot. The church there was little more than a shed on the bank of the creek. It was made of rough logs with no windows. The benches were planks laid over stumps. There was no fireplace.

“Someday there will be a real church here,” John said. “But now the settlement is only scattered cabins along the branches.”

John made a fire outside the church and we baked some potatoes we'd carried in our pockets. That was our meal before the service. The hot potatoes warmed me, and I washed my hands later in the branch.

We lit the lantern and hung it in the building, and soon after the sun went down members of the congregation began to arrive. They walked out of the woods from both directions on the road. Women in bonnets and men in rough jumpers and hunting shirts came in and sat down on the benches. Some men brought their rifles and leaned them in the corner. John welcomed each one and introduced me as his helper. Folks nodded at me.

Just as John was about to begin, a short man came to the door and looked in. His face was red and his eyes wet. When he took a step inside I thought he was lame, but then I smelled his breath and saw he was drunk.

“You are welcome, Brother Albert,” John called. The short man stumbled to the back bench and sat down beside me. He smelled like rotten peaches and unwashed clothes. John announced that the first song would be “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross.”

The short man beside me sang, but in broken notes and to his own tune. He sang in a loud voice, like he was deaf and couldn't hear the others. He swayed as he sang and closed his eyes and hiccupped. John kept singing more verses, and everybody joined in as if the drunk man wasn't there.

When the song was over John led in prayer, but as he prayed the drunk man mumbled and belched and tried to pray along with him. “Amen,” the short man said, and jerked his head. And then he said “Amen” again. Every time he said “Amen,” he jerked his whole body.

When the prayer was over John began to talk about grace in our troubled times. He talked about the joys of gathering together.

“The Lord means for his own to fellowship together,” John said. “For together we inspire and encourage each other. Together we comfort and teach each other. The Lord's work is done through fellowship and community. Alone we are weak, but together we are strong. Together we step forward to the future.”

“Preacher,” the drunk man hollered. All turned to look at him.

“Yes, Brother Albert?” John said in a calm and kindly voice.

“Want to testify,” the short man said.

“We will have testimonials presently,” John said.

“Want to testify now,” the drunk man said, and stared hard at John.

“Then you shall testify now,” John said, and grinned. There were chuckles in the room.

The drunk man stood up, and swayed forward and back. “Seen a vision,” he said, and paused like he'd forgotten what he was going to say.

“Tell us your vision,” John said.

The drunk man raised his finger like he had just remembered. “Woke up on Dogleg Mountain and seen a light over all the valley,” he said.

He swayed like he was about to fall and then caught himself. “I seen the light shining on Crowfoot,” he said, “and the Lord said out of the sky, Albert, you go to the Crowfoot church and tell the Crowfoot pastor I have somewhat against him.” He stopped again and looked like he couldn't recall where he was.