Magic in the Mix (11 page)

“Hold fire!” someone screamed, and the man laughed harder and shot again.

“Run!”

There was a tiny, frozen second of silence, and then a ringing clatter, an earth-shaking thunder of hooves, and a wall of dust rose from the road.

Miri felt Molly go limp against her back. “It's over.”

Miri panted like a dog. Her mouth wouldn't make words.

“Don't move,” Molly breathed.

Miri blinked in answer. She couldn't have moved if she wanted to. Before her, a ghost on horseback rose out of the weeds. No, not a ghost. It was a man, a man in a gray coat covered with white dust. He
wheeled his equally dusty horse around, and she saw that he was grinning. “Hern!” he whooped.

“Yessir!” A short man with a drooping mustache and a dirty gray uniform scrambled into view.

“Hern and Carter! Tie up the horses and tend to those who're still alive. We're gonna trail the others!”

A big man, the same one who had fired so casually into the crowd, appeared alongside the ghostly horse and rider. He was still laughing. “Colonel! Let me come along and give 'em some hell. I'll pick 'em clean!”

The Colonel pulled up on his horse and glared down at him. “You'll follow orders, Carter. And you, Hern. We'll come back for you.” He glanced over his shoulder at the men scattered over the road. “I want those Yankees tended to, you hear? I don't want 'em dead.” He turned to give Carter a piercing look. “You hear me, Carter?”

“You're just going to hang 'em anyway,” said Carter sulkily.

“Maybe so,” said the Colonel. “But they've got to be alive. I want Yankee prisoners, not Yankee corpses. That clear? Carter?”

“I'm a soldier, not a doctor,” Carter sniffed.

Miri saw the Colonel's face. So did Carter. “Yessir,” he mumbled.

The Colonel started to move off and then had second thoughts. “Don't try to tell me they died, either, Carter. I'll have you shot.” And with that, he was off, tearing down the road in a plume of dust.

For a minute, Hern and Carter looked after the galloping figure. The one named Carter spat into the grass. “I believe we just got skunked, Hern.”

“You got skunked,” said Hern in a sour voice.

Molly's hand closed around Miri's arm. “Soon as they turn around, we run into the barn,” she breathed.

Miri nodded, the functional part of her brain thankful that Molly was taking charge. She herself was stiff with fear; her mind was dashing about like a hunted rabbit. What was going on? Who were these guys? Soldiers? What for? And what would they do if they saw her?

The last question was probably the most important. Miri turned her head a fraction of an inch and saw that the two men were still looking after the retreating Colonel. “Pah!” Carter said bitterly. “Do I look like a stable boy? Do I look like a nursemaid?”

Hern sighed and tucked his pistol into his belt. “Guess the Colonel thinks so.”

From Miri's vantage point, Carter just looked scary. He was enormous, and he was furious, and the combination looked deadly. His face was boiling with anger, his eyes were weirdly pale, and two of his fingers were jerking convulsively. For a moment, he stood stiff and rigid, then suddenly, he bent down, seized a rock, and hurled it with all his might at the barn. Miri heard the wood crack. She wished there were something more solid than grass between them.

“Now, Carter,” said Hern uneasily. “Colonel said we was to pick up the wounded.”

Carter ignored him. “Colonel's got no right to leave me behind,” he said through his teeth. “I'm the best Ranger he's got, and he knows it. If he gets anything, it's because of me, and I deserve my share of the pickings. That Yankee captain had a gold watch, I'd bet my life on it, and I should get it. I shot more of them than anyone. I shot that fool lieutenant over there, and I got both the men in the ditch, too.” He tallied them up like the score of a game. “And look! That boy's about done for. That's four!”

“Let's go tie up them horses,” suggested Hern.

What about the wounded men? thought Miri. In spite of Molly's arm, she lifted her head a bit, just enough to see. Immediately, she wished she hadn't. A soldier lay in the road, his blue jacket pocked with holes, his eyes fixed on the empty sky. She looked away and saw the boy who'd been thrown off his horse; he had fallen on his back, and to Miri's surprise, he was still alive. He was trying to push himself through the weeds with the heel of his boot: a weak shove, a pause while he gulped for air, another shove. His blue coat was stained dark, with blood or sweat, Miri couldn't tell.

A horse whinnied nervously as Hern approached on one side, Carter on the other, stepping over the soldier in the road as if he didn't see him.

“Now,” breathed Molly. Clutching Miri's hand, she rose in one quick movement, and they ran, crouching, toward the barn. They zigzagged around its weathered corner and lunged for the door. There—they made it. Inside the barn, they collapsed on a meager pile of hay against a wall.

“What—what the
heck
is going on?” demanded Miri in a whisper-shout.

“I'm pretty sure,” Molly said, low, “that we're in the middle of the war.”

“
What
war? There's no
war
in our front yard!”

“There was,” Molly said. “The big one. The Civil War.”

“The Civil War? But that's—that's
crazy
,” Miri blurted. “That was a million years ago!”

Molly blinked at her. “No, it wasn't.”

“But—but—” sputtered Miri, “it can't be. It's ridiculous.” The Civil War? Impossible! The Civil War was something unimaginably ancient, something that didn't actually exist in the same three-dimensional world she did. As she continued to stutter her objections, she saw, again, the smoke and fire, heard the chunking of metal into wood, the heavy breathing of horses and men, all of them crackling with movement and energy. It couldn't be the Civil War. The Civil War was black-and-white pictures, educational videos, and long books with footnotes. “They don't look like history,” she said weakly. “They look like regular people.”

“It was the 1860s, not the Jurassic period,” began Molly, but before she could say more, there was a heavy thud against the outer wall of the barn.

“Why, my gracious, I must've dropped him,” snickered Carter.

“Help me,” choked a voice.

Miri and Molly looked at each other, horrified, and they heard Hern mutter, “Colonel said not to kill 'em.”

“Do you see me killing anyone?” asked Carter.

“Bandage?” croaked the man. “Could I get a bandage—”

“Bandage?” asked Carter. “I wouldn't waste an inch of cloth on a Yankee dog like you. Use that piece of trash you call a shirt if you want a bandage.” There was a shifting sound as the man struggled with his shirt, and then Carter said, “Look at that fool boy, pushing himself through the dirt. Does he think we're blind?”

“Is that Jamie?” The wounded man's voice lifted with hope. “He's still—he's not—he's alive?”

“I'm ashamed to say that he is,” Carter said bitterly. “Don't know how I missed such an easy shot.”

Again, Miri saw him, laughing as he fired his gun into the crowd. A lump of anger rose in her throat. Molly squeezed her hand and made a gesture that meant
Hush
.

“I guess we gotta haul him up here,” said Hern regretfully.

“Wait,” said Carter. “Wait a few minutes, and he'll die. I wager he'll die before he gets to the road. I'll put five dollars on it.”

“You don't got five dollars,” said Hern. “Colonel said to keep 'em alive. Come on.” Footsteps kicked through grass and died away.

Carter heaved a dramatic sigh and followed.

Miri turned to Molly. Who are these guys? she mouthed.

“Southerners,” breathed Molly. “Rebels. Confederates. Anyone in a gray coat is fighting for the South. Blue coats are the Yankees.” She gave Miri a look. “The Yankees are the Northerners.”

“I know
that
,” said Miri defensively. She pictured the men lying in the road. They were wearing blue. “I thought the Yankees won.”

“Yeah, in the end, but not the whole time. And this wasn't a big battle. This was just a few soldiers.”

It had seemed big enough to Miri. “The guy on the other side of the wall, he's their prisoner?” she whispered, and Molly nodded. What a rotten deal. First you had to fight and maybe die, and then, if you lost, you were taken prisoner by your enemies.

Molly put her finger to her lips as Carter returned. “I am not cut out for heavy lifting,” he drawled, and the wall of the barn shook as another body crashed into it. It wasn't the boy, was it? thought Miri incredulously. They wouldn't throw a boy so badly wounded on the ground like that, would they? He'd never survive it. She heard a tiny whimper and dug her fingernails into her palm in agonized sympathy.

“Jamie?” asked his friend gently. “Jamie?”

“Isn't that sweet?” Carter cooed, and Miri sent waves of loathing through the barn wall.

“He don't look so good,” observed Hern.

“Sit up, now, boy! Come on, lad!” urged the wounded soldier. His voice was stronger than it had been—Miri guessed that the shirt-bandage had helped. But Jamie was silent. “Help me get him up,” pleaded the man. “He's hardly breathing, pitched over like he is.”

“Don't touch him, Hern!” snapped Carter. “What're you thinking? He's the enemy!”

“Colonel said not to kill 'em,” Hern said doggedly. Stupid but stubborn, Miri thought. Not as bad as Carter.

“Come now,” pleaded the wounded man. “Please!
Just lift him a little, and I can do the rest. Come on, Jamie, old boy.”

“Colonel said not to kill them,” repeated Hern.

“Oh, for the love of God, I am plagued by fools!” Carter bellowed. “All right, Hern, watch me: I will doctor the lad.” He made a noise that Miri guessed was a laugh, but it sounded like a dog squealing, and she felt the flesh on the back of her neck shrivel a little. “It is my medical opinion that the boy has fainted. He needs to be brought around. Observe: the direct method.” There was a sharp slap and a cry. Miri covered her mouth with her hands. Beside her, Molly sat rigidly, her eyes tightly shut.

“Why, look at that!” Carter giggled. “Look at him twitch. I should have been a doctor.” Another slap.

“Stop!” yelled the wounded man. “You're going to kill him!”

“Stop that, Carter!” blustered Hern. “Colonel's going to shoot us if they're dead.”

“No, no, he's getting better each time!” Carter snickered. “Watch!”

“Five hundred dollars in gold!” bellowed the soldier.

A sudden silence.

“Beg pardon?” asked Carter.

“Let us go,” the soldier gasped. “Give me a horse. I'll pay five hundred dollars in gold.”

“You don't have five hundred dollars in gold,” said Carter. But Miri thought he sounded a little cautious.

“I do.”

“Where?” demanded Carter. “Back home in your mattress?”

“No. Someplace near. I'll tell you if you let us go.”

There was a pause. “How'd you get it?”

“We're guard detail,” the man said. “All of us. Guard detail, trying to go north and get this gold onto the train east before you Rebs can blow up the tracks again.”

Miri looked a question at Molly: What's guard detail?

The guys who guard the trains, Molly mouthed. I think.

Carter interrupted. “Where's the gold?” His elegant language got a lot simpler when he talked about money, Miri noticed.

“Carter,” Hern whined. “We can't do this. Colonel needs prisoners. He said so.”

“You can get yourself some other boys, easy,” the soldier said quickly. “There's plenty of them right behind us. They sent down the rawest pack of babies I ever saw to watch over the railroad crew. They're coming out of Fisher's Hill, not six hours behind us. You just sit right here, you'll catch yourself more prisoners than you know what to do with. Your Colonel won't care, and you'll be five hundred dollars richer. And”—he shifted against the wall—“me and Jamie will be off your hands.” His voice cracked, and Miri could hear the panic right below the surface. He was bargaining for his life, his life and Jamie's, and he'd reached the moment when the balance would tip in one direction or the other. Miri closed her eyes and added her hopes to the soldier's. Come on, she urged Hern and Carter. Say yes.

The silence stretched out. “Bird in the hand,” Carter said.

“Five hundred dollars,” Hern said thoughtfully.

“In gold,” said Carter, luxuriating in the word. “You can't do better than gold.”

Miri and the soldier exhaled with relief. Then he asked, “How do I know you won't shoot me in
the back once you got the money?” A good question, in Miri's opinion.

But Carter was offended. “You dare to judge my honor by your own, you swine?” he boomed. “I am a Carter of Virginia and a gentleman. Were it not for my honor, I'd shoot you now and hunt out the money myself. I'd do it with pleasure.”

The soldier sniffled. “It's pretty well hid. Not so easy to find.”

There was a pause, and then Carter said, “I give you my word of honor, as a Carter, before Hern here as witness, that I won't shoot you in the back—or the head or any other place. I'll give you a horse, and I'll even help you get on it, once I have five hundred dollars in gold in my hand.”

“What about me?” yelped Hern.

“Three hundred for me, two hundred for you,” said Carter smoothly. “As I have conducted the negotiations.”

There was a silence. “Two hundred,” Hern sighed. “But don't you go cheating me.” Miri and Molly exchanged glances. Hern was going to be cheated.