Ride With the Devil

THE CONSTANT BOMBARDMENT OF THE UNION Army’s heavy mortars prevented the exhausted men from getting any sleep during the night. The noise was continuous, from the solid thump of the mortars being fired to the scream of shells in flight to the crash of bombs bursting just overhead, bathing the area in a flash of light and sending out whistling shards of hot, jagged metal to kill and maim.

It was easy to follow the deadly transit of the missiles because of the sputtering red sparks that emanated from the fuses. The one-hundred-pound bombs described a high arc through the cold black sky before slamming down to explode among the weary Confederate soldiers.

The bombardment continued without letup until the eastern sky grew gray. Only with the coming of dawn did the bombardment end.

Then, as day broke, a low-lying haze rose over the open field that separated the Confederate position from the breastworks the Union soldiers had thrown up two nights earlier. The haze was partly due to a fog that the early morning sun coaxed from the frosted ground, as well as the gun smoke
that continued to hover over the field where a two-day battle had taken place on the Chickamauga.

As the sun grew higher, the ground fog burned away and the smoke gradually began to dissipate. When the darkness, fog, and smoke had lifted, the horror of the battle was clearly revealed. The meadow between where Sergeant Mason Hawke was standing and the Yankee breastworks at the edge of the woods some half mile distant was covered with bodies. They were the easily identifiable blue uniforms of the Union soldiers, the natty gray of the Virginians, the Georgians’ butternut, and finally the mixed bag of clothing worn by the Western Confederate soldiers. In addition to the dead and dying, there were hundreds of vultures, some circling overhead, others already on the ground, attending to their gruesome work.

Though the final numbers weren’t in, the casualty estimates were running as high as six thousand killed and 25,000 wounded.

On this, the third morning, many of the wounded were still on the battlefield, having spent a long, cold night lying among the dead. With the dawn, these poor souls could be seen feebly waving their arms—those who could move—in an effort to signal their comrades to come for them. The result, when one looked over the battlefield, was an almost rhythmic movement, as wheat in the wind.

There was a sound as well; not the crash and roar of battle, but a low moan, often punctuated with sharp cries of pain and the plaintive cries for water.

On this day of the autumnal equinox, the sun would rise and set at exactly six o’clock. But it was nearly nine o’clock before everyone realized that the Union Army had abandoned the field, and not until then did full-scale rescue operations get underway. Hundreds of Confederate soldiers
moved through the carnage, conducting triage in the field and putting on their stretchers only those they thought might benefit from medical attention.

Sergeant Mason Hawke was one of the soldiers recovering the wounded, and as he moved through the carnage, he saw one of his boyhood acquaintances. The young man’s abdomen was red-brown from encrusted blood. At first Mason thought he was dead, but he saw a small movement, stopped and knelt beside his old friend.

“That one’s dead, Sergeant Hawke, we’d best leave him be for now,” one of the stretcher bearers said.

“He’s not dead. I saw him move.”

“Well if he ain’t dead yet, he soon will be. Let’s find someone in better shape.”

“Take this one,” Hawke said.

“Sarge, we’re supposed to take only those—”

“I said take this one!” Hawke ordered sternly.

“All right, Sarge, if you say so. But if he’s dead by the time we get him back to the aid station, you’re goin’ to have to explain to the cap’n why we got him.”

Hawke watched them pick the man up and put him on the stretcher. His friend opened his eyes then and, looking up, saw him.

“I’ll be damned,” he said. “It would be you, wouldn’t it?”

“You’re going to be fine,” Hawke said, but his words were unheard because the wounded soldier, having forced himself to stay awake throughout the long night, was by then unconscious.

Hawke watched as the stretcher bearers carried his boyhood friend back to the aid station, then he turned back to look out over the valley of the dead.

He closed his eyes. Only three years ago he had been in Europe, visiting such glamorous locations as London, Paris,
Rome, Vienna, and Berlin. That a man could experience such a contrast between that and this in so short a time seemed inconceivable.

He didn’t know how many more battles he would have to face or how many more men he would have to kill before it all ended. He did know, however, that he could never go back to the genteel life that had taken him on the grand tour of Europe. That Mason Hawke now lay with the dead, not only here at Chickamauga, but at battlefields such as Antietam, Fredricksburg, and Gettysburg.

The music that he once offered to the world was now buried deep within his soul.

Chapter 1

Several years later

“HAWKE!”

The word was more of an angry bark than a name. It rolled off the speaker’s lips like an obscenity.

“That is who you are, ain’t it? You’re the one they call Mason Hawke?”

The tall, slender man standing at the bar looked into the mirror. The big man who had addressed him had a matted beard and wore a shirt that looked as if it hadn’t been changed in a month or so. His unkempt appearance contrasted sharply with Hawke’s own clean-shaven countenance.

Hawke wore a white ruffled shirt poked down into fawn-colored trousers, a blue jacket, and a crimson cravat. His mode of dress set him apart from most of the others he encountered in his wanderings, and in fact Hawke made a conscious effort to dress well and to keep himself clean and well-groomed. It was his last link to a world he had abandoned so long ago.

“Yeah,” the man said. “That’s who you are, all right. I was told to look for the fanciest dressed son of a bitch in the saloon, and there you are, standing there like a whorehouse dandy.”

With the man’s challenging words, nearly everyone else in the saloon started moving, to get out of the way of whatever was about to occur. An intense poker game was left in progress, with the cards facedown in front of the players, the stack of money undisturbed in the middle of the table. The bottles and glasses were taken from all the occupied tables, and now men and a few women stood in rows along the front and back walls of the saloon, drinking beer and whiskey while intently watching the deadly theater unfolding before them.

But Hawke noticed that not everyone had joined those who rushed to get out of harm’s way. Two men, as unkempt as the one who had accosted him, remained at opposite ends of the bar. They stood drinking their whiskeys while maintaining a studied indifference to what was going on. That assumed disinterest alerted Hawke. Before he turned around, he studied each of them in the mirror and saw that the two were not only armed, but that the pistols were loose in their holsters and kicked out for quick and easy access.

“Are you goin’ to turn around and face me like a man?” Hawke’s challenger called. “Or are you going to stand there like the coward you are, with your back to me?”

Slowly and deliberately, Hawke finished his drink, put his glass on the bar, then turned.

“Evidently, my friend, you have a burr under your saddle,” he said easily.

“You killed my brother,” the big man said angrily.

“Did I?” Hawke replied. “Well, if I did, he probably needed killing.”

“You don’t even know who I’m talking about, do you?”

“I’m afraid not. Who are you?” Hawke asked.

“My name is Purvis Tucker. That name mean anything to you?”

Hawke nodded. “Yes. I imagine you would be talking about Asa Tucker.”

Three months earlier, Hawke had shot and killed Asa Tucker. It had happened unexpectedly. He’d been working in a saloon in Plano at the time and was taking the day’s cash receipts to the bank for deposit. Tucker, who had plans to steal the money, was waiting for him in an alley. When Hawke approached the bank, Tucker stepped out into the street, already shooting. Hawke had no choice but to shoot back. Asa missed; Hawke didn’t.

“I reckon you know why I’m here now,” Tucker said, his voice a guttural growl.

“Let me see,” Hawke said as he faced the man. A cold smile spread across his face. “My guess would be that you want to visit your brother. Well, I’ll be glad to make the arrangements for you.”

The anger in Tucker’s face was replaced by a look of confusion. “What? What are you talking about, go visit my brother?”

“Why, I’m talking about sending you to hell too, of course,” Hawke replied easily. “You and these two ugly bastards standing at either end of the bar,” he added.

“Billy, he knows!” one of the men shouted. Stepping away from the bar, his hand dipped toward his pistol.

Hawke fired three times, his shots coming in such rapid succession that it was almost like one sustained roar. He took down the one who was going for his gun first, then the man at the other end of the bar.

Tucker, not ready to make his play yet, was caught by surprise when the fight was joined. Forced by events, he had just cleared his holster and was bringing his gun to bear when Hawke turned and fired. The heavy bullet from Hawke’s .44 sent Tucker backward. He fell onto the poker table, breaking through it and scattering cards and money.

A quarter rolled halfway across the floor, spun a few times, then fell. Gun smoke drifted through the room—the
smoke of three discharges from a single gun, because Hawke was the only one who had managed to get off a shot. With the room now silent, Hawke checked out the three men who had braced him.

The one who drew first was in an odd, kneeling position, one of his legs hung up in the brass railing at the foot of the bar. He was slumped forward, his cocked but unfired gun still in his hand.

The man at the other end of the bar—the one called Billy—was belly down, his head submerged in the brown liquid of the spittoon. His gun was lying on the floor beside his outstretched hand. The hammer hadn’t even been pulled back.

Tucker was on his back between the two halves of the broken table, his open eyes already glazing over. The playing cards were scattered all around him, and one of them, the ace of spades, was faceup on his chest, just under the dark red bullet hole in his heart.

Before putting his pistol away, Hawke made a quick survey of the rest of the saloon to determine if anyone else might pose a threat.

Those who had moved to either side of the room were still there, looking on in a combination of shock and morbid curiosity. Upstairs, on the balcony of the second floor that overlooked the main salon, a couple of the whores and their customers had come to the railing to see what was going on. One of the whores had put on a dressing gown, but the other was standing there naked. It wasn’t until someone pointed her out that the others in the saloon noticed her.

“Damn, Cindy Lou! Is that how you come to a shooting?” someone shouted, and Cindy Lou, perhaps just noticing that she was naked, let out a little yelp of alarm and turned to hurry back to her room, chased by the laughter of those below.

The sheriff and a deputy chose that precise moment to come into the saloon. The two lawmen were greeted with the
sight of three dead men on the floor, while everyone in the saloon was laughing uproariously.

“What the hell! Three men get shot and you folks think it’s funny?” the sheriff asked.

“You don’t understand, Sheriff,” the bartender replied. “It was Cindy Lou, she was naked.”

The sheriff looked at the bartender as if he and everyone else in the room had gone insane.

“Ah, you had to be here,” the bartender said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

“Has anyone checked? Are all three dead?” the sheriff asked. With his foot, he lifted Billy’s head out of the spittoon, then rolled him over. Billy’s face was covered with juice and pieces of expectorated tobacco.

By now Hawke had returned his pistol to his holster and had his back to the bar, leaning against it and resting on his elbows.

“They’re dead,” he said.

“Did you do this, Mr. Hawke?” the sheriff asked.

“Yes,” Hawke replied.

“Are you telling me you shot all three of ’em?”

“Yes.”

“What the hell did you shoot ’em for?”

“Because they were trying to shoot me.”

The sheriff went around to each of the dead men and, picking up their guns, sniffed the barrels.

“It don’t appear to me that any of these guns was fired,” he said.

“They wasn’t,” the bartender said.

The sheriff looked up at Hawke. “None of these guns was fired, but you say they was trying to shoot you?”

“He’s tellin’ you like it is, Sheriff. He didn’t have no choice,” the bartender explained. “These here men drew on him first.”

“That’s right, Sheriff!” at least half a dozen others
shouted in support of the bartender’s testimony. “They drew on him first, then he shot ’em. Damndest thing I ever seen.”

The sheriff stroked his chin for a moment, then nodded.

“Mr. Hawke, you know, don’t you, that I’m goin’ to have to take you in for a hearing?” he asked. “It’s for your own good. If what these folks are sayin’ is true, the judge will rule that there’s no charges and all this will be behind you.”

“All right,” Hawke said.

The sheriff looked at him for a moment. “From the way you handled these three, I don’t reckon I can take your gun from you unless you’re willin’ to give it to me. But I wish you would.”

Using his thumb and forefinger, Hawke pulled his pistol from his holster and handed it to the sheriff.

“When will we have this hearing?” Hawke asked.

“Not until tomorrow morning.”

“Do I have to stay in jail tonight?”

“It would be better if you did.”

“Sheriff, can I say something?” the bartender asked.

“Charley, I’ve known you for a long time,” the sheriff replied. “And I’ve never known you not to say whatever it is that you have on your mind. So go ahead. What is it?”

“Well, you heard everyone say that it wasn’t Mr. Hawke’s fault. Can’t you just release him to me? We’ve got a big crowd in here tonight and I’ll be needin’ him to play the piano. Fact is, after a shootin’ like this, a little piano music might just calm things down.”

The sheriff stroked his chin for a moment, then nodded and handed the pistol back to Hawke. “All right,” he said. “But I expect you to be down at the courthouse by eight o’clock in the morning.”

“I’ll be there,” Hawke said, slipping the pistol back into his holster. He looked over at the bartender. “Thanks, Charley.”

“You want to thank me, get back to work,” Charley said. He pointed to the piano in the back of the room. “Play something.”

Two days later, in another part of Texas, more than half the citizens of Salcedo had come out to the cottonwood tree just east of town to watch the hanging. They stood around in morbid curiosity as Titus Culpepper saw to the final details.

“Has anybody got the execution order?” Culpepper asked.

“We don’t need no execution order,” someone said. “Just hang the son of a bitch.”

“This is not a lynching, Vox,” Culpepper said, speaking harshly. “This is a legal, court-ordered execution, and I plan to see that it is not only carried out, but carried out correctly. Now, does anyone have the execution order?”

“I’ve got it right here, Colonel,” one of the other deputies said, riding over to hand a sheet of paper to Culpepper.

“Thank you, Deputy Bates,” Culpepper said as he took the paper from him.

Culpepper, Vox, Bates, and all of the other deputies were mounted. So was the condemned man, who was now sitting on his horse with his hands tied behind his back.

By Culpepper’s order, no one else from the town could be mounted, so more than one hundred people had walked the half mile to the hanging tree to watch.

Clearing his throat, Culpepper began reading from the judge’s order for execution.

“‘Edward Delaney, having been found guilty of horse stealing and other crimes, this court sentences you to be hanged by the neck until you are dead.’”

The rope had already been thrown over a convenient horizontal branch of the tree, and now the noose hung but inches from Delaney’s head.

“Do you have any last words?” Culpepper asked.

Delaney stared at Culpepper.

“I don’t have nothin’ to say to these folks,” he said. “I forgive them, because they are innocent people who don’t know what they are doin’.”

“Well, that’s might righteous of you, forgiving us like that,” Culpepper said sarcastically.

“I said I forgive them, not you. To you, I do have something to say.”

“Well, I expect you better say what you’ve got to say, then,” Culpepper said as he placed the noose around Delaney’s neck. “Because you’ve got about thirty seconds left to live.”

“I know what you done durin’ the war, Culpepper. I didn’t find out until it was too late to do anything about it, but I know it was you. And I’ll be waiting for you in hell.”

“Really?” Culpepper said. He chuckled. “Well, when you get there, kick the devil in the ass for me, will you?”

Without waiting for a reply, Culpepper slapped the rump of Delaney’s mount.

The horse bolted forward and the rope tightened, pulling Delaney from the saddle. The tree limb sagged a bit under Delaney’s weight, but the fall did not break his neck. Delaney was slowly strangling, and he kicked his legs and made gagging sounds as he swung back and forth, describing a wide arc. His eyes were open and bulging, his tongue ran out, and his face turned dark red, then blue.

Many of the people in the crowd, unable to look at his suffering, turned their faces away. A few, shocked by the unexpected dreadfulness of what they were watching, began to throw up. The mounted deputies, though, to a man, watched with barely concealed glee. Finally Delaney’s struggles stopped and he grew still, save for the continuing but now gentle pendulum swing of his body.

By the time the townspeople started back into town, Delaney’s body was hanging perfectly still.

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