The Bloody Ground - Starbuck 04 (19 page)

If only Delaney knew how to achieve it.

starbuck never did learn
the Colonel's name. He was a tall, wispy-haired man in his late fifties who was plainly overwhelmed by the responsibilities that had been thrust on him. "The town," he told Starbuck, "isn't fit to be a depot. Isn't fit, you hear me? The Yankees have been here more than once and what they didn't steal our own skulkers took. You need boots?" ' "No."

"You can't have any. General Lee demands boots. What boots?" He gestured about his cluttered office that had once been a dry goods store as if to demonstrate the obvious absence of any footwear. "You don't need any?" The Colonel suddenly understood Starbuck's reply.

"No, sir."

"Do you have any to spare?" the Colonel asked eagerly.

"Not a pair, sir. But I do need axes, tents, wagons. Especially a wagon." The battalion's only transport was a handcart that had proved a brute on the short marches the Yellowlegs had so far completed. The cart carried the precious rifles and as much spare ammunition as could be piled on top, but Starbuck doubted whether the rickety vehicle would last another ten miles.

"No good asking me for wagons," the Colonel said. "You can try commandeering from the local farms, but I doubt you'll have any luck. Too many troops have been through this place. They've stripped it bare." The Colonel was in charge of the town of Winchester, which lay at

the northern end of the Shenandoah Valley and was now the supply base for Lee's army across the Potomac.
Starbuck
's battalion had abandoned its train at Strasburg and marched north through a glorious summer dawn. Now, as the sun's heat grew stifling, the exhausted men waited in Winchester's main street as Starbuck reported for his orders. "I don't have any orders," the Colonel said as he finished searching among his disordered papers. "None for you, anyway. Who do you say you are?"

"Starbuck, sir, Special Battalion."

"Special?" the Colonel, who had introduced himself to Starbuck, but so quickly that Starbuck had never caught his name, sounded surprised. "Special," he said again in a puzzled tone, then he remembered. "You're the Yellowlegs!" He shuddered slightly, as though Starbuck might be contagious. "Then I do have orders for you, indeed I do. But aren't you called Maitland?"

"Starbuck, sir."

"Orders are addressed to Maitland," the Colonel said, feverishly searching again among the papers on the shop's counter. All the doors and windows were propped open, but the ventilation scarcely alleviated the day's oppressive heat. The Colonel was sweating as he searched. "Is Maitland coming?" he asked.

"I replaced Maitland," Starbuck said patiently.

"Someone has to get the short straw, I suppose," the Colonel said. "Can't say I envy you. It's bad enough taking willing men to war, let alone a bunch of skulkers. How many did you lose between here and Strasburg?"

"Not one."

"No?" The Colonel drew the word out to show his incredulity.

"I marched at the back," Starbuck said, and touched the Adams revolver at his side.

"Quite right, quite right," the Colonel said and went back to his search.

Starbuck had shaded the truth. Some men had dropped out, and those men he had collected and forced back onto the road, though by the time they had finished the short march the stragglers were near beat and had feet with blisters so bad that blood was seeping out of the ill-sewn shoes they had been issued at Camp Lee. Most of the shoes, Starbuck guessed, would not last a week, which meant they would need to take some off the Yankees. Other men had fallen out of the column with diarrhea, yet despite their sickness and frail feet, all the men were now present in Winchester, but still the march had been a bad augury. The battalion was simply unfit.

"You know what's happening here?" the Colonel asked.

"No, sir."

"We're about to throttle the Yankees out of Harper's Ferry. After that, God only knows. You need ammunition?"

"Yes, sir."

"We do have that, but no wagons." The Colonel scribbled on a chit of paper that he gave to Starbuck. "Authorization to draw cartridges. You'll find them stored in a barn at the top end of Main Street, but if you ain't got a wagon, Major, you'll be hard put to carry a proper supply, and I can't find you a wagon." He gave Starbuck another piece of paper. "That's a War Department form entitling a civilian to be paid for any wagon you commandeer, but I doubt you'll find one. Too many other regiments have plowed this town. Ah, and you should go to the Taylor Hotel, Major."

"Taylor Hotel?"

"Down the street, just a few steps. Place with a big porch and not much paint. Not much left to eat there either, but it's still the most comfortable place in town. Your fellow's waiting there."

Starbuck, completely confused, shook his head. "My fellow?"

"Officer! Didn't you know? Fellow called Captain Tumlin. A good one, too! First-class fellow. Got captured at New Orleans and has been in Yankee jails ever since, but he managed to escape and reach our lines. Capital fellow! Richmond assigned him to your battalion for the duration of the campaign, so I kept him here. Seemed pointless to send him all the way to Richmond while you were coming here. He's even got some men for you! Skulkers and coffee-chasers, of course, every last one of them, but you must be used to that kind of scum. I shall be sorry to lose Billy Tumlin. He's an amusing fellow, capital company. Here we are." He found Starbuck's orders and tossed them up the counter. "I hope to God you're not staying in the town," he added anxiously. "I'm hard put to feed the men I've got without feeding more."

Starbuck slit open the orders and scanned them. He smiled, cracking the sweaty dust that was caked onto his face. "Good," he said, then, in response to the Colonel's raised eyebrow, explained his pleasure. "We're assigned to Swynyard's Brigade."

The name meant nothing to the Colonel. "You're leaving today, I trust?" the Colonel inquired anxiously.

"We're either to wait here or at Ch
arlestown, which
ever's convenient, for more orders."

"You'll want to be in Charlestown then," the Colonel said emphatically. "That's a very pleasant town. A long day's march from here, but you'll have to make it sooner or later."

"We will?"

"You will if you're going north. Charlestown is just this side of Harper's Ferry. Get there early, Major, and you'll have first pick of the bivouacs before the rest of the army arrives. And first pick of the girls. If there are any girls left, of course, which there might not be. Place has been picked over by both sides, but it's still very fair, very fair." "Any Yankees there?"

The Colonel pursed his lips and shrugged. "Maybe a few. Doubtless the Harper's Ferry garrison scavenge for corn thereabouts."

In other words, Starbuck thought, the very pleasant Charlestown was Yankee-haunted, stripped clean of supplies, and half deserted. "We'll march this morning,"
Starbuck
said, much to the Colonel's relief. "You can give us someone to show us the way out of town?"

"No need, my dear fellow. Straight up the road. Straight up. Can't miss your way."

Starbuck pocketed the orders and went out to the sidewalk and called Potter to him. "You're a rogue, Potter."

"Yes, sir."

"So be a rogue now and find a wagon. Any wagon. You're allowed to commandeer civilian vehicles, but you must sign for it so the owner can get reimbursement from Richmond, understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then you collect ammunition and follow us north. Take a dozen of your men to load and haul." He gave Potter the two pieces of paper. "Lucifer!"

"Major?" The boy ran up to Starbuck.

"Captain Potter is on a looting expedition, and you're good at that so you can help him. I want a wagon, anything on wheels that we can fill with cartridges. If the townspeople see soldiers combing the streets they'll hide anything valuable, but they won't notice you, so go and spy on them."

"Yes, Major," Lucifer grinned and ran off.

"Dennison!" Starbuck shouted. Dennison was the senior captain and thus, whether Starbuck liked it or not, the second in command of the battalion. "Get 'em up, get 'em moving," Starbuck said. "Straight up the road. Just keep going and I'll catch up with you." There was no point in waiting. The men might be tired, but the more they marched the fitter they would be, and the longer they rested in Winchester the more reluctant they would ever be to leave the town's dubious comforts.

"You staying to enjoy the town, Major?" Dennison asked cattily.

"I'm staying to collect some more men. I'll be ten minutes behind you. Now move."

The men climbed reluctantly to their feet. It was promising to be another day of terrible heat, no day for a march, but Starbuck had no intention of traveling all day. He planned to take a few miles off the journey, then find a field in which the battalion could have an afternoon of rest, then finish the journey in the next day's cool dawn.

He walked down the sidewalk and found the Taylor Hotel, which proved to be three impressive storys of pillared balconies dominating the street. Captain Tumlin's room was on the third floor and, because the Captain was nowhere to be found in the public rooms, Starbuck climbed the wooden stairs and knocked on the room's door.

"Go away," a voice said. Starbuck turned the handle and found the door locked. "And don't come back!" the voice added.

"Tumlin!"

"Go away!" the man called. "I'm at my prayers." A woman giggled. "Tumlin!" Starbuck shouted again. "I'll meet you downstairs. Give me a half hour!" Tumlin answered.

The door's lock splintered at a simple push and Starbuck stepped inside to see a plump, sweating man rolling out of a disordered bed to reach for his holstered revolver. The man checked as he saw Starbuck's uniform. "Who the hell are your' Tumlin asked.

"Your new commanding officer, Billy," Starbuck said, then tipped his hat to the girl who was clawing the grubby sheet to cover her breasts. She was a pretty black girl with a fine head of curls and sad, dark eyes. "Morning, ma'am," Starbuck said, "sure is a hot one."

"You're who?" Billy Blythe asked as he settled back under the sheet.

"Your new commanding officer, Billy," Starbuck said again. He walked to the louvered doors that opened onto the hotel's top balcony and pushed them open. From the balcony he could see the battalion forming its ranks, ready to march away, but the job was being done with pathetic slowness. Dozens of men were resting in the shade of verandahs and the sergeants were doing nothing to stir them. "Sergeant Case!" Starbuck shouted. "Show me how a proper soldier gets a battalion moving. Snap to it! The name's Starbuck," he called over his shoulder to Tumlin, "Major Nathaniel Starbuck."

"Jesus," Billy Blythe said. "You the son of the Reverend Starbuck?"

"Sure am. That worry you?"

"Hell, no," Billy Blythe said. "Just seems strange, you being a Yankee and all."

"No stranger than a man being in bed on a fine morning when there are Yankees to be killed," Starbuck said cheer-fully. The street beneath him was at last showing some signs of vigor, so he turned back into the room. "Now get the hell up, Billy. I hear you've got some men for me. Where are they?"

Billy Blythe flapped a hand. "In camp, Major."

"Then get your boots on, Billy, and let's go fetch them.

You know where I might find a wagon in this town?"

"Lucky if you can find a wheelbarrow," Tumlin said. "Hell, there ain't nothing here but bad soldiers and good women." He slapped the black girl's rump.

Starbuck saw some cigars on the washstand and helped himself to one. "You don't mind?"

"Hell, no, help yourself," Billy Blythe said. "There's a flint and steel on the mantel." He waited until Starbuck's back was turned, then swung himself out from under the yellowing bedsheet.

Starbuck turned. "Billy," he said reprovingly. "You go to bed dressed?" The pinkly naked Tumlin had a pouch belted round his stomach. "That's no way to treat a lady," Starbuck added.

"Just keeping it safe, Major," Tumlin said, scrambling into a pair of long underpants. He blushed, felt in the pouch, and took out two silver coins. "You'll forgive me, Major?" he asked and tossed the coins onto the bed. "Sorry about the interruption, honey."

The girl snatched the money as Starbuck lowered himself into a cane chair and put his dusty boots up on the washstand. "You were in a Yankee jail, I hear?" he asked Tumlin.

"Most of this year," Blythe said.

"They fed you well," Starbuck said as Tumlin buttoned a shirt round his plump belly, which was distended by the money pouch.

"I was four times this size when I got took," Blythe said.

"Where were you held?" Starbuck asked.

"Union, Massachusetts."

"Union?" Starbuck asked. "Where the hell's Union?"

"Out west," Blythe said. He had met Starbuck's father and knew the family came from Boston, so placing his mythical town of Union in the west of the state seemed a safe bet.

"In the Berkshires?" Starbuck asked.

"I guess," Blythe said, sitting on the bed to tug on his boots. "What are they? Hills? Not that we saw any hills, Major. Just big walls."