Devil's Dream - Madison Smartt Bell [81]
“Got holt of yore penstaff?” he asked Anderson. “Good, set this down. You lowdown bellycrawlen horsethieven niggerstealen passel of murderen rapen renegades have got your sorry ass in a slipknot now! I’d as lief kill ever man in the place, contraband niggers and bushwhackers too, and if ye ain’t got the good sense to give up and quit I will damn well do it and do it barehanded for I don’t mean to waste no more powder on ye!”
“Yes sir.” Anderson held his paper to the light. “Let me just read that back.”
Headquarters, Forrest’s Cavalry
Before Fort Pillow, April 12, 1864
Major Booth, Commanding United States Forces, Fort Pillow
Here Anderson paused to clear his throat, while Henri’s mouth opened like the mouth of a fish; he had to make a conscious effort to close it. In the course of the morning he had seen Major Booth arrive in the land of the Old Ones, struck in the heart by a long lucky shot, while inspecting the inner fort’s batteries.
Major, — the conduct of the officers and men garrisoning Fort Pillow has been such as to entitle them to being treated as prisoners of war. I demand the unconditional surrender of this garrison, promising that you shall be treated as prisoners of war. My men have received a fresh supply of ammunition and from their present position can easily assault and capture the fort. Should my offer be refused, I cannot be responsible for the fate of your command.
N. B. Forrest
Major General Commanding
“Close enough, I reckon,” Forrest said as Anderson folded the letter. He reached into his watch pocket but instead of the watch he produced the drilled coin on its leather thong, which he looked at for a moment before raising his eyes to Captain Goodman.
“Well, git ye a white rag and carry that note on over,” he said.
Goodman saluted and reached for the paper. Forrest put the coin back into his pocket. “Henry,” he said.
Henri, who had just stretched out on the green springy earth, raised up on onto his elbows.
“I want ye to go too,” Forrest said.
Why, Henri thought, but there was no telling.
They rode up along the top of the ridge south of the inner fort’s horseshoe, bearing a borrowed white shirt raised on a musket barrel. At the sight of the truce flag the guns all fell silent; to fill that vacuum, Henri’s ears began to ring. From the height they had reached he could see well enough that Forrest was really not bluffing this time. The ammunition wagons had in fact arrived from Brownsville long before. McCulloch, from the position he’d taken among the cabins of the cove, had completely silenced three cannon of the fort and the others were much troubled by sharpshooters Forrest had moved up from the hills to the east. There was more than one Federal boat on the river, but Anderson was just now marching three companies into trenches dug at the foot of the bluff, to forestall any attempt at a landing. On the north side of the fort, Henri could just make out Nolan’s buckskin jacket creeping forward through the ravine beside Coal Creek. A couple of his raiders were visible crawling along after him and all his men were probably there somewhere. It was Nolan who had shown Forrest this weak spot and got his leave to be first to exploit it. Henri couldn’t quite fix on what about this situation troubled him so.
With the cease-fire, the heads of black soldiers had begun to pop up above the parapet. Soon enough they got the confidence to show all of themselves, and the parapet was lined with them like birds alit on a rail. They looked very well in their blue uniforms, which mostly had not yet seen hard use. A half-dozen or so stood easily, their arms at parade rest almost, looking at Henri with a calm curiosity. He could feel the force that was latent in them. Where were you in 1859? he thought. Or the year after that. Or the year after that. They were here now, anyway. He thought suddenly that Forrest might have attached him to this party so that he could