The Architecture of the Arkansas Ozarks - Donald Harington [79]
Isaac felt a sting in his shoulder, and swatted at it. His swat touched cold steel and he turned to see that it was the bayonet of one of the soldier-guards.
“Just what do you think you’re doing?” the guard demanded.
Even if Isaac hadn’t been the most taciturn of all the Ingledews, he wouldn’t have known what to say.
They took him off and locked him up. The other prisoners were Rebel soldiers from south Arkansas, and Isaac didn’t like the way they talked or the things they said, but there wasn’t much he could do about it because they outnumbered him by dozens. He could have avoided prison if he had tried to persuade the soldiers that he was the governor’s son, but he didn’t want to embarrass the governor, and already he was himself deeply embarrassed if not mortified to have discovered that his father had a sweetheart. So that was the reason nobody in Stay More had been told that he was the governor! Isaac decided just to keep his mouth shut, an easy decision for him since he rarely opened it except to eat and cuss, and when he got out of prison he would just go on back home to Stay More and keep his mouth shut there too and be nice to his mother and never tell her.
But he didn’t get out of prison. Early the following morning he was taken before a military court and tried as a Confederate spy. He gave his name as “John Johnson.” The guard who had captured him went on the stand to testify. Then Isaac went on the stand, and the prosecutor asked him what he was doing looking in the window of the governor’s mansion. Isaac replied, “Nothing.” The prosecutor with much sarcasm speculated about several facetious motives that John Johnson might have had, then declared what the true motive was: that John Johnson was spying upon the governor. “Do you deny it?” the prosecutor demanded. No, Isaac admitted. “Then what was the motive of your spying? Did you intend to assassinate the governor?” Here the prosecutor held up Exhibit A: Isaac’s pistol. “Naw,” Isaac said. The prosecutor tried for several hours, with one brief recess, to find out John Johnson’s motive, and finally made a speech to the officers of the tribunal in which the motive was claimed to be assassination. The officers agreed, and sentenced Isaac to hang at dawn of the following day. Back in his cell, awaiting his end, Isaac tried to feel sorry for himself, but that was an emotion to which he was a stranger.
At dawn he was taken out to a public gallows, riding to it atop his own coffin, staring coolly at the spectators who were jeering him. The gallows was surrounded by troops; he couldn’t run away if he wanted to. He was hustled up the steps to the gallows, and the noose was thrown like a lariat over his head, then tightened. The provost-marshal prepared a blindfold, but waited. He waited a long time, holding the blindfold.
Bored, Isaac demanded, “What’re ye waitin fer?”
“The governor,” the man replied. “He aint et his breakfast yet.”
“Tie on the #@%*&#@* blindfold!” Isaac insisted.
“Not till the governor gets a look at your traitorous mug.”
Another half-hour passed before a carriage finally arrived with the governor. The governor was ill-humored and complaining about having to leave his coffee and watch spies git hung. Then he looked up at the spy. The spy had his eyes closed. Scared shitless, no doubt, the governor reflected. But then the governor decided he didn’t actually look scared, apart from the closed eyes. He was standing tall and proud, awaiting his dread fate manfully. A big and handsome man. Why did he have his eyes closed? “Tell him to pop open them peepers,” the governor ordered an aide. This command was conveyed to the spy, who obeyed. His eyes were blue. Just like mine, the governor thought, and then he recognized the spy.
“Isaac??” he croaked.
“Howdy, Paw,” Isaac returned mildly.
“What in tarnation air ye a-standin up there for, boy?”
“They’re a-fixin for to hang me, Paw,” Isaac said.
Jacob grabbed the nearest general by the collar and demanded, “What