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By Root 355 0

No two things on earth are equal or have an equal chance, not a leaf nor a tree. There’s many a man worse than me, and some better, but I don’t think race or country matters a damn. What matters is justice. ’Tis why I’m here. I’ll be treated as I deserve, not as my father deserved. I’m Kilrain, and I God damn all gentlemen. I don’t know who me father was and I don’t give a damn. There’s only one aristocracy, and that’s right here—” he tapped his white skull with a thick finger “—and you, Colonel laddie, are a member of it and don’t even know it. You are damned good at everything I’ve seen you do, a lovely soldier, an honest man, and you got a good heart on you too, which is rare in clever men. Strange thing, I’m not a clever man meself, but I know it when I run across it. The strange and marvelous thing about you, Colonel darlin’, is that you believe in mankind, even preachers, whereas when you’ve got my great experience of the world you will have learned that good men are rare, much rarer than you think. Ah—” he raised his hands, smiling “—don’t you worry about ministers. The more you kill, the more you do the world a service.” He chuckled, rubbing his face. His nose was fat and soft, rippling under his fingers.

Chamberlain said, “What has been done to the black is a terrible thing.”

“True. From any point of view. But your freed black will turn out no better than many the white that’s fighting to free him. The point is that we have a country here where the past cannot keep a good man in chains, and that’s the nature of the war. It’s the aristocracy I’m after. All that lovely, plumed, stinking chivalry. The people who look at you like a piece of filth, a cockroach, ah.” His face twitched to stark bitterness. “I tell you, Colonel, we got to win this war.” He brooded. “What will happen, do you think, if we lose? Do you think the country will ever get back together again?”

“Doubt it. Wound is too deep. The differences … If they win there’ll be two countries, like France and Germany in Europe, and the border will be armed. Then there’ll be a third country in the West, and that one will be the balance of power.”

Kilrain sat moodily munching on a blade of grass. More cannon thumped; the dull sound rolled among the hills. Kilrain said, “They used to have signs on tavern doors: Dogs and Irishmen keep out. You ever see them signs, Colonel?”

Chamberlain nodded.

“They burned a Catholic church up your way not long ago. With some nuns in it.”

“Yes.”

“There was a divine spark.”

Chamberlain grinned, shook his head. Kilrain turned away. Chamberlain sat for a while silently and then took out a copy of Harper’s Weekly he’d carried up with him and began to look through it. There was an article by a general from Argentina concerning the use of Negro troops. He said that they fought very well, with training.

Chamberlain’s nose wrinkled. The world around him grew silent; there was something in the air. The odor of dead meat came down on the wind, drifting through the trees. Soft and sour, the smell of distant death. It passed like an invisible cloud. Kilrain said, “Make you a little wager, Colonel. We’ll sit here all day and in the evening we’ll march away again.” He lay back. “So I might’s well get some rest.”

Chamberlain moved back against a tree. He was not tired. He closed his eyes, saw a sudden shocking memory of death, torn flaps of skin, the black rotted meat of muscle.

Kilrain said sleepily, “I bet nothing happens today.”

But Chamberlain knew. He was certain. He looked toward the odor of death. Still early in the day. Long time until nightfall. They’ll come. He could not relax. But what if it is you who are wrong? But I am not wrong. Thank God for that. If I were an officer for them, on the other side, what would I be feeling now?

The cannon had stilled. The old soldier was popping corn: pop pop poppity pop.

Chamberlain put down the paper, folded his arms. Waited.

3.

LONGSTREET

They had taken a door from its hinges at the Thompson house and placed it across fence rails to serve as a map table. Lee stood above