Ghost Legion, page 19
On Cane Creek, the Loyalists finally ate—green pumpkins and some corn. Guards tossed in the food, cackling like hens, calling out at the prisoners as they would while luring hogs in to eat. Brodie ignored those taunts, and no one seemed to care, not even Captain DePeyster. For the Loyalists, this was a feast. They ate with relish until hearing news that at Fort Ninety-Six, just a few days earlier, eleven Whigs had been hanged.
Soon, Brodie heard the guards talking, could see the hatred returning to their eyes, smell their lust for revenge.
The next day, they covered four or five miles, arriving at Bickerstaff’s Old Fields, better known as the Red Chimneys. Before the insurrection, it had been another thriving plantation. Now the barns and houses lay crumbling, the main building nothing but charred timbers and red chimneys that rose from the ruins like tombstones. A couple of cabins had recently been erected on the property, ramshackle buildings really, just enough shelter from wind and rain. Campbell, Shelby, and Sevier claimed the larger of the cabins, while the second was turned into a ward for wounded officers. After stacking the weapons one more time, the Loyalists, as usual, were marched into the remnants of a large corral.
In the bullpen, Brodie watched the commotion. The number of guards had been doubled, and ropes with hangman’s nooses were soon tossed over the huge limb of a stout oak. Rebel soldiers and civilians, some women, paraded past the prisoners, pointing at a few, whispering. Whig officers took notes and nodded secretly. A handful of words reached Brodie’s ears: house-burners—trial—Buford—horse thief—assassin—magistrates.
“So this is where it ends,” he said softly, and waited.
* * * * *
The colonels had relinquished their cabin, turned it into some court of law. Brigands law, Brodie thought as they ushered him inside, hands tied behind his back. A fat captain explained the proceedings to him as he stood facing a jury of twelve traitors, fiends who had risen against King George, men who had killed his brother, cowards who had the gall to try him for crimes against North Carolina.
According to colony law, two magistrates could summon a jury, conduct a trial, and, if needed, execute convicted offenders. Cloaked under legality, these snakes in the grass would be free to kill their enemies. The magistrates, now wearing powdered wigs, had fought at King’s Mountain along with the jurors, all officers, some of them showing wounds they had sustained in the battle.
“A mockery,” Brodie whispered.
Never had he witnessed a trial, let alone been tried, but his father had told him of what he had seen back in England. Poor wretches being hurried into a court, dazed, petrified. Often, before they even realized what was happening, they had been tried, convicted, and sentenced.
The magistrate named Cleveland, a rebel colonel, informed Brodie that he had been charged with breaking open two score houses, which were then burned, of leaving defenseless women and children homeless, of killing men and boys in the most ruthless, cold-blooded fashion.
“I have done no such,” Brodie said. “I have fought honorably, to avenge my brother you Patriots flogged, brutalized, and hanged.”
“Then you deny that you rode with Bloody Bill Cunningham?” A man leaped from his seat, pointing a gnarled finger at Brodie. “You were there, damn you, on the Pacolet River!”
Colonel Cleveland demanded order, and, as if somehow detached from his body, Brodie observed the cabin as a young ensign escorted a frail woman to the front. Although she looked ancient, Brodie understood that she must be in her early thirties. A second later, he remembered her so vividly, pictured her again, sobbing in front of Bloody Bill’s Legionnaires at that farm, the dog wailing near the well, begging for the butcher to spare the lives of her two young sons caught manufacturing ammunition for the rebellion. When interrogated by Cunningham, she had said the pewter balls were for hunting, a lie. This time she admitted that the balls would have been given to the boys’ father, her husband, a gallant sergeant who rode for liberty with Elijah Clarke. “Had ridden,” she corrected herself, weeping harder. He had been among those prisoners hanged at Ninety-Six.
“Now I have no one,” she cried. She revealed the scar on her throat, the mark of a bayonet, and barely made it through her account as she told the assembly how Cunningham’s Legionnaires had raided their farm, knocked her out, and left every building burning. They had stolen the horses, slaughtered her pigs, even killed the dog, then poisoned the well. She had had to bury her two boys, chopped beyond recognition, with her own hands.
“The darky was with them,” the woman said feebly.
Brodie could not deny it. He had been there, had watched the butchery, had not tried to stop it, although he had saved another woman’s life, had almost beaten Lieutenant Abel Hart to death later on Brush Creek. Cunningham would have killed Brodie then if Major Ferguson had not arrived. Maybe that would have been a better end for Stuart Brodie.
The jury found him guilty, and Magistrate Colonel Benjamin Cleveland sentenced him to hang. “‘For they sow the wind,’” Cleveland said, quoting Hosea just as Brodie had back on the Pacolet, “‘and they shall reap the whirlwind.’”
* * * * *
Bound for the cord. Of the thirty-six Loyalists tried by this mock jury of rebel trash, only four had been acquitted. Midnight had passed by the time the magistrates passed the last death sentence, and the wind sighed as hundreds of Whigs escorted the convicted to that large oak tree. One man tried to break free, only to be clubbed down by the throng, four or five deep, singing, chanting, waving pine-knot torches. Two Loyalists helped the man to his feet.
“Bear up, old man,” one said. “Do not give these brigands the satisfaction. We are men. They are animals.”
They stopped a few rods from the oak, listening as a rebel preacher said—screamed, to be precise—a few words about the fire of Hades, the candle of the wicked, God’s mighty arm and freedom.
“Three at a time,” an officer ordered, and the first row of condemned men were led forward. Hands bound behind their backs, they were helped onto wobbling chairs and offered blindfolds.
“I shall prefer to watch you cowards,” said Colonel Ambrose Mills, shaking his head, “so that I might recognize your faces when I see you in the pit.”
A handful of Loyalists cheered their colonel, despite the knowledge that they would join him shortly. Those hurrahs fell silent when the chairs were kicked from underneath the three men. Captains James Chitwood and Walker Gilkey died instantly. Colonel Mills was not so lucky, and dangled helplessly, kicking savagely for minutes before giving a final shudder, then soiling himself.
Moments later, three more stepped forward.
“Damned efficient,” the man standing beside Brodie said softly. He kept his head up, stiff, but tears welled in his eyes, his Adam’s apple bobbed, and beads of sweat, reflecting eerie light from the torches, rolled down his forehead.
“Come on, ye sons-of-bitches,” one of the savages demanded, “take ye medicine!”
Within seconds, the number of bodies stretching from the oak had doubled.
“Next three!”
The hangmen moved rapidly. Now, nine men hanged from the limb. The killers would soon be out of room, would have to move their gallows to another limb, mayhap even another tree.
Laughing, a man in buckskins pushed a limp foot dangling from the tree with his rifle butt. “Would to God every tree in the wilderness bore such fruit as that!” he said.
“Amen,” another blackheart agreed with a chuckle.
“Next three prisoners, step forward!”
In unison, Brodie, the sweating man, and a third Loyalist took their places underneath the oak. Two men lifted Brodie onto the seat of the dirty chair. The body of Augustine Hobbs brushed against Brodie, and he trembled uncontrollably at the savage light reflecting in the dead man’s bulging eyes. He regained control, would not let these murderers recognize his fear. Brodie steadied himself.
So be it, Brodie thought as a white-haired, tall outlaw called Folson tightened the noose around his neck. Finis.
Chapter Twenty-Three
In the cabin, she bathed in a copper tub, a canvas partition separating her from the makeshift hospital, scrubbing herself furiously, a woman possessed, trying to remove all the dirt and grime, gentle only around the gash in her hand, which had been stitched up at King’s Mountain by the Tory surgeon, and the scar across her ribs. The sight of the latter wound, healing but puffy, raw, and rugged, shocked her, but not as much as the filthy water when she finally climbed out of the tub.
As muddy as the Catawba River during spring run-off.
After toweling herself off, Marty looked at the wardrobe. Colonel Sevier had brought it in last night, a gift for Lieutenant O’Keeffe, he said, to present to that lady friend he had been talking so much about in his sleep. The clothes had been found with Ferguson’s traps. “Your share of the spoils,” Sevier had told O’Keeffe with a smile. “Your lady fair will be one much admired, Mister O’Keeffe, so you had better heal quickly to fend off all her suitors.”
O’Keeffe had smiled weakly, and, after the colonel had left, he had asked Marty if she would put on the clothes so that he might see how truly beautiful she was. Marty had blushed. No one had ever called her beautiful. She certainly didn’t feel pretty.
Now, she looked at the clothes. She put another strip of bandage across her side, then slipped on the linen smock. The petticoat and chemise were quite ornate, laced, delicate. Marty had never seen such clothing, couldn’t remember the last time she had worn a dress. Have I ever worn a dress?
The skirt was billowing, the bodice beautiful, but the shoes wouldn’t fit. Leather things would pinch her too much anyway, so she pulled on her moccasins, and laughed in spite of herself. A fancy outfit, probably the rage in London or Charles Town, and deerskin moccasins. Don’t I look proper. She combed the tangles out of her hair—tried to, that is—and peered around the curtain.
The last officer to remain in the cabin, Flint O’Keeffe lay on a cot. Others had healed enough that they were sent home. One had died.
Although she wondered how she looked, Marty felt too afraid to find a mirror. Cautiously she stepped behind the curtain and went to O’Keeffe’s bedside, praying no one would enter until after she had put on her smelly hunting frock and breeches. Late as it was, dark as it was, and with the trials proceeding at the other cabin, Marty didn’t worry too much about any intrusion. She gripped O’Keeffe’s pallid hand, and his eyes slowly opened. Biting her lip, Marty tried not to cry.
At the Cowpens, O’Keeffe had been improving. He even had gotten off the litter unassisted, walked around for a couple of minutes, proclaimed that he was on the mend. Marty knew better, although she wanted to believe. The ball remained in his kidney, and, by the following morning, fever racked him. He couldn’t keep any food down, not even water. A Sullivan County man named Welchel, who said he had doctored many a man, had made a poultice for the wound and forced a smelly broth down O’Keeffe’s throat, which he promptly threw up. Another self-anointed healer later suggested that they bleed the poison out of the lieutenant’s body with leeches, but Marty had never held with such notions. Desperate, though, she had relented, and the Wilkes County man attached the leeches. O’Keeffe had grown weaker, however, so she had halted the treatment, hoping they would find a doctor—a real doctor—in Gilbert Town.
The closest they could find, though, was a midwife named Mrs. Cash. “There is nothing to be done,” she had told Marty. “He is in God’s hands.”
He had slept fitfully the past couple of nights, and, when he had been able to talk, Marty had heard death’s rattle in his throat. Finally he had slipped into a deep sleep. Marty wasn’t sure he would wake up.
Yet he did, eyes adjusting to the candle-lit room, and he spoke in a hoarse, barely audible voice. “Why, Martha Anne McKidrict, you are fetching.”
She shook her head.
“I wonder,” O’Keeffe said, “why Ferguson. . . ?”
Placing her fingers on his lips, she told him to save his strength, not to talk. She remembered the red-headed woman, shot in the head, remembered the Negro prisoner saying that they should bury her with Major Ferguson. She knew why Ferguson had carried this wardrobe. She knew whose clothes she was wearing. They were too big for her, really, but felt so comfortable, not as itchy, not as filthy as what she had been wearing for so long. Her breasts seemed to appreciate no longer being strapped down to hide her sex.
He tried to lift his hand, but couldn’t, so Marty helped him, guided the hand into her wet hair. O’Keeffe stroked, but the very effort left him exhausted.
“You are beautiful,” he whispered.
“I am no such. . . .”
“Find a looking-glass, please,” he said. “I want you to see yourself. See yourself for the first time.”
Reluctantly Marty rose, remembering one of those fancy ladies mirrors that had been left on a corner table. She grabbed a candle, crossed the room, found the mirror, but didn’t have the courage to look at herself. Mirror in hand, she was crossing the hard-packed dirt floor again when Teever Barnes burst through the door.
“Hey, Lieutenant!” Barnes yelled. “We are about to hang that darky! The one that shot you. Hanging the lot. You shall be avenged. . . .”
She had not seen Barnes much since the battle. The last time she had really noticed him had been on the mountainside, when he had been cradling his dead Tory brother in his arms, bawling like a newborn calf. Barnes must have blocked out that memory, for now he was his old, revengeful, repulsive self.
At the sound of breaking glass, he spun, his eyes widening, face paling, as if he had seen a ghost. He stared at Marty, uncomprehending, began to stutter as he backed away, then whirled around, and knocked Edward Lacey off his feet as the colonel crossed the threshold. Barnes tripped himself, skinning his knees, but bounced back to his feet and ran scrambling into the night, yelling something lost amid the cacophony of voices from outside the other cabin.
Dusting himself off, Edward Lacey rose, cursing the fleeing Barnes for his clumsiness. A second later, he saw Marty from the corner of his eye, checked his tirade, and quickly removed his cocked hat, apologizing for his offensive language. Lacey bowed, looked up again, and dropped his hat.
From his bed, Flint O’Keeffe let out a weak laugh.
Marty ignored the colonel. She had dropped the mirror when Barnes startled her, smashing the glass. O’Keeffe’s laugh died suddenly, and the sound of voices outside rose, angry shouts, and the words of Teever Barnes must have finally registered, for O’Keeffe tried to lift himself off the cot, only to fall back with a groan.
She knelt beside him, wiping perspiration off his face.
“How many?” he asked, his voice suddenly strong. “How many are they hanging?”
Marty bowed her head. I don’t know, she mouthed, unable to speak. Tears stained her cheeks.
Lacey stood at the foot of the bed. O’Keeffe redirected his question.
“More than thirty,” Lacey answered. “But this was done by jury and magistrates. A legal proceeding.”
“You must stop this,” O’Keeffe said.
Lacey shook his head. “There is nothing that can be done. The man of color was not charged with shooting you, Flint, but of riding with William Cunningham’s cut-throats. That is why he shall hang.”
“No!” O’Keeffe clenched both fists.
“Flint. . .,” Marty began.
“Damnation!” he roared. “Why are we fighting, Marty? Is this what liberty means? This is murder. Murder in the dead of night. We are no better than Tarleton or Gibbs if this is allowed. . . .” He sank deep into the cot, too weak to continue, and drifted back to sleep.
“It is too late,” Lacey said, although O’Keeffe could not hear him.
“No.”
Marty didn’t realize she had spoken, but suddenly she stood. Her gaze caught Lacey’s eyes momentarily, then she lifted the hems of her skirt and raced outside. For the second time, she ran to save this Negro, although she knew it was more than just him. O’Keeffe was right. Hanging men like this, guilty or not, under the cloak of midnight—this was not justice, not the act of Patriots. If she allowed this to happen, if the Whigs allowed this, they would be despoilers—as evil as Seb McKidrict.
She pushed her way through the crowd, shouting to be heard above the rough voices. A torch singed her, and she smelled the stench of burned hair.
“By God,” someone said at last. “This is a woman!”
They had lifted the Negro and two other men onto chairs, and Marty gasped at the sight of the nine others, nine men she was too late to save.
“Stop this!” she yelled, but a rough hand threw her on the ground. Marty looked up. Ryan Folson’s eyes blazed in the firelight. He lifted a hand as if to strike her, then the arm fell at his side.
“It’s. . . .” He peered closer. “My . . . McKidrict?”
She pulled herself up. “Are we butchers?” she demanded. “Let these men go!”
“They have been convicted, you damned harlot!” someone shouted from the crowd. “They are Tory sons-of-bitches . . . ravishers . . . barn-burners . . . murderers . . . the scourge of God!”
In the distance, thunder rolled. The breeze picked up.
“By Jupiter, that is Marty McKidrict! He’s a woman!”
“McKidrict! It cannot . . . thunderation, it is!”
“Nine men have been hanged,” Marty said. “Is that not enough of a warning? Flint O’Keeffe lays in that cabin yonder, dying, and it is his request that these lives be spared. It. . . .”
“This nigger is the one that mortally wounded Lieutenant O’Keeffe!”
Her lips trembled as she tried to think of something to say. “Has not there been enough killing?” she asked timidly. “Are we . . . should not we be the ones that cherish life, even the lives of our enemies? Are . . . are we no better than Tarleton? That’s what Flint O’Keeffe wonders. . . . That’s. . . .”
