Issue 3: "Life During Wartime"

It took Wainwright a few days to adjust to the idea, but after a lengthy talk with both Hex and Cassie -- on separate occasions, so as to get an unclouded view of their feelings -- he realized that what they had together truly went beyond youthful lust, and that keeping them apart would be nearly impossible. So he consented to their relationship, under one condition: that Jonah make her an honest woman as soon as possible. Neither of them objected to that in the slightest way, and immediately began to make plans for the wedding, starting with Cassie writing to her cousin Jeb in Virginia -- she insisted on being married in her mother's bridal dress, and wanted her family back home to send it to her. Such things didn't matter one bit to Jonah, he was just happy that he didn't have to hide his affections anymore.

Spring drew near, and the two of them were acting as husband and wife in all but name. Jonah slept very little in the scouts' barracks, spending his nights in the company of his beloved instead, usually all the way up 'til morning reveille. The colonel wasn’t too pleased with that, but Jonah couldn’t help himself -- after so many years of heartache, he couldn’t get over the fact that he had a girl as wonderful as Cassie, and he never wanted to leave her side.

Early one morning, he awoke in her bed to find her already up and dressed for the day. “Whut's all this about, sugar?" he asked with a yawn. "Sun ain't even all the way up yet.”

“Captain Shelly’s heading into Portersville to collect the payroll." She primped her hair in the mirror. "I asked him yesterday if I could come along to see if my dress arrived yet."

Jonah rolled his eyes -- it had been nearly two months since Cassie wrote the letter. “Tuh Hell with thet dress already," he said and hopped out of bed himself, coming up behind her and wrapping his arms around her waist -- they made an odd pairing, he in his longjohns and she with her petticoats. "Ah say yuh forget all thet fuss an’ head on down the aisle naked, whut yuh think ‘bout thet?”

She gasped, her eyes fixed on their mutual reflection in the mirror, but she was smiling. “You’re awful!” she told him.

"Next thing yuh know, yo're gonna tell me Ah'll have tuh take a bath aforehand, too," he continued. "Bad enough yuh talked me into cuttin' muh hair..."

"You look good with short hair." To emphasize, Cassie reached up and ran her fingers through his newly-shorn locks, now just long enough to cover the back of his neck.

Jonah gazed upon his image in the glass and mused, "Maybe Ah do...or maybe yo're just tryin' tuh civilize me." He turned her around to face him, smiling himself now. "Yuh wouldn't go an' do a durn fool thing like thet tuh me, would yuh, little girl?"

"Never." She gave him a kiss, and he did her one better by picking her up and giving her a whirl around the room. "Stop it!" she squealed. "They're going to leave without me!"

Jonah did as she asked and let her finish getting ready, but not before getting another kiss out of her. He got dressed himself, and accompanied Cassie as she went to meet the captain, who was already saddled up and ready to go along with three other soldiers. Two of Hex's fellow scouts, Croy and Barstow, were waiting on horseback as well, and Daniels was in the driver's seat of the supply wagon, reins in hand. "M-Miss Wainwright...I didn't know you was taggin' along today," the man stuttered as Jonah helped her onto the wagon.

"You don't mind a little company, do you?" she asked Daniels, smoothing out her skirt.

"No...no ma'am, I don't, but..." His eyes darted over to Croy and Barstow.

"Yuh just keep in mind thet it's only temporary company," Jonah added, "an' thet Ah expect y'all tuh remember who put thet there ring on her finger." He then turned to Cassie and said in a much gentler voice, "Yuh be careful now, sugar. If'n there's any trouble, yuh listen close tuh whutever these boys tell yuh."

"You know I will, Jonah. Do you want me to check with the postmaster and see if Windy sent you another letter yet?"

"Thet'd be fine." His mentor Windy Taylor had left Fort Andrews a few weeks before Christmas -- he'd received word that his wife Bess had become gravely ill, and had taken off for home almost immediately. From the notes Windy had sent Hex so far, it looked like he wouldn't be returning to the fort any time soon. A couple years ago, Jonah would have shown more concern over that, but now that Cassie was in his life, the majority of his thoughts were on her.

Colonel Wainwright stood beside Captain Shelly's mount, saying, "Make sure you don't dawdle too long in town. These men have been waiting over three months for their wages, and are mighty eager to finally get some coin back in their pockets." Delays in payroll were common in the military, with some soldiers waiting as long as half-a-year for their measly pay.

Shelly nodded, then called out, "All right, men, let's get underway before the whole day's gone." He took the lead in line, the others stationing themselves around the wagon -- Jonah barely had time to steal one last kiss from Cassie before Daniels lurched their ride into motion. Hex took off his hat and used it to wave farewell to his sweetheart as she passed through the gates, though the dust kicked up by the wagon mostly obscured him from her view.

"Well now," the colonel said, sidling up beside him, "with luck, the two of you will be Mister and Missus quite soon." He laid a hand Hex's shoulder. "In which case, I believe you and I should have a bit of a talk, man to man."

"Sir?" Jonah stiffened inside -- he thought Wainwright was all talked out on the matter.

"At ease, son, I'm not going to court-martial you." He began to steer Jonah towards his office. "Tell me: have you ever had genuine Kentucky bourbon?"

"...so Ah rode straight into the Paiute camp, all hell-bent fer leather an' guns blazin', an' Ah managed tuh pull Samson up into the saddle behind me. We lit outta there afore they knew whut hit 'em, an' didn't stop 'til we was back inside Fort Winona." Jonah settled back in his chair, shaking his head. "They'd worked the poor fella over pretty good, but he recovered...though he ended up bein' shy a few digits." The young man waggled his own intact fingers for emphasis.

"With all you've been through, it seems remarkable that you're still around to talk about it." Wainwright picked up the bottle of bourbon and poured a little more into each of their glasses sitting on the desk. They'd gone through more than half the bottle so far while regaling one another with various tales of past experiences. The things Jonah spoke of sometimes left the colonel speechless just due to the sheer brutality of them -- the young man's usual distant, closemouthed behavior suddenly made more sense. "I'm also surprised that those experiences haven't driven you to seek out a...shall we say, more mundane lifestyle."

"If'n yo're implyin' thet Ah look fer trouble, thet certainly ain't the case." He paused to take a drag off his smoke -- in addition to the liquor, Wainwright had offered up a box of fine cigars. "Trouble finds me, fer good or fer ill, an' Ah've learned tuh just roll with it an' hope thet Ah come out on top in the end." A wry smile came to his lips as he said, "Considerin' thet Ah kin look forward tuh spendin' the rest of muh life with Cassie, Ah'd say everything's right as rain lately."

"And that is the crux of why I wanted to speak with you," the older man replied. "What sort of plans do you have in mind for the future?" Jonah simply gave him a puzzled look, so he continued, "Do you think that you can support yourself and Cassie on an Army scout's salary?"

"Tuh be perfectly honest, the thought hadn't crossed muh mind. Reckon scoutin' is all Ah know how tuh do...ain't got the foggiest notion 'bout farmin', so thet's right out..."

Wainwright waved a hand. "I didn't mean that you need a new profession, I meant have you ever considered being more than a scout? A man of your talents could go far in the military."

"Me? In the Army, with a commission an' all thet?" Jonah was sitting bolt upright in his chair, his eyes wide in disbelief. "Hell, Ah never even finished muh schoolin'!"

"That may be so, but you know how to read and write, which means you already have a leg up on the majority of soldiers in this fort alone. Plus you have knowledge of things that can't be taught in any schoolhouse, by which I mean all your years amongst the Apache." He let out a small laugh. "I'm sure you could teach some of the Army's so-called 'experts' a thing or three."

The young man took a drink, mulling it over -- he tried to picture himself clad in Union blue, brass buttons shining in the sun. "This is...this is awful big, sir," he said finally, "Ah reckon Ah might need some time tuh think this through."

"I understand, son. Though I must admit, it would be quite a sight at the wedding: you in uniform and Cassie in her..." He stopped abruptly when he heard a knock at the office door, and Corporal Louis poked his head in, a look of concern on his face.

"Sorry to interrupt, sir," he said, "but Captain Shelly an' the others is long overdue."

Wainwright pulled out his watch and muttered, "Good Lord, have we really been sitting here this long?" He then said to the corporal, "Send the other scouts out to check on them."

"I can't, sir, they've been gone all day, too."

"Well, where the Hell are they?" When Louis professed ignorance, the colonel snapped, "Are you telling me that every damn scout we've got is unaccounted for?"

"Except for Mr. Hex a-sittin' there...yessir, they is."

"This smells rotten," Jonah said, then turned to Wainwright. "Sir, how much money is supposed tuh be in thet payroll we's gettin'?"

"Close to a hundred thousand..." He suddenly grew pale. "You're not suggesting..."

"Ah'm doin' a mite more'n suggestin'," Hex replied, then stood up. "Ah'll admit Ah've been spendin' most of muh off-duty time with Cassie, but lately when Ah've been in the barracks, them boys have seemed a bit cagey...an' yuh all but said it yerself, sir: bein' an Army scout don't pay too well." He moved to the door, pausing only to tell Louis, "Go round up Parker, Hays, an' Randolph. Ah want all four of yuh saddled up an' at the front gate in five minutes."

The corporal stared at the departing scout, then at Wainwright, who barked at him, "You heard the man, now move!" Louis ran out of the office like his ass was on fire.

Hex didn't really want to bring along all those soldiers -- they were merely backup in case his suspicions about the other scouts was true -- the real work of tracking the party and finding where they'd gotten to all fell on him. He'd tracked men before, usually Indians, but never like this. If they'd truly stolen the payroll, then they were now outlaws, with no home camp or territory for him to zero in on. They could head anywhere, in any number, and Cassie...no, he couldn't let those sort of thoughts distract him now. Keeping his eyes glued to the plain before him, Jonah led the soldiers towards Portersville. He found fresh wheel tracks and horse prints leading towards town, but none coming back. When they reached the midpoint, he suddenly saw the return tracks. "Hold up now," he told the others, and dismounted. Jonah walked back the way they'd come about twenty feet, then turned about -- with no true road to follow, the two sets of tracks didn't overlap, but they were close enough for him to compare. "They came this far on the return trip," he explained, "but thet was it. They must've turned around or something." He hunkered down in between the tracks, staring at the muddled message they spelled out -- in his mind, he could see the wagon wheels backing up, the horses trampling the grass, but where...

"South...they done went south!" he called out to the soldiers, then ran to his mount, the other men already riding in the direction he indicated. The group headed up over the rise, and as soon as they gained the high ground, they saw the abandoned wagon. Without any thought of the possible danger, Jonah drove his horse forward as fast as it would go, flying across the open land and not stopping until he saw the first dead soldier. He dismounted and knelt beside the body. The bullet wounds were close-range -- whoever did it was right on top of him.

Randolph was the first to catch up. "I only count four bodies...where's the others?"

"Long gone. They took the money an' horses, then..." Jonah fell silent as he caught sight of something white fluttering in the back of the wagon: Cassie's wedding dress. He walked over and picked it up with numb hands. They took her, too, he thought. The bastards must've...

"There's another one!" Louis shouted. "Looks like...oh, sweet Jesus...Hex..."

He jerked his head up and looked in Louis' direction. Sure enough, there was another body splayed out in the grass. Dropping the dress, he started walking towards it. The corporal tried to stop him, but Jonah shoved him to the ground and he continued on. Someone told him not to look, but he had to make sure, he had to know. His whole body was numb now, save for a hard, clawing sensation in his throat, like something was lodged in there, choking him. He could hear nothing but the pounding of his heart, see nothing but Cassie's form laying face-down before him, a bloom of red between her shoulderblades. Falling to his knees, he reached out and turned her over -- the front of her dress was soaked in blood, a look of shock frozen on her face. His own face twisting into a grimace of pain, Jonah pulled her into his arms, feeling the weight of her body against his, remembering how she felt this morning when he swung her around the bedroom, how warm and alive she was, not cold and still and silent. His breath hissed in and out between his clenched teeth, the choking sensation growing, until finally a scream broke loose from Hex's throat, a tortured howl that didn't even convey a tenth of the agony in his soul.

A few days later, Jonah met with the investigators Quentin Turnbull hired, laying out all the information he'd acquired over the past year, and describing the six men and their habits to help narrow down any future leads. They seemed like competent men to Jonah, but instead of relief, he only felt more guilty -- this was his task, and for over a year, he'd failed miserably at it. Walking away from it and handing it over to someone else just added to the sting. But he wanted to do what was best by Cassie, and the Turnbulls were her proper family. If they thought the matter should be turned over to professionals, then he'd abide by their wishes. He just wished he could have done something more, brought both Cassie's soul and his own some measure of peace.

After speaking with the detectives, Hex decided he should be moving on -- he meant what he said about not being a freeloader, and didn't want to burden these near-strangers with his presence any longer than necessary. Despite this, Jonah found himself dragging his feet when it came to actually departing. He'd make ready for bed each night, thinking of how he should get down to the train station in the morning and check the schedules, then spend the entirety of the next day with Jeb, the two of them touring the Virginia countryside on horseback or sitting in the parlor and reminiscing about Cassie. The latter was difficult for Jonah at first -- the mere thought of her was enough to make him tremble with grief sometimes -- but he soon realized how much the girl’s death had wounded Jeb as well. They had both loved her deeply, though not in the same way, and together they found a small amount of solace in their mutual pain.

Deep down, Hex knew the real reason why he kept putting off his departure: once he crossed the Mississippi again and returned to the West, he'd be alone, even more so than before he met Cassie, and he couldn't bear the thought of that just yet. So he lingered on, days turning into weeks, weeks into months. Fortunately for him, the Turnbulls didn't seem to mind Jonah staying longer than he'd originally planned, and treated him like he truly was part of their family, though Jonah was certainly not used to traveling in the same circles as they did. For three generations, the Turnbulls had made a fine living off tobacco, and was one of the richest families in Virginia because of it. As such, Quentin and his son attended many social events in Richmond where they regularly rubbed elbows with both politicians and other plantation owners. Jonah often found himself being pulled along to these high-society functions, dressed in fancy duds borrowed from Jeb -- the well-worn clothes of a former frontier scout would not do in this setting. No amount of sprucing up, however, could hide the fact that Hex was not of their ilk: all it took was one look at his rough, callused hands to reveal that he was a man who had toiled long and hard at physical labor his entire life, not a member of the idle rich.

As was common at these social gatherings, the subject of politics came up often. Jonah had no interest in such things, but Quentin could talk about it for hours, and as the presidential elections quickly approached, one particular sore point kept surfacing that many of his fellow Southerners agreed upon: if Lincoln and his anti-slavery Republicans took office, there would be Hell to pay. "It's all well and good for those people to sit about and talk of abolition," Turnbull said at one party, a glass of liquor in one hand and his ever-present cane in the other, "for they know that it wouldn't affect them one damn bit. It's quite easy to do away with an institution that you do not participate in yourself...at least not in name. The Republicans make such a noise about how inhumane and degrading the practice of slavery is, yet they turn a blind eye to their own factories in the North, full of Irishmen and other filthy immigrants, toiling away for pennies and living in squalor. We care for our Negroes, see that they're properly clothed and fed, and they let their workers die in the streets! Who is inhumane now?" he asked, daring anyone to oppose him.

The men gathered around him murmured assent, one of them saying, "How do they expect us to make a living if we turn them all loose? Takes thirty Negroes to bring in my crop, plus all the others I've got taking care of my property. They gonna ship down some of them Irish to help out?" A laugh rippled through the group at that.

"I highly doubt it. The consequences of their proposed action matter not to them, just that they get their way." He spoke fervently on the matter, for he had much to lose himself: the Turnbull plantation utilized close to eighty slaves, from the fields to the stables to the house itself. "All of the North looks down upon us, just as England once looked down upon the whole of America before the Revolution. 'Do as we say, or we will discipline you,' they say, but not with words: they say it with their laws, with their 'free states'...they act as if making a new state open to slavery would force all citizens to buy a Negro. Better to eliminate the option, they think, and thereby force those who do participate in our peculiar institution to stay out of the West." He stopped and turned to Jonah, standing at the edge of the group. "Your home state of Texas allows slaves...tell me, my boy, how do you think it will fare if the Republicans rule the land?"

Hex balked at being put on the spot, and took a long moment to finish his drink before answering, "Tuh be honest, Ah ain't never known any folk whut owned slaves...colored slaves." He hoped no one noticed the way he amended his words. "Most of the folk Ah knew was too poor tuh afford thet sort of thing...but the choice was there, like yuh said. If'n they wanted tuh buy a slave, they could, an' if'n they didn't want tuh, they didn't have tuh. Thet's the whole idea of America, ain't it? Freedom of choice. Ain't right tuh try an' take thet away from somebody just 'cause yuh don't agree with 'em."

"Well put, young man," Turnbull said, smiling, then turned back to the rest of the group. "That is exactly what this comes down to: freedom of choice, and the North wanting to take away our ability to make any other choice but their own. Should Lincoln win the day come November, I do believe we shall have to take drastic action to preserve our freedom." The men gathered knew he was referring to secession -- talk like that had been bubbling for months all across the South, and some states were already putting legislation in motion to do just that should the Republicans win. It was a bold move, but many were beginning to see it as necessary if they were to preserve their individual rights. For Jonah, the point was moot: as he said, he looked upon slave-owning as a choice, and his own choice was to not participate, so whether it existed or not, or where it existed, affected him not in the least...

But in the grand scheme of things, the indifference of a man like Jonah Hex meant little compared to the feelings of the rest of his countrymen -- the cracks between North and South had been forming for decades, and it was only a matter of time before the entire Union split in half under the strain.

The two young men had to wait nearly three months after their initial induction into the Army to see any action. Due to their mutual experience on horseback, they signed up for cavalry duty, and were assigned to the 4th Virginia. The regiment was a mix of raw recruits and seasoned men, and in the interim, they prepared themselves as best they could for the fighting ahead, drilling until the ragged lines of men tightened up and formed something bordering on military. No one had any idea what to expect, even Hex -- his background was based on plains warfare, where there may not be a town for miles. In the skirmishes to come, they could possibly be fighting within rifle range of people's houses and farms. Some of these soldiers might be defending their home soil in a very literal sense.

When the word finally came in July, the regiment headed north, sometimes by rail, sometimes on the march, until they reached the town of Manassas, a scant thirty miles from the Potomac River and, consequently, Washington D.C. -- a rumor spread amongst the men that they were going to barrel headlong across the water and wipe out the city just to spite the Yankees. Jonah doubted very much about that, but the significance of their location wasn't lost on him, and he knew the Union would fight like Hell to keep the Confederates far from their capital. "There's gonna be a lot of blood spilled here," Hex told Jeb that evening around the campfire. "If'n we live through this, it'll be a damn miracle."

"You've got to have faith, cousin." The younger Turnbull pulled off his forage cap and ran a hand through his dark blonde hair. "Them Northern boys are more than likely as green as we are. Besides, we have the upper hand: they have to try and puncture our lines to get anywhere in this war, while we merely have to hold them back." He slapped the kepi back on his head and gave Jonah a lopsided smile. Hex wondered if he'd still be so cocky after he'd been shot at a few times.

The battle began at dawn the next day, with Union troops marching in a line across a small stream the locals called Bull Run, some using the bridge, others wading through the water. Waiting for them in an open field was the 4th Cavalry, along with thousands of other soldiers from other regiments, both mounted and on foot. For the first time in over a year, Jonah could feel that old sensation returning to his body, the sharpening of senses that tightened his focus on the battle ahead. When the charge was sounded and he drove his horse forward, all thoughts of danger left his mind -- even Jeb riding beside him on his own mount was forgotten. Hand and eye and target, that was all that remained. For hours the cannons roared and gunshots rang out until it became nothing but a wall of noise, and all the while Jonah tore through the Union men, firing off shots from his Enfield that rarely missed their mark. While many of his fellow cavalrymen had to pause to reload their rifles, he could do the same on horseback with an efficiency that came from years spent out West, sometimes resorting to holding the reins in his teeth and gripping the horse with his legs. When his ammunition ran out, he sank his bayonet into soldiers as he passed, and when one Yankee grabbed hold of it as he fell dying, Jonah called it a loss and pulled out his revolvers. All around him was chaos, but he paid it no mind -- so long as he could ride, he refused to stop.

At one point in the battle, long after midday, an unusual thing happened: Hex saw a line of the Union soldiers begin to retreat, a few even dropping their guns as they ran. Removing his kepi and waving it at some cavalrymen behind him, he called out, "C'mon, them sons of bitches have done lost their nerve!" He then set his mount after the enemy, letting loose with an Apache war cry that unsettled the retreating Yankees even more -- they dove for cover along the banks of the stream, trying to scramble to the other side before they were trampled by the horses. Quite a few were, while others were ambushed by infantrymen and taken prisoner. Not long after, other Northerners started to turn tail, until it seemed their entire army had given up the fight and decided that things would be safer back in Washington. The Confederates didn't let up on them, however, herding the men across the water like cattle or cutting down those who refused to yield. By nightfall, the battle was all but over, and the South clearly stood as the victor -- all across the ruin of the battlefield, men raised their voices in a Rebel yell that could be heard for miles. They had sustained losses as heavy as their opponent, but they still held their ground while the North had nothing to show for it but wounds to both their men and their pride.

The bragging seemed to start almost immediately, even as they collected up the dead and wounded. A good many soldiers spoke of General Thomas Jackson's defensive stance during the battle, likening it to a stone wall. One private, a transplanted Texan like Hex by the name of Smith, told anyone who would listen about the Yankee who shot off two of his toes, and how Smith returned the favor by gutting the man and stealing his saber and hat -- oddly enough, the Yankee's rank seemed to increase with each telling. Jonah himself did no bragging, feeling that the Federals gave as good as they got, though a few men were willing to brag for him, including Jeb. "In all my days, I've never seen a man ride like you, Jonah," he said when they finally caught up with one another again -- by a stroke of luck, both of them had come through the battle with only minor injuries. "I swear, I could hardly tell where the horse ended and you began."

"Just doin' whut comes natural," he replied with a shrug. "Weren't nothin' special."

"'Nothin' special'? Well, I can't wait to see what you’re like when you really get going!" Jeb clapped the former scout on the back, the smile from the night before on his face again. "Didn't I tell you this was going to work in our favor?"

Hex allowed himself a small smile -- he had to admit, he'd never expected the North to fold in so easily. "Reckon yuh did...maybe this'll all be over sooner than we thought."

1862:

Just as Turnbull had promised, Jeb and Jonah were transferred to the 7th Virginia Cavalry as lieutenants not long after New Year's. The increased rank also meant increased responsibility, and the two of them did their best to set an example for the enlisted men under them. The new year also brought a new challenges for the Confederates, for the Federals were gaining footholds throughout the South. For months, the two armies clashed, losing ground one day and reclaiming it not long after. The 7th Cavalry seemed unable to get a respite through it all, but they pressed on at the behest of their commanding officers, even as their comrades fell around them on the battlefield. The worst blow came in mid-September as General Lee’s forces invaded Maryland, hoping to give the North a taste of the suffering they’d endured on their side of the border. After assisting General Jackson in the taking of Harpers Ferry, the 7th Cavalry followed him to Sharpsburg, near Antietam Creek, and joined the thousands of Confederate troops already gathered there. They locked horns with the Union men in an all-out bloodbath until, regretfully, Lee had to concede that his losses were too great -- the Rebels had no choice but to retreat back to Virginia.

It was a horrific blow to Southern morale, with over nine thousand dead or wounded and not an inch of Northern ground in their possession to show for it. Like many other soldiers, the men under Hex and Turnbull’s command were rather sullen for days -- they’d lost nearly a third of their company in that one conflict. Unfortunately, the war was not about to stop on their account, and the two lieutenants faced the unenvied task of keeping them focused on the battles to come and not the one behind them.

A week after Sharpsburg, Hex took out a platoon to scout for possible Yankee activity near the border. By their second day out, they’d found nothing but a family of runaway slaves. Standing orders were for all Negroes to be put back into bondage, so they took the blacks prisoner and brought them along as they made their way back the regiment. Though he held his tongue, the situation gave Jonah an ill feeling in his stomach -- ever since the incident at the Turnbull plantation, the sight of slaves unsettled him in a way it never had before. He tried to dismiss it, reasoning that it was due to having to shoot so many of them, while the slaves had been armed with nothing more than improvised clubs at best. It was either yerself or them, an’ yuh know they wouldn’t have hesitated tuh do yuh in, he told himself. But the feeling persisted, especially when he caught sight of the way the recaptured slaves looked at him in his gray uniform.

When they made camp for the night, Hex found himself tossing and turning in his bedroll. He eventually gave up and sat in his tent, rolling one smoke after another as he stared at the canvas walls. This is ridiculous, he thought. Whut’s done is done, Jonah boy, so why yuh keep lettin’ whut happened last Christmas eat at yuh? He didn’t know, and that didn’t help matters much. “Hell with it,” he muttered, and left his tent. The rest of the camp was sound asleep, the only light being a small fire near where they'd tied up the horses -- a guard sat watch over there with the slaves, who were bound hand and foot to prevent trouble. Jonah walked over that way, figuring that, if he wasn't going to sleep, the least he could do was take watch for a while and let the other man catch some shuteye. When he got close, however, he noticed that the soldier was leaning strangely against an old stump. Fella's done nodded off already, Hex thought, then saw that the slaves were missing, the ropes they'd been bound with cut and cast aside . Cursing under his breath, he checked the guard and found the man had only been knocked out, then he cast his eyes about the ground looking for tracks. What he saw was not to his liking: in addition to the footprints left by the departing slaves, there was an unknown set of prints, large and possibly clad in moccasins.

Good Lord...it might be thet Scalphunter. There had been talk winding through the regiments about a huge, crazy Indian that had been massacring Confederates and spiriting away any Negroes in their possession -- a few claimed that they’d seen him make trophies from the dead men’s bodies, and had dubbed him “Scalphunter” because of it. Jonah had dismissed it as just stories, but now he wasn’t so sure. Though he was wearing nothing more than his longjohns and a pair of trousers, Hex grabbed the unconscious soldier’s pistol and followed the tracks off towards the woods, hoping that they weren’t too far ahead of him. Sure enough, he soon spotted the group as they passed through a break in the trees, a tall, dark-haired man in buckskin leading the way. “Halt or Ah’ll shoot!” Jonah ordered. The blacks froze in place, but the other man simply turned and urged them forward. “Ah mean it, dammit!“ Jonah said to them. “Don’t test me!” Again, the other man ignored his threats, and this time managed to get the runaways moving again before coming at Jonah with surprising speed.

As the Indian barreled towards him, Hex let off a shot but missed, and was knocked flat before he had a chance to fire again. Sitting on top of him, the man wrenched the gun from Jonah’s hand and tossed it away, nearly snapping off his trigger finger in the process. The big fella plays rough, he thought, good thing Ah do, too. Jonah chopped the flat of his other hand against the Indian’s throat, causing him to gag and loosen his grip for a moment. He then pulled himself free, tucked in his legs, and kicked the man square in the chest -- the Indian fell backward, and Jonah tried to reach for the gun. Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to be that easy, as the Indian was on him again in seconds, wrapping his arms around the Rebel’s chest in a bear hug. His arms locked at his sides, Hex groped for anything to give him an advantage, and found it in a knife hanging from the Indian’s belt -- he managed to unsheathe it and jabbed it into his opponent’s thigh. Once again, the Indian let go, but not in the way he’d expected: with a growl, his opponent threw Hex against a nearby tree, temporarily dazing him. Before he could reach his feet, the Indian’s hand was around his throat, the knife he’d just used now inches from his face.

“You shouldn’t have followed us,” his opponent said, leaning in close. “I didn’t do your fellow soldier any permanent harm, but you just couldn’t bear the thought of those innocent people finding their way to freedom, could you?” Jonah gasped for air as the man tightened his grip. “You disgust me...but at least I’ll have the satisfaction of knowing you won’t live long enough to enslave anyone else.” Their eyes were locked together as the man moved the knife down to Hex‘s belly. In what seemed like a moment of lunacy, Hex thought those eyes looked somewhat familiar -- he knew he’d seen that face somewhere before, but it was hard to peer beneath the streak of red warpaint covering it. Then, in the moonlight, he saw an odd strawberry-colored mark on the side of the man’s neck.

It cain’t be...Jonah thought, but considering he was seconds away from being gutted, he was willing to try anything. Drawing in as much breath as he could, he said in the common language used by most Indians on the plains, “Why is it...that we always...end up fighting each other?” His opponent stared at him, shocked to hear a white man speaking in that tongue. “I hope you are not mad at me...for almost breaking your arm...all those years ago,” Jonah continued, the words coming out in strangled gasps.

Slowly, the man’s fingers eased up and he backed away, the look of shock growing on his face. “You...you’re the Apache slave I fought in Kansas, at the meeting of chiefs,“ he said in English. “Of all the people to run into out here...”

“Funny, Ah was thinkin’ the same,” Hex croaked as he rubbed his throat. “Reckon yuh ain’t a slave no more.”

“No, I won my freedom years ago...as you did, obviously.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry to see that you didn’t learn anything from the experience.”

“Whut the Hell’s thet supposed tuh mean?”

“Look at you: fighting to keep people in bondage after you’ve suffered the same. How can you side with them?”

“Ah’m fightin’ with them ‘cause Ah believe thet the North should mind its own goddam business instead of nosin’ around in ours. All we want is tuh be left alone, an’ they won’t oblige us.”

“Do you honestly believe that’s all this war is about?”

Jonah glared at the man for a moment, then his eyes dropped away. “Thet’s the only part Ah care about. Slavery don’t matter tuh me one way or another.”

“How can you ignore the problem after what we went through? Have you forgotten how our Indian masters treated us, humiliated us? Don’t you think that the Negroes suffer just as much as we did, if not more? Don‘t you think that they have just as much right to escape that as we did?”

Hex gave no answer, his mind going back to the uprising at the Turnbull plantation, to the ill feeling that had taken hold of him ever since then. Though he had been set free by High Cloud nearly ten years ago, he could still remember what it was like to be nothing more than property to someone, and he could see an echo of those days in the eyes of every slave he passed...and yet he kept crowing about how white Southerners should have the freedom to live as they please while he forced coloreds back into a life that he’d despised. “But this is the way things are,” he said quietly, knowing how weak and stupid it sounded the moment the words left his mouth. “In the South, colored folk are slaves...yuh cain’t just wave yer hand an’ make it disappear.”

“Then I guess you haven’t heard...” the Kiowa warrior began to say, then stopped as a shout carried through the wood from the direction of camp.

“Reckon thet gunshot woke the boys up,” Jonah muttered, then turned to the other man. “Ah cain’t believe Ah’m sayin’ this, but yuh’d best get tuh steppin’ afore they see yuh.”

“What about you? Don’t tell me you’re going back to them.”

“Yuh’ve given me some things tuh think about, but Ah’ve still got responsibilities. Just let me work this out in muh own time.”

“All right, I just hope you’ve gotten it worked out by the next time we meet, because if you haven’t...” He let the sentence trail off.

“Ah understand, an‘ Ah hope it don‘t come tuh thet.” The man turned to leave, but Hex stopped him, saying, “Wait, afore yuh go...hit me.” When he just stared at him, Hex explained, “If’n Ah’m conscious when they find me, they’s gonna wonder why, so...” He picked up his gun, handed it over, then turned around and tapped the back of his head. “Consider it payback fer yankin’ yer arm outta joint. Just try not tuh crack muh skull open, okay?”

After a long pause, the man known as Scalphunter clubbed Jonah just behind his right ear, and he crumpled to the ground. He then threw the gun aside and ran as fast as he could in the direction he’d sent the runaways. He could hear voices in the clearing behind him, but to his relief, they didn’t appear to be pursuing. Despite that, he didn’t slow down until he reached the narrow dirt road bordering the wood, where a horse-drawn wagon waited -- a lanky young man in a white slouch hat and duster was fastening down a canvas tarp on the back of the wagon, and he nearly jumped out of his skin when Scalphunter emerged from the trees. “What took you so long? Between the gunshot and your lollygagging, I’d just about written you off as dead,” the young man said.

“I’ll explain later. Everything all right here?”

“Ask ‘em yourself, if you like.” He tugged at the canvas and revealed the runaways laying huddled beneath it. “How you folks enjoyin’ your accommodations so far?”

“We’s fine in here, Mistuh Lash,” one of the black men answered, “but we’d feel a lot better if’n we was movin’ away from them Rebs.”

“Have no fear, now that my partner has stopped draggin’ his feet, we can get this show on the road.” Bartholomew Aloysius Lash tipped his hat to them, the daisy stuck in the hatband bobbing as he did so, then turned to Scalphunter. “By the by, you know your leg’s bleedin’?”

“It’ll keep.” They checked the canvas one last time before climbing on board the wagon, Lash taking the reins. “If you really thought the soldiers had gotten me, why didn’t you take off?”

“Well, there is the slight matter of you not payin’ me yet for this little expedition." He snapped the reins to set the horses in motion. "If I’m gonna risk bein’ hanged by my fellow Southerners, I’d like to do it with some money in my pockets.”

“What happened to that ’better nature’ of yours, Bat?”

“It’s better when I ain't broke,” he quipped. “But enough about me...what happened back there that you ain’t dead?”

"I sort of ran into someone I know," Scalphunter said as he wrapped a bandana around his leg wound.

His partner did a double-take. "You're joshin' me! The great Ke-Woh-No-Tay, scourge of the Confederacy, is consortin' with the enemy! Just wait 'til I tell your brother, he'll die of shame."

"Button it, Lash, and keep your eyes on the road."