I Shall Be Near to You(43)
‘Then you shall serve one week of latrine duty AND to ensure you never forget how you have jeopardized the safety of your countrymen, endangered your fellow soldiers, and disgraced yourself, you shall be branded a deserter!’
The whole Regiment holds its breath, me along with it. That’s why Jennie ain’t happy with her husband and why she’s got that basket on her arm, why the fire is burning hot by the tent, a poker sticking from the flames. Captain gestures to Hiram, who swaggers to the fire. He pulls that poker from the coals with a look on his face like it gives him a special pleasure to see the red-orange D glow against the charred wood. Then he and young Frank Morgan push Levi down on the ground. Hiram must be even stronger than he looks because he forces Levi’s head to the right, pinning his cheek against the dirt. All the while Levi is going wild, kicking and bucking as Captain moves that poker toward him, and I knew he ain’t one to ever cross.
I close my eyes, but that don’t make it stop.
CHAPTER
16
OLD CAPITOL PRISON, WASHINGTON, D.C.: MAY 1862
Our first real orders come a week later, the day Henry finishes his punishment. We’re to guard Secesh prisoners kept at the Old Capitol Prison, and even though I draw relief with Will and Edward instead of Jeremiah or one of the boys from home, I’m glad to be somewhere the Rebels ain’t fighting.
The three of us, me, Will, and Edward, walk on a wide pavement, toward the four-story brick building. Except for the arched windows above the door, all the windows have got curtains pulled, almost like it’s a real home but for the iron bars.
Just as we step up to the main guardhouse, Edward elbows me. ‘You know they have a lady spy in this prison?’
‘Have they now?’
‘That’s right,’ he says, and digs his thumb into Will’s ribs. ‘I’m of a mind to get a good look at her, maybe give her a good squeeze for me and my brother.’
Edward winks at the thick-shouldered warden we’re reporting to, but it don’t work the way he hopes because Thick-shoulders says, ‘You patrol the street—I need you to keep any passersby away from the prison yard. And you other two, you’ll take Mrs. Greenhow down for some air.’
‘You’ve got to be daft!’ Edward shouts. ‘You think those two can even keep a sheep in line?’
Edward is still being ornery with Thick-shoulders when me and Will head up the steps into the prison. It is nicer than any house I’ve ever set foot in. By the wall where the floors ain’t dirty and scraped, the richness of the dark wood shows. The halls are wide and plastered, and the main staircase has a carved pineapple post and a curved railing. Those stairs creak under our weight, like I am some fine person, and there is something good in that thought.
When we open the door to her room, Mrs. Greenhow jerks her hand back from the curtain at the window and then settles back into her chair at the old table there. She is a handsome woman, her nut-brown hair parted straight down the middle and swept to the back, where it is coiled and curled.
She don’t even look at us, just starts scribbling something down like she can’t be bothered to hurry. We stand there looking around her room, which is nothing but cracked plaster walls and boards nailed across her window, like the bars outside ain’t enough. Her little girl, not more than eight or nine, sits on a pallet, slowly turning the pages of a book, watching us with a down-turned mouth.
Will clears his throat and says, ‘It’s time to go out to the yard, Mrs. Greenhow,’ but still she don’t stop what she is doing. Will looks at me, but I don’t know how else we should act either, so we just wait until she folds that paper and puts it inside a book on the table. Then she turns to her daughter, saying, ‘Rose, shall we?’ as she stands and holds out her hands, her black netting gloves stretching up to her elbows, her black widow’s dress rustling like dried cornstalks.
‘You think you ought to put out that candle?’ I ask. ‘Wouldn’t want to burn the place down, would you?’
Mrs. Greenhow gives me an eyebrow and a sharp look as she draws back the curtain, reaches through the wood slats, and blows out the candle that’s guttering there in the middle of the day. She breezes past us like royalty, keeping her face looking apart from us as we head down the hall to the stairs, like we ain’t good enough to speak to, like we are the traitors instead of her, and I can’t help but wonder what she is about, acting the spy for our benefit.
Being that she’s the only woman in the prison, Mrs. Greenhow gets time all to herself in the prisoners’ yard. Me and Will stand at the gate, watching her promenade around, her skirts sashaying after her, like it is something more grand than a tall wire fence and hard-packed dirt. Some of the boys out in the courtyard watch Mrs. Greenhow as she takes her few turns, Little Rose on her arm. When a loud catcall comes, it’s Hiram who’s got his fingers to his lips, the boys around him hooting and slapping his shoulders, Frank Morgan laughing so much he’s practically doubled over at the waist. Mrs. Greenhow, though, she don’t pay it any mind, and keeps her eyes on the street just beyond the fence. She finishes her turn before sinking onto a bench, flouncing out her skirts.
Hiram can’t leave her be, though. He saunters over to the fence right behind Mrs. Greenhow.
‘Rebel Rose,’ he calls in a singsong voice. ‘I’ve got all kinds of secrets I’ll spill, if you come upstairs with me.’