FORT PILLOW

He yawned. He could hardly stay on his horse, he was so tired. He'd ridden all day and all night, then fought a battle, then got stuck with that damned sentry duty. So he hadn't had enough sleep to spit at the past couple of days. He wasn't the only man swaying in the saddle, either-far from it.

At least the Confederates weren't going hell for leather now. They'd done what they set out to do. There were no Federals anywhere dose by to give them a hard time. They could move at their own pace.

“Wonder where old Bedford'll want us to kick the damnyankees' asses next,” somebody said.

“Wherever it is, we'll do it,” Jenkins said. He had confidence in Nathan Bedford Forrest, and he had confidence in the men with whom he rode.

Whether they still had confidence in him… “Got to make sure they don't trip you when you've got your foot back to kick,” one of them said.

“No damn Federal's ever gonna trip me again,” Jenkins said furiously. “Ever, you hear?”

The rest of the troopers looked at one another, but none of them said anything. The two stripes on Jenkins's sleeve didn't hold them back; they weren't men who feared sassing underofficers. The growl in his voice, the glint in his eye, the angry flush that reddened his badly shaved cheeks, the hunch of his broad shoulders… Any soldier who sassed him now would have to back it up, with fists or maybe with a gun, and some things were more trouble than they were worth.

A great blue heron sprang into the air from the edge of the swamp, a fish in its beak. The bird's wingspan was almost as wide as a man was tall. Jenkins followed it with his eyes. “Wish I could fly like that,” he said.

“Who don't?” somebody else said-that seemed safe enough to answer. “I've had dreams where I could flap my arms and go up into the air.”

“Me, I've had dreams where I could flap my feet,” another trooper put in.

“I believe that, Lou-they're big enough,” still another man said.

“You find a Federal with shoes that'd cover those gunboats?”

“Sure did-took a pair off a dead nigger,” Lou said. “Cryin' shame when a damn nigger's got better shoes than a white man-that's all I've got to tell you.”

“It is,” his friend agreed. “Well, they're yours now, by Jesus. That lousy black son of a bitch don't need 'em no more.”

“What I'd like to do is, I'd like to go up in a balloon one of these days,” another Confederate said. “Showmen'll take 'em up at country fairs sometimes. Don't know what they charge for a ride – a quarter-eagle, maybe even a half-eagle. Hell with me if I wouldn't pay five dollars just so as I could say I really flew.”

Jack Jenkins thought about doing that. It wouldn't be bad-if he had a five-dollar goldpiece, he figured he would plunk it down so he could see what going up in the air was like, too. But it wasn't what he'd had in mind when he spoke; it wasn't what he craved. A showman's balloon was tethered to the ground. Even if the line should break, the balloon was at the mercy of every vagrant breeze.

When he talked about flying, when he thought about flying, he meant flying the way you flew in dreams, flying the way the heron flew. He meant going from here to there because you were here and you wanted to get there. Where here and there were wouldn't matter; you could just hop in the air and go.

Nobody in all the world could do that. Jeff Davis couldn't. Neither could Abe Lincoln. Neither could Queen Victoria, and she had more money than both of them put together. So what did that say about a ragged Confederate cavalry corporal's chances? That they weren't what you'd call good, worse luck.

For that matter, almost anybody in the world could go from here to there on the ground, and where here and there were didn't matter. Not me, dammit, Jenkins thought. He was going where he was going because that was where Nathan Bedford Forrest wanted him to go. The privates riding with him were much more likely to pick a fight with him than he was to pick a fight with Bedford Forrest.

Riding to Forrest's will, his backside almost as sore from the saddle as if he were stricken with boils, he came into Brownsville from the west. Had he ridden into it from the east only two days before? That seemed impossible, but it was true. Would he be able to sleep in a bed tonight, or at least under a roof? After all he'd been through, that seemed impossible, too, but at least he could hope.

Pain dulled by laudanum, Mack Leaming lay on the Platte Valley's deck. The world would do whatever it did. For the moment, he couldn't do anything about it. With the brandy and opium coursing through his veins, he couldn't even care about it very much.

Captain Anderson walked along the steamer's deck with the Platte Valley's skipper. The civilian wore a uniform considerably gaudier than a Navy man's would have been. “You will give me receipts for all the men you take aboard, sir?” Forrest's aide said.

“Oh, yes, of course,” the skipper answered. “Got to keep the paperwork straight. We'll both wind up in hot water if things don't come out even. “