Out Of Their Minds Part 12

I knew that it was wrong. I knew that this was not the way that it had been. But, standing there, I half forgot that it was nothing but a play and could only feel the gold-spangled glory and the glory-haunted melancholy.

The mule had quit his braying and somewhere a group about a campfire had begun to sing. Behind me the leaves were whispering in the clump of trees.

Gettysburg, I thought. I had been here in another time, on another world (or in another world, or of another world, whatever it might Be, or however it worked out) and had stood, on this very spot, and tried to imagine what it had been like, and now I saw-or, at least, I saw a part of it.

I started down the hill when a voice spoke my name.

"Horton Smith."

I swung toward the sound and for a moment I failed to see the one who had spoken, and then I did, perched upon the broken wheel of the sh.e.l.l-smashed cannon. I could see just the outline of him, the thatched and pointed head, the juglike ears, and, for once, he was not bouncing in consuming rage; he was simply roosting there.

"So it's you again," I said.

"You had the Devil's help," said the Referee. "You did not do it fair. The encounter with Quixote should not count at all and you must have needed the Devil's help to-live through the cannonade."

"All right. So I had the Devil's help. What do you do about it?"

"You admit it?" he asked, eagerly. "You admit that you had help?"

"Not at all," I said. "You said it and I don't really know. The Devil said nothing to me about giving any help."

He slumped, dejected. "Ah, then there is nothing one can do. Three times is a charm. It is the law and I cannot question it, although," he said, sharply, "I would like to very much. I do not like you, Mr. Smith. I like you not at all."

"It's a feeling," I told him, "that I reciprocate."

"Six times!" he mourned. "It is immoral! It is impossible! There has never been anyone before who even did it three times."

I walked close to the cannon where he perched and took a good hard look at him. "If you can find any comfort in it," I finally told him, "I made no deal with the Devil. I asked him to speak a kind word for me, but he indicated that he couldn't do it. He said a rule was a rule and there was nothing he could do."

"Comfort!" he shrilled, puffing up in rage. "Why should you wish to give me comfort? It's another trick, I tell you. Another dirty human trick!"

I turned abruptly on my heel. "Go chase yourself,"-1 told him. What was the use of trying to be civil with a jerk like that?

"Mr. Smith," he called after me. "Mr. Smith. Please, Mr. Smith."

I paid him no attention and went on, tramping down the hill.

To my left I saw the faint outlines of a white farmhouse, enclosed by a picket fence which was white as well. Some of the fence, I saw, had been torn down. Light shone through the windows and tied horses stamped in the yard outside the house. That would be General Meade's headquarters and the general might be there. If I wanted to walk over, I might get a glimpse of him. But I didn't walk over. I kept on down the hill. For the thing that was Meade would not be really Meade, no more than the house was really a house or the broken cannon a cannon. It was all cruel make-believe, but in a very solid form-a form so solid that for a moment, back there on the hilltop, I'd caught the sense of a substantial and historic battlefield.

Now there were hidden voices all about me and occasionally the sound of footsteps and at times I caught the sight of dim human figures hurrying across the hill, on official business, perhaps, but more than likely on business of their own.

The ground beneath my feet plunged sharply and I saw that it led down into a gulch, with a thicket of small trees at the upper end of it. Beneath the trees was the flare of a campfire light. I tried to veer away, for I had no wish to meet anyone, but I had gone too far to avoid detection. Small stones loosened by my feet went rolling and bouncing down into the gulch and a voice cried out sharply at me.

I stopped and stood stock-still.

"Who's there?" the voice cried again.

"Friend," I said, and it was a silly thing to say, but all that I could think of.

The firelight glinted on a lifted musket barrel.

"There ain't no need, Jed, to be so upset," said a drawling voice. "There ain't no Rebs around and even if there were, they'd be inclined to be plumb peaceful."

"I just wanted to make sure, is all," said Jed. "After today, I ain't taking any chances."

"Take it easy," I said, walking toward the fire. "I'm not any Reb."

I stopped when I was in sight of them and let them look me over. There were three of them, two sitting by the fire, the other on his feet with the musket lifted.

"You ain't one of us, neither," said the standing one, who apparently was Jed. "Just who are you, mister?"

"My name is Horton Smith," I said. "A newspaperman."

"Well, what do you know," said the one who drawled. "Come on in and sit by the fire with us for a spell if you have got the time."

"I have some time," I said.

"We can tell you all about it," said the one who had not spoken before. "We was right up there in the thick of it. Right by the clump of trees."

"Wait a minute," said the drawly one. "We don't need to tell him. I seen this gentleman before. He was up there with us for a while. Maybe all the time. I seen him, then things got hot and I lost track of everything."

I walked toward the blaze. Jed leaned his musket against a small plum tree and resumed his seat beside the fire.

"We was frying up some sow belly," he said, motioning toward the pan set on a bed of coals raked out from the fire. "If you are hungry, we got plenty of it."

"But you got to be hungry," said one of the others, "or you can't nohow stomach it."

"I thing I'm hungry enough," I said. I came into the circle of the firelight and squatted down. Beside the pan of frying pork sat a steaming coffee pot. I sniffed at its aroma. "It seems that I missed lunch," I said, "and breakfast, too."

"Then maybe you can manage it," said Jed. "We got a couple of extra hardtack and I'll make you up a sandwich."

"Be sure," said the drawling one, "to knock them against something to dislodge the crawlers. Someone that ain't use to it might not like fresh meat."

"Say, mister," said the third one, "looks to me as if you picked up a crease."

I put my hand to my head and the fingers came away sticky.

"Knocked out for a while," I said. "Just came to a while ago. Sh.e.l.l fragment, I suppose."

"Mike," Jed said to the drawly one, "why don't you and Asa wash him up a bit and see how bad it is. I'll pour him a cup of coffee. Probably he could use it."

"It's all right," I said. "It is just a scratch."

"Better have a look," said Mike, "then, when you leave, head down to Taneytown Road. Just south on the road a piece you'll find a sawbones. He can slop some junk on it, keep it from mortifying."

Jed handed me a cup of coffee and it was strong and hot. I took a sip of it and burned my tongue. Mike worked on my head, as tenderly as if he'd been a woman, daubing away with a handkerchief soaked in water from his canteen.

"It's just a crease," he said. "Took off some hide, is all. But if I was you, I'd see me a sawbones."

"All right, I will," I said.

And the funny thing about it, I realized, was that these three men around their fire really believed that they were Union soldiers. There was no playacting here. They were what they were supposed to be. Perhaps they could be anything at all, or the force (if it was a force) that could be shaped into form and matter, could be anything at all. But once that form had been taken, they were, to all intents and purposes, the thing that had been formed. In a little time, perhaps, their solid shapes would be transformed back to its elemental form, available then for another form and being, but until that came about they were Union soldiers who had just fought a battle on this sh.e.l.l-scarred hillside.

"It's all that I can do," said Mike, going back and sitting down. "I haven't even got a clean rag I can wrap around your head. But you find the doc and he'll fix you up."

"Here's a sandwich," said Jed, handing it to me. "I tried to knock the skippers out. I think I got the most of them."

It was an unappetizing-looking mess and the hardtack was as hard as I had read it was, but I was hungry and it was food and I put it down. Jed fixed sandwiches for the others and we all sat munching, not talking because it took a man's full concentration to eat that kind of food. The coffee had cooled enough so that I could drink it and it helped to wash the hardtack down.

Finally we were finished and Jed poured each of us another cup of coffee; Mike got out an old pipe and hunted around in a pocket until he found some crumbled shreds of tobacco with which to load the pipe. He lit it with a brand pulled gingerly from the fire.

"A newspaperman," he said. "From New York, most likely."

I shook my head. New York was too close. One of them might just happen to know a newsman from New York. "London," I said. "The Times."

"You don't sound like no Britisher to me,", said Asa. "They got a funny way of talking."

"I haven't been in England for years," I said. "I've knocked around a lot"

It didn't explain, of course, how a man could lose his British accent, but it held them for the moment.

"There's a Britisher with Lee's army," Jed said. "Free-mantle or some such name as that I suppose you know " him."

"I've heard of him," I said. "I've never met the man."

They were getting just a bit too curious. Friendly still, of course, but too curious. But they didn't follow it up. There were too many other things they wanted to talk about.

"When you write your piece," asked Mike, "what do you intend to say of Meade?"

"Why, I don't really know," I said. "I haven't thought that much about it. He fought a splendid battle here, of course. He made the Southerners come to him. He played their game for once. A strong defense and ..."

Jed spat. "That may all be so," he said. "But he hasn't got no style. Now Mac-there's a man who really had some style."

"Style, sure," said Asa, "but he was always letting us get licked. It feels right good, I tell you, to be on the winning side for once." He looked across the fire at me. "You think we won this one, don't you?"

"I'm sure of it," I said. "Lee will be pulling out tomorrow. Maybe he's pulling out right now."

"Some of the men don't think so," said Mike. "I was talking to some of the Minnesota troops. They figure them crazy Rebs will make another try."

"I don't think so," said Jed. "We broke their backs this afternoon. h.e.l.l's fire, they came walking up that hill as if they were on parade. They walked right up to us; they walked right into the cannon's mouth. And us blasting away at them the way you'd blast away at targets. We're always being told what a smart general this. Lee is, but I tell you there ain't no general smart who will march his men up a pasture slope into the cannon's mouth."

"Burnside did it at Fredericksburg," said Asa.

Jed spat. "Burnside wasn't smart. No one ever said he was."

I finished my coffee, swirled the little that was left in the bottom of the cup to stir up the grounds, and tossed it at the fire. Jed reached out and lifted the pot.

"No more, thanks," I said. "I must be getting on."

I didn't want to be getting on. I wanted to stay right where I was and yarn away another hour or so with the three around the fire. The blaze was comfortable and the gully snug.

But I had a deep, underlying hunch that I had best get out when I could. Get away from these men and this battlefield before something else could happen. That bit of flying iron had been close enough. Theoretically, of course, I was in the clear, but I had no confidence in this land, nor in the Referee. The quicker out the better.

I rose to my feet. 'Thanks for the food and coffee. It was something that I needed."

"Where you going now?"

"I think, first of all, I'll hunt up that doctor."

Jed nodded. "I would if I were you," he said.

I turned about and walked away, expecting each second that they would call me back. But they didn't and I went Stumbling down the gully in the dark.

I had a crude, half-remembered map in mind and as I walked I figured out what I would do. Not the Taneytown Road that would keep me too close to the battlefield. I'd cross the Taneytown Road and keep on the east until I hit the Baltimore Pike and I'd follow that southeast. Although just why I bothered, I don't know. One place probably was as good as another in this weird place. I wasn't going any where, actually; I was just moving around. The Devil had said that Kathy was safe, back in the human world again but there had been no hint from him as to how a mar could get back into the human world and I wasn't downright sure that I could believe what the Devil said of Kathy, He was a s.h.i.+fty critter and not one to be trusted.

I reached the end of the gully and came out in a valley, Ahead of me lay the Taneytown Road. There were camp fires here and there and I veered around them. But stumbling through the dark, I fetched up against a warm body that had hair and that snorted at me. I backed away and, squinting, made out it was a horse, tied to a still standing section of a small rail fence.

The horse slanted its ears forward and nickered softly al me. It probably had been standing there a long tune and it may have been frightened and I got the feeling that it was glad to see a human being. It wore a saddle and was tied to the fence by a bridle rein.

"Hi, horse," I said. "Howsa fellow?"

It whuffled at me and I walked up and stroked its neck. It swung its head around and tried to nuzzle me.

I stepped back and had a look around and there was no one near. So I untied the reins and got them over the horse's neck and straightened out, then rather awkwardly climbed into the saddle. The horse seemed pleased to be untied and swung obediently as I reined it.

There was a tangle of wagons on the Taneytown Road, but I managed to get through them without anyone hailing me and once clear of the road, I headed the horse southeast and he took off at an easy lope.

We met small groups of men, plodding off somewhere, and had to swing around a battery of guns, but gradually the traffic cleared and the horse finally reached the Baltimore Pike and we went pounding down it, away from Gettysburg.

16.

A few miles out of Gettysburg the road came to an end, as I should have known it would, for back there on South Mountain, where Kathy and I had landed in this place, there had been only a cart track and nothing like a road. The Pike and Taneytown Road and all the other roads, perhaps even Gettysburg itself, had been no more than a stage setting for the battle, and once one left the battle area, there was no need of roads.

Once the road gave out, I gave up any attempt to pick a route and let the horse go as it pleased. There was really no point to keeping on at all. There was no place I had in mind to go, but I let the horse keep on. For some reason, it seemed that it might be a good idea to build up a little distance.

Riding under the stars, in soft summer weather, I had the first chance since I'd come into the land to try to do some thinking. I reviewed in my mind all that had happened since I'd turned off the freeway onto the winding road that led to Pilot k.n.o.b and I asked a lot of questions about all the things that had happened after that, but there seemed no ready answers. When that became apparent, I realized that I was searching for answers that would serve my human logic and I knew that was a fruitless search. In the face of all I knew, there was no reason to believe that human logic had a thing to do with what was going on. I admitted to myself that the only possible explanation must be based upon the speculation in my old friend's ma.n.u.script.

Therefore there was a place, and I was in it, where the force-substance (a very awkward term) of imagination became the basic stuff from which matter, or a semblance of matter, or a new concept of matter, might be formed. I worked for quite a while to work out a statement which would cover the situation, to reduce the maybe's and the if's to a workable proportion, but it was a hopeless job and, finally, for working purposes, I labeled this place that I was in the Land of Imagination and let it go at that. It was a cowardly way to do it, but maybe later on someone could work out a definition for it.

So here was this land, forged of all the fantasy, all the make-believe, all the fairy tales and folk stories, all the fictions and traditions of the race of Man. And in this land stalked and lurked and ran all the creatures and all the situations the ever-busy minds of all the flighty little primates had ever given birth. Here (on any night, or just on Christmas Eve?) Santa Claus went storming through the skies in his reindeer-drawn sleigh. Here, somewhere (on any night, or only of a Halloween?) Ichabod Crane whipped his jaded mount down a rocky road in a desperate effort to reach a magic bridge before the Headless Horseman could hurl the pumpkin that hung at his saddle-horn. Here Daniel Boone stalked Kentucky meadows with his long rifle slung across his arm. Here the Sandman roamed and foul and grinning things danced jigs upon the ridgepole. And here the battle of Gettysburg was fought (again and yet again, or only for special purposes?), but not the battle as it had been fought, but fought in the polite and glorious and almost bloodless fas.h.i.+on in which the public mind in later years had conceived of its being fought. And other battles, too, perhaps, the great and b.l.o.o.d.y battles that loomed large in significance and larger in tradition. Waterloo and Marathon, s.h.i.+loh, Concord Bridge and Austerlitz, and in the days to come, when they'd become embedded in tradition, the mindless and mechanical and humanly agonizing battles of World Wars I and II, or Korea and Vietnam. In other years, as well, the fabulous Roaring Twenties, with the racc.o.o.n coats, the hip flasks and the flappers, the Stutz Bearcat and the gangsters, with machine guns comfortably ensconced in violin cases, would become a part of this land as well-perhaps already were.

All of these, all that man could think of or had thought of long enough-all the madness and the wit, all the buffoonery and the viciousness, all the lightness and the sadness which all men, in all ages, from the cave up to the present moment, had fas.h.i.+oned in their minds were in this very place.