Liberty Man

By Brad Livengood

What if love can transcend death? What if our lives are but a tiny increment in a vast eternal existence? What if the answers to the greatest mysteries are right in front of our eyes, revealed in the simplest events of day to day life and in the heroic tales of centuries past? Liberty Man is an epic novel that explores these themes through the stories of a Revolutionary War Soldier as he searches against hopeless odds to find his great, lost love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Apr 15, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543925395

Book preview

© 2018 Brad Livengood

Cover Photography by Ben Livengood

@LivengoodPhotographs

Print ISBN: 978-1-54392-538-8

eBook ISBN: 978-1-54392-539-5

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Contents

Book One

Lazarus, Come Forth!

Book Two

Listening to Herodotus

Book Three

Liberty Man

Epitaph

For Karen

In spring, the dead trees, roots, and animals come to life again exactly as they were, thus providing hundreds of thousands of examples, specimens and proofs of the supreme resurrection.

-Said Nursi

Nations, like stars are entitled to eclipse. All is well, provided the light returns and the eclipse does not become endless night. Dawn and resurrection are synonymous. The reappearance of the light is the same as the survival of the soul.

-Victor Hugo

For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. Not only that, but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.

-Romans 8: 22-23

Gabriel wandered into the expanse of a vast deciduous forest, captive in every thought and reflex to its ageless, impenetrable silence. A deep, cavernous space, it was cool, moist to the touch, and magnificently suffused with thick, sweeping mists. He moved swiftly, yet he did not tire. He felt the impression of his feet on the ancient loam of the forest floor, but could detect no footprints. There was pungency in the air from what he supposed were many centuries of plant decay. The sensation flooded his nostrils as he climbed high atop granite ridges where massive stands of oak, hickory, and chestnut stood watch over hollows sleek and flowing with mountain laurel, rhododendron, and wild arbutus. He had become a seeker, completely unaware of that which he sought. At times, he thought he could hear voices, silently rising in unison to a strange crescendo and then receding back into the forbidden shadows seldom lit by the sun.

To be sure, there were some areas of light. Tiny amber colored trickles descended from the ceiling-like canopy of the forest to its distant floor. He marveled at the patterns this light cast upon the multiple varieties of fauna, which carpeted the ground. Yet all about in the darkness, occasionally catching these feint beams, were shapes. They seemed to be moving, back and forth, changing into vaguely discernable images. There was malevolence about them and he wanted to avoid them entirely, so he concentrated on the narrow path ahead. But something enticed him and he curiously glanced to the side, as the forms became more distinct. The sight was unmistakable.

A group of large canines, which he guessed were wolves, slid through the underbrush in quest of some helpless prey. He was fascinated as they communicated with barks and growls their secret language of the coming kill. Soon their expressions reverberated along with the cries of an unfortunate victim. Gabriel understood the horror of the scene at once and the familiarity unnerved him. This was no animal under attack. It was a man.

He was clearly aware he should do something, but was afraid and unable to remove his eyes from the amazing teamwork of the pack. A gaunt and scrubby female had her teeth locked around the poor man’s throat. A larger black wolf, he assumed the male, had a hold of the inner thigh. Each held firm in their unrelenting jaws, anticipating the flailing of the arms: their front feet balanced, their hind legs tightly anchored. The other wolves squirmed like maggots to tear at the soft flesh of the victim’s abdomen. Eventually the wild movements ceased, and the real feast began.

At the sight of this spectacle, Gabriel felt nauseated. He took a step backward and bent over, heaving. This motion alerted the feeding wolves and they quickly looked up, their breath visible in the crisp air, their snouts red and covered with blood. One of the wolves howled and the others followed in reply, each alternately looking right at him. A singular bolt of terror befell him like lightening. He attempted to run, but the nausea affected his equilibrium and he fell. He found himself sliding on wet leaves off the rim of a brush-covered slope, previously hidden by the dense flora. His face and arms were repeatedly slapped and cut by the briars and laurel thickets he passed on the way down.

As he came to a halt, Gabriel was breathless and bleeding. Still sick from the feeding of the wolves, he became aware of a completely dissimilar presence hovering about. Reluctantly, he rose on his elbows and peered into the faces of two onlookers. They seemed to smile at him from far away and he marveled at the improbability of seeing them in such a place. With some incredulity he closed his eyes tightly and re-opened them, but still they were there. So he sat and watched the diaphanous figures of his mother and father flit around him. They were dressed quite peculiarly for these surroundings, she in a wedding gown and he in the dress uniform of a Marine sergeant, but they behaved as if ignorant of the inconsistency and they motioned toward him with an inviting flourish. He got up and dusted himself off.

His parents led him through the vaporous wood for a time, until they came to a kind of glade. Gabriel looked up and noticed the skeleton-like crag of what he thought was an old gum tree. On its lowest branch, as if placed there for his personal viewing, hung the dripping, bloated corpses of six men, each with bulging eyes and quizzical expressions long left unanswered.

Before he could begin to fathom this, he heard a distinct voice question him, I say sir, might I inquire as to the time?

Startled, Gabriel looked behind him and rotated his head around the circumference of the clearing. His parents were gone. Replacing them, unannounced, was a tall, swarthy man wearing a green-colored frock coat of some antiquated fashion. He appeared preoccupied with a small pipe, slowly packing its contents into the bowl. He did not look as if he even noticed Gabriel.

The time I say, he repeated, eyes on the pipe. Might I inquire as to the time? There was a strange cadence in the words as if the man spoke in an ancient meter.

Who…who are these people? Gabriel’s elocution, in contrast, was slow and hesitant. What possible crime did they…?

We all must be prepared, the man interrupted.

What?

It is apparent that you are unable to explain your present circumstances, he said abstractly, still looking down. We all must be prepared.

Prepared, Gabriel slowly mouthed the word. Prepared for what?

The man then looked up for the first time and smiled. It was an odd half-moon smirk, which contorted the upper muscles of his face and made it seem as if it were made of elastic.

Why the final glance, of course, he replied as if enjoying the moment. To gaze into the nothingness of death, where we stand at the supreme precipice and peer into the unavoidable darkness. He motioned with a broad sweep of his arm.

Gabriel glanced about for his parents and suddenly felt isolated and confused. Is this the end? He whispered. It can’t be over now, I have so many things…

Might I inquire as to the time? The man broke in, emphatically this time. Gabriel could not bear to see him again.

In an instant, he disappeared. Gabriel inspected the scene, but could see nothing through the dense arms of the native thickets with their magical blooms and elephantine leaves. He could hear the wolves again in the distance, closely followed by other voices. What was this place? It did not matter. He had to get out. Once more he glanced at the gum tree. The six bodies were still in place. But one of the previously indistinct faces now caught his attention. Gabriel shivered. It was the man with whom he had just spoken, grinning the same half-moon smile as before.

Now he formed a curious word with his lips and beckoned Gabriel toward him.

Winehandler, he said, or so Gabriel thought. Winehandler, he echoed, twisting on the rope with the turn of his head.

The word sounded around Gabriel in some weird disconnect from its source. Turning about, he did not hesitate. He pitched forward and began to run, trying to retrace his steps out of the woods. He was quite sure he was being followed, but did not care to look back. He could detect an obscure opening ahead. Perhaps it was a pathway that could lead him away from the dreadful place. He headed for it, his confidence gaining as he moved. Eager to be rid of the situation, his legs churned faster. But as he sped toward that unknown destination, he fell again, this time without impact, descending through some timeless vortex to a spot very familiar, where he was awakened by the stark epiphany of the October sun upon his Aunt Edna’s quilt.

He gasped as the dream rushed over him like a powerful gust. His heart pounded. His skin was cold with perspiration. It was the same, always the same. The dark procession of purposeless scenes raced through his brain each night, like the surety of the tides, or the certainty of the seasons. He figured that these were not common nightmares, but some kind of parallel consciousness, like he was part of a fellowship in some primordial purgatory. He winced as he reached for the alarm clock, as exhausted as if he had run a marathon. 4:42. It stopped early that morning. He would be late again.

He rolled over to examine the opposite side of the bed. It was neatly tucked and unslept, providing all the evidence he needed to begin his daily anguish. Jesse had not returned the night before. He threw the frozen clock across the room.

It was the fall of 1971 and America was at war with itself. Gabriel was at war with himself, Jesse with herself, and each, in turn, with the other. He had been plagued with these visions for months, terrifying him to the point that he had developed an irrepressible phobia of night, confounding to his very soul. It was as if he had accidentally gazed upon something unspeakable, and an unreasoning force of nature had condemned him to eternal torment as a consequence.

Out of sorts and unable to work regularly, the illusions now followed him out of night into the day. What originally were shadowy, nocturnal affairs had become startling hallucinations by daylight. They were so real that he feared sleep, and thought his sanity was slowly leaving him.

It was in this regard that he picked up on his mother’s old habit, involving the drink. He hated to admit the problem, but it was now too much a part of him to avoid. It was purposeful, he told himself in rationalization. If he simply passed out from the alcohol, specifically bourbon, then the likelihood of the dreams occurring was substantially less. Anything was to be preferred to that, he thought. But he had reached a point where this method was no longer successful and the goblins raged no matter what he drank. He had come to depend upon the substance for its own merits and he was losing Jesse as a result. The nightmares were winning the battle.

Like many people, when in some sort of despair, Gabriel tried to think of familiar, essential things, in the faint hopes of retrieving his stolen contentment. He would go back in chronological order to the initial strains of his memory: to the sound of his mother’s voice, to the grainy taste of brown sugar, which he knew to have been placed upon his pacifier, to the feel of cool water on his body as he and Ray would swim in Aunt Edna’s pond. He tried to recall his mother’s singing, what little there was of it, or shooting basketball in an iron hoop on the side of Hap’s barn, or the smell of biscuits and molasses on a cold Saturday night.

He wanted to remember these things because they seemed to represent home, which was not just a simple physicality to Gabriel Brower the way it was to some folks. For if it were, then the endless tobacco fields, hog lots, and cotton mills, which surrounded the small crossroads named for the first battle of the American Revolution, would be home. Although the shot heard ‘round the world was surely detected in Lexington, North Carolina, the town in recent years was more recognized for its transcendent process of cooking barbecued pork shoulder. The taste, pleasing to natives and travelers alike, guarded its secret in a tangy marinade: a blend of vinegar, tomato, salt and pepper, simmered with the mellow smoke of pure hickory. But even that could not signify home to Gabriel. For him, Jesse was home, the only home he knew. Without her the sum of his days were meaningless. There could be no harmony or proportion.

The dividing point between them was not his drinking so much as it was the war in Vietnam. Gabriel was the son of a World War II marine, who had been killed at Tarawa in 1943. An infant at the time, he only knew his father through a few surviving snapshots and the indirect testimony of his mother and his Uncle Hap. In the intervening years, he built a persistent mythology around the man. Like many children whose parents fought the Second World War, Gabriel grew up believing there could be no question of America being right in any scenario, for in moral terms, his father could occupy no neutral ground.

When President Johnson began the escalation in Vietnam, he and Ray, Jesse’s older brother and Gabriel’s best friend, could not wait to go fight. They were both immersed in ROTC in high school and scarcely let a minute go by without heated discussions of such things as tanks or anti-personnel mines.

Ultimately, Jesse superseded the war in Gabriel’s heart. After they were engaged in 1966, she begged him not to go. It was the topic of conversation for much of the summer. Gabriel put up a lot of fuss. But in the end, with a great deal of reluctance, he gave in. He could still be drafted, of course. Most anyone could. But he would not volunteer. Ray was a different story.

For a time, it seemed as if America would win the war as she always had. Gabriel and Jesse purchased a house on the Jerusalem Road and talked of beginning a family. They read the letters Ray wrote home, but rarely commented on the growing despondency within. Then on one dark Tuesday in April 1967, a strange black car drove up to Jesse’s parent’s house. A Western-Union telegram was promptly delivered; succinct and to the point, like a knife in the chest. Raymond Shelton had been killed in action on a night patrol in a place called Khe Sanh, near the Laotian border. It was an avalanche.

The week of the funeral was a blur to Gabriel now. He only remembered weeping: for Ray, for his parents, for America, for all that he had lost and could possibly lose. He did not cry much as a boy. Hardened by tragedy as he was, he would simply grit his teeth and refuse the flow, whatever the occasion. Now he could no longer cry at all. It occurred to him that most of the discharge stored in his ducts was shed that one week of his life, when everything changed.

Sorrowful episodes continued for months. Everywhere you looked in Lexington, you saw something that reminded you of Ray; tall, curly headed light-hearted Ray. Raymond the punster they called him. How he loved his pranks, such as putting Ben-Gay in athletic supporters, or slicking doorknobs with Vaseline. He was never overly inventive, just persistent.

It bothered Gabriel that he did not pay attention to the obvious cries for help in Ray’s last few letters. He began reading them aloud to Jesse after Ray’s death, searching for some clue to his friend’s mood during his last days on earth. Jesse would listen and say nothing. More often than not, she would get up and leave the room.

For the next year, in fact, Jesse rarely spoke about anything, or so it appeared to Gabriel. It was as if she had to work out in her own mind the convulsions triggered by her brother’s death. There was anger and there was revilement. Then methodically, she began to change, becoming more vocal and opinionated. Before the most non-political, non-confrontational person he had ever met, the events in America were reshaping her into someone he no longer recognized. He found the transformation distasteful, but sought to understand anyway. Ray’s death had silenced her, he figured, but that was only on the outside. Who knew what was lurking below the surface. She had to deal with this too, he told himself. Maybe this was only her way of screaming out.

Gabriel was, of course, well acquainted with screams in his own right. Around the time that Jesse broke her silence, his dreams began. The dank, macabre nature of the scenes convinced him they were about the war. They had to be some kind of psychological manifestation of Vietnam, or so he thought: the constant gloom casting a pall over the nation, the endless arena of killing and death splashing across the TV screen each night, or simply the regret he felt about not going. He felt shame that he had not been killed like Ray, or his father. He once considered the forests in his dreams to be a physical suggestion of the jungle in Vietnam, enveloping him in his guilt. But now he was not so certain. These woods were not like a jungle at all. They were more like something from a bizarre Grimm’s fairy tale. Besides, he had never actually seen any jungle, and certainly, there could be no wolves in the ‘Nam. Not like those, at any rate.

And what of the cryptic word still on his lips each morning? Winehandler? What was that? He whispered the phrase over and over as he sifted through dictionaries, seeking its elusive meaning. Was it a self-indictment of his progressive drinking? He thought about it. But the notion seemed silly and did not add up.

What Gabriel feared was that the combination of the booze and the dreams had permanently eroded his cognitive balance. This was the same process, he imagined, that finally consumed his mother, and he was cosmologically bound, somehow, to accept a similar fate. He was less sure of himself now than he had ever been, even as a shy child, for along with his reason, he was losing the one thing he could not, Jesse. He had to do something to alter the course of events, but as he sat on the edge of the bed that morning, he could not guess what. He was late for work.

In the hopes of finding something to stimulate his failing appetite, he staggered downstairs. He absent-mindedly glanced in the living room at Jesse’s grandfather clock. It was silent, weights hanging limp at either side, its pendulum, motionless. In the den the ogee clock on the mantle was similarly unwound, static.

What time is it? He wanted to shout the question to the walls. Then, he remembered the man’s peculiar inquisition in the dream. I say sir might I inquire as to the time? He could still see the warped face and the thought made him shudder. His heart shifted gears in his chest. Maybe there was a link, but he was sick of making connections.

Hoping to hear the time, he reached down and turned on the television. Perhaps The Good Morning Show was still on. A local program of basic news and features, it was nothing fancy, just some friendly banter with which to soak up your coffee. Gabriel and Jesse enjoyed watching it in better times. Instead, it was the war again, on every channel. Everybody was a prisoner of this war, he thought, there was no escaping the thing: commentators ranting, morning, noon and night, eternal combat footage, Cambodia, Nixon, Kissinger, and now, who was it? Westmoreland? Did they not retire this guy? Guess not, for here he was, face plastered across the screen, wavy lines notwithstanding. His eyes were lean and cool, his fatigues sharply pressed. Still he was singing the praises of those infamous attrition reports. How could such allegedly sharp men lay such ill-conceived plans? Was it all lies? Who could you believe anymore? Was hope itself irredeemable? He grabbed a piece of toast and left the house.

As he drove out that morning, Gabriel reflected on the measure of his indifference to the world around him. His tardiness on the job had become commonplace in recent months, which in of itself was a curiosity, for work was the one place where he felt comfortable. But no longer did he care, even for that. His appearance had grown quite shabby. He seldom cut his hair or shaved anymore. It was wholly out of character, but he now found himself wearing the same clothes for days at a time. This was from the kid who was once voted neatest in his senior class.

As he looked out at the bright morning through the faded windshield of his 1953 Ford pickup, he remembered how autumn used to be his favorite time of year. The seasons were clearly changing in western North Carolina, but he had barely noticed. How he loved the smell, the feel, and the simple moods of the harvest: the crackling sound of tumbling leaves in a brisk wind, the glimmer of frost on the ground on a sunny morning, the sight of pumpkins by a roadside stand, the luminescent glory of an enormous moon, dominating the evening skies as if the Lord Himself had examined the annual yield of the soil, pronounced it good, and such was the sign of His pleasure.

Gabriel was numb to it all. He wanted to be moved, to respond positively to beauty once more, to touch, to sensation, and to experience. But no resistance remained. The icy fingers of chance held their imperceptible grasp upon him and as a result all he knew and loved was being ripped to pieces. He believed himself somehow to be perishing in increments. He imagined that his soul, the basic essence of all we are, or could ever possibly be, was eroding like a sandcastle at high tide. He was in the fight of his life.

As he drove up to the work site, he found the Caterpillar in the same place he left it following the previous day’s dispute. He parked the truck and exhaled deeply, like an ancient zephyr sweeping across the land. It would be nice to have an uneventful morning, but such a thing was unlikely and he knew it. Gabriel was a good worker, unique in his abilities, but his problems off site, with Jesse and with the drinking, had brought the ire of the diminutive foreman of U.W. Garrett Construction and Grading, the outfit where each had worked for over six years. His name was Amos Bright, and just yesterday morning, like every morning as of late, he faced a big problem: how to make up for lost time due to bad weather. Amos was one of those guys who delighted in every misfortune except for his own, and he tended to prey on Gabriel’s. He was a small man with an unusual ambulation, short and very swift, like a bird on the shoreline running from the surf. It made you chuckle to watch him. But he had a soul chipped and knapped like flint; hewn to such an edge that he cut you on occasion. He barked loud and often, like a tiny Chihuahua dog, which could intimidate in no other way.

Can’t blame the weatherman, Gabriel said, won’t change anything. This was true enough, even to Amos. So instead, he blamed Gabriel. The impugnment that followed was, as usual, accompanied by a pompous display of the man’s chief personality trait: a tirade of curses suitable to peel the paint off the large earthmovers and bulldozers that were the chief assets of the business.

The altercation was typical. For some unexplained reason, Amos halted Gabriel in mid-task. Some newly formed maledictions were expressed, to Gabriel’s never-ending dismay, but to the delight of his two favorite co-workers: a local partisan hippie called Roscoe, who was Lexington’s chief spokesman for the coming Age of Aquarius, and his constant companion, Spread, a melancholic black man given to large meals and fits of spontaneous crooning. The two of them stood behind Amos during the tirade, spoofing his every move, Roscoe mocking his edicts and Spread gesturing in mimicry. The disagreement seemed arbitrary to Gabriel, as it normally did, and he was not entirely sure what Amos was talking about amid the profanity. He figured it pointless, a waste of more time; nevertheless, he shut down his engine to listen. As he did, it began to drizzle and they each looked up at the dark clouds gathering with an ominous presence. No further discussion was needed. In seconds, the rain picked up and Amos waddled off in rhetorical anguish. Roscoe and Spread could not resist the urge to point finger pistols at Gabriel and fire.

You know what they say, Bright the Slight, said Roscoe. Gabriel forced a smile, then set the brake and got down. They were washed out again.

The Cat looked differently now in the rarity of the bright, golden landscape. As he climbed up he noticed that the sun had warmed it to the touch. He could hear the distinctive clatter of the company’s machines as he sat down. Somewhere in the remote distance everybody was already working. He thought about announcing himself as present, driving over the ridge and waving his arms or something. But he did not want any hassle from Amos, so he decided it best to get moving. He started the motor.

The sound and the rumble of the great engine always soothed Gabriel. He even smiled slightly at the dragon-like belch of the muffler. Since childhood, when Hap had first introduced him to the noise, he loved to feel the power. He thought it amazing that he could appreciate both the resonance of a fine musical instrument and the growling vibration of such enormous machines, which had been known to sometimes collapse towering embankments of earth and bury workers underneath. Eager to engage the blade, he proceeded to head for large grove of cedars, imagining them to be the dark forests of his dreams and he was briskly removing them from the planet.

Gabriel represented the third generation in his family to toil in the ancient tradition of moving and molding the earth in the name of progress. The lore of highway construction was not new of course. It went back over five thousand years, to the dawn of history. The Egyptians employed thousands of laborers, sweating and straining, to build roads to connect their empire. Not to be outdone, the Romans constructed such durable thoroughfares that many were still in use in the present day.

In a sense, Gabriel knew that the building of roads was the story of America too. He knew the importance of the machines preceding the giant diesel landmovers he drove, beginning with the horse-drawn dragscraper, which was used in the grading and maintenance of roads in colonial times. The indelible Ames shovels, so superior in design that they made all previous earth moving equipment obsolete, were responsible for the digging of the Erie Canal, which was the engineering marvel of its age. He knew about the Marion steamshovel and the Holt machines with their ingenious track units and how they started a revolution in road design by the turn of the century. He knew about these things because his uncle, Hap, taught them to him, reciting them almost gospel-like, every evening as he tinkered with the massive engines.

The Browers were a part of that long tradition. Gabriel’s grandfather had worked on the construction of old US route 70 back in the 1920s, using a Caterpillar 60 gasburner. Hap, whose expertise was limited to three subjects: bluegrass music, bulldozers and molasses, was involved on the Alcan highway during World War II, which ran all the way to Fairbanks, Alaska.

Greatest earthmoving project since the Panama Canal, he would boast, unusual for a man of his quiet modesty. Now, U.W. Garrett had contracted for a cloverleaf section of the new interstate, I-85, which was to intersect with old NC highway 8. Gabriel was content to embrace the ritual and continue the tradition.

But the sweetness of the autumn air and the scent of the newly turned earth had little effect on him now. The ghoulish tenacity by which the apparitions accompanied his every thought made him feel more like a butcher than a builder. No longer was he a harbinger of progress, but a prophet of some apocalyptic doom. He could detect this in his bones and winced at the sounds of destruction as the massive blade ripped and gouged the earth, the freshly spilled red clay instantly evoking the image of blood. He even imagined that he heard the land itself groaning in lamentation beneath the roar of the thunderous diesel.

Then something did convulse below him, crying with the wail of a living thing, shocked and astonished at its own death. Gabriel looked about, suddenly aware of the wrenching and heaving of somnolent life, rising, untouched and undisturbed for countless centuries. But there was more.

No, he thought, grimacing. This can’t be here…now. He looked up at the sunlight as if it had betrayed him and listened in disbelief as the noise sounded all about him, and he knew.

Oh Lord help me! Gabriel cried out, although he was certain no one could hear him. Something was speaking, in very low tones at first, and then, Winehandler, it appeared to say.

He hit the clutch and froze. The Cat came to a sudden halt. He found himself shaking and it was not from the vibrations. He listened intently. He did hear this. Didn’t he? Or had he truly gone over the edge?

The unexpected lunge of fear came upon him so fast that he hardly noticed the lone figure running up from the distance. It was Amos, little legs flying, arms waving, ranting as usual. It was obvious he was shouting something directly to Gabriel, so he killed the engine.

After a few seconds the din gradually subsided and he began to understand what Amos was bellowing about. He thought he said something like the word cemetery. This, of course, was nothing new to a construction company. Family plots were fairly scattered all over the Old North State, but nobody said anything about one being here.

Gabriel rose up in his seat and looked around. What? He said, quite befuddled. I don’t see nothing.

Well, look, said Amos, Look right in front of you. He pointed with a stubby finger and then turned, hands on hips. Now you really done it, he said accusingly. Gabriel got down from the Cat, just as Roscoe and Spread drove up and got out, instantly aware of the commotion.

Land O’ Goshen, said Spread. Must be thirty of ‘em.

Forty, I bet, Roscoe amended the estimate as he fondled the well-worn roach clip he was known for.

How do you know? Amos squinted in the glare of morning sunlight. They’re busted up and scattered all over God knows where.

Gabriel staggered forward and witnessed the broken pieces of weathered slate and soapstone all about the dozer’s path. He spied the remnants of an old woven wire fence hopelessly tangled around the blade. A terrible sickness came over him, unlike the nausea of his dreams. This was an incomprehensible feeling of rot, of disintegration. He felt faint but still bore the presence of mind to ask, hoarsely. Are any of them… left intact?

Sure don’t look like it, said Amos in frustration. You beat everything Brower. He took off his cap and scratched his head. I told you over there, he said pointing across the way.

You did? Gabriel looked at Roscoe and Spread, who responded with a quick roll of the eyes as if to say not to worry.

Alright then fan out, look around, Amos commanded. See if you can find anything…with a name on it.

Naw, Spread recoiled, stepping back as if to make a run for it.

What?

Naw, he said. Might be skeletons. He looked around at Roscoe, then at Amos. Don’t want to see no skeletons, now.

You’ll look if I tell you, Amos’ voice rose slightly. Everybody braced for another eruption. Roscoe you make him look, he said.

Gabriel noticed at this point that Roscoe himself was temporarily distracted. Do you smell that? He asked, picking his nose with the roach clip. Somebody up there is cooking catfish. Oh man, it’s been a long time since I’ve smelled something like that.

What? Amos and Gabriel spoke simultaneously.

Catfish, he said. I’d know that smell anyplace. He scratched the grimy bit of stubble at the edge of his chin and chuckled. I’d know it if I was as dead as these folks here.

If you don’t get looking you’re going to be as dead as these folks here, Amos snarled.

Alright, Roscoe sighed and started forward reluctantly. Man this always creeps me out.

They squished all about in the red mud, seeing little but rubble, occasionally finding a piece of marker with writing. But these were faint and indecipherable. Gabriel’s movements were slow, for he trembled so that he could barely put one foot in front of the other. He imagined something far worse than skeletons emerging from the disordered muck. Something was going to happen here. He could sense it.

Spread apparently noticed the oddity in Gabriel’s demeanor and the uncertainty in his steps. He walked over along side him. Them wolves a-going at you again? He whispered.

Gabriel shook his head. The only people he could truly talk to these days were Roscoe and Spread. He had told them about the dreams, the liquor, how he felt about Ray, the war and Jesse, especially Jesse. So there was an ease of discussion with them.

They just keep coming and coming, he said. I think I’m losing it. Gabriel was scarcely intelligible.

Spread, who had gained his nickname because of his obvious girth, felt a kind of kinship with Gabriel, perhaps born of tragedy, for he had lost a son in Vietnam. He spoke with a soothing empathy.

That’s ‘ole man liquor talking, he said as he walked Gabriel around like an invalid. You hang in there G, don’t worry ‘bout this here. They each looked at the ruins. You know it happens. He licked his lips. But I got to be in agreement with you this time. He continued looking at the mess. I don’t like this at all, no sir.

At different times in recent weeks, both Spread and Roscoe had intervened for Gabriel when Amos attempted to get him fired, or at least reprimanded in some way. They talked with U.W. and had become Gabriel’s counselors and mediators, never failing to lift his spirits. But even they could not help him now.

As he and Spread inched forward they heard Roscoe call out. Found one! They silently backtracked to the spot, which was practically underneath the blade of Gabriel’s machine. The marker was covered with the red mud, but seemed to be intact. They hurried toward it.

Turn it over, Gabriel said nervously, unsure if he truly wanted to see the inscription and wondering what possible difference it would make if he did. Easy, he spoke as if contemplating the placement of a grand piano. Be careful with it.

It took all of them to pry the thing from the ground where Gabriel had run over it, and they held it up like a relic of old. Brush the mud off! Brush it off! he said, feeling an unnatural surge of something like adrenaline. Spread squatted down and used an old handkerchief to carefully wipe away the mud. They all crouched beside him as vultures over their provender and watched his large hands move across the weathered stone as if he was applying brushstrokes to a painting.

Suddenly Gabriel stood up and backed off hurriedly. What’s the matter with you now? said Amos, looking up.

You alright there G? Spread called to him.

No response.

Gabriel!

Hey Gabriel! Roscoe shouted also, mouth open in bewilderment. But again, Gabriel did not reply.

So they stood and watched him as he left the scene in full flight, then silently turned about to read and ponder the inscription that had caused his retreat:

William Kinney

Born 1733

Scotland

Fired the First Shot in the

Battle of Guilford Courthouse

March 15, 1781

Died 1821

His Wife

Sallie Parks

She watched the deliberate strokes of the brush across her nail as she awaited her mother’s response. In a weak effort to conceal her annoyance, she pantomimed a deferential expression, but the bluff was unsuccessful and taken precisely for what it was. The soft blue of her mother’s eyes was replaced with a scorching white heat, and the resulting stare burned like fire. There always seemed to be a sacred bond between the two of them, but now an essential ingredient was conspicuously absent. Amid the stifling atmosphere of fingernail polish permeating the room, Jesse recognized what it was. Simple really, she thought, perhaps devastating in its consequence, but quite simple. It was faith. Her faith in her mother’s advice was gone; misplaced, somehow, like everything else in her life, the way someone might misplace car keys, or their wallet. Funny, as soon as she realized the loss, Jesse found herself hoping that the trust could be retrieved, found again, the way you find lost pennies scattered under the cushions of the living room sofa.

After what seemed like hours, her mother finally averted her eyes and cleared her throat. Jesse braced herself for the onslaught. You must never tell anybody the real reason, you know, she said.

Reason for what? Jesse asked, although she knew exactly to what her mother alluded. It was a common game she played when the conversation took an uncomfortable turn and Jesse could not summon an appropriate response.

You know, the secret…why you’re leaving him. If you ever actually do, she wiped her nose, a sure sign of aggravation. If word ever got out about…you know, the drinking and his mother and all, well I don’t know what I would do. Jesse, people will talk.

Mama, she said in wonderment. Does everything have to be about you? She imagined the sound of glass crashing. Don’t you care that I’ve got a stake in this, too. I mean whose life are we discussing?

Secrecy my dear, she said, ignoring the question. If the conversation is one-sided, it’s because you’re so secretive about everything. Maybe I only talk about me because I don’t have any real idea what’s up with you. How about that? She smirked a big one.

Jesse looked down at her nails and held out her hand in examination. I just need to make a decision, Mama, she said, changing tactics, and I can’t quite get on with it.

There were truly no words to express the divisions she felt, but still, she forced an explanation. I feel like I need to be alone for awhile, to sort things out, but I still have these feelings, like I sort of…well…need him. She wasn’t sure if need was the proper word and started to retract it, but let it stand.

Her mother stared at her and then gestured with the small brush, pointing it like a baton for instruction. Decision? Your decision has already been made, she said flatly. You made it five years ago when you married the boy.

Jesse hated to be scolded, least of all from her mother, and she did not like Gabriel being referred to as a boy. She jerked her hand back, her face unable to disguise the hurt. She understood then, that she did not want her mother’s advice, but only her sympathy, as if sympathy alone could ease the pain of the uncertainty she faced. Somewhere in the distant, seldom explored contours of her mind, she sought a solution. She imagined that if her steadfast, unyielding mother, she of the haute fashion-sense and the Mary Tyler Moore hairdo, she upon whom the entire community relied, could only commiserate with her, just a tiny bit, then things might not seem so bad. Instead, her mother only glared at her and put the brush back in the bottle. Jesse got up to get more Kleenex.

Let me ask you this, Jess. Her voice changed slightly for effect. Has Gabriel ever once been unfaithful? Has he ever not provided for you? She hesitated. Has he ever hit you?

The last inquiry caused her to look up abruptly, but she said nothing. What was the use? They both knew the answers, just as they anticipated the questions. The on-going polemic between them solved nothing. Her mother implied that she should resent the very thought of leaving Gabriel, that such a course of action should be inconceivable, but Jesse could not help but consider it, and she felt silly for falling into her mother’s verbal snare.

For Anne Shelton, all this talk of leaving and going out on your own was nonsense. Now was the time to clench your teeth, dig in your fingernails, polished and all, and hold on with all of your might. This was her daughter, after all. It was her family, her neighborhood. She could not leave this alone, nor would she. The lecture continued.

If I can put up with what I’ve had to with the linchpin in there, her eyes rolled towards her father’s study, then you can put up with Gabriel and his… flights of fancy. You can’t go on living with one foot in the door and one out.

Jesse was used to the scathing ring of her voice, but she hated to hear her father spoken of in such a way. Her mother could be wildly hyperbolic at times, calling people this and that, and giving credence to any number of ridiculous scenarios. It was rare, however, for Jesse to be the object of her arraignment. Ray was always the one who got the lectures and the discipline. He was the mischievous one. He was the troublemaker. Yet he was so good-natured and genuinely funny that her mother would end up laughing at him before any lecture was complete and resulting sentence pronounced. On the other hand, Jesse routinely did what her parents asked and was eager to please, which was the principal reason, she figured, for her mother’s wrath now. There were seldom any grounds previously for her to be upset.

With each exchange between the two of them, Jesse’s mind began to drift, as it often did in recent weeks, and she found herself casually looking away. In doing so she could not help but glimpse the family portrait, which hung in the hallway adjacent to the kitchen. As she listened to the acerbic rant, she sank as if in a slumber and returned to the day when the photograph was taken. She remembered the time quite well. It was back in high school, just before she started dating Gabriel. She studied the faces closely. Each of them appeared immaculately dressed and groomed, not the least of which was her mother. She recalled how Ray threw his voice like a ventriloquist that day. He made it seem as if the camera itself mocked the photographer’s every word. The hapless fellow became so flustered he could hardly complete the process. She and her mother giggled through the entire sitting, and the resulting image showed the amusement. The portrait revealed, in every visible way at least, a typical family, if not a perfect one.

Everything about the house and its contents conveyed the same impression. All was about neatness and control, from the meticulous shopping lists attached to the refrigerator door, to the inflexible passions lining the walls of her mother’s heart. But beneath the splendid appearance of things at 612 Beck’s Church Road, Jesse knew there were issues. They hung thick in the air like the stench of decay. The symptoms were honest confusion and paralyzing grief, both traceable to the death of their beloved Ray.

Perhaps the greatest transformation occurred in her mother, that most immutable of souls. In an arrangement that shocked Jesse and her father, she started keeping pets. There was nothing subtle about this. Animals were expressly forbidden in the house before, but since the funeral, she developed a peculiar attachment for a monkey, of all things. She called the little menace Romeo, and cooed and whispered to it like a baby. Next, after deciding that Romeo needed company, she purchased a strangely obese mynah bird named Doris.

Who ever heard of a fat bird, Jesse would hear her father grumbling to himself. Look at that thing, Anne, it’s got a regular beer belly. Weeks went by and months became years, but neither could get used to the new inmates.

Anne Shelton also cultivated an interest in genealogy, the results of which were paraded about like some farcical sideshow. After doing a considerable amount of reading and studying, she discovered a randomly suitable Confederate antecedent, a Captain Randolph something or other, on her father’s side. The captain had died a singularly unheroic death from dysentery, or some other ailment of the bowels, but that did not trouble her. They brought him home from Virginia early in 1862, she said, and laid him to rest at Beck’s Churchyard, not far from where Ray was buried.

The connection was not lost on her. She placed a UDC certificate beside Ray’s service picture, his ribbons, and badges, acknowledging the association between Captain Randolph and their present family. The Civil War theme continued with the gray Confederate suit she made for Romeo, and Doris’ incessant whistling of Dixie, performed in the same off key manner as her master.

Not to be outdone, Jesse’s father displayed his own brand of curious behavior. Miles Shelton was devoted to his wife, despite her domineering nature. Sometimes, in fact, he appeared blindly obedient to her every whim. Yet he lived quite a life of his own. He was originally a tobacco auctioneer and, like what one might expect from such a person, spoke with an accelerated, musical inflection. Jesse loved to go with him to auctions as a child. She remembered so well the taste of a ham sandwich and a cold grape soda on those long days with her father. She could almost hear the sound of his magical voice yet, echoing off the walls, crying the bid to an attentive audience.

His cadence still rose and fell, but only when excited would he spout sentences with his old rapidity. In the years before Ray went to Vietnam, Miles took a job with RJ Reynolds Tobacco in Winston-Salem and had seen a great deal of the world in the bargain. As RJR went global, he traveled on business to exotic locales in Europe, Asia, and even South America. Upon each return, he dazzled the family with presents and details of the things he had seen. The house, to this day, was filled with trinkets from every corner of the earth, relics from those distant years abroad, now facing the fabled dust cloths of Anne Shelton.

His withdrawal came after Ray’s death and the subsequent discovery of a box of passionate love letters from someone named M. Roquefort in New Orleans. The letters, all signed, affectionately, Millie, and addressed to Reynolds Tobacco, were discovered by Jesse’s mother on one of her many cleaning jaunts. A furious quarrel went on for several months, never satisfactorily concluded. Then it seemed like there was nothing more to be said. The proclamation of silence was sullen and vicious, lasting for years.

Jesse’s parents now merely co-existed, locked in a sort of symbiotic death grip, uncertain who was the parasite and who was the host. Her father spent his time in the study pursuing, like her mother, what should have been a normal hobby, metastasized into manic obsession. Numismatics commanded his thoughts and energies the way his family once did. Viewing coins with one eye under a fluorescent magnifier had given him a disagreeable leer, which made Jesse uncomfortable when around him. A progressively worsening cough, the result of three packs a day for forty years, and of telling the whole world that Winston tastes good like a cigarette should, was the only sound to be heard from his lair. Mostly he just seemed tired and too worn out to converse about anything save his precious coins. All of his spirit and vitality had passed. The jocularity, the affection, everything she had once taken for granted, was long gone, vanished. To Jesse, it was sometimes scarcely conceivable that this man was once the object of her undying worship.

It was his coughing that interrupted her mother’s lecture and brought Jesse back to the moment. She watched her cringe with every convulsion.

It’s getting worse, she whispered, although there was little chance he could hear her over his repetitive spasms. He still does it you know, she continued. I can smell it on his clothes. The man had never been allowed to smoke in the house, of course, so sneaking a few outside the garage was not a great change.

My lands, it’s going to kill him yet, She grabbed the comet cleanser and proceeded to scrub the sink, a nervous habit. You know what that General Surgeon says about it, don’t you?

Jesse smiled, amused at her mother’s inversion of the man’s title. Surgeon General, Mama, She corrected her. We all know how bad it is for him.

Causes cancer. Her mother said, firmly.

Jesse averted her attention from the penetrating gaze that coincided with that particular tone. Her mother clearly recognized that she had ignored most of the morning’s discourse, and each intuitively understood what was coming next.

What am I standing here talking to you for, huh? She said.

Jesse shifted her posture and attempted to prepare herself for the next volley.

You haven’t heard a word I’ve said, have you? It was a favorite expression. Jesse said nothing initially, then, as she started to reply, she was interrupted.

You’re still going to Maggie’s every night, aren’t you? Another salvo. She wiped her nose again.

Jesse, it’s just not right, you know.

She could hold it back no longer. I know it’s not right, Mama! Jesse yelled back, surprising herself with the volume of her voice. Nothing’s right anymore. The dam burst. I think I should leave him, make a clean break, get my life back in order, but I just can’t.

Her words trailed off and she hesitated. But then, other times…I think that I could never…. She felt a tear stream down her face and felt embarrassed that her emotions were not all that had spilled.

Maggie’s just…well you know what Maggie is…what that’s about. Now they both wiped their noses. Its just not a simple decision either way, said Jesse. I mean…whatever happened to simplicity, Mama? Is nothing simple anymore?

Her mother drew a deep breath, revealing an expression of sorrow that Jesse had not remembered seeing, even at the funeral. I don’t know, honey, she said, as she got up to get a pitcher of water from the refrigerator. Does he still play you the song? She asked as she poured a glass.

Hmm? Jesse stalled, realizing precisely to what she alluded.

You know what I mean, her mother smiled purposely. That lamentation song.

Jesse did not respond.

Honey, the whole thing is not normal, her mother continued. You don’t talk to each other, you don’t live with each other, God knows, you don’t even look at each other. She tapped her finger on the counter.

You spend every night camping out at Maggie’s and the only communication you have is when he plays the song. He plays and you cry, that’s it.

So that’s what it has come to, Jesse thought. That’s all that remains. A song. It troubled her in a way she had not previously felt, but she knew her mother was right. The song kept her holding on to Gabriel for some strange purpose. Something about the haunting tune spoke to her in a way few things could. It was called Munro’s Lament and was just an old folk piece Gabriel liked to play sometimes, nothing more. But when Jesse did a little investigating about the song, she discovered that its ancient lyrics were about war and young men dying. When will they ever learn, Jesse thought. The lyrics might have, in retrospect, represented any war, or any generation of youth, but for Jesse, not only were they personal and poignant, they were so very timely. She soon found herself singing the words as Gabriel played. Never more, never more, never more returning, the song repeatedly said, teasingly, an eternal lament over lost youth. As the balls fly by and our boys fall down and the crimson powder’s burning, Young Johnny Munro, Young Johnny Munro, is never more returning. The lyrics penetrated through thousands of years of civilization, denoting the inherent human incapability in each and every epoch to avoid the horrific mistakes of the previous one.

Jesse mouthed over the lyrics for a moment. The words lured you, with each stanza producing a more profound result. They seemed to be directed to her and the actual circumstances of her life, especially