Crockett of Tennessee Read online

  The spirit rising inside David was ugly and vicious—but yielding to it was far too gratifying for him to resist it. “You make me sick to the pit of my stomach, Persius! I regret the day I talked you into joining this army—I never thought I’d see a man pleasure himself with killing and dying the way you have here! Bloody hell, you’re no better than any savage yourself!” David was too wrought up to realize that, having just chastised Persius for having been too eager to avoid war and slaughter to begin with, he now condemned him for having become too fond of them. It was very nearly a contradiction, but it passed unnoticed.

  “Don’t you preach to me, Crockett! God! I seen you do your share of killing, and I didn’t see no tears in your eyes for the savages you laid low!”

  David jutted out his chin and shoved his face close to Persius’s. “At least I didn’t kill my own kind, half-breed! You ain’t no better than a savage because you are a savage! Half your blood is redskin blood! Ain’t nothing to marvel at, what you did at Mims! The savages was as much your own kind as them they butchered!”

  “You lie! You lie like hell!”

  David’s steam grew even hotter. “I’ll tell you what I’m saying, Persius Tarr!” He yelled the last name, and looked at the men gathered around. “That’s right—his name is Tarr, not Campbell. He’s a half-blood Creek his own self, the bastard son of a trader and a squaw! I heard it straight from the mouth of John Haynes, who knew Persius Tarr’s pap in his Injun trading days! This half-breed here watched women and children murdered at Fort Mims, and he’s killed his own people here today!” David reached out, yanked the gorget from around Persius’s neck and held it high. “See that? He took it off a dead woman who might have been his own granny, for all he knows! That’s the kind of man Persius Tarr is! He’s a savage, and he comes by it fair and square! But he don’t just kill redskins. He kills white folk too—he’s wanted for murder in Jefferson County!”

  Persius roared and drew out a knife. He made a lunge for David, but others stepped in and grabbed him, wrenching the knife from his hands.

  “Let me go, damn you!” Persius shouted, struggling vainly. “He’s a damned liar! I ain’t no redskin!”

  “It’s you who are the liar, Persius,” David said. “If anybody doubts the truth of what I’m saying, let them ask Haynes! Yes sir, you’ve lied aplenty in your time. You’ve lied here about your name, and you’re lying about the blood in your own veins! And tell me this, Persius: Were you lying too about them men who threw you into that cave along the Clinch River? You said you let them be, but that ain’t the truth, is it? You killed them, that’s what you did—and it was the killing of them that shook you so bad you tried to turn Quaker … ain’t that it? I can see from your face that it is. You—a Quaker! Pshaw! You weren’t fit on your best day to touch the boots of a good Quaker like old John Canaday! You’re naught but a murderer, a liar, a half-breed bush baby who’s carried sorrow and trouble with him everywhere he’s gone. You’re a—”

  Persius jerked free from those who held him and pounded David hard in the jaw. David fell back and Persius threw himself atop him, hammering blow after blow against David’s face and head until the others managed to pull him off. David had been beaten into a stupor. By now the hubbub had attracted two officers, and after a moment of interrogation of the witnesses, all of whom soundly blamed Persius Tarr for the trouble, Persius was placed under arrest, his hands tied behind him.

  Hunger made David’s stomach rumble. Supplies had not reached the camp, so the men were on half rations tonight and suffering for it. But not David Crockett. He hardly noticed his emptiness, nor even the pain of his bruised face. His suffering was of a different and far more severe kind.

  He walked up to the weary-looking sentinel posted outside a little tent at the edge of camp. Bleary-eyed, the guard looked back at David, whiskered lips downturned, shoulders stooped. “What you want?”

  “I want to see the prisoner.”

  “Can’t do that. Orders. He’s to be kept alone until he’s took back to Jefferson County. He kilt a man there, y’see.”

  “Yes. I know.” David made a quick spy all around. “Look here, I really need to see him. If you’ll let me, I’ll give you …” He faltered unable to think of anything to offer.

  “‘Give me what?” From the man’s expression and tone, his openness to bribery was evident.

  “Give you …” David reached into his pocket and pulled out a dollar coin. “… this. It’s the best I can offer.”

  He knew the man wouldn’t accept such a low payment for such a risky transgression of duty, and began to turn away. The fellow surprised him by grasping his arm, taking the coin, and nodding him into the tent.

  Persius was chained to a deeply rooted post inside the tent. He looked up at David silently. No feature moved except one corner of his lip, which twitched spasmodically when his gaze met David’s. The tent roof was so low that David had to crouch on the balls of his feet, which put him uncomfortably eye-to-eye with Persius.

  “Persius, I’m …” David winced; the words he was going to say sounded so hollow and futile.

  “You look a sight,” Persius said. “I pounded you up right good.”

  “I don’t care about that. I earned the beating. Persius, I’m … I’m sorry. God, I’m sorry. I don’t know why I did it. All them words just came tumbling out, and I don’t know from where. I don’t know how I could have done that to you.”

  “I do. You did it because you hate me.” Persius spoke very matter-of-factly.

  “Hate you? Lord, no! Persius, you been my friend since I first knew you. I don’t hate you. Couldn’t, if I wanted.”

  It astonished David that Persius didn’t even look angry, not even sad. Just resigned. David would have preferred fury to this. Persius shook his head slowly. “Maybe you ain’t hated me before, but you sure enough hated me today. David, I’ve sat here in this tent and thunk on the subject of hating, and I’ve ciphered it out. Take me. I hate Injuns. Purely hate ’em—and I’ve never really tried to figure why. Best I can come up with is it’s because I got Injun blood in me, and it’s like a black mark or some such, holding me back from ever being what I could be if my mother had been a white woman. I hate the Injun blood in myself, but I can’t get rid of it. So it just makes me hate other Injuns, just for reminding me of what’s in my own veins. That’s the long and short of it. I hate Injuns because I hate myself.”

  “But I don’t hate you, Persius. God above, if I hated you I wouldn’t feel so regretful at how I got you in such a fix here. Out there today, it was like something in me just steaming and burning and making me say things I didn’t mean. It was … I don’t know. The way you talked about that poor little Creek boy … it made me mad. Kicked-dog mad. And so I just lit in on you.”

  Persius nodded. This time his tone was slightly sharper, definitely more intense. “You was mad at me because the same thing you seen in me, the thing that made you despise me, was in you too. Don’t look at me that way—you know it’s the truth. I saw you put your rifle ball through that old woman right along with the rest of us. And right on with the rest of us you shot them warriors inside that house she had guarded. Shot ’em like they was rats in a barrel. It’s like I’ve got it figured about the Injun blood: I hate Injuns because they remind you of me, and out there today you hated me because I remind you of you. That’s the truth and you know it.”

  David wanted to protest this, but there was no spirit left in him. Maybe Persius was right. Blast it all, he was right, hard though it was to face it. When he had turned on Persius, he was turning on the ugly side of his own nature.

  Persius was in a philosophical frame of mind. “David, let me tell you a thing or two just for what it’s worth, and while I’ve got the chance. You were right, what you said about them two on the Clinch River. I did find them and kill them after I crawled out of that bone cave. Cut the old one’s throat, and threw the young one in alive like they’d done me—though I tied him up first so he couldn�
��t get out. They was the first human lives I’d ever took, and it ate at me for a long time. You were right too about that being the reason I tried to turn Quaker.” Persius chuckled heartlessly. “That is a caution to think about, huh? Persius Tarr, a Quaker! Hell, I’ll never be good enough to be a Quaker or nothing else that’s decent. You’re right about me, David. Everything you said out there, it was true. And you know what? When I killed Crider Cummings, maybe it was murder. Sure, he come at me first, but even if he hadn’t, I probably would have killed him, just to get him out of my hair. I reckon I’ve got a murderer’s heart. So when they hang me back in Jefferson County, it won’t be nothing I ain’t earned fair and square. You can ease your conscience on that one.”

  David fingered his hair, shifting and posturing in ways that made obvious his rising anguish. “This is my fault … I’ll go to the officers and tell them I was wrong, that you ain’t really wanted for any murder. I’ll tell them I made it all up in anger over some past card game or woman … they’ll let you go then.”

  “Too late for that. They rousted out another couple of soldiers here who had lived in Jefferson County before. They knew all about Persius Tarr and backed up what you had said. And that John Haynes told them I was the spitting image of old Mick Tarr the Injun trader. There was no point in denying the truth after that. I admitted it to them.”

  “You admitted to murdering Crider Cummings? Lord a’mercy, Persius, that was a fool thing to—”

  “No, no. I admitted to being Persius Tarr, that’s all. That’s all. They want to hang me, they’ll have to convict me first. And before they convict me, they’ll have to keep me.” He paused, eyes shifting, glittering meaningfully—and for a second David was back in Greer’s store in Greene Courthouse, looking at the face of a swarthy little orphan boy freshly brought to town by John Crockett so he could be bound out through the Orphan Court. Suddenly David understood. Persius intended to escape. The comprehension gave him a wild, boyish thrill. Escape! That was the answer for Persius … and for David Crockett. If Persius got away, then there would be no removal to Jefferson County, no trial, no hanging. David’s conscience could be left in peace.

  The conversation from here out took place in even softer whispers. “But how, Persius? They’ve got you under guard.”

  “Guards can be bribed—as you being in here suffices to show. Or they can be conked on the head.”

  “You’re chained. How will you get out?”

  “The guard has the key. And from time to time he has to take me out to the woods for a piss or a squat. I’ll find my chance.”

  An idea came. David reached into his pocket and pulled out the old silver piece.

  “Here … bribe him with this. Tell him it’s Creek silver, just part of a whole potful you found during the fight today. Tell him that if he’ll let you go, you can take him to where the rest is hid. Then lead him off just west of camp, down in that little hollow beneath the sandy bluff. I’ll be there to help you. I’ll go there soon as it’s dark. We’ll get you loose, Persius, or I’ll give my life trying. I owe it to you, for it’s my fault you’re here.”

  “Well, to large measure, I reckon it is. Of course, the life I’ve lived has contributed its share to my situation too.” Persius grinned. “Thank you, Davy. I ought to break your neck for what you’ve done, but I’ve never been able to hold a grudge on you for nothing, whether it’s gathering a crowd to watch me poot worms, or trying to put my neck in a Jefferson County noose. I swear, one of these days you’ll be the death of me, Crockett!”

  “Don’t say that,” David replied. “It ain’t funny. And Persius—no matter how you’ve got it figured, or what trouble my big mouth has got you into, I don’t hate you. If I hated you today, it was stirred-up feelings causing it, and that’s all. And I’ll prove I don’t hate you by helping you get away from here safe and sound. Tonight. I promise.”

  He went to the tent flap and whispered to the bribed guard that he wanted to slip out now. A few moments later the guard hissed the all-clear and David exited and left Persius alone.

  Encumbered by his chains, Persius worked open the little pouch and removed the silver nugget. Closing it in his fist, he gave it a little squeeze for luck, and held it while keeping his eye on the base of the tent flap, waiting for daylight to fade. After it, was dark he counted off the minutes until an hour was gone by, and called out: “Guard! You going to stand around there until a man’s beshat his own britches? I need to go to the woods, and quick.”

  Gruffly the guard stuck his head through the flap, and Persius was surprised to see a different face than he had expected. The guard had changed—and this man might not be as open to bribery as the first obviously had been. Well, no matter now. He had already rolled the dice, and he would have to play the number he had received.

  The guard entered and freed Persius’s chain from the post. Taking up his rifle, he led his prisoner toward a line of trees, while all around, campfires sent sparks skyward and half-rationed soldiers complained about the gnawing emptiness of their stomachs.

  Chapter 37

  Before dawn the troops were up, still grumbling over their hunger. By the time their badly insufficient breakfast was eaten, something far more interesting than empty bellies dominated their attention. The story spread from man to man, and if any initially doubted its truth, the dark expressions of the officers and, at last, the sight of the draped corpse being carried into the camp verified the tale.

  The dead man was a private who had been assigned as one of the guards of Persius Tarr. He had last been seen leading the chained prisoner toward the forest, probably to allow the prisoner to perform his private functions. The guard never came back. Evidence on the body showed he had been choked to death with the prisoner’s chain. Afterward the key had been taken from the body and the chains removed. And one of the officers’ horses was gone, probably stolen by the escapee.

  No one was hit harder by this news than was David Crockett. Great fear came over him. Had he been seen coming or going from Persius’s tent? The guard he had bribed for entrance was not the same one who had died. The original guard might reveal to the officers David’s illegal visit to Persius. He might be suspected as an accomplice … and in fact he very nearly was. It was he who had encouraged Persius’s escape attempt, he who had waited for several hours at the base of the sandy cliff for Persius and the guard to show up. Persius never arrived. David had finally concluded that the guard hadn’t snapped at the bait about the hidden Creek silver, and had sneaked back to camp and his bedroll.

  David had hardly finished cleaning his mess dishes before he was called to come to the commanding officers’ tent. When he entered, there sat the guard he had bribed with a dollar. The man’s face was blanched; he looked thoroughly scared. David felt the color drain from his own countenance.

  “Private Crockett, we’ll come right to the issue. It is true, is it not, that you have been a companion of the escaped Private Tarr, and in fact enlisted in company with him, and made him one of your scouts when you were sent out to reconnoiter under Major Gibson?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “And it was you who argued with Private Tarr loudly and revealed the murder charge pending against him in Jefferson County, Tennessee?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “After which Private Tarr knocked you senseless, accounting for the bruises still visible on your face?”

  “Yes. Yes sir.”

  “Private, did you make any attempt to visit or speak with Private Tarr during the time he was held under guard?”

  David hoped his voice would not quake. “No sir.”

  “No attempt at all?”

  “No.” David’s eyes flickered to the face of the bribed guard. He saw a look of relief. Praise be, David thought. That man has told the same lie as me.

  He should have figured that to begin with. The guard wouldn’t reveal him; that would show that he had taken a bribe.

  “Are you aware of anyone else attempting to make conta
ct with the prisoner?”

  “No sir.”

  Silence, pursed lips, a conclusory nod. “Very well, then. You may go.”

  David left the tent, whistling nonchalantly. He walked toward the nearest grove of trees, and disappeared into it. Once there, he sank to his knees, slumped over, eyes closed, and took deep breaths. For a few moments he had thought it all was over, that he had been caught in an escape conspiracy with a prisoner who had turned murderer. Thanks be to God, he thought—unnoticing of the irony of this prayer—that he was able to lie his way out.

  And Lord, let that guard I bribed lie just as good as I did. Let him lie like the devil, Lord. In Jesus’ name, amen.

  It would be sometime later before he gave serious thought to the fact that Persius had killed another man. Murdered him outright. If there was still question about whether the slaying of Crider Cummings had been true murder, surely there was none in this case. Persius had choked the life out of an innocent man. But now he was gone. Thank God, he was gone.

  Never again, David vowed to himself, would he befriend Persius Tarr, or let it be known, to any but those who knew already, that he was friend to such a man.

  I wash my hands of him, forever. I was a fool to have ever entwined my life with his. I’ll not make that mistake again, from now to my dying day.

  Later in the morning, the troops marched back to the smoldering ruins of Tallusahatchee. Horrific sights met them: dead bodies, already being picked over by carrion birds. A sickly stench, combining the smells of charred wood, burned flesh, and bodily decay, hung like a cloud over the town.

  David was drawn to the large house where the forty-plus warriors had died. Nothing remained of its walls now, so the heaped corpses were clearly visible. They had been mostly consumed by the flames, but not entirely, and what remained was sickening to behold. David could not look for long.