Echoes of Dark and Light (45 page)

“You are
not
a Yankee,” I hissed under my breath. “You may come from the north, but you couldn’t care less about this country. Besides, you even stole that uniform from a dead soldier!”

Pa shrugged, hawking up a wad of phlegm and spitting it to the ground, missing my slippers by half an inch.

“Aw, whadda the Rebs know, they got their heads stuck up their musket barrels anyway.”

“Quiet! The captain said no talking!” The young, peach-fuzzed guard shifted his weight nervously, but held his pistol steady and true.

Pa and I sat on a splintery bench beneath the office eaves awaiting the arrival of the lieutenant in charge. According to the captain, the lieutenant would be in an especially raucous mood, having his day off interrupted. Not to mention the irritation at having to walk the tracks over from Manchester since the train wouldn’t make another run until morning.

The sun glared down at us, angling in under the eaves, and I felt the sweat trickling down under my corset. I squirmed as the tight, itchy clothes seemed to grow more constricting with each breath, as did the cold clump of fear in my stomach. I had failed my mission, let down Captain Truckey, and hadn’t even caught a glimpse of my brother. I couldn’t have done any worse had I tried. And then there was the painfully aching emptiness in my heart where Toby used to be. Against every instinct, despite every excruciating lesson learned, I’d began to trust Toby. And, like most everyone else, he’d let me down.

Unable to sit still, yet ordered to stay put, my leg bounced as if in a life or death race, and I wiggled around on my rear, searching for an elusive comfort spot that just didn’t exist when one awaited a fate worse than death. And worse than death definitely described the conditions at Belle Isle Prison.

I couldn’t help almost falling into a panic about my brother. We’d covered almost every inch of the encampment before my ‘dear dad’ ratted me out and my ‘faithful friend’ abandoned me. Robert couldn’t be in the only places left to search, the hospital and the cemetery, he just couldn’t. Not after everything else he’d suffered through already.
Then again, maybe the cemetery would offer him some peace.

“Can’t you sit still?” the guard demanded.

Pa nudged me with his shoulder. “What, you gotta visit the latrine or something?”

How old did he think I was, five? Then again…

“Yeah, I need to use the outhouse, please.” Maybe I could find a chance to escape.

“Captain,” the guard called inside the office. “The lady needs to pee.”

“Tough,” he yelled back. “She should a thought of that before she lied her way inside our prison.”

The young guard smirked at me and I sighed.
Worth a shot anyway.
I drilled my brain for different options. No way would I just sit here and let them destroy me.

As I searched for options, my stomach reminded me of the approaching evening with a reverberating growl of hunger.

Pa laughed. “That won’t get fixed around here. What little food they offer us wouldn’t tempt a starving hog. Heck, one time the lieutenant dropped by for an inspection, he brought his little dog along. That furry varmint disappeared! The lieutenant ordered a thorough search of the entire island, but they never found the dog. Rumor has it someone ate the lieutenant’s dog for dinner.” Pa crackled at the story, revealing stained and rotten teeth.

My stomach heaved at the poor pup’s fate, and at the desperation of the starving prisoners. Anger and disgust chased away my hunger.

“So,” he continued, still chuckling at his story, “why’d you weasel your way in here in the first place?”

“Why do you care? You couldn’t be bothered to even say hi when we lived under the same roof.”

“Just making conversation. What, were ya trying to break your old man out of jail?”

“I didn’t even know you were here,” I growled back at him. “But if I had known, I certainly wouldn’t risk my own hide to save yours. As far as I’m concerned, the Rebs can keep you!”

“Watch your mouth!” he snarled. “What happened to that respect your parents commandment?”

“What do you know about respect? And since when did you become a follower in the ten commandments? Right after you killed Ma?”

“You snotty little brat!” Pa leapt to his feet, his heavy fists raised high.

My first instinct urged me to cower into a little ball. But I had changed a lot since that scared little girl, and new instincts took command. I launched up on top of the bench, pink parasol raised and ready, poised like a club.

The captain stormed out of the office, voice booming with impatience and rage, his pistol pointed dead center at Pa’s chest.

Then movement caught my eye, and I stared thunderstruck at the scene across the clearing.

Marching towards us out of the descending dusk, a tall man in civilian garb held a pistol to the head of a Rebel officer. Rebel guards surrounded the two, keeping a cautious distance, but ready for orders with hands on their weapons.

Pa and the captain followed my astonished gaze.

“What the—” The captain re-aimed his pistol at the approaching men.

“Lower your weapon, Captain,” Toby ordered, his tone leaving no doubt of who now commanded the situation.

“Do as he says,” the lieutenant ordered. A murderous glaze burned in his eyes, yet he remained quiet and collected despite the pistol’s barrel pressing against his temple.

Again, I ignored my first instinct, to rush at Toby and beat him over the head with my pink parasol. Instead, I slowly stepped down off of the bench.

“What’s going on, Toby?” I tried to squash the glimmer of hope at seeing his face. I wouldn’t let him off that easy; he’d skipped out on me.

“You okay, Bobbi?” he asked, his eyes briefly leaving the lieutenant to scan my face.

“I’ve been better, like when I foolishly thought you had my back. Where you been, off having a celebratory cup of tea with the Rebs?”

Exasperated, Toby rolled his eyes. “Does this look like tea time to you? Obviously, our plans hit some rough ground when your father appeared uninvited. I decided that we desperately needed a bit of leverage to boost our cause.”

“So you split to save your own hide?” I hated the tears blurring my vision and quickly blinked them clear.

Toby glared at me. “Drop it, Bobbi. You know I’d never, ever desert you, not as long as I still draw breath in my lungs. And it seems a huge waste of that breath to be arguing with you. When I realized our cover had been blown, I drifted into a group of prisoners, until I could figure out what to do. When the captain sent for the lieutenant, I managed to talk my way past the gate guard and then waited to jump the lieutenant when he walked over the railroad tracks.”

“Just how in the blazes did you get past my gate guard?” the captain bellowed, furiously scanning the Rebel crowd for the culprit.

Toby shrugged. “Word hadn’t yet reached the gate about the situation. I simply told the guard that Miss Sally had left her parasol at the train station.”

At the mention of the loathsome nuisance, I tossed the parasol into the dust and carefully approached Toby. I tried to contain the bubble of hope swelling in my chest.

“What’s the plan, Toby?” I asked, trying not to smile.

“Yes, Toby,” the lieutenant asked with a sneer. “Fill us in on your plan.”

Toby ignored him, remaining level-headed and calm. “First off, I want all guards over there. No one touches a weapon or even attempts to wire a message out to headquarters. Understand? Second, bring Robert Rivers to us.”

“If I recall correctly,” the captain said, jerking his head toward Pa, “he’s already here.”

“Not him,” Toby corrected, “his son, Robert Rivers, the second.”

“Toby,” I whispered, “he’s not here.”

“We haven’t checked the hospital yet,” he murmured to me. “We’ll find him.”

I felt strength slowly edging back into my muscles at his confidence.

“Ah, Robert, my oldest boy,” Pa said, leaning back against the office shack. “Didn’t know he was here. Heck, I saw him about a year ago, just inside the Tennessee border.”

I didn’t bother correcting him. If he still couldn’t tell the difference between his son and his daughter, I wouldn’t waste my breath explaining it’d been me he’d seen in Tennessee.

As we waited for a guard to run to the hospital, the lieutenant muttered to Toby. “You’re not going to get away with this, you little twerp.”

Twerp?
But before I could mull over that, the guard returned half-carrying a pale, sickly Yankee soldier with a mesh of dirty red hair.

“Robert?” I whispered.

A bright flash of joy surged through my body, and I scrambled over to my brother, tripping on my skirt in my haste. I threw my arms around him, almost knocking us both to the ground.

“Bobbi?” Robert’s voice croaked with dryness and shock.

I never wanted to let go, and proceeded to clutch my brother even tighter, until a groan escape him. I quickly let go and stood back to take a better look.

Dull blue eyes stared disbelieving out of bruised eyelids, the only colors in an otherwise strikingly pale face. His once bright red hair hung in dirty, matted clumps, and his stained and torn clothes hung on his emaciated frame.
What has this nightmarish prison done to my big, strong brother, the guy who taught me to swim, shoot a gun, climb a tree and defend myself?
Skinny as a chicken bone and dripping with lice, the painful truth slammed into my chest: he wouldn’t have lasted much longer.

“Bobbi? What are you doing here…” his eyes slowly traveled down my attire, “…in a dress?”

I grinned, despite the deadly seriousness of the situation. “We’re here on a top secret mission to recover information on a Rebel prison. Rescuing my big brother is just an added bonus.”

“We?” he asked, taking in the crowd for the first time.

“Come and meet my friend,” I ordered, half-dragging, half-supporting him toward Toby. “This is my brother Robert. Robert, this is my friend, Toby. He helped me find you.”

Toby’s eyes left the lieutenant for the briefest of seconds in order to acknowledge Robert. “It’s a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance. Your insane sister has dragged me all over this war looking for you.”

Robert cracked a small, painful attempt at a smile. “Now that sounds like Bobbi. For a minute there, I thought I might be having delusions.”

“Can we skip past the pleasantries and get on with it?” the lieutenant grunted.

Toby tightened his grip on his pistol. “Oh, I guess as long as we’re exchanging introductions…Robert, Bobbi, I’d like you to meet Jonathon, my brother.”

“What?” My mouth dropped opened in a most unladylike manner.

“Yeah,” he continued, “took me by surprise, too. I didn’t know he’d been assigned here. Then again, I haven’t heard any news from home in a long time.”

Jonathon sneered, a near crazy glint in his eye. “That usually happens when a traitor gets disowned from a family. Really Toby, I can’t believe even you are capable of something this despicable. Although after you killed Randy, I should believe anything.”

“Randy was an accident,” Toby growled. His hand holding the gun began to tremor slightly.

“Toby didn’t kill Randy,” I shot back, shaken loose from my shock. “I did. And it truly was an accident!”

“At least you sent his body home,” Jonathon sneered, ignoring me. “That is the only shred of decency you inherited from the Dove name! You should have heard Mother cry.”

I could see Jonathon’s words sinking in, slowly devouring Toby’s heart and mind. I had to do something.

“Toby, let’s get out of here, now!”

He blinked, refocusing on me. I had most of Robert’s weight leaning on my shoulders; I knew he wouldn’t be able to stand much longer. Toby seemed to realize that as well.

“Okay, next step,” Toby spoke loudly for everyone to hear. “I’m going to keep this gun on the lieutenant while Bobbi and Robert exit over the railroad bridge. No one moves, no one touches the telegraph. As soon as they are safe on the other side, I’ll release Jonathon.”

I stared at Toby in confusion, waiting to hear the rest of his plan, like when he would cross the bridge as well.

“I’m afraid your scheme has a few holes in it, little brother,” Jonathon scoffed. “As soon as I’m released, your Yankee friends will be rounded up and sentenced to hang. And you—”