Post by California gal on Feb 15, 2009 15:39:14 GMT -8
Originally posted August 2007
He lay flat on his stomach, keeping his head low, hat laying beside him in the brush. This was not a good situation. He was in enemy territory, with Reb soldiers swarming all around him. Even worse was the fact that he was out of uniform. If caught, the severest penalty could be…
Wait a minute! What the hell?
James West stared about him, forgetting all caution for the moment as he lifted his head. He saw and heard the men in butternut uniforms crashing through the brush all around him. They were seeking him. But… why? How? The war had been over for years. What…?
Loveless!
“Got you, damn Yankee! Don’t make no wrong move or I’ll be happy to run this bayonet through your bluebelly guts!”
Jim looked around. A bearded man attired in faded blue trousers and nearly colorless flannel shirt was standing above him, the bayonet of his weapon poised over Jim’s back, as warned.
“Is this some sort of game?” Jim asked, carefully getting to his knees.
“You’re damn right it is,” another man snarled, coming toward him, rifle butt at his shoulder, pointing his weapon straight at Jim’s head. “And you’re ‘it.’ On your feet, Yank. The general warned us a spy would be in the area, and we damn sure caught one. You’re gonna be dancing from a rope afore long.”
Within moments every gray-clad man who had been in the area had congregated around the prisoner, all with weapons ready. One wearing a sergeant’s stripes on a much repaired tunic stood in front of Jim West, looking him up and down. “So this is the famous Captain West we’ve heard about. Don’t look like much, does he, boys?”
The first man who had accosted Jim spoke up. “Don’t forget to tell the colonel who caught him!”
“All right, all right, Perkins. You’ll get your medal. Tie his hands. The general said he’s a slippery devil.”
“Sergeant,” Jim spoke quietly and carefully, “you know this isn’t real, don’t you? You’re all a figment of Loveless’s imagination…”
The back of the sergeant’s hand cracked across Jim West’s mouth, sending him staggering backwards against the men who had moved up to follow the order to bind his hands. “You keep your filthy mouth shut, you dirty Yankee bastard! Don’t you mention our general’s name. You ain’t fit to lick his boots!”
The blood tasted real. The sting on his mouth sure was real. Jim West looked around as his wrists were lashed behind his back. Virginia, he guessed. Did he dare ask the date? Better keep my mouth shut for the time being. Hard to say what Loveless has in mind here. What did he do with Artie?
Jim West and his partner had been traveling in the parlor car on the special train, heading east after completing an assignment in Wyoming, looking forward to a little rest and relaxation before the next job. Grant had said he would try to arrange that for them. The President knew they had been working nonstop for weeks, and not only that, had been involved in a couple of stressful, very dangerous situations.
When the train slowed unexpectedly somewhere in Nebraska, Artie had gone to look out a window. “I don’t see anything,” he reported. As the car came to a halt, he went to the cupboard which housed the communications device to the engine. He blew in the tube. “Orrin, what’s going on?”
Jim had seen his partner’s eyes widen in astonishment as he placed the tube to his ear to listen. Slowly, Artemus lowered the instrument. “Loveless,” he said.
That single word had caused Jim West to leap to his feet, heading for the weapons room, halting only when his partner urgently called his name. “Jim, he’s got the engine. Either we come out, unarmed, or he’ll blow it up… with the boys inside.”
They knew Miguelito Loveless too well to doubt that the demented but brilliant little man would carry out such a threat. Through the windows, armed horsemen were now in view. Too many to attempt to drive off by themselves.
So the two agents stepped out onto the rear platform, hands in the air. A bulky wagon approached from the direction of the engine, Loveless on the seat alongside a burly bearded man who was handling the reins.
“Greetings, my dear friends,” Loveless called. “I’m so glad you have decided to help me.”
“Help you?” Jim asked, glancing at his equally baffled partner.
“I knew you would be interested in participating in a scientific experiment,” Loveless beamed. “Especially Mr. Gordon. This will fascinate you.”
“I’m sure,” Artemus responded sardonically. “What’s the experiment? To see how long we can hold our hands in the air before all the blood drains from our fingers?”
Loveless chortled. “You do have a wit, Mr. Gordon. I’ll have to remember that one. Please climb into my chariot. I’ll tell you all about it when we get home.”
“Home?” Jim muttered as they walked to the back of the “chariot.” A large box had been built on the back of the wagon, a door opened at the rear. Ten guns were pointed at them, so they had had no choice but to obey.
As soon as they were inside, the door had been slammed shut and a padlock was snapped. No light entered, leaving the interior pitch black.
“So much for hospitality,” Artemus murmured. He knocked on the wall of the box. “Seems pretty solid.”
“Yeah. What’s that smell?”
“Gas!” Artie barely had an opportunity to choke out the word.
At the moment, that was pretty much all Jim could remember prior to finding himself laying in the grass, surrounded by what appeared to be Confederate soldiers. Strangely, at first, all had seemed “normal.” He had known where he was, why he was there. Almost as though history was repeating itself, except that other time, Artie had been hiding in the brush with him. They had escaped…
Rewriting history.
Somehow those words meant something to him. Someone had said them. Loveless? Why can’t I remember? Is this a big charade? His men portraying Rebs in an attempt to confuse and maybe terrorize me?
They had found his horse. Perhaps that was partially why they knew he was in the area, although that one man had said they had been warned about the presence of a spy. That had occurred in reality as well, a traitor who informed on them. He and Artie had made it out by the skin of their teeth, James West with a minnie ball in his shoulder. Artemus Gordon had been the reason they made it back to Union lines that day.
Where is Artie? He was with me in Loveless’s laboratory…
Slowly, bits and pieces were coming back. Another memory prior to finding himself here in… wherever he was. Tied to chairs in the windowless laboratory as the diminutive doctor expounded on his theories. Quite a bit of the lecture went over Jim West’s head, partially because he was still experiencing the effects of the anesthetic that had knocked them out. He remembered seeing the astonishment on Artie’s face, however. Artemus Gordon had comprehended at least some of it. Enough to be aghast with whatever Loveless was proposing.
Boosted into the saddle, Jim sat quietly, looking around as the Rebel cavalrymen mounted their own horses. Yes, this looked like the Virginia countryside he remembered. The oak and pine trees, mountain laurel bushes… by the flowers it appeared to be late spring or early summer. It does not feel like a dream. It looks real. It feels real. Too damned real. He could even smell the horses, hear the buzz of a June bug somewhere in the vicinity. Birds were not chirping, likely having been driven out of the immediate area by the humans.
The Confederate troopers surrounded him as they headed out of the woods, reaching a dirt road that seemed to skirt the forested area. The sense that he had heard referred to as déjà vu washed over James West as he surveyed the region. He knew he had been here before. This was definitely where he and Artemus had come so very close to being captured in the spring of eighteen sixty-three.
Henry Halleck, the general in charge of the overall armies, east and west, had requested a couple of men from the western theater to be sent to the Potomac region to do some espionage work. He wanted someone unknown to the Confederates, men who could move among them without suspicion. Grant had detached his two aides from the Vicksburg front, feeling they were not needed there at the moment, and sent them east. West and Gordon had been spectacularly successful… until betrayed.
“What’s the date, soldier?”
The man riding alongside Jim stared at him. “What kinda spy are you if you don’t even know what day it is?”
“Just curious to see if I’m right.”
“May 14, 1863.”
This is crazy! That was indeed the date that he and his partner had had to flee for their lives, a week or so after the end of the ferocious—and lost—battle of Chancellorsville. Why am I reliving it, but reliving it wrong? Jim tried to remember more of what had been said and done in Loveless’s laboratory. A large box… not the one on the wagon, but in the laboratory. Shiny and…
Jim shook his head. The memories would not come. He knew he needed to relax, let them enter his mind naturally. Yet he needed to know. He needed to have some clue about what Loveless was doing, hoping to accomplish. Something twisted. Something bizarre…
Rewriting history.
Those words echoed again. Artemus had said them, Jim realized. An angry, frustrated Artemus, speaking in protest, trying to argue… something. “You can’t be rewriting history! It will cause disaster of untold proportions!” That was what his partner had raged.
Freight wagons on the road were the first clue that they were approaching the Rebel camp. Weary horses, mules, and some oxen were hitched to those wagons, and equally weary and ragtag men were at the reins. The South was feeling the pinch, the lack of supplies, army and civilian. If only they had not been so damnably stubborn, Jim mused. He could tell them now how futile it all would be. Thousands of men would be lost on both sides…
Would they listen to him? Was this the history to be rewritten? Was he supposed to convince someone to end the conflict earlier than April 1865? Would that also save Abraham Lincoln’s life? A stir of excitement built in Jim West’s mind, but was quickly quelled as he remembered something else, something that had occurred just minutes ago, the reason his mouth was throbbing: he had been slapped because he “insulted” a general’s name. The name he had spoken had been Loveless.
Miguelito Loveless was here as well. If Jim West had been somehow transported into a netherworld of a distorted past, so had Dr. Loveless, who had apparently taken on another persona. A general? Jim would have laughed out loud if the very thought was not so horrifying.
They came upon the camp, passing through the pickets on guard. Jim saw how those men stared at him. They all seemed to know his identity. That had not exactly been the situation that other time. The colonel in charge of the camp had been the one to receive the information from the traitor. That colonel’s “cleverness” and arrogance had done him in, when he decided he wanted to take all the credit for capturing the Yankee spies. West and Gordon had worked a ruse that allowed them to escape, although Jim had been wounded in the process.
Hundreds of men, infantry and cavalry, were in the camp, attending to chores or simply lounging near their tents, a few with bandages from apparently light wounds received in the recent battle. Like the pickets, they stared at the cavalry patrol and their prisoner. Jim vaguely wondered which Confederate regiment the camp belonged to, and which commander he would be encountering. He had a sense that this was not the same camp he and Artie had been taken to in the previous incarnation. Somehow it was different.
The difference, he came to realize as they passed rows and rows of tents, was in the layout. In the previous instance, the men had seemed to have erected their tents fairly haphazardly, by company, perhaps, or just because they had liked a particular area and got there first. These rows were orderly. Crisp, neatly aligned. One could sight down the rows which appeared to have been set up on a string laid taut, with their front pegs on that string.
The headquarters tents were toward the far side. Several larger tents, some with front flaps opened and supported to create shade over tables and chairs. Jim saw officers in and around these tents, and as before, they gaped at him. Many started following the patrol. The other time, the officers had looked, but most remained where they were, uninterested in another Yankee prisoner. These men knew.
They halted in front of the largest tent, where the men dismounted and the sergeant pulled Jim off his horse. I must have quite a reputation these days, Jim mused, as two men pressed in behind him, the points of their bayonets in his back. The others remained alert, guns at the ready.
The bearded sergeant went to the shadowed door of the tent, saluted and spoke to someone inside. Then he stepped back, and it was Jim’s turn to gape.
“Artie!” he exclaimed aloud.
The officer in the gray uniform adorned with medals and a golden sash about the waist stared hard as he emerged. Three golden stars on a gray background were sewn onto the standup collar of his tunic. “You will address me as Colonel Gordon, sir.” He lifted his right hand. A leather quirt hung from his wrist by a loop.
Jim clamped his mouth shut. Was that the major change in this scenario? Had Artemus somehow taken the guise of a Rebel colonel in his efforts to spy on the Confederate activities? If so, Jim West sure did not want to blow his cover. Nonetheless, the icy hatred in the “colonel’s” brown eyes was disconcerting. Artemus was a fine actor, to be sure, but…
“Have you positively identified him as West?” Gordon asked the sergeant.
“No papers on him. But he sure fits the description, don’t he? Wiry, good looking kid with green eyes.”
Kid? Jim West’s eyes widened slightly. Were they seeing him as he had appeared years ago, in his early twenties? Come to consider it, Artemus did look younger as well. Perhaps nearly ten years younger.
The colonel approached the prisoner, clasping his hands behind him as he swaggered slightly, eyes narrowed. “He fits the description. But he doesn’t look very dangerous to me. General Loveless knows him by sight. He’ll confirm the identification when he arrives tomorrow.”
“Loveless!” Jim could not suppress the exclamation. “Artie, listen to me. Loveless did this… somehow. We’ve got to get back to our time and stop that crazy…”
The hand bearing the quirt flashed around, and the leather slashed across Jim West’s chest, tearing the fabric of his cotton shirt, opening a cut across his flesh. Jim fell back, again caught by the men behind him. Surprise, more than pain, was the immediate emotion. The blow had been vicious and intentional.
“You keep your filthy Yankee mouth shut,” Gordon snarled, leaning toward him, the quirt lifted menacingly. “I don’t want to hear our revered general’s name uttered through your dirty lips again! You hear me?”
Pushed erect, Jim glanced down at his chest, saw the blood staining the shirt. Real physical pain now accompanied the astonishment. Artie! What did he do to you? What could Miguelito Loveless have done to cause Artemus Gordon’s behavior to alter so drastically? Jim could see Artie threatening him, even pretending to strike him. But to use the quirt as he had…
“Take him to the guardhouse,” Gordon snapped. “I want a twenty-four hour guard on him. Four men to a shift. If he escapes, anyone who was on duty at the time will face the firing squad. Move!” He whirled and stalked back into the tent, ignoring the salutes of every man present.
The size of the stockade surprised Jim. Usually, except in an established fortress, a “guardhouse” was merely a well-guarded tent, or perhaps even just a makeshift fence to enclose prisoners of war, recaptured deserters, and malcontents. The fresh hewn timber revealed it had been constructed recently. A fence built with perpendicular logs, each cut to a fine point on the top, surrounded a log building, which he soon discovered was separated into four cells, one on each corner. Each cell appeared to have its own heavy barred door, and one small window.
The entire cavalry patrol escorted him again. Jim wished he could laugh about it. The situation was far too serious at the moment, especially until he could figure out what was going on. He had pretty much given up the idea that Loveless had him under some sort of trance and was implanting these images. Everything was much too real.
He was shoved inside through an opened door, where he turned and faced the sergeant. “This is some setup for a temporary camp.”
“The colonel likes to have things done right,” the sergeant responded stiffly, displaying no opinion whatsoever about the arrangements.
“Going to undo my hands?”
The man’s mouth tightened. “I didn’t have no orders to do that.” He stepped back out through the door, which was slammed shut. Jim heard the bar thud into place.
After a moment, Jim West turned and surveyed his new quarters in the faint light that came through the window, a window too small for a grown man, even the smallest, to slip through. He saw a narrow wooden bench against the far wall, and that was that as far as furnishings were concerned. The bench was bare, but obviously it was his bed. He noted a trench had been dug against the wall under the window. The latrine, apparently. By the odor, he was not the first to have inhabited this particular portion of the guardhouse.
He could hear voices through the open window, which was too high for him to look out through. With his hands still bound behind him, he was unable to grasp the sill to hoist himself up. Orders were being barked, obviously the commands regarding his security. With a loud sigh, Jim West sat down on the bench.
The cut on his chest was still stinging, though the bleeding had all but ceased. Likely, he mused, his shirt was going to adhere to his skin as the blood dried. Great. He looked at his dusty boots with some regret. Not the boots he wore as a Secret Service agent, the ones devised by Artemus Gordon that contained all manner of weapons and materials. Loveless, of course, knew about those secrets. Had he been forced to change his clothes…?
Once more Jim tried to remember what had occurred in the laboratory. He could hear Loveless’s droning, if somewhat excited voice, and above all, see in his mind’s eye how the doctor had been strutting around in anticipation of carrying his plan to fruition. Again, he heard Artemus’s angry protests as well.
“You can’t do it! You have no idea what could happen! You’ll be affecting thousands, millions of lives, not just a few! You may perpetrate unknown disasters…”
Jim wished he could remember what Loveless had been telling them. He was unsure whether his inability to hear the doctor’s words were due to his failure to comprehend all the scientific jargon that might have been used, or if, somehow, Loveless had blocked them from his mind. If that was the case, had something been said that would offer a clue to defeat whatever this Machiavellian plan was? Would Artie know?
Jim looked down at the cut on his chest again. He had seen Artemus Gordon’s face as the quirt was applied. Almost… almost as though the ersatz colonel enjoyed causing pain. Good acting on Artie’s part? Jim had a cold, numbing sense that that was not the case. Somehow this Artemus Gordon was not the Artemus who had been with him hours ago… days ago?… in the parlor car, and in Loveless’s laboratory.
If that was truly the case, James West was all alone. Alone and currently helpless in a warped section of time. It appeared that somehow Loveless had sent the three of them back ten years, and at the same time, had changed the personality of Artemus Gordon. Why just Artie, and not me as well? If Loveless wanted to change history, and he had the ability to alter the behavior of men, why not both of them?
Or am I really, truly alone? Had he been transported back through time by himself? Was that not Artemus Gordon, his own Artemus Gordon, he had met, despite the resemblance? Was the General Loveless mentioned not the Miguelito Loveless… Jim remembered Colonel Noel Vautrain who had caused him to meet a different Artemus in an antebellum situation. At that instance, Artemus had called himself Jack Maitland and had challenged Jim West to a duel. “Maitland” had subsequently been killed by a band of brigands who attacked the dueling party. Vautrain had mastered a method of time travel, had used it in an attempt to…
Jim West shook his head rather violently to rid himself of the thoughts. Artemus Gordon was a northerner, a Union man like himself. Both had served the Union cause faithfully and courageously, and were still doing so in the Secret Service. Nothing would have persuaded the Artemus Gordon Jim knew to fight to support the Cause, the beliefs that would have broken the country in two, and worse, continued the curse of slavery. Loveless could not have changed things enough to change Artie’s beliefs… could he?
Jim wished he could believe that this Colonel Gordon was not his long time friend and brother. Artie had no kin living in the South, Jim was certain. No close kin anyway. Highly unlikely, in any case, that such kin would resemble Artemus so nearly identically, let alone bear the same name.
So many questions with no hope of gaining answers while being confined in this cell block. He needed to talk to Artemus, and yes, to Loveless. The general was arriving tomorrow. From where? Why was not the good doctor here waiting for him?
A couple of hours later, Jim heard the bar being removed from his door. He got to his feet, ready for anything. A man he had not seen before, another sergeant, stepped into the doorway, rifle ready, and ordered him out. Stepping into the bright sun, Jim squinted, and when he hesitated, he was shoved from behind, only by the hardest keeping his feet.
A half dozen men escorted him to the camp’s blacksmith, a man with a forge and anvil, and a roaring fire. There manacles were fastened to Jim West’s wrists. The chain between the “bracelets” possessed heavy links that would not be broken without the help of acid or a rasp. No fetters were placed on his ankles, which surprised him to some extent. Were they so confident that he would not, or could not, run from this place? A chain connecting his ankles would make it very difficult to mount a horse, as well. Of course, if they put this many men around him every time he was outside the cell, could be they were right!
Back in his cell, he was given a tin cup of tepid water and a chunk of very dry bread. He drank the water, pitched the bread out the window, having no appetite. Then came the long wait for darkness, and the even longer night. That Colonel Gordon did not make another appearance was unexpected. Jim had thought the camp’s commander might want to interrogate him. Perhaps that honor was being left to the general expected the following day.
Colonel Artemus Gordon stood in the opening of his tent, sipping the hot “coffee” from the tin cup. Might as well just drink hot water, he mused. The few beans left in the commissary were being parceled out parsimoniously, providing very little flavor. Still it was better than the substitutes many civilians and military were required to use these days, which was often made from roasted peanuts, rye, or some other grain.
He liked to gaze out at the orderly arrangements of the camp. Disorder had always bothered him, even as a boy in Georgia. “My neat little boy,” Mama would say when he arranged the dishes and flatware on the table before him just so. Colonel Gordon was certain that his orderly mind had been a factor in his rather rapid rise through the ranks of the Confederate Army. Other men of the cohort who had enlisted when he did were still far below him in rank.
Perhaps that dislike of disorder was one of the reasons he was feeling so perturbed this morning. He could not say why, but that young man brought into camp yesterday afternoon bothered him a great deal. Of course, West was a spy, an officer of the enemy ranks, clad in civilian garb when captured. He would hang. If it had not been for General Loveless’s orders, Gordon would have scheduled the execution for this morning.
The information that the spy would be operating in their area, along with a full description, had come from the general’s headquarters, accompanied by specific instructions that when captured, Captain West was to be held until General Loveless had an opportunity to speak to him. No one was to interrogate West beforehand.
That troubled the colonel as well. He did not like to think that the great general, the savior of the South, possessed a poor opinion of his capabilities. Colonel Artemus Gordon had had numerous successes in the field as well as in camp. His men were known to be well-trained and highly disciplined. Colonel Gordon expected a promotion any day now. He suspected he could receive the word momentarily, not only because his regiment had performed so ably in the recent conflict at Chancellorsville, but because of the loss of several high ranking officers to wounding or death during that battle, creating openings. He knew that no one could quarrel with his politics. He had been, and was still, dedicated supporter of the Cause.
No, he told himself, some other reason existed why General Loveless wanted to be the one to question the prisoner. It has nothing to do with me. Although no prior warning had been received that any other Union spies were in the area, apparently the general knew something about this man, perhaps even more than the fact that West had been on the staff of General Grant in the western theater.
Was that why Loveless claimed first dibs? He wanted to learn as much as possible about the man who was gaining such an outstanding reputation in the west, who was driving the Confederate forces there from the field? That has be it, Gordon reassured himself. No slight against his own abilities.
Yet, he could not forget that moment when he himself lost his temper and struck the prisoner. West had recoiled from the blow, blood immediately staining his shirt. The pain in his green eyes, however, appeared to be something more than the agony caused by the blow. He had been… surprised. Hurt.
Why had West attempted to speak to him so intimately, using a pet name that only his family and closest friends ever dared utter? Loveless did this… That was what he had said. Did what? West went on to say something about time. Had he been attempting to establish himself as a madman?
Loveless did this…
Why were those words so troubling? Almost as though something needed to be remembered. Nonsense. Artemus Gordon had an excellent memory. He had been known throughout his school days for his ability to memorize poems and passages in books. He had pleased his mother by committing the entire New Testament book of John to memory at Sunday School. Miniscule, seemingly unimportant facts had a tendency to cling to his brain, and oftentimes turned out to be important after all. The memory retention served him well during his military career. He had an orderly mind. He had forgotten nothing. Especially, I have not forgotten a fellow named Jim West.
An orderly appeared, saluting, reporting that breakfast was ready. Gordon followed him to the large tent where the junior officers were gathered, all on their feet. They saluted, the colonel saluted back, and they all sat down. Officer’s fare was better than that served the enlisted men, but not by much. A Yankee supply train had been raided a couple of weeks ago, providing some tinned meat to supplement the hoecakes fashioned from ground corn.
“Beg your pardon, sir,” Captain Pike spoke up, “do we know when the general will arrive?”
“Last word was before midday. I ordered Captain Weathers to ride out to meet his party, and to send a man back in order to inform us.”
Pike smiled, nodding. “Perhaps he’ll finish with the Yankee spy and turn him over to us. I’m of a mood to see a bluebelly dancing from a rope. Especially one with his reputation.”
“You’ve heard of him, Jeremy?” asked the captain seated beside Pike.
“My brother is with Forrest. He’s written to me about James West. Cocky little devil. Has gotten away with a great deal, even at his young age, quite often due to his ability to charm the ladies.”
“Enough gossip,” the colonel snapped, unsure why he was annoyed by it this morning. Gossip was usual fodder for conversation in these long days in camp. All were hoping that General Loveless would be bringing them news of an upcoming move for the army. Everyone knew the importance of following up the great victory just accomplished as soon as possible. “Captain Pike, of far more import is whether your men are ready to welcome the general.”
“Yes, sir. The company is extremely proud and gratified to be selected for the honor, sir.” Pike frowned then. “I’m puzzled with the order that the prisoner is to be positioned outside the stockade for the welcoming ceremonies.”
“The general’s orders,” Gordon clipped. He had been bemused by that part of the orders as well. Especially because the orders had arrived three days ago, long before West was in custody. The general had been very certain that the spy would be captured, obviously. Gordon could only wonder if General Loveless had had some past encounter with James West. Their ages and circumstances were so different….
Colonel Artemus Gordon pushed the thoughts from his mind, just as he had had to concentrate last night to stop thinking about the captive in order to gain some rest. He had no reason to question the great general who had led the South’s army so close to ultimate victory here in the east. Everyone knew that as soon as the Union Army of the Potomac was destroyed, perhaps after just one more great battle, they would be heading west to help defeat Grant. And then the Confederacy would be a true reality.
Breakfast had been no better, and possibly worse, than supper, consisting of some probably captured hardtack and a cup of bitter-tasting hot water. Nevertheless, realizing that chances were the Reb soldiers were not eating much better, and also that he needed any semblance of nourishment he could get, Jim soaked the hardtack in the water until it was somewhat chewable. At least it was not weevil infested. He had had his share of that in the west on the occasions when Union supply wagons had been unable to get through.
Jim West certainly had not slept well. The narrow hard slab that served as his bed was not so much the problem as the manacles on his wrists, which restricted his movements and rattled every time he moved. Maybe I’ll get used to them. He chuckled mockingly. Chances were, he would not have opportunity to get used to them. The surprise was that he had not been hanged already.
Hanged? What if I die in this… this lifetime? That would change the future. Was that what Artemus had argued about? Loveless could not, should not arrange for either of us to die in an alternate history.
Or was something else to be changed? The mere fact that Miguelito Loveless was known as a great general for the Confederacy was a huge alteration of history. Loveless, rather than Robert E. Lee leading the Confederate forces? The good doctor’s ego getting in the way again, it appeared. Could it be more than ego? Some sort of plot to… what?
Jim did not like to even speculate. Loveless was not entirely a predictable man, beyond the fact that he would have devised a grandiose scheme that usually involved elevating himself to some sort of emperor status. The pint-sized doctor had been trying for years to regain a huge portion of the state of California, claiming that it had been purloined from his ancestors.
Could this be connected to his ambitions as far as California was concerned? Help the South win the war, and be awarded the state of California for his own kingdom? Jim shook his head. In the first place, California was not part of the Confederate states to be parceled out as spoils. Then again, if the Union had to sue for peace and…
He sighed heavily, leaning his head back against the rough wooden wall as he lolled on the bench. Why bother? Loveless would be making an appearance, and knowing the talkative doctor, he would be anxious to reveal his plans to the agents. Agent. Singular. Unless Jim was very wrong in his assumptions now, Artemus Gordon was no longer with him. Somehow, Loveless had placed Artie on the other side.
Jim knew the noon hour had not yet arrived sometime later when he heard voices outside the stockade, and then the bar was lifted from his door. The sergeant who had led the unit that made the capture was there, weapon ready. He did not speak, but jerked his head in a summons. Jim got the idea he was not too happy with whatever was coming up. Jim West wondered if he would not be very happy with it himself. Interrogation of spies could get a bit rough.
Once again surrounded by armed men, Jim was led down the orderly paths between tents toward the headquarters area. In one sense he welcomed an opportunity to see and talk to “Colonel Gordon” again. Whatever Loveless had done to Artie, the possibility existed that talking to him about the past—or the future, depending on how one looked at it—could shake Gordon’s mind processes. Jim knew he was going to try, in any case, even if it earned him more blows from the quirt. He had to.
Colonel Gordon was standing in front of his tent with a number of other Confederate officers, all togged out in their finest. Jim was surprised—then again, not so much—to recognize Jeremy Pike among them. Pike’s expression when he gazed on the prisoner was as cold and hateful as that of any other officer wearing the gray uniform. He doesn’t know me either!
Jim was escorted to a sturdy pole embedded deeply into the ground off to one side. The chain connecting his wrists was fastened to a ring at the top of that pole, stretching Jim’s arms high above his head. He was then gagged with a neckerchief. Their prisoner thus secured, his guards took their places with their units.
Jim West had no doubt who they were waiting for, and he found himself anticipating as well. The “great general” was coming, and the camp was alive with excitement. Jim had heard, and had witnessed a couple of times, how the Southern troops revered “Marse Robert.” He had seen expressions on the faces of the common soldier that mirrored what he was seeing now. The arrival of “Marse Miguelito” was imminent, obviously.
The cavalry arrived first. Jim recognized the leader of the unit. The famous General James Ewell Brown Stuart, known as “Jeb.” Hey, Jeb! In case you are interested, you’re going to die about a year from now at Yellow Tavern, struck down by Union horsemen. Or would he? In Loveless’s alternate history… who knew?
A buggy conveying the commanding general was next. The general was not alone, nor was Jim surprised. A very lovely blonde woman sat at his side on the fine leather seat. An enlisted man in uniform handled the reins. All the soldiers in Gordon’s camp set up a huge cheer. Loveless waved, grinning widely.
Not astonishing that Loveless was also dressed to the nines. Golden epaulets glittered on his shoulders, matching the sash around his waist. The décor on his collar was the stars against gold of a general. Apparently the fact that Lee never wore this insignia did not deter his “replacement” from doing so. An array of medals on the chest of the coat almost seemed as though they might overbalance the small man as he scampered down the steps set out for him. He was not wearing a ceremonial sword, but he did carry a gold-headed cane. He did not look toward the prisoner, waving the snowy-white wide-brimmed hat at the adoring throng.
Colonel Gordon orated a splendid welcoming speech. Artie always could put on a show. At least Loveless had not altered that part of Gordon’s personality. All of the officers were introduced to the general, and though Jim could not hear the words exchanged, the expressions on the countenances told it all. They worshipped the man!
Artemus Gordon personally escorted the general to the tent set up to be his residence while he was present in camp. Gordon had made certain the location was perfect, in the shade of a large oak tree, after commanding several junior officers to relocate their own tents. Everyone knew that General Loveless was fond of creature comforts. A tent for his secretary, Miss Evans, was placed nearby.
Gordon knew better than to comment on the presence of the female secretary. Most officers had male aides, as he himself had. The fact that Miss Evans was a comely young lady, of… well… normal size, was a subject of gossip, but no officer who valued his career was going to allow the general to be aware of that. General Loveless was a bachelor so his personal affairs were his own. His ability as a general did not suffer for lack of a staff either. He was able to attend to issuing necessary orders and receive reports without any perceivable problems.
“This will do splendidly,” Loveless announced after a survey of his quarters. “Now, bring the prisoner to me.”
“Sir…!” Gordon’s eyes widened, as protest leapt to his tongue.
The general raised a hand to stop his words. “I wish to speak to him in complete privacy, Colonel. It is a matter of national security. You will bring him to my tent. Station guards on the perimeter, but they must be twenty feet distant. Understand?”
“Yes, sir. I… understand.”
I don’t understand, but I am trained to take orders. Gordon saluted smartly, and headed back toward his own tent and the pole where the prisoner was still confined. He gave the orders briskly, and though both officers and men questioned with their eyes, none spoke aloud. Loveless was known for his eccentricity. Eccentric, but brilliant on the field of battle. In the first two years of the war, he had given orders that initially appeared insane, often flying in the face of all known military tactics. Yet in every instance, he had been able to anticipate the enemy perfectly. For that reason, the South was going to win this war. No one had any doubt.
THE NIGHT OF THE SHIFTING SANDS OF TIME
He lay flat on his stomach, keeping his head low, hat laying beside him in the brush. This was not a good situation. He was in enemy territory, with Reb soldiers swarming all around him. Even worse was the fact that he was out of uniform. If caught, the severest penalty could be…
Wait a minute! What the hell?
James West stared about him, forgetting all caution for the moment as he lifted his head. He saw and heard the men in butternut uniforms crashing through the brush all around him. They were seeking him. But… why? How? The war had been over for years. What…?
Loveless!
“Got you, damn Yankee! Don’t make no wrong move or I’ll be happy to run this bayonet through your bluebelly guts!”
Jim looked around. A bearded man attired in faded blue trousers and nearly colorless flannel shirt was standing above him, the bayonet of his weapon poised over Jim’s back, as warned.
“Is this some sort of game?” Jim asked, carefully getting to his knees.
“You’re damn right it is,” another man snarled, coming toward him, rifle butt at his shoulder, pointing his weapon straight at Jim’s head. “And you’re ‘it.’ On your feet, Yank. The general warned us a spy would be in the area, and we damn sure caught one. You’re gonna be dancing from a rope afore long.”
Within moments every gray-clad man who had been in the area had congregated around the prisoner, all with weapons ready. One wearing a sergeant’s stripes on a much repaired tunic stood in front of Jim West, looking him up and down. “So this is the famous Captain West we’ve heard about. Don’t look like much, does he, boys?”
The first man who had accosted Jim spoke up. “Don’t forget to tell the colonel who caught him!”
“All right, all right, Perkins. You’ll get your medal. Tie his hands. The general said he’s a slippery devil.”
“Sergeant,” Jim spoke quietly and carefully, “you know this isn’t real, don’t you? You’re all a figment of Loveless’s imagination…”
The back of the sergeant’s hand cracked across Jim West’s mouth, sending him staggering backwards against the men who had moved up to follow the order to bind his hands. “You keep your filthy mouth shut, you dirty Yankee bastard! Don’t you mention our general’s name. You ain’t fit to lick his boots!”
The blood tasted real. The sting on his mouth sure was real. Jim West looked around as his wrists were lashed behind his back. Virginia, he guessed. Did he dare ask the date? Better keep my mouth shut for the time being. Hard to say what Loveless has in mind here. What did he do with Artie?
Jim West and his partner had been traveling in the parlor car on the special train, heading east after completing an assignment in Wyoming, looking forward to a little rest and relaxation before the next job. Grant had said he would try to arrange that for them. The President knew they had been working nonstop for weeks, and not only that, had been involved in a couple of stressful, very dangerous situations.
When the train slowed unexpectedly somewhere in Nebraska, Artie had gone to look out a window. “I don’t see anything,” he reported. As the car came to a halt, he went to the cupboard which housed the communications device to the engine. He blew in the tube. “Orrin, what’s going on?”
Jim had seen his partner’s eyes widen in astonishment as he placed the tube to his ear to listen. Slowly, Artemus lowered the instrument. “Loveless,” he said.
That single word had caused Jim West to leap to his feet, heading for the weapons room, halting only when his partner urgently called his name. “Jim, he’s got the engine. Either we come out, unarmed, or he’ll blow it up… with the boys inside.”
They knew Miguelito Loveless too well to doubt that the demented but brilliant little man would carry out such a threat. Through the windows, armed horsemen were now in view. Too many to attempt to drive off by themselves.
So the two agents stepped out onto the rear platform, hands in the air. A bulky wagon approached from the direction of the engine, Loveless on the seat alongside a burly bearded man who was handling the reins.
“Greetings, my dear friends,” Loveless called. “I’m so glad you have decided to help me.”
“Help you?” Jim asked, glancing at his equally baffled partner.
“I knew you would be interested in participating in a scientific experiment,” Loveless beamed. “Especially Mr. Gordon. This will fascinate you.”
“I’m sure,” Artemus responded sardonically. “What’s the experiment? To see how long we can hold our hands in the air before all the blood drains from our fingers?”
Loveless chortled. “You do have a wit, Mr. Gordon. I’ll have to remember that one. Please climb into my chariot. I’ll tell you all about it when we get home.”
“Home?” Jim muttered as they walked to the back of the “chariot.” A large box had been built on the back of the wagon, a door opened at the rear. Ten guns were pointed at them, so they had had no choice but to obey.
As soon as they were inside, the door had been slammed shut and a padlock was snapped. No light entered, leaving the interior pitch black.
“So much for hospitality,” Artemus murmured. He knocked on the wall of the box. “Seems pretty solid.”
“Yeah. What’s that smell?”
“Gas!” Artie barely had an opportunity to choke out the word.
At the moment, that was pretty much all Jim could remember prior to finding himself laying in the grass, surrounded by what appeared to be Confederate soldiers. Strangely, at first, all had seemed “normal.” He had known where he was, why he was there. Almost as though history was repeating itself, except that other time, Artie had been hiding in the brush with him. They had escaped…
Rewriting history.
Somehow those words meant something to him. Someone had said them. Loveless? Why can’t I remember? Is this a big charade? His men portraying Rebs in an attempt to confuse and maybe terrorize me?
They had found his horse. Perhaps that was partially why they knew he was in the area, although that one man had said they had been warned about the presence of a spy. That had occurred in reality as well, a traitor who informed on them. He and Artie had made it out by the skin of their teeth, James West with a minnie ball in his shoulder. Artemus Gordon had been the reason they made it back to Union lines that day.
Where is Artie? He was with me in Loveless’s laboratory…
Slowly, bits and pieces were coming back. Another memory prior to finding himself here in… wherever he was. Tied to chairs in the windowless laboratory as the diminutive doctor expounded on his theories. Quite a bit of the lecture went over Jim West’s head, partially because he was still experiencing the effects of the anesthetic that had knocked them out. He remembered seeing the astonishment on Artie’s face, however. Artemus Gordon had comprehended at least some of it. Enough to be aghast with whatever Loveless was proposing.
Boosted into the saddle, Jim sat quietly, looking around as the Rebel cavalrymen mounted their own horses. Yes, this looked like the Virginia countryside he remembered. The oak and pine trees, mountain laurel bushes… by the flowers it appeared to be late spring or early summer. It does not feel like a dream. It looks real. It feels real. Too damned real. He could even smell the horses, hear the buzz of a June bug somewhere in the vicinity. Birds were not chirping, likely having been driven out of the immediate area by the humans.
The Confederate troopers surrounded him as they headed out of the woods, reaching a dirt road that seemed to skirt the forested area. The sense that he had heard referred to as déjà vu washed over James West as he surveyed the region. He knew he had been here before. This was definitely where he and Artemus had come so very close to being captured in the spring of eighteen sixty-three.
Henry Halleck, the general in charge of the overall armies, east and west, had requested a couple of men from the western theater to be sent to the Potomac region to do some espionage work. He wanted someone unknown to the Confederates, men who could move among them without suspicion. Grant had detached his two aides from the Vicksburg front, feeling they were not needed there at the moment, and sent them east. West and Gordon had been spectacularly successful… until betrayed.
“What’s the date, soldier?”
The man riding alongside Jim stared at him. “What kinda spy are you if you don’t even know what day it is?”
“Just curious to see if I’m right.”
“May 14, 1863.”
This is crazy! That was indeed the date that he and his partner had had to flee for their lives, a week or so after the end of the ferocious—and lost—battle of Chancellorsville. Why am I reliving it, but reliving it wrong? Jim tried to remember more of what had been said and done in Loveless’s laboratory. A large box… not the one on the wagon, but in the laboratory. Shiny and…
Jim shook his head. The memories would not come. He knew he needed to relax, let them enter his mind naturally. Yet he needed to know. He needed to have some clue about what Loveless was doing, hoping to accomplish. Something twisted. Something bizarre…
Rewriting history.
Those words echoed again. Artemus had said them, Jim realized. An angry, frustrated Artemus, speaking in protest, trying to argue… something. “You can’t be rewriting history! It will cause disaster of untold proportions!” That was what his partner had raged.
Freight wagons on the road were the first clue that they were approaching the Rebel camp. Weary horses, mules, and some oxen were hitched to those wagons, and equally weary and ragtag men were at the reins. The South was feeling the pinch, the lack of supplies, army and civilian. If only they had not been so damnably stubborn, Jim mused. He could tell them now how futile it all would be. Thousands of men would be lost on both sides…
Would they listen to him? Was this the history to be rewritten? Was he supposed to convince someone to end the conflict earlier than April 1865? Would that also save Abraham Lincoln’s life? A stir of excitement built in Jim West’s mind, but was quickly quelled as he remembered something else, something that had occurred just minutes ago, the reason his mouth was throbbing: he had been slapped because he “insulted” a general’s name. The name he had spoken had been Loveless.
Miguelito Loveless was here as well. If Jim West had been somehow transported into a netherworld of a distorted past, so had Dr. Loveless, who had apparently taken on another persona. A general? Jim would have laughed out loud if the very thought was not so horrifying.
They came upon the camp, passing through the pickets on guard. Jim saw how those men stared at him. They all seemed to know his identity. That had not exactly been the situation that other time. The colonel in charge of the camp had been the one to receive the information from the traitor. That colonel’s “cleverness” and arrogance had done him in, when he decided he wanted to take all the credit for capturing the Yankee spies. West and Gordon had worked a ruse that allowed them to escape, although Jim had been wounded in the process.
Hundreds of men, infantry and cavalry, were in the camp, attending to chores or simply lounging near their tents, a few with bandages from apparently light wounds received in the recent battle. Like the pickets, they stared at the cavalry patrol and their prisoner. Jim vaguely wondered which Confederate regiment the camp belonged to, and which commander he would be encountering. He had a sense that this was not the same camp he and Artie had been taken to in the previous incarnation. Somehow it was different.
The difference, he came to realize as they passed rows and rows of tents, was in the layout. In the previous instance, the men had seemed to have erected their tents fairly haphazardly, by company, perhaps, or just because they had liked a particular area and got there first. These rows were orderly. Crisp, neatly aligned. One could sight down the rows which appeared to have been set up on a string laid taut, with their front pegs on that string.
The headquarters tents were toward the far side. Several larger tents, some with front flaps opened and supported to create shade over tables and chairs. Jim saw officers in and around these tents, and as before, they gaped at him. Many started following the patrol. The other time, the officers had looked, but most remained where they were, uninterested in another Yankee prisoner. These men knew.
They halted in front of the largest tent, where the men dismounted and the sergeant pulled Jim off his horse. I must have quite a reputation these days, Jim mused, as two men pressed in behind him, the points of their bayonets in his back. The others remained alert, guns at the ready.
The bearded sergeant went to the shadowed door of the tent, saluted and spoke to someone inside. Then he stepped back, and it was Jim’s turn to gape.
“Artie!” he exclaimed aloud.
The officer in the gray uniform adorned with medals and a golden sash about the waist stared hard as he emerged. Three golden stars on a gray background were sewn onto the standup collar of his tunic. “You will address me as Colonel Gordon, sir.” He lifted his right hand. A leather quirt hung from his wrist by a loop.
Jim clamped his mouth shut. Was that the major change in this scenario? Had Artemus somehow taken the guise of a Rebel colonel in his efforts to spy on the Confederate activities? If so, Jim West sure did not want to blow his cover. Nonetheless, the icy hatred in the “colonel’s” brown eyes was disconcerting. Artemus was a fine actor, to be sure, but…
“Have you positively identified him as West?” Gordon asked the sergeant.
“No papers on him. But he sure fits the description, don’t he? Wiry, good looking kid with green eyes.”
Kid? Jim West’s eyes widened slightly. Were they seeing him as he had appeared years ago, in his early twenties? Come to consider it, Artemus did look younger as well. Perhaps nearly ten years younger.
The colonel approached the prisoner, clasping his hands behind him as he swaggered slightly, eyes narrowed. “He fits the description. But he doesn’t look very dangerous to me. General Loveless knows him by sight. He’ll confirm the identification when he arrives tomorrow.”
“Loveless!” Jim could not suppress the exclamation. “Artie, listen to me. Loveless did this… somehow. We’ve got to get back to our time and stop that crazy…”
The hand bearing the quirt flashed around, and the leather slashed across Jim West’s chest, tearing the fabric of his cotton shirt, opening a cut across his flesh. Jim fell back, again caught by the men behind him. Surprise, more than pain, was the immediate emotion. The blow had been vicious and intentional.
“You keep your filthy Yankee mouth shut,” Gordon snarled, leaning toward him, the quirt lifted menacingly. “I don’t want to hear our revered general’s name uttered through your dirty lips again! You hear me?”
Pushed erect, Jim glanced down at his chest, saw the blood staining the shirt. Real physical pain now accompanied the astonishment. Artie! What did he do to you? What could Miguelito Loveless have done to cause Artemus Gordon’s behavior to alter so drastically? Jim could see Artie threatening him, even pretending to strike him. But to use the quirt as he had…
“Take him to the guardhouse,” Gordon snapped. “I want a twenty-four hour guard on him. Four men to a shift. If he escapes, anyone who was on duty at the time will face the firing squad. Move!” He whirled and stalked back into the tent, ignoring the salutes of every man present.
The size of the stockade surprised Jim. Usually, except in an established fortress, a “guardhouse” was merely a well-guarded tent, or perhaps even just a makeshift fence to enclose prisoners of war, recaptured deserters, and malcontents. The fresh hewn timber revealed it had been constructed recently. A fence built with perpendicular logs, each cut to a fine point on the top, surrounded a log building, which he soon discovered was separated into four cells, one on each corner. Each cell appeared to have its own heavy barred door, and one small window.
The entire cavalry patrol escorted him again. Jim wished he could laugh about it. The situation was far too serious at the moment, especially until he could figure out what was going on. He had pretty much given up the idea that Loveless had him under some sort of trance and was implanting these images. Everything was much too real.
He was shoved inside through an opened door, where he turned and faced the sergeant. “This is some setup for a temporary camp.”
“The colonel likes to have things done right,” the sergeant responded stiffly, displaying no opinion whatsoever about the arrangements.
“Going to undo my hands?”
The man’s mouth tightened. “I didn’t have no orders to do that.” He stepped back out through the door, which was slammed shut. Jim heard the bar thud into place.
After a moment, Jim West turned and surveyed his new quarters in the faint light that came through the window, a window too small for a grown man, even the smallest, to slip through. He saw a narrow wooden bench against the far wall, and that was that as far as furnishings were concerned. The bench was bare, but obviously it was his bed. He noted a trench had been dug against the wall under the window. The latrine, apparently. By the odor, he was not the first to have inhabited this particular portion of the guardhouse.
He could hear voices through the open window, which was too high for him to look out through. With his hands still bound behind him, he was unable to grasp the sill to hoist himself up. Orders were being barked, obviously the commands regarding his security. With a loud sigh, Jim West sat down on the bench.
The cut on his chest was still stinging, though the bleeding had all but ceased. Likely, he mused, his shirt was going to adhere to his skin as the blood dried. Great. He looked at his dusty boots with some regret. Not the boots he wore as a Secret Service agent, the ones devised by Artemus Gordon that contained all manner of weapons and materials. Loveless, of course, knew about those secrets. Had he been forced to change his clothes…?
Once more Jim tried to remember what had occurred in the laboratory. He could hear Loveless’s droning, if somewhat excited voice, and above all, see in his mind’s eye how the doctor had been strutting around in anticipation of carrying his plan to fruition. Again, he heard Artemus’s angry protests as well.
“You can’t do it! You have no idea what could happen! You’ll be affecting thousands, millions of lives, not just a few! You may perpetrate unknown disasters…”
Jim wished he could remember what Loveless had been telling them. He was unsure whether his inability to hear the doctor’s words were due to his failure to comprehend all the scientific jargon that might have been used, or if, somehow, Loveless had blocked them from his mind. If that was the case, had something been said that would offer a clue to defeat whatever this Machiavellian plan was? Would Artie know?
Jim looked down at the cut on his chest again. He had seen Artemus Gordon’s face as the quirt was applied. Almost… almost as though the ersatz colonel enjoyed causing pain. Good acting on Artie’s part? Jim had a cold, numbing sense that that was not the case. Somehow this Artemus Gordon was not the Artemus who had been with him hours ago… days ago?… in the parlor car, and in Loveless’s laboratory.
If that was truly the case, James West was all alone. Alone and currently helpless in a warped section of time. It appeared that somehow Loveless had sent the three of them back ten years, and at the same time, had changed the personality of Artemus Gordon. Why just Artie, and not me as well? If Loveless wanted to change history, and he had the ability to alter the behavior of men, why not both of them?
Or am I really, truly alone? Had he been transported back through time by himself? Was that not Artemus Gordon, his own Artemus Gordon, he had met, despite the resemblance? Was the General Loveless mentioned not the Miguelito Loveless… Jim remembered Colonel Noel Vautrain who had caused him to meet a different Artemus in an antebellum situation. At that instance, Artemus had called himself Jack Maitland and had challenged Jim West to a duel. “Maitland” had subsequently been killed by a band of brigands who attacked the dueling party. Vautrain had mastered a method of time travel, had used it in an attempt to…
Jim West shook his head rather violently to rid himself of the thoughts. Artemus Gordon was a northerner, a Union man like himself. Both had served the Union cause faithfully and courageously, and were still doing so in the Secret Service. Nothing would have persuaded the Artemus Gordon Jim knew to fight to support the Cause, the beliefs that would have broken the country in two, and worse, continued the curse of slavery. Loveless could not have changed things enough to change Artie’s beliefs… could he?
Jim wished he could believe that this Colonel Gordon was not his long time friend and brother. Artie had no kin living in the South, Jim was certain. No close kin anyway. Highly unlikely, in any case, that such kin would resemble Artemus so nearly identically, let alone bear the same name.
So many questions with no hope of gaining answers while being confined in this cell block. He needed to talk to Artemus, and yes, to Loveless. The general was arriving tomorrow. From where? Why was not the good doctor here waiting for him?
A couple of hours later, Jim heard the bar being removed from his door. He got to his feet, ready for anything. A man he had not seen before, another sergeant, stepped into the doorway, rifle ready, and ordered him out. Stepping into the bright sun, Jim squinted, and when he hesitated, he was shoved from behind, only by the hardest keeping his feet.
A half dozen men escorted him to the camp’s blacksmith, a man with a forge and anvil, and a roaring fire. There manacles were fastened to Jim West’s wrists. The chain between the “bracelets” possessed heavy links that would not be broken without the help of acid or a rasp. No fetters were placed on his ankles, which surprised him to some extent. Were they so confident that he would not, or could not, run from this place? A chain connecting his ankles would make it very difficult to mount a horse, as well. Of course, if they put this many men around him every time he was outside the cell, could be they were right!
Back in his cell, he was given a tin cup of tepid water and a chunk of very dry bread. He drank the water, pitched the bread out the window, having no appetite. Then came the long wait for darkness, and the even longer night. That Colonel Gordon did not make another appearance was unexpected. Jim had thought the camp’s commander might want to interrogate him. Perhaps that honor was being left to the general expected the following day.
W*W*W*W*W
Colonel Artemus Gordon stood in the opening of his tent, sipping the hot “coffee” from the tin cup. Might as well just drink hot water, he mused. The few beans left in the commissary were being parceled out parsimoniously, providing very little flavor. Still it was better than the substitutes many civilians and military were required to use these days, which was often made from roasted peanuts, rye, or some other grain.
He liked to gaze out at the orderly arrangements of the camp. Disorder had always bothered him, even as a boy in Georgia. “My neat little boy,” Mama would say when he arranged the dishes and flatware on the table before him just so. Colonel Gordon was certain that his orderly mind had been a factor in his rather rapid rise through the ranks of the Confederate Army. Other men of the cohort who had enlisted when he did were still far below him in rank.
Perhaps that dislike of disorder was one of the reasons he was feeling so perturbed this morning. He could not say why, but that young man brought into camp yesterday afternoon bothered him a great deal. Of course, West was a spy, an officer of the enemy ranks, clad in civilian garb when captured. He would hang. If it had not been for General Loveless’s orders, Gordon would have scheduled the execution for this morning.
The information that the spy would be operating in their area, along with a full description, had come from the general’s headquarters, accompanied by specific instructions that when captured, Captain West was to be held until General Loveless had an opportunity to speak to him. No one was to interrogate West beforehand.
That troubled the colonel as well. He did not like to think that the great general, the savior of the South, possessed a poor opinion of his capabilities. Colonel Artemus Gordon had had numerous successes in the field as well as in camp. His men were known to be well-trained and highly disciplined. Colonel Gordon expected a promotion any day now. He suspected he could receive the word momentarily, not only because his regiment had performed so ably in the recent conflict at Chancellorsville, but because of the loss of several high ranking officers to wounding or death during that battle, creating openings. He knew that no one could quarrel with his politics. He had been, and was still, dedicated supporter of the Cause.
No, he told himself, some other reason existed why General Loveless wanted to be the one to question the prisoner. It has nothing to do with me. Although no prior warning had been received that any other Union spies were in the area, apparently the general knew something about this man, perhaps even more than the fact that West had been on the staff of General Grant in the western theater.
Was that why Loveless claimed first dibs? He wanted to learn as much as possible about the man who was gaining such an outstanding reputation in the west, who was driving the Confederate forces there from the field? That has be it, Gordon reassured himself. No slight against his own abilities.
Yet, he could not forget that moment when he himself lost his temper and struck the prisoner. West had recoiled from the blow, blood immediately staining his shirt. The pain in his green eyes, however, appeared to be something more than the agony caused by the blow. He had been… surprised. Hurt.
Why had West attempted to speak to him so intimately, using a pet name that only his family and closest friends ever dared utter? Loveless did this… That was what he had said. Did what? West went on to say something about time. Had he been attempting to establish himself as a madman?
Loveless did this…
Why were those words so troubling? Almost as though something needed to be remembered. Nonsense. Artemus Gordon had an excellent memory. He had been known throughout his school days for his ability to memorize poems and passages in books. He had pleased his mother by committing the entire New Testament book of John to memory at Sunday School. Miniscule, seemingly unimportant facts had a tendency to cling to his brain, and oftentimes turned out to be important after all. The memory retention served him well during his military career. He had an orderly mind. He had forgotten nothing. Especially, I have not forgotten a fellow named Jim West.
An orderly appeared, saluting, reporting that breakfast was ready. Gordon followed him to the large tent where the junior officers were gathered, all on their feet. They saluted, the colonel saluted back, and they all sat down. Officer’s fare was better than that served the enlisted men, but not by much. A Yankee supply train had been raided a couple of weeks ago, providing some tinned meat to supplement the hoecakes fashioned from ground corn.
“Beg your pardon, sir,” Captain Pike spoke up, “do we know when the general will arrive?”
“Last word was before midday. I ordered Captain Weathers to ride out to meet his party, and to send a man back in order to inform us.”
Pike smiled, nodding. “Perhaps he’ll finish with the Yankee spy and turn him over to us. I’m of a mood to see a bluebelly dancing from a rope. Especially one with his reputation.”
“You’ve heard of him, Jeremy?” asked the captain seated beside Pike.
“My brother is with Forrest. He’s written to me about James West. Cocky little devil. Has gotten away with a great deal, even at his young age, quite often due to his ability to charm the ladies.”
“Enough gossip,” the colonel snapped, unsure why he was annoyed by it this morning. Gossip was usual fodder for conversation in these long days in camp. All were hoping that General Loveless would be bringing them news of an upcoming move for the army. Everyone knew the importance of following up the great victory just accomplished as soon as possible. “Captain Pike, of far more import is whether your men are ready to welcome the general.”
“Yes, sir. The company is extremely proud and gratified to be selected for the honor, sir.” Pike frowned then. “I’m puzzled with the order that the prisoner is to be positioned outside the stockade for the welcoming ceremonies.”
“The general’s orders,” Gordon clipped. He had been bemused by that part of the orders as well. Especially because the orders had arrived three days ago, long before West was in custody. The general had been very certain that the spy would be captured, obviously. Gordon could only wonder if General Loveless had had some past encounter with James West. Their ages and circumstances were so different….
Colonel Artemus Gordon pushed the thoughts from his mind, just as he had had to concentrate last night to stop thinking about the captive in order to gain some rest. He had no reason to question the great general who had led the South’s army so close to ultimate victory here in the east. Everyone knew that as soon as the Union Army of the Potomac was destroyed, perhaps after just one more great battle, they would be heading west to help defeat Grant. And then the Confederacy would be a true reality.
W*W*W*W*W
Breakfast had been no better, and possibly worse, than supper, consisting of some probably captured hardtack and a cup of bitter-tasting hot water. Nevertheless, realizing that chances were the Reb soldiers were not eating much better, and also that he needed any semblance of nourishment he could get, Jim soaked the hardtack in the water until it was somewhat chewable. At least it was not weevil infested. He had had his share of that in the west on the occasions when Union supply wagons had been unable to get through.
Jim West certainly had not slept well. The narrow hard slab that served as his bed was not so much the problem as the manacles on his wrists, which restricted his movements and rattled every time he moved. Maybe I’ll get used to them. He chuckled mockingly. Chances were, he would not have opportunity to get used to them. The surprise was that he had not been hanged already.
Hanged? What if I die in this… this lifetime? That would change the future. Was that what Artemus had argued about? Loveless could not, should not arrange for either of us to die in an alternate history.
Or was something else to be changed? The mere fact that Miguelito Loveless was known as a great general for the Confederacy was a huge alteration of history. Loveless, rather than Robert E. Lee leading the Confederate forces? The good doctor’s ego getting in the way again, it appeared. Could it be more than ego? Some sort of plot to… what?
Jim did not like to even speculate. Loveless was not entirely a predictable man, beyond the fact that he would have devised a grandiose scheme that usually involved elevating himself to some sort of emperor status. The pint-sized doctor had been trying for years to regain a huge portion of the state of California, claiming that it had been purloined from his ancestors.
Could this be connected to his ambitions as far as California was concerned? Help the South win the war, and be awarded the state of California for his own kingdom? Jim shook his head. In the first place, California was not part of the Confederate states to be parceled out as spoils. Then again, if the Union had to sue for peace and…
He sighed heavily, leaning his head back against the rough wooden wall as he lolled on the bench. Why bother? Loveless would be making an appearance, and knowing the talkative doctor, he would be anxious to reveal his plans to the agents. Agent. Singular. Unless Jim was very wrong in his assumptions now, Artemus Gordon was no longer with him. Somehow, Loveless had placed Artie on the other side.
Jim knew the noon hour had not yet arrived sometime later when he heard voices outside the stockade, and then the bar was lifted from his door. The sergeant who had led the unit that made the capture was there, weapon ready. He did not speak, but jerked his head in a summons. Jim got the idea he was not too happy with whatever was coming up. Jim West wondered if he would not be very happy with it himself. Interrogation of spies could get a bit rough.
Once again surrounded by armed men, Jim was led down the orderly paths between tents toward the headquarters area. In one sense he welcomed an opportunity to see and talk to “Colonel Gordon” again. Whatever Loveless had done to Artie, the possibility existed that talking to him about the past—or the future, depending on how one looked at it—could shake Gordon’s mind processes. Jim knew he was going to try, in any case, even if it earned him more blows from the quirt. He had to.
Colonel Gordon was standing in front of his tent with a number of other Confederate officers, all togged out in their finest. Jim was surprised—then again, not so much—to recognize Jeremy Pike among them. Pike’s expression when he gazed on the prisoner was as cold and hateful as that of any other officer wearing the gray uniform. He doesn’t know me either!
Jim was escorted to a sturdy pole embedded deeply into the ground off to one side. The chain connecting his wrists was fastened to a ring at the top of that pole, stretching Jim’s arms high above his head. He was then gagged with a neckerchief. Their prisoner thus secured, his guards took their places with their units.
Jim West had no doubt who they were waiting for, and he found himself anticipating as well. The “great general” was coming, and the camp was alive with excitement. Jim had heard, and had witnessed a couple of times, how the Southern troops revered “Marse Robert.” He had seen expressions on the faces of the common soldier that mirrored what he was seeing now. The arrival of “Marse Miguelito” was imminent, obviously.
The cavalry arrived first. Jim recognized the leader of the unit. The famous General James Ewell Brown Stuart, known as “Jeb.” Hey, Jeb! In case you are interested, you’re going to die about a year from now at Yellow Tavern, struck down by Union horsemen. Or would he? In Loveless’s alternate history… who knew?
A buggy conveying the commanding general was next. The general was not alone, nor was Jim surprised. A very lovely blonde woman sat at his side on the fine leather seat. An enlisted man in uniform handled the reins. All the soldiers in Gordon’s camp set up a huge cheer. Loveless waved, grinning widely.
Not astonishing that Loveless was also dressed to the nines. Golden epaulets glittered on his shoulders, matching the sash around his waist. The décor on his collar was the stars against gold of a general. Apparently the fact that Lee never wore this insignia did not deter his “replacement” from doing so. An array of medals on the chest of the coat almost seemed as though they might overbalance the small man as he scampered down the steps set out for him. He was not wearing a ceremonial sword, but he did carry a gold-headed cane. He did not look toward the prisoner, waving the snowy-white wide-brimmed hat at the adoring throng.
Colonel Gordon orated a splendid welcoming speech. Artie always could put on a show. At least Loveless had not altered that part of Gordon’s personality. All of the officers were introduced to the general, and though Jim could not hear the words exchanged, the expressions on the countenances told it all. They worshipped the man!
Artemus Gordon personally escorted the general to the tent set up to be his residence while he was present in camp. Gordon had made certain the location was perfect, in the shade of a large oak tree, after commanding several junior officers to relocate their own tents. Everyone knew that General Loveless was fond of creature comforts. A tent for his secretary, Miss Evans, was placed nearby.
Gordon knew better than to comment on the presence of the female secretary. Most officers had male aides, as he himself had. The fact that Miss Evans was a comely young lady, of… well… normal size, was a subject of gossip, but no officer who valued his career was going to allow the general to be aware of that. General Loveless was a bachelor so his personal affairs were his own. His ability as a general did not suffer for lack of a staff either. He was able to attend to issuing necessary orders and receive reports without any perceivable problems.
“This will do splendidly,” Loveless announced after a survey of his quarters. “Now, bring the prisoner to me.”
“Sir…!” Gordon’s eyes widened, as protest leapt to his tongue.
The general raised a hand to stop his words. “I wish to speak to him in complete privacy, Colonel. It is a matter of national security. You will bring him to my tent. Station guards on the perimeter, but they must be twenty feet distant. Understand?”
“Yes, sir. I… understand.”
I don’t understand, but I am trained to take orders. Gordon saluted smartly, and headed back toward his own tent and the pole where the prisoner was still confined. He gave the orders briskly, and though both officers and men questioned with their eyes, none spoke aloud. Loveless was known for his eccentricity. Eccentric, but brilliant on the field of battle. In the first two years of the war, he had given orders that initially appeared insane, often flying in the face of all known military tactics. Yet in every instance, he had been able to anticipate the enemy perfectly. For that reason, the South was going to win this war. No one had any doubt.
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