All Out of Heart

“Oh, have some pity on a dyin’ man, sir,” a voice sang out of the dark alongside the road. My instinct was to pass along, but I stopped, for a moment alarmed that now I’d be thronged upon by the desperate, bloody wounded.

“Have you one drop of water for a dyin’ man?” the same voice pleaded.

“Where are you, sir?” I asked, my own voice loud but without resonance, smothered by the mist and the black of the night.

“Here.”

I saw the flick of motion and carefully picked my way toward him. In fact, I had no water, but the flask of brandy in my coat.

The man had propped himself up against a fence post, beside a corpse lying face up, arms stretched out reaching away.

“I seen you pass,” the soldier said. He was breathless and did not move as I approached. His legs were straight out in front of him, and the rest of him was supported upright by the fence post.

I took out my canteen and removed the top, offered it to him.

“I don’ have the strength sir.”

Kneeling beside him, I pressed it to his lips.

“Spirits,” he said, and smiled. “I’m ’bliged, sir.”

I gave him another small drink.

“Yankee?” he asked.

“More or less. I’m a correspondent. Where you from?”

“I’s with Gordon.” He feebly raised an arm for another drink, and I fed him more. “I’m certain it’s my last, sir,” he apologized.

“The doctors are here now. In the field. They’ll be here soon.”

“No. I ain’t gon’ to last this night. I don’ mind. I’m overdue. And the Yankees have the field?”

He rolled his head against the post to face me directly.

“This field, yes. They expect General Lee might attack again at dawn. You might rejoin your company,” I said, to be encouraging.

“I’m gutshot,” he said quietly. “My legs is dead a’ready. But I got no pain.”

I said nothing. We both knew the surgeons could do little for him.

“But I’m ’bliged to you, sir.” Again he lifted his hand, and I raised the flask to his lips. His hand lighted on my own.

“You ain’t a bitter man, as a Yankee?”

I said nothing, but I felt the labored, trembling, but only slight pressure from his fingers as he groped for my hand.

“I don’ want to die alone,” he said.

I put down the flask and took his hand. He told me in quick, hoarse words between gulps of air that he was from Alabama, had a wife and two small sons. He’d tried to muster out at the end of his first enlistment, but they hadn’t let him. He hadn’t seen his wife in over a year. I told him my wife was in Charleston and I hadn’t seen her since Sumter.

He was silent for a time, and once again, I felt the delicate pressure of his fingers. He tried to speak, gave it up, then tried again. “We ain’t so very different,” he observed.

“Another drink?” I asked him, feeling on the ground in the utter blackness for the flask. My knuckles hit the metal and I took it in hand.

“Thank you kindly,” he said in a whisper. His fingers danced lightly on my hand. He released a long, sad sigh, and his hand dropped from mine.

I nudged him, told myself he’d only gone unconscious, but I knew he was dead. Hoped so, for even if he recovered, he’d have nothing of life now but misery. I put away the flask and got to my feet, looking for the lights of the hospital details, and made my way slowly along the avenue, through the haze, back down the Boonesboro Road, where I was joined once again by the tumbrels carrying the dead and wounded. My horse was where I’d left it, and I leaned against it for just a moment, comforted by its living warmth.