he alone was smiling. I did not know if it was the smoke or just the thought of Sgt. Nevin but tears began to run down my face & down Metzy’s face too & Ridgeway came over to us & set on a stool but just outside our little circle of whores & soldiers saying nothing.
I tipped some of my whiskey into the fire & the flames did flare up & it was like Nevin’s spirit ascending or maybe I was just dolted with drink to think such a thing.
Says Metzy now, “Will I play us a tune boys?” And though I did not feel like singing it was the proper thing to do for Nevin did always like a sing song & so I said this.
“Nevin would not have us acting like kids with no cake about the place boys. He would want us to raise a glass & wake him with a song or 2 well would he not?”
“He would,” says my brother.
“Then get us that fiddle that f_____ plank of wood that sounds like a strangling cat Mr. Kinney,” says Metzy to the Sutler who did not smile but did not object for joy in a hog ranch meant more coin in his trousers & he fetched the fiddle with its warp you could see across the room so a boy would nearly have to play it arsewise. “And another shoulder of Bust Head there too,” says my brother & the Sutler went back to the bar like he did not hear him but still came back with the whiskey.
Well the singing & playing did start up rightly then. Even one of the whores sung a song for Sgt. Nevin in her own tongue & though her song was an Indian lament it did not bother the lot of us because it was well intended & soon the stools & chairs got moved back & we begun to dance with the whores & with each other with only Tom’s girl to stay sitting for she did not look well. And as always (I will never forget it as long as I live which may not be long) but that G___ D_____ cuckoo clock did set to cooing & ringing in the hour of 2 in the morning & Tom’s girl started at the sound like she knew that clock was counting down to something.
“Take a drink,” says Tom to her sweetly. “Take one & you will feel better.”
But she did only push his glass away & left the room for her quarters behind the curtain with Tom following. Tom did always worry after her so I gave it no more thought then for we were whirling & dancing & singing now about the place with our bare feet on the cool packed dirt of the floor all the time pouring more whiskey into us & singing songs for the soul of the good Sgt. May He Rest At The Right Hand Of God. I sang The Vacant Chair & Hardtimes & Metzger played sad airs betimes & wild tunes for dancing as well & the clock ran on but it felt like no time was passing at all.
Everything was just grand I tell you Sir. It was just the wake Nevin would of wanted but things took a turn with the Sutler’s wife arriving at the shebeen. God Himself only knows what she wanted with coming there at such an hour. Likely it was to make sure her husband was not drinking away their profits as was his way but no matter. She came & if she hadn’t well things might of been different altogether.
Says Ridgeway to her, “Good evening Madam.”
Says she back to him with a face like the plague, “Good what’s good about it? The Ft.’s been locked up for good now. The Col. issued an order for courts martial of any soldier found outside the walls after taps. It will cost us pretty.” And then she looked to her husband like it did all be his fault. “It will cost us a pretty f______ penny,” says she with a mouth like a deckhand on a whaler.
Says the Sutler back to her, “Well these boys were never allowed off post without orders before tonight but they still came. Do not get vexed about it Clara.” But Clara was vexed & spat a string of tobacco juice into the fire. She did think herself high borne but was just as low as the rest of us.
Well