A More Perfect Union – Book 3

Prologue

Prologue—Abilene, Kansas—May 4th, 1867

The sleepy Kansas town had no idea what was headed its way. Its old men, women, and children weren’t cowering in fear of the unknown, however. Not like what had happened in South Carolina. Not like Benjamin Warley’s sisters and their families. The people of Abilene weren’t rushing to bury their valuables before Sherman’s forces burned everything to the ground.

Ben eased his weight in the saddle, letting his horse rest while he surveyed the false-fronted businesses of Abilene. As pitiful as it was, the town had grown since the first time he’d ridden through in the winter of ’sixty-four. There were more sod homes, one of them so fresh the dirt hadn’t yet weathered to gray. Several horses stood hipshot along the hitching rail in front of the general store. The evening sun glinted off a white cross set atop a sod building at the end of the main street. Small marks of progress.

Raising in his stirrups, Ben squinted at the eastern horizon. He couldn’t see it yet, but major changes were headed toward Abilene on iron rails and belching steam. It was thought the railroad would arrive before month’s end. With it would come something Ben desperately needed.

Opportunity.

He’d signed on for an extra eighteen months with the Second U.S. Volunteers to escort wagons from Fort Dodge to Fort Lyon up in Colorado. Most of Ben’s unit had mustered out at Fort Leavenworth in ’sixty-five. They’d had somewhere else to go or someone waiting for them. Ben had nothing but the clothes on his back, a pistol, and a few essentials bundled into his bedroll. Even the U.S.-branded horse he rode and the McClellan saddle he sat on belonged to the U.S. Cavalry.

But Ben didn’t. He’d mustered out five days before at Fort Dodge.

He chirped to the horse to get it moving toward the only building with corrals. He’d promised his sergeant he’d leave the animal at the livery stable. A courier would pick it up on his next ride east and return it to the fort. The animal was older but of good stock, likely Morgan breeding. Ben had tried to purchase it, but suitable cavalry horseflesh was in short supply on the western plains. He’d been lucky to be given the use of it to ride as far as Abilene, the collection of sod buildings being the closest town to Fort Dodge.

A town in its formative beginning where Ben could make a fresh start.

Leaving the horse in the hands of a capable-looking stableboy, Ben entered the saloon. His other reason for heading to Abilene stood behind the bar. A bear of a man polished a glass with a rag, the stub end of a cigar clamped in his teeth.

“Well, now.” The man slapped his rag onto the bar. “If it ain’t himself, come to me humble establishment.” He removed the cigar as a grin split the bristle of red beard covering the lower half of his face.

“Hello, Red.”

Several heads swiveled at Red’s words, mostly younger men, around Ben’s age, but two older fellows with lined faces and graying hair laid down their cards to watch.

Red waved him over to the bar. “What brings ye to Abilene?”

Ben leaned his elbows on the polished wood—a luxury on the almost treeless plain—and nodded to the row of clean glasses. “A drink.”

Red’s hearty laugh released the rest of the room to return to their previous occupations. As the big man filled a glass of beer, the buzz of conversation once again filled the space between the combination of sod and wooden walls.

Red slid the frothy glass in front of Ben. “There ye be.”

After a long pull to clear the Kansas dust from his throat, Ben sighed.

“Now, will ye be tellin’ yer old friend”—Red parked his elbows on the bar— “what brings ye to the likes of Abilene?”

“The railroad.” Ben tilted his head to the east. “And opportunity.”

“I was thinkin’ maybe ye’d stay in the army after ye signed up for another stint like ye did.”

“No.” Ben pushed the glass back and forth between his hands. “I just needed more time to decide what to do.”

“Ye won’t be high-tailin’ it back to South Carolina then?” Red’s eyebrows rose.

Ben shook his head. “Never planned to.” He met his friend’s eyes. “There’s nothing left for me back there.”

“Yer sisters?” Genuine concern colored the big man’s voice.

“They’re fine, both of them. Miraculously, neither lost her husband during the war.”

“They’ll be wantin’ to see ye, surely.”

Amelia and Pauleen would welcome Ben back, of that he had no doubt, but he wouldn’t be a burden to them. They’d kept their lands through the war, but that was it. Their husbands had returned to their wives and children living in makeshift tents, fields untended, crops unplanted, and all the slaves gone. They had enough to do without another mouth to feed. Their letters spoke of hope and determination, but also of deprivation—and no chance of employment for someone like him.

Someone who’d turned his back on the South.

His sisters were forgiving. He was their only surviving brother, after all. But the others? His old neighbors? They’d never understand why he’d done what he had. At times, he barely understood it himself.

Pauleen’s husband had visited the Warley homestead, the plantation Ben’s brother Peter should have inherited from their father. But Peter had fallen early in the war. Father had succumbed to one of the many diseases that thinned the ranks of the poorly fed and poorly equipped Confederate forces sometime before Ben had been taken prisoner.

“I’m moving on to a new life.” His tone was short, final.

Red cocked his head. “Ye even sound different.”

Ben had spent the past few years diligently trying to rid himself of his deep Southern drawl. A man in his position—a Galvanized Yankee—had enough things going against him. Losing the accent made life easier.

“While you still sound as Irish as if you’d just stepped off the boat.” He grinned to take any sting from his words.

Another hearty laugh followed, and then Red rubbed his whiskered chin. “If ye be lookin’ for opportunity, methinks I know just the man ye should be speakin’ to.” He slapped one meaty hand against the bar. “McCoy!”

A man not much older than Ben rose from a table and joined them.

“Ben Warley, ye need to meet Joseph McCoy.” Red waggled a finger between them. “McCoy, ye were spoutin’ off about needin’ a good man to send south to drum up yer herds.” He poked his thumb at Ben. “Here’s yer man.”

Joseph McCoy wore clothing that hadn’t seen hard work. His slicked-back hair exposed a wide forehead, while his face tapered into a narrow, shaved chin. There was intelligence in his brown eyes, and something about his mouth hinted at equal parts determination and good humor. He stuck out his hand, and Ben grasped it in a firm handshake.

“Red recommending you is no small thing.” McCoy pointed to an empty table near the door. “Bring your beer, and we’ll talk.”

Ben followed him and sat. The word herds had piqued his interest. If there was one thing Ben knew, it was horses. His father had raised some of the best thoroughbreds in South Carolina.

“So.” McCoy rested his hands on the table. “What do you know about cattle?”

The hope that had kindled dropped to the pit of Ben’s stomach. “I can tell one end from the other.” In truth, his father had kept a small herd on the plantation, but they’d been fat shorthorn cattle, purebreds with bloodlines tracing back to England. Nothing like Ben had seen since coming west.

McCoy chuckled. “That’s a start. Can you read and write?”

“I can.”

The other man pointed to the stripe down the side of Ben’s trousers. “Cavalry?”

Ben nodded.

“Good with horses then?”

“Better than most.” It wasn’t bragging if it was true, and the truth was, Ben could ride any horse with hair on it. He’d been good before he’d signed the loyalty oath that mustered him into the U.S. Army’s cavalry, but in the two-plus years he’d been in the West, he’d polished his skills to a high shine.

“I like a man with confidence in himself.” McCoy leaned back in his chair. “Let me tell you what I have in mind.”

Two hours later, Ben had agreed to work on a harebrained mission to round up herds of cattle in southern Texas and arrange for men to trail them all the way to the new railhead at Abilene, Kansas. From there, they’d ship on railcars to markets crying for beef. Steers that couldn’t fetch more than ten dollars in San Antonio would sell for thirty or even forty dollars in the large cities back east. It might be a crazy scheme, but Joseph McCoy was convinced he could make it work with the right people in place. And the man was a powerful salesman for the idea.

Ben almost believed him, but more importantly, he had the chance he needed to rebuild his life. He’d be paid a regular wage he could draw from the bank in San Antonio, be given a horse of his own with full tack, and travel south in the company of a surveyor named Timothy Hersey, an older Abilene man McCoy had hired to map the route north for the cattle to follow.

That night, Ben stretched out on the bed of the room he’d rented from Red and stared at the roots dangling between the boards holding the sod roof in place. His had been a long fall from the walnut-paneled walls and painted ceiling of his bedroom in South Carolina. He’d always miss the majestic hills and winding creeks of his boyhood home. The greenness of everything. The low singing of the slaves from their quarters drifting through the windows in the evenings. Nostalgia clogged his throat, deepened by the loss of his brother and father. Nothing would bring back the way of life he’d grown up with, but at last, he had something to look forward to.

A chance to make something of himself in the postwar world.

paperback ISBN: 979-8-9866966-0-7 – ebook ISBN: 979-8-9866966-1-4

Return to https://peggthomas.com/