Breakthroughs

“Then get the hell out of here,” the clerk said, and Cinci

He got out of the Covington city hall as fast as he could; he kept expecting Luther Bliss to pop out of nowhere and start grilling him. Had the Kentucky State Police chief known what all Cinci

When he got outside, he let out a sigh of relief. He also felt a surge of pride that surprised him. Somebody might actually call him Mr. Driver now, a form of address impossible before. In the form of his name-if in very little else-he had become a white man’s equal.

He spotted Apicius in the line snaking its way toward the building. The barbecue cook saw him, too, and waved. As he waved back, he wondered what the local Red leader would think of this small measure of equality. Nothing much, he suspected; mystification was one of Apicius’ favorite words.

Apicius waved again, more urgently this time. With a certain amount of reluctance, Cinci

“Driver,” Cinci

“Hell, no.” Apicius’ jowls wobbled as he scornfully shook his head. “I’m go

“Apicius Wood.” As the clerk had before, Cinci

“Don’t care much,” the Red answered, “on account of it don’t matter a hill of beans any which way. Just one more tool of the oppressors to do a better job of exploitin’ us. Hell of a lot easier to keep track of Apicius Wood than it is to keep track of Apicius the barbecue king.”

He made no particular effort to keep his voice down. Most Kentucky Negroes, like most down in what was still the CSA, had at least some sympathy for the Marxist line. Cinci

Apicius set his hands on his hips, which only made him look wider than ever. “I ain’t sayin’ you’re wrong, mind you, but I ain’t sayin’ you’ re right, neither,” he said. “Other thing is, ain’t a whole lot o’ niggers stand out in a crowd like I do.” He snapped his fingers. “In a crowd-that reminds me, goddamn if it don’t.”

“Reminds you of what?” Cinci

“Reminds me of why Tom Ke

Cinci

“Wonder if I ought to,” Apicius said thoughtfully. “I still don’t know whose game you’re playin’.”

“I’m playing my own game, goddammit,” Cinci

“You come prowlin’ round my place, you ain’t goin’ home again,” Apicius told him. “Catfish on the river bottom git hungry this time o’ year.” Cinci

“Tell me what you know, then.”

“Think about it like this,” Apicius said. “Think about how come Ke

Cinci

Letting Apicius see any of those thoughts but the first one was dangerous. “Uh- huh,” Cinci

A broad, friendly grin spread over Apicius’ face. Cinci

Pop goes the weasel, Cinci

“We’ve grabbed ’em by the nose!” Lieutenant General George Custer said in the map room of what had been the Te

“Yes, sir,” Major Abner Dowling said resignedly. Custer was a great one for mouthing slogans. He was a great one for inspiring his men, too. He’d had a lot of practice at that, having fed so many of them into the meat grinder. But, now that he’d come up with what was admittedly the great military idea of his career, he seemed disinclined to think about any other military ideas.

He had reasons, too, or thought he did. “The War Department is run by morons,” he growled, “and expects everyone else to be a moron, too.”

“Sir, as I’ve said before, in my opinion it’s just as well that First Army doesn’t advance on Memphis,” Dowling answered. “We’re too distant for the thrust to do much good. Murfreesboro is a better choice all the way around.”

Custer muttered something into his gilded mustache. It sounded like, If the War Department orders it, it must be wrong. But, since he hadn’t said it quite loud enough to compel Dowling to notice it, his adjutant didn’t. He made such a point of not noticing, in fact, that Custer had to say something intelligible: “So long as we kick ’em in the pants hard enough, maybe it won’t matter which direction we go in.”

“Yes, sir,” Dowling said, more enthusiastically than before. “We truly may have them on the ropes. All we need to do is finish them off.”

Was he really talking like that? He was. Did he really believe what he was saying? He did. That he believed it still astonished him. The Rebs were fighting hard-nobody had ever accused Confederate soldiers of having any quit in them-but there weren’t enough of them, white or black, and they didn’t have enough guns or barrels to hold back the United States, not any more.

Custer said, “The Barrel Brigade will put a crimp in the CSA-you wait and see if it doesn’t.”

“Yes, sir.” Abner Dowling didn’t know whether to be pleased he was thinking along with the general commanding First Army or appalled Custer was thinking along with him. After momentary hesitation, the latter emotion prevailed.

With a chuckle that struck Dowling’s ear as evil, Custer went on, “I’m going to make sure the Barrel Brigade doesn’t smash the Rebel line anywhere near General MacArthur’s division, too. And do you know what else, Major? I’ll have MacArthur thank me for doing things that way, too, because I’ll extend his men the great privilege of feinting against the Rebels to draw their attention away from the main axis of my attack.”

“That’s very-clever, sir,” Dowling said. No wonder Custer had sounded evil. He might not be a great soldier (on the other hand, despite everything, he might be, a realization that never failed to unsettle Dowling), but more than half a century in the Army had made him a nasty schemer. Daniel MacArthur could no more help putting his heart into any attack he made than a trout could help rising to a fly. But an attack meant as a feint would be foredoomed to failure, and not all his brilliance could change that. Poor bastard, Dowling thought-not that he was fond of the arrogant MacArthur, either.