Conceived in Liberty Read Free Page B

His face is blue and purple with frost, the dead flesh breaking on his nose. I wonder how men endure it, how I endure it. But I keep stamping round. Only get warm, I think. The idea of warmth, any warmth, possesses me.
    â€œWake Moss.”
    With the toe of his boot, Jacob prods the woman. He says: “High time to be moving, Jenny.”
    Charley Green grins, standing feet apart, his face dull with sleep, his hands in his armpits for warmth. Ely walks toward the Pennsylvania men, slowly, stiltedly, as if each step pained the bottom of his feet. I can understand how his mind is set only on fire; he’ll bring back the fire. He’ll talk to them gently; he has a way with him.
    We stand round Moss and Jenny. The woman moves and stretches her arms. The cold bites, and her hands seek out Moss. Then she screams and sits up.
    â€œHe’s cold,” she whimpered.
    Vandeer laughed. Her nose had turned bright red during the night and her hair had spread all over her face. She was an ugly, fat, gross creature. We were all of us filthy and ugly, broken in one way or another. But I hated her because she reminded me of things that had once been and brought them back to me, because she was a mocking caricature of a woman. The kind of woman I had known, once.
    I dragged her to her feet. I held her, her dirty blanket clutched in my hands, shaking her back and forth. The others watched me. Henry Lane was smiling stupidly, but the others didn’t move. They just watched.
    â€œYou’ll kill me!” she cried.
    Then I let go of her. “Get out of here,” I whispered.
    She arranged her blanket, turning round and round, patting the loose strands of her yellow hair into place. “I’m a good woman, I want you to know,” she said. “I’m a good, respectable woman.”
    Vandeer was laughing again. He was a little man; he had been a minister before the war. He had had two brothers who were killed at White Plains. Lately he had been like this. I could understand that. He was forty years old, yet he had become as lightheaded as a boy.
    â€œBetter go,” Jacob Eagen told her.
    She stumbled away, turning every now and then to swear at us and to scream at us that she was a good woman. Jacob bent down next to Moss, shaking him gently. Jacob was hard and bitter, but now with Moss he was gentle as a woman. He took the hair away from Moss’ face, and we saw blood clotted and frozen above his thin beard.
    Jacob stood up, said: “He’s cold.” When he said that, we knew.
    The boy’s eyes were open. Vandeer had stopped laughing. I bent over Moss and pulled off his thin cloak, scattering snow. I forced my hands to go to his eyes and close them.
    â€œIt’s a hard man needed to stand many nights like this night,” Brenner said softly.
    â€œHe’s dead?” Jacob asked me, and then demanded, querulously: “Where’s Ely? This is no time for Ely to be away from us.”
    â€œEly went for fire,” Edward said, dully.
    â€œWhy’d he go for fire? It’s too late for fire, ain’t it? There was a time for fire before, but it’s too late for fire now. The fire will not bring Moss alive.”
    â€œHe went to wheedle a little fire out of those Pennsylvania men—he has a way, Ely——”
    â€œShut up!”
    â€œWe couldn’t be starting a fire with flint. Ely’ll come with a burning brand. Cold hands can’t hold flint.”
    â€œThere’s nothing Ely can do now, Jacob.”
    Jacob knelt down by Moss. I went over to the fruit tree and sat down with my back against it. The cold was all through me, but it was not such a cold as Moss Fuller knew, nowhere near such a deep and silent cold.
    â€œYou’re sure he’s dead?”
    â€œHe’s dead,” Jacob said.
    The bugles were blowing, and all along the line, brigades were picking themselves up and starting to move. The sun came up, showing through the