Lucifer ran over the road, leading the black dog on a makeshift leash of two rifle slings. “You shouldn’t be here,” Starbuck said, making space for the boy behind the knoll.

“I always wanted a dog,” Lucifer said proudly. “Got to find him a name.”

“There are still Yankees in the wood,” Starbuck said, pushing down the lever that rammed the revolver’s chambers.

“I shot one,” Lucifer said.

“You damn fool,” Starbuck said fondly. “They’re fighting for your freedom.” He levered down the last chamber, then upturned the gun to push on the percussion caps.

“I’d have shot more,” Lucifer said, “only the gun don’t work.” He offered Starbuck his revolver. The trigger hung limp.

“It needs a new stop spring,” Starbuck said, handing the gun back, “but you shouldn’t be fighting. Hell, these bastards are trying to liberate you and you’re killing the poor sons of bitches.” Lucifer did not answer. Instead he frowned at his gun and twitched the trigger in hope that it would engage on some part of the mechanism. The small dog whimpered and he soothed it. It was a puppy, scarce weaned, with coarse black hair, a snub nose, and a stump of a tail. “The bastards will kill you,” Starbuck warned him. “You and your dog.”

“So I die,” Lucifer said defiantly. “And in heaven we get to be the masters and you all are our slaves.”

Starbuck grinned. “I don’t reckon on seeing heaven.”

“But maybe your hell is our heaven,” Lucifer said with relish. “Imp,” he added.

“Imp?” Starbuck asked, “imp of Satan?”

“The dog! I’m going to call him Imp,” Lucifer said delightedly as he ruffled Imp’s ears. “Got to get you some meat, Imp.” The stumpy tail suddenly wagged as the dog licked Lucifer’s face. “I always wanted a dog,” Lucifer said again.

“Then keep him safe,” Starbuck said, “and keep yourself safe.”

“I ain’t going to be killed,” Lucifer said confidently.

“Every corpse here thought that,” Starbuck said grimly.

Lucifer shook his head. “I ain’t,” he insisted. “I ate a Yankee grave.”

“You did what?”

“I found a dead Yankee’s grave,” Lucifer admitted, “and I waited till midnight, then I ate a scrap of dirt from the grave. No Yankee can kill me now. My mother taught me that.”

Starbuck heard something pathetic in the last few words. “Where is your mother, Lucifer?”

The boy shrugged. “She’s alive,” he said reluctantly.

“Where?”

The boy jerked his head, then shrugged. “She’s alive.” He waggled the useless trigger. “But they sold me out. Reckoned I was worth something, see?” He touched his skin. “I ain’t real black. If I’d been real black they’d never have sold me, but they reckoned I could be a house slave.” He shrugged. “I ran away.”

“So where is your mother?” Starbuck insisted.

“Hell, she’s probably sold by now. The master never kept the niggers he’d slept with, not usually. I don’t know where she is.” He said the last words angrily, as if to demonstrate that he did not want to talk about the subject any more.