“Sure am. That worry you?”

“Hell, no,” Billy Blythe said. “Just seems strange, you being a Yankee and all.”

“No stranger than a man being in bed on a fine morning when there are Yankees to be killed,” Starbuck said cheerfully. The street beneath him was at last showing some signs of vigor, so he turned back into the room. “Now get the hell up, Billy. I hear you’ve got some men for me. Where are they?”

Billy Blythe flapped a hand. “In camp, Major.”

“Then get your boots on, Billy, and let’s go fetch them. You know where I might find a wagon in this town?”

“Lucky if you can find a wheelbarrow,” Tumlin said. “Hell, there ain’t nothing here but bad soldiers and good women.” He slapped the black girl’s rump.

Starbuck saw some cigars on the washstand and helped himself to one. “You don’t mind?”

“Hell, no, help yourself,” Billy Blythe said. “There’s a flint and steel on the mantel.” He waited until Starbuck’s back was turned, then swung himself out from under the yellowing bedsheet.

Starbuck turned. “Billy,” he said reprovingly. “You go to bed dressed?” The pinkly naked Tumlin had a pouch belted round his stomach. “That’s no way to treat a lady,” Starbuck added.

“Just keeping it safe, Major,” Tumlin said, scrambling into a pair of long underpants. He blushed, felt in the pouch, and took out two silver coins. “You’ll forgive me, Major?” he asked and tossed the coins onto the bed. “Sorry about the interruption, honey.”

The girl snatched the money as Starbuck lowered himself into a cane chair and put his dusty boots up on the washstand. “You were in a Yankee jail, I hear?” he asked Tumlin.

“Most of this year,” Blythe said.

“They fed you well,” Starbuck said as Tumlin buttoned a shirt round his plump belly, which was distended by the money pouch.

“I was four times this size when I got took,” Blythe said.

“Where were you held?” Starbuck asked.

“Union, Massachusetts.”

“Union?” Starbuck asked. “Where the hell’s Union?”

“Out west,” Blythe said. He had met Starbuck’s father and knew the family came from Boston, so placing his mythical town of Union in the west of the state seemed a safe bet.

“In the Berkshires?” Starbuck asked.

“I guess,” Blythe said, sitting on the bed to tug on his boots. “What are they? Hills? Not that we saw any hills, Major. Just big walls.”

“So how many men have you got for me, Billy?”

“A dozen.”

“Stragglers?”

“Lost sheep, Major,” Blythe said, offering Starbuck a lazy grin, “just little lost sheep looking for a shepherd. Hell, I’m looking for a comb.”

“Here.” Starbuck saw the comb on the washstand and tossed it across the room. “So you escaped?”

Blythe winced as the comb caught in a tangle of his long hair. “Walked south, Major.”

“Then you’ll have good hard feet, Billy, all ready for some marching.”

“And where the hell are we marching, Major?” Blythe asked.

“My guess,” Starbuck said, “is Harper’s Ferry. And once we’ve bagged the Yankees there, over the river and keep going north till the Yankees beg us to stop.”