Conceived in Liberty by Howard Fast Read Free Book Online Page A

been asleep, because they didn’t move when I came in. Kenton sat on the edge of his bunk, his woman curled behind him. She was a Pennsylvania woman, thin, with light hair and pale blue eyes, speaking a Dutch dialect. She was free with her attentions; it’s hard for a woman to be anything else in a dugout with ten men. Vandeer stood in one corner, older than ever, hardly speaking and never smiling, dreaming of a little log parish-house, where the Sabbaths came regularly with six calm days in between. Henry slept. Brone was still on sentry beat. The last was a Polish Jew, a thin, strange man from Philadelphia, tall, hollow-chested, his brown eyes deep sunk in his head. He had been in America only a year, and he spoke no English. But she spoke Dutch, which most of us could understand. He sat next to the fire now, his head bent, his lips moving slowly.
    â€œPraying,” Kenton said. “He has no understanding of what night this is.” Kenton had never seen a Jew before, and I think he was afraid. “A heathen,” Kenton said.
    â€œEdward spat on his sleeve,” I said. “It froze before you could count three.”
    â€œI call to mind a gypsy at Brandywine—before the battle. He said a winter to freeze the marrow from the land.”
    Ely had bared my feet. Now, as he knelt over me, his long, grey-streaked beard brushed my hands. He worked my feet slowly. I had to turn my head away, but Ely worked them as if they were his own.
    â€œFeeling, Allen?”
    I nodded.
    Jacob stood over us, watching with a professional eye. The dugout was hot and close, but draughty, full of body-smell, thick heat and stray curls of cold air. The chimney drew badly, and the log roof was shielded with a layer of blue smoke. The rank odour of bad rum pierced through everything else.
    â€œThe foot’s a small part of a man,” Jacob said.
    Kenton’s woman sat up and said: “A stinking filthy pair of feet—ye’re no more men than pigs!”
    â€œYou shut up,” Jacob told her. “You Goddamn slut, shut up!”
    â€œKenton—Kenton, hear his foul tongue?”
    Kenton shrugged and smiled foolishly. Kenton was a peaceful, easy-going man.
    Charley Green woke up, leaned out of his bunk and looked on, mildly curious. His woman shouted:
    â€œA fine lot of men—to curse a poor woman!”
    â€œIt ain’t none of your matter,” Charley said.
    â€œI’m sicka seeing that slut,” Jacob muttered.
    â€œHear him, Kenton!”
    â€œI’ll not have you speaking of that, Jacob,” Kenton protested, mildly.
    Jacob turned round, his fists tight clenched. I watched them, too drunk with warmth to move. Ely went on kneading my feet, as if he had not heard. The Jew kept his eyes on the ground.
    â€œI speak as I please,” Jacob said.
    Kenton stood up. Vandeer pushed them apart. “Ye’re no men, but beasts,” Vandeer muttered. “There’s no love or fear of God left in you.”
    Jacob went to the fire, opposite the Jew, and crouched down. Kenton relaxed on the bed, and when the woman tried to caress him, he pushed her aside. Ely bound up my feet.
    â€œA cold night. I pity Edward,” Ely said simply.
    Vandeer stood in the middle of the dugout, his arms raised, his mouth half-open, the skin creased loosely in folds about his eyes. Then, abruptly, he dropped his arms and went to his bunk.
    Jacob poured some thin corn broth from a pot next to the fire and offered it to me. I drank it slowly, enjoying the warmth of it.
    â€œIt’s a hard thing to get the cold out of yer bones,” Ely said.
    The Jew looked up and said, in Dutch: “The cold of Siberia bites deeper—”
    â€œSiberia?”
    Green understood no Dutch, but he caught the word. “A frozen land in Asia.”
    â€œYou were there?” I asked the Jew. “What great journey took you such distances?”
    He groped for words, for space that was the