I pulled a deep breath. The air hung heavy with the rammish odors of wood-smoke, horse droppings, and hundreds of unwashed men. Even a polecat had discharged its pungent incense somewhere nearby. Nevertheless, the air whisked away any remaining doubts. With renewed confidence, I cuffed the dampness from my face. I zigzagged my way around the clumps of slumbering soldiers and camp accoutrements, heading for the copse of trees under which my knapsack awaited my return. Soon, bundled in blankets under the winter-stripped branches of a towering oak, I closed my eyes. I had done the right thing. The honorable thing. The only thing a true blood brother could have done. And, for the first time in two days, ever since the morning of Billy’s tearful pleas for my collaboration in this gruesome affair, I drifted into restful slumber.

In the east, dawn broke from behind wispy shrouds of cirrus, while to the west, prodigious black thunderheads loomed low on the horizon, promising a tumultuous day ahead. I almost wished for a mighty breeze to sweep the storm forward, then perhaps I could avoid, or at least delay, the fulfillment of my promise to Billy.

But then I spotted the captain. The moment of truth had arrived. As Roswell approached me, his lugubrious countenance told nothing. He hunkered down beside me and rested his hand on my shoulder.

“The second from the left,” he said in a conspiratorial tone. “The one with a deep gouge in the stock.”

Roswell stared into my eyes, and without words, again imparted his concern for my welfare. With a brittle smile, he gave my shoulder a fierce squeeze before leaving me alone to ponder. My body tingled with renewed dread as I both cheered and cursed at Providence.

Michanah Hawkins, a messmate and confidant who was privy to my situation, came rushing forward in the captain’s wake. A mixture of curiosity and tension blanched his sunken cheeks.

“So?” he asked. “What did Roswell say? Do you have permission?”

“It’s all been arranged, Hawk.”

“Hellsafire! How are you?”

“I gave my pledge. I’ll do my best.”

Hawkins fished a whiskey flask from his pocket. “Here, Sam. You’ll need a right smart of pop-skull.”

How blissful the thought of drinking myself into oblivion, to numb myself of the escalating anxiety, to free myself from this world for that of another, if for only a short while. Yet after a moment of devilish temptation, I declined. “No thanks, Hawk. I need to keep my wits about me. Can’t risk making a poor fist at the task.”

In comprehension, Hawkins gave me a nod and a handshake. He spouted some well-intentioned gibberish in a bid to lift my spirits, but he knew as well as I that the exercise was fruitless. “God be with you, Sam.”

If I could only be certain of that.

Hundreds of soldiers, several companies, in fact, had been called to bear witness to the day’s exhibition. Even members of Company Q, the infirm who were able to hobble from their sick beds, had been ordered to attend. The spectators formed three sides of a hollow square. Donned in patched and motley uniforms, frayed slouch hats and forage caps, many barefoot and in desperate need of nourishment, they looked like an army of scarecrows. Apart from the sporadic whispered banter and the nervous twittering I assume was born out of wariness for what lay ahead, my comrades stood in mute deliberation. And a quick observation of the various faces suggested that most, like me, did not have the stomach for it. But orders were orders.

Waiting, caught up in the winds of memories, my mind dwelled on Billy and the decade following our blood oath. At first, it had been easy to maintain my end of the pledge. The occasional loan of a few dollars when Billy coveted a new bowie knife, or the loan of a fist when neighborhood bullies converged on our bountiful fishing hole with an intention of claiming it as their own. We became inseparable. Thick as thieves, some might say, and together we lived our young lives to the fullest. We shared our first sip of whiskey together, our first “chaw of tabakky” together, and even spent countless evenings together investigating the mysteries of the petticoats with the painted ladies who lived in a rambling house at the edge of town.

But as the years trickled past, and the normal hijinks of youth gave way to maturity, the burden of the pledge grew wearisome. By our eighteenth summer, I had fallen in love with Martha Davenport, the prettiest gal in all of Charlottesville, at least in my eyes. Our whirlwind courtship and marriage brought new responsibilities, and I chucked my penchant for boyhood idylls and settled into a comfortable existence. I must say, in all fairness, that my dear Martha went a long way in taming me—especially after little Sammy arrived within a year of our nuptials, and pretty Ivy Anne following eleven months later—but I had come to enjoy the bridle. Yet, while my newfound life as a husband, father, and hardworking planter made me a pillar in the community, Billy’s life took a different turn.

His love affair with the whiskey bottle had become legendary in Albemarle County. His lucklessness at the gambling tables equaled his windfalls with the gals, and he possessed an insatiable craving for both. If the lack of funds posed a problem, he would resort to thievery. If someone looked at him cock-eyed, he would take to brawling. All in all, his proclivity for raising hell and low-down shecoonery caused quite a shindy wherever he went. And whether it be a run-in with a constable seeking justice or a cuckolded husband seeking revenge, I didn’t much cotton to Billy’s increasing need for assistance. Still, despite my better judgment and my darling Martha’s protests, I would always recall the day of that boyhood pledge and come to Billy’s aid.

And here I was again, honoring that pledge, although in a manner I had never dreamed possible. Dizzy from the headwork, an inertia of despair fell over me. I hovered on the edge of panic. A cold and clammy sweat collected under my arms and trickled down my back. My nerve endings hummed, almost as if I had indulged in Hawkins’ offered liquor.

But then I spotted Captain Roswell, standing with dark dignity off to one side of the hollow square. I pictured him leading our company into battle, unflinchingly foregoing his fear for the Rebel cause, and told myself I mustn’t quail. I looked at my thumb—the white scar shone with a sudden brilliance—and managed to outbrave my terror, to rally my fortitude, to remember that Billy’s wish transcended my personal hell.

The camp drummers snapped to life, their haunting racket slicing through the leaden silence. In jig time, the rattle of wheels and the creak of leather cut through the rhythmic din, while the thud of hooves beat a lazy tattoo on the hard-packed road. Three wagons came into view; the gaunt and shaggy horses pulling them mirrored the pale-faced onlookers. Led by a corporal, a squad of eight soldiers, holding their rifles at reverse arms, escorted the wagons to the field.

The first wagon, driven by a hefty teamster with a dead cigar clenched in his teeth, halted before the open side of the square. In the wagon bed, on top of a hastily fashioned pine box, sat a raggedy, weather-beaten man with hands tied behind his back and the gleam of defiance in his deep-set eyes. The second wagon arrived bearing similar cargo, except this prisoner had the first peach-fuzz of manhood on his chin, and his cheeks bore the pustules of adolescence. His face was a study in fright.

Then came the final wagon. The prisoner, a clean-shaven man, possessed a horrent, roan-colored shock of hair, prematurely streaked with silver—a condition not unknown to soldiers who have witnessed many a grisly sight. Lines of hard drinking and hard living had aged his otherwise youthful face. When the wagon halted, he rose from his coffin and stood on the flatbed, silhouetted against the thunderheads in the west. Fierce sunlight spilled from over my shoulder, deepening the reddish color of the prisoner’s jacket to a fiery crimson.

Billy.

His eyes scanned the assembly of soldiers, then settled on me. He smiled. It was a smile that guided me back to that afternoon of our blood oath. A smile that said, no matter what differences had come between us, he still trusted in me to do my best on his behalf. My palms prickled. My heart leapt into my throat.

Desertion. To me, the idea seemed poisonous, because if left unpunished, the crime had the power to demoralize entire regiments and cripple an army. Yet, in all honesty, I suppose I could empathize with these men, for I, too, have contemplated the crime for which they had been tried and convicted. My beloved Martha’s letters have ofttimes moved me to tears with their poignancy—“Please, my dearest,” she would write in her wispy script, “I would not have you do anything wrong, but before God, Samuel, unless you return home we are certain to die.” Martha would usually go on to describe the shambles to which our homestead had been subjected, or recount the latest in a series of indignities the town had suffered in the hands of the Bluebellies. But her depiction of our children—gentle souls wasting away for lack of sustenance—was always a blade to my heart. It might have also become the prod in my hindquarters to skedaddle were it not for Captain Roswell’s simple, yet commanding, maxim—

Death before dishonor.

Therefore, I knew punishment for the dishonorable crime of desertion was also a necessary evil. But execution? Dear God, just the memories of the last execution I had been forced to attend gave me occasional nightmares. I still remember vividly the bound and blindfolded prisoner, sitting on the edge of his coffin before a prepared grave, just scant paces from the firing squad. The chorus of gunshots and the hollow thud of the prisoner falling backward onto the coffin’s lid. The undead prisoner, torn into flinders with wounds to his abdomen and legs, crying tears of agony and begging for someone to kill him. The officer in charge racing over, pointing a pistol at the man’s head, and pulling the trigger. The prisoner’s wild-eyed panic when the officer’s gun misfired—again—then again—then again—until a bullet finally exploded in his face and quieted his hair-raising shrieks. And I knew that Billy, who had also borne witness to that hellish sight, remembered it well.

I shook off the horrific recollections. Billy, like the other two prisoners, now sat on his coffin and spoke to an ashen-faced chaplain. The provost marshal stood before the assembly, and in a booming voice, read aloud the sentence of the court for all to hear. For an instant, the scene before my eyes vanished in a glaze of hot tears.

How can I go through with this? Dear God, how?

But then Billy’s beseeching eyes met mine, and a ghost of a grin twisted his mouth, giving me the push I needed. Standing scant paces before him in a line of twelve men, I managed to build a wall around my emotions with the bricks of determination and courage, cementing it together with the love of brotherhood and honor. And for the hundredth time since the morning of his urgent plea, I stared at the faded line on my thumb and relived the afternoon of our pledge.

Orders broke the tense stillness. In unison, the soldiers in the three separate firing squads knelt and grabbed for a rifle on the ground before them. Some were loaded with balls, others were loaded with blanks, so that no man could be certain whether he had fired the fatal shot. I found mine easily. The second from the left. The one with the deep gouge in its stock. The rifle Captain Roswell himself had loaded with a ball to ensure that my marksmanship would spare Billy the horrors of past executions.

I picked up the gun. Stood at attention. Waited for the provost marshal’s command. I zeroed in on my target. Drew a bead on the center of Billy’s chest. The chest hidden beneath a coat. A red coat Billy had chosen to remind me of our days battling the squirrels.

But Billy needn’t have worried. He knew the pledge betwixt us had been an unnecessary pledge of brotherhood. I suppose, looking back, it was rather absurd for the two of us to share a blood oath after sharing a mother’s womb for nine months. Twins truly are about as close as two brothers can get.

When the order came, I pulled the trigger and honored Billy Whitmore’s last request.