The Gloaming
Private Shelby Wilkinson raised his head when the first rays of morning sunlight peeked over the eastern horizon. He and his comrades who served in Major General George Pickett's division, part of Lieutenant General James Longstreet's First Corps, were marching toward Pennsylvania—although "marching" may not be the right word to describe the slow but determined plodding of the war-weary Confederate soldiers. These were not men proudly parading in unison to an officer's call of "left, left, left, right, left." These were weary warriors who had fought hard battles at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville. Some bore the scars of past injuries they had received in battle. Others were recovering from either recent wounds or one of the many diseases that struck the army. All were exhausted, hungry, despondent and homesick.
For a brief moment, Shelby closed his eyes and savored the feel of the sun on his face. As that heavenly body made its westward journey over the next several hours, the temperatures would rise. Marching in the late-June heat, wearing woolen uniforms and carrying heavy weapons and knapsacks, could be brutally enervating. That was why the officers had insisted they set out before dawn.
"You've got a faraway look in your eyes, laddie boy. Are you thinking about your bonnie sweetheart back in Williamsburg?" asked Angus Coutts, a farmer from the Shenandoah Valley who immigrated from Scotland as a teenager.
A sudden frown appeared on Shelby's face.
"Uh-oh!" Antoine Barbier exclaimed when he saw his friend's look of consternation. "She has not gone and married someone else, has she?"
"No. Of course, not."
"Then why do you look so sad, mon ami?"
"I'm not sad. It's just a peculiar feeling I have, a feeling that has nothing to do with my dear Coreen."
"Oh? And what's that?" Angus asked.
"It's as though I've been in this exact situation before."
"We all have that feeling," the brawny, redheaded Scotsman laughed. "Marching into battle, to what might be certain death—again."
"No. I mean everything seems like it already happened once or possibly several times before. The French have a word for it, don't they, Antoine? Parlez vous or something like that?"
"You must mean déjà vu," replied the New Orleans native whose family relocated to Virginia when the city fell to the Yankees.
"That's it. I can't help but wonder if I'm not living under a spell of déjà vu."
"You mean a magic spell?" the Frenchman teased.
"Possibly."
"Yer aff yer heid!" Angus scoffed, using Scottish slang from his youth. "Magic spells, indeed! You sound like my old grandma from the Highlands. She always had stories to tell me and my brothers about Sawney Bean or the curse of the River Garnock."
"Superstitious, was she?" Shelby asked.
"Aye! That she was. She claimed to believe in all sorts of supernatural creatures such as kelpies, selkies, brownies, redcaps and the Ghillie Dhu. When I was but a wee lad, she put me to bed every night with tales of sea monsters in the loch, the Ghost Piper of Glanyard Bay, the Nine Maidens of Dundee and the Stoor Worm."
"And she expected you to sleep afterward? You were a boy. Didn't those stories give you nightmares?" Shelby wondered.
"Only one of them did. I was afraid of the bean-nighe."
"What is that?"
"That's the name the Scots gave it. In English, the word means 'washerwoman' or 'laundress.'"
"You were afraid of a washerwoman?" Antoine laughed.
"The bean-nighe is no ordinary washerwoman," Angus explained. "She is a spirit from the Otherworld, an omen of death. She wanders near deserted streams, washing blood from the graveclothes of people who are about to die."
"I can see why that story would be upsetting to a child," Shelby said.
"Especially one who lives on an isolated farm with a stream that runs through the property."
Like Chaucer's fabled medieval characters who told stories on their pilgrimage to Thomas Becket's shrine, these nineteenth-century warriors in gray proceeded to share memories from their childhood to pass the time on their long march. All these recollections sounded familiar to Private Wilkinson, who from time to time experienced a reoccurrence of that weird sensation of déjà vu.
* * *
By midmorning, the temperature had risen nearly twenty degrees, and the air was steamy with humidity. Perspiration beaded up on Shelby's forehead, and drops of sweat frequently slid down his back.
"What I wouldn't give to have a swim in a cool lake," Angus mused.
"Did you ever swim in the ocean?" Antoine asked.
Shelby knew that question was coming, just as he correctly predicted what the Scotsman's answer would be.
"No, I haven't," Angus replied. "When I left Scotland, I sailed across the Atlantic in a ship, but I never went in the water. Did you?"
"Many times. When I still lived in New Orleans and also after I moved to Yorktown, which is right near Chesapeake Bay."
"Yorktown? Isn't that where the final battle of the American Revolution occurred?"
"Oui. It took place in the fall of 1781. It was a lot cooler in the autumn months. Still, I suppose we shouldn't complain about the heat. The men who fought under Washington had to deal with the freezing temperatures at Valley Forge."
Shelby listened carefully to the conversation, even though he was certain he had heard it before.
At midday, the weary, half-starved soldiers were given time to rest and eat their meager rations and whatever nuts and fruit they had managed to scavenge during their march. While they ate, Shelby reached into his uniform pocket, intent on removing a letter from his sweetheart filled with tender words or a photograph of her beloved face that he could gaze at longingly. Instead, he discovered both his pockets and knapsack were empty.
"What are you looking for, laddie?" Angus asked.
"I've already told you ...," Private Wilkinson began. "But I suppose you don't remember. Once again, I'm looking for a picture, letter, or lock of hair—anything that my dear Coreen gave to me when I went off to war. I must have lost them."
Shelby not only had to give up studying law at the College of William & Mary when war was declared, but he also had to leave behind his fiancé. Tears came to his eyes when he realized that he carried no cherished mementos from home, neither from the girl he loved nor from his parents. Although he believed he had asked the question before, he asked it again.
"Do either of you have any photographs or letters from those you love?"
"I'm sure my bonnie lass gave me something to remember her by—as if I could forget her," Angus replied, and reached his hand inside his uniform.
It came back empty.
"Damn it!" the Scotsman swore. "You don't suppose ...."
"... someone robbed us during the night?" Shelby finished the question, one from a conversation he could recite verbatim.
"Why don't we talk about something else?" Antoine suggested, finding the current topic eerily disturbing.
"What about you?" Shelby asked, ignoring his friend's request. "Are you carrying anything on your person?"
"As a matter of fact, I have lettres d'amour from several young ladies," the Frenchman boasted, "all of whom write to me faithfully, professing their undying devotion."
"Let me see one."
"No gentleman would share ...."
"I don't want to read it. I just want proof that you've got them on you."
Like his two comrades at arms, however, Antoine's pockets and knapsack were empty.
"I don't understand. I had them yesterday."
Before the former William & Mary student could offer any theory as to why the photographs and billets-doux had disappeared, the men were given the order to continue their march.
"Do you know what the worst thing about summer is?" Antoine asked, some four hours later, as the men trudged along a dusty dirt road.
"The heat," Angus answered.
"You call this hot? This is nothing compared to a scorching August day on the Mississippi River Delta. No, I can handle the heat. It's the length of a day that I can't abide by. In winter, it gets dark out much earlier. In summer, we're on our feet until eight or nine o'clock. It's a wonder we have any soles left on our boots."
Shelby, who had been listening to the all-too-familiar exchange, looked down at his own feet. He agreed with Antoine. All that walking over rough terrain ought to have taken its toll on their footwear.
Yet my shoes are like new, he thought. And so is my uniform. There's not a tear in it.
The condition of the men's uniforms and boots was not the only thing that perplexed the young private. In addition to the previously mentioned empty pockets and knapsacks, there was the soldiers' appearance in general that gave him cause for concern. Although Angus had a full, bushy, red beard and Antoine sported a neatly trimmed, black mustache, Shelby, himself, was cleanshaven. He could not recall ever having taken a razor to his face or a pair of scissors to his hair, and yet he was well-groomed.
None of this is logical! his brain screamed.
* * *
The three men from Pickett's division heard the babbling brook before they saw it. Clean, fresh water always brought a smile to their faces. The officer gave the men a brief respite from marching to fill their canteens. Many of the soldiers poured the cool water over their sweating heads as they did so.
"Ah! That feels good!" the Scotsman exclaimed.
"Oui," the Frenchman agreed.
It was Shelby, the only one of the three soldiers who was not kneeling at the water's edge, who spotted her. She was young and fair, with long flaxen hair falling softly over her shoulders. The moment he laid eyes on her, that feeling of déjà vu became stronger than ever.
I've seen her before! I'm sure of it!
"What are you looking at, laddie?" Angus inquired, unable to see downstream from his vantage point.
"Don't you see her?"
The use of a feminine pronoun in such close proximity to the stream immediately put the Scotsman on his guard.
"Her?" he echoed.
He stood up and turned his head in the direction of his friend's gaze. Under normal conditions, the sight of such a bonnie lass would have pleased him. But this was no mortal woman. It was a bean-nighe. Intent on washing blood out of a gray uniform, she did not take notice of the soldiers gathered at the stream.
"Is that one of the washerwomen you told us about?" Shelby asked.
"Aye! It's a bean-nighe. That means only one thing: someone is about to die."
No sooner did these words leave the Scotsman's lips than the woman at the stream vanished. Shelby rubbed his eyes and stared at the spot where she had been only moments earlier. Had he actually seen her or had it been a hallucination caused by Angus's retelling of frightening bedtime stories.
There's no such thing as a washerwoman who can predict the future, he finally concluded. Besides, even if there were, this is America, not Scotland.
Once every man had the opportunity to fill his canteen, they continued on their march. The ordinarily boisterous Private Coutts was uncharacteristically quiet.
"What's the matter, mon ami?" asked Antoine, who had not seen the woman by the stream. "Are you having déjà vu like Wilkinson?"
"No," was his terse reply.
"Cheer up then. The sun will soon set, and we can rest for the night."
Angus closed his eyes, and a barely audible word escaped from his lips.
"What's that you said?"
"Gloaming," the burly, bearded soldier replied.
"What does that mean?" Shelby asked.
"Some call it dusk, others twilight. My grandmother always referred to that brief time before the world was plunged into total darkness as the gloaming."
"The gloaming, huh? I like that word. It has a nice poetic ring to it."
"Believe me, there's nothing poetic or romantic about the gloaming. On the contrary, it's extremely gloomy."
"The gloomy gloaming," Shelby laughed. "I told you it was poetic. I'll bet Edgar Allan Poe could have been inspired by such a phrase. Instead of 'once upon a midnight dreary,' he could have had the raven appear to him from the gloomy gloaming."
"The gloaming is no laughing matter," Angus cried, more in fear than in anger. "Bad things happen in the gloaming."
"Like what?"
"Death often comes to people in that time of semidarkness."
"Oh, please!" Antoine exclaimed. "No more of your grandmother's stories. Tomorrow we may meet up with the enemy. If I am to die in battle, I don't want to spend my last night on earth talking about chilling Scottish legends."
"Legends are sometimes based on fact," the Scotsman declared stubbornly.
"Mon Dieu! Enough of all this foolishness! Do you really think harm can come to people simply due to the spinning of the earth? That's what causes night and day, after all. When the western hemisphere turns away from the sun at night, it brings darkness to our part of the world. There's no mystery in your 'gloaming.' It's all science."
At that moment, a line from Hamlet came to Shelby: "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
His father was a teacher who instilled in him a love of books, hence his knowledge of Poe and Shakespeare. Still, he found it odd that on the eve of battle, his mind should dwell on literary references and not on ....
A chill suddenly coursed through the private's body, despite the heavy uniform he wore and the sweltering heat. His feet came to a stop, and he stood still, racking his brain.
"What's wrong now?" Angus asked when he noticed his comrade had fallen behind.
"My sweetheart ...."
"What about her?"
"I can't think of her name," Shelby answered, his eyes welling with unmanly tears.
"You mustn't ever let her learn that," Antoine teased. "If you do, she'll never forgive you."
"It's not just her name that slipped my mind. I can't recall her face either. I don't know if she was a blonde, brunette or redhead like Angus, or whether her eyes were blue, brown, hazel or green. I've known her since I was a small child, and yet I can't remember anything about her! Was she tall? Short? Thin? Heavyset? We were going to get married once the war was over. Why can't I remember proposing to her or saying goodbye to her at the train station when I left Williamsburg?"
"It's the gloaming," the Scotsman said in a dull monotone filled with dread. "It's stolen your memory—and mine, for I can't think of my wife's name or picture her face. Hell! I don't even know if we have any wee bairns or not."
Both men turned in Private Barbier's direction.
"Don't look at me!" the handsome Frenchman said lightheartedly. "I don't have a wife or a sweetheart. I am a carefree bachelor."
"Earlier today, you said there are several women who all claim to love you," Shelby reminded him. "Who are they?"
"You know me. I am a ladies' man. I don't bother with names."
"Then tell us something—anything at all—about them. What did they look like?"
"Please—stop this!"
"It's the gloaming," Angus reiterated.
That eerie sense of déjà vu Shelby had repeatedly felt throughout the day took hold of him once more.
"Yes," he agreed with a profound sense of fatalism. "It's the gloaming."
The three men found themselves standing alone in the gathering darkness that was creeping in like a swiftly moving fog.
"Where is everybody?" Antoine asked, suddenly noticing that the rest of Pickett's division seemed to have vanished into thin air.
"That woman by the stream ...," Private Wilkinson began.
"You mean the bean-nighe?" Angus asked.
"Yes. She was washing a gray uniform."
"Which means a Confederate soldier was about to die."
"Or was already dead."
"You don't think ...."
The Scotsman could not bring himself to finish the sentence.
"Yes, I do. I think we died—all three of us."
"But how? When?"
"I don't know. And as nightfall gets closer, I seem to know less and less. I can't remember your name."
Angus could not enlighten the puzzled private for he could not recall it himself.
"It's not the gloaming," Antoine said. "It's ...."
Moments later, the Frenchman's attractive features froze on his face. He stood in his spot, unmoving, like a statue.
"What's wrong with you?" Shelby cried, knowing full well his comrade was incapable of answering.
He turned to the Scotsman, who, like Private Antoine Barbier, was now standing straight and rigid, a gun with a fixed bayonet at his side.
The gloaming.
Those were the last words to cross the young private's mind as he felt his limbs stiffen.
* * *
"Gage!" a woman's voice called.
"What, Mom?" a little boy, her son, replied.
"It's time for bed. Put your toys away for tonight. You can play with them tomorrow."
The seven-year-old scooped up the last three gray-clad metal soldiers, carefully placed them in the storage box with the others and closed the lid. The following morning, after eating his breakfast, Gage ran downstairs to the playroom and went directly to the Civil War-era toy soldiers he had received as a Christmas present from his grandfather.
Entirely unaware of the real, twenty-first-century world around him, of which he was but a minuscule part, Private Shelby Wilkinson lifted his head when the first rays of morning sunlight peeked over the eastern horizon. He and his comrades who served in Major General George Pickett's division, part of Lieutenant General James Longstreet's First Corps, had been given the order to march toward Pennsylvania. He felt an odd sense of déjà vu, as though he had done this all before.
One year, I gave Salem a set of toy soldiers for Christmas. Being a Yankee from Massachusetts, he only played with the Union troops.
