Many demonstrators dispute that account, saying the Marines were not provoked in any way.
“The cowards on the other side of that fence opened fire for no reason,” said Paul Hartig, who had been camped out in front of the gate for the last three days. “They killed all those people for no reason at all, and they should hang for it.”
Reaction to the killing came swiftly. In Columbus, the ten senators representing the federal-aligned Southern states of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee issued a joint statement of condemnation, calling the incident “an unnecessary and tragic provocation that only empowers extremists and does nothing to ease the country from the brink of war.”
In a statement by the Free Southern State’s Council, the governors of Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina called the killings “outright cold-blooded murder” and an act of tyranny and treason for which federal president Martin Henley himself should stand trial.
“Every Southern patriot, upon hearing the news of the massacre at Fort Jackson, will know now as a fact that the federal government in Columbus considers Southern lives to be less than worthless,” the governors said.
“It is only the willfully blind who can today gaze upon the blood-soaked streets of Columbia and refuse to support the cause of secession.”
Throughout South Carolina, where anti-federal sentiment has run higher than perhaps anywhere outside the Texas oil fields, violence quickly erupted as word of the Fort Jackson killings spread. In Columbia, numerous franchises of Northern-headquartered businesses—many already shuttered in the months since federal president Daniel Ki’s assassination in Jackson, Mississippi, last December—were torched to the ground. In New Charleston, the bodies of three men, accused by citizen secessionist groups of working as intelligence gatherers for the North, were found bound on the shoreline, their throats slit.
“This isn’t only about secession anymore,” said a representative of a South Carolina citizens’ group. “This is about avenging our dead.”
By Wednesday evening, federal president Henley had yet to issue an official statement on the killings. The Department of Defense’s official press site, which has not been updated since Monday, continued to feature a terse statement stating that military officials believe the Marines at Fort Jackson are “acting with utmost restraint.”
Gov. Brown, who had previously called for all Northern sympathizers in South Carolina to leave the state, repeated that call on Wednesday, and asked for his citizens’ help in the cause of resistance.
“The wholesale slaughter of our people is not something to be negotiated. It is not the subject of concessions or compromise,” said Gov. Brown.
“From what has been done today in Fort Jackson, there is no going back.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Under the fractured shade of palm trees, the Chestnuts waited. In crossing the water, they had been pulled two miles downriver. They walked back along the country road that ran near the river, covering this distance and another mile more. The road was cracked deep in places, as though tilled. The remains of the yellow dividing line were now almost completely gone; there seemed to be no separation between the coming and the going.
They walked until they reached a bend in the road where there was a dirt pull-off and, growing there, a bush of anemic palms. The plants’ green, sharp stalks grew and leaned back toward the river, away from the rising sun. At the feet of the trees there were a few variegated yuccas, their machete leaves tinted green and white. This was the place where the man said the bus would be.
“The river’s going to take it,” Simon complained. He looked smaller under the weight of his backpack, which was full of clothes, comic books, a snorkeling mask, a hand-sharpened stick knife, and boxes of Benjamin Chestnut’s unfiltered Yuxis.
The Yuxis, thin and made with weak tobacco, were one of the very few vices the boy’s father had maintained. He kept them hidden from his wife behind a loose board in the outhouse. This secrecy was in fact unnecessary, as both son and wife knew of Benjamin’s smoking habit. But to maintain an unspoken dignity, they said nothing.
“The river won’t take it,” Martina said.
“We didn’t pull it far enough up the bank. Soon as it rains next, the river’s going to rise and it’ll float off to sea.”
“If it does, I’ll make you a new raft.”
“You’re just saying that because you know we’re not coming back.”
“Enough.”
The family set their belongings down in the clearing and waited for the bus to arrive. Dana, exhausted, fell back asleep on the ground with her backpack for a pillow.
Sarat wandered nearby, foraging around the bushes, inspecting the yuccas. They were resilient-looking things, their leaves flat and rigid. Of the few plants that still grew in the parched Southern earth, the yuccas grew best.
Sarat ran her finger along the leaves. The skin felt dry and its texture resembled that of sandpaper. But it was also rubbery, with some give to its flesh. She pressed her finger against the needle at the end of the leaf, feeling her own skin compress. The needle ends were brown and rigid, immune to sun and storm.
The day grew warmer. The Chestnuts waited but no bus came. Soon, Martina began to wonder if they’d missed it entirely, and if she might soon have to decide whether to take the family eastward by foot.
“What is this, Mama?” Sarat asked, pointing to the yucca.
“It’s a plant, honey.”
“What kind of plant?”
“A cactus. Don’t get too close, you’ll hurt yourself.”
“Cactus,” Sarat repeated, letting her tongue whip every syllable. “Cac-tus.”
Martina heard the sound of wheels against the road. The bus turned the corner, coming from the south. It was a yellow, prewar school bus, retrofitted with solar panels along the roof. On either side of the bus, where once there would have been stenciled the name of some high school, instead was written, in block letters, CIVILIAN TRANSPORT.
The bus moved slowly, its panels still soaking up sunlight. The driver came to a stop at the clearing. The door folded open.
Martina herded the children to the other side of the road. She peered inside the bus. A driver of about thirty sat at the wheel. He was a chubby man, the sweat beaded on his skin.
Behind the driver sat another man, much taller and broader. He wore a plain white shirt and blue jeans and by his side rested, barrel-up, an old Type-95. It was a cheap and cheaply built rifle, popular with the rebels because it rarely jammed or broke down, and because it could be smuggled with relative ease in the aid ships. The man with the rifle watched Martina, expressionless.
“We’re the Chestnuts,” Martina told the driver. She realized then that she’d never learned the name of the man who’d promised to grant her passage. “The rebel commander said we’d be allowed to ride to Patience.”
The driver chuckled. “The rebel commander said that, did he? Well we can’t go upsetting him.” The smirk disappeared from his lips. “A hundred each.”
Martina shook her head. “He said we’d be allowed on. He said—”
“Lady, you speak English? A hundred a head.”
Martina shuffled through her baggage for the tin of money. “I’ve only got three hundred,” she said, “in LAEs.”
“Did I say LAEs?” the driver replied. “They don’t even accept that joke currency in Louisiana no more.”
“That’s all I got.”
The driver shrugged. He pulled a lever by the wheel and the door unfolded shut, knocking Martina back. The bus began to move.
Martina pulled her children from the path of the wheels. She ran alongside the bus and banged on the door with a fistful of dollars. The driver slowed to a stop once more.
“Well won’t you look at that?” he said to the man with the rifle. “Guess she just misplaced it is all.”