The Lost Confederate Gold by Mark Roy Henowitz
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GBJ Fiction The Lost Confederate Gold by Mark Roy Henowitz 25th Annual Fiction t was curtains for the old courthouse. Eighteen- Writing Competition wheelers circled the crumbling edifice. Men The Editorial Board of the Georgia Bar I in coveralls wheeled, pushed, pulled, carried, Journal is proud to present “The Lost hauled, dragged, lugged and shoved a century of court- Confederate Gold,” by Mark Roy Henowitz of Buford, as the winner of the Journal’s house detritus out of the timeworn structure. 25th annual Fiction Writing Competition. The building was simply worn out. It was used up. The purposes of the competition are The sheriff had jumped ship years ago, favoring a store- to enhance interest in the Journal, to front around the corner. State Court had slipped away encourage excellence in writing by members to a brick building across the street. The tax assessor was housed up the hill in the old high school. The ornate, of the Bar and to provide an innovative classic and classy turn-of-the-century courtroom, which vehicle for the illustration of the life and comprised the entire second floor, had been sliced into work of lawyers. As in years past, this year’s three considerably less stately chambers. One Superior entries reflected a wide range of topics Court judge had relocated his bench to the old post and literary styles. In accordance with the office down the street. Another dispensed justice from a former movie theatre. The urban sprawl oozing our competition’s rules, the Editorial Board way had created a situation that the old relic on the selected the winning story through a process courthouse square had no capacity to address. of reading each story without knowledge of My own bailiwick was the real property record the author’s identity and then ranking each room. This division of the clerk’s office had long ago entry. The story with the highest cumulative outgrown its original home. The deed room had been shunted into the courthouse basement, an ill-lit, low- ranking was selected as the winner. The ceilinged affair, with exposed pipes overhead. It was Editorial Board congratulates Henowitz stifling in summer, flooded in spring and autumn, and and all of the other entrants for their freezing in winter. Stella, the deputy clerk, had termi- participation and excellent writing. nated a mouse down there, in close combat, by whack- ing it with a Swingline stapler. June 2016 33 I stood on the courthouse lawn, The real property record room “No. It’s the Justice and leaning against a granite monu- was upside down. The ancient leath- Administration Building. They’re ment, watching the workers like er bound deed books and indexes calling it the Jay Bee for short.” so many swarming ants empty the along with the more recent, more “Who is? obsolete hall of justice. Although I sterile computer print-out versions “Everybody. Yes, either the Jay came to the courthouse every work- were stacked like so much cord- Bee or the Law Mall, because it has day, I had never paid the slightest wood. Movers jostled each other a four-story foyer with an escala- bit of attention to the unusual mon- and the books as they wrestled their tor. It reminds people of a mall.” ument that I now reclined against. loads out the narrow doorway and “The Law Mall?” Daily, I breezed right by at a hearty up the even narrower stairs. She nodded. clip, on a mission; I had real prop- “You can’t work here today, “I’ll see it on Monday,” I said. erty titles to search. My diurnal Noble,” said Stella, the deputy “That will be soon enough. You’ll destination was that moldy base- clerk, peering at me disapproving- be open for business?” ment with its books and indexes. ly over reading glasses. “Knowing “Yes.” That day was different. I was in no you, though, it figures that you “Good luck with the move.” hurry. That day the books were not would show up and try.” I left the basement, climbed the waiting for me. No work could be “I’m not here to work, Stella. I stairs and walked across the hall done on that moving day. Nothing just wanted to be in the old court- to the Probate Court. The place could be searched or researched. house on the last day.” was even more torn apart than As the movers swarmed by me, I She shook her head at me, then the clerk’s haunt. Not only were took a step back from the singular slipped off the reading glasses and the books in huge stacks and the monument and studied it for the let them hang on a silver chain furniture and machines in a heap, first time. around her neck. “Why do you come but the very counters and book- At ground level was a square here every day, anyway, Noble? No cases had been ripped clean off granite block, maybe four feet high. one else does anymore. It’s all on the walls to which they had been Positioned atop that foundation was the Internet. You can search a title attached. It looked as if a tor- a stone structure that was too squat at home in your pajamas.” nado had torn through the place, to be an obelisk, yet too thin to be a “I don’t wear pajamas.” upending the world. pyramid. It was some kind of gran- “Spare me the details,” she “Anybody here?” I hollered. No ite hybrid obelisk-pyramid with laughed. answer. “Marie, are you hidden trapezoidal sides. This was capped “You know how this business under a pile of minute books?” by a small true pyramid. The struc- is,” I said. “During boom times No answer. ture rose to twice my height. the record room is filled with the I gingerly picked my way through There was an inscription on the kind of people who come from out the rubble. Skirting around an base. It read: To the memory of of nowhere. In bust times they go unsteady stack of chairs, I came to a the brave members of the compa- right back there.” counter that was about half peeled ny of mounted volunteers, Ensign “Not anymore, Noble.” She off the wall. Jammed between the Jasper Adams, Sergeant Asa Wade, stacked two more books onto an shorn counter and the wall, I spied Privates Adam Cain, James Vance, already unsteady, five-foot-high an old leather volume. It looked as if RW Eaves, David Tanner, Isaac pile. “You’re the last of the dino- it had been wedged there since the and EG Lafon, brothers, who, saurs, searching a title at the court- counter had been cobbled together; under the command of Captain house. Don’t you know it can be decades, maybe longer. Avoiding Thomas O’Shay, were slain in bat- done from Bangalore?” the protruding rusty nails, I gin- tle with a party of Creek Indians “What do you know about gerly slipped the volume out of its at Shepherd’s in Stewart County, Bangalore? Since when are you place of concealment. Georgia, on June 9, 1836. such an authority on all things It was a thin black book with a Was I standing in a graveyard? Internet?” red binding. The cover was hang- Were the eight men buried there “I’m on Facebook, Noble. You ing on by two hairs. Embossed on on that spot? Then again, no, the should friend me. Then you could the front in gold were the words monument was not a gravestone. enjoy the pictures of my grandba- Pension Record. It was a memorial. Surely, they bies that I post every day.” I rested it on the teetering counter were elsewhere. Most likely they “Sounds like I’m missing out.” and flipped it open. The pages were were interred where the skir- She frowned at me. “Have you yellow ledger leaves with rows and mish occurred, at Shepherd’s, in been to the new courthouse?” columns. The columns were labeled Stewart County. she said. Name, Company, Regiment, Time I shrugged and walked into the I shook my head. of Enlistment, When and Where courthouse. I took the stairs to “Actually, it’s not a courthouse.” Discharged and then a series of the basement. “No?” years from 1867 through 1917. 34 Georgia Bar Journal The rows were filled in with blue I unfolded it. It was some kind was made of armor plate. Presently ink. Page after page of entries. The of a hand drawn map. Chennault he was the distinguished occupant first column listed the pension- Crossroads was written in the cen- of the Senator Richard B. Russell ers alphabetically from Abner to ter. The map showed that at a dis- Endowed Chair in History at the Webb. Next, the companies and tance of 40, I assumed miles, from university. His lectures were well regiments were shown as Company the crossroads, following a fairly attended. His presentations were A 19th Ga or Company C Cobb’s straight line, curving only slightly, laser-like. His voice was rusty Legion or Company B 16th Ga or 9 was located a series of triangles. shrapnel. He knew more history Ga Artillery. Most entries showed Near to the triangles were two than any man this side of Toynbee. enlistments in 1861 or 1862. The irregular lines sketched in blue, He knew more Georgia history entry for discharge for nearly all possibly creeks or rivers, which than any man. Period. said simply Close War. Under each nearly intersected. That was the I was certain that I would find year was the handwritten sum of totality of the map.