The Bride of Texas by Josef Škvorecký Page A

the mock singsong of a preacher, then noted in a conversational tone, “Mulroney read that, all right. But the part that comes right after that he kept to himself.
‘But thou didst trust in thine own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications on every one that passed by; his it was.’ ”
    “Stop, you’re corrupting us!” Stejskal chimed in.
    “No, wait! Here’s the main thing he left out.” Back to the mocking singsong:
“ ‘And of thy garments thou didst take, and deckedst thy high places with divers colours, and playedst the harlot thereupon; the like things shall not come, neither shall it be so.’ ”
    He looked around at his comrades. They were silent. Shake stuck the meerschaum in his mouth and sent a little cloud of blue smoke towards the stars.
    Stejskal said, “What I can’t figure is how come you know the Bible by heart, you pagan.”
    “Me? A pagan?” Shake replied. “Were you knocked in the head by a cannonball, or what?”
    Outside, the moonlight fell on the sycamores.

    (illustration credit 1.1)

The
Writer’s
First
Intermezzo
    N O GENERAL took part in as many battles as Ambrose; had regulations not required him to be at the command post, he would have spent every minute in the thick of it, with his troops. In Cincinnati, he once told me that he never felt right about it. “Soldiers are dying, and I’m watching this from a distance through a glass. I feel like a dodger. I’ll never get used to it, Lorraine, though it’s logical, of course. But I reckon it’s just as logical to bolt as soon as the Reaper takes the field. No one wants to die.”
    “It’s not logical,” I said, “it’s only psychological. It is logical, though, to protect your generals, because it costs a great deal of money to teach them their trade.”
    Ambrose sighed. “That all depends.”
    “On what?” I asked, annoyed because I knew what he meant. He had never wanted to be commander-in-chief but, naturally, he obeyed Lincoln. An order from him was like one of the Ten Commandments. Lincoln was fond of Ambrose. He also thought he was smarter than Ambrose. And he was — exceptfor one thing. Ambrose knew himself better than anyone else did, including Lincoln.
    Dear Ambrose. He was simply the most honourable, the most truthful, the most loyal, and the bravest soldier in the Union army.
    He also cut quite a figure.
    I count myself among the many who have wronged him in his lifetime, although in my case there was an extenuating circumstance: I was young at the time, and correspondingly foolish. Perhaps more so than average.
    A time would come when Ambrose would take embarrassment in his stride. But back then —
2
    It was ghastly. Rather than strength of nerves, it must have been some kind of physical spasm that kept me on my feet after I turned and fled up the aisle from the altar, with those appalled faces gaping at me on either side. Nothing like this had ever happened in Liberty for as long as anyone could remember, and most of the congregation, perhaps all of it, had never even thought it possible. That spasm held me together as I ran outside into the searing sunshine and climbed into the carriage, where I even managed to wait for my maids of honour, Maggie and Sarah, who came rushing out of the church behind me. Only after they plopped down on the seats across from me did I instruct Sam to drive us home. And it was not until I got back to my own room that it all sank in, and I became so hysterical that I thought I could simply run back and put everything right again. But for the first time in my life, my legs wouldn’t obey me. And besides, there was that letter from the publisher in Boston on my writing desk.
    “Good Lord! Maggie, Sarah! I have to explain to him!”
    “How?” asked Maggie curtly, and stared at me without an ounce of sympathy.
    A good question.
    “I’ll go get him,” said Sarah, sweet soul that she was.
    “Save yourself the trouble,”