Beneath Gray Skies

  What people are saying about Beneath Gray Skies

  “Beneath Gray Skies is an extraordinarily well-written piece of what-if mind candy that becomes more and more difficult to put down the further one reads.

  “Full marks to Mr. Ashton for writing an enthralling tale of, as the front cover of the book tells us, ‘a past that never happened.’ I enjoyed it immensely and look forward to his next work of fiction.” Christopher Belton, author of Isolation and Crimes sans Frontières

  “This ‘what might have been’ tale has a tightly written plot, some colorful characters (including Hermann Goering and a forerunner of secret agent 007) and as an added bonus, a remarkably well researched introduction to German Zeppelin technology. Kudos to Ashton for coming up with such a creative and entertaining formula.” Mystery Fan on Amazon

  “Beneath Gray Skies is a delightful romp through what it terms ‘a past that never happened’  ”. A.B.Dahl, on Amazon

  “A real page-turner … entertaining, and highlights the role of individuals in the outplaying of history.” Damon Molinarius, Gatehouse Gazette

  Beneath Gray Skies

  A Novel of a Past that Never Happened

  Hugh Ashton

  Published by j-views at Smashwords

  Copyright © 2009, 2010, Hugh Ashton

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Preface to first edition

  As America suffered under the rule of an extremist government from 2000 onwards, and seemed determined to turn itself into a world pariah, my thoughts turned to why a nation of such generally pleasant people could turn into something that was so alien and hateful to most of the rest of the world. My quarrel was not with Americans, who constitute many of my friends, but with the nation of America, whose ways and values continued to puzzle me as I researched the topic.

  In my exploration of the subject, I discovered that many of the underlying attitudes expressed by Bush’s America were those of the 19th-century Confederacy, and indeed, much of today’s South: xenophobia, belligerence, a tendency to military violence, and a racial and religious intolerance.

  Such values were close to those held by Hitler’s Nazis, of course, and this set me to wondering what would have happened if the Confederacy had survived, and made an alliance with the Nazis.

  However, in writing this story, I didn’t want the Confederates to have won the Civil War. For one thing, I couldn’t imagine how they could have retained control over the Union states for long, given their relatively small armed forces. Much more likely, I felt, was the possibility that the Civil War had never been fought, and my conversation at the start between Seward and Chase is, as far as I can tell, fairly representative of various shades of opinion in the North at that time. Of course, a divided America would have had other implications on world history as we know it now, and I have tried to incorporate these ramifications into the story. For example, the First World War, here referred to as the Great European War, would probably have gone on longer without American intervention.

  It is quite possible that the Nazis would have achieved a greater momentum at an earlier date in a more thoroughly depressed and beaten Germany. Whether they would have achieved an alliance with the Confederacy is another matter.

  Airships have long been a love of mine. I think at one time I read almost everything about them in the popular (and a lot in the technical) realm about them that existed in Cambridge University Library, including much about Dr. Hugo Eckener, one of the great men of airships. I was once lucky enough to travel on the British Goodyear blimp, my experiences of which form the basis for David’s impressions of luxury airship travel; a form of transport that I think is sadly lost for ever.

  Kamakura, March 2009

  Preface to second edition

  Since I wrote the novel, the political complexion of the USA has changed yet again. As I write these words, the right and left are snapping at each other over health insurance reform and the role of government in individuals’ lives, and the country looks even more likely to tear itself to pieces than it did a few years ago. Sadly, if there is civil strife within the USA, it is unlikely to be geographical this time—it may end up much more like the Russian Civil War or the troubles in Northern Ireland, with localities bitterly divided by ideology, hating each other enough to kill. Let us pray that the USA can escape this fate, and that even if the States of America can no longer remain United (which may end up being the best solution for all concerned), that the dissolution comes without bloodshed.

  Kamakura, April 2010

  Acknowledgements

  At one point, David is asked to read a passage from a translation of Clausewitz’s On War, as translated in 1874 by Colonel Maude of the Royal Engineers. The poem that Hermann Goering requires for his wife is, of course, by Goethe, and shares the title with the previous poem in the collection, Wanderers Nachtlied (Night song of the wanderer). Goering’s impromptu translation is by me.

  The phrase “Confederate States of America” and the corresponding abbreviation of “CSA” were fairly obvious, and have no relation to Kevin Willmott’s fine movie C.S.A., which I deliberately avoided watching until I had finished this book.

  My thanks to my friends for their encouragement and support, together with constructive criticism. Special thanks to Cindy Mullins of 4M Associates, who encouraged me and arranged for two separate professional readings of the manuscript, resulting in a more coherent and professional product at the end of the day. Also to Eric Bossieux, who helped me with some of the Southern idiom used by many of the characters. Further thanks are due to John Talbot, who generously undertook the task of telling me where I had gone wrong while I was producing this second edition.

  And many loving thanks to a very patient wife, Yoshiko, who somewhat bemusedly supported me in my madness while I created this story and made my way through the minefields of independent publishing.

  Prologue: “The Old Club House”, Washington DC, United States of America, March 1861

  “Allow the erring sisters to depart in peace?”

  The erstwhile de facto leader of the Republican party, Henry Seward of New York, now serving as Secretary of State to the newly elected President Lincoln, faced the Secretary of the Treasury, Salmon Chase of Ohio, across the drawing room. Seward was relaxed, ensconced in his favorite armchair, and smoking one of his inevitable cigars, while Chase leaned ponderously forward in his chair, his bald dome of a head catching the light.

  “Mr. Chase,” began Seward. “As you know, we have a problem with our Southern sisters. If we provision Fort Sumter, we provoke violence from the South towards the North. If we do nothing, the secessionists will take over Federal property. I don’t like either of these alternatives.”

  “What does the President say?” Chase sipped at his water.

  “Oh, when I last saw him he wasn’t saying anything to anyone.” Lincoln had staggered through his inaugural ceremony three days earlier in the first stages of Potomac fever, and had since collapsed into bed, where his condition was described as “serious”. “Nothing that made any sense, anyway,” Seward added, refilling his brandy goblet.

  “My advice, as you know—” began Chase, but Seward headed him off.

  “Yes, I know, Mr. Chase. Your wish would be to eliminate slavery throughout the entire Union immediately.
Your sentiments do you great credit, but I hardly think that they are a practical solution to our present problems. The pressing subject is Fort Sumter. Would you recommend re-provisioning Fort Sumter? I ask you as one of the wiser and more experienced members of this new Cabinet. I hardly think our new Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Welles, has had any experience of this kind of matter.” The flattery worked, as Seward, the experienced politician, expected it to do.

  “Yes indeed, Mr. Seward, I would indeed recommend sending a naval squadron at once to relieve Fort Sumter, and to take active measures against any opposition that may be encountered.”

  “And I, Mr. Chase, would not do such any such thing. I would prefer to unite the North and South against a common enemy. Mexico, for example, or even Britain.”

  “That would be monstrous, Mr. Seward. You cannot start a war for political expediency alone!”

  “No?” Seward raised his eyebrows quizzically. “I was under the impression that this is how the majority of wars are started. So,” taking a pull at his drink, “you are opposed to my idea and I to yours.” The smaller Seward appeared to Chase, with his large hooked nose, and mop of graying hair, like a rather tipsy parrot. But not drunk, thought Chase.

  “We have the makings of an ‘irrepressible conflict’ between the two of us, wouldn’t you say, Mr. Chase?” Seward enjoyed quoting himself.

  “It seems to me to be so,” replied Chase.

  “But it is only the case if our aim is to preserve the Union,” replied Seward. What was Seward driving towards? Chase asked himself. “At least, as members of Mr. Lincoln’s Cabinet, we should be assuming that to be our aim, following the President’s speech three days ago?” Seward was urbane.

  “I think we can safely assume that address was at least in part the fever talking.” Chase shrugged off Lincoln’s inaugural address as spontaneous delirium. Seward knew that this was not the case, having reviewed the closely argued speech, which resembled a legal brief more than a political address, and he had suggested many changes to Lincoln before its final delivery, but he held his peace, letting Chase dismiss Lincoln’s finely honed reasoning.

  Chase continued, “If I may suggest my goal, which is, I assure you, not the product of an over-fevered mind, it is to eliminate slavery from the Union, with a plan of compensation to the owners.”

  “That is an impractical idea, Mr. Chase. However,” holding up a warning finger, “it becomes more practical if the Union is composed of a different collection of states to the present arrangement.”

  “Allow the erring sisters to depart in peace?” Chase had a habit of speaking in political clichés, Seward noted, but was quick to seize others’ meanings.

  “As a temporary measure,” Seward amended. “Do you think that their economy could withstand an embargo? That they could survive as an independent nation for more than a year, if we closed the frontier and imposed a blockade?”

  “And they would then be willing to rejoin the Union on our terms, which would include the abolition of slavery?”

  “Especially if a war were to come between us and Canada, or better yet, Mexico,” Seward smiled.

  Chase considered this. Seward had made a very convincing case for bending the South to the will of the Union, without fraternal bloodshed, and while satisfying the Abolitionists.

  “So your recommendation for our immediate future actions, Mr. Seward, is in fact to take no action?”

  “How can we do anything?” Seward gave an exaggerated shrug. “Our President is in bed with fever, the Cabinet is untried and largely inexperienced. Our untested Vice-President has no authority. Yes, Mr. Chase, we do nothing.”

  “And in two years’ time, the Union is restored to a true unity, without the foul taint of slavery besmirching its fair name.”

  “Or even less time, Mr. Chase, I promise you that.”

  “Mr. Seward, I think you have found the solution we have all been looking for. What a tragedy for our country that the convention in Chicago went the way that it did and gave the nomination to Mr. Lincoln.”

  “I’ll drink to that,” replied Seward, with a wry half-smile, and did so.

  Chapter 1: The disputed border between the United States of America and the Confederate States of America, South Kansas, 1923

  “We thank You for the blessings You continue to shower on the Confederate States of America, the most favored of all Your nations.”

  Private David Slater looked along the barbed wire fence that stretched as far as the eye could see in either direction across the flat, almost featureless Kansas plains. His unruly blond hair, roughly trimmed in the standard haircut of the Army of the Confederacy, was full of the dust blown by the almost constant wind.

  “Don’t reckon them Yankees is going to be bothering us much today,” he remarked to his companion, scratching his head, and took a swig of the whiskey that he carried in his back pocket. The other shook his head, indicating his dissent and refusing the whiskey with the same motion. David wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and stuffed the bottle back in the pocket of his threadbare uniform pants. And, he noted to himself, they were far too short. He’d shot up like a beanpole these last months, and there was now almost a two-inch gap between the bottom of his pants legs and the top of his boots. Good job he hadn’t filled out at the same rate, he thought, otherwise he’d be busting the buttons off of his pants. Mind you, no-one ever got fat on Army food.

  “You never know with those Yankee bastards,” Tom replied. “You hear about last month?”

  David nodded grimly. “A whole column of what they call motorized infantry with one of them airplanes came up out of nowhere and busted down that fort that our boys built down New Mexico way. Man, I know we lost that one, but I sure would have liked to be in on that. You know something?” He took another sip of the whiskey, more to impress the other with his maturity than because he liked the taste or effect of the moonshine which, truth be told, he’d diluted heavily with water before putting the bottle in his pocket this morning. “I only seen but three of them automobile things in my life.” This last was partly a reflection of David’s relative youth—he was only sixteen years old—and partly a reflection on the Confederate States of America, whose technology had advanced only slightly from the time the Southern states had split off from the United States of America a little more than 60 years earlier.

  “Well, I’ve seen a fair number of them in Richmond. Some of my mother’s kin are from up that way, and quite a few of them rich folks in Richmond get themselves automobiles from the North. Even the President.”

  “They ain’t meant to be doing that,” objected David. “They should be like the rest of us, buying their goods from good old Southern boys, or else from our friends in Europe.”

  “Well, why don’t y’all go down to Richmond, and tell them that?”

  “By heck, I might just do that if you’re telling me the truth about them in Richmond. I don’t care if President Davis is kin to the first Jeff Davis. He ought not to be doing that. He should be setting an example to the folks.”

  “Reckon you may be right there, Davy, but I wouldn’t push your luck on that one. You wait till you get out of the army—it’s only another five years or even less for you. Then you can get back to Tallahassee and take life easy.”

  Almost another five years of Army life away from home, and no time he could call his own seemed like an eternity to the young conscript. Although he’d only been drafted six months previously, with his folks unable to pay the money for a substitute, it seemed to him now that his whole life had been spent in his butternut gray uniform, constantly walking up and down barbed wire fences looking for dust clouds that might or might not be the hated and feared enemy from the North. “Reckon I could do just that. Sit on the porch and let the darkies do all my work for me.”

  “You know, Davy, I figure you’ll be going to college some time soon,” Tom remarked. “All the other guys reckon you’re smart enough to get in there, you know.”

  �
��Come off it, Tom. You and me, we know how them colleges is only for the rich folks. Folks like us, we don’t stand a chance of getting there.”

  Tom nodded. “That’s true, I reckon. Anyways, what good is them colleges? All they do is give you a load of crap what contradicts what you and I know to be true from the Bible.” He stopped speaking, and strained his eyes to look south, away from the fence, towards the town hall clock. Neither boy wore a watch. Neither could afford one. “Coming up to prayer time, Davy,” he remarked. “Time to thank the Lord.” The Confederate Army was keen on public expressions of religion, and morning and evening prayer according to the beliefs of the Confederate Baptist Conference were compulsory for all, and “voluntary” prayers throughout the day were encouraged.

  The two boys kneeled down in the hot sun, gripping their Parker-Hale rifles firmly in their right hands. “Almighty God,” they prayed together. “We thank You for the blessings You continue to shower on the Confederate States of America, the most favored of all Your nations. We pray for strength and courage to fight and defeat all those who would challenge the true Southern way of life. We pray for health and strength for President Davis, that he may continue to lead us in the paths of righteousness and truth, and for his Senate, that they may continue to provide wise and Godly counsel to him. We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, who washes away our sins, and will receive us when we arrive at the gates of glory. Amen.”