Listen--go to the door--by God, man, that's our yell! Ah, there comes the
rattle of the muskets--don't you hear it?”
“Lawd, Marse Dan, I'se done hyern dat soun' twel I'm plum sick er it,”
responded Big Abel, carefully measuring out a dose of arsenic, which had
taken the place of quinine in a country where medicine was becoming as
scarce as food. “You des swallow dis yer stuff right down en tu'n over en
go fas' asleep agin.”
Taking the glass with trembling hands, Dan drained it eagerly.
“It's the artillery now,” he said, quivering with excitement. “The
explosions come so fast I can hardly separate them. I never knew how long
shells could screech before--do you mean to say they are really across the
river? Go into the alley, Big Abel, and tell me if you see the smoke.”
Big Abel went out and returned, after a few moments, with the news that the
smoke could be plainly seen, he was told, from the upper stories. There was
such a crowd in the street, he added, that he could barely get
along--nobody knew anything, but the wounded, who were arriving in great
numbers, reported that General Lee could hold his ground “against Lucifer
and all his angels.”
“Hold his ground,” groaned Dan, with feverish enthusiasm, “why, he could
hold a hencoop, for the matter of that, against the whole of North America!
Oh, but this is worse than fighting. I must get up!”
“You don' wanter git out dar in dat mess er skeered rabbits,” returned Big
Abel. “You cyarn see yo' han' befo' you fur de way dey's w'igglin' roun' de
street, en w'at's mo' you cyarn heah yo' own w'uds fur de racket dey's
a-kickin' up. Des lis'en ter 'em now, des lis'en!”
“Oh, I wish I could tell our guns,” murmured Dan at each quick explosion.
“Hush! there comes the cheer, now--somebody's charging! It may be our
brigade, Big Abel, and I not in it.”
He closed his eyes and fell back from sheer exhaustion, still following, as
he lay there, the battalion that had sprung forward with that charging
yell. Gray, obscured in smoke, curved in the centre, uneven as the
Confederate line of battle always was--he saw it sweep onward over the
September field. At the moment to have had his place in that charge beyond
the river, he would have cheerfully met his death when the day was over.
Through the night he slept fitfully, awaking from time to time to ask
eagerly if it were not almost daybreak; then with the dawn the silence that
had fallen over the Potomac seemed to leave a greater blank to be filled
with the noises along the Virginia shore. The hurrying footsteps in the
street outside kept up ceaselessly until the dark again; mingled with the
cries of the wounded and the prayers of the frightened he heard always that
eager, tireless passing of many feet. So familiar it became, so constant an
accompaniment to his restless thoughts, that when at last the day wore out
and the streets grew empty, he found himself listening for the steps of a
passer-by as intently as he had listened in the morning for the renewed
clamour of the battle on the Maryland fields.
The stir of the retreat did not reach the stable where he lay; all night
the army was recrossing the Potomac, but to Dan, tossing on his bed of
straw, it lighted the victor's watch-fires on the disputed ground. He had
not seen the shattered line of battle as it faced disease, exhaustion, and
an army stronger by double numbers, nor had he seen the gray soldiers lying
row on row where they had kept the “sunken road.” Thick as the trampled
corn beneath them, with the dust covering them like powder, and the
scattered fence rails lying across their faces, the dead men of his own
brigade were stretched upon the hillside, but through the long night he lay
wakeful in the stable, watching with fevered eyes the tallow dips that
burned dimly on the wall.
In the morning a nurse, coming with a bowl of soup, brought the news that
Lee's army was again on Virginia soil.
“McClellan has opened a battery,” she explained, “that's the meaning of
this fearful noise--did you ever hear such sounds in your life? Yes, the
shells are flying over the town, but they've done no harm as yet.”
She hastened off, and a little later a dishevelled straggler, with a cloth
about his forehead, burst in at the open door.
“They're shelling the town,” he cried, waving a dirty hand, “an' you'll be
prisoners in an hour if you don't git up and move. The Yankees are comin',
I seed 'em cross the river. Lee's cut up, I tell you, he's left half his
army dead in Maryland. Thar! they're shellin' the town, sho' 'nough!”
With a last wave he disappeared into the alley, and Dan struggled from his
bed and to the door. “Give me your arm, Big Abel,” he said, speaking in a
loud voice that he might be heard above the clamour. “I can't stay here. It
isn't being killed I mind, but, by God, they'll never take me prisoner so
long as I'm alive. Come here and give me your arm. You aren't afraid to go
out, are you?”
“Lawd, Marse Dan, I'se mo' feared ter stay hyer,” responded Big Abel, with
an ashen face. “Whar we gwine hide, anyhow?”
“We won't hide, we'll run,” returned Dan gravely, and with his arm on the
negro's shoulder, he passed through the alley out into the street. There
the noise bewildered him an instant, and his eyes went blind while he
grasped Big Abel's sleeve.
“Wait a minute, I can't see,” he said. “Now, that's right, go on. By
George, it's bedlam turned loose, let's get out of it!”
“Dis away, Marse Dan, dis away, step right hyer,” urged Big Abel, as he
slipped through the hurrying crowd of fugitives which packed the street.
White and black, men and women, sick and well, they swarmed up and down in
the dim sunshine beneath the flying shells, which skimmed the town to
explode in the open fields beyond. The wounded were there--all who could
stand upon their feet or walk with the aid of crutches--stumbling on in a
mad panic to the meadows where the shells burst or the hot sun poured upon
festering cuts. Streaming in noisy groups, the slaves fled after them,
praying, shrieking, calling out that the day of judgment was upon them, yet
bearing upon their heads whatever they could readily lay hands on--bundles,
baskets, babies, and even clucking fowls tied by the legs. Behind them went
a troop of dogs, piercing the tumult with excited barks.
Dan, fevered, pallid, leaning heavily upon Big Abel, passed unnoticed amid
a throng which was, for the most part, worse off than himself. Men with old
wounds breaking out afresh, or new ones staining red the cloths they wore,
pushed wildly by him, making, as all made, for the country roads that led
from war to peace. It was as if the hospitals of the world had disgorged
themselves in the sunshine on the bright September fields.
Once, as Dan moved slowly on, he came upon a soldier, with a bandage at his
throat sitting motionless upon a rock beside a clump of thistles, and moved
by the expression of supreme terror on the man's face, he stopped and laid
a hand upon his shoulder.
“What's the trouble, friend--given up?” he asked, and then drew back
quickly for the man was dead. After this they went on more rapidly, flying
from the horrors along the road as from the screaming shells and the dread
of capture.
At the hour of sunset, after many halts upon the way, they found themselves
alone and still facing the open road. Since midday they had stopped for
dinner with a hospitable farmer, and, some hours later, Big Abel had
feasted on wild grapes, which he had found hidden in the shelter of a
little wood. In the same wood a stream had tinkled over silver rocks, and
Dan, lying upon the bank of moss, had bathed his face and hands in the
clear water. Now, while the shadows fell in spires across the road, they
turned into a quiet country lane, and stood watching the sun as it dropped
beyond the gray stone wall. In the grass a small insect broke into a low
humming, and the silence, closing the next instant, struck upon Dan's ears
like a profound and solemn melody. He took off his cap, and still leaning
upon Big Abel, looked with rested eyes on the sloping meadow brushed with
the first gold of autumn. Something that was not unlike shame had fallen
over him--as if the horrors of the morning were a mere vulgar affront which
man had put upon the face of nature. The very anguish of the day obtruded
awkwardly upon his thoughts, and the wild clamour he had left behind him
showed with a savage crudeness against a landscape in which the dignity of
earth--of the fruitful life of seasons and of crops--produced in a solitary
observer a quiet that was not untouched by awe. Where nature was suggestive
of the long repose of ages, the brief passions of a single generation
became as the flicker of a candle or the glow of a firefly in the night.
“Dat's a steep road ahead er us,” remarked Big Abel suddenly, as he stared
into the shadows.
Dan came back with a start.
“Where shall we sleep?” he asked. “No, not in that field--the open sky
would keep me awake, I think. Let's bivouac in the woods as usual.”
They moved on a little way and entered a young pine forest, where Big Abel
gathered a handful of branches and kindled a light blaze.
“You ain' never eat nigger food, is you, Marse Dan?” he inquired as he did
so.
“Good Lord!” ejaculated Dan, “ask a man who has lived two months on
corn-field peas if he's eaten hog food, and he'll be pretty sure to answer
'yes.' Do you know we must have crawled about six miles to-day.” He lay
back on the pine tags and stared straight above where the long green
needles were illuminated on a background of purple space. A few fireflies
made golden points among the tree-tops.
“Well, I'se got a hunk er middlin',” pursued Big Abel thoughtfully, “a
strip er fat en a strip er lean des like hit oughter be--but a nigger
'ooman she gun hit ter me, en I 'low Ole Marster wouldn't tech hit wid a
ten-foot pole.” He stuck the meat upon the end of Dan's bayonet and held it
before the flames. “Ole Marster wouldn't tech hit, but den he ain' never
had dese times.”
“You're right,” replied Dan idly, filling his pipe and lighting it with a
small red ember, “and all things considered, I don't think I'll raise any
racket about that middling, Big Abel.”
“Hit ain' all nigger food, no how,” added Big Abel reflectively, “caze de
'ooman she done steal it f'om w'ite folks sho's you bo'n.”
“I only wish she had been tempted to steal some bread along with it,”
rejoined Dan.
Big Abel's answer was to draw a hoecake wrapped in an old newspaper from
his pocket and place it on a short pine stump. Then he reached for his
jack-knife and carefully slit the hoecake down the centre, after which he
laid the bacon in slices between the crusts.
“Did she steal that, too?” inquired Dan laughing.
“Naw, suh, I stole dis.”
“Well, I never! You'll be ashamed to look the Major in the face when the
war is over.”
Big Abel nodded gloomily as he passed the sandwich to Dan, who divided it
into two equal portions. “Dar's somebody got ter do de stealin' in dis yer
worl',” he returned with rustic philosophy, “des es dar's somebody got ter
be w'ite folks en somebody got ter be nigger, caze de same pusson cyarn be
ner en ter dat's sho'. Dar ain' 'oom fer all de yerth ter strut roun' wid
dey han's in dey pockets en dey nose tu'nt up des caze dey's hones'. Lawd,
Lawd, ef I'd a-helt my han's back f'om pickin' en stealin' thoo dis yer
wah, whar 'ould you be now--I ax you dat?”
Catching a dried branch the flame shot up suddenly, and he sat relieved
against the glow, like a gigantic statue in black basalt.
“Well, all's fair in love and war,” replied Dan, adjusting himself to
changed conditions. “If that wasn't as true as gospel, I should be dead
to-morrow from this fat bacon.”
Big Abel started up.
“Lis'en ter dat ole hoot owl,” he exclaimed excitedly, “he's a-settin'
right over dar on dat dead limb a-hootin' us plum in de mouf. Ain' dat like
'em, now? Is you ever seed sech airs as dey put on?”
He strode off into the darkness, and Dan, seized with a sudden homesickness
for the army, lay down beside his musket and fell asleep.
III
THE CABIN IN THE WOODS
At daybreak they took up the march again, Dan walking slowly, with his
musket striking the ground and his arm on Big Abel's shoulder. Where the
lane curved in the hollow, they came upon a white cottage, with a woman
milking a spotted cow in the barnyard. As she caught sight of them, she
waved wildly with her linsey apron, holding the milk pail carefully between
her feet as the spotted cow turned inquiringly.
“Go 'way, I don't want no stragglers here,” she cried, as one having
authority.
Leaning upon the fence, Dan placidly regarded her.
“My dear madam, you commit an error of judgment,” he replied, pausing to
argue.
With the cow's udder in her hand the woman looked up from the streaming
milk.
“Well, ain't you stragglers?” she inquired.
Dan shook his head reproachfully.
“What air you, then?”
“Beggars, madam.”
“I might ha' knowed it!” returned the woman, with a snort. “Well, whatever
you air, you kin jest as eas'ly keep on along that thar road. I ain't got
nothing on this place for you. Some of you broke into my smokehouse night
befo' last an' stole all the spar' ribs I'd been savin'. Was you the ones?”
“No, ma'am.”
“Oh, you're all alike,” protested the woman, scornfully, “an' a bigger set
o' rascals I never seed.”
“Huh! Who's a rascal?” exclaimed Big Abel, angrily.
“This is the reward of doing your duty, Big Abel,” remarked Dan, gravely.
“Never do it again, remember. The next time Virginia is invaded we'll sit
by the fire and warm our feet. Good morning, madam.”
“Why ain't you with the army?” inquired the woman sharply, slapping the cow
upon the side as she rose from her seat and took up the milk pail. “An
officer rode by this morning an' he told me part of the army was campin'
ten miles across on the other road.”
“Did he say whose division?”
“Oh, I reckon you kin fight as well under one general as another, so long
as you've got a mind to fight at all. You jest follow this lane about three
miles and then keep straight along the turnpike. If you do that I reckon
you'll git yo' deserts befo' sundown.” She came over to the fence and stood
fixing them with hard, bright eyes. “My! You do look used up,” she admitted
after a moment. “You'd better come in an' git a glass of this milk befo'
you move on. Jest go roun' to the gate and I'll meet you at the po'ch. The
dog won't bite you if you don't touch nothin'.”
“All right, go ahead and hide the spoons,” called Dan, as he swung open the
gate and went up a little path bordered by prince's feathers.
The woman met them at the porch and led them into a clean kitchen, where
Dan sat down at the table and Big Abel stationed himself behind his chair.
“Drink a glass of that milk the first thing,” she said, bustling heavily
about the room, and browbeating them into submissive silence, while she
mixed the biscuits and broke the eggs into a frying-pan greased with bacon
gravy. Plump, hearty, with a full double chin and cheeks like winter
apples, she moved briskly from the wooden safe to the slow fire, which she
stirred with determined gestures.
“It's time this war had stopped, anyhow,” she remarked as she slapped the
eggs up into the air and back again into the pan. “An' if General Lee ever
rides along this way I mean to tell him that he ought to have one good
battle an' be done with it. Thar's no use piddlin' along like this twil
we're all worn out and thar ain't a corn-field pea left in Virginny. Look
here (to Big Abel), you set right down on that do' step an' I'll give you
something along with yo' marster. It's a good thing I happened to look
under the cow trough yestiddy or thar wouldn't have been an egg left in
this house. That's right, turn right in an' eat hearty--don't mince with
me.” Big Abel, cowed by her energetic manner, seated himself upon the door
step, and for a half-hour the woman ceaselessly plied them with hot
biscuits and coffee made from sweet potatoes.
“You mustn't think I mind doing for the soldiers,” she said when they took
their leave a little later, “but I've a husban' with General Lee and I
can't bear to see able-bodied men stragglin' about the country. No, don't
give me nothin'--it ain't worth it. Lord, don't I know that you don't git
enough to buy a bag of flour.” Then she pointed out the way again and they
set off with a well-filled paper of luncheon.
“Beware of hasty judgments, Big Abel,” advised Dan, as they strolled along
the road. “Now that woman there--she's the right sort, though she rather
took my breath away.”
“She 'uz downright ficy at fu'st,” replied Big Abel, “but I d'clar dose
eggs des melted in my mouf like butter. Whew! don't I wish I had dat ole
speckled hen f'om home. I could hev toted her unner my arm thoo dis wah des
es well es not.”
The sun was well overhead, and across the landscape the heavy dew was
lifted like a veil. Here and there the autumn foliage tinted the woods in
splashes of red and yellow; and beyond the low stone wall an old sheep
pasture was ablaze in goldenrod. From a pointed aspen beside the road a
wild grapevine let down a fringe of purple clusters, but Big Abel, with a
full stomach, passed them by indifferently. A huge buzzard, rising suddenly
from the pasture, sailed slowly across the sky, its heavy shadow skimming
the field beneath. As yet the flames of war had not blown over this quiet
spot; in the early morning dew it lay as fresh as the world in its
beginning.
At the end of the lane, when they came out upon the turnpike, they met an
old farmer riding a mule home from the market.
“Can you tell me if McClellan has crossed the Potomac?” asked Dan, as he
came up with him. “I was in the hospital at Shepherdstown, and I left it
for fear of capture. No news has reached me, but I am on my way to rejoin
the army.”
“Naw, suh, you might as well have stayed whar you were,” responded the old
man, eying him with the suspicion which always met a soldier out of ranks.
“McClellan didn't do no harm on this side of the river--he jest set up a
battery on Douglas hill and scolded General Lee for leaving Maryland so
soon. You needn't worry no mo' 'bout the Yankees gittin' on this side--thar
ain't none of 'em left to come, they're all dead. Why, General Lee cut 'em
all up into little pieces, that's what he did. Hooray! it was jest like
Bible times come back agin.”
Then, as Dan moved on, the farmer raised himself in his stirrups and called
loudly after him. “Keep to the Scriptures, young man, and remember Joshua,
Smite them hip an' thigh, as the Bible says.”
All day in the bright sunshine they crept slowly onward, halting at brief
intervals to rest in the short grass by the roadside, and stopping to ask
information of the countrymen or stragglers whom they met. At last in the
red glow of the sunset they entered a strip of thin woodland, and found an
old negro gathering resinous knots from the bodies of fallen pines.
“Bless de Lawd!” he exclaimed as he faced them. “Is you done come fer de
sick sodger at my cabin?”
“A sick soldier? Why, we are all sick soldiers,” answered Dan. “Where did
he come from?” The old man shook his head, as he placed his heavy split
basket on the ground at his feet.
“I dunno, marster, he ain' come, he des drapped. 'Twuz yestiddy en I 'uz
out hyer pickin' up dis yer lightwood des like I is doin' dis minute, w'en
I heah 'a-bookerty! bookerty! bookerty!' out dar in de road 'en a w'ite
hoss tu'n right inter de woods wid a sick sodger a-hangin' ter de saddle.
Yes, suh, de hoss he come right in des like he knowed me, en w'en I helt
out my han' he poke his nose spang inter it en w'innied like he moughty
glad ter see me--en he wuz, too, dat's sho'. Well, I ketch holt er his
bridle en lead 'im thoo de woods up ter my do' whar he tu'n right in en
begin ter nibble in de patch er kebbage. All dis time I 'uz 'lowin' dat de
sodger wuz stone dead, but w'en I took 'im down he opened his eyes en axed
fur water. Den I gun 'im a drink outer de goa'd en laid 'im flat on my bed,
en in a little w'ile a nigger come by dat sez he b'longed ter 'im, but
befo' day de nigger gone agin en de hoss he gone, too.”
“Well, we'll see about him, uncle, go ahead,” said Dan, and as the old
negro went up the path among the trees, he followed closely on his
footsteps. When they had gone a little way the woods opened suddenly and
they came upon a small log cabin, with a yellow dog lying before the door.
The dog barked shrilly as they approached, and a voice from the dim room
beyond called out:--
“Hosea! Are you back so soon, Hosea?”
At the words Dan stopped as if struck by lightning, midway of the vegetable
garden; then breaking from Big Abel, he ran forward and into the little
cabin.
“Is the hurt bad, Governor?” he asked in a trembling voice.
The Governor smiled and held out a steady hand above the ragged patchwork
quilt. His neat gray coat lay over him and as Dan caught the glitter and
the collar he remembered the promotion after Seven Pines.
“Let me help you, General,” he implored. “What is it that we can do?”
“I have come to the end, my boy,” replied the Governor, his rich voice
unshaken. “I have seen men struck like this before and I have lived twelve
hours longer than the strongest of them. When I could go no farther I sent
Hosea ahead to make things ready--and now I am keeping alive to hear from
home. Give me water.”
Dan held the glass to his lips, and looking up, the Governor thanked him
with his old warm glance that was so like Betty's. “There are some things
that are worth fighting for,” said the older man as he fell back, “and the
sight of home is one of them. It was a hard ride, but every stab of pain
carried me nearer to Uplands--and there are poor fellows who endure worse
things and yet die in a strange land among strangers.” He was silent a
moment and then spoke slowly, smiling a little sadly.
“My memory has failed me,” he said, “and when I lay here last night and
tried to recall the look of the lawn at home, I couldn't remember--I
couldn't remember. Are there elms or maples at the front, Dan?”
“Maples, sir,” replied Dan, with the deference of a boy. “The long walk
bordered by lilacs goes up from the road to the portico with the Doric
columns--you remember that?”
“Yes, yes, go on.”
“The maples have grown thick upon the lawn and close beside the house there
is the mimosa tree that your father set out on his twenty-first birthday.”
“The branches touch the library window. I had them trimmed last year that
the shutters might swing back. What time is it, Dan?”
Dan turned to the door.
“What time is it, Big Abel?” he called to the negro outside.
“Hit's goin' on eight o'clock, suh,” replied Big Abel, staring at the west.
“De little star he shoots up moughty near eight, en dar he is a-comin'.”
“Hosea is there by now,” said the Governor, turning his head on a pillow of
pine needles. “He started this morning, and I told him to change horses
upon the road and eat in the saddle. Yes, he is there by now and Julia is
on the way. Am I growing weaker, do you think? There is a little brandy on
the chair, give me a few drops--we must make it last all night.”
After taking the brandy he slept a little, and awaking quietly, looked at
Dan with dazed eyes.
“Who is it?” he asked, stretching out his hand. “Why, I thought Dick Wythe
was dead.”
Dan bent over him, smoothing the hair from his brow with hands that were
gentle as a woman's.
“Surely you haven't forgotten me,” he said.
“No--no, I remember, but it is dark, too dark. Why doesn't Shadrach bring
the candles? And we might as well have a blaze in the fireplace to-night.
It has grown chilly; there'll be a white frost before morning.”
There was a basket of resinous pine beside the hearth, and Dan kindled a
fire from a handful of rich knots. As the flames shot up, the rough little
cabin grew more cheerful, and the Governor laughed softly lying on his
pallet.