"GREAT Jehosephat, how hungry I am," suddenly ejaculated Shorty, stopping
his cheering, as the thunder of the guns died away into an occasional
shot after the rebels galloping back to the distant woods on the ridge
from which they had emerged.
"I must make some coffee. Wonder where I put my matches?"
"Here, Pete," continued Shorty, as he broke off some splinters from the
rails and started a little fire, "take my canteen and Si's and yours,
and run down there and find a spring, and fill 'em, before the others
make a rush. Be spry about it, for there'll be a rush there in a minute,
and you won't have no chance."
The excited boy had to be spoken to a second time before he would come
back to earth, much less comprehend the want of water and food. Like the
rest of his companions, the terrific drama which had just been enacted
had wrought him to a delirium, in which he could think of nothing but a
world full of bellowing cannon, and a nightmare of careering, plunging
horses, with savagely-yelling riders.
They could not realize that the battlecloud had rolled away just
as suddenly as it had burst upon them, and they stood there tightly
grasping their reloaded guns, and staring fixedly into the distance for
the next horrid development.
"I think you'll find a spring right over there where you see that bunch
o' young willers, Pete," said Si, handing him his canteen. "Break for
it, before anybody else gets there and muddies the water."
But Pete still stood rigid and unhearing, clutching his gun with a
desperate grip, and glaring with bulging, unmoving eyes across the
plain.
"Come, wake up, Pete," said Shorty, giving him a sharp shake. "Do as I
tell you, and on the jump. The fight's over."
"The fight's over?" stammered the boy. "Ain't they coming back again?"
"Not on their butternut-dyed lives they ain't," said Shorty scornfully.
"They've got their dirty hides as full o' lickin' as they kin hold for
one day. They'll set around for a while, and rub their hurts, and try to
think out jest how it all happened."
"Skip out, Pete," Si reminded the boy. "The rest o' you boys stack your
guns and foller Pete."
"Hadn't we batter take our guns along?" suggested Monty, holding on to
his with grim fearfulness.
"No. Stack 'em; stack 'em, I tell you," said Si impatiently. "And be
quick about it. They'll all git ahead o' you. Don't you see the rest
stackin' arms?"
The boys obeyed as if dazed, and started to follow little Pete's lead
toward the clump of willows.
The boy, full of the old nick, found an Orderly's horse nipping the
grass close by the path to the spring and, boy like, jumped on its back.
The clatter of the canteens frightened the horse, and he broke into a
dead run.
[Illustration: LITTLE PETE'S HORSE BOLTS. 168]
"Do ye s'pose the fight's really over?" whispered Pete to Alf Russell,
who was just behind him. "Don't you think the rebels just let go to get
a fresh hold?"
"Seems so to me," answered Alf. "Seems to me there was just millions
of 'em, and we only got away with a little passel, in spite of all
that shootin'. Why, when we come out on the ridge the valley down there
seemed fuller of 'em than it was at first."
"We oughtn't to get too far away from our guns," said Monty Scruggs.
"Them woods right over there may be full o' rebels watching to jump us
when we get far enough away."
"I don't like the looks of that hill to the left," said Gid Mackall,
nervously. "An awful lot o' them went behind it, and I didn't see any
come out."
"There, them bushes over there are shaking--they're coming out again,"
said Harry Joslyn, turning to run back for his gun.
"No, not there," nervously interjected Humphrey's, turning with him;
"ain't there something stirring down there by the crick?"
"No, no," said Sandy Baker, desperately. "It's just that blame fool
Pete. Come on! Come on! We've got to. We were ordered to. Le's make a
rush for it, like the men in the Indian stories done when they was sent
for water."
They acted on the suggestion with such vim that when Pete's horse
tripped at the edge of the little run, and sent Pete over its head with
a splash into the mud and water, the rest tumbled and piled on top of
him.
The men on the hill, who had noticed it, set up a yell of laughter,
which scared the boys worse than ever, for they thought it meant the
rebels were on them again.
"Now, what new conniption's struck them dumbed little colts?" said Si,
irritably, as he strode down to them, pulled them out, and set them on
their feet, with a shaking and some strong words.
"Is the rebels coming again?" gasped Pete, rubbing the mud and water out
of his eyes.
"No, you little fool," said Si. "The rebels ain't comin'. They're goin'
as fast as their horses kin carry 'em. They've got through comin' for
today.
"There ain't one of 'em within cannon-shot, and won't be till we go out
and hunt 'em up again. You've come near spilin' the spring with your
tormented foolishness. What on earth possessed you to climb that boss?
You need half killin', you do. Go up higher there and fill your canteens
from where the water's clear. Be slow and careful, and don't rile
the water. Say, I see some nice sassafras over there. I always drink
sassafras tea this time o' year. It cleans the blood. I'm goin' over and
see if I can't git a good root while you're fillin' your canteens."
Si walked out some distance in front of them, pulling as he walked
some of the tender, fragrant, spicy young leaves of the sassafras, and
chewing them with gusto. Arriving at the top of a rise he selected a
young shrub, pulled it up, carefully loosed its root from the mulchy
soil, and cut it off with his knife. His careless deliberation calmed
the overwrought nerves of the boys, and when he returned they had their
canteens filled, and walked back composedly to the fires, when they
suddenly remembered that they were as hungry as Si and Shorty, and fell
to work cooking their suppers.
"Is that the way with the rebel cavalry?" asked Monty Scruggs, with
his mouthful of crackers and meat. "Do they come like a hurricane, and
disappear again like an April shower?"
"That's about it," answered Shorty disdainfully. "That's the way with
all cavalry, dad-burn 'em. They're like a passel o' fice pups. They're
all yelp and bark, and howl and showin' o' teeth. They're jest goin' to
tear you to pieces. But when you pick up a stone or a club, or git ready
to give 'em a good kick they're gone, the devil knows where. They're
only an aggravation. You never kin do nothin' with 'em, and they kin
do nothin' with you. I never kin understand why God Almighty wasted his
time in makin' cavalry of any kind, Yank or rebel. All our own cavalry's
good for is to steal whisky and chickens from honest soldiers of the
infantry. The infantry's the only thing. It's like the big dog that
comes up without any special remarks, and sets his teeth in the other
dog. The thing only ends when one dog or the other is badly whipped and
somethin's bin accomplished."
"Will we have to fight them cavalry again tomorrow jest the same way?"
asked little Pete, still somewhat nervously.
"Lord only knows," answered Shorty indifferently, feeling around for
his pipe. "A feller never knows when he's goin' to have to fight rebel
cavalry any more'n he knows when he's goin' to have the toothache. The
thing just happens, and that's all there is of it."
Si and Shorty, having finished their suppers, lighted their pipes, and
strolled up through the regiment to talk over with the others the events
of the day and the probabilities of the morrow.
Left alone, the tongues of the excited boys became loosened, and ran
like the vibrations of a cicada's rattle.
"Wasn't it just wonderful?" said Monty Scruggs. "It looked as if a
million circuses had suddenly let out over there.
"'The Assyrians came down like a wolf on the fold,
And their cohorts were gleaming with purple and gold.'
"Only there didn't seem much purple and gold about them. Seemed mostly
brown rags and slouch hats and long swords. Gracious, did you ever see
anything as long and wicked as them swords! Seemed that every one was
pointing directly at me, and they'd reach me the very next jump."
"Of course, you thought they were all looking at you," said Alf Russell.
"That's your idea, always, wherever you are. You think you're spouting
on the platform, and the center of attraction. But I knew that they were
all looking at me, as folks generally do."
"More self-conceit," sneered Harry Joslyn. "Just because you're so good
looking, Alf. I knew that they weren't bothering about any boy
orator, who does most of his shooting with his mouth, nor any young
pill-peddler, who sings in the choir, and goes home with the prettiest
girl. They were making a dead set on the best shot in the crowd, the
young feller who'd come into the war for business, and told his folks
at home before he started that he was going to shoot Jeff Davis with his
own hand before he got back. That was me, I saw the Colonel of one o'
the regiments point his sword straight at me as they came across the
run, and tell his men to be sure and get me of all others."
"Why didn't you shoot him, if you're such a deadshot?" asked Gid
Mackall.
"Why, I was just loading my gun, when I saw him, and as I went to put on
the cap you were shaking so that it jarred the cap out of my hand, and
before I could get another, the smoke became so thick I couldn't see
anything."
"I shaking?" said Gib, with deep anger. "Now, Harry Josyn--"
"Come, boys; don't have a scrap, now," pleaded the serious-minded Alf.
"Just think how many dead men are lying around. It looks like raising a
disturbance at a funeral."
"That's so," said Jake Humphreys. "I don't think any of us is in shape
to throw up anything to another about shaking. I own up that I was never
so scared in all my life, and I feel now as if I ought to get down on my
knees before everybody, and thank God Almighty that my life was spared.
I ain't ashamed to say so."
"Bully for you, Jake," said Monty Scruggs, heartily. "We all feel that
way, but hain't the nerve to say so. I wish the Chaplain would come
around and open a meeting of thanksgiving and prayer."
"I tell you what's the next best thing," suggested Jake Humphreys. "Let
Alf Russell sing one of those good old hymns they used to sing in the
meetings back at home."
"Home!" How many thousands of miles away--how many years of time
away--seemed to those flushed, overwrought boys, bivouacking on the
deadstrewn battlefield, the pleasant cornfields, the blooming orchards,
the drowsy hum of bees, the dear homes, sheltering fathers, mothers,
and sisters; the plain white churches, with their faithful, grayhaired
pastors, of the fertile plains of Indiana.
Alf Russell lifted up his clear, far-reaching boyish tenor, that they
had heard a thousand times at devout gatherings, at joyful weddings, at
sorrowing funerals, in that grandest and sweetest of hymns:
"All hail the power of Jesus' name;
Let angels prostrate fall.
Bring forth the royal-diadem.
And crown Him Lord of All."
As far as his voice could reach, the rough soldiers, officers and men,
stopped to listen to him--listened to him with emotions far too deep
for the cheers that usually fly to the lips of soldiers at anything that
stirs them. The higher officers quit talking of the plans of the
morrow; the minor ones stopped, pen in hand, over their reports and
requisitions; the busy Surgeons stayed their keen knives; the fussy
Orderly-Sergeants quit bothering about rations and details; the men
paused, looked up from their cards and cooking until the hymn was sung
through.
The voice was so pure, so fresh, so redolent of all that had graced and
sweetened their far-off past, that it brought to each swarming emotions
for which there was no tongue.
"Bully for you, Alf; you're a sweet singer in Israel," said Si, brushing
away a suspicion of a tear. "Spread out your blankets, boys, and
lay down. Git all the sleep you kin, for there's lots o' work for us
tomorrow. There goes tattoo!"