"Tell you as I come back."
Meantime other aides have been scurrying to and fro; and far and near,
up and down the Shenandoah and out across the valley, where the morning
sunshine triumphs over the barring Loudon, the same stirring call rings
out upon the air. "Boots and saddles!" everywhere, and nowhere the
long-roll or the infantry assembly.
"Back to your breakfast, boys," says a tall and bearded sergeant.
"Whatever it is, it don't amount to shucks. The infantry isn't called
for."
But that it amounts to more than "shucks," despite the footman's
epigram, is presently apparent when the staff-officer comes more slowly
back, easing his panting horse. The major has by this time turned out,
and in boots and overcoat is striding over to the stone wall to get the
news.
"What is it, Win?" he asks.
And the aide-de-camp, bending low from the saddle and with grave face,
replies,
"Stuart again, by Heaven! He whipped around our right, somewhere near
Martinsburg, last night, and is crossing at Williamsport now."
"_What!_ Why, we've got three corps over there about Antietam yet."
"Yes; and he'll go around them, just as he did round us, and be up in
Pennsylvania to-morrow. Where are your wounded?"
"Some over near Keedysville; the others, those we lost at South
Mountain, somewhere near Frederick. The colonel and Abbot were there at
last accounts. Why?"
"Because it will be just like him to go clean around us and come down
the Monocacy. If he should, they are gone, sure."