The Long Roll Part 92

"Sir, I do not know."

"The officer to whom I gave the order, and who, wrongly enough, transferred it to another messenger, swears that he gave it thus and so."

"Yes, general. He swears it."

A silence reigned in the fire-lit ring. The red light showed form and feature clearly. Jackson sitting on the log, his large hands resting on the sabre across his knees, was full within the glow. It beat even more strongly upon Cleave where he stood. "You believe," said Jackson, "that he swore falsely?"

"Yes, general."

"It is a question between your veracity and his?"

"Yes, general."

"There was enmity between you?"

"Yes, general."

"Where is he now?"

"He is somewhere in prison. He was taken at Sharpsburg."

There fell another silence. The sentry's tread was heard, the crackle of the fire seizing upon pine cone and bough, a low, sighing wind in the wilderness. Jackson spoke briefly. "After this campaign, if matters so arrange themselves, if the officer returns, if you think you can provide new evidence or re-present the old, I will forward, approved, your appeal for a court of inquiry."

"I thank you, sir, with all my heart."

Stonewall Jackson slightly changed his position on the log. Jim tiptoed into the ring and fed again the fire. There was a whinnying of some near-by battery horses, the sound of changing guard, then silence again in the Wilderness. Cleave stood, straight and still, beneath the other's pondering, long, and steady gaze. An aide appeared at an opening in the scrub. "General Fitzhugh Lee, sir." Jackson rose. "You will return to your battery, Deaderick.--Bring General Lee here, captain."

The night pa.s.sed, the dawn came, red bird and wren and robin began a cheeping in the Wilderness. A light mist was over the face of the earth; within it began a vast shadowy movement of shadowy troops. Silence was so strictly ordered that something approaching it was obtained. There was a certain eeriness in the hush in which the column was formed--the grey column in the grey dawn, in the Wilderness where the birds were cheeping, and the mist hung faint and cold. By the roadside, on a little knoll set round with flowering dogwood, sat General Lee on grey Traveller. A swirl of mist below the two detached them from the wide earth and marching troops, made them like a piece of sculpture seen against the morning sky. Below them moved the column, noiseless as might be, enwound with mist. In the van were Fitzhugh Lee and the First Virginia Cavalry. They saluted; the commander-in-chief lifted his hat; they vanished by the Furnace road into the heart of the Wilderness.

Rodes's Division came next, Alabama troops. Rodes, a tall and handsome man, saluted; Alabama saluted. Regiment by regiment they pa.s.sed into the flowering woods. Now came the Light Division beneath skies with a coral tinge. Ambrose Powell Hill saluted, and all his brigades, Virginia and South Carolina. The guns began to pa.s.s, quiet as was const.i.tutionally possible. The very battery horses looked as though they understood that people who were going to turn the flank of a gigantic army in a strong position proceed upon the business without noise. Up rose the sun while the iron fighting men were yet going by. The level rays gilded all metal, gilded Traveller's bit and bridle clasps, gilded the spur of Lee and his sword hilt and the stars upon his collar. The sun began to drink up the mist and all the birds sang loudly. The sky was cloudless, the low thick woodland divinely cool and sweet. Violet and bloodroot, dogwood and purple Judas tree were all bespangled, bespangled with dew.

While the guns were yet quietly rumbling by Stonewall Jackson appeared upon the rising ground. He saluted. Lee put out his hand and clasped the other's. "General, I feel every confidence! I am sure that you are going forth to victory."

"Yes, sir. I think that I am.--I will send a courier back every half hour."

"Yes, that is wise.--As soon as your wagons are by I will make disposition of the twelve thousand left with me. I propose a certain display of artillery and a line of battle so formed as to deceive--and deceive greatly--as to its strength. If necessary we will skirmish hotly throughout the day. I will create the impression that we are about to a.s.sault. It is imperative that they do not come between us and cut the army in two."

"I will march as rapidly as may be, sir. The Furnace road, the Brock road, then turn eastward on the Plank road and strike their flank.

Good!" He jerked his hand into the air. "I will go now, general."

Lee bent across again. The two clasped hands. "G.o.d be with you, General Jackson!"

"And with you, General Lee."

Little Sorrel left the hillock. The staff came up. Stonewall Jackson turned in his saddle, and, the staff following his action, raised his hand in salute to the figure on grey Traveller, above them in the sunlight. Lee lifted his hat, held it so. The others filed by, turned sharply southward, and were lost in the jewelled Wilderness.

The sun cleared the tallest pines; there set in a splendid day. The long, long column, cavalry, Rodes's Division, the Light Division, the artillery, ordnance wagons and ambulances, twenty-five thousand grey soldiers with Stonewall Jackson at their head--the long, long column wound through the Wilderness by narrow, hidden roads. Close came the scrub and pine and all the flowering trees of May. The hors.e.m.e.n put aside vine and bough, the pink honeysuckle brushed the gun wheels; long stretches of the road were gra.s.s-grown. Through the woods to the right, by paths nearer yet to the far-flung Federal front, paced ten guardian squadrons. All went silently, all went swiftly. In the Confederate service there were no automata. These thousands of lithe, bronzed, bright-eyed, tattered men knew that something, something, something was being done! Something important that they must all help Old Jack with. Forbidden to talk, they speculated inwardly. "South by west. 'T isn't a Thoroughfare Gap march. They're all here in the Wilderness. We're leaving their centre--their right's somewhere over there in the brush. Shouldn't wonder--Allan Gold, what's the Latin for 'to flank'?--Lieutenant, we were just whispering! Yes, sir.--All right, sir. We won't make no more noise than so many wet cartridges!"

On they swung through the fairy forest, grey, steady, rapidly moving, the steel above their shoulders gleaming bright, the worn, shot-riddled colours like flowers amid the tender, all-enfolding green. The head of the column came to a dip in the Wilderness through which flowed a little creek. It was about nine o'clock in the morning. All the men looked to the right, for they could see the plateau of Hazel Grove and the great Federal intrenchments. "If those fellows look right hard they can see us, too! Can't help it--march fast and get past.--Oh, that's what the officers think, too! _Double quick_!"

The column crossed the tiny vale. Beyond it the narrow road of bends and turns plunged due south. Now, General Birney, stationed on the high level of Hazel Grove, observed, though somewhat faintly, that movement.

He sent a courier to Hooker at Chancellorsville. "Rebel column seen to pa.s.s across my front. All arms and wagon train. It has turned to the southward."

"To the south!" said Hooker. "Turned southward. Now what does that mean?

It might mean that Sedgwick at Fredericksburg has seized and is holding the road to Richmond. It might mean that Lee contemplated an un.o.bstructed retreat through this Wilderness section southward to Gordonsville, which is not far away. From Gordonsville, he would fall back on Richmond. Say that is what he planned. Then, finding me in strength across his path, he would naturally make some demonstration, and behind it inaugurate a forced march, southward out of this wild place. A retreat to Gordonsville. It's the most probable move. I will send General Sickles toward Catherine Furnace to find out exactly."

Birney from Hazel Grove, Sickles from Chancellorsville, advanced. At Catherine Furnace they found the 23d Georgia, and on both sides of the Plank road discovered Anderson's division. Now began hot fighting in the Wilderness. The brigades of Anderson did gloriously. The 23d Georgia, surrounded at the Furnace, saw fall, in that square of the Wilderness, three hundred officers and men; but those Georgians who yet stood did well, did well! Full in the front of Chancellorsville, McLaws, with his able, Roman air, his high colour, short black beard and crisp speech, handled his troops like a rightly trusted captain of Caesar's. He kept the enemy's attention strained in his direction. Standing yet upon the little hillock, in the midst of the flowering dogwood, a greater than McLaws overlooked and directed all the grey pieces upon the board before Chancellorsville, played, all day, like a master, a skilfully complicated game.

Far in the Wilderness, miles now to the westward, the rolling musketry came to the ears of Stonewall Jackson. He was riding with Rodes at the head of the column. "Good! good!" he said. "That musketry is at the Furnace. General Hooker will attempt to drive between me and General Lee."

An aide of A. P. Hill's approached at a gallop. He saluted, gained breath and spoke. "They're cutting the 23d Georgia to pieces, sir!

General Anderson is coming into action--"

A deeper thunder rolling now through the Wilderness corroborated his words. "Good! good!" said Jackson imperturbably. "My compliments to General Hill, and he will detach Archer's and Thomas's brigades and a battalion of artillery. They are to cooperate with General Anderson and protect our rear. The remainder of the Light Division will continue the march."

On past the noon point swung light and shadow. On through the languorous May warmth travelled westward the long column. It went with marked rapidity, emphatic even for the "foot cavalry," went without swerving, without straggling, went like a long, gleaming thunderbolt firmly held and swung. Behind it, sank in the distance the noise of battle. The Army of Northern Virginia knew itself divided, cut in two. Far back in the flowering woods before Chancellorsville, the man on the grey horse, directing here, directing there his twelve thousand men, played his master game with equanimity, trusting in Stonewall Jackson rushing toward the Federal right. Westward in the Wilderness, swiftly nearing the Brock road, the man on the sorrel nag travelled with no backward look. In his right hand was the thunderbolt, and near at hand the place from which to hurl it. He rode like incarnate Intention. The officer beside him said something as to that enormous peril in the rear, driving like a wedge between this hurrying column and the grey twelve thousand before Chancellorsville. "Yes, sir, yes!" said Jackson. "But I trust first in G.o.d, and then in General Lee."

The infantry swung into the Brock road. It ran northward; it lay bare, sunny, sleepy, walled in by emerald leaves and white and purple bloom.

The grey thunderbolt travelled fast, fast, and at three o'clock its head reached the Plank road. Far to the east, in the Wilderness, the noise of the battle yet rolled, but it came fainter, with a diminishing sound.

Anderson, Thomas, and Archer had driven back Sickles. There was a pause by Chancellorsville and Catherine Furnace. Through it and all the while the man on grey Traveller kept with a skill so exquisite that it shaded into a grave simplicity those thousands and thousands and thousands of hostile eyes turned quite from their real danger, centred only on a finely painted mask of danger.

At the intersection of the Brock and the Plank roads, Stonewall Jackson found ma.s.sed the 1st Virginia cavalry. Upon the road and to either side in the flowering woods, roan and bay and black tossed their heads and moved their limbs amid silver dogwood and rose azalea. The horses chafed, the hors.e.m.e.n looked at once anxious and exultant. Fitzhugh Lee met the general in command. The latter spoke. "Three o'clock. Proceed at once, general, down the Plank road."

"I beg, sir," said the other, "that you will ride with me to the top of this roll of ground in front of us. I can show you the strangest thing!"

The two went, attended only by a courier. The slight eminence, all clad with scrub-oak, all carpeted with wild flowers, was reached. The hors.e.m.e.n turned and looked eastward, the breast-high scrub, the few tender-foliaged young trees sheltering them from view. They looked eastward, and in the distance they saw Dowdall's Tavern. But it was not Dowdall's Tavern that was the strangest thing. The strangest thing was nearer than Dowdall's; it was at no great distance at all. It was a long abattis, and behind the abattis long, well-builded breastworks. Behind the breastworks, overlooked by the little hill, and occupying an old clearing in the Wilderness, was a large encampment--the encampment, in short, of the 11th Army Corps, Howard commanding, twenty regiments, and six batteries. From the little hill where the violets purpled the ground, Stonewall Jackson and the cavalry leader looked and looked in silence. The blue soldiers lay at ease on the tender sward. It was _dolce far niente_ in the Wilderness. The arms were stacked, the arms were stacked. There were cannon planted by the roadside, but where were the cannoneers? Not very near the guns, but asleep on the gra.s.s, or propped against trees smoking excellent tobacco, or in the square on the greensward playing cards with laughter! Battery horses were grazing where they would. Far and wide were scattered the infantry, squandered like plums on the gra.s.s. They lay or strolled about in the slant sunshine, in the balmy air, in the magic Wilderness--they never even glanced toward the stacked arms.

On the flowery slope across the road, Stonewall Jackson sat Little Sorrel and gazed upon the pleasant, drowsy scene. His eyes had a glow, his cheek a warm colour beneath the bronze. Staff, and indeed the entire 2d Corps, had remarked from time to time this spring upon Old Jack's evident good health. "Getting younger all the time! This war climate suits him. Time the peace articles are signed he'll be just a boy again!

Arrived at--what do you call it? perennial youth." Now he and Little Sorrel stood upon the flowering hilltop, and his lips moved. "Old Jack's praying--Old Jack's praying!" thought the courier.

Fitz Lee said something, but the general did not attend. In another moment, however, he spoke curt, decisive, final. He spoke to the courier. "Tell General Rodes to move _across_ the Plank road. He is to halt at the turnpike. I will join him there. Move quietly."

The courier turned and went. Stonewall Jackson regarded again the scene before him--abattis and breastworks and rifle-pits untenanted, guns lonely in the slanting sunlight, lines of stacked arms, tents, fluttering flags, the horses straying at their will, cropping the tender gra.s.s, in a corner of a field men butchering beeves--regarded the German regiments, Schimmelpfennig and Krzyzancerski, regarded New York and Wisconsin, camped about the Wilderness church. Up from the clearing, across to the thick forest, floated an indescribable humming sound, a confused droning as from a giant race of bees. The shadows of the trees were growing long, the sun hung just above the pines of the Wilderness.

"Good! good!" said Stonewall Jackson. His eyes, beneath the old, old forage cap, had a sapphire depth and gleam. A colour was in his cheek.

"Good! good!" he said, and jerked his hand into the air. Suddenly turning Little Sorrel, he left the hill--riding fast, elbows out, and big feet, down into the woods, his sabre leaping as he rode.

CHAPTER XLVIII

THE RIVER

It yet lacked of six o'clock when the battle lines were finally formed.

Only the treetops of the Wilderness now were in gold, below, in the thick wood, the brigades stood in shadow. In front were Rodes's skirmishers, and Rodes's brigades formed the first line. The troops of Raleigh Colston made the second line, A. P. Hill's men the third. A battery--four Napoleons--were advanced; the other guns were coming up.

The cavalry, with Stonewall Brigade supporting, took the Plank road, masking the actual movement. On the old turnpike Stonewall Jackson sat his horse beside Rodes. At six o'clock he looked at his watch, closed it, and put it in his pocket. "Are you ready, General Rodes?"

"Yes, sir."