Tuesday, June 16
Bryant flicked the reins lightly. The horse harnessed to the Jenny Lind did not move. Blue Bell instead continued to pick at weeds beside the recently built rail and post fence. The blond lumber contrasted sharply with the weathered brown fence on the other side of Emmitsburg Road.
She could not blame the horse for refusing to get going again. The road was muddy and difficult to pull a rig on.
These mucky roads were a pain. People said they could not remember a wetter June. It was getting a bit depressing, most days cloudy even if it didn’t rain. She supposed she should be grateful, though, that she was not back in the suffocating heat of Washington.
Bryant again flicked the reins. “Come on, Bell.” The horse ignored her.
She wasn’t going to fight. Blue Bell, her favorite, usually obeyed without hesitation. Bryant would let the horse eat and rest her fill. Next stream they came to she would also let Bell drink to heart’s content.
Why had they named her Blue Bell? Her coat was reddish brown, her mane and tail coal black. Not a speck of blue on her.
At the start of June she knew squat about horses. Prior to arriving in this era, her last experience with these creatures had been as a kid on a pony. In adulthood she regarded horses a relic that fools still rode to jump fences and chase foxes.
While next to the locals Bryant remained a greenhorn, she could now distinguish between a filly and a mare, a bay and a sorrel, a riding horse and a draft horse. Bell was a draft bay mare.
Maybe Bryant had become Bell’s favorite too. Benjy, the livery stable boy, certainly thought so. Benjy said Bell became cantankerous if anyone but Lily hired her. The horse certainly neighed with delight when Bryant approached. The delight was helped by a daily bribe of sugar cubes.
Bell continued to munch. Bryant alighted from the carriage, then tied the reins to a post. Not that Bell would be bolting anywhere over this soggy road.
This was beautiful country, and the rain had made it more so. Lush vegetation lay everywhere. She had visited England, and thought no place more intensely green, but these fields and woods now rivaled it.
She gazed at a farmhouse down the road. Like most of the farm dwellings around Gettysburg it was big and well maintained. She didn’t see anybody about. Maybe they were in town for supplies.
Foot high corn grew just beyond the fence. In neat rows it flowed across the field. She wondered if any of the crop—and that farmhouse—would survive the battle.
Probably not. Jack said some of the worst fighting took place along the Emmitsburg Road. Right where she stood men would be dying in great numbers.
It was so quiet now. Not even birds made a noise. Only the rattle of Bell’s harness sounded.
She tried not to think about the horror to come. When so many young men would kill each other. Young men, like Stod and Nicolay, that in other circumstances would fall all over themselves helping someone in distress.
Bryant wrapped arms over her chest. If only she could stop what would happen here. If only, on the first day of battle, she could go to the generals and demand they pull back their men. Make them instead sit around a table and negotiate peace.
If only.
She would not think of war. She would rather think of how she had enjoyed her time in Gettysburg. These buggy rides were boring, but the strolls about town had proved much better. From the start people had been welcoming.
Last Saturday evening she and Jack had attended an ice cream social. It had been held in the town square—really a big circle—as the sun slowly settled in the west. She was already on a first name basis with a number of people. Everyone gorged on ice cream and cake, there were patriotic speeches and songs, and as night fell the off-key but energetic band prompted dancing.
The evening was marred only by “militia” passing in review. These Gettysburg soldier wannabes could barely keep step. Most were too young or too old for combat. Their appearance did not bother her; it was rather their blind enthusiasm to participate in war. They should all tour a military hospital.
Once the dancing started, she forgot the wannabes. She pulled Jack into the square. Neither of them knew the steps to a polka, but they had fun trying. Waltzes they managed better. They even participated in the Virginia Reel. The townspeople called it a Scottish reel, except it looked just like what Scarlett O’Hara performed.
The evening was magical. She indulged in a wonderful fantasy, that she and Jack would marry and settle in this thriving little town. Let the battle go elsewhere. She and Jack would buy a home, have children, live a long and happy life.
She could indulge, couldn’t she?
The reality was that the nation’s greatest battle would soon take place here. Reality also was that she and Jack had at last begun to shrink. On both matters time was growing short. Two weeks to the battle, perhaps three before she and Jack became midgets and four before they disappeared altogether.
She heard the beat and splash of horse hoofs. Someone was approaching at a good pace, from the direction of town.
Bryant moved close to the Jenny Lind and the revolver in the side of the seat. Jack insisted she carry one in town or out. Not that she needed convincing; a woman going about alone made a tempting target in any era.
The road dipped where she had parked. When the rider appeared on the rise fifty yards away her eyes widened. It was Jack.
Her heart raced. There was only one reason he would break off his search in the middle of the day to come looking for her. He must have located Naylor and Jackson.
“No,” Mauer replied to Chloe’s breathless question, “I haven’t found them.”
“Then what’s happened?”
“Well, in town they have learned rebel cavalry entered Chambersburg yesterday. I just saw some panicky refuges arriving. But that’s not why I’m here.”
The Confederates were already withdrawing, but nobody this side of South Mountain knew that.
“What then?”
Mauer dismounted the lathered and mud splattered horse. He probably shouldn’t have pushed him so hard. He tied the reins to a post.
“Let’s sit in the buggy, Chloe.”
She didn’t move. “What’s going on? Why are you here if you haven’t found them?”
“I am abandoning the search. At least around Gettysburg.”
She gaped. Then she did get into the buggy. He followed.
“Jack, what are you talking about?”
“It’s been in the back of my mind. I almost called a stop last Friday.”
“Why didn’t you discuss this with me?”
She looked and sounded more hurt than angry.
“Because it will be a very difficult thing to do. For us to part.”
Chloe gaped again.
“I’m taking you back to Transit One, Chloe. To wait for me.”
Her pale skin turned paler and she croaked something. It sounded like “why?”
“We aren’t getting anywhere here. More and more I’m thinking if Naylor brought Jackson to Gettysburg, it was before we arrived. Then she probably got him well away. I’m betting they are over in the Cumberland Valley.”
“Why there?” She again spoke with a strangled voice.
Yes, he had delivered a body blow, saying they would have to separate. But separate they must. He had to make sure she survived.
“Most of Lee’s army will pass through Chambersburg. That is second best place for Jackson to take over his old command.”
Mauer had thought Jackson would wait until July 1st to reveal himself. At Gettysburg. When Jackson did pop back into existence, there would be no keeping it secret. The Army of Northern Virginia would go berserk with joy.
Word of the astounding event could not help but reach Northern commanders. If they learned on the afternoon of July 1st, it would be too late. The Army of the Potomac would have its head in the noose. If they learned even a day earlier, they would pull up sho
rt of Gettysburg. Fear of Jackson would render them ultra cautious.
Naylor may have decided it was too risky keeping Jack near Gettysburg. Until the Confederates arrived on the first, he would be naked to capture. Jackson would definitely be safer at Chambersburg, which Lee would firmly control by next week.
She probably figured she could still keep Jackson under wraps. Just disguise him as another resident of Cumberland County. Then Jackson could meet clandestinely with Lee or one of his staff, who could sneak him through the Cashtown Gap in the back of a wagon. Jackson would remain incognito until the appropriate moment on the first.
“Jack, you’ll need my help in Chambersburg.”
Sure he could use another set of eyes. But that could also sentence her to death.
“I have to kill Jackson at any cost. I may have to do it with no means of escape. Which means I could be shot down like a dog moments afterward.”
Her face twisted.
“We both knew it might come to that. If it does, my death will cause your death. Unless you are right by the transit point.”
She shook her head.
“Come on, Chloe. We’ve been here too long. Way past the expiration date for a single person. When—if I die, you will shrink fast. You’ll probably have only seconds to get into the transit.”
Her lower lip was quivering. Her eyes watered.
“Oh, Jack.”
He refrained from embracing her, caressing her. By now he wasn’t was surprised how much he wanted to.
“Whatever our personal feelings for each other—I admit they are strong—we still have this mission. The mission always comes first. We ATU vets know that better than anyone.”
“I’m part of the team too. I can help in Chambersburg. You need me there, you know it.”
“I’m going to move fast from now on. Use all my black ops experience. I mean no offense, you’ve been great, but you’d only be in the way.”
“No I wouldn’t.” She sniffled.
“You’re going to Transit One, Chloe.”
Now her back arched. She stared defiantly.
In that moment love squeezed through his stout defenses. Not brotherly or cousinly or comradely love, but the real dangerous thing. He shoved it back hard as he could.
He softened his voice. “One of us has to make it out of here. If I fail to get Jackson, you’ll have to take up the fight in 1882. Or 1901. Or whatever year, to try to get the Union back together if the South wins now.”
“I don’t want to lose you, Jack.”
“You may not. I mean, I intend to succeed. I will do my damn best to get back to Transit One.”
“You should have talked this over with me.”
“I know. But it wouldn’t have changed my decision.”
“Our decision.”
“What you would decide? If you were ATU director in charge of the operation?”
She turned from him. She stared down the road. The empty road that usually had traffic. Maybe the world was waiting for them to resolve this question upon which its future depended.
“I’d order just what you have.” She whispered the words.
“I’ll get back to Transit One, Chloe.”
“If anybody can, it will be you.”
God, he wanted to kiss her so bad. He almost did.
But there was Teri. Teri would always come first.