Traveller

  Sorrel had been right, as usual. I'd s'posed those people, when they started, would come acrost in boats, but 'stead they was doing their best to build bridges by laying flat timber on top of boats, one behind t'other. This was what all the musket fire was about. We had fellas down in the town, Tom, you see, doing their best to stop 'em. After a while Marse Robert rode me down towards the town, but what with the mist and the battle smoke, it was hard to see 'zackly what was going on, 'ceptin' that the Blue men seemed to be in plenty of trouble from our fellas holed up in the houses.

  During the morning the haze lifted some, and pretty soon the enemy's guns was firing into the town. I could see 'em a-blazing away all along the hills on t'other side of the river--jest one thick mass of smoke and flame. The houses was still covered with mist, but you could see the spires sticking up and the shells bursting down there. I was hoping to goodness Marse Robert wouldn't take it into his head to go right down into the town. It was jest the sort o' thing he'd be likely to do. The noise of the guns was as bad as I'd ever heared, and pretty soon you could see that a lot of the houses was on fire. Nothing come near us, though, and after a time Marse Robert rode me back to the hilltop.

  It was afternoon 'fore the Blue men began crossing--in boats, after all; they couldn't finish no bridges. The fighting went on all day. In the end they took the town and finished building their boat-bridges, but not before our fellas had given them a whole passel o' trouble.

  We stayed where we was all night; and I'll tell you, Tom, that was cold. No one could sleep and the horses was ridden every hour or so, jest to try to keep 'em warm. It was thick fog again the next morning; plenty of gunfire from t'other side the river, but nothing more'n that-- no Blue men moving out of the town. It must 'a been nigh on to midday when Marse Robert rode me off along the hills and we met Sorrel and Cap-in-His-Eyes. There was another man with us: one of Jine-the-Cavalry's officers--they called him Bork or Pork or something. He was a huge great fella--one of the biggest men I've ever seed--and all dressed up, with a big horse to match. I'd come acrost him before, 'cause he often used to bring messages to Marse Robert from Jine-the-Cavalry. I always used to call him "Vot-you-voz," from the funny way he had of talking.

  Vot-you-voz 'peared very excited. He kept pointing down towards the river, and after a while Marse Robert and Cap-in-His-Eyes rode with him down the hillside till we come to a barn. Then they dismounted and left us with Dave and another soldier, while the three of them went creeping real cautious downhill in the fog.

  Sorrel an' me--all the horses, in fact--we could tell there must be a lot of Blue men nearby, this side of the river. We could smell 'em through the fog and we could hear 'em, too--the hollow noise of boots on bridges and all the racket of hooves on planks, and guns and wagons rumbling up. You could hear picks and shovels going, too.

  "There must be a powerful lot of 'em coming acrost the river, says Sorrel. "All sorts--men, horses, guns. Jest listen! What in the world d'you s'pose your man and mine think they're up to?"

  "I reckon they want to have a look at 'em close up," I said. "Let's hope none o' the Blue men spot 'em. I don't want to lose Marse Robert after all this."

  "You won't," replied Sorrel. "It all feels safe 'nuff to me. What I figure is, he jest wants to see whether the most of 'em are crossing here or back in the town. He wants to find out where their attack's coming from."

  Sorrel always knowed so much more 'bout soldiering'n I did. I'd never have thought o' that, but once't he'd said it I could see it was plain sense. After a while the three of 'em come creeping back jest the way they'd gone. As Marse Robert was mounting up, he said to Cap-in-His-Eyes, real quiet, "I shall try to do them all the damage in our power when they come on." Cap-in-His-Eyes jest nodded and we-all rode off.

  It was even colder that night--the coldest night I've ever knowed in all my born days. I was wondering all night whether there mightn't be men--and horses, too--a-dying of the cold. There was no fires on our lines for fear of the Blue men ranging their guns on 'em. Good old Dave had somehow found me an extra blanket or I'd 'a come near dying myself. Cold's not really a question of courage, Tom, you see. A horse can bear only so much cold and no more. Our picket lines was real silent--not a nicker to be heared, only jest the blowing and stamping of hooves in the snow. The wind was terrible keen, and whichever way on you tried to stand, it only seemed worse. After what 'peared like about three days of darkness it died away, and with the first light of morning there come back the thick, freezing fog.

  That was a thick fog, too--thicker'n anything you can imagine. You couldn't hardly see no distance at all and every sound--harness, hooves, men's voices--was muffled and soft. Marse Robert took me out onto the lines and 'cepting for the cussin' everywhere they was jest like ghost lines. The fellas was almost too cold to cuss, even. But a lot of 'em had lit fires, now that it was getting light--or next thing to light in the fog--and they was cooking. Marse Robert, he kept talking to 'em, cheering them up and telling them we was going to win a great victory. Everyone was slapping theirselves to keep warm, seeing to their guns and ammunition and getting into place. The Blue men must be doing the same, we knowed that. You couldn't see 'em 'way off in the mist, but you could hear 'em--their voices, their drums, their bugles. D'you know, Tom, I heared a band playing that morning, too? Jest plain's could be, a band coming up out of that thick mist 'tween us and the river.

  Marse Robert and the rest of headquarters was drawn up on that same little hill--Marse Robert's hill, I called it--with the whole Army stretching away on either side. All our guns was ready. There was two extra big guns in position jest behind us, and some smaller ones, too. I could imagine how much noise they'd make when they began firing and I remember thinking, Well, at least they'll make it warmer where we are. All the usual headquarters comings and goings began. Vot-you-voz come up--I s'pose with a report from Jine-the-Cavalry--and then Old Pete come a-riding out of the fog on Hero. We nuzzled each other's necks as our men saluted.

  "Colder'n I've ever knowed," says I to Hero, blowing hard.

  Hero was seldom what you'd call talkative. "It'll get a lot warmer soon."

  Then all of a sudden up come Cap-in-His-Eyes on a new horse-- a stranger to me. My goodness, you never seed sech a change in a man! I reckon I've given you a pretty good idea, Tom, haven't I, of jest how drab and kinda dingy Cap-in-His-Eyes looked in the usual way? He'd never 'peared to anybody in the Army as what you'd call a smart soldier. I can see him now--stiff, gaunt figure, real sharp way of looking at you; big, firm mouth, hardly ever smiled. Often there'd be something loose 'bout him somewhere--a bootstrap undone, maybe, or some buttons adrift--something Marse Robert would have corrected sure 'nuff if he'd seed it on someone else. But this morning, here he comes turned out almost smarter'n Jine-the-Cavalry hisself. He was wearing a new coat with bright buttons, gold braid all round his new black hat, creases in his pants, shining boots and a fine, new sword. And that horse, whoever he was--I wisht it had been Sorrel--he was all got up in tackle picked out in red and silver. You never seed sech a sight! As Cap-in-His-Eyes dismounted, all the officers, from Marse Robert downwards--well, they commenced to laughing; but all the same, they told him he looked jest fine. As for Cap-in-His-Eyes, he said that 'twarn't none o' his doing at all. It had all been fixed by Jine-the-Cavalry, he said. That explained everything, for as I've told you, Tom, Jine-the-Cavalry was always dressed up so fine hisself you'd think he was off to dinner at some big house.

  "You'll be afraid of getting them clothes dirty!" shouts Old Pete. "You'll never get down to any work today!" He waved his hand down the hill, towards the Blue men in the fog. "What you going to do with those people over there?" "Sir," answers Cap-in-His-Eyes, "we will give 'em the bayonet! " Cap-in-His-Eyes always loved talking 'bout bayonets.

  Soon after that Marse Robert rode all along the hills, together with Cap-in-His-Eyes, Vot-you-voz and Jine-the-Cavalry. Our fellas was in high spirits, and everywhere we went they was laughing, and cheering Cap-in-His-E
yes. "Come on, General--come on down out'n that hat! No use sayin you ain't in thar! See your legs a-hanging down!" I wonder how often I've heared that joke, one way or t'other?

  'Course, knowing Marse Robert, 'twarn't long 'fore we come under fire. He rode out a long ways beyond our downstream flank, and by that time the fog was jest starting in to lift. You could make out there was a lot of Blue men out there. I began to hear the bullets dropping, but this time I felt like I was a new horse. I jest didn't care. I could feel Marse Robert's hands still warn't right, and I thought, I'll show him! I'll show Skylark, too--him and his fancy ways! When a bullet hit a rock and went whizzing off to one side, it was Skylark who jumped-- only a fraction, but he did--and not me. I felt completely at one with Marse Robert, ready to do whatever he wanted before he even gave me a signal.

  We galloped back four mile to headquarters at Marse Robert's hill; the fellas was a-cheering us all the way. They knowed we was going to win and so did I. The fog was burning off now, and pretty soon the enemy's guns opened up--jest a few here and there. First you could see the spires sticking up out of the mist in the town and then the long line of the hills on t'other side of the river. Still we stood waiting around, and then suddenly there come a little wind and blowed away the last of the fog.

  Oh, my, Tom! You never seed sech a sight in all your born days! All 'long below us, down on the flatland 'tween the hills and the river, there was the Blue men--thousands and thousands of 'em--I've never seed an Army like it! It stretched from the town on one side, all 'long our side of the river as far as you could see--men, horses and guns. There come a kind of gasp from the fellas nearest to where we was, but Marse Robert, he never moved a muscle. I could feel him entirely still, where he was a-sitting on my back.

  Then the Blue men began to advance to the attack. It was Red Shirt's fellas they started in on, 'way over beyond me. From where we was, we could see 'em plain as day. Red Shirt let 'em come on, right up the slope, real close, and then all his guns fired on 'em together. I don't remember 'zackly what happened after that, 'cause jest at that moment the big guns back of our hill began firing, too. They shook the ground, Tom, I'll tell you--and like to cut a hole right through your head from one side to t'other! And on top of that come the battle-smoke. I pranced here and there a little--I couldn't help it--and as I recovered myself I seed a teamster and his mules go dashing off to the rear.

  The next thing I knowed there was masses of Blue men pouring out of the town and coming straight up the slope towards us. A little ways down below, on my nearside, was a lane with a stone wall running all 'long in front of it. That lane was full of our fellas, and they was taking 'vantage of that wall; yet that was 'zackly where the Blue men seemed to be fixing to get to. The slope was steepest there, too. I jest couldn't believe what I seed, but on they came.

  Our guns didn't fire till they was near'bouts up to the wall. Then they simply blowed 'em into screaming, yelling, running crowds. They warn't soldiers no more! That was a terrible sight, Tom, but better'n if it had been our own fellas.

  All day long the enemy kept attacking us where we stood tight on them hills. In the early afternoon they tried again, over where Cap-in-His-Eyes was. It looked bad for a while--we couldn't see 'zackly what was going on. It was jest 'bout that time that one of the enemy's shells buried itself in the ground right under the parapet where we was. I felt the thud when it hit, but it didn't explode. A minute or two later, when Marse Robert and Old Pete and some others was a-talking together, the big gun right next to us blowed up. It bust all to bits-- fragments a-flying every which way--and yet nobody was hurt. Nobody at all! You wouldn't believe it, would you?

  Well, Tom, if'n I was to try to tell you and Baxter everything that happened that day you'd fall asleep even quicker'n what you are doing. The Blue men kept on coming at us, but we kept on beating 'em back every time. Now and then I'd hear our fellas raising the Yell, and then I knowed we was on top. The ground on the hillside below us was covered all over with Blue men. I couldn't imagine how them that was left could still keep a-coming on, but they did.

  "Well, there's one good thing 'bout all this," mutters Joker to me, jest as he was fixing to set off on some errand Marse Robert had given to Major Talcott. "I don't feel so durned cold now, do you?"

  Actually, it warn't so much a matter of not feeling cold as of forgetting 'bout the cold. It stayed bitter cold all that day.

  I don't reckon more'n a handful of the Blue men ever got close 'nuff to that wall of ours to have been able to throw a rock over it, even. In places, the dead was laying in great heaps, so's you couldn't even see the snow. I began to feel sorry for 'em--yes, I did. 'Twarn't really fighting, Tom, it was jest killing. I never felt half the fear I'd felt that day when the Little General's poor Chieftain had his legs blowed off. Of all the battles we ever fought, that was the easiest won.

  It was dark--it had been dark for an hour or two--by the time the Blue men's last attack failed. Our gunners couldn't even see; I reckon they was jest shooting at the flashes from the enemy's muskets down the hill. At last all firing died away on both sides and it growed quiet, 'ceptin' for the crying of the wounded.

  Now I'll tell you, Tom, 'bout something real strange that happened that night, after all the guns and the yelling had stopped--something the likes of which I've never seed before nor since. It began with a sort of shining, right away on the horizon, and that jest growed and growed. It was like looking at the freezing cold all a-glowing in the night. And then that glow turned into great, separate beams rising up into the sky from far off. They was moving all the time, too--flashing bright, sort of twisting and then disappearing and coming back again. It was 'nuff to frighten you--and nary a sound with it at all. Our soldiers was pointing up at the sky and calling out to one another. Some of 'em was getting down on their knees, like they used to back in camp. But Marse Robert 'parently didn't like 'em doing that, not this time. Anyways, he didn't jine in.

  Him and me rode round a good ways, down to that there sunken road our fellas had defended, and back along the hills. We hadn't many dead at all. Everywhere we went the soldiers cheered him. The plain truth was we'd whupped the Blue men again, and bad this time.

  'Course, it wouldn't have been like Marse Robert not to make folks dig. All 'long the hills we'd been holding there was men digging all night--hard work in the frost. I guessed Marse Robert was expecting another attack next day, but he reckoned that if only we was dug in, we could stop anything. Our fellas had so much faith in Marse Robert, there warn't hardly no grumbling--'spite of everyone being wore out with the cold and the fighting all day.

  Next morning the air was clear, and jest a little warmer, though not much. Marse Robert rode 'long the hills again, 'bout three mile, and him and Cap-in-His-Eyes talked for a good long while. There was still huge numbers of Blue men camped down below us, but 'far as I could see they didn't want no fight. They was busy burying the dead and bringing in the wounded. And as it turned out nothing happened all that day--hardly a gun fired, even.

  That same night, soon as it got dark, a whole lot of our fellas went creeping out to get theirselves boots and warm clothes. You couldn't see a thing--the moon was clouded over--but you could hear 'em crawling and stumbling 'bout in the dark an' cussing up a storm. The dead Blue men warn't all that far away from us, you see--and every now and then there'd be screaming and crying from some poor fella as warn't dead, that felt his coat or his boots being pulled off'n him.

  Jest the same, all us horses was getting 'long easy 'nuff. The strain and tightness was far less--the stress had eased up considerable--and old Dave had somehow found a good feed both for me and Lucy. I had these two blankets, so I was as warm as any horse could expect to be that night.

  Next day, 'far as I could make out, there 'peared to be some sort of agreement 'tween our fellas and the Blue men to stop fighting while things was cleaned up. It sure was needed, too. Marse Robert and me, we went down the hill to where our men was working at burying the dead and
fetching in any wounded still left alive. In spite of the cold, I could smell that same nasty smell I'd gotten used to back in the summer. There was Blue men laying dead by the hundreds. Close up, they looked lots worse--all swollen up and puffy, lot of 'em turned black as niggers, with big, bulging eyes a-staring up at the sky. Yeah, and some with no heads, no legs, all tore to pieces, pools of blood frozen on the ground. You could see the holes where the bullets had gone in. I remembered what the President's horse had said to me before that battle I was in, back in the summer. "Killin' each other? That's what men do. You might as well ask why the sun goes crost the sky." Well, I thought, I guess I've come to take it for granted now. But I'm still durned if'n I can see why they do it. You wouldn't find horses or any other animals doing that to each other. I can't see no sense to it. All the same, my feeling mostly was 'bout Marse Robert and me, how we was still doing fine together--better'n any horse and man in the Army-- so I jest settled for thinking he likely knowed more 'bout it than what I did. Anyway, I thought, seeing as how you ain't got much choice, you might's well be content with a good master. Yet I still wished, somehow, that Jim and me could have got to that there War he'd told me we was going to when we started out.

  'Course, there was plenty of pulling off'n enemy boots and stripping off'n coats and breeches and everything. I seed piles of Blue men left naked on the ground, frozen stiff and all turned black. They didn't get much burying, neither. In that hard ground the fellas didn't want to dig no more'n they had to. I seed a power of dead men shoveled under in heaps, hardly covered at all, arms and legs left sticking out. Well, arms and legs turn that stiff, Tom, you see, they won't go under. Wherever there was a shed or an old barn, they throwed 'em inside, jest to get 'em out of the way.

  That night was warmer, and it began to rain. Next morning it was still raining, and the mist was so heavy that no one could make out what the Blue men was up to. But later on, when Marse Robert was out 'long the railroad talking to Red Shirt and Cap-in-His-Eyes, they told him that all the Blue men had snuck back acrost the river in the night. Marse Robert couldn't hardly believe it, but it turned out to be true. He was disappointed, I could tell. He'd been hoping to do 'em a lot more damage--kill a sight more, maybe even finish 'em off for good this time. He was kinda disheartened all day. But me, Tom, I'll tell you, I was jest tickled we hadn't got to do no more fighting for a while. Not till next time, I thought, and that's good 'nuff for me. So you see, I was beginning to turn into some sort of a soldier, after all. That's how us soldiers reckon things: day to day, and a day alive's a good 'un.