CHAPTER 27.
AT THE HOSPITAL OF MORGAN'S MEN
In May, Grant simply said--Forward! The day he crossed the Rapidan, hesaid it to Sherman down in Georgia. After the battle of the Wildernesshe said it again, and the last brutal resort of hammering down thenorthern buttress and sea-wall of the rebellion--old Virginia--andAtlanta, the keystone of the Confederate arch, was well under way.Throughout those bloody days Chad was with Grant and Harry Dean waswith Sherman on his terrible trisecting march to the sea. For, afterthe fight between Rebels and Yankees and Daws Dillon's guerilla band,over in Kentucky, Dan, coming back from another raid into theBluegrass, had found his brother gone. Harry had refused to accept aparole and had escaped. Not a man, Dan was told, fired a shot at him,as he ran. One soldier raised his musket, but Renfrew the Silent struckthe muzzle upward.
In September, Atlanta fell and, in that same month, Dan saw his greatleader, John Morgan, dead in Tennessee. In December, the Confederacytoppled at the west under Thomas's blows at Nashville. In the spring of'65, one hundred and thirty-five thousand wretched, broken-down rebels,from Richmond to the Rio Grande, confronted Grant's million men, and inApril, Five Forks was the beginning of the final end everywhere.
At midnight, Captain Daniel Dean, bearer of dispatches to the greatConfederate General in Virginia, rode out of abandoned Richmond withthe cavalry of young Fitzhugh Lee. They had threaded their way amidtroops, trains, and artillery across the bridge. The city was on fire.By its light, the stream of humanity was pouring out of town--Davis andhis cabinet, citizens, soldiers, down to the mechanics in the armoriesand workshops. The chief concern with all was the same, a little to eatfor a few days; for, with the morning, the enemy would come andConfederate money would be as mist. Afar off the little fleet ofConfederate gunboats blazed and the thundering explosions of theirmagazines split the clear air. Freight depots with supplies wereburning. Plunderers were spreading the fires and slipping like ghoulsthrough red light and black shadows. At daybreak the last retreatinggun rumbled past and, at sunrise, Dan looked back from the hills on thesmoking and deserted city and Grant's blue lines sweeping into it.
Once only he saw his great chief--the next morning before day, when herode through the chill mist and darkness to find the head-quarters ofthe commanding General--two little fires of rubbish and twoambulances--with Lee lying on a blanket under the open sky. He rose, asDan drew near, and the firelight fell full on his bronzed and mournfulface. He looked so sad and so noble that the boy's heart was wrenched,and as Dan turned away, he said, brokenly:
"General, I am General Dean's son, and I want to thank you--" He couldget no farther. Lee laid one hand on his shoulder.
"Be as good a man as your father was, my boy," he said, and Dan rodeback the pitiable way through the rear of that noble army ofVirginia--through ranks of tattered, worn, hungry soldiers, among thebroken debris of wagons and abandoned guns, past skeleton horses andskeleton men.
All hope was gone, but Fitz Lee led his cavalry through the Yankeelines and escaped. In that flight Daniel Dean got his only wound in thewar--a bullet through the shoulder. When the surrender came, Fitz Leegave up, too, and led back his command to get Grant's generous terms.But all his men did not go with him, and among the cavalrymen who wenton toward southwestern Virginia was Dan--making his way back to RichardHunt--for now that gallant Morgan was dead, Hunt was general of the oldcommand.
Behind, at Appomattox, Chad was with Grant. He saw the surrender--sawLee look toward his army, when he came down the steps after he hadgiven up, saw him strike his hands together three times and rideTraveller away through the profound and silent respect of his enemiesand the tearful worship of his own men. And Chad got permissionstraightway to go back to Ohio, and he mustered out with his oldregiment, and he, too, started back through Virginia.
Meanwhile, Dan was drawing near the mountains. He was worn out when hereached Abingdon. The wound in his shoulder was festering and he was ina high fever. At the camp of Morgan's Men he found only a hospitalleft--for General Hunt had gone southward--and a hospital was what hemost needed now. As he lay, unconscious with fever, next day, a giantfigure, lying near, turned his head and stared at the boy. It was RebelJerry Dillon, helpless from a sabre cut and frightfully scarred by thefearful wounds his brother, Yankee Jake, had given him. And thus,Chadwick Buford, making for the Ohio, saw the two strange messmates, afew days later, when he rode into the deserted rebel camp.
All was over. Red Mars had passed beyond the horizon and the white Starof Peace already shone faintly on the ravaged South. The shatteredremnants of Morgan's cavalry, pall-bearers of the Lost Cause--had goneSouth--bare-footed and in rags--to guard Jefferson Davis to safety, andChad's heart was wrung when he stepped into the little hospital theyhad left behind--a space cleared into a thicket of rhododendron. Therewas not a tent--there was little medicine--little food. The drizzlingrain dropped on the group of ragged sick men from the branches abovethem. Nearly all were youthful, and the youngest was a mere boy, wholay delirious with his head on the root of a tree. As Chad stoodlooking, the boy opened his eyes and his mouth twitched with pain.
"Hello, you damned Yankee." Again his mouth twitched and again the olddare-devil light that Chad knew so well kindled in his hazy eyes.
"I said," he repeated, distinctly, "Hello, you damned Yank. DAMNED YankI said." Chad beckoned to two men.
"Go bring a stretcher."
The men shook their heads with a grim smile--they had no stretcher.
The boy talked dreamily.
"Say, Yank, didn't we give you hell in--oh, well, in lots o' places.But you've got me." The two soldiers were lifting him in their arms."Goin' to take me to prison? Goin' to take me out to shoot me, Yank?You ARE a damned Yank." A hoarse growl rose behind them and the giantlifted himself on one elbow, swaying his head from side to side.
"Let that boy alone!" Dan nodded back at him confidently.
"That's all right, Jerry. This Yank's a friend of mine." His browwrinkled. "At any rate he looks like somebody I know. He's goin' togive me something to eat and get me well--like hell," he added tohimself--passing off into unconsciousness again. Chad had the ladcarried to his own tent, had him stripped, bathed, and bandaged andstood looking down at him. It was hard to believe that the broken, agedyouth was the red-cheeked, vigorous lad whom he had known as DanielDean. He was ragged, starved, all but bare-footed, wounded, sick, andyet he was as undaunted, as defiant, as when he charged with Morgan'sdare-devils at the beginning of the war. Then Chad went back to thehospital--for a blanket and some medicine.
"They are friends," he said to the Confederate surgeon, pointing at ahuge gaunt figure.
"I reckon that big fellow has saved that boy's life a dozen times. Yes,they're mess-mates."
And Chad stood looking down at Jerry Dillon, one of the gianttwins--whose name was a terror throughout the mountains of the middlesouth. Then he turned and the surgeon followed.
There was a rustle of branches on one side when they were gone, and atthe sound the wounded man lifted his head. The branches parted and theoxlike face of Yankee Jake peered through. For a full minute, the twobrothers stared at each other.
"I reckon you got me, Jake," said Jerry.
"I been lookin' fer ye a long while," said Jake, simply, and he smiledstrangely as he moved slowly forward and looked down at his enemy--hisheavy head wagging from side to side. Jerry was fumbling at his belt.The big knife flashed, but Jake's hand was as quick as its gleam, andhe had the wrist that held it. His great fingers crushed together, theblade dropped on the ground, and again the big twins looked at eachother. Slowly, Yankee Jake picked up the knife. The other moved not amuscle and in his fierce eyes was no plea for mercy. The point of theblade moved slowly down--down over the rebel's heart, and was thrustinto its sheath again. Then Jake let go the wrist.
"Don't tech it agin," he said, and he strode away. The big fellow layblinking. He did not open his lips when, in a moment, Yankee Jakeslouched in with a canteen of water.
When Chad came back, one giant wasdrawing on the other a pair of socks. The other was still silent andhad his face turned the other way. Looking up, Jake met Chad'ssurprised gaze with a grin.
A day later, Dan came to his senses. A tent was above him, a heavyblanket was beneath him and there were clothes on his body that feltstrangely fresh and clean. He looked up to see Chad's face between theflaps of the tent.
"D'you do this?"
"That's all right," said Chad. "This war is over." And he went away tolet Dan think it out. When he came again, Dan held out his handsilently.