CHAPTER XXVI
THE BRIDGE AT PORT REPUBLIC
The seventh of June was passed by the Army of the Valley in a quiet thatseemed unnatural. For fifteen days, north from Front Royal to Harper'sFerry, south from Harper's Ferry to Port Republic, cannon had thundered,musketry rattled. Battle here and battle there, and endless skirmishing!"One male and three foights a day," said Wheat's Irishmen. But thisSaturday there was no fighting. The cavalry watched both flanks of theMassanuttons. The main army rested in the rich woods that covered thehills above the North Fork of the Shenandoah. Headquarters were in thevillage across the river, spanned by a covered bridge. Three miles tothe northwest Ewell's division was strongly posted near the hamlet ofCross Keys. From the great south peak of the Massanuttons a signal partylooked down upon Fremont's road from Harrisonburg, and upon the road bywhich Shields must emerge from the Luray Valley. The signal officer,looking through his glass, saw also a road that ran from Port Republicby Brown's Gap over the Blue Ridge into Albemarle, and along this roadmoved a cortege--soldiers with the body of Ashby. The dead general'smother was in Winchester. They would have taken him there, but couldnot, for Fremont's army was between. So, as seemed next most fit, theycarried him across the mountains into Albemarle, to the University ofVirginia. Up on Massanutton the signal officer's hand shook. He loweredhis glass and cleared his throat: "War's a short word to say all itsays--"
Fremont rested at Harrisonburg after yesterday's repulse. On the otherside of Massanutton was Shields, moving south from Luray under theremarkable impression that Jackson was at Rude's Hill and Fremonteffectively dealing with the "demoralized rebels." On the sixth he beganto concentrate his troops near where had been Columbia Bridge. On theseventh he issued instructions to his advance guard.
_"The enemy passed New Market on the 5th. Benker's Division in pursuit.The enemy has flung away everything, and their stragglers fill themountains. They need only a movement on the flank to panic-strike them,and break them into fragments. No man has had such a chance since thewar commenced. You are within thirty miles of a broken, retreatingenemy, who still hangs together. Ten thousand Germans are on his rear,who hang on like bull dogs. You have only to throw yourself down onWaynesborough before him, and your cavalry will capture thousands, seizehis train and abundant supplies."_
In chase of this so beautiful a chance Shields set forth down theeastern side of Massanutton, with intent to round the mountain at PortRepublic, turn north again, and somewhere on the Valley pike make thatwill-o'-the-wisp junction with Fremont and stamp out rebellion. But oflate it had rained much, and the roads were muddy and the streamsswollen. His army was split into sections; here a brigade and there abrigade, the advance south of Conrad's Store, the rear yet at Luray. Hehad, however, the advantage of moving through leagues of forest, heavy,shaggy, dense. It was not easy to observe the details of his operations.
Sunday morning dawned. A pearly mist wrapped the North Fork and theSouth Fork of the Shenandoah, and clung to the shingle roofs and bowerytrees of the village between. The South Fork was shallow and could beforded. The North Fork was deep and strong and crossed by a coveredbridge. Toward the bridge now, winding down from the near-by height onwhich the brigade had camped, came a detail from the 65th--twenty menled by Sergeant Mathew Coffin. They were chiefly Company A men, and theywere going to relieve the pickets along the South Fork. Thanks to Mr.Commissary Banks, they had breakfasted well. The men were happy, nothilariously so, but in a placid, equable fashion. As they came down,over the wet grass, from the bluff, they talked. "Mist over theShenandoah's just like mist over the James"--"No, 'tisn't! Nothing'slike mist over the James."--"Well, the bridge's like the bridge at home,anyway!"--"'Tisn't much like it. Hasn't got sidewalks inside."--"Yes, ithas!"--"No, it hasn't!"--"I know better, I've been through it."--"I'vebeen through it twice't--was through it after Elk Run, a monthago!"--"Well, it hasn't got sidewalks, anyway,"--"I tell you ithas."--"You 're mistaken!"--"I'm not."--"You never did see straightnohow!"--"If I was at home I'd thrash you!"
Mathew Coffin turned his head. "Who's that jowering back there? Stop it!Sunday morning and all!"
He went on, holding his head straight, a trig, slender figure, breathingirritation. His oval face with its little black moustache was set ashard as its boyish curves permitted, and his handsome dark eyes had twoparallel lines above them. He marched as he marched always nowadays,with a mien aggrieved and haughty. He never lost the consciousness thathe was wearing chevrons who had worn bars, and he was quite convincedthat the men continually compared his two states.
The progress down hill to the bridge was short. Before the party thelong, tunnel-like, weather-beaten structure loomed through the mist. Themen entered and found it dusk and warm, smelling of horses, the river,fifteen feet below, showing through the cracks between the heavy logs ofthe floor. The marching feet sounded hollowly, voices reverberated."Just like our bridge--told you 'twas--Ain't it like, Billy Maydew?"
"It air," said Billy. "I air certainly glad that we air a-crossing on abridge. The Shenandoah air a prop-o-si-tion to swim."
"How did you feel, Billy, when you got away?"
"At first, just like school was out," said Billy. "But when a wholepicket post started after me, 'n' I run fer it, 'n' the trees put outarms to stop me, 'n' the dewberry, crawling on the ground, said toitself, 'Hello! Let's make a trap'; 'n' when the rail fences allhollered out, 'We're goin' to turn agin you!' 'n' when a bit of swamphollered louder than any, 'Let's suck down Billy Maydew--suck down BillyMaydew!' 'n' when a lot o' bamboo vines running over cedars, up with'Hold him fast until you hear a bullet whizzing!' 'n' I got to theShenandoah and there wa'n't no bridge, 'n' the Shenandoah says 'I'd justas soon drown men as look at them!'--when all them things talked so, Iknew just how the critturs feel in the woods; 'n' I ain't so crazy abouthunting as I was--and I say again this here air a most con-ve-ni-entbridge."
With his musket butt he struck the boarded side. The noise was soresoundingly greater than he had expected that he laughed and the menwith him. Now Sergeant Mathew Coffin was as nervous as a witch. He hadbeen marching along with his thoughts moodily hovering over the batteryhe would take almost single-handed, or the ambush he would dislodge andso procure promotion indeed. At the noise of the stick he startedviolently. "Who did that? Oh, I see, and I might have known it! I'llreport you for extra duty--"
"Report ahead," said Billy, under his breath.
Coffin halted. "What was that you said, Maydew?"
"I didn't speak to you--sir."
"Well, you'll speak to me now. What was it you said then?" He camenearer, his arm thrown up, though but in an angry gesture. "If I struckyou," thought Billy, "I'd be sorry for it, so I won't do it. But onething's sure--I certainly should like to!"
"If you don't answer me," said Coffin thickly, "I'll report you fordisobedience as well as for disorderly conduct! What was it you saidthen?"
"I said, 'Report ahead--and be damned to you!'"
Coffin's lips shut hard. "Very good! We'll see how three days ofguardhouse tastes to you!--Forward!"
The party cleared the bridge and almost immediately found itself in thestraggling village street. The mist clung here as elsewhere, houses andtrees dim shapes, the surrounding hills and the dense woods beyond theSouth Fork hardly seen at all. Coffin marched with flushed face and hisbrows drawn together. He was mentally writing a letter on pale bluepaper, and in it he was enlarging upon ingratitude. The men sympathizedwith Billy and their feet sounded resentfully upon the stones. Billyalone marched with elaborate lightness, quite as though he were walkingon air and loved the very thought of the guardhouse.
Headquarters was an old corner house that had flung open its doors toGeneral Jackson with an almost tremulous eagerness. A flag waved beforethe door, and there was a knot beneath of couriers and orderlies, withstaff officers coming and going. Opposite was a store, closed of courseupon Sunday, but boasting a deep porch with benches, to say nothing ofconvenient kegs and boxes. Here the village youth
and age alike foundbusiness to detain them. The grey-headed exchanged remarks. "Sleep? No,I couldn't sleep! Might as well see what's to be seen! I ain't got longto see anything, and so I told Susan. When's he coming out?--Once't whenI was a little shaver like Bob, sitting on the scales there, I went withmy father in the stage-coach to Fredericksburg, I remember just aswell--and I was sitting before the tavern on a man's knee,--old man'twas, for he said he had fought the Indians,--and somebody came ridingdown the street, with two or three others. I jus' remember a blue coatand a cocked hat and that his hair was powdered--and the man put me downand got up, and everybody else before the tavern got up--and somebodyholloaed out 'Hurrah for General Washington--'"
There was a stir about the opposite door. An aide came out, mounted androde off toward the bridge. An orderly brought a horse from theneighbouring stable. "That's his! That's General Jackson's!--Don't looklike the war horse in Job, does he now?--Looks like a doctor'shorse--Little Sorrel's his name." The small boy surged forward. "He'scoming out!"--"How do you know him?"--"G' way! You always know generalswhen you see them! Great, big men, all trimmed up with gold. Besides, Isaw him last night."--"You didn't!"--"Yes, I did! Saw his shadow on thecurtain."--"How did you know 'twas his?"--"My mother said, 'Look, John,and don't never forget. That's Stonewall Jackson.' And it was a bigshadow walking up and down, and it raised its hand--"
The church bell rang. A chaplain came out of the house. He had a Biblein his hand, and he beamed on all around. "There's the first bell,gentlemen--the bell, children! Church in a church, just like before wewent to fighting! Trust you'll all come, gentlemen, and you, too, boys!The general hopes you'll all come."
Within headquarters, in a large bare room, Jackson was having hiscustomary morning half-hour with his heads of departments--an invariablyrecurring period in his quiet and ordered existence. It was omitted onlywhen he fought in the morning. He sat as usual, bolt upright, large feetsquarely planted, large hands stiff at sides. On the table before himwere his sabre and Bible. Before him stood a group of officers. Theadjutant, Colonel Paxton, finished his report. The general nodded."Good! good! Well, Major Harman?"
The chief quartermaster saluted. "The trains, sir, had a good night.There are clover fields on either side of the Staunton road and thehorses are eating their fill. A few have sore hoof and may have to beleft behind. I had the ordnance moved as you ordered, nearer the river.An orderly came back last night from the convoy on the way to Staunton.Sick and wounded standing it well. Prisoners slow marchers, butmarching. I sent this morning a string of wagons to Cross Keys, toGeneral Ewell. We had a stampede last night among the negro teamsters.They were sitting in a ring around the fire, and an owl hooted or a batflitted. They had been telling stories of ha'nts, and they swore theysaw General Ashby galloping by on the white stallion."
"Poor, simple, ignorant creatures!" said Jackson. "There is no witch ofEndor can raise that horse and rider!--Major Hawks!"
The chief commissary came forward. "General Banks's stores are holdingout well, sir. We are issuing special rations to the men to-day--Sundaydinner--fresh beef, rice and beans, canned fruits, coffee, sugar--"
"Good! good! They deserve the best.--Colonel Crutchfield--"
"I have posted Wooding's battery as you ordered, sir, on the brow of thehill commanding the bridge. There's a gun of Courtney's disabled. I havethought he might have the Parrott we captured day before yesterday.Ammunition has been issued as ordered. Caissons all filled."
"Good!--Captain Boswell--Ah, Mr. Hotchkiss."
"Captain Boswell is examining the South Fork, sir, with a view tofinding the best place for the foot bridge you ordered constructed. Ihave here the map you ordered me to draw."
"Good! Put it here on the table.--Now, Doctor McGuire."
"Very few reported sick this morning, sir. The good women of the villageare caring for those. Three cases of fever, two of pneumonia, somedysentery, measles among the recruits. The medicines we got atWinchester are invaluable; they and the better fare the men are getting.Best of all is the consciousness of victory,--the confidence andexaltation that all feel."
"Yes, doctor. God's shield is over us.--Captain Wilbourne--"
"I brought the signal party in from Peaked Mountain last night, sir. AYankee cavalry company threatened to cut us off. Had we stayed we shouldhave been captured. I trust, sir, that I acted rightly?"
"You acted rightly. You saw nothing of General Shields?"
"Nothing, sir. It is true that the woods for miles are extremely thick.It would perhaps be possible for a small force to move unseen. But wemade out nothing."
Jackson rose and drew closer the sabre and the Bible. "That is all,gentlemen. After religious services you will return to your respectiveduties."
The sun was now above the mountain tops, the mist beginning to lift. Itlay heavily, however, over the deep woods and the bottom lands of theSouth Fork, through which ran the Luray road, and on the South Forkitself.--Clatter, clatter! Shots and cries! Shouting the alarm as theycame, splashing through the ford, stopping on the hither bank for onescattering volley back into the woolly veil, came Confederate infantrypickets and vedettes. "Yankee cavalry! Look out! Look out! Yankees!" Inthe mist the foremost man ran against the detail from the 65th. Coffinseized him. "Where? where?" The other gasped. "Coming! Drove us in!Whole lot of them! Got two guns. All of Shields, I reckon, rightbehind!" He broke away, tearing with his fellows into the village.
Sergeant Coffin and his men stared into the mist. They heard a greatsplashing, a jingling and shouting, and in another instant were aware ofsomething looming like a herd of elephants. From the village behind themburst the braying of their own bugles--headquarters summoning, baggagetrain on the Staunton road summoning. The sound was shrill, insistent.The shapes in the mist grew larger. There came a flash of rifles, paleyellow through the drift as of lawn. Zzzzzz! Zzzzzz! sang the balls. Thetwenty men of the 65th proceeded to save themselves. Some of them toredown a side street, straight before the looming onrush. Others leapedfences and brushed through gardens, rich and dank. Others found housedoors suddenly and quietly opening before them, houses with capaciousdark garrets and cellars. All the dim horde, more and more of it, camesplashing through the ford. A brazen rumbling arose, announcing guns.The foremost of the horde, blurred of outline, preternaturally large,huzzaing and firing, charged into the streets of Port Republic.
In a twinkling the village passed from her Sunday atmosphere to one of ahighly work-a-day Monday. The blue cavalry began to harry the place. Thetownspeople hurried home, trumpets blared, shots rang out, oaths, shoutsof warning! Men in grey belonging with the wagon train ran headlongtoward their posts, others made for headquarters where the flag was andStonewall Jackson. A number, headed off, were captured at once. Others,indoors when the alarm arose, were hidden by the women. Three staffofficers had walked, after leaving Jackson's council, toward a householding pretty daughters whom they meant to take to church. When theclangour broke out they had their first stupefied moment, after whichthey turned and ran with all their might toward headquarters. There wasfighting up and down the street. Half a dozen huzzaing and sabringtroopers saw the three and shouted to others nearer yet. "Officers! Cutthem off, you there!" The three were taken. A captain, astride of agreat reeking horse, towered above them. "Staff? You're staff? IsJackson in the town?--and where? Quick now! Eh--what!"
"That's a lovely horse. Looks exactly, I imagine, like Rozinante--"
"On the whole I should say that McClellan might be finding Richmond likethose mirages travellers tell about. The nearer he gets to it thefurther it is away."
"It has occurred to me that if after the evacuation of CorinthBeauregard should come back to Virginia--"
The captain in blue, hot and breathless, bewildered by the very successof the dash into town, kept saying, "Where is Jackson? What? Quickthere, you! Where--" Behind him a corporal spoke out cavalierly. "Theyaren't going to tell you, sir. There's a large house down there that'sgot something like a flag before it--I
think, too, that we ought to gotake the bridge."
The streams of blue troopers flowed toward the principal street andunited there. Some one saw the flag more plainly. "That's aheadquarters!--What if Jackson were there? Good Lord! what if we tookJackson?" A bugler blew a vehement rally. "_All of you, come on! All ofyou, come on!_" The stream increased in volume, began to move, a compactbody, down the street. "There are horses before that door! Look at thatnag! That's Jackson's horse!--No."--"Yes! Saw it at Kernstown! Forward!"
Stonewall Jackson came out of the house with the flag before it. Behindhim were those of his staff who had not left headquarters when theinvasion occurred, while, holding the horses before the door, waited,white-lipped, a knot of most anxious orderlies. One brought LittleSorrel. Jackson mounted with his usual slow deliberation, then, turningin the saddle, looked back to the shouting blue horsemen. They saw himand dug spurs into flanks. First he pulled the forage cap over his eyesand then he jerked his hand into the air. These gestures executed hetouched Little Sorrel with the rowel and, his suite behind him, startedoff down the street toward the bridge over the Shenandoah. One would nothave said that he went like a swift arrow. There was, indeed, an effectof slowness, of a man traversing, in deep thought, a solitary plain. Butfor all that, he went so fast that the space between him and the enemydid not decrease. They came thunderingly on, a whole Federal charge--buthe kept ahead. Seeing that he did so, they began to discharge carbineand pistol, some aiming at Little Sorrel, some at the grey figure ridingstiffly, bolt upright and elbows out. Little Sorrel shook his head,snorted, and went on. Ahead loomed the bridge, a dusky, warm, gold-shottunnel below an arch of weather-beaten wood. Under it rolled with aheavy sound the Shenandoah. Across the river, upon the green hilltops,had arisen a commotion. All the drums were beating the long roll.Stonewall Jackson and Little Sorrel came on the trodden rise of earthleading to the bridge mouth. The blue cavalry shouted and spurred. Theircarbines cracked. The balls pockmarked the wooden arch. Jackson draggedthe forage cap lower and disappeared within the bridge. The four or fivewith him turned and drew across the gaping mouth.
The blue cavalry came on, firing as they came. Staff and orderlies, thegrey answered with pistols. Behind, in the bridge, sounded the hollowthunder of Little Sorrel's hoofs. The sound grew fainter. Horse andrider were nearly across. Staff and orderlies fired once again, then,just as the blue were upon them, turned, dug spur, shouted, anddisappeared beneath the arch.
The Federal cavalry, massed before the bridge and in the field to eitherside, swore and swore, "He's out!--Jackson's out! There he goes--up theroad! Fire!--Damn it all, what's the use? He's charmed. We almost gothim! Good Lord! We'd all have been major-generals!"
A patrol galloped up. "They've got a great wagon train, sir, at theother end of the village--ordnance reserve, supply, everything! It is inmotion. It's trying to get off by the Staunton road."
The cavalry divided. A strong body stayed by the bridge, while one aslarge turned and galloped away. Those staying chafed with impatience."Why don't the infantry come up--damned creeping snails!"--"Yes, wecould cross, but when we got to the other side, what then?--No, don'tdare to burn the bridge--don't know what the general wouldsay."--"Listen to those drums over there! If Stonewall Jackson bringsall those hornets down on us!"--"If we had a gun--Speak of theangels!--Unlimber right here, lieutenant!--Got plenty of canister? Nowif the damned infantry would only come on! Thought it was just behind uswhen we crossed the ford--What's that off there?"
"That" was a sharp sputter of musketry. "Firing! Who are they firing at?There aren't any rebels--we took them all prisoners--"
"There's fighting, anyway--wagon escort, maybe. The devil! Look acrossthe river! Look! All the hornets are coming down--"
Of the detail from the 65th Coffin and two others stood their grounduntil the foremost of the herd was crossing the ford near at hand,large, threatening, trumpeting. Then the three ran like hares, heartspounding at their sides, the ocean roaring in their ears, and in everycell in their bodies an accurate impression that they had been seen, andthat the trumpeting herd meant to run down, kill or capture every greysoldier in Port Republic! Underfoot was wet knot grass, difficult andslippery; around was the shrouding mist. They thought the lane ranthrough to another street, but it proved a cul-de-sac. Something rosemistily before them; it turned out to be a cowshed. They flungthemselves against the door, but the door was padlocked. Behind theshed, between it and a stout board fence, sprang a great clump of wetelder, tall and rank, with spreading leaves; underneath, black, miryearth. Into this they crowded, squatted on the earth, turned face towardthe passage up which they had come, and brought their rifles to thefront. A hundred yards away the main herd went by, gigantic in the mist.The three in the elder breathed deep. "All gone. Gone!--No. There's asquad coming up here."
The three kneeling in the mire, watching through triangular spacesbetween the branchy leaves, grew suddenly, amazingly calm. What was thesense in being frightened? You couldn't get away. Was there anywhere togo to one might feel agitation enough, but there wasn't! Coffin handledhis rifle with the deliberation of a woman smoothing her long hair. Theman next him--Jim Watts--even while he settled forward on his knees andraised his musket, turned his head aside and spat. "Derned old fogalways gits in my throat!" A branch of elder was cutting Billy Maydew'sline of vision. He broke it off with noiseless care and raised to hisshoulder the Enfield rifle which he had acquired at Winchester. Thereloomed, at thirty feet away, colossal beasts bestridden by giants.
Suddenly the mist thinned, lifted. The demon steeds and riders resolvedthemselves into six formidable looking Federal troopers. From the mainstreet rang the Federal bugles, vehemently rallying, imperative.Shouting, too, broke out, savage, triumphant, pointed with pistolshots. The bugle called again, _Rally to the colours! Rally!_
"I calculate," said one of the six blue horsemen, "that the boys havefound Stonewall."
"Then they'll need us all!" swore the trooper leading. "If anybody's inthe cow-house they can wait."--_Right about face! Forward! Trot!_
The men within the elder settled down on the wet black earth. "Might aswell stay here, I suppose," said Coffin. Jim Watts began to shiver."It's awful damp and cold. I've got an awful pain in the pit of mystomach." He rolled over and lay groaning. "Can't I go, sir?" askedBilly. "I kind of feel more natural in the open."
Now Mathew Coffin had just been thinking that while this elder bushspringing from muddy earth, with a manure heap near, was damneduncomfortable, it was better than being outside while those devils wereslashing and shooting. Perhaps they would ride away, or the army mightcome over the bridge, and there would be final salvation. He had evenadded a line to the letter he was writing, "An elder bush afforded mesome slight cover from which to fire--" And now Billy Maydew wanted togo outside and be taken prisoner! Immediately he became angry again."You're no fonder of the open than I am!" he said, and his upper liptwitched one side away from his white teeth.
Billy, his legs already out of the bush, looked at him with large, calmgrey eyes. "Kin I go?"
"Go where? You'll get killed."
"You wouldn't grieve if I did, would you? I kinder thought I might getby a back street to the wagons. A cousin of mine's a wagon master and heain't going ter give up easy. I kinder thought I might help--"
"I'm just waiting," said Coffin, "until Jim here gets over his spasm.Then I'll give the word."
Jim groaned. "I feel sicker'n a yaller dog after a fight--'n' you know Ididn't mind 'em at all when they were really here! You two go on, 'n'I'll come after awhile."
Coffin and Billy found the back street. It lay clear, warm, sunny,empty. "They're all down at the bridge," said Billy. "Bang! bang! bang!"They came to a house, blinds all closed, shrinking behind its trees.Houses, like everything else, had personality in this war. A townoccupied changed its mien according to the colour of the uniform inpossession. As the two hurrying grey figures approached, a woman,starting from the window beside which she had been kneeling, w
atchingthrough a crevice, ran out of the house and through the yard to thegate. "You two men, come right in here! Don't you know the Yankees arein town?"
She was young and pretty. Coffin swept off his cap. "That's the reasonwe're trying to get to the edge of town--to help the men with the wagontrain."
Her eyes grew luminous. "How brave you are! Go, and God bless you!"
The two ran on. Mathew Coffin added another line to his letter: "A ladybesought me to enter her house, saying that I would surely be killed,and that she could conceal me until the enemy was gone. But I--"
They were nearly out of town--they could see the long train hurriedlymoving on the Staunton road. There was a sudden burst of musketry. Avoice reached them from the street below. "Halt, you two Confeds runningthere! Come on over here! Rally to the colours!" There was a flash ofthe stars and bars, waved vigorously. "Oh, ha, ha!" cried Billy, "tharwas some of us wasn't taken! Aren't you glad we didn't stay behind thecowshed?"
It came into Coffin's head that Billy might tell that his sergeant hadwished to stay behind the cowshed. The blood rushed to his face; he sawthe difficulty of impressing men who knew about the cowshed with hisabilities in the way of storming batteries single-handed. He had reallya very considerable share of physical courage, and naturally he esteemedit something larger than it was. He began to burn with the injustice ofBilly Maydew's thinking him backward in daring and so reporting himaround camp-fires. As he ran he grew angrier and angrier, and not farfrom the shaken flag, in a little grassy hollow which hid them fromview, he called upon the other to halt. Billy's sense of disciplinebrought him to a stop, but did not keep him from saying, "What for?"They were only two soldiers, out of the presence of others and in apretty tight place together--Mathew Coffin but three years older thanhe, and no great shakes anyhow. "What for?" asked Billy.
"I just want to say to you," said Coffin thickly, "that as to thatshed, it was my duty to protect my men; just as it is my duty as anofficer to report you for disobedience and bad language addressed to anofficer--"
Billy's brow clouded. "I had forgotten all about that. I was going alongvery nicely with you. You were really behaving yourself--like a--like agentleman. The cow-house was all right. You are brave enough when itcomes to fighting. And now you're bringing it all up again--"
"'_Gentleman._'--Who are you to judge of a gentleman?"
Billy looked at him calmly. "I air one of them.--I air a-judging fromthat-a stand."
"You are going to the guardhouse for disobedience and bad language andimpertinence."
"It would be right hard," said Billy, "if I had to leavesu-pe-ri-or-i-ty outside with my musket. But I don't."
Coffin, red in the face, made at him. The Thunder Run man, supple as amoccasin, swerved aside. "Air you finished speaking, sergeant? Fer ifyou have, 'n' if you don't mind, I think I'll run along--I air onlyfighting Yankees this mornin'!"
An aide of Jackson's, cut off from headquarters and taking shelter inthe upper part of the town, crept presently out of hiding, and findingthe invaders' eyes turned toward the bridge, proceeded with dispatch andquietness to gather others from dark havens. When he had a score or morehe proceeded to bolder operations. In the field and on the Staunton roadall was commotion; wagons with their teams moving in double column upthe road, negro teamsters clamouring with ashen looks, "Dose damn Yanks!Knowed we didn't see dat ghos' fer nothin' las' night!" Wagon mastersshouted, guards and sentries looked townward with anxious eyes. The aidegot a flag from the quartermaster's tent; found moreover a very fewartillery reserves and an old cranky howitzer. With all of these hereturned to the head of the main street, and about the moment thecavalry at the bridge divided, succeeded in getting his forces admirablyplaced in a strong defensive position: Coffin and Billy Maydew joinedjust as an outpost brought a statement that about two hundred Yankeecavalry were coming up the street.
The two guns, Federal Parrott, Confederate howitzer, belching smoke,made in twenty minutes the head of the street all murk. In the firstcharge Coffin received a sabre cut over the head. The blood blinded himat first, and when he had wiped it away, and tied a beautiful newhandkerchief from a Broadway shop about the wound, he found it stillaffected sight and hearing. He understood that their first musketry firehad driven the cavalry back, indeed he saw two or three riderless horsesgalloping away. He understood also that the Yankees had brought up agun, and that the captain was answering with the superannuated howitzer.He was sure, too, that he himself was firing his musket with greatprecision. _Fire!--load, fire!--load, fire! One, two,--one, two!_ buthis head, he was equally sure, was growing larger. It was now largerthan the globe pictured on the first page of the geography he hadstudied at school. It was the globe, and he was Atlas holding it._Fire--load, fire--load!_ Now the head was everything, and all life waswithin it. There was a handsome young man named Coffin, very brave, butmisunderstood by all save one. He was brave and handsome. He could takea tower by himself--_Fire, load--Fire, load--One, two._ The enemy knewhis fame. They said, "Coffin! Which is Coffin?"--_Fire, load, one, two._The grey armies knew this young hero. They cheered when he went by. Theycheered--they cheered--when he went by to take the tower. They wrotehome and lovely women envied the loveliest woman. "Coffin! Coffin!Coffin's going to take the tower! Watch him! _Yaaaaih! Yaaaih!_"--Hestruck the tower and looked to see it go down. Instead, with a roar, itsprang, triple brass, height on height to the skies. The stars fell, andsuddenly, in the darkness, an ocean appeared and went over him. He laybeneath the overturned Federal gun, and the grey rush that had silencedthe gunners and taken the piece went on.
For a long time he lay in a night without a star, then day began tobreak. It broke curiously, palely light for an instant, then obscured bythick clouds, then faint light again. Some part of his brain began tothink. His head was not now the world; the world was lying on hisshoulder and arm, crushing it. With one piece of his brain he began toappeal to people; with another piece to answer the first. "Mother, takethis thing away! Mother, take this thing away! She's dead. She can't,however much she wants to. Father! He's dead, too. Rob, Carter--Jack!Grown up and moved away. Judge Allen, sir!--Mr. Boyd!--would you justgive a hand? Here I am, under Purgatory Mountain. Darling--take thisthing away! Darling--Darling! Men!--Colonel Cleave!--Boys--boys--" Allthe brain began to think. "O God, send somebody!"
When Purgatory Mountain was lifted from his shoulder and arm he fainted.Water, brought in a cap from a neighbouring puddle and dashed in hisface, brought him to. "Thar now!" said Billy, "I certainly air glad tosee that you air alive!" Coffin groaned. "It must ha' hurt awful! S'poseyou let me look before I move you?" He took out a knife and gently slitthe coat away. "Sho! I know that hurts! But you got first to the gun!You ran like you was possessed, and you yelled, and you was the first totouch the gun. Thar now! I air a-tying the han'kerchief from your headaround your arm, 'cause there's more blood--"
"They'll have to cut it off," moaned Coffin.
"No, they won't. Don't you let 'em! Now I air a-going to lift you andcarry you to the nearest house. All the boys have run on after theYanks."
He took up his sergeant and moved off with an easy step. Coffin uttereda short and piteous moaning like a child. They presently met a number ofgrey soldiers. "We've druv them--we've druv them! The 37th's down there.Just listen to Rockbridge!--Who've you got there?"
"Sergeant Coffin," said Billy. "He air right badly hurt! He was thefirst man at the gun. He fired, an' then he got hold of the sponge staffand laid about him--he was that gallant. The men ought to 'lect himback. He sure did well."
The nearest house flung open its doors. "Bring him right in here--oh,poor soldier! Right here in the best room!--Run, Maria, and turn downthe bed. Oh, poor boy! He looks like my Robert down at Richmond! Thisway--get a little blackberry wine, Betty, and the scissors and my rollof lint--"
Billy laid him on the bed in the best room. "Thar now! You air allright. The doctor'll come just as soon as I can find him, 'n' then I'llget back to the boys--Wait--I didn't hear,
I'll put my ear down. Youcouldn't lose all that blood and not be awful weak--"
"I'd be ashamed to report now!" whispered Coffin. "Maybe I was wrong--"
"Sho!" said Billy. "We're all wrong more or less. Here, darn you, drinkyour wine, and stop bothering!"
Across the Shenandoah Stonewall Jackson and the 37th Virginia came downfrom the heights with the impetuosity of a torrent. Behind them pouredother grey troops. On the cliff heads Poague and Carpenter came intoposition and began with grape and canister. The blue Parrott, fullbefore the bridge mouth, menacing the lane within, answered with ashriek of shells. The 37th and Jackson left the road, plunged down theragged slope of grass and vines, and came obliquely toward the darktunnel. Jackson and Little Sorrel had slipped into their battle aspect.You would have said that every auburn hair of the general's head andbeard was a vital thing. His eyes glowed as though there were lampsbehind, and his voice rose like a trumpet of promise and doom."Halt!--Aim at the gunners!--Fire! Fix bayonets! Charge!"
The 37th rushed in column through the bridge. The blue cavalry fired onevolley. The unwounded among the blue artillerymen strove to plant ashell within the dusky lane. But most of the gunners were down, or thefuse was wrong. The grey torrent leaped out of the tunnel and upon thegun. They took it and turned it against the horsemen. The blue cavalryfled. On the bluff heads above the river three grey batteries came intoaction. The 37th Virginia began to sweep the streets of Port Republic.
The blue cavalry, leaving the guns, leaving prisoners they had taken andtheir wounded, turned alike from the upper end of the village and rode,pell-mell, for the South Fork. One and all they splashed through, notnow in covering mist, but in hot sunshine, the 37th volleying at theirheels and from the bluffs above the Shenandoah, Poague and Carpenter andWooding strewing their path with grape and canister.
A mile or two in the deep woods they met Shields's infantry advance.There followed a movement toward the town--futile enough, for as thevanguard approached, the Confederate batteries across the river limberedup, trotted or galloped to other positions on the green bluff heads, andtrained the guns on the ground between Port Republic and the head of theFederal column. Winder's brigade came also and took position on theheights commanding Lewiston, and Taliaferro's swung across the bridgeand formed upon the townward side of South Fork. Shields halted. Allday he halted, listening to the guns at Cross Keys.
Sitting Little Sorrel at the northern end of the bridge, StonewallJackson watched Taliaferro's men break step and cross. A staff officerventured to inquire what the general thought General Shields would do.
"I think, sir, that he will stay where he is."
"All day, sir?"
"All day."
"He has ten thousand men. Will he not try to attack?"
"No, sir! No! He cannot do it. I should tear him to pieces."
A heavy sound came into being. The staff officer swung round on hishorse. "Listen, sir!"
"Yes. Artillery firing to the northwest. Fremont will act withoutShields."
A courier came at a gallop. "General Ewell's compliments, sir, and thebattle of Cross Keys is beginning."
"Good! good! My compliments to General Ewell, and I expect him to winit."