The Scouts of Stonewall: The Story of the Great Valley Campaign Part 17

"If I were as well fixed as you are, Arthur," said Langdon, who appeared at this moment on the other side of the wagon, "I'd stay where I was. But it's so long since I've been hauled that I'm afraid the luxury would overpower me. Think of lying on your back and letting the world float peacefully by! Did I say 'think of it'? I was wrong. It is unthinkable. Now, Harry, what plans has Old Jack got for us?"

"I don't know."

"Well, he'll get us out of this. We're sure of that. But when? That's the question."

The question remained without an answer. Early the next morning they were on the march again under lowering skies. The heavens from horizon to horizon were a sodden gray and began to drip rain. Harry was sent again to the rear-guard, where Ashby's cavalry hung like a curtain, backed by the Invincibles and one or two other skeleton regiments.

Harry joined Sherburne and now the drip of the rain became a steady beat. Chilling winds from the mountains swept over them. He had preserved through thick and thin, through battle and through march that big cavalry cloak, and now he b.u.t.toned it tightly around him.

He saw down the road puffs of smoke and heard the las.h.i.+ng fire of rifles, but it did not make his pulses beat any faster now. He had grown so used to it that it seemed to be his normal life. A bullet fired from a rifle of longer range than the others plumped into the mud at the feet of his horse, but he paid no attention to it.

He joined Sherburne, who was using his gla.s.ses, watching through the heavy, thick air the Northern advance. The brilliant young cavalryman, while as bold and enduring as ever, had changed greatly in the last two or three weeks. The fine uniform was stained and bedraggled. Sherburne himself had lost more than twenty pounds and his face was lined and anxious far more than the face of a mere boy of twenty-three should have been.

"I think they'll press harder than ever," said Sherburne.

"Why?"

"The Shenandoah river, or rather the north fork of it, isn't far ahead. They'd like to coop us up against it and make us fight, while their army under s.h.i.+elds and all their other armies-G.o.d knows how many they have-are coming up."

"The river is bridged, isn't it?"

"Yes, but it takes a good while to get an army such as ours, loaded down with prisoners and spoil, across it, and if they rushed us just when we were starting over it, we'd have to turn and give battle. Jupiter, how it rains! Behold the beauties of war, Harry!"

The wind suddenly veered a little, and with it the rain came hard and fast. It seemed to blow off the mountains in sheets and for a moment or two Harry was blinded. The beat of the storm upon leaves and earth was so hard that the cracking of the rifles was dulled and deadened. Nevertheless the rifle fire went on, and as well as Harry could judge, without any decrease in violence.

"Hear the bugles now!" said Sherburne. "Their scouts are warning them of the approach to the Shenandoah. They'll be coming up in a minute or two in heavier force. Ah, see, Ashby understands, too! He's ma.s.sing the men to hold them back!"

The rain still poured with all the violence of a deluge, but the Northern force, horse and cannon, pushed forward through the mud and opened with all their might. Ashby's cavalry and the infantry in support replied. There was something grim and awful to Harry in this fight in the raging storm. Now and then, he could not see the flame of the firing for the rain in his eyes. By a singular chance a bullet cut the b.u.t.ton of his cloak at the throat and the cloak flew open there. In a minute he was soaked through and through with water, but he did not notice it.

The cavalry, the Invincibles and the other regiments were making a desperate stand in order that the army might cross the bridge of the Shenandoah. Harry was seized with a sort of fury. Why should these men try to keep them from getting across? It was their right to escape. Presently he found himself firing with his pistols into the great pillar of fire and smoke and rain in front of him. Mud splashed up by the horses struck him in the face now and then, and stung like gunpowder, but he began to shout with joy when he saw that Ashby was holding back the Northern vanguard.

Ahead of him the Southern army was already rumbling over the bridge, while the swollen and unfordable waters of the Shenandoah raced beneath it. But the Northern brigades pressed hard. Harry did not know whether the rain helped them or hurt them, but at any rate it was terribly uncomfortable. It poured on them in sheets and sheets and the earth seemed to be a huge quagmire. He wondered how the men were able to keep their ammunition dry enough to fire, but that they did was evident from the crash that went on without ceasing.

"In thinking of war before I really knew it," said Harry, "I never thought much of weather."

"Does sound commonplace, but it cuts a mighty big figure I can tell you. If it hadn't rained so hard just before Waterloo Napoleon would have got up his big guns more easily, winning the battle, and perhaps changing the history of the world. Confound it, look at that crowd pus.h.i.+ng forward through the field to take us in the flank!"

"Western men, I think," said Harry. "Here are two of our field guns, Sherburne! Get 'em to throw some grape in there!"

It was lucky that the guns approached at that moment. Their commander, as quick of eye as either Harry or Sherburne, unlimbered and swept back the western men who were seeking to turn their flank. Then Sherburne, with a charge of his cavalry, sent them back further. But at the call of Ashby's trumpet they turned quickly and galloped after Jackson's army, the main part of which had now pa.s.sed the bridge.

"I suppose we'll burn the bridge after we cross it," said Harry.

"Of course."

"But how on earth can we set fire to it with this Noah's flood coming down?"

"I don't know. They'll manage it somehow. Look, Harry, see the flames bursting from the timbers now. Gallop, men! Gallop! We may get our faces scorched in crossing the bridge, but when we're on the other side it won't be there for the Yankees!"

The Invincibles and the other infantry regiments all were advancing at the double quick, with the cavalry closing up the rear. Behind them many bugles rang and through the dense rain they saw the Northern cavalry leaders swinging their sabers and cheering on their men, and they also saw behind them the heavy ma.s.ses of infantry coming up.

Harry knew that it was touch-and-go. The bulk of the army was across, and if necessary they must sacrifice Ashby's cavalry, but that sacrifice would be too great. Harry had never seen Ashby and his gallant captains show more courage. They fought off the enemy to the very last and then galloped for the bridge, under a shower of sh.e.l.l and grape and bullets. Ashby's own horse was killed under him, falling headlong in the mud, but in an instant somebody supplied him with a fresh one, upon which he leaped, and then they thundered over the burning bridge, Ashby and Sherburne the last two to begin the crossing.

Harry, who was just ahead of Ashby and Sherburne, felt as if the flames were licking at them. With an involuntary motion he threw up his hands to protect his eyes from the heat, and he also had a horrible sensation lest the bridge, its supporting timbers burned through, should fall, sending them all into the rus.h.i.+ng flood.

But the bridge yet held and Harry uttered a gasp of relief as the feet of his horse struck the deep mud on the other side. They galloped on for two or three hundred yards, and then at the command of Ashby turned.

The bridge was a majestic sight, a roaring pyramid that shot forth clouds of smoke and sparks in myriads.

"How under the sun did we cross it?" Harry exclaimed.

"We crossed it, that's sure, because here we are," said Sherburne. "I confess myself that I don't know just how we did it, Harry, but it's quite certain that the enemy will never cross it. The fire's too strong. Besides, they'd have our men to face."

Harry looked about, and saw several thousand men drawn up to dispute the pa.s.sage, but the Northern troops recognizing its impossibility at that time, made no attempt. Nevertheless their cannon sent sh.e.l.ls curving over the stream, and the Southern cannon sent curving sh.e.l.ls in reply. But the burning bridge roared louder and the pyramid of flame rose higher. The rain, which had never ceased to pour in a deluge, merely seemed to feed it.

"Ah, she's about to go now," exclaimed Sherburne.

The bridge seemed to Harry to rear up before his eyes like a living thing, and then draw together a ma.s.s of burning timbers. The next moment the whole went with a mighty crash into the river, and the blazing fragments floated swiftly away on the flood. The deep and rapid Shenandoah flowed a barrier between the armies of Jackson and Fremont.

"A river can be very beautiful without a bridge, Harry, can't it?" said a voice beside him.

It was St. Clair, a heavy bandage over his left shoulder, but a smoking rifle in his right hand, nevertheless.

"I couldn't stand it any longer, Harry," he said. "I had to get up and join the Invincibles, and you see I'm all right."

Harry was compelled to laugh at the sodden figure, from which the rain ran in streams. But he admired St. Clair's spirit.

"It was by a hair's breadth, Arthur," he said.

"But we won across, just the same, and now I'm going back to that wagon to finish my cure. I fancy that we'll now have a rest of six or eight hours, if General Jackson doesn't think so much time taken from war a mere frivolity."

The Southern army drew off slowly, but as soon as it was out of sight the tenacious Northern troops undertook to follow. They attempted to build a bridge of boats, but the flood was so heavy that they were swept away. Then Fremont set men to work to rebuild the bridge, which they could do in twenty-four hours, but Jackson, meanwhile, was using every one of those precious hours.

CHAPTER XIV. THE DOUBLE BATTLE

The twenty-four hours were a rest, merely by comparison. There was no pursuit, at least, the enemy was not in sight, but the scouts brought word that the bridge over the Shenandoah would be completed in a day and night, and that Fremont would follow. Jackson's army triumphantly pa.s.sed the last defile of the Ma.s.sanuttons and the army of s.h.i.+elds did not appear issuing from it. It was no longer possible for them to be struck in front and on the flank at the same time, and the army breathed a mighty sigh of relief. At night of the next day Harry was sitting by the camp of the Invincibles, having received a brief leave of absence from the staff, and he detailed the news to his eager friends.

"General Jackson is stripping again for battle," he said to Colonel Leonidas Talbot and Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire. "He's sent all the sick and wounded across a ferry to Staunton, and he's dispatched his prisoners and captured stores by another road. So he has nothing left but men fit for battle."

"Which includes me," said St. Clair proudly, showing his left shoulder from which the bandage had been taken, "I'm as well as ever."

"Men get well fast with Stonewall Jackson," said Colonel Talbot. "I'll confess to you lads that I thought it was all up with us there in the lower valley, when we were surrounded by the ma.s.ses of the enemy, and I don't see yet how we got here."

"But we are here, Leonidas," said Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire, "and that's enough for us to know."

"Right, Hector, old friend. It's enough for us to know. Do you by chance happen to have left two of those delightful cigarettes?"

"Just two, Leonidas, one for you and one for me, and now is a chance to smoke 'em."

The young lieutenants drew to one side while the two old friends smoked and compared notes. They did not smoke, but they compared notes also, as they rested on the turf. The rain had ceased and the gra.s.s was dry. They saw through the twilight the dark ma.s.s of the Ma.s.sanuttons, the extreme southern end, and Happy Tom Langdon waved his hand toward the mountain, like one who salutes a friend.

"Good old mountain," he said. "You've been a buffer between us and the enemy more than once, but it took a mind like Stonewall Jackson's to keep moving you around so you would stand between the armies of the enemy and make the Yankees fight, only one army at a time."

"You're right," said Harry, who was enjoying the deep luxury of rest. "I didn't know before that mountains could be put to such good use. Look, you can see lights on the ridge now."

They saw lights, evidently those of powerful lanterns swung to and fro, but they did not understand them, nor did they care much.

"Signals are just trifles to me now," said Happy Tom. "What do I care for lights moving on a mountain four or five miles away, when for a month, day and night without stopping, a million Yankees have been shooting rifle bullets at me, and a thousand of the biggest cannon ever cast have been pouring round shot, long shot, sh.e.l.l, grape, canister and a hundred other kinds of missiles that I can't name upon this innocent and unoffending head of mine."

"They'll be on us tomorrow, Happy," said St. Clair, more gravely. "This picnic of ours can't last more than a day."

"I think so, too," said Harry. "So long, boys, I've got to join Captain Sherburne. The general has detached me for service with him under Ashby, and you know that when you are with them, something is going to happen."

Harry slept well that night, partly in a camp and partly in a saddle, and he found himself the next day with Ashby and Sherburne near a little town called Harrisonburg. They were on a long hill in thick forest, and the scouts reported that the enemy was coming. The Northern armies were uniting now and they were coming up the valley, expecting to crush all opposition.

"Take your gla.s.ses, Harry," said Sherburne, "and you'll see a strong force crossing the fields, but it's not strong enough. We've a splendid position here in the forest and you just watch. Ah, here come your friends, the Invincibles. See, Ashby is forming them in the center, while we, of the horse, take the flanks."

The men in blue, catching sight of the Confederate uniforms in the wood, charged with a shout, but they did not know the strength of the force before them. The Invincibles poured in a deadly fire at close range, and then Ashby's cavalry with a yell charged on either flank. The Northern troops, taken by surprise, gave way, and the Southern force followed, firing continuously.

They came within a half mile of Harrisonburg, and the main Northern army of Fremont was at hand. The general who had pursued so long, saw his men retreating, and, filled with chagrin and anger, he hurried forward heavier forces of both cavalry and infantry. Other troops came to the relief of Ashby also, and Harry saw what he thought would be only a heavy skirmish grow into a hot battle of size.

Fremont, resolved that the North should win a battle in the open field, and rejoiced that he had at last brought his enemy to bay, never ceased to hurry his troops to the combat. Formidable lines of the western riflemen rushed on either flank, and before their deadly rifles Ashby's cavalry wavered. Harry saw with consternation that they were about to give way, but Ashby galloped up to the unbroken lines of infantry and ordered them to charge.

The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when his horse, shot through, fell to the ground. Ashby fell with him, but he sprang instantly to his feet, and shouted in a loud voice: "Charge men, for G.o.d's sake! Charge! Charge!" With a rush and roar, the Invincibles and their comrades swept forward, but at the same instant Harry saw Ashby fall again. With a cry of horror he leaped from his horse and ran to him, lifting him in his arms. But he quickly laid him back on the gra.s.s. Ashby had been shot through the heart and killed instantly.

Harry gazed around him, struck with grief and dismay, but he saw only the resistless rush of the infantry. The Invincibles and their comrades were avenging the death of Turner Ashby. Tired of retreating and hot for action they struck the Northern division with a mighty impact, shattering it and driving it back rapidly. The Southern cavalry, recovering also, struck it on the flank, and the defeat was complete. Fremont's wish was denied him. After so much hard marching and such a gallant and tenacious pursuit, he had gone the way of the other Northern generals who opposed Jackson, and was beaten.

Although they had driven back the vanguard, winning a smart little victory, and telling to Fremont and s.h.i.+elds that the pursuit of Jackson had now become dangerous, there was gloom in the Southern army. The hors.e.m.e.n did not know until they trotted back and saw Harry kneeling beside his dead body, that the great Ashby was gone. For a while they could not believe it. Their brilliant and daring leader, who had led Jackson's vanguard in victory, and who had hung like a covering curtain in retreat, could not have fallen. It seemed impossible that the man who had led for days and days through continuous showers of bullets could have been slain at last by some stray shot.

But they lifted him up finally and carried him away to a house in the little neighboring village of Port Republic, Sherburne and the other captains, hot from battle, riding with uncovered heads. He was put upon a bed there, and Harry, a staff officer, was selected to ride to Jackson with the news. He would gladly have evaded the errand, but it was obvious that he was the right messenger.

He rode slowly and found Jackson coming up with the main force, Dr. McGuire, his physician, and Colonel Crutchfield, his chief of artillery, riding on either side of him. The general gave one glance at Harry's drooping figure.

"Well," he said, "have we not won the victory? From a hilltop our gla.s.ses showed the enemy in flight."

"Yes, general," said Harry, taking off his hat, "we defeated the enemy, but General Ashby is dead."

Jackson and his staff were silent for a moment, and Harry saw the general shrink as if he had received a heavy blow.

"Ashby killed! Impossible!" he exclaimed.

"It's true, sir. I helped to carry his body to a house in Port Republic, where it is now lying."

"Lead us to that house, Mr. Kenton," said Jackson.

Harry rode forward in silence, and the others followed in the same silence. At the house, after they had looked upon the body, Jackson asked to be left alone awhile with all that was left of Turner Ashby. The others withdrew and Harry always believed that Jackson prayed within that room for the soul of his departed comrade.

When he came forth his face had resumed its sternness, but was without other expression, as usual.

"He will not show grief, now," said Sherburne, "but I think that his soul is weeping."

"And a bad time for Fremont and s.h.i.+elds is coming," said Harry.

"It's a risk that we all take in war," said Dalton, who was more of a fatalist than any of the others.

The chief wrote a glowing official tribute to Ashby, saying that his "daring was proverbial, his powers of endurance almost incredible, his character heroic, and his sagacity almost intuitive in divining the purposes and movements of the enemy." Yet deeply as Harry had been affected by Ashby's death, it could not remain in his mind long, because they had pa.s.sed the Ma.s.sanuttons now, and Fremont and s.h.i.+elds following up the valley must soon unite.

Harry believed that Jackson intended to strike a blow. The situation of the Confederacy was again critical-it seemed to Harry that it was always critical-and somebody must wield the sword, quick and strong. McClellan with his great and well-trained army was before Richmond. It was only the rapid marches and lightning strokes of Jackson that had kept McDowell with another great army from joining him, but to keep back this force of McDowell until they dealt with McClellan, there must be yet other rapid marches and lightning strokes.

Harry's sleep that night was the longest in two weeks, but he was up at dawn, and he was directed by Jackson to ride forward with Sherburne toward the southern base of the Ma.s.sanuttons, observe the approach of both Fremont and s.h.i.+elds and report to him.

Harry was glad of his errand. He always liked to ride with Sherburne, who was a fount of cheerfulness, and he was still keyed up to that extraordinary intensity and pitch of excitement that made all things possible. He now understood how the young soldiers of Napoleon in Italy had been able to accomplish so much. It was the man, a leader of inspiration and genius, surcharging them all with electrical fire.

Sherburne's troop was a portion of a strong cavalry force, which divided as it reached the base of the Ma.s.sanuttons, a half pa.s.sing on either side. Sherburne and Harry rode to the right in order to see the army of s.h.i.+elds. The day was beautiful, with a glorious June sun and gentle winds, but Harry, feeling something strange about it, realized presently that it was the silence. For more than two weeks cannon had been thundering and rifles cras.h.i.+ng in the valley, almost without cessation. Neither night nor storm had caused any interruption.

It seemed strange, almost incredible now, but they heard birds singing as they flew from tree to tree, and peaceful rabbits popped up in the brush. Yet before they went much further they saw the dark ma.s.ses of the Northern army under s.h.i.+elds moving slowly up the valley, and anxious for the junction with Fremont.

But the Northern generals were again at a loss. Jackson had turned suddenly and defeated Fremont's vanguard with heavy loss, but what had become of him afterward? Fremont and s.h.i.+elds were uncertain of the position of each other, and they were still more uncertain about Jackson's. He might fall suddenly upon either, and they grew very cautious as they drew near to the end of the Ma.s.sanuttons.

Sherburne and Harry, after examining the Northern army through their gla.s.ses, rode back with a dozen men to the south base of the Ma.s.sanuttons. Most of them were signal officers, and Harry and Sherburne, dismounting, climbed the foot of the mountain with them. When they stood upon the crest and looked to right and left in the clear June air, they beheld a wonderful sight.

To the south along Mill Creek lay Jackson's army. To the west ma.s.sed in the wider valley was the army of Fremont, which had followed them so tenaciously, and to the east, but just separated from it by the base of the Ma.s.sanuttons, were the ma.s.ses of s.h.i.+elds advancing slowly.

Harry through his powerful gla.s.ses could see the hors.e.m.e.n in front scouting carefully in advance of either army, and once more he appreciated to the full Jackson's skill in utilizing the mountains and rivers to keep his enemies apart. But what would he do now that they were pa.s.sing the Ma.s.sanuttons, and there was no longer anything to separate s.h.i.+elds and Fremont. He dismissed the thought. There was an intellect under the old slouch hat of the man who rode Little Sorrel that could rescue them from anything.

"Quite a spectacle," said Sherburne. "A man can't often sit at ease on a mountaintop and look at three armies. Now, Barron, you are to signal from here to General Jackson every movement of our enemies, but just before either s.h.i.+elds or Fremont reaches the base of the mountain, you're to slip down and join us."

"We'll do it, sir," said Barron, the chief signal officer. "We're not likely to go to sleep up here with armies on three sides of us."

Sherburne, Harry and two other men who were not to stay slowly descended the mountain. Harry enjoyed the breathing s.p.a.ce. On the mountainside he was lifted, for a while, above the fierce pa.s.sions of war. He saw things from afar and they were softened by distance. He drew deep breaths of the air, crisp and cool, on the heights, and Sherburne, who saw the glow on his face, understood. The same glow was on his own face.

"It's a grand panorama, Harry," he said, "and we'll take our fill of it for a few moments." They stood on a great projection of rock and looked once more and for a little while into the valley and its divisions. The two Northern armies were nearer now, and they were still moving. Harry saw the sun flas.h.i.+ng over thousands of bayonets. He almost fancied he could hear the crack of the teamsters' whips as the long lines of wagons in the rear creaked along.

They descended rapidly, remounted their horses and galloped back to Jackson.

They buried Ashby that day, all the leading Southern officers following him to his grave, and throughout the afternoon the silence was continued. But the signals on the mountain worked and worked, and the signalmen with Jackson replied. No movement of the two pursuing armies was unknown to the Southern leader.

Harry, with an hour's leave, visited once more his friends of the Invincibles. He had begged a package of fine West Indian cigarettes from Sherburne, and he literally laid them at the feet of the two colonels-he found them sitting together on the gra.s.s, lean gray men who seemed to be wholly reduced to bone and muscle.