Part 37 (1/2)
Kenly looked, pressed his lips together, opened them and gave the order.
”_Face to the rear. Forward. March!_” Discretion was at last entirely the better part of valour. Strasburg was fourteen miles away; over hill and dale rose and fell the road that ran that way. Off, off! and some might yet escape--or it might please the G.o.ds to let him meet with reinforcements! His guns ceased with their canister and limbering up thundered away toward the sun, now low and red in the heavens. The infantry followed; the small cavalry force bringing up the rear, now deployed as skirmishers, now rallying and threatening the grey footmen.
The Shenandoah was impetuous, deep, turbid, with many eddies, lifted by the spring rains almost level with its banks. The horses liked it not--poor brutes! They shuddered, whinnied, glared with distended, bloodshot eyes. Once in, they patiently did their best. Each was owned by its rider, and was his good friend as well as servant. The understanding between the two could not be disturbed, no, not even by the swollen Shenandoah! The trooper, floating free upon the down-stream side, one hand on mane, or knees upgathered, and carbine held high, squatting in the saddle on the crossed stirrups, kept up a stream of encouragement--soft words, pet names, cooing mention of sugar (little enough in the commissariat!) and of apples. The steed responded. The G.o.d above or beside him wished it thus, and certainly should be obeyed, and that with love. The rough torrent, the eddies, the violent current were nothing--at least, not much! In column of twos the horses breasted the river, the G.o.ds above them singing of praise and reward. They neared the western sh.o.r.e and the green, overhanging trees, touched bottom, plunged a little and came out, wet and s.h.i.+ning, every inch of metal about them glinting in the level rays of the sun.
High on the bank Stonewall Jackson with Flournoy and his aides, the first to cross, watched that pa.s.sage of the squadrons. Little Sorrel, slow and patient, had perhaps been, in his own traversing, the one steed to hear no especial word of endearment nor much of promise. He did not seem to miss them; he and Jackson apparently understood each other. The men said that he could run only one way and that toward the enemy.
Far down the Front Royal and Winchester turnpike, through a fair farming country, among cornfields and orchards, the running fight continued. It was almost sunset; long shadows stretched across the earth. Scene and hour should have been tranquil-sweet--fall of dew, vesper song of birds, tinkling of cow bells coming home. It was not so; it was filled with noise and smoke, and in the fields and fence corners lay dead and wounded men, while in the farmhouses of the region, women drew the blinds, gathered the children about them and sat trembling.
The blue cavalry was hard put to it. The grey infantrymen were good marksmen, and their line was long, drawn across the road and the up and down of the fields. Here and there, now and again, a trooper went down to the dust, and the riderless horse, galloping to the rear, brought small comfort to Kenly's retreating companies. At last there rode back the major commanding the New York squadron. ”We're losing too heavily, colonel! There's a feverishness--if they're reinforced I don't know if I can hold the men--”
Kenly debated within himself, then. ”I'll make a stand at the cross-roads yonder. Atwell shall plant the guns and give them canister.
It is nearly night--if we could hold them off one hour--”
Richard Cleave, pressing very close with his skirmishers, lost sight of the blue infantry now behind an orchard-clad undulation. ”Billy Maydew!
come climb this tree and tell me what you see.”
Billy went up the roadside locust like a squirrel. ”Thar air a man just tumbled off a black horse with a white star! 'T was Dave hit him, I reckon. They look powerful droopy, them cavalrymen! The big man you wouldn't let us take, he air waving his sabre and swearing--”
”The infantry?”
”The infantry air halted. The road air stuffed with them.
One--two--three--six companies, stretched out like a black horse's tail.”
”Faced which way?”
”That way. No! by Jiminy, they ain't! They air faced this way! They air going to make a stand!”
”They have done well, and they've got a brave officer, whoever he is.
The guns?”
”Away ahead, but they air turning! They air making for a hilltop that hangs over the road. Thar's another man off his horse! Threw up his arm and fell, and his foot caught in the stirrup. I don't know if 't war Dave this time shot him--anyhow, 't war not Sergeant Coffin--”
”Is the infantry deploying?”
”They air still in column--black as flies in the road. They air tearing down the fence, so they can get into the fields.”
”Look behind--toward the river.”
Billy obediently turned upon the branch. ”We air coming on in five lines--like the bean patch at home. I love them Lou-is-iana Tigers!
What's that?”
”What?”
”An awful cloud of dust--and a trumpet out of it! The First Maryland's getting out of the way--Now the Tigers!--Oh-h-h!”
He scrambled down. ”By the left flank!” shouted Cleave. ”Double quick.
March!”