The Shades of the Wilderness: A Story of Lee's Great Stand, Joseph A. Altsheler [new reading txt] 📗

Oh, I must have 'em. Unbutton your coat and waistcoat and hand 'em to me at once. I hate to take human life, but war demands a terrible service, and I mean what I say!"

His voice rang with determination. The man slowly unbuttoned his waistcoat and took out a folded dispatch.

"Put it on the ground in front of you. That's right, and don't you reach for it again. Now, lay your canteen beside it!"

"What in thunder do you want with my canteen? It's empty!"

"I can fill it again. This is a well watered country. That's right; put it beside the dispatch. Now you walk about one hundred yards to the right with your back to me. If you look around at all I fire, and I'm a good marksman. Stand there ten minutes, and then you can move on! That's right! Now march!"

The man walked away slowly and when he had gone about half the distance Harry, picking up the dispatch, took flight again across the fields. Climbing a fence, he looked back and saw the figure of John Haskell, standing motionless on a hill. He knew that the man was not likely to remain in that position more than half the allotted time. It was certain that he would soon turn, despite the risk, but Harry was already beyond his reach.

He leaped from the fence, crossed another field and entered a wood. There he paused among the trees and saw Haskell returning. But when he had come a little distance, he shook his head doubtfully, and then walked toward the north.

"A counsel of wisdom," chuckled Harry, who was going in quite another direction. "I think I'll read my dispatch now."

He opened it and blessed his luck. It was from Meade to Pleasanton, directing him to cut in with all the cavalry he could gather on the enemy's flank. The Potomac was in great flood and the Army of Northern Virginia could not possibly cross. If it were harried to the utmost by the Union cavalry the task of destroying it would be much easier.

"So it would," said Harry to himself. "But Pleasanton won't get this dispatch. Providence has not deserted me yet; and it's true that fortune favors the brave. I'm John Haskell of the Fifth Pennsylvania and I can prove it."

He had put the canteen over his shoulder and the name upon it was a powerful witness in his favor. The dispatch itself was another, and his faded uniform told nothing.

Harry had passed through so much that a reckless spirit was growing upon him, and he had succeeded in so much that he believed he would continue to succeed. Regretfully he threw the shotgun away, as it would not appear natural for a messenger to carry it and a rifle too.

He went forward boldly now, and, when an hour later he saw a detachment of Union cavalry in a road, he took no measures to avoid them. Instead he went directly toward the horsemen and hailed them in a loud voice. They stopped and their leader, a captain, looked inquiringly at Harry, who was approaching rapidly.

Harry held up both hands as a sign that he was a friend, and called in a loud voice:

"I want a horse! And at once, if you please, sir!"

He had noticed that three led horses with empty saddles, probably the result of a brush with the enemy, and he meant to be astride one of them within a few minutes.

"You're a cool one," said the captain. "You come walking across the field, and without a word of explanation you say you want a horse. Don't you want a carriage too?"

"I don't need it. But I must have a horse, Captain. I ride with a message and it must be of great importance because I was told to go with it at all speed and risk my life for it. I've risked my life already. My horse was shot by a band of rebels, but luckily it was in the woods and I escaped on foot."

As he spoke he craftily moved the canteen around until the inscription showed clearly in the bright sunlight. The quick eyes of the captain caught it at once.

"You do belong to the Fifth Pennsylvania," he said. "Well, you're a long way from your regiment. It's back of that low mountain over there, a full forty miles from here, I should say."

Harry felt a throb of relief. It was his only fear that these men themselves should belong to the Fifth Pennsylvania, a long chance, but if it should happen to go against him, fatal to all his plans.

"I don't want to join my regiment," he said. "I'm looking for General Pleasanton."

"General Pleasanton! What can you happen to want with him?"

Harry gave the officer a wary and suspicious look, and then his eyes brightened as if he were satisfied.

"I told you I was riding with a message," he said, "and that message is for General Pleasanton. It's from General Meade himself and it's no harm for me to show it to so good a patriot as you."

"No, I think not," said the captain, flattered by the proof of respect and confidence.

Harry took the letter from his pocket. It had been sealed at first, but the warmth of the original bearer's body with a little help from Harry later had caused it to come open.

"Look at that," said Harry proudly as he took out the paper.

The captain read it, and was mightily impressed. He was, as Harry had surmised, a thoroughly staunch supporter of the Union. He would not only furnish this valiant messenger with a good horse, but he would help him otherwise on his way.

"Dexter," he called to an orderly, "bring the sorrel mare. She was ridden by a good man, Mr. Haskell, but he met a sharpshooter's bullet. Jump up."

Harry sprang into the saddle, and, astride such a fine piece of horseflesh, he foresaw a speedy arrival in the camp of General Lee.

"I'll not only mount you," said the captain, "but we'll see you on the way. General Pleasanton is on Lee's left flank and, as our course is in that direction, we'll ride with you, and protect you from stray rebel sharpshooters."

Harry could have shouted aloud in anger and disappointment. While the captain trusted him fully, he would not be much more than a prisoner, nevertheless.

"Thank you very much, Captain," he said, "but you needn't trouble yourself about me. Perhaps I'd better go on ahead. One rides faster alone."

"Don't be afraid that we'll hold you back," said the captain, smiling. "We're one of the hardest riding detachments in General Pleasanton's whole cavalry corps, and we won't delay you a second. On the contrary, we know the road so well that we'll save you wandering about and losing time."

Harry did not dare to say more. And so Providence, which had been watching over him so well, had decided now to leave him and watch over the other fellow. But he had at least one consolation. Pleasanton was on Lee's flank and their ride did not turn him from the line of his true objective. Every beat of his horse's hoofs would bring him nearer to Lee. Invincible youth was invincibly in the saddle again, and he said confidently to the captain:

"Let's start."

"All right. You keep by my side, Haskell. You appear to be brave and intelligent and I want to ask you questions."

The tone, though well meant, was patronizing, but Harry did not resent it.

"This troop is made up of Massachusetts men, and I'm from Massachusetts too," continued the captain. "My name is Lester, and I had just graduated from Harvard when the war began."

"Good stock up there in Massachusetts," said Harry boldly, "but I've one objection to you."

"What's that?"

"Everything wonderful in our history was done by you. No chance was left for anybody else."

"Well, not everything, but almost everything. Good old Massachusetts! As Webster said, 'There she stands!'"

"It was mostly New York and Pennsylvania that stood at Gettysburg."

"Yes, you did very well there."

"Don't you think, Captain, that a nation or a state is often lucky in its possession of writers?"

"I don't catch your drift exactly."

"I'll make an illustration. I've often wondered what were the Persian accounts of Marathon and Thermopylae, of Salamis and Plataea. Now most of our history has been written by Massachusetts men."

"And you insinuate that they have glorified my state unduly?"

"The expression is a trifle severe. Let's say that they have dwelled rather long upon the achievements of Massachusetts and not so long upon those of New York and Pennsylvania."

"Then let New York and Pennsylvania go get great writers. No state can be truly great without them. There's another detachment of ours just ahead, but we'll talk to them only a minute or two."

The second detachment reported that Pleasanton, with a heavy cavalry force, was about six miles farther west and that there was a fair road all the way. They should overtake him in an hour.

Harry's heart beat hard. Unless something happened within that hour he would never reach Lee, and his brain began to work with extraordinary activity. Plans passed in review before it as rapidly as pictures on a film, but all were rejected. He was in despair. They were trotting rapidly down a smooth road. A quarter of an hour passed and then a half-hour. A low bare hill appeared immediately on their right, and Harry saw beyond it the tops of trees.

"Captain Lester," he said, "suppose that you and I ride to the crest of the hill. You have strong glasses, so have I, and we may see something worth while. The men will ride on, but we can easily overtake them."

"Not a bad idea, Haskell," said the captain, still in that slightly patronizing tone. "I judge by your speech that you're a well educated man, and you appear to think."

They rode quickly to the summit, and Lester, putting his glasses to his eyes, gazed westward over a vast expanse of cultivated country. But Harry looking immediately down the slope, saw the forest that he wished.

Lester swept the glasses in a wide circle, looking for Union troops. His own troop was about a hundred yards ahead and the hoofbeats were growing fainter. Then Harry's courage almost failed him, but necessity was instant and cruel. Still he modified the blow, nor did he use any weapon, save one that nature had given him.

"Look out!" he cried, and as Lester turned in astonishment he struck him on the point of the jaw. Even as his fist flashed forward he held back a little and his full strength was not in the blow.

Nevertheless it was sufficient to strike Lester senseless, and he slid from his horse. Harry caught him by the shoulder and eased him in his fall. Then he lay stretched on his back in the grass like one asleep, with his horse staring at him. Harry knew that he would revive in a minute or two, and with a "Farewell, Captain Lester," he galloped down the slope and into the covering woods.

He knew that Lester's men, finding that they did not follow, would quickly come back, and he raced his horse among the trees as fast as he dared. A couple of miles between him and the hill and he felt safe, at least so far as the troop of Captain Lester was concerned. Fortune seemed to have made him a favorite again, but he knew that dangers were still as thick around him as leaves in Vallombrosa.

He tied his horse, climbed a tree, and used his glasses. Two miles to the west the bright sun flashed on long lines of mounted men, obviously the horsemen of Pleasanton. How was he to get through that cavalry screen and reach Lee? He did not see a way, but he knew that to find, one must seek. His desire to get through, intense as it always had been, was now doubled. He not only carried the news to Lee about the possible ford, but he also bore Meade's dispatch to Pleasanton, directing a movement which, if successful, must be most dangerous to the Army of Northern Virginia.

He descended the tree and waited a while in the forest. He found a spring at which he drank, and he filled