The Star of Gettysburg: A Story of Southern High Tide, Joseph A. Altsheler [best value ebook reader txt] 📗

in the room of little Miss Julia Moncrieffe, aged nine, the young lady who sent us the holly. Evidently they took away all their clothing and lighter articles of furniture, but they forgot the doll. Put it back, George. They'll return to Fredericksburg some day and we want her to find it there."

"You're right, Harry," said Dalton, as he replaced the doll and closed the drawer. "You and I ought to be grateful to that little girl whom we may never see."

"We won't forget," said Harry, as he undressed rapidly and lay down upon their luxurious bed of blankets and straw.

Neither of them remembered anything until they were dragged into the middle of the room next morning by St. Clair and Langdon.

"Here! here! wake up! wake up!" cried Langdon. "It's not polite to your hosts to be snoring away when breakfast is almost ready. Go down on a piece of the back porch that's left, and you'll find two pans of cold water in which you can wash your faces. It's true the pans are frozen over, but you can break the ice, and it will remind you of home and your little boyhood."

They sprang up and dressed as rapidly as they could, because when they came from the covers they found it icy cold in the room. Then they ran down, as they had been directed, broke the ice in the pans and bathed their faces.

"Fine air," said Harry.

"Yes, but too much of it," said Dalton.

"Br-h-h-h-h, how it freezes me! Look at the icicles, George! I think some new ones came to town last night! And what a cold river! I don't believe there was ever a colder-looking river than the Rappahannock!"

"And see the fogs and mists rising from it, too. It looks exactly as it did the morning of the battle."

"Let it look as it pleases," said Harry. "I'm going to make a dash for the inside and a fire!"

They found the colonels and the rest of the staff in the sitting-room, all except two, who were acting as cooks, but their work ceased in a moment or two, as breakfast was ready. It consisted of coffee and bread and ham left over from the night before. A heap of timber glowed in the fireplace and shot forth ruddy flames. Harry's soul fairly warmed within him.

"Sit down, all of you," said Colonel Talbot, "and we'll help one another."

They ate with the appetite of the soldier, and Colonel Talbot and Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire, finishing first, withdrew to a wide window seat. There they produced the board and box of chessmen and proceeded to rearrange them exactly as they were before the battle of Fredericksburg.

"You will recall that your king was in great danger, Leonidas," said Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire.

"Truly I do, Hector, but I do not think it beyond my power to rescue him."

"It will be a hard task, Leonidas."

"Hector, I would have you to remember that I am an officer in the Army of Northern Virginia, and the Army of Northern Virginia prefers hard tasks to easy ones."

"You put the truth happily, Leonidas, but I must insist that your position is one of uncommon danger."

"I recognize the fact fully, Hector, but I assert firmly that I will rescue my red king."

Harry, his part of the work finished, watched them. The two gray heads bent lower and lower over the table until they almost touched. Everybody maintained a respectful silence. Colonel Talbot's brow was corded deeply with thought. It was a full quarter of an hour before he made a move, and then his opponent looked surprised.

"That does not seem to be your right move, Leonidas."

"But it is, Hector, as you will see presently."

"Very well. I will now choose my own course."

Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire's own brow became corded and knotted as he put his whole mental energy upon the problem. Harry watched them a little while, and then strolled over to the other window, where St. Clair was looking at the ruined town.

"Curious how people can find entertainment in so slow a game," he said, nodding toward the two colonels.

"That same game has been going on for more than a year," said St. Clair, with a slight smile. "It's odd how something always breaks it up. I wonder what it will be this time. But it's an intelligent game, Harry."

"I don't think a sport is intellectual, merely because it is slow."

Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire made a move, Colonel Leonidas Talbot made another, and then promptly uttered a little cry of triumph.

"My king is free! He is free! You made no royal capture, Hector!" he exclaimed joyously.

"It is so, Leonidas. I did not foresee your path of retreat. I must enter upon a new campaign against you."

Harry, who was looking toward the heights on the other side of the river, saw a flash of flame and a puff of smoke. A rumbling noise came to him.

"What is it, Harry?" asked Colonel Talbot.

"A Yankee cannon. I suppose it was telling us Christmas is over. The ball struck somewhere in Fredericksburg."

"A waste of good ammunition. Why, they've done all the damage to Fredericksburg that they can do. It's your move, Hector."

Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire corded and knotted his brow again, and once more the two heads nearly met over the chessboard. A whistling sound suddenly came from the street without. Something struck with a terrible impact, and then followed a blinding flash and roar. The whole house shook and several of the men were thrown down, but in a half minute they sprang to their feet.

Colonel Leonidas Talbot and Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire were standing erect, staring at each other. The chessmen were scattered on the floor and the board was split in half. A fragment of the exploding shell had entered the window and passing directly between them had done the damage. The same piece had gone entirely through the opposite wall.

Harry's quick glance told him that nothing had suffered except the chessboard. He sprang forward, picked up the two halves, and said:

"No real harm has been done. Two strips underneath, a few tacks, and it's as good again as ever."

The other lads carefully gathered up the scattered chessmen and announced that not one of them was injured.

"Thank you, boys," said Colonel Talbot. "It is a pleasing thing to see that, despite the war, the young still show courtesy to their elders. You will bear in mind, Hector, when this game is resumed at a proper time and place, that the position of one of your knights was very delicate."

"Assuredly I will not forget it, Leonidas. It will be no trouble to either of us to replace them exactly as they were at a moment's notice."

Harry and Dalton were compelled now to return to General Jackson, and they did so, after leaving many thanks with their generous hosts. Heavy winter rains began. The country on both sides of the Rappahannock became a vast sea of mud, and the soldiers had to struggle against all the elements, because the rains were icy and the mud formed a crust through which they broke in the morning.

While they lingered here news came of the great battle in the West, fought on the last day of the old year and the first day of the new, along the banks of Stone River. Harry and his comrades looked for a triumph there like that which they had won, and they were deeply disappointed when they heard the result.

Harry had a copy of a Richmond paper and he was reading from it to an attentive circle, but he stopped to comment:

"Ours was the smaller army, but we drove them back and held a part of the field. Two or three days later we withdrew to Chattanooga. Well, I don't call it much of a victory to thump your enemy and then go away, leaving him in possession of the field."

"But the enemy was a third more numerous than we were," said Happy Tom, "and since it looks like a draw, so far as the fighting was concerned, we, being the smaller, get the honors."

"That's just the trouble," said Dalton gravely. "We are loaded down with honors. Look at the great victories we've won in the East! Has anything solid come of them? Here is the enemy on Virginia soil, just as he was before. We've given the Army of the Potomac a terrible thrashing at Fredericksburg, but there it is on the other side of the Rappahannock, just as strong as ever, and maybe stronger, because they say recruits are pouring into it."

"Stop! Stop, Dalton!" said Happy Tom. "We don't want any lecture from you. We're just having a conversation."

"All right," said Dalton, laughing, "but I gave you my opinion."

Days of comparative idleness followed. The Army of the Potomac moved farther up the river and settled itself around the village of Falmouth. The Army of Northern Virginia faced it, and along the hillsides the young Southern soldiers erected sign posts, on the boards of which were painted, in letters large enough for the Union glasses to see, the derisive words:

THIS WAY TO RICHMOND


CHAPTER VII JEB STUART'S BALL

But Hooker, the new Northern commander, did not yet move. The chief cause was mud. The winter having been very cold in the first half, was very rainy in the second half. The numerous brooks and creeks and smaller rivers remained flooded beyond their banks, and the Rappahannock flowed a swollen and mighty stream. Ponds and little lakes stood everywhere. Roads had been destroyed by the marching of mighty masses and the rolling of thousands of heavy wheels. Horses often sank nearly to the knee when they trod new paths through the muddy fields. There was mud, mud everywhere.

Hooker, moreover, was confronted by a long line of earthworks and other intrenchments, extending for twenty miles along the Rappahannock, and defended by the victors of Fredericksburg. After that disastrous day the Northern masses at home were not so eager for a battle. The country realized that it was not well to rush a foe, led by men like Lee and Jackson.

But Hooker was a brave and confident man. The North, always ready, was sending forward fresh troops, and when he crossed the Rappahannock, as he intended to do, he would have more men and more guns than Burnside had led when he attacked the blazing heights of Fredericksburg. Lincoln and Stanton, warned too by the great disasters through their attempts to manage armies in the field from the Capitol, were giving Hooker a freer hand.

On the other hand, the Confederate president and his cabinet suddenly curtailed Lee's plans. A fourth of his veterans under Longstreet were drawn off to meet a flank attack of other Northern forces which seemed to be threatened upon Richmond. Lee was left with only sixty thousand men to face Hooker's growing odds.

It was not any wonder that the spirits of the Southern lads sank somewhat. Harry realized more fully every day that it was not sufficient for them merely to defeat the Northern armies. They must destroy them. The immense patriotism of those who fought for the Union always filled up their depleted ranks and more, and they were getting better generals all the time. Hancock and Reynolds and many another were rising to fame in the east.

The Invincibles were posted nearly opposite Falmouth, and Harry had many chances to see them. On his second visit the chessboard was mended so perfectly that the split was not visible, and the two colonels sat down to finish their game. Fifteen minutes later a dispatch from General Jackson to Colonel Leonidas Talbot arrived, telling him to leave at once by the railway in the Confederate rear for Richmond. President Davis wished detailed information from him about the fortifications along the coasts of North Carolina and South Carolina, which were now heavily threatened by the enemy.

The two colonels had not made a move, but Colonel Leonidas Talbot rose, buttoned every button of his neat tunic, and said in precise tones:

"Hector, I depart in a half hour. You will, of course, have command of the regiment in my absence, and if any young lieutenants should be exceedingly obstreperous in the course of that time, perhaps I can prove to them that they are