The Rock of Chickamauga, Joseph A. Altsheler [best book club books txt] 📗

have used saucy words. So, sir, I think it must

have been a boy. Just like Pennington there, for instance."

 

"Good, George, go on with your reasonings."

 

"As surely, sir, as z plus y equals the total of the two, the one who

put up the placard was a son of the owner. He alone would feel deeply

enough to take so great a risk. The conditions absolutely demand that

the owner has such a son and that he has done it."

 

"Very good, George. I think you're right, and this youth in giving way

to a natural burst of anger, although he did not mean to do so, has

posted up for us a warning. A lad of his spirit would go in search

of Forrest, and we cannot forget our experience with that general in

Tennessee. Now, boys, we'll make ready for the night, which is not far

away."

 

The house was built for a Southern climate, although Dick had learned

that it could be cold enough in Central Mississippi in midwinter. But

it was spring now and they opened all the doors and windows, letting the

pleasant air rush through the musty house.

 

"It may rain," said Colonel Winchester, "and the officers will sleep

inside. The men will spread their blankets on the piazzas, and the

horses will be tethered in the grounds. I hate to see the flowers and

grass trodden down, but nature will restore them."

 

Some of the soldiers gathered wood from heaps nearby and fires were

kindled in the kitchen, and also on the hearths in the slave quarters.

Colonel Winchester had been truly called the father of his regiment.

He was invariably particular about its health and comfort, and, as he

always led it in person in battle, there was no finer body of men in the

Union service.

 

Now he meant for his men to have coffee, and warm food after this long

and trying ride and soon savory odors arose, although the cooking was

not begun until after dark, lest the smoke carry a signal to a lurking

enemy. The cavalrymen cut the thick grass which grew everywhere, and fed

it to their horses, eight hundred massive jaws munching in content. The

beasts stirred but little after their long ride and now and then one

uttered a satisfied groan.

 

The officers drank their coffee and ate their food on the eastern

piazza, which overlooked a sharp dip toward a creek three or four

hundred yards away. The night had rushed down suddenly after the fashion

of the far South, and from the creek they heard faintly the hoarse frogs

calling. Beyond the grounds a close ring of sentinels watched, because

Colonel Winchester had no mind to be surprised again by Forrest or by

Fighting Joe Wheeler or anybody else.

 

The night was thick and dark and moist with clouds. Dick, despite the

peace that seemed to hang over everything, was oppressed. The desolate

house, even more than the sight of the field after the battle was over,

brought home to him the meaning of war. It was not alone the death

of men but the uprooting of a country for their children and their

children's children as well. Then his mind traveled back to his uncle,

Colonel Kenton, and suddenly he smote his knee.

 

"What is it, Dick," asked Colonel Winchester, who sat only two or three

yards away.

 

"Now I remember, sir. When I was only seven or eight years old I heard

my uncle tell of stopping, as I told you, at a great plantation in

Mississippi called Bellevue, but I couldn't recall the name of its

owner. I know him now."

 

"What is the name, Dick?"

 

"Woodville, John Woodville. He was a member of the Mississippi Senate,

and he was probably the richest man in the State."

 

"I think I have heard the name. He is a Confederate colonel now, with

Pemberton's army. No doubt we'll have to fight him later on."

 

"Meanwhile, we're using his house."

 

"Fortune of war. But all war is in a sense unfair, because it's usually

a question of the greater force. At any rate, Dick, we won't harm

Colonel Woodville's home."

 

"Yet in the end, sir, a lot of these great old country places will go,

and what will take their place? You and I, coming from a border state,

know that the colored race is not made up of Uncle Toms."

 

"Well, Dick, we haven't won yet, and until we do we won't bother

ourselves about the aftermath of war. I'm glad we found so large a place

as this. At the last moment I sent part of the men to the cabins, but

at least three or four hundred must lie here on the piazzas. And most of

them are already asleep. It's lucky they have roofs. Look how the clouds

are gathering!"

 

As much more room had been made upon the piazzas by the assignment of

men to the cabins, Colonel Winchester and some of his officers also

rested there. Dick, lying between the two blankets which he always

carried in a roll tied to his saddle, was very comfortable now, with his

head on his knapsack. The night had turned cooler, and, save when faint

and far lightning quivered, it was heavy and dark with clouds. But the

young lieutenants, hardened by two years of war and life in the open,

felt snug and cosy on the broad, sheltered piazza. It was not often they

found such good quarters, and Dick, like Colonel Winchester, was truly

thankful that they had reached Bellevue before the coming storm.

 

It was evident now that the night was going to be wild. The lightning

grew brighter and came nearer, cutting fiercely across the southern sky.

The ominous rumble of thunder, which reminded Dick so much of the mutter

of distant battle, came from the horizon on which the lightning was

flashing.

 

Colonel Winchester, Pennington and Warner had gone to sleep, but Dick

was wakeful. He had again that feeling of pity for the people who had

been compelled to flee from such a house, and who might lose it forever.

It seemed to him that all the men, save himself and the sentinels, were

asleep, sleeping with the soundness and indifference to surroundings

shown by men who took their sleep when they could.

 

The horses stamped and moved uneasily beneath the threat of the

advancing storm, but the men slept heavily on.

 

Dick knew that the sentinels were awake and watchful. They had a

wholesome dread of Forrest and Wheeler, those wild riders of the South.

Some of them had been present at that terrible surprise in Tennessee,

and they were not likely to be careless when they were sure that Forrest

might be near, but he remained uneasy nevertheless, and, although he

closed his eyes and sought a soft place for his head on the saddle,

sleep did not come.

 

He was sure that his apprehension did not come from any fear of an

attack by Forrest or Wheeler. It was deeper-seated. The inherited sense

that belonged to his great grandfather, who had lived his life in the

wilderness, was warning him. It was not superstition. It seemed to Dick

merely the palpable result of an inheritance that had gone into the

blood. His famous great-grandfather, Paul Cotter, and his famous friend,

Henry Ware, had lived so much and so long among dangers that the very

air indicated to them when they were at hand.

 

Dick looked down the long piazza, so long that the men at either end of

it were hidden by darkness. The tall trees in the grounds were nodding

before the wind, and the lightning flashed incessantly in the southwest.

The thunder was not loud, but it kept up a continuous muttering and

rumbling. The rain was coming in fitful gusts, but he knew that it would

soon drive hard and for a long time.

 

Everybody within Dick's area of vision was sound asleep, except himself.

Colonel Winchester lay with his head on his arm and his slumber was so

deep that he was like one dead. Warner had not stirred a particle in the

last half-hour. Dick was angry at himself because he could not sleep.

Let the storm burst! It might drive on the wide roof of the piazza

and the steady beating sound would make his sleep all the sounder and

sweeter. He recalled, as millions of American lads have done, the days

when he lay in his bed just under the roof and heard hail and sleet

drive against it, merely to make him feel all the snugger in the bed

with his covers drawn around him.

 

The fitful gusts of rain ceased, and then it came with a steady pour and

roar, driving directly down, thus leaving the men on the outer edges of

the piazzas untouched and dry. Still, Dick did not sleep, and at last

he arose and walked softly into the house. Here the sense of danger

grew stronger. He was reminded again of his early boyhood, when some one

blindfolded was told to find a given object, and the others called "hot"

when he was near or "cold" when he was away. He was feeling hot now.

That inherited sense, the magnetic feeling out of the past, was warning

him.

 

Dick felt sure that some one not of their regiment was in the building.

He neither saw nor heard the least sign of a presence, but he was

absolutely certain that he was not alone within Bellevue. Since the

lightning had ceased it was pitchy dark inside. There was a wide hall

running through the building, with windows above the exits, but he saw

nothing through them save the driving rain and the dim outline of the

threshing trees.

 

He turned into one of the side rooms, and then he paused and pushed

himself against the wall. He was sure now that he heard a soft footstep.

The darkness was so intense that it could be felt like a mist. He waited

but he did not hear it again, and then he began to make his way around

the wall, stepping as lightly as he could.

 

He had gone through most of the rooms at their arrival and he still

retained a clear idea of the interior of the house. He knew that there

was another door on the far side of the chamber in which he stood, and

he meant to follow the wall until he reached it. Some one had been in

the room with him and Dick believed that he was leaving by the far door.

 

While he heard no further footsteps he felt a sudden light draught on

his face and he knew that the door had been opened and shut. He might

go to Colonel Winchester and tell him that a lurking spy or somebody

of that character was in the house, but what good would it do? A spy

at such a time and in such a place could not harm them, and the whole

regiment would be disturbed for nothing. He would follow the chase

alone.

 

He found the door and passed into the next room. Its windows opened upon

the southern piazza and two or three shutters were thrown back. A faint

light entered and Dick saw that no one was there but himself. He could

discern the dim figures of the soldiers sleeping on the piazza and

beyond a cluster of the small pines grown on lawns.

 

Dick felt that he had lost the trail for the time, but he did not intend

to give it up. Doubtless the intruder was some one who knew the house

and who was also aware of his presence inside. He also felt that he

would not be fired upon, because the stranger himself would not wish to

bring the soldiers down upon him. So, with a hand upon his pistol butt,

he opened the side door and followed once more into the darkness.

 

The ghostly chase went on for a full half-hour, Dick having nothing to

serve him save an occasional light footfall. There was one period of

more than half an hour when he lost the fugitive entirely. He wandered

up to the second floor and then back again. There, in a room that had

been the library, he caught a glimpse of the man. But the figure was so

shadowy that he could tell nothing about him.

 

"Halt!" cried Dick, snatching out his pistol. But when he leveled it

there was nothing to aim at. The figure had melted away, or rather it

had flitted through another door. Dick followed, chagrined. The stranger

seemed to be playing with him. Obviously, it was some one thoroughly

acquainted with the house, and that brought to Dick's mind the thought

that he himself, instead of the other man, was the stranger there.

 

He came at last to a passage which led to the kitchen, a great room,

because many people were often guests at Bellevue,