The Killer Angels

1. THE SPY.

He rode into the dark of the woods and dismounted.

He crawled upward on his belly over cool rocks out into the sunlight, and suddenly he was in the open and he could see for miles, and there was the whole vast army below him, filling the valley like a smoking river. It came out of a blue rainstorm in the east and overflowed the narrow valley road, coiling along a stream, narrowing and choking a white bridge, fading out into the yellowish dust of June but still visible on the farther road beyond the blue hills, spiked with flags and guidons like a great chopped bristly snake, the snake ending headless in a blue wall of summer rain.

The spy tucked himself behind a boulder and began counting flags. Must be twenty thousand men, visible all at once. Two whole Union Corps. He could make out the familiar black hats of the Iron Brigade, troops belonging to John Reynolds’ First Corps. He looked at his watch, noted the time. They were coming very fast. The Army of the Potomac had never moved this fast. The day was murderously hot and there was no wind and the dust hung above the army like a yellow veil. He thought: there’ll be some of them die of the heat today. But they are coming faster than they ever came before.

He slipped back down into the cool dark and rode slowly downhill toward the silent empty country to the north. With luck he could make the Southern line before nightfall. After nightfall it would be dangerous. But he must not seem to hurry. The horse was already tired. And yet there was the pressure of that great blue army behind him, building like water behind a cracking dam. He rode out into the open, into the land between the armies.

There were fat Dutch barns, prim German orchards. But there were no cattle in the fields and no horses, and houses everywhere were empty and dark. He was alone in the heat and the silence, and then it began to rain and he rode head down into monstrous lightning. All his life he had been afraid of lightning but he kept riding. He did not know where the Southern headquarters was but he knew it had to be somewhere near Chambersburg. He had smelled out the shape of Lee’s army in all the rumors and bar talk and newspapers and hysteria he had drifted through all over eastern Pennsylvania, and on that day he was perhaps the only man alive who knew the positions of both armies. He carried the knowledge with a hot and lovely pride. Lee would be near Chambersburg, and wherever Lee was Longstreet would not be far away. So finding the headquarters was not the problem. The problem was riding through a picket line in the dark.

The rain grew worse. He could not even move in under a tree because of the lightning. He had to take care not to get lost. He rode quoting Shakespeare from memory, thinking of the picket line ahead somewhere in the dark. The sky opened and poured down on him and he rode on: it will be rain tonight: let it come down. That was a speech of murderers. He had been an actor once. He had no stature and a small voice and there were no big parts for him until the war came, and now he was the only one who knew how good he was. If only they could see him work, old cold Longstreet and the rest. But everyone hated spies. I come a single spy. Wet single spy. But they come in whole battalions. The rain began to ease off and he spurred the horse to a trot. My kingdom for a horse. Jolly good line. He went on, reciting Henry the Fifth aloud: “Once more into the breech…”

Late that afternoon he came to a crossroad and the sign of much cavalry having passed this way a few hours ago. His own way led north to Chambersburg, but he knew that Longstreet would have to know who these people were so close to his line. He debated a moment at the crossroads, knowing there was no time. A delay would cost him daylight. Yet he was a man of pride and the tracks drew him. Perhaps it was only Jeb Stuart. The spy thought hopefully, wistfully: if it’s Stuart I can ask for an armed escort all the way home. He turned and followed the tracks.

After a while he saw a farmhouse and a man standing out in a field, in a peach orchard, and he spurred that way. The man was small and bald with large round arms and spoke very bad English. The spy went into his act: a simpleminded farmer seeking a runaway wife, terrified of soldiers.

The bald man regarded him sweatily, disgustedly, told him the soldiers just gone by were “plu” soldiers, Yankees. The spy asked: what town lies yonder? and the farmer told him Gettysburg, but the name meant nothing. The spy turned and spurred back to the crossroads. Yankee cavalry meant John Buford’s column. Moving lickety-split. Where was Stuart? No escort now. He rode back again toward the blue hills. But the horse could not be pushed. He had to dismount and walk.

That was the last sign of Yankees. He was moving up across South Mountain; he was almost home. Beyond South Mountain was Lee and, of course, Longstreet. A strange friendship; grim and gambling Longstreet, formal and pious old Bobby Lee. The spy wondered at it, and then the rain began again, bringing more lightning but at least some cooler air, and he tucked himself in under his hat and went back to Hamlet. Old Jackson was dead. Good night, sweet Prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest…

He rode into darkness. No longer any need to hurry. He left the roadway at last and moved out in to a field away from the lightning and the trees and sat in the rain to eat a lonely supper, trying to make up his mind whether it was worth the risk of going on. He was very close; he could begin to feel them up ahead. There was no way of knowing when or where, but suddenly they would be there in the road, stepping phantomlike out of the trees wearing those sick eerie smiles, and other men with guns would suddenly appear all around him, prodding him in the back with hard steel barrels, as you prod an animal, and he would have to be lucky, because few men rode out at night on good and honest business, not now, this night, in this invaded country.

He rode slowly up the road, not really thinking, just moving, reluctant to stop. He was weary. Fragments of Hamlet flickered in his brain: If it be not now, yet it will come. Ripeness is all. Now there’s a good part. A town ahead. A few lights. And then he struck the picket line.

There was a presence in the road, a liquid Southern voice. He saw them outlined in lightning, black ragged figures rising around him. A sudden lantern poured yellow light. He saw one bleak hawkish grinning face; hurriedly he mentioned Longstreet’s name. With some you postured and with some you groveled and with some you were imperious.

But you could do that only by daylight, when you could see the faces and gauge the reaction. And now he was too tired and cold. He sat and shuddered: an insignificant man on a pale and muddy horse. He turned out to be lucky. There was a patient sergeant with a long gray beard who put him under guard and sent him along up the dark road to Longstreet’s headquarters.

He was not safe even now, but he could begin to relax.

He rode up the long road between picket fires, and he could hear them singing in the rain, chasing each other in the dark of the trees. A fat and happy army, roasting meat and fresh bread, telling stories in the dark. He began to fall asleep on the horse; he was home. But they did not like to see him sleep, and one of them woke him up to remind him, cheerily, that if there was no one up there who knew him, why, then, unfortunately, they’d have to hang him, and the soldier said it just to see the look on his face, and the spy shivered, wondering. Why do there have to be men like that, men who enjoy another man’s dying?

Longstreet was not asleep. He lay on the cot watching the lightning flare in the door of the tent. It was very quiet in the grove and there was the sound of the raindrops continuing to fall from the trees although the rain had ended. When Sorrel touched him on the arm he was glad of it; he was thinking of his dead children.

”Sir? You asked to be awakened if Harrison came back.”

”Yes.” Longstreet got up quickly and put on the old blue robe and the carpet slippers. He was a very big man and he was full-bearded and wild-haired. He thought of the last time he’d seen the spy, back in Virginia, tiny man with a face like a weasel: “And where will your headquarters be, General, up there in Pennsylvania? T’is a big state indeed.”

Him standing there with cold gold clutched in a dirty hand.

And Longstreet had said icily, cheerily, “It will be where it will be. If you cannot find the headquarters of this whole army you cannot be much of a spy.” And the spy had said stiffly, “Scout, sir. I am a scout. And I am a patriot, sir.”

Longstreet had grinned. We are all patriots. He stepped out into the light. He did not know what to expect. He had not really expected the spy to come back at all.

The little man was there: a soggy spectacle on a pale and spattered horse. He sat grinning wanly from under the floppy brim of a soaked and dripping hat. Lightning flared behind him; he touched his cap.

”Your servant. General. May I come down?”

Longstreet nodded. The guard backed off. Longstreet told Sorrel to get some coffee. The spy slithered down from the horse and stood grinning foolishly, shivering, mouth slack with fatigue.

”Well, sir-“ the spy chuckled, teeth chattering-“you see, I was able to find you after all.”

Longstreet sat at the camp table on a wet seat, extracted a cigar, lighted it. The spy sat floppily, mouth still open, breathing deeply.

”It has been a long day. I’ve ridden hard all this day.”

”What have you got?”

”I came through the pickets at night, you know. That can be very touchy.”

Longstreet nodded. He watched, he waited. Sorrel came with steaming coffee; the cup burned Longstreet’s fingers.

Sorrel sat, gazing curiously, distastefully at the spy.

The spy guzzled, then sniffed Longstreet’s fragrant smoke. Wistfully: “I say. General, I don’t suppose you’ve got another of those? Good Southern tobacco?”

”Directly,” Longstreet said. “What have you got?”

”I’ve got the position of the Union Army.”

Longstreet nodded, showing nothing. He had not known the Union Army was on the move, was within two hundred miles, was even this side of the Potomac, but he nodded and said nothing. The spy asked for a map and began pointing out the positions of the corps.

”They’re coming in seven corps. I figure at least eighty thousand men, possibly as much as a hundred thousand.

When they’re all together they’ll outnumber you, but they’re not as strong as they were; the two-year enlistments are running out. The First Corps is here. The Eleventh is right behind it. John Reynolds is in command of the lead elements. I saw him at Taneytown this morning.”

”Reynolds,” Longstreet said.

”Yes, sir.”

”You saw him yourself?”

The spy grinned, nodded, rubbed his nose, chuckled.

”So close I could touch him. It was Reynolds all right.”

”This morning. At Taneytown.”

”Exactly. You didn’t know any of that, now did you, General?” The spy bobbed his head with delight. “You didn’t even know they was on the move, did ye? I thought not. You wouldn’t be spread out so thin if you knowed they was comin’.”

Longstreet looked at Sorrel. The aide shrugged silently If this was true, there would have been some word. Longstreet’s mind moved over it slowly He said: “How did you know we were spread out?”

”I smelled it out.” The spy grinned, fox-like, toothy “Listen, General, I’m good at this business.”

”Tell me what you know of our position.”

”Well, now I can’t be too exact on this, ‘cause I aint scouted you myself, but I gather that you’re spread from York up to Harrisburg and then back to Chambersburg, with the main body around Chambersburg and General Lee just ‘round the bend.”

It was exact. Longstreet thought: if this one knows it, they will know it. He said slowly, “We’ve had no word of Union movement.”

The spy bobbed with joy “I knew it. Thass why I hurried. Came through that picket line in the dark and all. I don’t know if you realize, General-“ Sorrell said coldly, “Sir, don’t you think, if this man’s story was true, that we would have heard something?”

Sorrel did not approve of spies. The spy grimaced, blew.

”You aint exactly on friendly ground no more. Major. This aint Virginia no more.”

True, Longstreet thought. But there would have been something. Stuart? Longstreet said, “General Stuart’s cavalry went out a few days back. He hasn’t reported any movement.”

The spy shrugged, exasperated, glooming at Sorrel.

Sorrel turned his back, looked at his fingernails.

Longstreet said, “What have you heard of Stuart?”

”Not much. He’s riding in the north somewhere. Stirring up headlines and fuss, but I never heard him do any real damage.”

Longstreet said, “If the Union Army were as close as you say, one would think-“ “Well, I’m damned,” the spy said, a small rage flaming.

”I come through that picket line in the dark and all. Listen, General, I tell you this: I don’t know what old Stuart is doing and I don’t care, but I done my job and this is a fact.

This here same afternoon of this here day I come on the tracks of Union cavalry thick as fleas, one whole brigade and maybe two, and them bluebellies weren’t no four hours hard ride from this here now spot, and that, by God, is the Lord’s truth.” He blew again, meditating. Then he added, by way of amendment, “Buford’s column, I think it was. To be exact.”

Longstreet thought: can’t be true. But he was an instinctive man, and suddenly his brain knew and his own temper boiled. Jeb Stuart… was joyriding. God damn him. Longstreet turned to Sorrel.

”All right. Major. Send to General Lee. I guess we’ll have to wake him up. Get my horse.”

Sorrel started to say something, but he knew that you did not argue with Longstreet. He moved.

The spy said delightedly, “General Lee? Do I get to see General Lee? Well now.” He stood up and took off the ridiculous hat and smoothed wet plastered hair across a balding skull. He glowed. Longstreet got the rest of the information and went back to his tent and dressed quickly.

If the spy was right the army was in great danger. They could be cut apart and cut off from home and destroyed in detail, piece by piece. If the spy was right, then Lee would have to turn, but the old man did not believe in spies nor in any information you had to pay for, had not approved of the money spent or even the idea behind it. And the old man had faith in Stuart, and why in God’s name had Stuart sent nothing, not even a courier, because even Stuart wasn’t fool enough to let the whole damned Army of the Potomac get this close without word, not one damned lonesome word.

Longstreet went back out into the light. He had never believed in this invasion. Lee and Davis together had overruled him. He did not believe in offensive warfare when the enemy outnumbered you and outgunned you and would come looking for you anyway if you waited somewhere on your own ground. He had not argued since leaving home, but the invasion did not sit right in his craw; the whole scheme lay edgewise and raspy in his brain, and treading here on alien ground, he felt a cold wind blowing, a distant alarm. Only instinct. No facts as yet. The spy reminded him about the cigar. It was a short way through the night to Lee’s headquarters, and they rode past low sputtering campfires with the spy puffing exuberant blue smoke like a happy furnace.

” ‘Tis a happy army you’ve got here, General,” the spy chatted with approval. “I felt it the moment I crossed the picket line. A happy army, eager for the fight. Singing and all. You can feel it in the air. Not like them bluebellies. A desperate tired lot. I tell you. General, this will be a factor.

The bluebellies is almost done. Why, do you know what I see everywhere I go? Disgraceful, it is. On every street in every town, able-bodied men. Just standing there, by the thousands, reading them poor squeaky pitiful newspapers about this here mighty invasion and the last gasp of the Union and how every man must take up arms, haw.” The spy guffawed. “Like a bunch of fat women at church.

The war’s almost over. You can feel it. General. The end is in the air.”

Longstreet said nothing. He was beginning to think of what to do if the spy was right. If he could not get Lee to turn now there could be disaster. And yet if the Union Army was truly out in the open at last there was a great opportunity: a sudden move south, between Hooker and Washington, cut them off from Lincoln. Yes. Longstreet said, “What do you hear of Hooker? Where is he?”

The spy stopped, mouth sagging. “Oh by Jesus. Forgive me.” He grimaced, shook his head. “I done forgot. There was an item in the newspaper this morning. Saying that Hooker was replaced. They gave the command to Meade, I think it was.”

”George Meade?”

”Yes, sir. I think.”

”You’re sure?”

”Well, it was Meade the newspaper said, but you know them damn newspapers.”

Longstreet thought: new factor. He spurred the horse, but he couldn’t move fast because of the dark. Lee must listen.

God bless the politicians. Reynolds was their best man.

Why did they go to Meade? But I’m sorry to see Hooker go.

Old Fighting Joe. Longstreet said, “It was Meade, then, and not Reynolds?”

”Rumor was that Reynolds was offered the job but wouldn’t have it on a plate. That’s what the paper said.”

Old John’s too smart to take it. Not with that idiot Halleck pulling the strings. But Meade? Fussy. Engineer. Careful.

No genius for sure. But a new factor. A Pennsylvania man.

He will know this country.

The spy chatted on amiably. He seemed to need to talk.

He was saying, “Strange thing about it all, thing that bothers me is that when you do this job right nobody knows you’re doing it, nobody ever watches you work, do you see? And sometimes I can’t help but wish I had an audience.

I’ve played some scenes, ah, General, but I’ve been lovely.” The spy sighed, puffed, sighed again. “This current creation, now, is marvelous. I’m a poor half-witted farmer, do you see, terrified of soldiers, and me lovely young wife has run off with a drummer and I’m out ascourin’ the countryside for her, a sorrowful pitiful sight am. And people lookin’ down their noses and grinnin’ behind me back and all the time tellin’ me exactly what I want to know about who is where and how many and how long ago, and them not even knowin’ they’re doin’ it, too busy feelin’ contemptuous. There are many people. General, that don’t give a damn for a human soul, do you know that? The strange thing is, after playing this poor fool farmer for a while I can’t help but feel sorry for him.

Because nobody cares.”

They came to Lee’s camp, in the grove just south of Chambersburg. By the time they got there Longstreet knew that the spy was telling the truth. Young Walter Taylor was up, annoyed, prissy, defending General Lee’s night’s rest even against Longstreet, who glowed once with the beginning of rage, and sent Taylor off to get the old man out of bed. They dismounted and waited. The spy sat under an awning, grinning with joy at the prospect of meeting Lee.

Longstreet could not sit down. He disliked getting the old man up: Lee had not been well. But you could lose the war up here. Should have gone to Vicksburg. News from there very bad. It will fall, and after that… we must win here if we are to win at all, and we must do it soon. The rain touched him; he shivered. Too damn much rain would muck up the roads.

Lee came out into the light. The spy hopped to attention.

Lee bowed slightly, stiffly.

”Gentlemen.”

He stood bareheaded in the rain: regal, formal, a beautiful white-haired, white-bearded old man in a faded blue robe. He looked haggard. Longstreet thought: he looks older every time you see him. For a moment the spy was silent, enraptured, then he bowed suddenly from the waist, widely, formally, gracefully, plucking the floppy hat from the balding head and actually sweeping the ground with it, dandy, ridiculous, something off a stage somewhere designed for a king.

”General,” the spy said grandly, “a votre service.” He said something else in a strange and southern French.

Longstreet was startled at the transformation.

Lee glanced at Longstreet: a silent question. Longstreet said, “Beg pardon, sir. I thought this urgent. The man has information.”

Lee looked at the spy silently. His face showed nothing.

Then he said formally, “Sir, you must excuse me, I do not know your name.”

”The name is Harrison, sir, at present.” The spy grinned toothily. “The name of an ex-President, ex-General. A small joke, sir. One must keep one’s sense of humor.”

Lee glanced again at Longstreet. Longstreet said, “The man has the position of the Union Army. He says they are very close. I have a map.”

He moved to the map table, under the awning. The spy followed with reproach. Lee came slowly to the table, watching the man. After a moment he said to Harrison, “I understand that you are General Longstreet’s”-a slight pause-“’scout.’” Lee would not use the word spy. “I believe we saw you last back in Virginia.”

”That’s a fact,” the spy worshipped. “I been kind of circulatin’ since, amongst the bluebellies, and I tell you, General, sir, that it’s an honor and a priv-“ Longstreet said, “He claims their lead elements are here.

He says there is a column of strong Union cavalry not four hours off.”

Lee looked at the map. Then he sat down and looked more closely. Longstreet gave the positions, the spy fluttering moth-like behind him with numbers and names and dates. Lee listened without expression.

Longstreet finished. “He estimates perhaps one hundred thousand men.”

Lee nodded. But estimates meant nothing. He sat for a moment staring at the map and then bowed his head slightly.

Longstreet thought: he doesn’t believe. Then Lee raised his eyes and regarded the spy.

”You appear to have ridden hard. Have you come a long way?”

”Sir, I sure have.”

”And you came through the picket line after dark?”

”Yes, sir-“ the spy’s head bobbed-“I did indeed.”

”We are in your debt.” Lee stared at the map. “Thank you. Now I’m sure General Longstreet will see to your accommodations.” The spy was dismissed, had sense enough to know it. He rose reluctantly. He said, “It has been my pleasure, sir, to have served such a man as yourself. God bless you, sir.”

Lee thanked him again. Longstreet instructed Sorrel to see that the man was fed and given a tent for the night and to be kept where Longstreet could find him if he needed him, which meant: keep an eye on him. The spy went out into the dark. Longstreet and Lee sat alone at the table in the rain.

Lee said softly, “Do you believe this man?”

”No choice.”

”I suppose not.” Lee rubbed his eyes, leaned forward on the table. With his right hand he held the muscle of his left arm. He shook his head slowly. “Am I to move on the word of a paid spy?”

”Can’t afford not to.”

”There should have been something from Stuart.”

”There should have been.”

”Stuart would not have left us blind.”

”He’s joyriding again,” Longstreet said. “This time you ought to stomp him. Really stomp him.”

Lee shook his head. “Stuart would not leave us blind.”

”We’ve got to turn,” Longstreet said. His heart was beating strongly. It was bad to see the indomitable old man weak and hatless in the early morning, something soft in his eyes, pain in his face, the right hand rubbing the pain in the arm. Longstreet said, “We can’t risk it. If we don’t concentrate they’ll chop us up.”

Lee said nothing. After a moment Longstreet told him about Meade. Lee said, “They should have gone to Reynolds.”

”Thought so too. I think he turned it down.”

Lee nodded. He smiled slightly. “I would have preferred to continue against General Hooker.”

Longstreet grinned. “Me too.”

”Meade will be… cautious. It will take him some time to take command, to organize a staff. I think… perhaps we should move quickly. There may be an opportunity here.”

”Yes. If we swing in behind him and cut him off from Washington…”

”If your man is correct.”

”We’ll find out.”

Lee bent toward the map. The mountains rose like a rounded wall between them and the Union Army. There was one gap east of Chambersburg and beyond that all the roads came together, web-like, at a small town. Lee put his finger on the map.

”What town is that?”

Longstreet looked. “ Gettysburg,” he said.

Lee nodded. “Well-“ he was squinting-“I see no reason to delay. It’s their army I’m after, not their towns.”

He followed the roads with his finger, all converging on that one small town. “I think we should concentrate in this direction. This road junction will be useful.”

”Yes,” Longstreet said.

Lee looked up with black diamond eyes. “We’ll move at first light.”

Longstreet felt a lovely thrill. Trust the old man to move.

”Yes, sir.”

Lee started to rise. A short while ago he had fallen from a horse onto his hands, and when he pushed himself up from the table Longstreet saw him wince. Longstreet thought: go to sleep and let me do it. Give the order and I’ll do it all. He said, “I regret the need to wake you, sir.”

Lee looked past him into the soft blowing dark. The rain had ended. A light wind was moving in the tops of the pines-cool sweet air, gentle and clean. Lee took a deep breath.

”A good time of night. I have always liked this time of night.”

”Yes.”

”Well.” Lee glanced once almost shyly at Longstreet’s face, then looked away. They stood for a moment in awkward silence. They had been together for a long time in war and they had grown very close, but Lee was ever formal and Longstreet was inarticulate, so they stood for a long moment side by side without speaking, not looking at each other, listening to the raindrops fall in the leaves. But the silent moment was enough. After a while Lee said slowly, “When this is over, I shall miss it very much.”

”Yes.”

”I do not mean the fighting.”

”No.”

”Well,” Lee said. He looked to the sky. “It is all in God’s hands.”

They said good night. Longstreet watched the old man back to his tent. Then he mounted and rode alone back to his camp to begin the turning of the army, all the wagons and all the guns, down the narrow mountain road that led to Gettysburg. It was still a long dark hour till dawn. He sat alone on his horse in the night and he could feel the army asleep around him, all those young hearts beating in the dark. They would need their rest now. He sat alone to await the dawn, and let them sleep a little longer.

2. CHAMBERLAIN.

He dreamed of Maine and ice black water; he awoke to a murderous sun. A voice calling: “Colonel, darlin’.” He squinted: the whiskery face of Buster Kilrain.

”Colonel, darlin’, I hate to be a-wakin’ ye, but there’s a message here ye ought to be seein’.”

Chamberlain had slept on the ground; he rolled to a sitting position. Light boiled in through the tent flap.

Chamberlain closed his eyes.

”And how are ye feelin’ this momin’. Colonel, me lad?”

Chamberlain ran his tongue around his mouth. He said briefly, dryly, “Ak.”

”We’re about to be havin’ guests, sir, or I wouldn’t be wakin’ ye.”

Chamberlain looked up through bleary eyes. He had walked eighty miles in four days through the hottest weather he had ever known and he had gone down with sunstroke.

He felt eerie fragility, like a piece of thin glass in a high hot wind. He saw a wooden canteen, held in the big hand of Kilrain, cold drops of water on varnished sides. He drank.

The world focused.

”… one hundred and twenty men,” Kilrain said.

Chamberlain peered at him.

”They should be arriving any moment,” Kilrain said. He was squatting easily, comfortably, in the opening of the tent, the light flaming behind him.

”Who?” Chamberlain said.

”They are sending us some mutineers,” Kilrain said with fatherly patience. “One hundred and twenty men from the old Second Maine, which has been disbanded.”

”Mutineers?”

”Ay. What happened was that the enlistment of the old Second ran out and they were all sent home except one hundred and twenty, which had foolishly signed three-year papers, and so they all had one year to go, only they all thought they was signing to fight with the Second, and Second only, and so they mutinied. One hundred and twenty. Are you all right. Colonel?”

Chamberlain nodded vaguely.

”Well, these poor fellers did not want to fight no more, naturally, being Maine men of a certain intelligence, and refused, only nobody will send them home, and nobody knew what to do with them, until they thought of us, being as we are the other Maine regiment here in the army. There’s a message here signed by Meade himself. That’s the new General we got now, sir, if you can keep track as they go by. The message says they’ll be sent here this morning and they are to fight, and if they don’t fight you can feel free to shoot them.”

”Shoot?”

”Ay.”

”Let me see.” Chamberlain read painfully. His head felt very strange indeed, but he was coming awake into the morning as from a long way away and he could begin to hear the bugles out across the fields. Late to get moving today. Thank God. Somebody gave us an extra hour. Bless him. He read:… you are therefore authorized to shoot any man who refuses to do his duty. Shoot?

He said, “These are all Maine men?”

”Yes, sir. Fine big fellers. I’ve seen them. Loggin’ men.

You may remember there was a bit of a brawl some months back, during the mud march? These fellers were famous for their fists.”

Chamberlain said, “One hundred and twenty.”

”Yes, sir.”

”Somebody’s crazy.”

”Yes, sir.”

”How many men do we now have in this Regiment?”

”Ah, somewhat less than two hundred and fifty, sir, as of yesterday. Countin’ the officers.”

”How do I take care of a hundred and twenty mutinous men?”

”Yes, sir,” Kilrain sympathized. “Well, you’ll have to talk to them, sir.”

Chamberlain sat for a long moment silently trying to function. He was thirty-four years old, and on this day one year ago he had been a professor of rhetoric at Bowdoin College. He had no idea what to do. But it was time to go out into the sun. He crawled forward through the tent flap and stood up, blinking, swaying, one hand against the bole of a tree. He was a tall man, somewhat picturesque. He wore stolen blue cavalry trousers and a three-foot sword, and the clothes he wore he had not taken off for a week. He had a grave, boyish dignity, that clean-eyed, scrubbedbrain, naive look of the happy professor.

Kilrain, a white-haired man with the build of an ape, looked up at him with fatherly joy “If ye’ll ride the horse today, Colonel, which the Lord hath provided, instead of walkin’ in the dust with the others fools, ye’ll be all right- if ye wear the hat. It’s the walkin’, do you see, that does the great harm.”

”You walked,” Chamberlain said grumpily, thinking: shoot them? Maine men? How can I shoot Maine men? I’ll never be able to go home.

”Ah, but. Colonel, darlin’, I’ve been in the infantry since before you was bom. It’s them first few thousand miles.

After that, a man gets a limber to his feet.”

”Hey, Lawrence. How you doin’?”

Younger brother, Tom Chamberlain, bright-faced, high-voiced, a new lieutenant, worshipful. The heat had not seemed to touch him. Chamberlain nodded. Tom said critically, “You lookin’ kinda peaked. Why don’t you ride the horse?”

Chamberlain gloomed. But the day was not as bright as it had seemed through the opening of the tent. He looked upward with relief toward a darkening sky. The troops were moving in the fields, but there had been no order to march.

The wagons were not yet loaded. He thought: God bless the delay. His mind was beginning to function. All down the road and all through the trees the troops were moving, cooking, the thousands of troop and thousands of wagons of the Fifth Corps, Army of the Potomac, of which Chamberlain’s 20th Maine was a minor fragment. But far down the road there was motion.

Kilrain said, “There they come.”

Chamberlain squinted. Then he saw troops on the road, a long way off.

The line of men came slowly up the road. There were guards with fixed bayonets. Chamberlain could see the men shuffling, strange pathetic spectacle, dusty, dirty, ragged men, heads down, faces down: it reminded him of a history book picture of impressed seamen in the last war with England. But these men would have to march all day, in the heat. Chamberlain thought: not possible.

Tom was meditating. “Gosh, Lawrence. There’s almost as many men there as we got in the whole regiment. How we going to guard them?”

Chamberlain said nothing. He was thinking: How do you force a man to fight-for freedom? The idiocy of it jarred him. Think on it later. Must do something now.

There was an officer, a captain, at the head of the column.

The Captain turned them in off the road and herded them into an open space in the field near the Regimental flag. The men of the Regiment, busy with coffee, stood up to watch.

The Captain had a loud voice and used obscene words. He assembled the men in two long ragged lines and called them to attention, but they ignored him. One slumped to the ground, more exhaustion than mutiny. A guard came forward and yelled and probed with a bayonet, but abruptly several more men sat down and then they all did, and the Captain began yelling, but the guards stood grinning confusedly, foolishly, having gone as far as they would go, unwilling to push further unless the men here showed some threat, and the men seemed beyond threat, merely enormously weary. Chamberlain took it all in as he moved toward the Captain. He put his hands behind his back and came forward slowly, studiously. The Captain pulled off dirty gloves and shook his head with contempt, glowering up at Chamberlain.

”Looking for the commanding officer. Twentieth Maine.”

”You’ve found him,” Chamberlain said.

”That’s him all right.” Tom’s voice, behind him, very proud. Chamberlain suppressed a smile.

”You Chamberlain?” The Captain stared at him grimly, insolently, showing what he thought of Maine men.

Chamberlain did not answer for a long moment, looking into the man’s eyes until the eyes suddenly blinked and dropped, and then Chamberlain said softly, “Colonel Chamberlain to you.”

The Captain stood still for a moment, then slowly came to attention, slowly saluted. Chamberlain did not return it. He looked past the Captain at the men, most of whom had their heads down. But there were eyes on him. He looked back and forth down the line, looking for a familiar face.

That would help. But there was no one he knew.

”Captain Brewer, sir. Ah. One-eighteen Pennsylvania.”

The Captain tugged in his coat front, produced a sheaf of papers. “If you’re the commanding officer, sir, then I present you with these here prisoners.” He handed the papers. Chamberlain took them, glanced down, handed them back to Tom. The Captain said, “You’re welcome to ‘em. God knows. Had to use the bayonet to get ‘ em moving. You got to sign for ‘em. Colonel.”

Chamberlain said over his shoulder, “Sign it, Tom.” To the Captain he said, “You’re relieved. Captain.” The Captain nodded, pulling on the dirty gloves. “You’re authorized to use whatever force necessary. Colonel.” He said that loudly, for effect. “If you have to shoot ‘em, why, you go right ahead. Won’t nobody say nothin’.”

”You’re relieved, Captain,” Chamberlain said. He walked past the Captain, closer to the men, who did not move, who did not seem to notice him. One of the guards stiffened as Chamberlain approached, looked past him to his captain. Chamberlain said, “You men can leave now. We don’t need any guards.”

He stood in front of the men, ignoring the guards. They began to move off. Chamberlain stood for a moment looking down. Some of the faces turned up. There was hunger and exhaustion and occasional hatred. Chamberlain said, “My name is Chamberlain. I’m Colonel, Twentieth Maine.”

Some of them did not even raise their heads. He waited another moment. Then he said, “When did you eat last?”

More heads came up. There was no answer. Then a man in the front row said huskily, in a whiskey voice, “We’re hungry, Colonel.”

Another man said, “They been tryin’ to break us by not feedin’ us.” Chamberlain looked: a scarred man, hatless, hair plastered thinly on the scalp like strands of black seaweed. The man said, “We ain’t broke yet.”

Chamberlain nodded. A hard case. But we’ll begin with food. He said, “They just told us you were coming a little while ago. I’ve told the cook to butcher a steer. Hope you like it near to raw; not much time to cook.” Eyes opened wide. He could begin to see the hunger on the faces, like the yellow shine of sickness. He said, “We’ve got a ways to go today and you’ll be coming with us, so you better eat hearty. We’re all set for you back in the trees.” He saw Glazier Estabrook standing huge-armed and peaceful in the shade of a nearby tree. “Glazier,” Chamberlain said, “you show these men where to go. You fellas eat up and then I’ll come over and hear what you have to say.” No man moved. Chamberlain turned away. He did not know what he would do if they did not choose to move. He heard a voice: “Colonel?”

He turned. The scarred man was standing.

”Colonel, we got grievances. The men elected me to talk for ‘em.”

”Right.” Chamberlain nodded. “You come on with me and talk. The rest of you fellas go eat.” He beckoned to the scarred man and waved to Glazier Estabrook. He turned again, not waiting for the men to move off, not sure they would go, began to walk purposefully toward the blessed dark, wondering again how big a guard detail it would take, thinking he might wind up with more men out of action than in, and also: what are you going to say? Good big boys they are. Seen their share of action.

”Gosh, Lawrence,” Tom Chamberlain said.

”Smile,” Chamberlain said cheerily, “and don’t call me Lawrence. Are they moving?” He stopped and glanced pleasantly backward, saw with delight that the men were up and moving toward the trees, toward food. He grinned, plucked a book from his jacket, handed it to Tom.

”Here. This is Casey’s Manual of Infantry Tactics. You study it, maybe someday you’ll make a soldier.” He smiled at the scarred man, extended a hand. “What’s your name?”

The man stopped, looked at him for a long cold second.

The hand seemed to come up against gravity, against his will. Automatic courtesy: Chamberlain was relying on it.

”I’m not usually that informal,” Chamberlain said with the same light, calm, pleasant manner that he had developed when talking to particularly rebellious students who had come in with a grievance and who hadn’t yet learned that the soft answer turneth away wrath. Some wrath. “But I suppose somebody ought to welcome you to the Regiment.”

The man said, “I don’t feel too kindly. Colonel.”

Chamberlain nodded. He went on inside the tent, the scarred man following, and sat down on a camp stool, letting the man stand. He invited the man to have coffee, which the man declined, and then listened silently to the man’s story.

The scarred man spoke calmly and coldly, looking straight into Chamberlain’s eyes. A good stubborn man.

There was a bit of the lawyer about him: he used chunky phrases about law and justice. But he had heavy hands with thick muscular fingers and black fingernails and there was a look of power to him, a coiled tight set to the way he stood, balanced, ugly, slightly contemptuous, but watchful, trying to gauge Chamberlain’s strength.

Chamberlain said, “I see.”

”I been in eleven different engagements. Colonel. How many you been in?”

”Not that many,” Chamberlain said.

”I done my share. We all have. Most of us-“ he gestured out the tent flap into the morning glare-“there’s some of them no damn good but most of them been all the way there and back. Damn good men. Shouldn’t ought to use them this way. Looky here.” He pulled up a pants leg.

Chamberlain saw a purple gash, white scar tissue. The man let the pants leg fall. Chamberlain said nothing. The man looked at his face, seemed suddenly embarrassed, realized he had gone too far. For the first time he was uncertain. But he repeated, “I done my share.”

Chamberlain nodded. The man was relaxing slowly.’ It was warm in the tent; he opened his shirt. Chamberlain said, “What’s your name?”

”Bucklin. Joseph Bucklin.”

”Where you from?”

” Bangor.”

”Don’t know any Bucklins. Farmer?”

”Fishermen.”

Former Sergeant Kilrain put his head in the tent.

”Colonel, there’s a courier comin’.”

Chamberlain nodded. Bucklin said, “I’m tired, Colonel.

You know what I mean? I’m tired. I’ve had all of this army and all of these officers, this damned Hooker and this goddamned idiot Meade, all of them, the whole bloody lousy rotten mess of sick-brained pot-bellied scabheads that aint fit to lead a johnny detail, aint fit to pour pee outen a boot with instructions on the heel. I’m tired. We are good men and we had our own good flag and these goddamned idiots use us like we was cows or dogs or even worse. We aint gonna win this war. We can’t win no how because of these lame-brained bastards from West Point, these goddamned gentlemen, these officers. Only one officer knew what he was doin: McClellan, and look what happened to him. I just as soon go home and let them damn Johnnies go home and the hell with it.”

He let it go, out of breath. He had obviously been waiting to say that to some officer for a long time. Chamberlain said, “I get your point.”

Kilrain announced, “Courier, sir.”

Chamberlain rose, excused himself, stepped out into the sunlight. A bright-cheeked lieutenant, just dismounted, saluted him briskly.

”Colonel Chamberlain, sir. Colonel Vincent, wishes to inform you that the corps is moving out at once and that you are instructed to take the advance. The Twentieth Maine has been assigned to the first position in line. You will send out flankers and advance guards.”

”My compliments to the Colonel.” Chamberlain saluted, turned to Kilrain and Ellis Spear, who had come up. “You |g heard him, boys. Get the Regiment up. Sound the General, strike the tents.” Back inside the tent, he said cheerfully to Bucklin, “We’re moving out. You better hurry up your eating. Tell your men I’ll be over in a minute. I’ll think on what you said.”

Bucklin slipped by him, went away. Chamberlain thought: we’re first in line.

Kilrain.

The former sergeant was back. “Sir.”

”Where we headed?”

”West, sir. Pennsylvania somewhere. That’s all I know.” – “Listen, Buster. You’re a private now and I’m not supposed to keep you at headquarters in that rank. If you want to go on back to the ranks, you just say so, because I feel obligated-well, you don’t have to be here, but listen, I need you.”

”Then I’ll be stayin’, Colonel, laddie.” Kilrain grinned.

”But you know I can’t promote you. Not after that episode with the bottle. Did you have to pick an officer?”

Kilrain grinned. “I was not aware of rank, sir, at the time. And he was the target which happened to present itself.”

”Buster, you haven’t got a bottle about?”

”Is the Colonel in need of a drink, sir?”

”I meant… forget it. All right. Buster, move ‘em out.”

Kilrain saluted, grinning, and withdrew. The only professional in the regiment. The drinking would kill him. Well.

He would die happy. Now. What do I say to them?

Tom came in, saluted.

”The men from the Second Maine are being fed, sir.”

”Don’t call me sir.”

”Well, Lawrence, Great God A-Mighty-“

”You just be careful of the name business in front of the men. Listen, we don’t want anybody to think there’s favoritism.”

Tom put on the wounded look, face of the ruptured deer.

”General Meade has his son as his adjutant.”

”That’s different. Generals can do anything. Nothing quite so much like God on earth as a general on a battlefield.” The tent was coming down about his head; he stepped outside to avoid the collapse. The General and God was a nice parallel. They have your future in their hands and they have all power and know all. He grinned, thinking of Meade surrounded by his angelic staff: Dan Butterfield, wild Dan Sickles. But what do I say?

”Lawrence, what you goin’ to do?”

Chamberlain shook his head. The regiment was up and moving.

”God, you can’t shoot them. You do that, you’ll never go back to Maine when the war’s over.”

”I know that.” Chamberlain meditated. “Wonder if they do?”

He heard a flare of bugles, looked down the road toward Union Mills. The next regiment, the 83rd Pennsylvania, was up and forming. He saw wagons and ambulances moving out into the road. He could feel again the yellow heat. Must remember to cover up. More susceptible to sunstroke now. Can’t afford a foggy head. He began to walk slowly toward the grove of trees.

Kilrain says tell the truth.

Which is?

Fight. Or we’ll shoot you.

Not true. I won’t shoot anybody.

He walked slowly out into the sunlight. He thought: but the truth is much more than that. Truth is too personal.

Don’t know if I can express it. He paused in the heat.

Strange thing. You would die for it without further question, but you had a hard time talking about it. He shook his head.

I’ll wave no more flags for home. No tears for Mother.

Nobody ever died for apple pie.

He walked slowly toward the dark grove. He had a complicated brain and there were things going on back there from time to time that he only dimly understood, so he relied on his instincts, but he was learning all the time. The faith itself was simple: he believed in the dignity of man.

His ancestors were Huguenots, refugees of a chained and bloody Europe. He had learned their stories in the cradle.

He had grown up believing in America and the individual and it was a stronger faith than his faith in God. This was the land where no man had to bow. In this place at last a man could stand up free of the past, free of tradition and blood ties and the curse of royalty and become what he wished to become. This was the first place on earth where the man mattered more than the state. True freedom had begun here and it would spread eventually over all the earth.

But it had begun here. The fact of slavery upon this incredibly beautiful new clean earth was appalling, but more even than that was the horror of old Europe, the curse of nobility, which the South was transplanting to new soil.

They were forming a new aristocracy, a new breed of glittering men, and Chamberlain had come to crush it. But he was fighting for the dignity of man and in that way he was fighting for himself. If men were equal in America, all these former Poles and English and Czechs and blacks, then they were equal everywhere, and there was really no such thing as foreigner; there were only free men and slaves.

And so it was not even patriotism but a new faith. The Frenchman may fight for France, but the American fights for mankind, for freedom; for the people, not the land.

Yet the words had been used too often and the fragments that came to Chamberlain now were weak. A man who has been shot at is a new realist, and what do you say to a realist when the war is a war of ideals? He thought finally Well, I owe them the truth at least. Might’s well begin with that.

The Regiment had begun to form. Chamberlain thought: At least it’ll be a short speech. He walked slowly toward the prisoners.

Glazier Estabrook was standing guard, leaning patiently on his rifle. He was a thick little man of about forty. Except for Kilrain he was the oldest man in the Regiment, the strongest man Chamberlain had ever seen. He waved happily as Chamberlain came up but went on leaning on the rifle. He pointed at one of the prisoners.

”Hey, Colonel, you know who this is? This here is Dan Burns from Orono. I know his daddy. Daddy’s a preacher. You really ought to hear him. Best damn cusser I ever heard. Knows more fine swear words than any man in Maine, I bet. Hee.”

Chamberlain smiled. But the Burns boy was looking at him with no expression. Chamberlain said, “You fellas gather round.”

He stood in the shade, waited while they closed in silently, watchfully around him. In the background the tents were coming down, the wagons were hitching, but some of the men of the Regiment had come out to watch and listen.

Some of the men here were still chewing. But they were quiet, attentive.

Chamberlain waited a moment longer. Now it was quiet in the grove and the clink of the wagons was sharp in the distance. Chamberlain said, “I’ve been talking with Bucklin. He’s told me your problem.”

Some of the men grumbled. Chamberlain heard no words clearly. He went on speaking softly so that they would have to quiet to hear him.

”I don’t know what I can do about it. I’ll do what I can.

I’ll look into it as soon as possible. But there’s nothing I can do today. We’re moving out in a few minutes and we’ll be marching all day and we may be in a big fight before nightfall. But as soon as I can, I’ll do what I can.”

They were silent, watching him. Chamberlain began to relax. He had made many speeches and he had a gift for it.

He did not know what it was, but when he spoke most men stopped to listen. Fanny said it was something in his voice.

He hoped it was there now.

”I’ve been ordered to take you men with me. I’ve been told that if you don’t come I can shoot you. Well, you know I won’t do that. Not Maine men. I won’t shoot any man who doesn’t want this fight. Maybe someone else will, but I won’t. So that’s that.”

He paused again. There was nothing on their faces to lead him.

”Here’s the situation. I’ve been ordered to take you along, and that’s what I’m going to do. Under guard if necessary. But you can have your rifles if you want them. The whole Reb army is up the road a ways waiting for us and this is no time for an argument like this. I tell you this we sure can use you. We’re down below half strength and we need you, no doubt of that. But whether you fight or not is up to you. Whether you come along, well, you’re coming.”

Tom had come up with Chamberlain’s horse. Over the heads of the prisoners Chamberlain could see the Regiment falling into line out in the flaming road. He took a deep breath.

”Well, I don’t want to preach to you. You know who we are and what we’re doing here. But if you’re going to fight alongside us there’s a few things I want you to know.”

He bowed his head, not looking at eyes. He folded his hands together.

”This Regiment was formed last fall, back in Maine.

There were a thousand of us then. There’s not three hundred of us now.” He glanced up briefly. “But what is left is choice.”

He was embarrassed. He spoke very slowly, staring at the ground.

”Some of us volunteered to fight for Union. Some came in mainly because we were bored at home and this looked like it might be fun. Some came because we were ashamed not to. Many of us came… because it was the right thing to do. All of us have seen men die. Most of us never saw a black man back home. We think on that, too. But freedom… is not just a word.”

He looked up in to the sky, over silent faces.

”This is a different kind of army. If you look at history you’ll see men fight for pay, or women, or some other kind of loot. They fight for land, or because a king makes them, or just because they like killing. But we’re here for something new. I don’t… this hasn’t happened much in the history of the world. We’re an army going out to set other men free.”

He bent down, scratched the black dirt into his fingers.

He was beginning to warm to it; the words were beginning to flow. No one in front of him was moving. He said, “This is free ground. All the way from here to the Pacific Ocean. No man has to bow. No man born to royalty. Here we judge you by what you do, not by what your father was. Here you can be something. Here’s a place to build a home. It isn’t the land-there’s always more land. It’s the idea that we all have value, you and me, we’re worth something more than the dirt. I never saw dirt I’d die for, but I’m not asking you to come join us and fight for dirt. What we’re all fighting for, in the end, is each other.”

Once he started talking he broke right through the embarrassment and there was suddenly no longer a barrier there. The words came out of him in a clear river, and he felt himself silent and suspended in the grove listening to himself speak, carried outside himself and looking back down on the silent faces and himself speaking, and he felt the power in him, the power of his cause. For an instant he could see black castles in the air; he could create centuries of screaming, eons of torture. Then he was back in sunlit Pennsylvania. The bugles were blowing and he was done.

He had nothing else to say. No one moved. He felt the embarrassment return. He was suddenly enormously tired.

The faces were staring up at him like white stones. Some heads were down. He said, “Didn’t mean to preach. Sorry.

But I thought… you should know who we are.” He had forgotten how tiring it was just to speak. “Well, this is still the army, but you’re as free as I can make you. Go ahead and talk for a while. If you want your rifles for this fight you’ll have them back and nothing else will be said. If you won’t join us you’ll come along under guard. When this is over I’ll do what I can to see that you get fair treatment.

Now we have to move out.” He stopped, looked at them.

The faces showed nothing. He said slowly, “I think if we lose this fight the war will be over. So if you choose to come with us I’ll be personally grateful. Well. We have to move out.”

He turned, left silence behind him. Tom came up with the horse-a pale-gray light-footed animal. Tom’s face was shiny red.

”My Lawrence, you sure talk pretty.”

Chamberlain grunted. He was really tired. Rest a moment. He paused with his hands on the saddle horn. There was a new vague doubt stirring in his brain. Something troubled him; he did not know why.

”You ride today, Lawrence. You look weary.” Chamberlain nodded. Ellis Spear was up. He was Chamberlain’s ranking officer, an ex-teacher from Wiscasset who was impressed with Chamberlain’s professorship. A shy man, formal, but very competent. He gestured toward the prisoners.

”Colonel, what do you suggest we do with them?”

”Give them a moment. Some of them may be willing to fight. Tom, you go back and see what they say. We’ll have to march them under guard. Don’t know what else to do.

I’m not going to shoot them. We can’t leave them here.”

The Regiment had formed out in the road, the color bearers in front. Chamberlain mounted, put on the wide-brimmed hat with the emblem of the infantry, began walking his horse slowly across the field toward the road.

The uneasiness still troubled him. He had missed something, he did not know what. Well, he was an instinctive man; the mind would tell him sooner or later. Perhaps it was only that when you try to put it into words you cannot express it truly, it never sounds as you dream it. But then… you were asking them to die.

Ellis Speer was saying, “How far are we from Pennsylvania, Colonel, you have any idea?”

”Better than twenty miles.” Chamberlain squinted upward. “Going to be another hot day.”

He moved to the head of the column. The troops were moving slowly, patiently, setting themselves for the long march. After a moment Tom came riding up. His face was delighted. Chamberlain said, “How many are going to join us?”

Tom grinned hugely. “Would you believe it? All but six.”

”How many?”

”I counted, by actual count, one hundred and fourteen.”

”Well.” Chamberlain rubbed his nose, astounded.

Tom said, still grinning, “Brother, you did real good.”

”They’re all marching together?”

”Right. Glazier’s got the six hardheads in tow.”

”Well, get all the names and start assigning them to different companies. I don’t want them bunched up, spread them out. See about their arms.”

”Yes, sir. Colonel, sir.”

Chamberlain reached the head of the column. The road ahead was long and straight, rising toward a ridge of trees.

He turned in his saddle, looked back, saw the entire Fifth Corps forming behind him. He thought: 120 new men. Hardly noticeable in such a mass. And yet… he felt a moment of huge joy. He called for road guards and skirmishers and the Twentieth Maine began to move toward Gettysburg.

3. BUFORD.

The land west of Gettysburg is a series of ridges, like waves in the earth. The first Rebel infantry came in that way, down the narrow gray road from the mountain gap. At noon they were in sight of the town. It was a small neat place: white board houses, rail fences, all in order, one white church steeple. The soldiers coming over the last ridge by the Lutheran Seminary could see across the town to the hills beyond and a winding gray road coming up from the south, and as the first gray troops entered the town there was motion on that southern road: a blur, blue movement, blue cavalry. They came on slowly around the last bend, a long blue smoking snake, spiked with guns and flags. The soldiers looked at each other across vacant fields. The day was very hot; the sky was a steamy haze. Someone lifted a gun and fired, but the range was too long. The streets of Gettysburg were deserted.

Just beyond the town there were two hills. One was wooded and green; the other was flat, topped by a cemetery.

The Union commander, a tall blond sunburned man named John Buford, rode up the long slope to the top of the hill, into the cemetery. He stopped by a stone wall, looked down across flat open ground, lovely clear field of fire. He could see all the way across the town and the ridges to the blue mountains beyond, a darkening sky. On the far side of the town there was a red brick building, the stately Seminary, topped with a white cupola. The road by the building was jammed with Rebel troops. Buford counted half a dozen flags. He had thought it was only a raiding party. Now he sensed power behind it, a road flowing with troops all the way back to the mountains.

The first blue brigade had stopped on the road below, by a red barn. The commander of that brigade. Bill Gamble, came up the hill on a muddy horse, trailed by a small cloud of aides, gazed westward with watery eyes. He wheezed, wiping his nose.

”By God, that’s infantry.”

Buford put the glasses to his eyes. He saw one man on a black horse, waving a plumed hat: an officer. The Rebel troops had stopped. Buford looked around, searching for other movement. He saw a squad of blue troopers, his own men, riding down into deserted streets. Still no sound of gunfire.

Gamble said, “That’s one whole brigade. At least one brigade.”

”Do you see any cavalry?”

Gamble swept the horizon, shook his head.

Strange. Infantry moving alone in enemy country. Blind. Very strange.

Gamble sneezed violently, wiped his nose on his coat, swore, wheezed. His nose had been running all that day He pointed back along the ridge beyond the cemetery.

”If you want to fight here, sir, this sure is lovely ground.

We tuck in here behind this stone wall and I’d be proud to defend it. Best damn ground I’ve seen all day.”

Buford said, “It is that.” But he had only two brigades.

He was only a scout. The big infantry was a long day’s march behind him. But Gamble was right: it was lovely ground.

”By God, I think they’re pulling back.”

Buford looked. The gray troops had turned; they had begun to withdraw back up the road. Slowly, very slowly.

He could see back-turned faces, feel the cold defiance. But he felt himself loosen, begin to breathe.

”Now that’s damned strange.” Gamble sniffled. “What do you make of that?”

Buford shook his head. He rode slowly along the stone wall, suspending judgment. There was no wind at all; it was exactly noon. It was very quiet among the gravestones.

Superb ground. He thought: they must have orders not to fight. Which means they don’t know who we are or how many. Which means they have no cavalry, no eyes. He stopped by a white angel, arm uplifted, a stony sadness. For five days Buford had been tracking Lee’s army, shadowing it from a long way off as you track a big cat. But now the cat had turned.

Buford said aloud, “He’s coming this way.”

”Sir?”

”Lee’s turned. That’s the main body.”

”You think so?” Gamble mused, wriggling his nose.

”Could be. But I would have sworn he was headed for Harrisburg.”

”He was,” Buford said. An idea was blowing in his brain. But there was time to think, time to breathe, and he was a patient man. He sat watching the Rebs withdraw, then he said, “Move your brigades into town. That will make the good citizens happy. I’m going to go have a look.”

He hopped the stone wall, rode down the long slope. He owed a message to Reynolds, back with the infantry, but that could wait until he was sure. He was old army cavalry, Kentucky-born, raised in the Indian wars; he was slow, he was careful, but he sensed something happening, a breathless something in his chest. He rode down through the town and out the road the Rebs had taken. There was no one in the streets, not even dogs, but he saw white faces at windows, a fluttering of curtains. There were no cows anywhere, or chickens, or horses. Reb raiding parties had peeled the land. He rode up toward the brick building with the cupola and topped a crest. Off in the distance there was another rise; he could see the Reb column withdrawing into a blue west. He saw the lone officer, much closer now, sitting regally on horseback, outlined against a darkening sky. The man was looking his way, with glasses. Buford waved. You never knew what old friend was out there. The Reb officer took off his hat, bowed formally. Buford grimaced: a gentleman. A soldier fired at very long range.

Buford saw his staff people duck, but he did not hear the bullet. He thought: they’ll be back in the morning. Lee’s concentrating this way. Only one road down through the mountains; have to come this way. They will all converge here. In the morning.

He turned in his stirrups, looked back at the high ground, the cemetery. The hills rose like watchtowers. All that morning he had seen nothing but flat ground. When the Rebs came in, in the morning, they would move into those hills. And Reynolds would not be here in time.

Gamble rode up, saluting. Tom Devin, the other brigade commander, arrived with a cheery grin. Gamble was sober sane; Devin was more the barroom type.

Buford walked the horse back and forth along the rise. He said aloud, “I wonder where their cavalry is.”

Devin laughed. “The way old Stuart gets around, he could be having dinner in Philadelphia.”

Buford was not listening. He said abruptly, “Get your patrol out. Scout this bunch in front of us, but scout up north. They’ll be coming in that way, from Carlisle. We’ve got a bit of light yet. I want to know before sundown. I think Lee’s turned. He’s coming this way. If I’m right there’ll be a lot of troops up the northern road too. Hop to it.”

They moved. Buford wrote a message to John Reynolds, back with the lead infantry: Have occupied Gettysburg. Contacted large party of Reb infantry. I think they are coming this way.

Expect they will be here in force in the morning.

The word would go from Reynolds to Meade. With any luck at all Meade would read it before midnight. From there it would go by wire to Washington. But some of Stuart’s cavalry had cut the wires and they might not be patched yet, so Washington would be in the dark and screaming its head off. God, that miserable Halleck. Buford took a deep breath. The great joy of the cavalry was to be so far away, out in the clean air, the open spaces, away from those damned councils. There were some moments, like now, when he felt no superior presence at all. Buford shook his head. He had been badly wounded in the winter, and possibly as you got older you had less patience instead of more. But he felt the beautiful absence of a commander, a silence above him, a windy freedom.

The last Reb infantry walked away over the last rise. The Reb officer stood alone for a moment, then waved again and withdrew. The ridge was bare.

Buford sniffed: distant rain. The land around him was hot and dry and the dust of the horses was blowing steadily up from the south as the wind began to pick up, and he could see a darkness in the mountains, black sky, a blaze of lightning. A squadron of Gamble’s cavalry moved slowly up the road. Buford turned again in the saddle, looked back again at the high ground. He shook his head once quickly.

No orders: you are only a scout.

Devin rode back, asking for instructions as to where to place his brigade. He had a cheery boyish face, curly yellow hair. He had much more courage than wisdom. Buford said abruptly, accusing, “You know what’s going to happen in the morning?”

”Sir?”

”The whole damn Reb army’s going to be here in the morning. They’ll move right through town and occupy those damned hills-“ Buford pointed angrily-“because one thing Lee ain’t is a fool, and when our people get here Lee will have the high ground and there’ll be the devil to pay.”

Devin’s eyes were wide. Buford turned. The moods were getting out of hand. He was no man for war councils, or teaching either, and no sense in brooding to junior officers-but he saw it all with such metal brilliance: Meade will come in slowly, cautiously, new to command, wary of reputation. But they’ll be on his back from Washington, wires hot with messages: attack, attack. So he will set up a ring around the hills and when Lee’s all nicely dug in behind fat rocks Meade will finally attack, if he can coordinate the army, straight up the hillside, out in the open in that gorgeous field of fire, and we will attack valiantly and be butchered valiantly, and afterward men will thump their chests and say what a brave charge it was.

The vision was brutally clear: he had to wonder at the clarity of it. Few things in a soldier’s life were so clear as this, so black-line etched that he could actually see the blue troops for one long bloody moment, going up the long slope to the stony top as if it were already done and a memory already, an odd, set, stony quality to it, as if tomorrow had occurred and there was nothing you could do about it, the way you sometimes feel before a foolish attack, knowing it will fail but you cannot stop it or even run away but must even take part and help it fail. But never this clearly. There was always some hope. Never this detail. But if we withdraw-there is no good ground south of here. This is the place to fight.

Devin was watching him warily. Buford was an odd man.

When he rode off there by himself he liked to talk to himself and you could see his lips moving. He had been too long out in the plains.

He looked at Devin, finally saw him. He said abruptly, “No orders yet. Tell your men to dismount and eat. Rest.

Get some rest.”

He rode slowly away to inspect the ground in front of him, between him and the Rebels. If we made a stand here, how long do you think we could hold? Long enough for John Reynolds to get here with the infantry? How long would that take? Will Reynolds hurry? Reynolds is a good man. But he might not understand the situation. How do you make him understand? At this distance. But if you hold, you at least give him time to see the ground. But how long can you hold against Lee’s whole army? If it is the whole army. These are two very good brigades; you built them yourself. Suppose you sacrifice them and Reynolds is late?

For Reynolds will be late. They’re always late.

Think on it, John.

There’s time, there’s time.

The land was long ridges, with streams down in the dark hollows. Dismounted, along a ridge, with all night to dig in, the boys could hold for a while. Good boys. Buford had taught them to fight dismounted, the way they did out west, and the hell with this Stuart business, this glorious Murat charge. Try that against an Indian, that glorious charge, saber a-shining, and he’d drop behind a rock or a stump and shoot your glorious head off as you went by No, Buford had reformed his boys. He had thrown away the silly sabers and the damned dragoon pistols and given them the new repeating carbines, and though there were only 2,500 of them they could dig in behind a fence and hold anybody for a while.

But could they hold long enough?

Wherever he rode he could look back at the hills, dominant as castles. He was becoming steadily more nervous. Easy enough to pull out: the job is done. But he was a professional. Damned few of them in this army. And he would not live forever.

Rain clouds blotted the western sun. The blue mountains were gone. Gamble’s first scouts rode back to report that the Rebs had gone into camp just down the road, about three miles out of Gettysburg. Buford rode out far enough to see the pickets for himself, then he rode back toward the green hills. He stopped by the Seminary and had a cup of coffee.

The staff left him alone. After that he deployed the brigades.

He had made no plans, but it didn’t hurt to prepare. He told Gamble to dismount and dig in along the crest of the ridge just past the seminary, facing the Rebs who would come down that road. He posted Devin in the same way, across the road from the north. Three men in line, every fourth man to fall back with the horses. He watched to see that it was done. They were weary men and they dug silently and there was no music. He heard an officer grumbling. The damned fool wanted to charge the Reb picket line. Buford let loose a black glare. But it was a good line. It would hold for a while, even old Bobby Lee. If John Reynolds got up early in the morning.

It was darker now, still very quiet. No need to make the decision yet. They could always pull out at the last minute.

He grinned to himself, and the staff noticed his face and relaxed momentarily. Buford thought: one good thing about cavalry, you can always leave in a hell of a hurry.

Buford turned and rode back through the town, anxious for news from his scouts. People were moving in the streets.

He collected a small following of happy boys, one small ragged girl with a beautiful, delicate face. He smiled down, but in the square ahead he saw a crowd, a speaker, a circle of portly men. He turned quickly away. He was no good with civilians. There was something about the mayors of towns that troubled him. They were too fat and they talked too much and they did not think twice of asking a man to die for them. Much of the east troubled Buford. A fat country.

Too many people talked too much. The newspapers lied.

But the women… Yes, the women.

He rode by one porch and there was a woman in a dress of rose, white lace at the throat, a tall blond woman with a face of soft beauty, so lovely that Buford slowed the horse, staring, before taking off his hat. She stood by a vined column, gazing at him; she smiled. There was an old man in the front yard, very old and thin and weak; he hobbled forward, glaring with feeble, toothless rage. “They’s Johnny Rebs eva-where, eva-where!” Buford bowed and moved on, turned to look back at the beautiful woman, who stood there watching him.

”Go back and say hello. General.”

A coaxing voice, a grinning tone: lean Sergeant Corse, a bowlegged aide. Buford smiled, shook his head.

”Widow woman, I betcha.”

Buford turned away, headed toward the cemetery.

”If ye’d like me to ride back. General, I’m sure an interduction could be arranged.”

Buford chuckled. “Not tonight, Sergeant.”

”The General could use a di-version. Beggin’ yer pardon. General. But ye’r too shy a lad, for yer age. Ye work too hard. These here now quiet towns, now, nothin’ ever happens here, and the ladies would be so delighted to see you, an important adventurous man such as you, who has seen the world, now, ye’d be doin’ ‘em a gracious favor, just wi’ yer presence.”

Buford smiled. “I’m about as shy as a howitzer.”

”And similarly graceful. Begging yer pardon.”

”Zackly.” Buford began the slow ride up the hill to the cemetery.

”Ah,” the Sergeant said sadly, “but she was a lovely lass.”

”She was that.”

The Sergeant brightened. “Well, then if the General does not mind, I may just ride on over there meself, later on, after supper, that is, if the General has no objections.” He pushed the glasses back up on his nose, straightened his hat, tucked in his collar.

Buford said, “No objections. Sergeant.”

”Ah. Urn.”

Buford looked.

”And, ah, what time would the General be having supper, now?”

Buford looked at the staff, saw bright hopeful eyes. The hint finally got to him. They could not eat until he had eaten. They trailed him wherever he went, like a pennant; he was so used to their presence he did not notice their hunger. He was rarely hungry himself these days.

The Sergeant said woefully, “The folks in this here town have been after us for food. The Rebs didn’t leave them much. The General ought to eat what we got while we got it, because the boys is givin’ it away.” He glared reproachfully at the other officers.

”Sorry,” Buford said. He pointed to the cemetery. “I’ll eat right here. A little dried beef. You gentlemen have some supper.”

They rode on into the cemetery. He dismounted at last, first time in hours, sat down on stone in silent pain. He thought: body not much good but the mind works well. Two young lieutenants sat down near him, chewing on corn dodgers. He squinted; he did not remember their names. He could remember if he had to, duty of a good officer; he could fish in the memory for the names and pull them up out of the darkness, after a while, but though he was kind to young lieutenants he had learned a long time ago it was not wise to get to know them. One of these had wispy yellow hair, red freckles, he had a strange resemblance to an ear of corn. The other was buck-toothed. Buford suddenly remembered: the buck-toothed boy is a college boy, very bright, very well educated. Buford nodded. The Lieutenants nodded. They thought he was a genuis. He had thrown away the book of cavalry doctrine and they loved him for it.

At Thorofare Gap he had held against Longstreet, 3,000 men against 25,000, for six hours, sending off appeal after appeal for help which never came. The Lieutenants admired him greatly, and he could sometimes overhear them quoting his discoveries: your great fat horse is transportation, that’s all he is, with no more place on a modern battlefield than a great fat elephant. He turned from eager eyes, remembering the cries for help that never came. That time it was General Pope. Now it was General Meade. Make no plans.

He sat watching the lights come on in Gettysburg. The soldiers bordered the town along the west and the north in two long fire-speckled fences-a lovely sight in the gathering dusk. The last light of June burned in the west. He had one marvelous smoke-a dreamy cigar. Tomorrow he will come, old Bob Lee himself, down that western road, on a gray horse. And with him will come about seventy thousand rnen.

One of the Lieutenants was reading a newspaper. Buford saw rippled black headlines:

CITIZENS OF PENNSYLVANIA: PREPARE TO DEFEND YOUR HOMES!

A call for militia. He smiled. Militia would not stop old Bobby Lee. We have good old George Meade.

Now, now. Have faith. He might be very good.

The hell he is.

Buford peered quickly around, not knowing if he had said that out loud. Damned bad habit. But the Lieutenants were chatting. Buford looked past them to the silent town. Pretty country. But too neat, too tidy. No feel of space, of size, a great starry roof overhead, a great wind blowing. Well. You are not a natural Easterner, that’s for sure. Extraordinary to think of war here. Not the country for it. Too neat. Not enough room. He saw again the white angel. He thought: damn good ground.

He sat on a rail fence, watching the night come over Gettysburg. There was no word from the patrols. He went around reading the gravestones, many Dutch names, ghostA ly sentinels, tipped his hat in respect, thought of his own death,, tested his body, still sound, still trustable through a long night, but weaker, noticeably weaker, the heart uneven, the breath failing. But there was at least one good fight left. Perhaps I’ll make it here. His mind wandered. He wondered what it would be like to lose the war. Could you ever travel in the South again? Probably not for a while. But they had great fishing there. Black bass rising in flat black water: ah. Shame to go there again, to foreign ground.

Strange sense of enormous loss. Buford did not hate. He was a professional. The only ones who even irritated him were the cavaliers, the high-bred, feathery, courtly ones who spoke like Englishmen and treated a man like dirt. But they were mostly damn fools, not men enough to hate. But it would be a great shame if you could never go south any more, for the fishing, for the warmth in winter. Thought once of retiring there. If I get that old.

Out of the dark: Devin.

”Sir, the scouts are in. You were right, sir. Lee’s coming this way all right.”

Buford focused. “What have you got?”

”Those troops we ran into today were A. P. Hill. His whole Corps is back up the road between here and Cashtown. Longstreet’s Corps is right behind him. Ewell’s Corps is coming down from the north. They were right in front of Harrisburg but they’ve turned back. They’re concentrating in this direction.”

Buford nodded. He said absently, “Lee’s trying to get around us, between us and Washington. And won’t that charm the Senate?”

He sat down to write the message to Reynolds, on a gravestone, by lantern light. His hand stopped of itself. His brain sent nothing. He sat motionless, pencil poised, staring at the blank paper.

He held good ground before and sent off appeals, and help never came. He was very low on faith. It was a kind of gray sickness; it weakened the hands. He stood up and walked to the stone fence. It wasn’t the dying. He had seen men die all his life, and death was the luck of the chance, the price you eventually paid. What was worse was the stupidity. The appalling sick stupidity that was so bad you thought sometimes you would go suddenly, violently, completely insane just having to watch it. It was a deadly thing to be thinking on. Job to be done here. And all of it turns on faith.

The faces were staring at him, all the bright apple faces.

He shuddered with vague anger. If Reynolds says he will come, Reynolds will come. An honorable man. I hope to God. Buford was angry, violently angry. But he sat down and wrote the message.

He was in possession of good ground at Gettysburg. If Reynolds came quick, first thing in the morning, Buford could hold it. If not, the Rebs would take it and there was no ground near that was any good. Buford did not know how long his two brigades could hold. Urgent reply.

It was too formal. He struggled to make clear. He stared at it for a long while and then sealed it slowly, thinking, well, we aren’t truly committed, we can still run, and gave the message to the buck-toothed lieutenant, who took it delightedly off into the night, although he’d been in the saddle all that day.

Buford felt the pain of old wounds, a sudden vast need for sleep. Now it was up to Reynolds. He said to Devin, “How many guns have we got?”

”Sir? Ah, we have, ah, one battery, sir, is all. Six guns.

Calef’s Battery, that is, sir.”

”Post them out along that west road. The Cashtown road.”

Buford tried to think of something else to do but it was all suspended again, a breezy vacancy. Rest until Reynolds sends the word. He sat down once more, back against a gravestone, and began to drift slowly away, turning his mind away as you shift a field of vision with your glasses, moving to focus on higher ground. He remembered a snowstorm. Young lieutenant delivering military mail: days alone across an enormous white plain. Lovely to remember: riding, delivering mail. He dreamed. The wound began to hurt. He woke to the Sergeant, bowlegged Corse: the man dragged drearily by on a spattered horse, raised disgusted eyes.

”The husband, by God, is an undertaker.’” He rode mournfully off. The sound of music began to drift up the hill from Gettysburg. A preacher from the Seminary began a low, insistent, theological argument with a young lieutenant, back and forth, back and forth, the staff listening with admiration at the lovely words. The staff began to bed down for the night. It was near midnight when the buck-toothed boy came back from Reynolds, panting down from a lathered horse. Buford read: General Buford: Hold your ground. I will come in the morning as early as possible. John Reynolds.

Buford nodded. All right. If you say so. The officers were up and gathering. Buford said to the buck-toothed boy, “Did he say anything else?”

”No sir. He was very busy.”

”How far back is he?”

”Not ten miles, sir, I don’t think.”

”Well,” Buford said. He faced the staff: the eager, the wary. “We’re going to hold here in the morning.” He paused, still fuzzy-brained. “We’ll try to hold long enough for General Reynolds to come up with some infantry. I want to save the high ground, if we can.”

There was a breathy silence, some toothy grins, as if he had announced a party.

”I think they’ll be attacking us at dawn. We ought to be able to stop them for a couple of hours.”

At Thorofare Gap we held for six. But that was better ground.

Devin was glowing. “Hell, General, we can hold them all the long damned day, as the feller says.”

Buford frowned. He said slowly, “I don’t know how long will be necessary. It may be a long time. We can force them to deploy, anyway, and that will take up time. Also, that’s a narrow road Lee’s coming down, and if we stack them up back there they’ll be a while getting untracked. But the point is to hold long enough for the infantry. If we hang onto these hills, we have a good chance to win the fight that’s coming. Understood?”

He had excited them. They were young enough to be eager for this. He felt a certain breathless quality himself.

He ordered a good feed for the night, no point now in saving food. They moved out to give their orders. Buford rode out once more, in the dark, to the picket line.

He posted the lead pickets himself, not far from the Rebel line. There were four men along the bridge: New York and Illinois, two of them very young. They were popeyed to be so near the Rebs. Closer than anybody in the whole dang army.

Buford said, “They should come in just at about first light. Keep a clear eye. Stay in there long enough to get a good look, then shoot and run. Give us a good warning, but fire only a few rounds. Don’t wait too long before you pull out.”

A corporal said stiffly, “Yes, sir. General, sir.” He broke into a giggle. Buford heard a boy say, “Now aint you glad you jined the calvry?”

Buford rode back to the Seminary. He made his headquarters there. In the morning he would have a good view from the cupola. He dismounted and sat down to rest. It was very quiet. He closed his eyes and he could see fields of snow, miles and miles of Wyoming snow, and white mountains in the distance, all clean and incredibly still, and no man anywhere and no motion.

4. LONGSTREET.

In Longstreet’s camp, they were teaching the Englishman to play poker. They had spread a blanket near a fire and hung a lantern on a tree and they sat around the blanket slapping bugs in the dark, surrounded by campfires, laughter and music. The Englishman was a naturally funny man. He was very thin and perpetually astonished and somewhat gap-toothed, and his manner of talking alone was enough to convulse them, and he enjoyed it. His name was Fremantle-Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Lyon Fremantle- late of Her Majesty’s Coldstream Guards, observing for the Queen. There were several other foreigners in the group and they followed Longstreet’s headquarters like a small shoal of colorful fish. They were gathered around the blanket now, watching Fremantle perform, and everyone was laughing except the Prussian, Scheiber, a stocky man in a stained white suit, who was annoyed that no one could speak German.

Longstreet sat with his back against a tree, waiting. His fame as a poker player was legendary but he had not played in a long time, not since the deaths of his children, and he did not feel like it now; but he liked to sit in the darkness and watch, passing the time silently, a small distance away, a member of it all warmed by the fire but still not involved in it, not having to talk.

What bothered him most was the blindness. Jeb Stuart had not returned. The army had moved all day in enemy country and they had not even known what was around the next bend. Harrison ’s news was growing old: the Union Army was on the move. Longstreet had sent the spy back into Gettysburg to see what he could find, but Gettysburg was almost thirty miles away and he had not yet returned.

Longstreet dreamed, storing up energy, knowing the fight was coming and resting deliberately, relaxing the muscles, feeling himself loose upon the earth and filling with strength slowly, as the lungs fill with clean air. He was a patient man; he could outwait the dawn. He saw a star fall: a pale cold spark in the eastern sky. Lovely sight. He remembered, counting stars at midnight in a pasture: a girl. The girl thought they were messages from God. Longstreet grinned: she loves me, she loves me not.

”Sir?”

He looked up-a slender, haughty face: G. Moxley Sorrel, Longstreet’s chief of staff. Longstreet said, “Major.”

”I’m just back from General Lee’s headquarters, sir. The General has retired for the night. Everything going nicely, sir. General Lee says we should all be concentrated around Gettysburg tomorrow evening.”

”Nothing from Stuart?”

”No, sir. But some of General Hill’s troops went into Gettysburg this afternoon and claim they saw Union cavalry there.”

Longstreet looked up sharply. Sorrel went on: “They had orders not to engage, so they withdrew. General Hill thinks they were mistaken. He says it must be militia. He’s going back in force in the morning.”

”Who saw cavalry? What officer?”

”Ah, Johnston Pettigrew, I believe, sir.”

”The scholar? Fella from North Carolina?”

”Ah, yes, sir. I think so, sir.”

”Blue cavalry?”

”Yes, sir.”

”Why doesn’t Hill believe him? Does Hill have other information?”

”No, sir. Ah, I would say, sir, judging from what I heard, that General Hill thinks that, ah, Pettigrew is not a professional and tends to be overexcited and perhaps to exaggerate a bit.”

”Urn.” Longstreet rubbed his face. If there was infantry coming, as Harrison had said, there would be cavalry in front of it.

”What does General Lee say?”

”The General, ah, defers to General Hill’s judgment, I believe.”

Longstreet grimaced. He thought: we have other cavalry.

Why doesn’t the old man send for a look? Tell you why: he can’t believe Stuart would let him down.

”Have you any orders, sir?” Sorrel was gazing longingly toward the poker game.

”No.”

”The men are anxious to have you join the game, sir. As you once did.”

”Not tonight. Major.”

Sorrel bowed. “Yes, sir. Oh, by the way, sir, General Pickett sends his compliments and states that he will be dropping by later this evening for a chat.”

Longstreet nodded. There’ll be a complaint from old George. But good to see him. Sorrel moved off into a burst of laughter, a cloud of lovely tobacco. Longstreet sat brooding.

There was an odor of trouble, an indefinable wrong. It was like playing chess and making a bad move and not knowing why but knowing instinctively that it was a bad move. The instincts were yelling. As they used to do long ago at night in Indian country. He gazed out into the black.

The stars were obscured. It was the blindness that bothered him. Cavalry in Gettysburg? Harrison would know.

”Sir?”

He looked up again. In soft light: Fremantle.

”Beg your pardon, sir. Most humbly, sir. I’m not disturbing you?”

”Um,” Longstreet said. But there was something about the man, prepared for flight that made Longstreet grin. He was a scrawny man, toothy, with a pipe-like neck and a monstrous Adam’s apple. He looked like a popeyed bird who had just swallowed something large and sticky and triangular. He was wearing a tall gray hat and a remarkable coat with very wide shoulders, like wings.

He said cheerily, “If I am disturbing you at all, sir, my most humble apologies. But your fame, sir, as a practitioner of poker, is such that one comes to you for advice. I hope you don’t mind.”

”Not ‘t’all,” Longstreet said. Sometimes when you were around Englishmen there was this ridiculous tendency to imitate them. Longstreet restrained himself. But he grinned.

”What I wanted to ask you, sir, is this. I gather that you are the authority in these matters, and I learned long ago, sir, that in affairs of this kind it is always wisest to go directly, straightway, may I say, to the top.”

Longstreet waited. Fremantle relaxed slightly, conspiratorially, stroked a handlebar mustache.

”I am most curious, General, as to your attitude toward a subtle subject: the inside straight. On what occasion, or rather, under what circumstance, does one draw to an inside straight? In your opinion. Your response will be kept confidential, of course.”

”Never,” Longstreet said.

Fremantle nodded gravely, listening. There was nothing else. After a moment he inquired, “Never?”

”Never.”

Fremantle thought upon it. “You mean never,” he concluded.

Longstreet nodded.

”Quite,” Fremantle said. He drew back, brooding, then drew himself up. “Indeed,” he said. “Well, thank you, sir.

Your most humble servant. My apologies for the disturbance.”

”Not ‘fall.”

”I leave you to more important things.” He bowed, backed off, paused, looked up. “Never?” he said wistfully.

”Never,” Longstreet said.

”Oh. Well, right-ho.” Fremantle went away.

Longstreet turned to the dark. A strange and lacey race.

Talk like ladies, fight like wildcats. There had long been talk of England coming in on the side of the South. But Longstreet did not think they would come. They will come when we don’t need them, like the bank offering money when you’re no longer in debt.

A cluster of yells: he looked up. A group of horsemen were riding into camp. One plumed rider waved a feathered hat: that would be George Pickett. At a distance he looked like a French king, all curls and feathers. Longstreet grinned unconsciously. Pickett rode into the firelight, bronze-curled and lovely, hair down to his shoulders, regal and gorgeous on a stately mount. He gestured to the staff, someone pointed toward Longstreet. Pickett rode this way, bowing. Men were grinning, lighting up as he passed; Longstreet could see a train of officers behind him. He had brought along all three of his brigade commanders: Armistead, Garnett and Kemper. They rode toward Longstreet like ships through a gleeful surf, Pickett bowing from side to side. Someone offered a bottle. Pickett raised a scornful hand. He had sworn to dear Sallie ne’er to touch liquor.

Longstreet shook his head admiringly. The foreigners were clustering.

Pickett stopped before Longstreet and saluted grandly.

”General Pickett presents his compliments, sir, and requests permission to parley with the Commanding General, s ‘il vous plait.”

Longstreet said, “Howdy, George.”

Beyond Pickett’s shoulder Lew Armistead grinned hello, touching his hat. Longstreet had known them all for twenty years and more. They had served together in the Mexican War and in the old 6th Infantry out in California. They had been under fire together, and as long as he lived Longstreet would never forget the sight of Pickett with the flag going over the wall in the smoke and flame of Chapultepec.

Pickett had not aged a moment since. Longstreet thought: my permanent boy. It was more a family than an army. But the formalities had to be observed. He saluted. Pickett hopped out of the saddle, ringlets aflutter as he jumped.

Longstreet whiffed a pungent odor.

”Good Lord, George, what’s that smell?”

”That’s me,” Pickett said proudly. “Ain’t it lovely?”

Armistead dismounted, chuckling. “He got it off a dead Frenchman. Evening, Pete.”

”Woo,” Longstreet said. “I bet the Frenchman smelled better.”

Pickett was offended. “I did not either get it off a Frenchman. I bought it in a store in Richmond.” He meditated. “Did have a French name, now that I think on it. But Sallie likes it.” This concluded the matter. Pickett glowed and primped, grinning. He was used to kidding and fond of it. Dick Garnett was dismounting slowly. Longstreet caught the look of pain in his eyes. He was favoring a leg.

He had that same soft gray look in his face, his eyes. Too tired, much too tired.

Longstreet extended a hand. “How are you, Dick?”

”Fine, General, just fine.” But the handclasp had no vitality. Lew Armistead was watching with care.

Longstreet said easily, “Sorry I had to assign you to old smelly George. Hope you have a strong stomach.”

”General,” Garnett said formally, gracefully, “you must know how much I appreciate the opportunity.”

There was a second of silence. Garnett had withdrawn the old Stonewall Brigade without orders. Jackson had accused him of cowardice. Now Jackson was dead, and Garnett’s honor was compromised, and he had not recovered from the stain, and in his company there were many men who would never let him recover. Yet Longstreet knew the quality of the man, and he said slowly, carefully, “Dick, I consider it a damned fine piece of luck for me when you became available for this command.”

Garnett took a deep breath, then nodded once quickly, looking past Longstreet into the dark. Lew Armistead draped a casual arm across his shoulders.

”Dick’s been eating too many cherries. He’s got the Old Soldier’s Disease.”

Garnett smiled weakly. “Sure do.” He rubbed his stomach. “Got to learn to fight from the squatting position.”

Armistead grinned. “I know what’s wrong with you. You been standing downwind of ole George. You got to learn to watch them fumes.”

A circle had gathered at a respectful distance. One of these was Fremantle, of Her Majesty’s Coldstream Guards, wide-hatted. Adam’s-appled. Pickett was regarding him with curiosity.

Longstreet remembered his manners. “Oh, excuse me, Colonel. Allow me to present our George Pickett. Our loveliest general. General Pickett, Colonel Fremantle of the Coldstream Guards.”

Pickett bowed low in the classic fashion, sweeping the ground with the plumed hat.

”The fame of your regiment, sir, has preceded you.”

”General Pickett is our ranking strategist,” Longstreet said. “We refer all the deeper questions to George.”

”They do,” Pickett admitted, nodding. “They do indeed.”

”General Pickett’s record at West Point is still the talk of the army.”

Armistead hawed.

”It is unbecoming to a soldier, all this book-learning,” Pickett said haughtily.

”It aint gentlemanly, George,” Armistead corrected.

”Nor that either,” Pickett agreed.

”He finished last in his class,” Longstreet explained.

”Dead last. Which is quite a feat, if you consider his classmates.”

”The Yankees got all the smart ones,” Pickett said placidly, “and look where it got them.”

Fremantle stood grinning vaguely, not quite sure how to take all this. Lew Armistead came forward and bowed silently, delicately, old courtly Lo, giving it a touch of elegance. He did not extend a hand, knowing the British custom. He said, “Good evening, Colonel. Lo Armistead.

The ‘Lo’ is short for Lothario. Let me welcome you to ‘Lee’s Miserables.’ The Coldstream Guards? Weren’t you fellas over here in the discussion betwixt us of 1812? I seem to remember my daddy telling me about… No, it was the Black Watch. The kilted fellas, that’s who it was.”

Fremantle said, “Lee’s Miserables?”

”A joke,” Longstreet said patiently. “Somebody read Victor Hugo-believe it or not I have officers who read and ever since then we’ve been Lee’s Miserables.”

Fremantle was still in the dark. Longstreet said, “Victor Hugo. French writer. Novel. Les Miserables.”

Fremantle brightened. Then he smiled. Then he chuckled. “Oh that’s very good. Oh, I say that’s very good indeed, Haw.”

Pickett said formally. “Allow me to introduce my commanders. The elderly one here is Lewis Armistead. The ‘Lothario’ is a bit of a joke, as you can see. But we are democratic. We do not hold his great age against him. We carry him to the battle, and we aim him and turn him loose. “ His is what we in this country call an ‘Old Family’-“

Armistead said briefly, “Oh God”-“although doubtless you English would consider him still an immigrant. There have been Armisteads in all our wars, and maybe we better change the subject, because it is likely that old Lo’s grandaddy took a pot-shot at your grandaddy, but anyway, we had to let him in this war to keep the string going, do you see? Age and all.”

”Creak,” Armistead said.

”The next on here is Dick Garnett. Ah, Richard Brooke Garnett.”

Garnett bowed. Pickett said, “Old Dick is a good lad, but sickly. Ah well-“ Pickett made a sad face-“some of us are born puny, and others are blessed with great natural strength. It is all God’s will. Sit down, Dick. Now this next one here-“ he indicated stoic Jim Kemper-“this one is not even a soldier, so watch him. Note the shifty beady eye?

He’s a politician. Only reason he’s here is to gather votes come next election.”

Kemper stepped forward, hand extended warily. He had been speaker of the Virginia House and he was not fond of foreigners. Fremantle took the hand with forced good will.

Kemper said brusquely, “Look here now, Colonel. Been | wondering when you people were going to get out and break than damned Yankee blockade. How about that?”

Fremantle apologized, grinning foolishly. Now the Prussian was here and the Austrian, Ross. A crowd was forming. Pickett went on to introduce some of his staff: Beau Harrison, his IG, and Jim Crocker. Crocker was moodily sentimental, already a bit drunk. He was returning now after an absence of thirteen years to his old alma mater, Pennsylvania College, in Gettysburg. Someone suggested they drink to that, but Pickett reminded one and all soulfully of his oath to Sallie, schoolgirl Sallie, who was half his age, and that brought up a round of ribald kidding that should have insulted Pickett but didn’t. He glowed in the midst of it, hairy, happy. Fremantle looked on, never quite certain what was kidding and what wasn’t. He produced some brandy; Armistead came up with a flask; Kemper had a bottle of his own. Longstreet thought: careful. He sat off to one side, withdrawing, had one long hot swig from Armistead’s flask, disciplined himself not to take another, withdrew against the trunk of a cool tree, letting the night come over him, listening to them talk, reminiscing. He knew enough to stay out of it. The presence of the commander always a damper. But after a few moments Pickett detached himself from the group and came to Longstreet.

”General? A few words?”

”Sure, George. Fire.”

”By George you’re looking well, sir. Must say, never saw you looking better.” “You look lovely too, George.” Longstreet liked this man. He was not overwhelmingly bright, but he was a fighter. Longstreet was always careful to give him exact instructions and to follow him to make sure he knew what to do, but once pointed, George could be relied on. A lovely adventurous boy, thirty-eight years old and never to grow older, fond of adventure and romance and all the bright sparkles of youth. Longstreet said happily, “What can I do for you, George?”

”Well, sir, now I don’t mean this as a reflection upon you, sir. But well, you know, sir, my Division, my Virginia boys, we weren’t at Chancellorsville.”

”No.”

”Well, you know we were assigned away on some piddling affair, and we weren’t at Fredericksburg either; we were off again doing some other piddling thing, and now they’ve taken two of my brigades, Corse and Jenkins, and sent them off to guard Richmond-Richmond, for the love of God-and now, General, do you know where I’m placed in line of march? Last, sir, that’s where. Exactly last. I bring up the damned rear. Beg pardon.”

Longstreet sighed.

Pickett said, “Well, I tell you, sir, frankly, my boys are beginning to wonder at the attitude of the high command toward my Division. My boys-“

”George,” Longstreet said.

”Sir, I must-“ Pickett noted Longstreet’s face. “Now, I don’t mean to imply this command. Not you, sir. I was just hoping you would talk to somebody.”

”George.” Longstreet paused, then he said patiently, “Would you like us to move the whole army out of the way and let you go first?”

Pickett brightened. That seemed a good idea. Another look at Longstreet’s face.

”I only meant, sir, that we haven’t-“

”I know, George. Listen, there’s no plot. It’s just the way things fell out. I have three divisions, right? There’s you, and there’s Hood and McLaws. And where I go you go.

Right? And my HQ is near the Old Man, and the Old Man chooses to be here, and that’s the way it is. We sent your two brigades to Richmond because we figured they were Virginia boys and that was proper. But look at it this way: if the army has to turn and fight its way out of here, you’ll be exactly first in line.”

Pickett thought on that.

”That’s possible?”

”Yup.”

”Well,” Pickett mused. At that moment Lew Armistead came up. Pickett said wistfully, “Well, I had to speak on it, sir. You understand. No offense?”

”None.”

”Well then. But I mean, the whole war could be damn well over soon, beg pardon, and my boys would have missed it. And these are Virginians, sir, and have a certain pride.” It occurred to him that Longstreet not being a Virginian, he might have given another insult.

But Longstreet said, “I know I can count on you, George, when the time comes. And it’ll come, it’ll come.”

Armistead broke in, “Sorry to interrupt, but they’re calling for George at the poker table.” He bowed. “Your fame, sir, has preceded you.”

Pickett excused himself, watchful of Longstreet. Pickett was always saying something to irritate somebody, and he rarely knew why, so his method was simply to apologize in general from time to time and to let people know he meant well and then shove off and hope for the best. He apologized and departed, curls ajiggle.

Armistead looked after him. “Hope he brought some money with him.” He turned back to Longstreet, smiling.

”How goes it, Pete?”

”Passing well, passing well.” An old soldier’s joke, vaguely obscene. It had once been funny. Touched now with memories, sentimental songs. Longstreet thought: he’s really quite gray. Has reached that time when a man ages rapidly, older with each passing moment. Old Lothario.

Longstreet was touched. Armistead had his eyes turned away, following Pickett.

”I gather that George was trying to get us up front where we could get shot. Correct? Thought so. Well, must say, if you’ve got to do all this damn marching at my age there ought to be some action some time. Although-“ he held up a hand-“I don’t complain, I don’t complain.” He sat, letting a knee creak. “Getting rickety.”

Longstreet looked: firelight soft on a weary face. Armistead was tired. Longstreet watched him, gauging. Armistead noticed.

”I’m all right, Pete.”

”Course.”

”No, really. I…”He stopped in mid-sentence. “I am getting a little old for it. To tell the truth. It, ah…” He shrugged. “It isn’t as much fun when your feet hurt. Ooo.”

He rubbed his calf. He looked away from Longstreet’s eyes. “These are damn good cherries they grow around here.

Wonder if they’d grow back home.”

Laughter broke from Pickett’s group. A cloud passed over the moon. Armistead had something on his mind.

Longstreet waited. Harrison had to be back soon. Armistead said, “I hear you have some word of the Union Army.”

”Right.” Longstreet thought: Hancock.

”Have you heard anything of old Win?”

”Yep. He’s got the Second Corps, headed this way. We should be running into him one of these days.” Longstreet felt a small jealousy. Armistead and Hancock. He could see them together-graceful Lo, dashing and confident Hancock. They had been closer than brothers before the war. A rare friendship. And now Hancock was coming this way with an enemy corps.

Armistead said, “Never thought it would last this long.”

He was staring off into the dark.

”Me neither. I was thinking on that last night. The day of the one-battle war is over, I think. It used to be that you went out to fight in the morning and by sundown the issue was decided and the king was dead and the war was usually over. But now…”He grunted, shaking his head. “Now it goes on and on. War has changed, Lewis. They all expect one smashing victory. Waterloo and all that. But I think that kind of war is over. We have trenches now. And it’s a different thing, you know, to ask a man to fight from a trench. Any man can charge briefly in the morning. But to ask a man to fight from a trench, day after day…”

”Guess you’re right,” Armistead said. But he was not interested, and Longstreet, who loved to talk tactics and strategy, let it go. After a moment Armistead said, “Wouldn’t mind seeing old Win again. One more time.”

”Why don’t you?”

”You wouldn’t mind?”

”Hell no.”

”Really? I mean, well, Pete, do you think it would be proper?”

”Sure. If the chance comes, just get a messenger and a flag of truce and go on over. Nothing to it.”

”I sure would like just to talk to him again,” Armistead said. He leaned back, closing his eyes. “Last time was in California. When the war was beginning. Night before we left there was a party.”

Long time ago, another world. And then Longstreet thought of his children, that Christmas, that terrible Christmas, and turned his mind away. There was a silence.

Armistead said, “Oh, by the way, Pete, how’s your wife?

Been meaning to ask.”

”Fine.” He said it automatically. But she was not fine.

He felt a spasm of pain like a blast of sudden cold, saw the patient high-boned Indian face, that beautiful woman, indelible suffering. Children never die: they live on in the brain forever. After a moment he realized that Armistead was watching him.

”If you want me to leave, Pete.”

”No.” Longstreet shook his head quickly.

”Well, then, I think I’ll just set a spell and pass the time of day. Don’t get to see much of you any more.” He smiled: a touch of shyness. He was five years older than Longstreet, and now he was the junior officer, but he was one of the rare ones who was genuinely glad to see another man advance.

In some of them there was a hunger for rank-in Jubal Early it was a disease-but Armistead had grown past the hunger, if he ever had it at all. He was an honest man, open as the sunrise, cut from the same pattern as Lee: old family, Virginia gentleman, man of honor, man of duty. He was one of the men who would hold ground if it could be held; he would die for a word. He was a man to depend on, and there was this truth about war: it taught you the men you could depend on.

He was saying, “I tell you one thing you don’t have to worry on, and that’s our Division. I never saw troops anywhere so ready for a brawl. And they’re not just kids, either. Most of them are veterans and they’ll know what to do. But the morale is simply amazing. Really is. Never saw anything like it in the old army. They’re off on a Holy War.

The Crusades must have been a little like this. Wish I’d a been there. Seen old Richard and the rest.”

Longstreet said, “They never took Jerusalem.”

Armistead squinted.

”It takes a bit more than morale,” Longstreet said.

”Oh sure.” But Longstreet was always gloomy. “Well, anyhow, I’ve never seen anything like this. The Old Man’s accomplishment. Incredible. His presence is everywhere.

They hush when he passes, like an angel of the Lord. You ever see anything like it?”

”No.”

”Remember what they said when he took command? Called him Old Granny. Hee.” Armistead chuckled. “Man, what damn fools we are.”

”There’s talk of making him President, after the war.”

”They are?” Armistead considered it. “Do you suppose he’d take it?”

”No, I don’t think he would take it. But, I don’t know. I like to think of him in charge. One honest man.”

”A Holy War,” Longstreet said. He shook his head. He did not think much of the Cause. He was a professional: the Cause was Victory. It came to him in the night sometimes with a sudden appalling shock that the boys he was fighting were boys he had grown up with. The war had come as a nightmare in which you chose your nightmare side. Once chosen, you put your head down and went on to win. He thought: shut up. But he said: “You’ve heard it often enough: one of our boys can lick any ten of them, that nonsense.”

”Well.”

”Well, you’ve fought with those boys over there, you’ve commanded them.” He gestured vaguely east. “You know damn well they can fight. You should have seen them come up that hill at Fredericksburg, listen.” He gestured vaguely, tightly, losing command of the words. “Well, Lo, you know we are dying one at a time and there aren’t enough of us and we die just as dead as anybody, and a boy from back home aint a better soldier than a boy from Minnesota or anywhere else just because he’s from back home.”

Armistead nodded carefully. “Well, sure.” He paused watchfully “Of course I know that. But then, on the other hand, we sure do stomp them consistently, now don’t we, Pete? We… I don’t know, but I feel we’re something special. I do. We’re good, and we know it. It may just be the Old Man and a few other leaders like you. Well, I don’t know what it is. But I tell you, I believe in it, and I don’t think we’re overconfident.”

Longstreet nodded. Let it go. But Armistead sat up.

”Another thing, Peter, long as the subject is up. I’ve been thinking on your theories of defensive war, and look, Pete, if you don’t mind the opinion of an aging military genius, just this once? Technically, by God, you’re probably right.

Hell, you’re undoubtedly right. This may be a time for defensive war. But, Pete, this aint the army for it. We aren’t bred for the defense. And the Old Man, Lord, if ever there was a man not suited for slow dull defense, it’s old R.E.”

Longstreet said, “But he’s a soldier.”

”Exactly. And so are you. But the Old Man is just plain, well, too proud. Listen, do you remember when he was assigned to the defense of Richmond and he started digging trenches, you remember what they started calling him?”

”The King of Spades.” God, the Richmond newspapers.

”Right. And you could see how hurt he was. Most people would be. Stain on the old honor. Now, Pete, you’re wise enough not to give a damn about things like that. But Old Robert, now, he’s from the old school, and I’ll bet you right now he can’t wait to get them out in the open somewhere where he can hit them face to face. And you know every soldier in the army feels the same way, and it’s one of the reasons why the morale here is so good and the Union morale is so bad, and isn’t that a fact?”

Longstreet said nothing. It was all probably true. And yet there was danger in it; there was even something dangerous in Lee. Longstreet said, “He promised me he would stay on the defensive. He said he would look for a good defensive position and let them try to hit us.”

”He did?”

”He did.”

”Well, maybe. But I tell you, Pete, it aint natural to him.”

”And it is to me?”

Armistead cocked his head to one side. Then he smiled, shook his head, and reached out abruptly to slap Longstreet’s knee.

”Well, might’s well be blunt, old soul, and to hell with the social graces. Truth is, Peter, that you are by nature the stubbomest human being, nor mule either, nor even army mule, that I personally have ever known, or ever hope to know, and my hat is off to you for it, because you are also the best damn defensive soldier I ever saw, by miles and miles and miles, and that’s a fact. Now-“ he started to rise-“I’ll get a-movin’, back to my virtuous bed.”

Longstreet grunted, found himself blushing. He rose, went silently with Armistead toward the crowd around Pickett. Moxley Sorrel was on his feet, pounding his palm with a clenched fist. The Englishman, Fremantle, was listening openmouthed. The Prussian, Scheiber, was smiling in a nasty sort of way. Longstreet caught the conclusion of Sorrel’s sentence.

”… know that government derives its power from the consent of the governed. Every government, everywhere. And, sir, let me make this plain: We do not consent. We will never consent.”

They stood up as Longstreet approached. Sorrel’s face was flushed. Jim Kemper was not finished with the argument, Longstreet or no. To Fremantle he went on: “You must tell them, and make it plain, that what we are fighting for is our freedom from the rule of what is to us a foreign government. That’s all we want and that’s what this war is all about. We established this country in the first place with strong state governments just for that reason, to avoid a central tyranny-“

”Oh Lord,” Armistead said, “the Cause.”

Fremantle rose, trying to face Longstreet and continue to listen politely to Kemper at the same moment. Pickett suggested with authority that it was growing quite late and that his officers should get back to their separate commands.

There were polite farewells and kind words, and Longstreet walked Pickett and Armistead to their horses. Kemper was still saying firm, hard, noble things to Sorrel and Sorrel was agreeing absolutely-mongrelizing, money-grubbing Yankees-and Longstreet said, “What happened?”

Pickett answered obligingly, unconcerned, “Well, Jim Kemper kept needling our English friend about why they didn’t come and join in with us, it being in their interest and all, and the Englishman said that it was a very touchy subject, since most Englishmen figured the war was all about, ah, slavery, and then old Kemper got a bit outraged and had to explain to him how wrong he was, and Sorrel and some others joined in, but no harm done.”

”Damn fool,” Kemper said. “He still thinks it’s about slavery.”

”Actually,” Pickett said gravely, “I think my analogy of the club was best. I mean, it’s as if we all joined a gentlemen’s club, and then the members of the club started sticking their noses into our private lives, and then we up and resigned, and then they tell us we don’t have the right to resign. I think that’s a fair analogy, hey, Pete?”

Longstreet shrugged. They all stood for a moment agreeing with each other, Longstreet saying nothing. After a while they were mounted, still chatting about what a shame it was that so many people seemed to think it was slavery that brought on the war, when all it was really was a question of the Constitution. Longstreet took the reins of Pickett’s horse.

”George, the army is concentrating toward Gettysburg.

Hill is going in in the morning and we’ll follow, and Ewell is coming down from the north. Tomorrow night we’ll all be together.”

”Oh, very good.” Pickett was delighted. He was looking forward to parties and music.

Longstreet said, “I think that sometime in the next few days there’s going to be a big fight. I want you to do everything necessary to get your boys ready.”

”Sir, they’re ready now.”

”Well, do what you can. The little things. See to the water. Once the army is gathered in one place all the wells will run dry. See to it, George.”

”I will, I will.”

Longstreet thought: don’t be so damn motherly.

”Well, then. I’ll see you tomorrow night.”

They said their good nights. Armistead waved farewell.

”If you happen to run across Jubal Early, Peter, tell him for me to go to hell.”

They rode off into the dark. The moon was down; the night sky was filled with stars. Longstreet stood for a moment alone. Some good men there. Lo had said, “Best defensive soldier.” From Lewis, a compliment. And yet, is it really my nature? Or is it only the simple reality?

Might as well argue with stars.

The fires were dying one by one. Longstreet went back to his place by the camp table. The tall silent aide from Texas, T. J. Goree, had curled up in a bedroll, always near, to be used at a moment’s notice. For “The Cause.” So many good men. Longstreet waited alone, saw one falling star, reminding him once more of the girl in a field a long time ago.

Harrison came back long after midnight. He brought the news of Union cavalry in Gettysburg. Longstreet sent the word to Lee’s headquarters, but the Old Man had gone to sleep and Major Taylor did not think it important enough to wake him. General Hill had insisted, after all, that the reports of cavalry in Gettysburg were foolish.

Longstreet waited for an answer, but no answer came. He lay for a long while awake, but there was gathering cloud and he saw no more falling stars.

Just before dawn the rain began: fine misty rain blowing cold and clean in soft mountain air. Buford’s pickets saw the dawn come high in the sky, a gray blush, a bleak rose. A boy from Illinois climbed a tree. There was mist across Marsh Creek, ever whiter in the growing light. The boy from Illinois stared and felt his heart beating and saw movement. A blur in the mist, an unfurled flag. Then the dark figures, row on row: skirmishers. Long, long rows, like walking trees, coming up toward him out of the mist. He had a long paralyzed moment, which he would remember until the end of his life. Then he raised the rifle and laid it across the limb of the tree and aimed generally toward the breast of a tall figure in the front of the line, waited, let the cold rain fall, misting his vision, cleared his eyes, waited, prayed, and pressed the trigger.