Michael Shaara - The Killer Angels

by The Killer Angels(Lit)

  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 yo
u'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 s
ilent, 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.