Kincaid's Battery
Page 56
LVI
BETWEEN THE MILLSTONES
Telegraph! They had been telegraphing for days, but their telegrams havenot yet been delivered.
On the evening when the camps of Johnston and Grant with burning Jacksonbetween them put out half the stars a covered carriage, under theunsolicited escort of three or four gray-jacketed cavalrymen and drivenby an infantry lad seeking his command after an illness at home, crossedPearl River in a scow at Ratcliff's ferry just above the day'sbattlefield.
"When things are this bad," said the boy to the person seated beside himand to two others at their back, his allusion being to theirself-appointed guard, "any man you find straggling to the _front_ is thekind a lady can trust."
This equipage had come a three hours' drive, from the pretty town ofBrandon, nearest point to which a railway train from the East wouldventure, and a glimpse into the vehicle would have shown you, behindConstance and beside Miranda, Anna, pale, ill, yet meeting every inquirywith a smiling request to push on. They were attempting a circuit ofboth armies to reach a third, Pemberton's, on the Big Black and in andaround Vicksburg.
Thus incited they drove on in the starlight over the gentle hills ofMadison county and did not accept repose until they had put Grant tenmiles behind and crossed to the south side of the Vicksburg and JacksonRailroad at Clinton village with only twenty miles more between them andBig Black Bridge. The springs of Anna's illness were more in spirit thanbody. Else she need not have lain sleepless that night at Clinton's manycross-roads, still confronting a dilemma she had encountered in Mobile.
In Mobile the exiles had learned the true whereabouts of the brigade,and of a battery then called Bartleson's as often as Kincaid's by apublic which had half forgotten the seemingly well-established fact ofHilary's death. Therein was no new shock. The new shock had come when,as the three waited for telegrams, they stood before a vast ironcladstill on the ways but offering splendid protection from Farragut'swooden terrors if only it could be completed, yet on which work hadceased for lack of funds though a greater part of the needed amount,already put up, lay idle solely because it could not be dragged up to atotal that would justify its outlay.
"How much does it fall short?" asked Anna with a heart at full stop, andthe pounding shock came when the shortage proved less than the missingproceeds of the bazaar. For there heaved up the problem, whether to passon in the blind hope of finding her heart's own, or to turn instead andseek the two detectives and the salvation of a city. This was thedilemma which in the last few days had torn half the life out of herand, more gravely than she knew, was threatening the remnant.
Constance and Miranda yearned, yet did not dare, to urge the latterchoice. They talked it over covertly on the back seat of the carriage,Anna sitting bravely in front with the young "web-foot," as their wheelsnext day plodded dustily westward out of Clinton. Hilary would never befound, of course; and _if_ found how would he explain why he, comingthrough whatever vicissitudes, he the ever ready, resourceful anddaring, he the men's and ladies' man in one, whom to look upon drew intohis service whoever looked, had for twelve months failed to get so muchas one spoken or written word to Anna Callender; to their heart-brokenNan, the daily sight of whose sufferings had sharpened their wits andstrung their hearts to blame whoever, on any theory, could be blamed.Undoubtedly he might have some dazzling explanation ready, but thatexplanation they two must first get of him before she should know thather dead was risen.
Our travellers were minus their outriders now. At dawn the squad,leaving tender apologies in the night's stopping-place, had left theladies also, not foreseeing that demoralized servants would keep themthere with torturing delays long into the forenoon. When at length thethree followed they found highways in ruin, hoof-deep in dust and nolonger safe from blue scouts, while their infantry boy proved asinnocent of road wisdom as they, and on lonely by-ways led them astrayfor hours. We may picture their bodily and mental distress to hear, at aplantation house whose hospitality they craved when the day was near itsend, that they were still but nine miles from Clinton with eleven yetbetween them and Big Black Bridge.
Yet they could have wept for thanks as readily as for chagrin orfatigue, so kindly were they taken in, so stirring was the next word ofnews.
"Why, you po' city child'en!" laughed two sweet unprotected women. "Letthese girls bresh you off. You sho'ly got the hafe o' Hinds County onyou ... Pemberton's men? Law, no; they _wuz_ on Big Black but they rightout here, now, on Champion's Hill, in sight f'om our gin-house ... Brodnax'bri'--now, how funny! We jess heard o' them about a' hourago, f'om a bran' new critter company name' Ferry's Scouts. Why, Ferry'sf'om yo' city! Wish you could 'a' seen him--oh, all of 'em, they wasthat slick! But, oh, slick aw shabby, when our men ah fine they ah fine,now, ain't they! There was a man ridin' with him--dressed diff'ent--he_wuz_ the batteredest-lookin', gayest, grandest--he might 'a' been agen'al! when in fact he was only a majo', an' it was him we heard saythat Brodnax was some'uz on the south side o' the railroad and couldn'tcome up befo' night ... What, us? no, we on the nawth side. You didn'tnotice when you recrossed the track back yondeh? Well, you _must_ 'a'been ti-ud!"
Anna dropped a fervid word to Miranda that set their hostesses agape."Now, good Lawd, child, ain't you in hahdship and dangeh enough? Not oneo' you ain't goin' one step fu'ther this day. Do you want to git shot?Grant's men are a-marchin' into Bolton's Depot right now. Why, honey,you might as well go huntin' a needle in a haystack as to go lookin' fo'Brodnax's brigade to-night. Gen'al Pemberton himself--why, he'd jestsend you to his rear, and that's Vicksburg, where they a-bein' shelledby the boats day and night, and the women and child'en a-livin' incaves. You don't want to go there?"
"We don't know," drolly replied Anna.
"Well, you stay hyuh. That's what that majo' told us. Says 'e, 'Ladies,we got to fight a battle here to-morrow, but yo'-all's quickest way outof it'll be to stay right hyuh. There'll be no place like hometo-morrow, not even this place,' says 'e, with a sort o' twinkle thatmade us laugh without seein' anything to laugh at!"