Ailsa Paige Part 56

The half dozen lancers, lying on their bellies in the gra.s.s on the bank above the road where this discussion took place remained crimson, mute, paralysed with mortification. Was that what the army thought of them?

But they had little time for nursing their mortification that morning; the firing along the river was breaking out in patches with a viciousness and volume heretofore unheard; and a six-gun Confederate field battery had joined in, arousing the entire camp of Claymore's brigade. Louder and louder grew the uproar along the river; smoke rose and took silvery-edged shape in the suns.h.i.+ne; bugles were calling to the colours regiments encamped on the right; a light battery trotted out across a distant meadow, unlimbered and went smartly into action.

About noon the bugles summoned the 3rd Zouaves. As they were forming, the camps of the 8th Lancers and the 10th Light Battery rang with bugle music. Berkley, standing to horse, saw the Zouaves leaving the hill at a jog-trot, their red legs twinkling; but half way down the slope they were halted to dress ranks; and the Lancers, cantering ahead, turned westward and moved off along the edge of the river swamp toward the piled-up cloud of smoke down stream.

After them trotted the 10th New York Flying Battery as though on parade, their guidons standing straight out behind the red-and-white guidons of the Lancers.

The Zouaves had now reached wet land, where a staff officer met Colonel Craig and piloted him through a field of brush and wild gra.s.s, and under the parapets of an emplacement for big guns, on which men were nonchalantly working, to the beginning of a newly laid road of logs. The noise of musketry and the smoke had become prodigious. On the logs of the road lay the first big pool of blood that many of them had ever seen. What it had come from they could not determine; there was nothing dead or dying there.

The men glanced askance at the swamp where the black s.h.i.+ning water had risen almost level with the edges of the road; but the Colonel and his staff, still mounted, rode coolly over it, and the regiment followed.

The corduroy road through the heavily wooded swamp which the 3rd Zouaves now followed was the only inlet to the noisy scene of local action, and the only outlet, too.

Except for watching the sh.e.l.ls at Blue Bridge, the regiment had never been in battle, had never seen or heard a real battle; many had never even seen a wounded man. They understood that they were going into battle now; and now the regiment caught sight of its first wounded men. Stretchers pa.s.sed close to them on which soldiers lay naked to the waist, some with b.r.e.a.s.t.s glistening red and wet from unstopped haemorrhage, some with white bodies marked only by the little round blue hole with its darker centre. Soldiers pa.s.sed them, limping, b.l.o.o.d.y rags dripping from thigh or knee; others staggered along with faces the colour of clay, leaning on the arms of comrades, still others were carried out feet first, sagging, a dead-weight in the arms of those who bore them. One man with half his fingers gone, the raw stumps spread, hurried out, screaming, and scattering blood as he ran.

The regiment pa.s.sed an artilleryman lying in the water whose head, except for the lower jaw, was entirely missing; and another on his back in the ooze whose bowels were protruding between his fingers; and he was trying very feebly to force them back, while two comrades strove in vain to lift him.

The regiment sickened as it looked; here and there a young zouave turned deathly pale, reeled out of the ranks, leaned against a tree, nauseated, only to lurch forward again at the summons of the provost guard; here and there a soldier disengaged his white turban from his fez and dropped it to form a sort of Havelock; for the vertical sun was turning the men dizzy, and the sights they saw were rapidly unnerving them.

They heard the tremendous thunder and felt the concussion of big guns; the steady raining rattle of musketry, the bark of howitzers, the sharp, clean crack of rifled field guns dismayed them. Sometimes, far away, they could distinguish the full deep cheering of a Union regiment; and once they caught the distant treble battle cry of the South. There were moments when a sudden lull in the noise startled the entire regiment. Even their officers looked up sharply at such times. But ahead they could still see Colonel Craig riding calmly forward, his big horse picking its leisurely way over the endless road of logs; they could see the clipped gray head of Major Lent under its red forage-cap, steady, immovable, as he controlled his nervous mount with practised indifference.

It was broiling hot in the swamp; the Zouaves stood bathed in perspiration as the regiment halted for a few minutes, then they moved forward again toward a hard ridge of gra.s.s which glimmered green beyond the tangled thicket's edges.

Here the regiment was formed in line of battle, and ordered to lie down.

Stephen wiped his sweaty hands on his jacket and, lifting his head from the gra.s.s, looked cautiously around. Already there had been fighting here; a section of a dismantled battery stood in the road ahead; dead men lay around it; smoke still hung blue in the woods. The air reeked.

The Zouaves lay in long scarlet rows on the gra.s.s; their officers stood leaning on their naked swords, peering ahead where the Colonel, Major, and a mounted bugler were intently watching something-the two officers using field gla.s.ses. In a few moments both officers dismounted, flung their bridles to an orderly, and came back, walking rather quickly. Major Lent drawing his bright, heavy sword and tucking up his gold-embroidered sleeves as he came on.

"Now, boys," said Colonel Craig cheerfully, "we are going in. All you've got to do can be done quickly and thoroughly with the bayonet. Don't c.o.c.k your muskets, don't fire unless you're told to. Perhaps you won't have to fire at all. All I want of you is to keep straight on after me-right through those dry woods, there. Try to keep your intervals and alignment; don't yell until you sight the enemy, don't lose your heads, trust your officers. Where they go you are safest."

He dropped his eye-gla.s.ses into his slashed pocket, drew out and put on a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. The soldiers saw him smile and say something to Major Lent, saw him bare his handsome sword, saw the buglers setting the s.h.i.+ning bugles to their lips.

"Now, charge, you red-legged rascals!" shouted Major Lent; and up from the gra.s.s rose a wave of scarlet and flas.h.i.+ng steel.

Charge! Charge! echoed the bugles; a wailing storm, high among the tree tops, pa.s.sed over them as they entered the dry woods on a run; branches crashed earthward, twig's and limbs crackled down in whirling confusion. But there was nothing in the woods except smoke-and the streaming storm shrilling overhead, raining down on them leaves and boughs and splintered sticks.

The belt of woodland was very narrow; already the men could see sunlight on the farther edge, and catch glimpses of fields; and still they ran forward, keeping their alignment as best they might among the trees; and came, very soon, to the wood's edge. Here they were halted and ordered to lie down again; and they lay there, close to the ground among the dead leaves, while from above living leaves rained on them in never-ending showers, and the wild tempest sped overhead unchecked.

Far out across the fields in the suns.h.i.+ne, looking diminutive as toys in the distance, four cannon puffed smoke toward them. The Zouaves could see the guns-see even the limbers and caissons behind, and the harnessed teams, and the cannoneers very busily at work in the suns.h.i.+ne. Then a long low wall of white smoke suddenly appeared along a rail fence in front of the guns, and at the same time the air thickened with bullets storming in all about them.

The Colonel and the Major had run hastily out into the field. "Get up! Get up!" shouted the company officers. "Left dress, there!

Forward! Don't c.o.c.k your rifles; don't fire until you're told to.

Steady there on the left. Forward! Forward!"

"Now yell, you red-legs! Yell!"

As they started running, their regimental colours fell, man and nag sprawling in the gra.s.s; and the entire line halted, bewildered. The next instant a zouave had lifted the colours, and was running forward; and: "Get on there! Continue the movement! What in h.e.l.l's the matter with you Zouaves!" shouted their lieutenant-colonel. And the sagging scarlet line bellied out, straightened as the flanks caught up, and swept out into the suns.h.i.+ne with a cheer-the peculiar Zouave cheer-not very full yet, for they had not yet lost the troubled wonder of things.

Stephen, running with shouldered musket, saw close ahead a long line of blue smoke and flame, but instead of the enemy there was nothing hidden behind the smoke except a long field-ditch in which dry brush was burning.

Into the ditch tumbled the regiment, and lay panting, coughing, kicking out the embers, and hugging the ground closely, because now the storm that had swept the tree tops was shaving the weeds and gra.s.s around them; and the drone of bullets streaming over the ditch rose to a loud, fierce whine.

Up in the blue sky little white clouds suddenly unfolded themselves with light reports, and disappeared, leaving jagged streamers of vapour afloat here and there; the near jarring discharge of artillery shook the ground till bits of sod fell in particles, crumbling from the ditch's edge; the outrageous racket of musketry never slackened.

Lying there, they heard a sudden burst of cheering, and far to the left saw another regiment come tumbling into the ditch and crouch, huddled there in a blue line stretching as far away as they could see. And again the firing increased to a stunning roar, and there were more cheers; and, to their right, another regiment came running and rolling into the ditch.

Officers, recklessly erect, stood here and there along the interior of the ditch; then from the lair of each regiment flags emerged, bugles blew clear and impatient; there came an upheaval of bayonets, and the three regiments scrambled to their feet, over the ditch's edge, and surged forward into the suns.h.i.+ne.

Across the fields Stephen saw guns being limbered up; and drivers las.h.i.+ng their horses to a gallop across a bridge. The regiment on their left was firing by wings as it advanced, the regiment on the right had broken into a heavy run, yelling: "Hey! We want them guns! Wait a second, will yer? Where you takin' them guns to?"

There was a new rail fence close in front of the Zouaves, barring their way to the bridge; and suddenly, from behind it, men arose with levelled muskets; and the Zouaves dropped flat to the volley that buried the fence in smoke.

"Now, boys!" cried Colonel Craig, "we've got to have that bridge! So we'll finish this business right here with the bayonet. Come on and let's end it now!"

Major Lent ran forward and started to climb the smoky fence; everywhere the Zouaves were swarming along the newly split rails or driving their bayonets through the smoke at the gray phantoms cl.u.s.tering behind. Shots rang out, the crack of stock against stock, the ringing clamour and click of steel filled the air.

The zouave next to Stephen lurched up against him spouting blood from the neck; on the other side of him another, a sergeant, too, had gone stark mad, apparently, and was swinging his terrible sabre bayonet without regard to friend or foe; and still another man of his squad, swearing horridly, had clutched a ghostly enemy in the smoke across the fence and was trying to strangle him with his bare hands.

Stephen, bewildered by a blow which glanced from his head to his left shoulder, clung to his musket and tried to stagger forward, but a bayonet seared his right temple, tearing the scalp and letting down a rush of blood all over his face and eyes. Blinded, the boy called instinctively: "Father! I'm hurt! Could you help me!"

Colonel Craig turned white under his tan, and looked back.

"I can't help you, my boy. Sergeant, will you look after my son?" And he ran forward into the infernal network of bayonets, calling out: "Get through there, boys. We might as well clean up this mess while we're about it. Pull down that fence! Never mind those men behind it!-rush it! Kick it over! Now come on! I don't ask you to do anything that I don't do. Major Lent and I will take you through. Come on and take that bridge!"

A captain, fighting back the bayonets with his sword, suddenly floundered to the fence top and clung, balanced on his belly, shouting hysterically:

"Look at the Lancers! Look at 'em coming! Now, Zouaves! Pull down the fence and give them a chance to charge the bridge!"

Over a low swell of land some hors.e.m.e.n trotted into view; behind them the horizon was suddenly filled with the swimming scarlet pennons of the Lancers. A thousand horses' heads shot up against the sky line, manes tossing; a thousand lance points fell to a glittering level.

They were cheering shrilly as they came on; the Zouaves heard them, the gray infantry regiment gave way, turned, filed off, retreating toward the bridge at a slow trot like some baffled but dangerous animal; and after it ran the Zouaves, firing, screaming, maddened to hysteria by their first engagement, until their panting officers and their bugles together barely managed to halt them short of the edges of utter annihilation just as a full Confederate brigade rose grimly from the wood's edge across the stream, ready to end their hysterical yelling for ever.

Stephen, sitting on the gra.s.s among the dead and stricken, tied his b.l.o.o.d.y turban, pulled the red fez close over it, smeared the blood from his eyes, and, clutching his musket, stood up unsteadily.

He could see the charge of the 8th Lancers-see the hors.e.m.e.n wheel and veer wildly as they received the fire of the Confederate troops from the woods across the stream, squadron after squadron sheering off at a gallop and driving past the infantry, pell-mell, a wild riot of maddened horses, yelling riders, and streaming scarlet pennons descending in one vivid, headlong torrent to the bridge. But the structure was already hopelessly afire; and the baffled carbineers of the advance reined up at the edge of the burning timbers and sent an angry volley after the gray infantry now jogging back into the woods beyond. Then, suddenly, the Zouaves heard the Lancers cheering wildly in the smoke of the burning structure, but did not know what it meant.

It meant-Berkley.

Fear had squired him that day. When the bugles sounded through the cannon thunder and his squadron trotted out, Fear, on a paler horse than Death bestrides, cantered with him, knee to knee. Fear's startled eyes looked into his through the jetted smoke of musketry, through the tumult of the horses and the trumpets; Fear made his voice light and thin, so that he scarcely heard it amid the fierce cheering of his comrades, the pounding of hoofs, the futile clattering of equipments.

It was all a swift and terrible nightmare to him-the squadrons breaking into a gallop, the woods suddenly belted with smoke, the thud and thwack of bullets pelting leather and living flesh, the frantic plunging of stricken horses, the lightning down-crash of riders hurled earthward at full speed, the brief glimpses of scarlet streaks under foot-of a horse's belly and agonised iron-shod feet, of a white face battered instantly into obliteration, of the ruddy smoke flowing with sparks amid which bugles rang above the clas.h.i.+ng halt of maddened squadrons.

Then, through the rolling ocean of smoke, he saw officers and men trying to hack away and beat out the burning timbers-saw a reckless carbineer-his own tent-mate-dismount and run out across the planking which was already afire, saw him stumble and roll over as a bullet hit him, get to his knees blindly, trip and fall flat in the smoke. Then Fear bellowed in Berkley's ear; but he had already clapped spurs to his horse, cantering out across the burning planking and straight into the smoke pall.

"Where are you, Burgess?" he shouted. The Fear of Death stiffened his lips as he reined up in the whirling spark-shot obscurity. "Burgess-d.a.m.n you-answer me, can't you!" he stammered, half strangled in the smoke, trying to master his terrified mount with rein and knee and heel.

Vaguely he heard comrades shouting for him to come back, heard sh.e.l.ls exploding amid the smoke, wheeled his staggering horse, bent swiftly and grasped at an inanimate form in the smoke, missed, dismounted and clutched the senseless carbineer-his comrade-and once his valet.