or listen to the woman who loved him?
And did it make any difference?
Ted knew that he could be dead in a week. Ifthat happened, it might be a blessing. No matter which way he chose, he would never have to choose again, never have to face himself in a shaving mirror with that question mark between his eyebrows, never have to wonder if he had made the right choice. The need to choose would end with his life. That knowledge gave him some sort of perverse pleasure.
He would rest now. Tomorrow he would begin the search. Closing his eyes, he leaned back against the chilly ground and waited for sleep. He could feel the frozen knot beginning to chill every nerve in his body. Each limb felt as if it were sculpted from ice. Ted wondered if he had ever felt this calm. It brought him back to the night of April 4, 1862. He had lain on another hillside then. And like now, there had been no fire. The Yankees were out there then. Snipers swarmed all over the woods, tying themselves in trees and just waiting for some fool to pass between a roaring fire and a gunsight. It hadn’t taken long to realize it was better to be cold than to be dead.
At least that’s what he had thought then. But he was young, and life had seemed like it would never end unless he made a mistake. And he had been too young to make mistakes. He was no longer that young. And he was no longer that naive. The next day had stripped him of whatever innocence he had.
It came back as plain as day, the way it alwaysdid. There had been rain. Everyplace he looked, there was mud. Sometimes the troops had to sleep in fields so full of standing water, they were no better than swamps. The roads, tramped on by hundreds of horses and thousands of men, turned to rivers of thick, clinging clay. The wagons bogged down time after time and often had to be manhandled to get them free of the morass.
For days, there were skirmishes. Cavalry patrols would run afoul of pickets. Musket fire would crack for twenty minutes, then one side or the other would withdraw, dragging a couple of wounded men, hurling curses over their shoulders. No one had any idea of the horror that was to come.
It seemed then almost like a picnic with fireworks. Now and then somebody got hurt, but that happened at picnics, too. The guns were toys. After all, the troops were children, most of them. It was the officers who were the old men. Old men leading boys into a cauldron full of molten lead that would scald the flesh from their bones and leave them gasping like dying fish on the muddy ground.
It started by accident, and Ted wasn’t even there. Most of the officers were surprised by it, and almost all of the men. But it didn’t take long to turn from a schoolboy’s outing to a hellish nightmare. The cannons fired canisters full of grape shot, balls the size of small plums, then exploded and scatteredthe deadly shot in every direction. Limbs were torn off, leaving stumps spouting blood in thick gouts. Eyes were lost, hands and arms and legs blown away.
One of Ted’s friends, a kid who couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen, got shot through the belly. Ted knelt beside him where the blood on his uniform almost obscured the foot of intestines ripped through the wound by the minié ball. The kid kept screaming, and Ted could do nothing but slit the wound a little and stuff the intestine back. Then he sat there and held the kid’s head in his lap until he died.
All day and into the next, it continued. Men fell on both sides by tens and hundreds. He never did learn how many died. But the smell of the gunsmoke, so thick it hung like a lowering fog over the fields, was still with him.
And it was to get worse before it was over. A charge with fixed bayonets into a Federal camp, almost on the banks of the Tennessee River, was the last straw. Sweeping through the tents, firing at things that moved and things that didn’t, they burst open the camp, stabbing at wounded men who were too close to death
And did it make any difference?
Ted knew that he could be dead in a week. Ifthat happened, it might be a blessing. No matter which way he chose, he would never have to choose again, never have to face himself in a shaving mirror with that question mark between his eyebrows, never have to wonder if he had made the right choice. The need to choose would end with his life. That knowledge gave him some sort of perverse pleasure.
He would rest now. Tomorrow he would begin the search. Closing his eyes, he leaned back against the chilly ground and waited for sleep. He could feel the frozen knot beginning to chill every nerve in his body. Each limb felt as if it were sculpted from ice. Ted wondered if he had ever felt this calm. It brought him back to the night of April 4, 1862. He had lain on another hillside then. And like now, there had been no fire. The Yankees were out there then. Snipers swarmed all over the woods, tying themselves in trees and just waiting for some fool to pass between a roaring fire and a gunsight. It hadn’t taken long to realize it was better to be cold than to be dead.
At least that’s what he had thought then. But he was young, and life had seemed like it would never end unless he made a mistake. And he had been too young to make mistakes. He was no longer that young. And he was no longer that naive. The next day had stripped him of whatever innocence he had.
It came back as plain as day, the way it alwaysdid. There had been rain. Everyplace he looked, there was mud. Sometimes the troops had to sleep in fields so full of standing water, they were no better than swamps. The roads, tramped on by hundreds of horses and thousands of men, turned to rivers of thick, clinging clay. The wagons bogged down time after time and often had to be manhandled to get them free of the morass.
For days, there were skirmishes. Cavalry patrols would run afoul of pickets. Musket fire would crack for twenty minutes, then one side or the other would withdraw, dragging a couple of wounded men, hurling curses over their shoulders. No one had any idea of the horror that was to come.
It seemed then almost like a picnic with fireworks. Now and then somebody got hurt, but that happened at picnics, too. The guns were toys. After all, the troops were children, most of them. It was the officers who were the old men. Old men leading boys into a cauldron full of molten lead that would scald the flesh from their bones and leave them gasping like dying fish on the muddy ground.
It started by accident, and Ted wasn’t even there. Most of the officers were surprised by it, and almost all of the men. But it didn’t take long to turn from a schoolboy’s outing to a hellish nightmare. The cannons fired canisters full of grape shot, balls the size of small plums, then exploded and scatteredthe deadly shot in every direction. Limbs were torn off, leaving stumps spouting blood in thick gouts. Eyes were lost, hands and arms and legs blown away.
One of Ted’s friends, a kid who couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen, got shot through the belly. Ted knelt beside him where the blood on his uniform almost obscured the foot of intestines ripped through the wound by the minié ball. The kid kept screaming, and Ted could do nothing but slit the wound a little and stuff the intestine back. Then he sat there and held the kid’s head in his lap until he died.
All day and into the next, it continued. Men fell on both sides by tens and hundreds. He never did learn how many died. But the smell of the gunsmoke, so thick it hung like a lowering fog over the fields, was still with him.
And it was to get worse before it was over. A charge with fixed bayonets into a Federal camp, almost on the banks of the Tennessee River, was the last straw. Sweeping through the tents, firing at things that moved and things that didn’t, they burst open the camp, stabbing at wounded men who were too close to death
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