Devil's Dream - Madison Smartt Bell [49]
“Buckland, then?”
“That’s him back yonder I reckon,” Bill said, jerking his thumb to the north, where, a couple of blocks distant, Federal soldiers were being called to formation to advance on the raiders.
“You don’t mean it, Brother Bill,” Jesse said. “We didn’t get a lick of what we come for.”
“I don’t know about that,” Bill said. “This ought to fetch A. J. Smith back out of Mississippi, if I don’t miss my guess.”
“We don’t mean to wait till he gets here do we?” Jesse said, peering around. The fog was still heavily swirling, but had turned very bright; soon the sun would cut through, and they’d all be exposed.
“No, but where’s Bedford?”
Jesse shrugged. “Wasn’t he laying back with Neely and them?”
“When was he ever a one to lay back?”
A rhetorical question. Henri opened his mouth to speak, but Dinkins, who’d crossed a leg over the pommel of his saddle to lace on the second shoe he had requisitioned, was ahead of him.
“General Forrest was with us as far as Beale Street.”
“Beale Street,” Bill Forrest ran a thumb along the bone beneath his beard. “You don’t say. …”
“We got a passel of horses and prisoners here,” Jesse said. “I think we better get a move on, Bedford or not. He’s bound to be somewhere.”
STUMBLING TOWARD the river and Fort Pickering, General Hurlbut blessed his guiding star that he’d spent the night with a friend, and his lady friends, instead of bunking in the Gayoso, but he cursed the corn whiskey he’d been drinking till late, and which made his head hammer louder than the cannon in the fort, which were blazing at nothing since no raiders were near.
“Will you for Chrissake hold your fire?” Hurlbut yelled, and the guns hushed as he came to the gate. “They aren’t coming here! They’ve got no artillery. You won’t fight them off sitting inside this fort!”
Inside the gate he found Washburn, his face purple as a beet, struggling to stuff his nightshirt into a pair of borrowed britches too small for him. An adjutant drew Hurlbut aside to report.
“Well if that doesn’t beat …” Hurlbut narrowed his eyes at the furious Washburn, and spoke to the adjutant behind his hand. “They had him relieve me because I couldn’t keep Forrest out of West Tennessee, but it looks like he can’t keep Forrest out of his own damn bedroom.”
FORREST OVERTOOK his brothers at a battery on the edge of town. They’d overrun it on the way in but couldn’t spare men to set a guard, and the Federal gunners had returned. Their nerves seemed none too steady, though. Forrest raised a whoop and a holler and rode down on them with a Navy six in one hand and saber in the other, piloting King Philip with his knees alone, as the warhorse stretched out his long neck and spread his yellow teeth to bite. The gunners dropped their matches and scattered without getting off a shot.
“Brother, you look full of piss and vinegar,” Bill Forrest said.
“Obliged,” Forrest said, panting. A couple of the riders were dismounting now to spike the cannon, while others herded horses and prisoners down the road running south out of town.
“Whar’s them three generals,” Forrest said.
“Missed’m,” said Bill.
“You don’t mean it.” Forrest holstered his pistol and cocked a hand on his hip.
“Well, maybe you run acrost them somewhere,” Bill said, looking at him hard. He was as big a man as his elder brother and some few believed him possibly the tougher of the two. “Wherever you was at.”
Bill’s face was gray from the pain of his half-healed thigh wound, but Bedford was first to break the gaze.
“Well look yonder, would ye.” He gestured with his blade. The Sixth Illinois was just turning the corner, in order of battle and stepping out smartly.
“Aye,” Bill said. He swung his horse to face the enemy.
Forrest studied him. “Ye look about blowed,” he remarked. “I’m fresher’n you are, I spec. Ye best herd them horses on down the road. We’ll give these folks their jollification and be right along—Ornery!” he called.
Henri spurred up, as Bill Forrest, biting his pale lower lip, turned around and rode to the rear. The newly shod Dinkins