Gods and Generals - Jeff Shaara [136]
“I’m not sure. It looks like the battle might swing back this way. We had better be ready.” He had said it again, felt foolish again. Telling them to be ready won’t make them ready.
Kilrain looked up toward the hill, said, “It’s already in front of us, Colonel, there.”
Chamberlain listened, realized the noises to the right had faded, replaced now by a wave of new sounds, over the hill and out in front of where he had been. And now the cannon fired again and did not pause, and the smoke began to flow down the hill toward them and above them, darkening the sky. He heard the scream again, the whine of the incoming shell, and up on the hill the shell burst, a new thunder, and he felt the ground shake under his feet. More shells came high overhead, and behind him the men began to move nervously, some standing, some crouching, and the officers were shouting, keeping them in line—there was no other place to go.
The sounds were much closer now. He stared at the hill, wondered if this would be the place, if suddenly the rebels would pour over the hill, rush past the cannon and down. Easy, he thought . . . there’s a whole army out there . . . we’re in back, behind them all.
The cannon kept up the waves of firing, and the enemy’s shells continued falling around them, but only a few, and not aimed at them . . . just chance . . . the shells that were missing their targets. He sat down now, and the men who had stood, expecting . . . something, sat as well, and there was nothing to do but wait.
It was now past noon, and out on the road men and wagons were moving back, away from the fight. The troops stared at the long procession, the solid line of wounded, heard the sounds, the wails and screams, and some would not look, turned their faces away, and others stared hard. Chamberlain had stood at first, a show of respect, but this too was not a parade, and he sat again and listened to the battle work its way along the creek far out in front of them. Now there was fire down to the left, toward the stone bridge, and it seemed to grow more quiet in front of him, and he had the strange feeling that the battle had been like some great, horrible wheel, rolling slowly from right to left, right in front of them, right past them.
It is not coming after all, he thought. This is what the reserves do, they sit back behind it all and hear the sounds, and wait for an attack that does not come. He realized then that he felt disappointment. He looked down along the lines, saw the faces that had been watching the hill, that like him had been expecting something and who now began to look elsewhere. There were a few fires, coffee being made, more laughing.
Well, then, it must be going well, he thought. They don’t need us. He began to move toward the new smells, was suddenly very hungry. He brushed dirt from his pants, stepped around a small crater, then another. The men were letting go now, the tension releasing, and there was more laughter, a big sergeant teasing a small man with glasses.
Chamberlain did not feel like laughing, felt something dead, hollow in his gut. The hunger had become something else, more painful now. He stopped at a fence post, cupped his hand over the top, suddenly pulled hard on the post, pulled it down, the base uprooting from the soft dirt. He stood back, looked around, felt embarrassed, but more, he felt angry, denied. He turned toward the hill, looked up to the guns, silent now, the fight drifting, too far away.
24. HANCOCK
September 17, 1862. Early afternoon.
THE BATTLE had moved away, off to the left. He had been up front, in the center of the entire Federal line, for only an hour or so, and he expected a fight, a good fight. He could still see the gray lines spread out on the far side of the field, but they did not come.
He did not know Israel Richardson, knew only that the man was down, presumed dead by now, a terrible wound. It had happened just after noon, when the fighting was heaviest