Gods and Generals - Jeff Shaara [175]
There had been no official word. No report had come down this far, but they knew the day was not a good one. Before, from across the river, they could not see what was happening in front of the stone wall, but now, as the broken units out in front of them hugged the ground and broken men flowed from the field, Chamberlain understood. His men were the reserves, and they were being sent in.
The Twentieth Maine was part of the Third Brigade of Griffin’s division, Fifth Corps. Griffin’s other brigades were already moving out, and Chamberlain watched them go, growing smaller and fading into the drifting smoke. Now he heard new bugles, and Ames, down the line, the familiar voice, “Advance . . . the Twentieth!” and the line began to move slowly forward.
They marched in lines three deep. Chamberlain looked to the side, down the short rows, thought, We are not very many, and this is a big damned field. To his left he saw the other regiments, men from New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan. Men like these, he thought, just farmers and shopkeepers, and now we are soldiers, and now we are about to die. The thought struck him as a certainty, and it shocked him. He did not feel afraid, felt no emotion at all, only the slow rhythm of his steps kicking through the thick grass, small, hard lumps of snow.
He had been hearing the constant sounds all day, and nothing had changed, and so it did not affect him. The sounds were closer, maybe louder, but they were the same sounds. He became curious, thought, We will see, now, won’t we? We will learn something, what this is like, what it has been like for the men in front of us, the men who were in front of us at Antietam, who have done this before.
From the brigade in front of him he saw a man break, turn and run back toward him, closer, and he saw the face, the animal eyes, the pure terror. Down the line his men began to yell, taunting, and he suddenly knew that it was his job to do . . . something.
He felt at his belt, grabbed his pistol, pulled it from the holster and pointed it at the man’s head. The man looked at him, the eyes clearing for a few seconds, and he stopped running, stood a few yards in front of him. Chamberlain was still moving forward, his feet in a rhythm by themselves, and the man stared at the pistol, abruptly turned and began to walk forward again, by himself, out in front of the regiment.
Chamberlain lowered the pistol, amazed, heard cheering from his men, and he stared ahead at the back of the lone soldier, thought, All right, it’s all right. The instinct is in all of us, to save ourselves. But what happened to that man, what was it that made him suddenly turn?
He began to feel afraid now, a sudden wave of sickness filling him. What if I run? No, do not do that. You think too much. This is not about thinking, it is about . . . instinct, a different instinct than survival. He tried to think of the cause, yes, focus on that . . . the reason for . . . all of this. He tried to picture it, slavery, the rights of all men. . . . But the men . . . why are they doing this? No, this wasn’t working. His mind was numb, he felt no great fire, no passion for any cause. Where had it gone, the excitement and enthusiasm for doing something that was so . . . necessary, his trip to the capital, to the governor? It was all vague, faint memory . . . and out in front of him the puffs of smoke and the small flashes were all that was real.
The shells began to reach them now, and the rhythm of his steps was jarred, the ground rolling and bouncing him up, and dirt spraying him, pushing him aside with a breath of hot wind. But he did not fall, looked back toward the explosion, saw . . . nothing, a gap in the line. He turned to the front, the rhythm returning, thought, There had been a man there . . . several. But his mind would not let him focus on that, and he stared ahead, saw the backs of the men out