Gods and Generals - Jeff Shaara [178]
The man jumped, lurched back, said in a burst, “For the love of God!” and crawled away, sat for a moment in the dark, said in a whisper, “Sorry. I thought you was with the Beyond.”
Chamberlain raised himself up, could see across the field now. The moon had come up, and men were moving around, crawling among the dead, pulling off coats and shirts and boots. There were men with stretchers, lifting some of the wounded, carrying them back toward the wagons waiting far behind the lines. The sounds of the wounded were still there, but not as many, softer sounds, and he thought, Many have died, maybe the lucky ones.
He propped himself up on his elbows, told himself, You are in command, maybe you should . . . This had never been discussed; Ames had not told him what to do in this situation. Ames . . . he wondered if he was alive. He crawled out from the shelter of the bodies, slid along painfully, then saw more of the stretcher bearers, standing, and he rose to his knees, tried to look around. He wanted to say something, to call out, how many were still alive . . . Tom. Tom! He felt a burst of cold in his gut.
“Tom!” The noise exploded through the cold night, and he listened, waited, and then he heard other voices, other yells.
“Tom!” and laughing, and he looked that way, over the hill, toward the stone wall, and now there were more voices.
“Tom! You home, Tom?” and along the hill, across the field, his own men began to take up the call.
“No Tom here!”
“Hey, Tom! You got a message!”
He felt a rush of anger, wanted to yell again, and now he heard another voice, one single sound from below him, down in the bottom of the wide depression:
“Lawrence!”
He started to rise, to stand up, thought, I can see, the moon is bright, maybe I can see where he is . . . and suddenly there was a flash, several more, and he dropped down, lay flat, and around him other men began to yell, “Keep it down, stay down. You’ll draw fire!”
He lay still for a minute, raised himself up slowly, thought, He is alive, thank God. He turned, crawled back up to his bed, slid in tight between the bodies, pulled again at the flaps of cloth.
There were clouds now, moving across the face of the bright moon, and he could see fewer stars. There was a new sound, the wind, a steady growing breeze, and he thought, No, please, no storm, no snow, not tonight. But the clouds were thin, and the moon was still there, shining through. The breeze flowed across the field, and he rose one more time, felt the sharp chill, lay back down, said in a low whisper to the bodies, to his shelter, “God forgive me.”
He lay still for a long time, watched the clouds slide past the moon, and the wind began to change, to shift direction, and suddenly there was a noise, a rustle, a knocking. He sat up, looked to the side, up over the rise, saw a dark shape in the distance, a battered house. The noise came from there, but he could see nothing. He lay back down, and the noise kept coming, and he tried to imagine what it was, pictured a house in his mind, the wind, thought, A window. And he knew it was a curtain, a blind, slapping against an open window frame. He felt relief, let out a long breath. He lay still again, and the noise still came, the sound growing, pushing everything else away, and his mind was filled again, and the noise became words, a hard, cold whisper.
“Never, forever . . . never, forever . . .”
HE WOKE to the dim light of a foggy dawn and the sound of muskets. There were scattered shots, small protests from the stone wall, and his men learned quickly that they had no choice but to stay low, keeping their heads barely above the surface of the ground. The depression gave them cover, broke the clean line of fire from the wall, but higher up, on the face of the hill, the big guns still watched over them, and so Chamberlain stayed put.
The word had been passed, the Ninth Corps would advance, come up behind them, renew the attack, a strong force moving up to replace them. It had the logic of something official, and so he believed it,