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By Root 4561 0

for the opening. But it was a silent rage, a crafty rage; he was learning war. He rode purposefully, slowly off into the dark feeling the swelling inside his chest like an unexploded bomb and in the back of his mind a vision of that gray rocky hill( all spiked with guns, massed with blue troops at the top, and he knew as certainly as he had ever known anything as a soldier that the hill could not be taken, not any more, and a cold, metal, emotionless voice told him that coldly, calmly, speaking into his ear as if he had a companion with him utterly untouched by the rage, the war, a machine inside wholly unhurt, a metal mind that did not feel at all.

"Sir?"

Longstreet swiveled in the saddle: Sorrel. The man said warily, "Captain Goree is here, sir. Ah, you sent for him."

Longstreet looked, saw the skinny Texan, gestured.

Sorrel backed off. Longstreet said, "T. J. Want you to get out to the right and scout the position. No more damn fool counter-marches in the morning. Take most of the night but get it clear, get it clear. I've got Hood's Division posted on our right flank. Or what's left of it. I've put Law in command. You need any help, you get it from Law, all right?"

The Texan, a silent man, nodded but did not move.

Longstreet said, "What's the matter?"

"They're blaming us," Goree said. His voice was squeaky, like a dry wagon wheel. He radiated anger.

Longstreet stared.

"What?"

"I been talking to Hood's officers. Do you know they blame us? They blame you.

For today."

Longstreet could not see the bony face clearly, in the dark, but the voice was tight and very high, and Longstreet thought: he could be a dangerous man, out of control.

Goree said, "You may hear of it. General. I had to hit this fella. They all said the attack was your fault and if General Lee knowed he wouldn't have ordered it and I just couldn't just stand there and I couldn't say right out what I felt, so I had to hit this one fella. Pretty hard. Had to do it. Ain'

goin' to apologize neither. No time. But. Thought you ought to know."

"Is he dead?"

"I don't think so."

"Well, that's good." Longstreet meditated. "Well, don't worry on it. Probably won't hear another thing if you didn't kill him. Probably forgotten in the morning. One thing: I want no duels. No silly damn duels."

"Yes, sir. Thing is, if anything bad happens now, they all blame it on you. I seen it comin'. They can't blame General Lee. Not no more. So they all take it out on you. You got to watch yourself, General."

"Well," Longstreet said. "Let it go."

"Yes, sir. But it aint easy. After I saw you take all morning trying to get General Lee to move to the right."

"Let it go. T. J. We'll talk on it after the fight."

Goree moved out. There goes a damn good man.

Longstreet felt the warmth of unexpected gratitude. He swung the black horse toward Lee's headquarters back on the road to Cashtown. Time now to talk. Good long talk.

Watch the anger. Careful. But it is true. The men shied from blaming Lee. The Old Man is becoming untouchable. Now more than anything else he needs the truth. But... well, it's not his fault, not the Old Man. Longstreet jerked the horse, almost ran into Sorrel. They came out into a patch of bright moonlight.

Longstreet saw: the man was hurt.

"Major," Longstreet said harshly. "How are you?"

"Sir? Oh, I'm fine, sir. Juss minor problem."

"That's a godawful piece of horse you've got there."

"Yes, sir. Lost the other one, sir. They shot it out from under me. It lost both legs. I was with Dealing's Battery.

Hot time, sir." Sorrel bobbed his head apologetically.

Longstreet pointed. "What's the trouble with the arm?"

Sorrel shrugged, embarrassed. "Nothing much, sir. Bit painful, can't move it.

Shrapnel, sir. Hardly broke the skin. Ah, Osmun Latrobe got hit too."

"How bad?"

"Just got knocked off the horse, I believe. This fighting is very hard on the horses, sir. I was hoping we could get a new supply up here, but these Yankee horses are just farm stock-too big, too slow. Man would look ridiculous on a plow horse."

"Well," Longstreet grumbled vaguely.