The Killer Angels - Michael Shaara [26]
“The general, ah, defers to General Hill’s judgment, I believe.”
Longstreet grimaced. He thought: We have other cavalry. Why doesn’t the old man send for a look? Tell you why: He can’t believe Stuart would let him down.
“Have you any orders, sir?” Sorrel was gazing longingly toward the poker game.
“No.”
“The men are anxious to have you join the game, sir. As you once did.”
“Not tonight, Major.”
Sorrel bowed. “Yes, sir. Oh, by the way, sir, General Pickett sends his compliments and states that he will be dropping by later this evening for a chat.”
Longstreet nodded. There’ll be a complaint from old George. But good to see him. Sorrel moved off into a burst of laughter, a cloud of lovely tobacco. Longstreet sat brooding.
There was an odor of trouble, an indefinable wrong. It was like playing chess and making a bad move and not knowing why but knowing instinctively that it was a bad move. The instincts were yelling. As they used to do long ago at night in Indian country. He gazed out into the black. The stars were obscured. It was the blindness that bothered him. Cavalry in Gettysburg? Harrison would know.
“Sir?”
He looked up again. In soft light: Fremantle.
“Beg your pardon, sir. Most humbly, sir. I’m not disturbing you?”
“Um,” Longstreet said. But there was something about the man, prepared for flight, that made Longstreet grin. He was a scrawny man, toothy, with a pipelike neck and a monstrous Adam’s apple. He looked like a popeyed bird who had just swallowed something large and sticky and triangular. He was wearing a tall gray hat and a remarkable coat with very wide shoulders, like wings.
He said cheerily, “If I am disturbing you at all, sir, my most humble apologies. But your fame, sir, as a practitioner of poker, is such that one comes to you for advice. I hope you don’t mind.”
“Not ’t’all,” Longstreet said. Sometimes when you were around Englishmen there was this ridiculous tendency to imitate them. Longstreet restrained himself. But he grinned.
“What I wanted to ask you, sir, is this. I gather that you are the authority in these matters, and I learned long ago, sir, that in affairs of this kind it is always wisest to go directly, straightway, may I say, to the top.”
Longstreet waited. Fremantle relaxed slightly, conspiratorially, stroked a handlebar mustache.
“I am most curious, General, as to your attitude toward a subtle subject: the inside straight. On what occasion, or rather, under what circumstance, does one draw to an inside straight? In your opinion. Your response will be kept confidential, of course.”
“Never.” Longstreet said.
Fremantle nodded gravely, listening. There was nothing else. After a moment he inquired, “Never?”
“Never.”
Fremantle thought upon it. “You mean never,” he concluded.
Longstreet nodded.
“Quite,” Fremantle said. He drew back, brooding, then drew himself up. “Indeed,” he said. “Well, thank you, sir. Your most humble servant. My apologies for the disturbance.”
“Not ’t’all.”
“I leave you to more important things.” He bowed, backed off, paused, looked up. “Never?” he said wistfully.
“Never,” Longstreet said.
“Oh. Well, right-ho.” Fremantle went away.
Longstreet turned to the dark. A strange and lacey race. Talk like ladies, fight like wildcats. There had long been talk of England coming in on the side of the South. But Longstreet did not think they would come. They will come when we don’t need them, like the bank offering money when you’re no longer in debt.
A cluster of yells: he looked up. A group of horsemen were riding into camp. One plumed rider waved a feathered hat: that would be George Pickett. At a distance he looked like a French king, all curls and feathers. Longstreet grinned unconsciously. Pickett rode into the firelight, bronze-curled and lovely, hair down to his shoulders, regal and gorgeous on a stately mount. He gestured to the staff, someone pointed toward Longstreet. Pickett rode this way, bowing. Men were grinning, lighting up as he passed; Longstreet could see a train of officers behind him. He had brought along all three of his