The Killer Angels - Michael Shaara [38]
He was again breathless, but he bent over the map. Longstreet said nothing.
“He’s new to command,” Lee said. “It will take him some days to pick up the reins. His information will be poor, he will have staff problems.”
“Yes, and he will have Washington on his back, urging him to throw us out of Pennsylvania. He has to fight. We don’t.”
Lee put his hand to his eyes. He was fuzzy-brained. Longstreet loved the defense. But all the bright theories so rarely worked. Instinct said: Hit hard, hit quick, hit everything. But he listened. Then he said slowly, “That move will be what Meade expects.”
“Yes. Because he fears it.”
Lee turned away from the table. He wanted no argument now. He had been down this road before, and Longstreet was immovable, and there was no point in argument when you did not even know where the enemy was. Yet it was good counsel. Trust Longstreet to tell the truth. Lee looked up and there was Traveler, led by a black groom. The staff had gathered, the tents were down. Time to move. Lee took a deep, delighted breath.
“Now, General,” he said, “let’s go see what George Meade intends.”
They moved out into the open, into the warm sunlight. It was becoming a marvelous day. Out on the road the army flowed endlessly eastward, pouring toward the great fight. Lee smelled the superb wetness of clean mountain air. He said, “General, will you ride with me?”
Longstreet bowed. “My pleasure.”
Lee mounted in pain, but the hot sun would heal the old bones. They rode out into a space in the great gray bristling stream. Another band played; men were shouting. It was lovely country. They rode through soft green rounded hills, a sunny morn, a splendid air, moving toward adventure as rode the plumed knights of old. Far back in the woods there was still fog in the trees, caught in the branches like fragments of white summer, and Lee remembered:
Bow down Thy Heavens, O Lord, and come down,
Touch the mountains, and they shall smoke.
He closed his eyes. Blessed be the Lord my strength, which teacheth my fingers to fight and my hands to war. Amen.
They rode several miles before they heard the first thunder.
Lee reined to a stop. Silence. Motion of ragged white clouds. He said, “Did you hear that?”
Longstreet, who was slightly deaf, shook his head.
“It might have been thunder.” But Lee waited. Then it came: low, distant thumping. Ominous: angry. Longstreet said grimly, bright-eyed, angered, “I don’t hear too well anymore.”
“That was artillery,” Lee said. Longstreet gazed at him with black marble eyes. “You don’t think …” Lee began, then stopped. “I’d better ride forward,” he said. Longstreet nodded. Lee looked at his watch. Not quite ten in the morning. He left Longstreet and rode toward the sound of the guns.
2.
BUFORD
Just before dawn Buford rode down the line himself, waking them up, all the boyish faces. Then he climbed the ladder into the white cupola and sat listening to the rain, watching the light come. The air was cool and wet and delicious to breathe: a slow, fine, soaking rain, a farmer’s rain, gentle on the roof. The light came slowly: there were great trees out in the mist. Then the guns began.
A single shot. He sat up. Another. Two more widely spaced. Then a small volley, a spattering. A long silence: several seconds. He stared at white air, the rounded tops of smoky trees. Men were moving out in the open below him. An officer paused on horseback in the road. The firing began again, Rebel guns, farther off, but not many. Buford was cold. He shuddered, waited.
The first attack was very short: a ragged fire. Buford nodded, listening. “Yes. Tried to brush us off. Got a bloody nose. Now he’ll get angry, all puffed up like a partridge. Now he’ll form up a line and try us for real, and he’ll hit the main line.” The mist was lifting slowly, the rain was slackening, but Buford could not see the line. He felt the attack come and