The Killer Angels - Michael Shaara [99]
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“You do pretty good.” Kilrain blinked, peered, looking for him.
“Colonel?”
“Right here.”
“The army was blessed …” But he ran out of breath, closed his eyes.
“You take it easy.”
“Want you to know. Just in case. That I have never served …” He paused to breathe, put out the bloody hand, looked into Chamberlain’s eyes. “Never served under a better man. Want you to know. Want to thank you, sir.”
Chamberlain nodded. Kilrain closed his eyes. His face began to relax; his skin was very pale. Chamberlain held the great cold hand. Chamberlain said, “Let me go round up something medicinal.”
“I’d be eternal grateful.”
“You rest.” Chamberlain was feeling alarm.
Tozier said, “I’ve sent off.”
“Well I’ve seen them run,” Kilrain said dreamily. “Glory be. Thanks to you, Colonel darlin’. Lived long enough to see the Rebs run. Come the Millennium. Did you see them run, Colonel darlin’?”
“I did.”
“I got one fella. Raggedy fella. Beautiful offhand shot, if I say so mesel’.”
“I’ve got to go, Buster.”
“He was drawin’ a bead on you, Colonel. I got him with one quick shot offhand. Oh lovely.” Kilrain sighed. “Loveliest shot I ever made.”
“You stay with him, Sergeant,” Chamberlain said.
Thomas nodded.
“Be back in a while, Buster.”
Kilrain opened his eyes, but he was drifting off toward sleep, and he nodded but did not see. Chamberlain backed away. There were some men around him from the old Second Maine and he talked to them automatically, not knowing what he was saying, thanking them for the fight, looking on strange young bloody faces. He moved back down the slope.
He went back along the low stone wall. The dead were mostly covered now with blankets and shelter halves, but some of them were still dying and there were groups of men clustered here and there. There were dead bodies and wounded bodies all down the wall and all down through the trees and blood was streaked on the trees and rocks and rich wet wood splinters were everywhere. He patted shoulders, noted faces. It was very quiet and dark down among the trees. Night was coming. He began to feel tired. He went on talking. A boy was dying. He had made a good fight and he wanted to be promoted before he died and Chamberlain promoted him. He spoke to a man who had been clubbed over the head with a musket and who could not seem to say what he wanted to say, and another man who was crying because both of the Merrill boys were dead, both brothers, and he would be the one who would have to tell their mother. Chamberlain reached the foot of the hill and came out into the last light.
Ellis Spear came up. There were tears in the corners of his eyes. He nodded jerkily, a habit of Maine men, a greeting.
“Well,” he said. He did not know what to say. After a moment he pulled out an impressively ornamented silver flask, dented, lustrous.
“Colonel? Ah, I have a beverage here which I have been saving for an, ah, appropriate moment. I think this is—well, would the Colonel honor me by joining me in a, ah, swallow?”
Chamberlain thought: Kilrain. But he could not hurt Spear’s feelings. And his mouth was gritty and dry. Spear handed it over solemnly, gravely, with the air of a man taking part in a ceremony. Chamberlain drank. Oh, good. Very, very good. He saw one small flicker of sadness pass over Spear’s face, took the bottle from his lips.
“Sorry, Ellis. ‘Swallow’ is a flighty word. An indiscriminate word. But thank you. Very much. And now.”
Spear bowed formally. “Colonel, it has been my pleasure.”
Here through the rocks was a grinning Tom. Young Tom. Only a boy. Chamberlain felt a shattering rush of emotion, restrained it. Behind Tom were troops of the 83rd Pennsylvania: Captain Woodward, Colonel Rice of the 44th New York. Chamberlain thought: Rice must be the new commander of the whole brigade.
Tom said with vast delight, ticking them off, “Lawrence, we got prisoners from