I Shall Be Near to You(61)
We are the first ones stirring so I touch his shoulder.
‘I never meant for you to have to do a thing like that. Not on my account,’ I say, taking Jeremiah’s hand and tracing the Winter trees of veins there, imagining I can feel the blood flowing strong.
A strange flat voice comes out of Jeremiah when he says, ‘This ain’t a good place,’ and after that I put what he’s done down with all the other things I won’t ever say another word about.
CHAPTER
22
BULL RUN: AUGUST 30, 1862
When I wake again, it ain’t because I’m rested. It’s because the sun is full up and Jeremiah’s hand is shaking my shoulder.
‘What?’ I say, and then I see Captain standing stiff before us. I bolt upright.
‘Your efforts last night have not gone unnoticed. I want to express the gratitude of the Union Army for your assistance above and beyond your duty.’
Captain’s gaze is piercing. Jeremiah nudges me.
‘Thank you, Sir,’ I say. ‘But there wasn’t much we could—’
‘Your efforts have not been in vain,’ he says, turning to go. ‘This Army is proud to have soldiers like you.’
As soon as Captain leaves, Sully starts whispering to Jeremiah with so much excitement he might as well be yelling.
‘Before Captain decided to get all lovey with Ross here, he told me they’ve got reports those Rebs are retreating! Maybe they’re licked already!’
Jeremiah looks out toward the field, past where Will is kneeling, his hands clasped.
‘What I hear out on that field,’ Jeremiah says, ‘don’t know how we could be winning.’
‘Must be mostly Rebs dying out there,’ Sully says.
It ain’t worth stirring myself to tell him any different and risk bringing up feelings no one else needs now. Especially when Jeremiah’s face has already got a look I can’t stand, something bleak that weren’t ever there before.
It ain’t long before Sergeant comes, saying, ‘Two Regiments in the Brigade are staying in reserve to guard the stone house, but our Regiment has been ordered forward. We’re to relieve Kearny’s men, who have been stretched thin holding the Army’s right flank.’
My Mama lays baby’s breath and yarrow at my brothers’ graves to mark each year, and cries over every letter her sister sends, and now I am marching into battle. Why ain’t I said a proper good-bye to her and Papa?
Let us live let us live let us live. The words swell up in my heart until Jeremiah says the first thing to me since we woke.
‘Don’t you think about last night. It ain’t our time yet,’ and he rests a hand on my shoulder.
OUR BUGLES SOUND and voices roar as we march past the stone house and up a steep hill. Our blue Company flag waves ahead of the officers on their horses and the drums roll and my feet move without me even willing them. The air around us is tight like before lightning, and I think of Mama’s pregnant belly stretched taut.
Captain yells, ‘Left Flank!’ and we turn from the road, through a strip of meadow, to a swath of trees where a ghost smoke rises. Double quick our lines braid themselves through trees. I watch for rocks and branches but the boots and legs in front of me are moving moving moving and then out from under Jeremiah’s foot, a wild violet still blooming, its purple flowers rising up from being crushed.
Firing rumbles in front of us now, the musket volleys coming closer, louder. Artillery roars off to our left, shells hail down around us, and this is what is meant by hellfire. Our lines go to wavering and breaking and it is all I can do to keep pushing forward. I want to throw myself down into the ground, anything just to stay living, but Jeremiah is there ahead of me and so I bring my rifle to my shoulder like everyone else.
The bullets keep coming and the whole Company wheels to the right, a herd of horses bolting, and then there is a steep bank rising up before us, maybe a hundred paces away, taller than any man, and so clear it ain’t natural. That bank stretches to the left and right as far as the eye can go, giving the Rebels cover to run behind for miles.
Our flag flutters up ahead, its gold fringe catching flashes of light coming through the trees, and there ain’t no orders to be heard but the boys move after it.
I stay on Jeremiah’s heel, branches snapping across my face and arms. Let us live let us live let us live. Gray boys move, flashing in and out between the trees in front of the bank, Rebel skirmishers set out to stop us from getting near to what must be at least a full Brigade hiding behind that embankment. We can never get up to those Rebs and still be living and I want to grab Jeremiah’s arm and run back the way we came, back through the trees with him in tow.
Beside me Sully yells, ‘C’mon! Keep coming!’ and I don’t know if he’s talking to us or to the Rebels.
The Company in front of us rushes and runs across that ground to the mound, leaving us open. A panic races through me as they go, when we are left open. There is a volley of fire and smoke and the thug of bullets hitting bodies, the tang of gunpowder mixing with blood, only a few of that Company even getting to the base of the embankment. Most of them fall and we are next and we’ve got to get to that mound. I push into a run, Henry and Jimmy off to my right side, Will on my left, Sully with Jeremiah in front.
‘Stay back!’ Jeremiah yells, and shoves me with his elbow when I try coming up alongside him.