They joined the squad which was driving back the rebels who had started out to break the fence.
Presently the cavalry wheeled about and disappeared in the woods. The rear was scarcely out of sight, and the 200th Ind. was just beginning to feel a sense of relief, when there was a sputter of shots and a chorus of yells away off to the extreme left.
"Just as I expected," grumbled Shorty. "They are jumping the rear of the train now."
Leaving Co. A to watch the head of the train, the rest of the regiment bolted off on the double-quick for the rear. They did not get there a moment too soon. Not soon enough, in fact. As they came over the crest of the hill they saw Co. B, which had been with the rear, having more than it could attend to with a horde of yelling, galloping rebels, who filled the little valley. Co. B"s boys were standing up manfully to their work, and popping away at the rebels from behind fences and rocks, but the latter had already gotten away from them a wagon which had been far to the rear, had cut loose the mules and run them off, and were plundering the wagon, and trying to start a fire under it.
The fusillade which the regiment opened as the men grained the crest of the hill, put a different{64} complexion on the affair. The rebels recognized the force of circ.u.mstances, and speedily rode back out of range, and then out of sight. As the last of them disappeared over the hill the wearied regiment dropped down all around to rest.
[Ill.u.s.tration: GROUNDHOG FLED 64]
"We can"t rest long, boys," said the sympathetic Colonel; "we"ve got to start these wagons along."
Presently he gave the order:
"Go back to your wagons, now, and get them out as quickly as you can."
Si and Shorty took a circuit to the left to get on some sod which had not been trampled into mortar. They heard a volley of profanity coming from a cedar brake still farther to the left, and recognized the voice of their teamster. They went thither, and found Groundhog, who had fled from the scene, after the manner of his race, at the first sound of firing, but had been too scared to fasten up his traces when he unhitched his saddle mule. These had flapped around, as he urged his steed forward, and the hooks had caught so firmly into the cedars when he plunged into the thicket that he was having a desperate time getting them loose.
"You dumbed, measly coward," said Si. "I told you I"d blow your head offen you if you didn"t stay by them mules. I ought to do it."
"Don"t, Si," said Shorty. "He deserves it, and we kin do it some other time. But we need him now in our business. He hain"t much of a head, but it"s all that he"s got and he can"t drive without it. Le"s git the mule loose first."
They got the mule out and turned him around toward the wagons.
"Now," said Shorty, addressing Groundhog, "you white-livered son-in-law of a jacka.s.s, git back to that wagon as fast as you kin, if you don"t want me to run this bayonet through you."
There was more straining and prying in the dreary rain and fathomless mud to get the wagons started.{66}
"Shorty," said Si, as they plodded alongside the road, with a rail on one shoulder and a gun on the other, "I really believe that this is the toughest day we"ve had yet. What d"you s"pose father and mother"d say if they could see us?"
[Ill.u.s.tration: EARNING THIRTEEN DOLLARS A MONTH 57]
"They"d probably say we wuz earning our $13 a month, with $100 bounty at the end o" three years.," snapped Shorty, who was in no mood for irrelevant conversation.
So the long, arduous day went. When they were not pulling, pushing, prying, and yelling, to get the wagons out of mudholes, they were rushing over the clogging, plowed fields to stand off the nagging rebel cavalry, which seemed to fill the country as full as the rain, the mud, the rocks and the sweeping cedars did. As night drew on they came up to lines of fires where the different divisions were going into line-of-battle along the banks of Stone River. The mud became deeper than ever, from the trampling of tens of thousands of men and animals, but they at least did not have the aggravating rebel cavalry to bother them. They found their division at last in an old cottonfield, and were instantly surrounded by a crowd of hungry, angry men.
"Where in blazes have you fellers bin all day?" they shouted. "You ought to"ve got up here hours ago. We"re about starved."
"Go to thunder, you ungrateful whelps," said Si. "You kin git your own wagons up after this. I"ll never help guard another wagon-train as long as I"m in the army."
CHAPTER VI. BATTLE OF STONE RIVER
THE 200TH IND. IS PRAISED FOR BRAVERY.
THE f.a.gged-out 200th Ind. was put in reserve to the brigade, which lay in the line-of-battle. After having got the train safely into camp, the regiment felt that it was incapable of moving another foot.
While their coffee was boiling Si and Shorty broke off a few cedar branches to lay under them, and keep out the mud. The rain still drizzled, cold, searching and depressing, but they were too utterly tired to do anything more than spread their over coats on the branches, lay their blankets and ponchos over, and crawl in between.
In the few minutes which they allowed to elapse between getting into camp and going to sleep they saw and heard something of the preparations going on around them for the mighty battle, but body and brain were too weary to properly "sense" these. They hardly cared what might happen to-morrow. Rest for to-day was everything. They were too weary to worry about anything in the future.
"It certainly looks, Shorty," said Si, as he crawled in, "like as if the circus was in town, and the big show"d come off to-morrow, without regard to the{68} weather."
"Let it come and be blamed to it," snorted Shorty. "They can"t git up nothin" wuss"n we"ve bin havin" to-day, let them try their durndest. But I tell you, Mr. Si Klegg, I want you to lay mighty still to-night. If you git to rollin" around in your usual animated style and tanglin"
up the bedclothes, I"ll kick you out into the rain, and make you stay there. Do you hear me?"
"You bet I"ll lay quiet," said Si, as together they gave the skillful little kick only known to veteran campaigners by which they brought the blankets snugly up around their feet. "You could sooner wake up a fence-rail than me. I want to tell you, too, not to git to dreamin" of pryin" wagons out of the mud, and chasin" rebel cavalry. I won"t have it."
The reveille the next morning would have promptly awakened even more tired sleepers than Si and Shorty. Even before the dull, damp drums began rolling and the fifes shrieking the air of enforced gaiety along the sinuous line of blue which stretched for miles through red, muddy cottonfields and cedar tangles wet as bath-room sponges, there came from far away on the extreme right a deepening roll of musketry, punctuated with angry cannon-shots and the faint echo of yells and answering cheers.
"That"s McCook opening the battle," said the officers, answering the anxious looks of the men. "He"s to hold the rebels out there, while Crittenden sweeps around on the left, captures Murfreesboro, and takes them in the rear."
Miles away to the left came the sound of musketry and cannons, as if to confirm this. But the firing there died down, while that to the right increased{69} with regular, crashing volleys from muskets and artillery.
The 200th Ind. was in that exceedingly trying position for soldiers, where they can hear everything but see nothing. The cedar thicket in which they stood shut off the view in every direction. The Colonel kept officers and men standing strictly in place, ready for any contingency.
Si and Shorty leaned on their muskets and anxiously watched the regimental commander as he sat rigidly in his saddle, with his fixed gaze bent in the direction of the awful tumult. The Adjutant had ridden forward a little ways to where he could get a better view. The other officers stood stiffly in their places, with the points of their drawn swords resting on the ground, and their hands clasped on the hilts, and watched the Colonel intently. Sometimes they would whisper a few words to those standing near them. The Captain of Co. Q drew geometric figures in the mud with the point of his sword.
Constantly the deafening crash came nearer, and crept around farther to the right.
Si gave a swift glance at Shorty. His partner"s teeth were set, his face drawn and bloodless, his eyes fixed immovably on the Colonel.
"Awful fightin" goin" on out there, Shorty," said Si, in hushed voice.
"I"m afraid they"re lickin" our fellers."
"Confound it!" snorted Shorty, "why in thunder don"t they move us out, and give us something to do? This is h.e.l.l standin" here listenin"."
A teamster, hatless and coatless, with his hair{70} standing up, came tearing through the brush, mounted on his saddle-mule.
A chorus of yells and curses greeted his appearance. It was immense relief for the men to have something to swear at.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A FRIGHTENED TEAMSTER 70]
"Run, you egg-sucking hound.
"Run, you scald-headed dominie.{71}
"Somebody busted a cap in your neighborhood, old white-liver."
"Seen the ghost of a dead rebel, Pilgarlic?"
"Pull back your eyes, you infernal mulewhacker. A limb"ll brush "em off."
"Look at his hair standin" up stiffer"n bristles on a boar"s back."
"Your mules got more sand "n you. They"re standing where you left "em."
"Of course, you"re whipped and all cut to pieces. You was that when you heard the first gun crack."