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Fix bayonets! Charge! Fix bayonets! Charge! He leaped down from the boulder, still screaming, his voice begi
”The pistol too,” he said.
The officer handed him the gun: a cavalry revolver, Colt.
”Your prisoner, sir.” The face of the officer was very white, like old paper. Chamberlain nodded.
He looked up to see an open space. The Rebs had begun to fall back; now they were ru
”By God, Colonel, by God, by God,” Spear said. He pointed. Men were ru
The Regiment had not stopped, was chasing the Rebs down the long valley between the hills. Rebs had stopped everywhere, surrendering. Chamberlain said to Spear, “Go on up and stop the boys. They’ve gone far enough.”
”Yes, sir. But they’re on their way to Richmond.”
”Not today,” Chamberlain said. “They’ve done enough today.”
He stopped, took a deep breath, stood still, then turned a to look for Tom. Saw Morrill, of Company B, wandering toward him through thick brush.
”Hey, Colonel, glad to see you. I was begi
Chamberlain stared. “You were begi
”I tell you. Colonel, I keep thinking I better come back and help you, but you said stay out there and guard that flank, so I did, and I guess it come out all right, thank the Lord. Nobody came nowhere near me until just a few minutes ago. Then they come backin’ my way, which I didn’t expect. So we opened up, and they all turned around and quit, just like that. Damnedest thing you ever saw.” He shook his head, amazed. “Easiest fight I was ever in.”
Chamberlain sighed. “Captain,” he said, “next time I tell you to go out a ways, please don’t go quite so far.”
”Well, Colonel, we looked around, and there was this here stone wall, and it was comfortin’, you know?”
Tom was here, well, untouched. Chamberlain opened up into a smile. Tom had a Reb officer in tow, a weary gentleman with a face of grime and sadness, of exhausted despair.
”Hey, Lawrence, want you to meet this fella from Alabama. Cap’n Hawkins, want you to meet my brother. This here’s Colonel Chamberlain.”
Chamberlain put out a hand. “Sir,” he said. The Alabama man nodded slightly. His voice was so low Chamberlain could hardly hear it. “Do you have some water?”
”Certainly.” Chamberlain offered his own canteen. Off to the right a huge mass of prisoners: two hundred, maybe more. Most of them sitting, exhausted, heads down. Only a few men of the Regiment here, mostly Morrill’s Company.
Ironic. Chamberlain thought: well, he’s the only one with ammunition.
Firing was slacking beyond the hill. The charge of the 20th Maine had cleared the ground in front of the 83rd Pe
He heard whoops and hollers, felt a grin break out as if stepping into lovely sunshine. We did it, by God.
The Alabama man was sitting down. Chamberlain let him alone. Kilrain. Looked. Where? He moved painfully back up the rocks toward the position from which they had charged. Hip stiffening badly. Old Kilrain. Unhurtable.
He saw Kilrain from a distance. He was sitting on a rock, head back against a tree, arm black with streaked blood. But all right, all right, head bobbing bareheaded like a lively mossy white rock. Ruel Thomas was with him, and Tozier, working on the arm. Chamberlain bounded and slipped on wet rocks, forgetting his hurts, his throat stuffed. He knelt.
They had peeled back the shirt and the arm was whitely soft where they had cleaned it and there was a mess around the shoulder. Great round muscle: strong old man. Chamberlain gri
”Buster? How you doin’? You old mick.”
Kilrain peered at him vaguely cheerily. His face had a linen softness.
”They couldn’t seem hardly to miss,” he said regretfully, apologizing. “Twice, would you believe. For the love of Mary. Twicet.”
He snorted, gloomed, looked up into Chamberlain’s eyes and blinked.
”And how are you. Colonel darlin’? This fine day?”
Chamberlain nodded, gri
”In the armpit,” he gloomed forlornly. “For the love of God. He died of his wounds. In the bloody bleedin’ armpit. Ak.”
To Tozier, Chamberlain said, “How is that?”
Tozier shrugged. “It’s an arm.”
”By God,” Chamberlain said. “I think you’ll live.”
Kilrain blinked hazily. “Only an arm. Got to lose something, might’s well be an arm. Can part with that easier than the other mechanics of nature, an thass the truth.” He was blurring; he stretched his eyes. “Used to worry about that, you know? Only thing ever worried, really. Losing wrong part.” His eyes closed; his voice was plaintive. “I could do with a nip right now.”