FORE:"Alf Russell caught a bullet," said Monty Scruggs. "I heard him yell, and turned to look at him, when that rebel's bowlder gave me something else to think about, so I don't know where he is."
FORE:"Well, I'm Jim Elkins. Used to belong to Co. A," replied the Sergeant. "I recollect your stealing the caboose door down there at Murfreesboro. Say, that was great. How that conductor ripped and swore when he found his door was gone. I got an ax from you. You never knew who took it, did you? Well, it was me. I wanted the ax, but I wanted still more to show you that there was somebody in the camp just as slick on the forage as you were. But I got paid for it. The blamed old ax glanced one day, while I was chopping, and whacked me on the knee."
FORE:"All right. Go ahead. Drink quick, for you must go on the jump, or you'll lose your boys.""Trust Corpril Elliott," said Gid, returning to his old partisanship of the taller veteran. "He knows his business every time."
FORE: YorEs, SAM.Dodd found himself weeping, twisting himself in the chair; reaching out with his hands, violently racked in spasms of grief: it seemed as if the room shook and he grasped nothing until she put her hands on his shoulders. His eyes were blind with water, his body in a continual series of spasms. He heard his own voice, making sounds that had never been words, crying forfor what? Help, peace, understanding?
FORE:"Is that the way with the rebel cavalry?" asked Monty Scruggs, with his mouthful of crackers and meat. "Do they come like a hurricane, and disappear again like an April shower?"
FORE:"O, that bog-trottin' old section boss, that hairy-handed artist with the long shovel, is there, is he with his crucifix and his prayers to the Saints. That's all right. He's bin stormin' and swearin' ever since the fight begun; because he's bin obliged to stay inside and shoot, and instid of making a grand rush and settling things, according to Donnybrook Fair rules. I tell you what you do. You work the boys carefully down through the brush toward the race, and git 'em into position in easy range of the rebels, covering 'em behind logs. I'll take a circuit around to the left, and git over to the hill, behind the rebels, and near enough the mill for Hennessey to hear me. Then I'll fire a shot and yell for Hennessey. He knows my voice, and he'll bring his men out like a pack o' hornets. Then you let into the rebels from your side. They can't git across the race at you, and we'll have 'em where we kin whipsaw 'em."Albin's control snapped. "Damn it, you'll learn what you have to!" he yelled. "You don't have to ask questionsyou're a slave. A slave! Get that through your green head and shut up!"
THREE:MRS. G.: We talked it over. I mean the group I belong to, you know. On Wednesday. Because all of us had heard something about it, you see, and so we brought it up and discussed it. And it's absolutely true.
THREE:The mention of need for cartridges was an electric impulse which set the boys keenly alive. They bundled their rations into their haversacks, and flung their blanket rolls over their shoulders, and were standing in a state of palpitating expectancy, when Shorty came back with his hands full of cartridges, which he proceeded to distribute.
"That sounds like Levi Rosenbaum," said Shorty.And the busy Orderly passed on to superintend other preparations in the company.In despair, the Deacon turned to a man who wore a Major's shoulder-straps."Glory, we're goin' home!" shouted the Deacon, waving his paper exultingly to the railroad men who had been so helpful. But he exulted prematurely. The engine rattled ahead sharply for a few hundred yards, and then began backing to opposite the spot where it had started from.Cadnan, by this time, was nearly paralyzed with fright. He sat very still. The elders continued, in a slow, leaden chorus: