it was a dark, soft, summer night in virginia, that of the 1st of july. after the tropical heat of the day, the air was being mercifully cooled, here on the hilltop, by a gentle breeze, laden with just a moist suggestion of the mist rising from the river flats and marshes down below. it was not mother nature’s fault that this zephyr stirring along the parched brow of the hill did not bear with it, too, the scents of fruits and flowers, of new-mown hay and the yellow grain in shock, and minister soothingly to rest and pleasant dreams.
instead, this breeze, moving mildly in the darkness, was one vile, embodied stench of sulphur and blood, and pestilential abominations. go where you would, there was no escaping this insufferable burden of foul smells. if they were a horror on the hilltop, they were worse below.
it was one of the occasions on which man had expended all his powers to prove his superiority to nature. the elements in their wildest and most savage mood could never have wrought such butchery as this. the vine-wrapped fences, stretching down from the plateau toward the meadow lands below, were buttressed by piles of dead men, some in butternut, some in blue. clumps of stiffened bodies curled supine at the base of every stump on the fringe of the woodland to the right and among the tumbled sheaves of grain to the left. out in the open, the broad, sloping hillside and the valley bottom lay literally hidden under ridge upon ridge of smashed and riddled human forms, and the heaped d茅bris of human battle. the clouds hung thick and close above, as if to keep the stars from beholding this repellent sample of earth’s titanic beast, man, at his worst. an egyptian blackness was over it all.
at intervals a lightning flash from the crest of the outermost knoll tore this evil pall of darkness asunder, and then, with a roar and a scream, a spluttering line of vivid flame would arch its sinister way across the sky. a thousand little dots of light moved and zigzagged ceaselessly on the wide expanse of obscurity underneath this crest, and when the bursts of wrathful fireworks came from overhead it could be seen that these were lanterns being borne about in and out among the winrows of maimed and slain. above all, through all, without even an instant’s lull, there arose a terrible babel of chorused groans and prayers and howls and curses. this noise could be heard for miles—almost as far as the boom of the howitzers above could carry—and at a distance sounded like the moaning of a storm through a great pine-forest. near at hand, it sounded like nothing else this side of hell.
an hour or so after nightfall the battery on the crest of the knoll stopped firing. the wails and shrieks from the slope below went on all through the night, and the lanterns of the search parties burned till the morning sunlight put them out.
up on the top of the hill—a broad expanse of rolling plateaus—the scene wore a different aspect. at widely separated points bonfires and glittering lights showed where some general of the victorious army held his headquarters in a farm-house; and unless one pried too curiously about these parts, there were few enough evidences on the summit of the day’s barbaric doings.
the chief of these houses—a stately and ancient structure, built in colonial days of brick proudly brought from europe—had begun the forenoon of the battle as the headquarters of the fifth corps. then the general and his staff had reduced their needs to a couple of rooms, to leave space for wounded men. then they had moved out altogether, to let the whole house be used as a hospital. then as the backwash of calamity from the line of conflict swelled in size and volume, the stables and barns had been turned over to the medical staff. later, as the savage evening fight went on, tons of new hay had been brought out and strewn in sheltered places under the open sky to serve as beds for the sufferers. before night fell, even these impromptu hospitals were overtaxed, and rows of stricken soldiers lay on the bare ground.
the day of intelligent and efficient hospital service had not yet dawned for our army. the breakdown of what service we had had, under the frightful stress of the battles culminating in this blood-soaked malvern hill, is a matter of history, and it can be viewed the more calmly now as the collapse of itself brought about an improved condition of affairs. but at the time it was a woful thing, with a lax and conflicting organization, insufficient material, a ridiculous lack of nurses, a mere handful of really competent surgeons and, most of all, a great crowd of volunteer medical students and ignorant practitioners, who flocked southward for the mere excitement and practice of sawing, cutting, slashing right and left. so it was that army surgery lent new terrors to death on the battle-field in the year 1862.
the sky overhead was just beginning to show the ashen touch of twilight, when two men lying stretched on the hay in a corner of the smaller barnyard chanced to turn on their hard couch and to recognize each other. it was a slow and almost scowling recognition, and at first bore no fruit of words.
one was in the dress of a lieutenant of artillery, muddy and begrimed with smoke, and having its right shoulder torn or cut open from collar to elbow. the man himself had now such a waving, tangled growth of chestnut beard and so grimly blackened a face, that it would have been hard to place him as our easy-going, smiling dwight ransom.
the new movement had not brought ease, and now, after a few grunts of pain and impatience, he got himself laboriously up in a sitting posture, dragged a knapsack within reach up to support his back, and looked at his companion again.
“i heard that you were down here somewhere,” he remarked, at last. “my sister wrote me.”
marsena pulford stared up at him, made a little nodding motion of the head, and turned his glance again into the sky straight above. he also was a spectacle of dry mud and dust, and was bearded to the eyes.
“where are you hit?” asked dwight, after a pause.
for answer, marsena slowly, and with an effort, put a hand to his breast—to the left, below the heart. “here, somewhere,” he said, in a low, drylipped murmur. he did not look at dwight again, but presently asked, “could you fix me—settin’ up—too?”
“i guess so,” responded dwight. with the help of his unhurt arm he clambered to his feet and began moving dizzily about among the row of wounded men to his left. these groaned or snarled at him as he passed over them, but to this he paid no attention whatever. he returned from the end of the line, bringing two knapsacks and the battered frame of a drum, in which some one had been trying to carry water, and with some difficulty arranged these in a satisfactory heap. then he knelt, pushed his arm under marsena’s shoulders, and lifted him up and backward to the support. both men grimaced and winced under the smart of the effort, and for some minutes sat in silence, with closed eyes.
when they opened them finally it was with a sudden start at the sound of a woman’s voice. their ears had for long hours been inured to a ceaseless din of other noises—an ear-splitting confusion of cannon and musketry roar from the field less than an eighth of a mile away, of yelping shells overhead, and of screams and hoarse shouts all about them. yet their senses caught this strange note of a woman’s voice as if it had fallen upon the hush of midnight.
they looked up, and beheld miss julia parmalee!
upon such a background of heated squalor, dirt, and murderous disorder, it did not seem surprising to them that this lady should present a picture of cool, fresh neatness. she wore a snow-white nurse’s cap, and broad, spotless bands of white linen were crossed over the shoulders of her pale dove-colored dress. her dark face, dusky pink at the cheeks, glowed with a proud excitement. her big brown eyes swept along the row of recumbent figures at her feet with the glance of a born conqueror.
“this is not a fit place for him,” she said. “it is absurd to bring a gentleman—an officer of the headquarters staff—out to such a place as this!”
then the two volunteers from octavius saw that behind her were four men, bearing a laden stretcher, and that at her side was a regimental hospital steward, who also looked speculatively along the rows of sufferers.
“it’s the best thing we can do, anyway,” he replied, not over-politely; “and for that matter, there’s hardly room here.”
“oh, there’d be no trouble about that,” retorted miss julia, calmly. “we could move any of these people here. the general told me i was always to do just what i thought best. i am sure that if i could see him now he would insist at once that colonel starbuck should have a bed to himself, inside the house.”
“i’ll bet he wouldn’t!” said the hospital steward, with emphasis.
“perhaps you don’t realize,” put in miss julia, coldly, “that colonel starbuck is a staff officer—and a friend of mine.”
“i don’t care if he was on all the staffs there are,” said the hospital steward, “he’s got to take his chance with the rest. and it don’t matter about his being a friend, either; we ain’t playing favorites much just now. i don’t see no room here, miss. you’ll have to take him out in the open lot there.”
“oh, never!” protested miss julia, vehemently. “it’s disgraceful! why, the place is under fire there. i saw them running away from a shell there only a minute ago. no, if we can’t do anything better, we’ll have one of these men moved.”
“well, do something pretty quick!” growled one of the men supporting the stretcher.
miss parmalee had looked two or three times in an absent-minded way at the two men on the ground nearest her—obviously without recognizing either of them. there was a definite purpose in the glance she now bent upon dwight ransom—a glance framed in the resourceful smile he remembered so well.
“you seem to be able to sit up, my man,” she said, ingratiatingly, to him; “would you be so very kind as to let me have that place for colonel star-buck, here—he is on the headquarters staff—and i am sure we should be so very much obliged. you will easily get a nice place somewhere else for yourself. oh, thank you so much! it is so good of you!”
suppressing a groan at the pain the movement involved, and without a word, dwight lifted himself slowly to his feet, and stepped aside, waving a hand toward the hay and knapsack in token of their surrender.
then miss julia helped lift from the litter the object of her anxiety. colonel starbuck was of a slender, genteel figure, and had the top of his head swathed heavily in bandages. he wore long, curly, brown side-whiskers, and his chin had been shaved that very morning. this was enough in itself to indicate that he belonged to the headquarters staff, but the fact was proclaimed afresh by everything else about him—his speckless uniform, his spick-and-span gauntlets, his carefully polished boots, the glittering newness of his shoulder-straps, sword scabbard, buttons, and spurs. it was clear that, whatever else had happened, his line of communication with the headquarters baggage train had never been interrupted.
“it is so kind of you!” miss parmalee murmured again, when the staff officer had been helped off the stretcher, and in a dazed and languid way had settled himself down into the place vacated for him. “would you”—she whispered, looking up now, and noting that the hospital steward and the litter-men had gone away—“would you mind stepping over to the house, or to one of the tents beyond—you’ll find him somewhere—and asking dr. willoughby to come at once? tell him it is for colonel starbuck of the headquarters staff, and you’d better mention my name—miss parmalee of the sanitary commission. you won’t forget the name—parmalee?”
“i don’t fancy i shall forget it,” said dwight, gravely. “i’ve got a better memory than some.”
miss julia caught the tone of voice on the instant, and looked up again from where she knelt beside the colonel, with a swift smile.
“why, it’s mr. ransom, i do believe!” she exclaimed. “i should never have known you with your beard. it’s so good of you to take this trouble—you always were so obliging! any one will tell you where dr. willoughby is. he’s the surgeon of the eighteenth, you know. i’m sure he’ll come at once—to please me—and time is so precious, you know!”
without further words, dwight moved off slowly and unsteadily toward the house.
miss parmalee, seating herself so that some of her mouse-tinted draperies almost touched the face of dwight’s companion, unhooked a fan from her girdle and began softly fanning colonel starbuck. “the doctor won’t be long,” she said, in low, cooing tones, after a little; “do you feel easier now?”
“i am rather dizzy still, and a little faint,” replied the colonel, languorously. “that fanning is so delicious though, that i’m really very happy. at least i would be if i weren’t nervous about you. you have been through such tremendous exertions all day—out in the sun, amid all these horrid sights and this infernal roar—without a parasol, too. are you quite sure it has not been too much for you?”
“you are always so thoughtful of others, dear colonel starbuck,” murmured miss julia, reducing the fanning to a gentle, measured movement, and fixing her lustrous eyes pensively upon the clouds above the horizon. “you never think of yourself!”
“only to think how happy my fate is, to be rescued and nursed by an angel,” sighed the colonel.
a smile of gentle deprecation played upon miss julia’s red lips, and imparted to her eyes the expression they would wear if they had been gazing upon a tenderly entrancing vision in the sky. then, all at once; she gave a little start of aroused attention, looked puzzled, and after a moment’s pause bent her head over close to the colonel’s.
“the man behind me has taken tight hold of my dress,” she whispered, hurriedly. “i don’t want to turn around, but can you see him? he isn’t having a fit or anything, is he?”
colonel starbuck lifted himself a trifle, and looked across. “no,” he whispered in return, “he appears to be asleep. probably he is dreaming. he is a corporal—some infantry regiment. they do manage to get so—what shall i say—so unwashed! shall i move his hand for you?”
miss julia shook her head, with an arch little half smile.
“no, poor man,” she murmured. “it gives me almost a sense of the romantic. perhaps he is dreaming of home—of some one dear to him. corporals do have their romances, you know, as well as—”
“as well as colonels,” the staff officer playfully finished the sentence for her. “well, i congratulate him, if his is a thousandth part as joyful as mine.”
“oh, then, you have one!” pursued miss parma-lee, allowing her eyes to sparkle for an instant before they were coyly raised again to the clouds. darkness was gathering there rapidly.
“why pretend that you don’t understand?” pleaded colonel starbuck—and there seemed to be no answer forthcoming. the fan moved even more sedately now, with a tender flutter at the end of each downward sweep.
presently the preoccupation of the couple—one might not call it silence in such an unbroken uproar as rose around them and smashed through the air above—was interrupted by the appearance of a young, sharp-faced man, who marched straight across the yard toward them and, halting, spoke hurriedly.
“i was asked specially to come here for a moment,” he said, “but it can only be a minute. we’re just over our heads in work. what is it?”
miss parmalee looked at the young man with a favorless eye. he was unshaven, dishevelled, brusque of manner and speech. he was bareheaded, and his unimportant figure was almost hidden beneath a huge, revoltingly stained apron.
“i asked for my friend, dr. willoughby,” she said. “but if he could not come, i must insist upon immediate attention for colonel starbuck here—an officer of the headquarters staff.”
while she spoke the young surgeon had thrown himself on one knee, adroitly though roughly lifted the colonel’s bandages, run an inquiring finger over his skull, and plumped the linen back again. he sprang to his feet with an impatient grunt. “paltry scalp wound,” he snorted. then, turning on his heel, he almost knocked against dwight ransom, who had come slowly up behind him. “you had no business to drag me off for foolishness of this sort,” he said, in vexed tones. “here are thousands of men waiting their turn who really need help, and i’ve been working twenty hours a day for a week, and couldn’t keep up with the work if every day had two hundred hours. it’s ridiculous!”
dwight shrugged his unhurt shoulder. “i didn’t ask you for myself,” he replied. “i’m quite willing to wait my turn—but the lady here—she asked me to bring help—”
“it can’t be that this gentleman understands,” put in miss julia, “that his assistance was desired for an officer of the headquarters staff.”
“madame,” said the young surgeon, “with your permission, damn the headquarters staff!” and, turning abruptly, he strode off.
“i will go and see the general myself,” exclaimed miss parmalee, flushing with wrath. “i will see whether he will permit the sanitary commission to be affronted in this outrageous—”
she stopped short. her indignant effort to rise to her feet had been checked by a hand on the ground, which held firmly in its grasp a fold of her skirt. she turned, pulled the cloth from the clutch of the tightened fingers, looked at the hand as it sprawled limply on the grass, and gave a little, shuddering, half-hysterical laugh. “mercy me!” was what she said.
“you know who it is, don’t you?” asked dwight ransom.
the meaning in his voice struck miss julia, and she bent a careful scrutiny through the dusk upon the face of the man stretched out beside her. his head had slipped sidewise on the knapsack, and his bearded chin was unnaturally sunk into his collar. through the grime on his face could be discerned an unearthly pallor. his wide-opened eyes seemed staring fixedly, reproachfully, at the hand which had lost its hold upon miss julia’s dress.
“it does seem as if i’d seen the face before somewhere,” she remarked, “but i don’t appear to place it. it is getting so dark, too. no, i can’t imagine. who is it?”
she had risen to her feet and was peering down at the dead man, her pretty brows knitted in perplexity.
“he recognized you!” said dwight, with significant gravity. “it’s marsena pulford.”
“oh, poor man!” exclaimed julia. “if he’d only spoken to me i would gladly have fanned him, too. but i was so anxious about the colonel here that i never took a fair look at him. i dare say i shouldn’t have recognized him, even then. beards do change one so, don’t they!”
then she turned to colonel starbuck and made answer to the inquiry of his lifted eyebrows.
“the unfortunate man,” she explained, “was our village photographer. i sat to him for my picture several times. i think i have one of them over at the commission tent now.”
“i’ll go this minute and seize it!” the gallant colonel vowed, getting to his feet.
“take care! we unprotected females have a man trap there!” julia warned him; but fear did not deter the staff officer from taking her arm and leaning on it as they walked away in the twilight. then the night fell, and dwight buried marsena.
