Dora Darling the daughter of the regiment |
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| 33. | CHAPTER XXXIII. |
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 | CHAPTER XXXIII. Dora Darling |  |
33. CHAPTER XXXIII.
Meanwhile the battle raged with alternating success.
Four times the rebels charged with ferocious determination
upon the little band of Union men, and as often were
repulsed with frightful slaughter. But still no sound
denoted that an attack had commenced upon the other
side of the camp, and the enemy had evidently been
heavily reënforced since the federal spies had reported
his numbers. The odds were terrific in favor of the
rebels, and only a spirit of chivalrous bravery, and a
determination not to desert the comrades who might at
any moment come into action, justified the continuance
of the combat.
A hurried consultation among the leaders of the division
was held. Colonel Blank, heated, blood-stained,
and grimly despairing, announced the necessity of falling
back.
“There is no sign that Moody and Owens are even
within hearing. I have sent out scouts, who can bring
no tidings of them. These fellows outnumber us four to
one, and have their line of cabins as cover, while we are
fully exposed. Our ammunition is nearly expended, and
am not used to be the first to cry, `Enough.' Even now
I will head a charge upon those lines, and do the best
I may before I am cut down, if you and the men will
follow.”
“What's to be gained by it? We can't expect to take
the place by storm with this handful of men,” responded
the leader of the Indiana corps.
“Of course not. The only gain would be a very sufficient
escort of rebels to the other world. I should be
sorry if our fellows did not average three apiece.”
“We all know your courage, colonel,” interposed the
gallant cavalry captain; “but foolhardiness is not courage;
and if no more's to be done here, we must make up
our minds to withdraw. We have had three hours of it
already, and the other division is evidently to be of no
use to-day.”
“Here they come! We won't run before them! Receive
this charge, and when they draw off, I will order
the retreat!” exclaimed the colonel, hurriedly; and each
officer hastened to sustain his own command.
On came the rebels with shouts and curses. Steady
as a rocky shore stood the Union men to receive them.
The distance lessened, and yet each withheld his fire —
the federals to save their scanty ammunition, the rebels
from bravado. A hundred feet alone separated the
lines: eyes met the glare of hostile eyeballs, curses and
Northerners boiled within their veins.
“Fire!”
“Fire!”
And along either line moved a writhing serpent of
flame, as a thousand rifles gave up their contents in a
breath. Men fell, on either side, as fall the autumn
leaves when the north wind smites them in its wrath;
but none quailed. The Union men in their turn charged,
with bayonets fixed, and vengeance in their eyes. Resistlessly
they bore down upon the rebel line, that faltered,
broke, retreated; and many a traitor fell stabbed
in the back as he fled towards the shelter of his camp.
“Forward, my boys! Follow them up! Remember
Manassas! Remember Guyandotte! Give it them
while we have the chance.”
So shouted, at the head of his men, Captain Karl,
himself far in advance, his fair hair blowing backward
in the keen wind, his blue eyes flashing, his face pallid
with excitement, his clinched sword gleaming above his
uncovered head.
A hoarse shout of mingled enthusiasm and revenge
answered his appeal, as the men dashed forward in his
footsteps.
Many of them had shared the disgraceful rout of
Manassas; several had lost their nearest friends in the
massacre of Guyandotte; the rest had heard and read
blood was stirred to frenzy, and it was not a company of
men, but of heroes, who followed the springing lead of
that fair young Viking.
The guns were empty, but the keen sabre bayonets
remained, and Company Z charged through the rebel
line as they might through a hedge of roses.
“Stop, you confounded cowards! Don't you dare
face us on your own ground?” roared Captain Karl,
while his men scattered right and left, adroitly cutting
off the retreat of their flying foes.
“Who said coward?” cried a deep voice, as a tall
young fellow extricated himself from a knot of retreating
rebels, and turned to face his taunting pursuer.
“Here's the man who said it,” contemptuously retorted
Captain Karl, aiming a furious blow at the other's
head.
“You're a liar, then!” shouted the swarthy young
rebel, as he adroitly parried the blow with his gun-barrel,
and then thrust with his bayonet at the captain's
heart.
A sidelong spring evaded the attack, and the next
instant Captain Karl dashed the pommel of his broken
sword into the face of his antagonist, and pinioning him
with his arms, loudly demanded a surrender.
“I'll see you — first,” panted the rebel, struggling
to reach his knife. But, with a dexterous movement,
same instant, himself snatched the knife from the rebel's
belt, and holding it to his throat, again offered quarter.
The reply was a movement so sudden and so energetic,
that Captain Karl suddenly found himself dragged to the
ground, disarmed, and at the mercy of his antagonist,
who, with a grim smile, flashed the glittering blade above
his head, and with his eye measured its deadly aim.
Too proud to ask for quarter, the young hero looked
sternly up at the unrelenting face bent over him, and in
his heart bade good by to earth and life. Blood from a
deep wound in the rebel's throat dropped down, and
plashed upon the face of the Union soldier.
“Coward, am I?” exclaimed the victor. “There's
one for that! And here's one for this cut in my throat.”
With the first words the knife descended across the
captain's cheek; at the next it was poised above his
heart, when a piercing voice cried, —
“Tom! Tom Darley! O, stop!”
Without relaxing his grasp, the rebel turned an astonished
face towards the direction of the sound.
A tall, slight figure, in a dress half womanly, half
soldierly, was flying towards him, with eager eyes, pallid
lips, and outstretched arms.
“Dora!” exclaimed he, softly.
“Tom, it's I. Tom, it's your own sister! O, Tom,
let him go!”
Her arms were tight about his neck, her face pressed
close to his, her gasping appeal sobbing in his ear, —
“O, Tom, if you kill him, you'll kill me.”
“Dora! Why, how came you here?”
“Move! move off his chest. Tom, you've killed him;
you've killed my own dear Captain Karl!”
“Here, you reb, you're my prisoner. What's this!
Killed our captain? Wish't I'd shot you in the first place.
Run to the woods, Miss Dora, and send out a couple of
men for his body. I'll bring on this —”
“No, no! we'll bring him now. Tom, you'll help, —
won't you? For my sake, Tom; and you'll promise not
to escape till we get to the ambulance — won't you? He's
my brother, Simpson!”
“Your brother, miss? More's the pity,” said the soldier,
bluntly. “Well, catch hold there, if you're going
to, lad, and keep your parole, if you don't want to find
what's inside this six-shooter of mine. It's loaded, I
promise you. I guess, by the looks of your neck, though,
you don't feel very spry.”
Tom, whose warlike mood had received a check in
the sudden appearance of his sister, and who was also
somewhat faint from the profuse bleeding of the wound
in his throat, gave a sullen promise to make no attempt
to escape; and the two men, raising the inanimate body
of the young captain, bore it hurriedly to the shelter of
the woods. Already the leaders of the different commands
barely time to make sure that life yet lingered in the
frame of her wounded hero, when he was again raised
between two men, and borne down the mountain side to
the ambulance.
Repressing her own inclination to follow him, Dora
devoted herself to searching the tangled thickets of the
wood for wounded sufferers who were likely to be overlooked,
giving them refreshment and comfort, and summoning
to their aid some one of the parties detailed to
carry away the wounded and dead. Many a fainting
soldier of the Union, many a helpless sufferer, owed his
life that day to the exertions of the bright-eyed girl, who
heeded no danger, shunned no fatigue, nerved herself to
endure all fearful sights, that she might fulfil the noble
duty she had undertaken.
She was still bending over a poor boy mortally
wounded in the breast, to whose dying lips she held the
water they so madly craved, when Mr. Brown stood
beside her, and laid a hand upon her head.
“Dora, why did you leave the spot where I placed
you? I have been very anxious,” said he, with tender
severity.
“I saw men lying wounded nearer the enemy, and I
went to give them help. O, Mr. Brown! This poor
boy!”
“He is dying. Let me hold his head. Do not look
at him.”
Softly laying the poor convulsed frame upon the turf,
the chaplain knelt beside it, praying fervently and silently
for the brave young spirit, that each throe set free, and,
when all was over, beckoned to a party of ambulance
men, who would carry it away for Christian sepulture.
Then taking Dora's hand, he led her away.
“You saw wounded men; but I told you to remain in
safety where you were until I gave you permission to go
to them. I went forward to see if the enemy persisted
in his attack at that point, because, if so, I would not
have you put yourself in the way. When I came back
you were gone; and much of the good that I might
have done to-day has gone undone, because I was seeking
for you.”
“That was wrong, I think,” said Dora, abstractedly.
“What was wrong?”
“To be looking for me instead of helping the wounded
soldiers. It wasn't half so much matter for one girl as
for hundreds of men.”
“Dora, it was more matter to me what had become
of you, than the fate of both armies together,” said the
chaplain, impetuously.
Dora looked up with astonishment at the noble face
bent towards her, the traces of strong emotion on all its
lineaments, tear-drops actually glistening in the eyes.
“I didn't know you cared so much about me, sir,”
said she, simply.
“I care more than you think,” replied the chaplain,
recovering with an effort his usual manner.
“Now tell me how it happened that you disobeyed me
so entirely; for I hear that you were seen in the very
heart of the battle.”
“I went forward a little from the rock where you left
me, to carry drink to some men wounded by a cannon-ball,
not a great way from me. Then I saw others, a
great many others, and I went to them all, and then
filled my cask again at a brook I found. Then I was
going back, and I heard a great shouting among the rebels,
and knew they were coming on, and I wanted to see
the charge; so I ran forward to the top of a little hill,
just behind our men. I kept behind a tree, — indeed, I
did, sir, — and was very careful, till all at once I saw
Captain Karl dashing forward at the head of his company;
and he looked so glorious, sir! O, I think not
one of those knights of the Round Table ever looked
more knightly! And the men rushed after him, and
went right through the rebels, scattering them every way.
Then they all broke up, and fought in little groups of
two and three together, and Captain Karl —”
“Always that boy!” muttered the chaplain.
“He chased after the rebels,” pursued Dora, without
heeding the exclamation; “and all at once one of them
brother Tom!”
“Well, what then?”
“Then they fought. I don't know about that part,
for I felt so; and I set out to run and stop them; but it
seemed as if a cannon-ball was tied to each of my feet.
I was so very, very eager to get there in time, I could
hardly stir. But I did get there: I got there just as
Tom had lifted his arm; and Captain Karl lay quite
still; and in the next minute the knife would have come
down — O, Mr. Brown, I can't tell any more.”
Wrenching her hand out of the chaplain's grasp, Dora
hurried on before him; nor did he again see her face
until they reached the ambulance train, where the vivandière
found immediate and full employment.
Captain Karl, with his wounds dressed, and sitting upright,
greeted his little friend after his usual merry fashion.
“Dora Darling, is it you? Next time I'm attacked, I
shall sing out, not, `I'll tell my big brother,' but, `I'll tell
my little sister.' Did any one ever see such a spooney
fellow as I am, though? The minute I'm hurt, I faint
just like a girl. A girl, though! I wish to Heaven
most of the men I know had your pluck, Dora — girl
though you are!”
“You're not badly hurt, then, after all?” asked Dora,
anxiously. “I thought you were killed at first.”
“Thank you. You took it coolly enough, then. What
has become of that big ruffian you picked off of me? I
way you pitched in: all I knew was, that it was you, and
that I was sure of protection. You've no idea what a
relief I found it, to be able to drop off comfortably, leaving
my affairs in such good hands.”
Dora could not respond to the laugh that rang so
merrily from the captain's pale lips.
“It was my brother that you were fighting with,”
said she, gravely.
“Your brother! Why, Dora Darling, I'm ever so
glad neither of us killed the other, it would have made
you feel so sorry.”
Dora looked at him without reply for a moment, then
briefly said, —
“You don't know much about it, Captain Karl. Now
I'm going to see Tom.”
But Dora found her brother sullen, and disinclined for
conversation. He was much chagrined at being taken
prisoner, declaring that he would rather have been shot
upon the field. The wound in his throat was deep and
painful, and the bruise lent him by the pummel of the
captain's sword had resulted in a racking headache. Altogether,
Tom was very poor company; and Dora, after
vainly trying to render him more comfortable, was fain
to offer her services elsewhere.
The first division, exhausted, dispirited, and without
ammunition, were now re-formed in column, ready for
mountain, announced that the comrades whose failure
to coöperate with them had, as all felt, lost the day to
the Union forces, were at last engaged single-handed
with the enemy.
To help them was now impossible, and an order was
despatched to their comrades intimating that retreat was
the only course left open to either division. This counsel,
so repugnant to the hearts of the brave leaders, was
not immediately followed; but, after a dodging, unsatisfactory
engagement of several hours, it was seen to be
the inevitable termination of the affair; and the second
division sullenly and reluctantly drew off the bloody
field, bringing their dead and wounded with them, and
leaving traces of their prowess in many a rebel corpse,
or maimed and wounded sufferer.
At noon the whole force was again in motion, and,
some hours later, reëntered their own works, neither
jubilant nor despairing; for, although the Stars and Bars
still waved over Camp Baldwin, the number of its defenders
had been considerably lessened by that morning's
work, and the Union soldiers had for seven hours sustained
a close combat with an enemy outnumbering
them as three to one. Indeed, as Sergeant Brazer pithily
observed, —
“It might have been better, and it might have been
worse; but if fighting's a man's trade, he can't have too
much of it, whichever way it turns.”
| CHAPTER XXXIII. Dora Darling | |