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He could not remember when he had had his clothes off, had bathed or worn a clean shirt. Now he smeared his jacket sleeve across his face in place of a towel and tramped wearily back to the fire where his own small squad had settled in for what rest they could get. Croff was sniffing the air, hound fashion. "Ain't gonna do you no good," Webb told him sourly.
"You know," Kirby said, "it's jus' crazy enough to work. Lordy if it was summer, I'd say we all had our brains sun-cured, but I'm willin' to try it. Who does what?" "Croff and Webb'll take out the sentries. We'll go hunt us up some Yankees." As Kirby said, it was a wild plan anchored here and there on chance alone. But the scouts were familiar with action as rash as this, which had worked.
"Where's Anse?" Drew demanded more loudly, and there was a faint echo of his voice from overhead. Croff flipped off the cooling compress as Webb applied the fresh one. But Drew was no longer lulled by that warmth. "He ain't here," replied the Cherokee. "Where then?" Drew was suddenly silent, no longer wanting an answer.
But their first duty was to the army: The gathering of information, and any discomfort they could deal the Yankees, must be their primary project. Croff brought them into a camping site he had chosen for just such use. It lay at the head of a small rocky ravine down the center of which ran an ice-sealed thread of stream. It was not quite a cave, but provided shelter for them and their mounts.
It's hot and fillin', and you got bacon to give it some taste...." With hot food under their belts, a fire, and no sign of orders to move, they were content. Kirby and Croff followed the old Plains trick of raking aside the fire, leaving a patch of warmed earth on which all four could curl up together, two men sharing blankets.
Man, how I could do with some dry land!" Kirby spoke with unusual fervor. Croff laughed. "No use hopin' for that. Anyways, we have business ahead." Just as they had rounded up wagons to transport the infantry between skirmishes, so now they were on the hunt for oxen to move the guns.
"Now that we ain't headin' north, you thinkin' of joinin' Croff an' Webb?" Men on furlough had been given their orders to collect supplies from home, but also to devil the Yankees when and where they could. They were to fire into transports along the rivers and rout and capture any Union patrols small enough to be attacked when and where they came across them.
The seriously ill certainly could not be moved. But he wished he could have seen the boy; there was no telling when and where they would meet again. "Well," Kirby pointed out, "if the doc took him, it means they thought he was able to make it. He's young an' tough. Bet he'll be back in line soon." "They'll travel slow," Croff added.
Perhaps if Boyd had some of that in him.... But dared they stay here? Kirby squatted back on his heels as Drew settled Boyd on his blankets and went to unhook the pot. Then the Texan supported the younger boy as Drew ladled spoonfuls of the improvised broth into his mouth. "Th' doc'll come," Kirby murmured. "Croff promised to guide him heah. But this gang business "
Ride up to their camp an' say, 'We know wheah at theah's some bushwhackers, come'n see'?" Webb asked scornfully. "After this mornin' they won't even listen to a truce flag, I'm thinkin'." Croff nodded. "That's right." "Supposin' those sentries we passed back there were knocked out and two of us took their places and the other two then laid a trail leadin' here?"
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