Who goes there?

by B. K. Benson

Then another idea came. Could I not post myself as a Confederate vedette between the connecting men? But for what? Even if I could do so there was no profit in this romantic idea. I gave it up.

Yet I must do something. I considered the chances of going forward boldly, walking straight between two pits, and on up the hill. The pickets would see that I was a Confederate. If I could strike between the connecting pits of the two commands, the thing might be done. Yet I wanted a better way.

Before the second relief had returned I was hidden in the boughs of a tree. The corporal and a man passed back as they had come. They were talking, but I could not hear what they said.

I watched them from the tree. A gully was in front of me, a large gully, only in parts visible from my position; it seemed to be on their route. The two men became hidden by this gully. I saw them no more. My interest was excited. Why had the men gone into this gully? There was smoother ground outside. They had a purpose; I must find it out.

Until the next relief should come I was comparatively safe. I was on neutral ground, or unobserved ground, for an hour at least. I could not know whether the reliefs came as ordinarily--once every two hours. There would probably be nobody passing between vedettes and pickets--unless, indeed, some officer should go the rounds of the sentinels; that was something I must risk.

I came down from the tree and cautiously approached the mouth of the gully. I climbed another tree, from which I had a better view. I could now see that the gully extended far up the hill, and I suspected that the picket-line stretched across it; but there was no indication of the purpose which had caused the men to go into the gully. My position was a good one, and I waited. I could see a part of the picket-line--that is, not the men, but the rifle-pits.

Ten minutes went by. Coming down the hill from the right in an oblique direction toward the gully, I saw an unarmed rebel. He disappeared. He had gone down into this gully, which, I was now confident, separated by its width the pickets of different commands. What could this unarmed man be doing in the gully? Nothing for me to do but to wait; I was hoping that an opportunity had been found.

Soon I saw another man coming down toward the gully; he was coming from the other side--the left; he was armed. At nearly the same instant the unarmed man reappeared; his back was toward me, he held his canteen in his hand. The situation was clear; there was water in the gully; my opportunity had come.

I came down from the tree. Almost an hour would be mine before the vedettes were relieved. Cautiously I made my way to the mouth of the gully. I lay flat and watched. A man was climbing the side of the gully; he was going to the left; he was armed--doubtless the man I had seen a moment before. I went into the gully. I must get to that spring or pool, or whatever it was, before another man should come.

Before the man had reached the picket-line, I was at the spring--and it was a good one, at least for that swamp. A little hollow had been made by digging with bayonets, perhaps, or with the hands, on one side of the gully, just where a huge bulk of unfallen earth would protect the hole from the midday sun, the only sun which could reach the bottom of this ravine, defended by its wall on either hand. The hole was so small that only one canteen could be filled at a time; but the water was good compared with that of the Chickahominy. Doubtless it was the difficulty of getting pure water that justified the relaxation of discipline which permitted the men to have recourse to this spring in rear of their vedette lines.