Désirée stepped down the bank into the square of gold and gathered up her washing. With it over one arm she returned and gave her hands to Edward. They said good-day to the fisherman, and went away, up the slight hill, Edward doing well with his stick and an arm over her shoulder. They laughed like children in the sunshine.
They had what she called “tisane” for dinner—“tisane” with hard-tack crumbled in. A drummer-boy, straying by, was given his share. They sat on billets of wood underneath the hop-vine, ate and drank and were happy. The boy was fourteen and small for his age. He had a shock of sunburnt hair and a happy, freckled face, and he said that he hoped the war would never stop. When every crumb and drop was gone, he volunteered to “wash up,” and went whistling down to Little Pumpkin-Vine with the tin cups and spoons and small, black kettle.
Other soldiers strayed past the cabin. An orderly appeared, sent by officers’ mess of the ——th Virginia. He bore, together with enquiries and messages, to-morrow’s rations. A picket detail went marching over the hilltop. About three o’clock came a clattering of horses’ hoofs. The hill was a fair post of observation, and here was the commanding general with his staff. All stopped beneath the pine; Johnston pointed with his hand, now here, now there; his chief of staff beside him nodding comprehension.
Then the General, dismounting, came over to the cabin. “No, no! don’t stand!” he said to Edward. “I only want to ask Mrs. Cary for a cup of water. How is the wound to-day?”
“Very much better, sir. I’ll report for duty presently.”
“Don’t hurry,” said Johnston, with kindness. “It’s a mistake to get well too quickly.” He had much warm magnetism, tenderness with illness, an affectionate deference always toward women. He took the cup of water from Désirée, thanked her, and said that evidently the campaign had not harmed her. “Women always were the best soldiers.”
General Mackall had ridden up. “There’s many a true word said in jest,” he remarked.
“I didn’t say it in jest, sir,” said Johnston. He mounted and gathered up the reins, an erect and soldierly figure. “General Hood,” he said, “is moving from Allatoona, and I have ordered Hardee’s corps back from the Dallas and Atlanta road. There may come a general battle on this ground. If it arrives, my dear,”—he spoke to Désirée,—“you apply for an ambulance and leave this cabin!”
Off he rode in the golden light. At sunset came marching by the ——th Virginia, going toward New Hope Church. The road ran behind the cabin. Désirée helped Edward out to it, and they stood in a little patch of sunflowers and greeted the regiment. The regiment to a man greeted back. The colonel stopped his horse and talked, the captains smiled and nodded, the men gave the two a cheer. It was one of the friendly, sunshiny moments of war. The regiment was like a dear and good family; everywhere in and out ran the invisible threads of kindliness. The regiment passed, the rhythmic beat of feet dying from this stretch of the road. Désirée and Edward went back to the cabin through the languorous, Southern dusk, with the lanterns of the fire-flies beginning, and the large moths sailing by. There was a moon, and all night, in the wood behind the cabin, a mocking-bird was singing.
The next day and the next and the next there was fighting—not “a great, crashing battle,” but stubborn fighting. It waxed furious enough where Hooker struck Stewart’s division of Hood’s at New Hope Church, and where, on the twenty-eighth, Cleburne and Wheeler met and forced back Palmer and Howard; but when calm came again only a couple of thousand of each colour lay dead or wounded around New Hope Church.