The Andre Norton Megapack - 15 Classic Novels and Short Stories

“There’s trouble on the other side. You’ve been using that mule of yours to get some of the horses over, haven’t you?”
    Drew was so tired that words were too much trouble to shape. He nodded dully. Pryor had been right about Hannibal. The big mule had not only taken his own passage across the Tennessee as a matter-of-course proceeding, but had shouldered and urged along three horses as he went. And twice since then Drew had taken him back and forth to bring in skittish mounts causing trouble.
    “That horse of mine’s running wild; he broke out of the water twice.” The captain caught at Drew’s bare arm so hard his nails cut. “Think you could get him over with the mule’s help?”
    Drew wavered a little as he walked slowly to where he had picketed Hannibal after their last trip. He was tired, and although he had eaten earlier that morning, he was hungry again. It was warm and the sun was climbing, but the air felt chill against his naked body and he shivered. The one thing they were all getting out of this river business, Drew decided, were much-needed baths.
    Kirby, his body white save for tanned face and throat, sun-darkened hands and wrists, crouched on the raft as Drew brought Hannibal down to that unwieldy craft.
    “Tryin’ for the cap’n’s hoss?”
    “What’s wrong with it?” Drew helped the Texan push off.
    “Reaches no bottom, an’ then it plain warps its backbone tryin’ to paw down the sky. Maybe that mule can git some sense into the loco critter. But I’m not buyin’ no chips on his doin’ it.”
    Drew located Campbell’s horse, a rangy, good-looking gray which reminded him a little of the colt he had seen at Red Springs, snorting and trotting back and forth along the path they had worn on the banks during their efforts of the past twenty-four hours. One of the rear guard held its lead rope and kept as far from the skittish animal as he could.
    “He’s plumb mean,” the guardian informed Drew. “When he jumps, get out from under—quick!”
    Yet when Drew, mounted on Hannibal now, brought the horse down to the water’s edge, the horse appeared to go willingly enough. The scout tossed the lead rope to Kirby, waiting until the raft pushed off with its load of men and fringe of horses, then took to the river beside Campbell’s horse. When they reached the deeper section he saw the gray go into action.
    Rearing, the horse appeared about to try to climb onto the raft. And the man holding its lead rope dropped it quickly. Drew, swimming, one hand on Hannibal’s powerful shoulder, tried to guide the mule toward the horse that was still splashing up and down in a rocking-horse movement. But the mule veered suddenly, and Drew saw those threatening hoofs loom over his own head. He pushed away frantically, but too late to miss a numbing blow as one hoof grazed his shoulder.
    Somehow, with his other hand outflung, he caught Hannibal’s rope tail and held on with all the strength he had left, while the water washed in and out of a long raw gouge in the skin and muscles of his upper arm.
    CHAPTER 8
    Happy Birthday, Soldier!
    “No water here either.” Boyd climbed up the bank of what might once have been a promising stream. Carrying three canteens, he ran the tip of his tongue over his lips unhappily. “It sure is hot!”
    They had turned off the road, which was now filled with men, horses, men, artillery, and men, all slogging purposefully forward. They composed an army roused out before daylight, on the move toward another army holed in behind a breastworks and waiting. And over all, the exhausting blanket of mid-July heat which pressed to squeeze all the vital juices out of both man and animal.
    Drew touched his aching arm soothingly. It still hurt, although the rawness had healed during the weeks between that turbulent crossing of the Tennessee and this morning in Mississippi as they moved at the Union position on the ridge above the abandoned ghost town of Harrisburg. The remnant of Morgan fugitives, some eighty strong, had fallen in with General Bedford Forrest’s ranging scouts at Corinth, and had ridden still farther southward to join his main army just on the eve of what promised to be a big battle.
    “Hot!” echoed Kirby. “A man could git hisself killed today an’ never know no difference.”
    They were reluctant to re-enter the stream progressing along the road. The dust was ankle-deep there, choking thick when stirred by feet and hoof to a powdery cloud. In