Novel 1963 - How The West Was Won (v5.0) by Louis L'Amour

Author:Louis L'Amour
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Usenet
Publisher: Bantam
Published: 1963-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

* * *

BY CANDLE- AND lantern-light in Shiloh Meeting House the surgeons worked. About them lay the wounded, the dying, and the dead, helter-skelter, on the floor, on cots, and in the pews themselves. Men cried out in the half-light that reeked of chloroform.

The surgeons worked with quiet desperation, saving a life here, seeing one pass there, saving an arm or a leg, or amputating one. It was bloody, it was awful, and it was filled with shuddering cries of pain and the anguished sobs of men who would never walk again, or see.

Litter-bearers dumped the body of Linus Rawlings upon one of the bloody tables. The surgeon lifted an eyelid and shook his head. “You wasted your time, boys.”

The stretcher-bearers rolled the body from the table and immediately another was put in its place.

Throughout the night the lantern-bearers searched the field of Shiloh for the dead, sifting the chaff of ruined bodies for those who might yet live, or those whom it was possible to identify. Some lay sprawled grotesquely upon the grass, others were heaped together like debris washed upon some strange beach.

Among the dead the lantern-bearers prowled and peered, each a dark Diogenes searching with his lantern among many now honest men. Here and there they recovered valuables, letters, occasional weapons capable of further use, or other prized possessions. Some of these would be sent home to relatives, some kept by the finders.

Sometimes the searchers called out as they wandered among the human flotsam. “Anybody here from the 12th Michigan? The 36th Indiana? Who’s from Birge’s Sharpshooters? 16th Wisconsin, answer here!” Their chants became a weird litany to the dead, but one by one the lanterns vanished as the searchers grew weary of the thankless task.

Yet the voices did not go entirely unheard. Zeb Rawlings heard them, and slowly, using his one good arm, he pushed himself into a sitting position. For a moment he stared about in confusion. It was dark and cold, and something was wrong with his arm or his shoulder.

He felt for his rifle but it was missing. All he had left was his bayonet and his canteen. Catching hold of a tree, he pulled himself to his feet, watching the lantern-bearers weaving their macabre ballet among the dead. He heard their questing voices, and occasionally a faint reply. Nearby a plaintive voice cried out in the darkness: “Water! Water! Will somebody give me water?”

The voice was close by, the lanterns far off. Stumbling, Zeb went to the wounded man and knelt beside him. “Here y’are soldier. It ain’t much, but you’re welcome.”

The man drank in eager gulps, emptying the canteen. “I sure thank y’,” he gasped hoarsely. “Hate to take your last drop, but that there was mighty fine.”

“I’ll send somebody,” Zeb promised. He moved off across the field toward a group of men who were digging a mass grave. He could hear the sound of their shovels as he approached, and he saw two stretcher-bearers lowering the body of a man to the ground near the edge of the grave.

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