Free The Railroad War by Jesse Taylor Croft Page A

town just a few days, he only managed to destroy some of them. The next time he entered Jackson, the major and the lieutenant
     both knew, Cump Sherman intended to make up for what he had missed the first time.
    “Sorry, sir,” Tom Stetson said.
    The major gave the lieutenant a tight little smile of acknowledgment, but his eyes were on the area next to the train that
     was now forming up. The train was all flatcars. In the area beside the flatcars were big field cannons. If General Johnston
     intended to defend Jackson from his well-fortified positions, he would need those cannon.
    “See those?” The major nodded toward the train.
    “Yes, sir,” Tom Stetson said.
    “What do you make of that, Tom?”
    “The cannon?”
    “Right, the cannon,” the major said. “I wonder if they’re in the yard now because they’re on their way to the lines. Or are
     they here because they’re on their way to Meridian?”
    The lieutenant thought on that for a moment.
    “If they’re sending them to Meridian,” Tom said softly, “then…” He paused to take in the sharp look the major was giving him.
     After a moment, he resumed, making the correction the look demanded. “Then
we
would not have them for a battle with Sherman.”
    “Right.”
    “We’d
never be able to fight a battle without them.”
    “Right.”
    “So
we
aren’t going to fight a battle?” Stetson offered.
    “
If
the cannon are waiting shipment to Meridian,” the major said.
    “Son of a bitch.”
    “On the other hand…” the major said, leaving the thought unfinished.
    He then let his gaze swing around the yards again, taking as much in as he could. He needed all the information his eyes could
     record, but it would not do to be obtrusive.
    What seemed most in evidence, though, were women, children, and old people, the flotsam and jetsam of the battles that had
     raged for months all across northern Mississippi and western Tennessee.
    “Yeah,” he said to himself softly, pitying them all, “get moving again, you people. The bad times are coming soon and this
     won’t be a good place for you. But where will you be safe?”
    “What’s that?” Tom Stetson asked, unable to catch his words.
    “Never mind,” the major said, shaking his head sadly. “There’s no help for it.”
    He rubbed his chin for a moment, reflecting. Then he looked at the lieutenant. “Tom, here’s what we need to do before we catch
     that train. You stay here and keep watching our horses. There are people here who believe they need them more than you or
     I do. More important, I want you to keep an eye on the rail yards. Make a note in your mind of everything that’s going onto
     those trains.
    “Meanwhile,” he added with a smile, “I have an appointment with a lady.”
    “A lady?”
    “That’s right.”
    “A real lady? As in lace and fine clothes and servants.”
    “That’s right: auburn hair, a voice like an angel, fine clothes and servants, and no man to whom she is officially and legally
     attached.”
    “You lucky bastard. I thought every woman who called herself a lady had found some reason to absent herself from this part
     of Mississippi.”
    “Evidently not. Count trains, my son. I’ll return for you in due course.”
    “So long—
sir,”
Tom Stetson said, managing to make it sound like a curse. His eyes, however, were twinkling.
    But the major, having already turned and set off, ignored him.
    As it happened, since the major had never previously met the lady in question, he was not telling the truth when he described
     her to Lieutenant Tom Stetson. The woman the major went to see turned out to be quite different from the fine but imaginary
     lady he’d left in Tom’s mind.
    Her name was Jane Featherstone, and she looked to be somewhere between thirty and thirty-five. She was pleasant but ordinary
     of face and figure, and her appearance was livened by quick, probing, though somewhat nervous eyes. She had one servant, and
     she lived in rooms