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.“That’s right.” The second Reb had hair so dark, it gleamed blue in the light of the lanterns.He gave her a wink and a nod that were meant to be friendly.“But come on, now.Everybody aboard.”The captain lingered by the Zephyr while the elderly couple settled in.The students climbed over the cart’s edge behind them.“I need to reach a telegraph.I’ll have to tell my dispatcher that the ship is down, and give them coordinates to retrieve it,” the captain said plaintively.But Mercy saw the artillery flashes and heard the earsplitting pops of gunfire through the trees, and she answered with a guess before anyone else could say it.“There won’t be anything left of her by morning.”“One bullet,” Gordon Rand said softly from his spot in the cart.“That’s all it’ll take, on her side, with her tanks exposed like that.”“Damn straight,” said the blond who’d first communicated through the windshield.“All the more reason to hit the road, sooner rather than later.We don’t want to be anywhere near her when she goes up in flames.She’ll take a quarter mile of forest and everything in it.”Ernie gave a yelp when he was hauled onboard, prompting the dark-haired private—Mercy thought he was a private, anyway—to ask if anyone else was hurt.“Does anyone need any help? Is this everybody?”“This is everybody,” the captain confirmed.“We weren’t traveling full.And the line wasn’t supposed to move this far south; they told me at Richmond that it hadn’t come this far,” he complained even as he climbed aboard to join the rest of his passengers and crew.The private reached for the reins and held on to them as he climbed up onto the steering seat.His companion leaped up to take a spot beside him, and with a crack of the reins, the cart was turning around to go back the way it had come.The private continued, raising his voice to make himself heard over the background roar of fighting, “We were holding ’em back real good, up until tonight.We’d cut ’em off from their cracker line, and the Chatty trains were keeping us in food and bullets, while they were running low on both.”Mercy didn’t see the blond soldier who’d been first on the scene—he had either stayed on the scene or gone in some other direction.The other blond had left the driving to the private, and was scanning the trees with a strange scope layered with special lenses, the nature of which Mercy could only guess.The captain asked, “Then what happened, man? What turned the tide so fast that the taps couldn’t catch up?”Over his shoulder, the driver said, “They brought in an engine.That thing tore right through our blockades like they were made of pie dough.Killed a score every half a mile.Eventually we just had to let them have it.”Mercy said, “An engine? Like a train engine? I don’t understand.”The blond lowered his scope and said, “The rail lines around here, they run crisscross, all over each other, every which-a-direction.We commandeered the switches and posted up our lads to keep the Yanks’ cracker line squeezed off shut.But then they brought—”The private interrupted him.“The Dreadnought.That’s what they call it.”“My CO said he thought the damn thing was back east, over in D.C., watching over the capital after our rally there last month.But no! Those bastards brought that unholy engine all the way out here, and it mowed us right down.They took back their line in under an hour, and now they’re pushing us back.They’re pushing us back good,” he emphasized, and drew the lenses back up to his face.“Veer us left, Mickey,” he said to the driver.“I don’t like the look of the smoke kicking up to the east.”“We’re going to run out of road.”“Better that than running into artillery, eh?”The Zephyr’s copilot was sour looking, squatting next to the captain.He asked, “How do you know it’s artillery? I can’t see a damn thing past the lanterns on the cart.”The navigator gave the copilot a look like he must be the stupidest man alive and waggled his scope, with its myriad jingling lenses.“They’re the latest thing.They ain’t perfect, but they do all right.” One more glance through the lenses, and he said, “But we gotta get rid of our lights or they’ll spot us over there.Mickey, the lanterns.Kill ’em.Kill all of ’em.”“Clinton, I swear to God—”“I’m not asking you a favor, you nitwit, I’m telling you—”“I’m working on it!” Mickey cut him off.“Who’s holding the other one?”“I am,” the captain said.“And I’m trimming the wick right now.”“Not enough,” insisted Clinton.“Turn it off.Damp the whole thing down.”Mickey’s lantern had already been snuffed, so when the captain reluctantly killed the light he held, the forest swallowed them whole.The horses slowed without being told, whinnying and neighing their displeasure and their nervousness.Mickey told them, “Hush up, you two.” Then, to the people in the back, he said, “Down, all of you.Get as low as you can go.Cover your heads.”The old man, who had been silent against his wife thus far, instead asked, in a voice far too loud for anyone’s comfort, “Why did it get so dark and quiet?”Gordon Rand slapped his hand firmly over the old man’s mouth and whispered, “Because none of us want to die.Now contain yourself, sir.”The old man did not so much contain himself as begin to giggle, but it was a quiet giggle, and no one chided him for it.All of them crouched down low, hunkering as deeply as possible against the floor of the cart as it rattled, jostled, and bounced them along the nearly invisible road between the trees.then off to the left where the road was less distinct, and rougher.It was also harder to bear for the folks whose knees, elbows, and ribs battered against the wood-slat bottom.Nearby, a tree exploded, casting splinters as large as arms and legs through the darkness.The old woman muffled her own scream, and everyone else flattened even lower, as if they could meld themselves with the floor of the cart.Mickey groaned.When Mercy looked up, she could see something dark and shiny all over his face and side, but he stayed upright and flipped the reins at the horses, yelling “Yah!”The elderly man, absent Gordon Rand’s hand over his mouth, exclaimed, “I thought we were supposed to be quiet!”But there was no being quiet anymore; it wouldn’t do any good at this point, and the horses and cart were barreling—kicking back to the main road where travel was faster, if more exposed.Another tree nearby was blown to bits with a sound like the whole world falling down.As the echo of it faded, Mercy’s ears were ringing, and there was a tickle in her nose, of sawdust or vibration, then a knock against her head as a rock in the road launched the cart higher, then dropped it to the ground again with a clap that fractured the back axle.“Oh, Jesus!” Mercy gasped, not that she thought He might be listening [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]