Lucas raced down the stairs.
He lingered a few seconds longer, again shifting his field glasses to George. He could tell his old friend was loving the moment. Mounted again, riding along the skirmish line, urging his men to get up, to press forward.
He certainly led a charmed life. He had seen George go down, and for a second feared he was dead, but then the man had stood up, brushed himself off, remounted, and was back in the fight.
'Your day, George,' he said.
Phil ran down the stairs and out under the awning of the depot.
The men over at the ravine were disengaging, sliding down the slope, running to their horses, mounting up. It was going to be a tight race. As soon as his boys stopped shooting, George would press in.
The first of them came galloping down the track, more following, troopers leading the empty mounts of the men who had been holding the depot. The telegraphy crew from Frederick were already riding for the bridge.
Lucas brought up Phil's horse, and he climbed into the saddle. He didn't need to give any orders now, the boys knew where to go and just wanted to skedaddle before the Yankees closed in. They raced for the bridge. Fortunately, the wooden structure, wide enough for two tracks, had planking laid to either side between the crossties, otherwise they'd have had to cross dismounted, leading nervous mounts.
His men galloped across, Phil slowing as he reached the bridge. Bullets whined about him. Yankees were up to the ravine, tumbling down its side; others were running toward the depot. He caught a glimpse of George, raised a hand in salute, and, turning, urged his mount across the bridge at a gallop.
Was that Phil? George wondered, quickly uncasing his field glasses and focusing them on the bridge. It was hard to tell with the smoke and the mist still rising off the river.
The way he kept his saddle, the wave-it did indeed look like his old friend.
He edged his mount around the ravine, leaning back in his saddle as he finally went down the slope and out onto the track. His men, breathing hard, grinning, faces besmirched with powder, sweating, were down into the ravine, running toward the depot.
Half a dozen rebs lay along the lip of the railroad cut, dead. A dozen more, wounded, were down by the track, several of his men already there helping them. 'What regiment are you?' Custer asked. 'Third Virginia,' one of them announced, looking up at him defiantly.
'Captain Duvall?'
'That's our man. What of it?' the reb said. George nodded and then saluted. 'My compliments, boys. You put up a good fight.' So it was Phil.
'Any trains come through here since yesterday?' 'How the hell would I know. We just got here ahead of you Yankees.'
George rode up to the depot, looking around. If the rebs had moved trains up here, there would have been more men defending this place than an outpost patrol he'd been dogging since yesterday. By damn, we got here ahead of 'em.
The depot itself was pockmarked with bullet holes. He studied the bridge that Phil had just ridden across, the far end obscured by smoke and fog. The bridge, a rough affair, looked like something military railroad crews would have thrown up after an earlier bridge was destroyed. He drew closer, and saw down in the river twisted lengths of cable, iron girders. Obviously the wreckage of what had been here, most likely before the Antietam campaign.
Already his mind was working. Hold it or destroy it?
His gaze swept back over the depot. Blockhouse, a turntable, the triangle of track. If the rebs get hold of this they can easily turn trains around. With a double-track system, in a matter of hours they can bring up a hundred trains or more out of Baltimore, move an entire army.
He had no idea where Grant was at this moment. Maybe ten miles off, maybe fifty. Destroy the bridge, perhaps it will get Grant's dander up, but then again, we can replace it in a day or two. No, I came here to block the rebs from moving their pontoon bridge and by God that's what I'll do.
'General, sir.'
He looked over his shoulder. Lieutenant Schultz was riding up.
'Sir, Colonel Gray's compliments. His boys are deployed, but he is shifting two companies over to the stone bridge, the one for the National Road. Says that reb skirmishers are on the other side. Colonel Mann is in place as reserves.'
George nodded, saying nothing.
Skirmishers on the main road heading back to Baltimore. 'Infantry or cavalry?' 'Sir, he didn't say.'
Most likely cavalry, George thought. I've got a thousand men with me. It has to be cavalry coming up. It is surprising they're not already here.
That decided it.
'Lieutenant Schultz, do we have any ammunition reserves, raw powder?'
'Sir?'
'Just that, barrels of powder?'
He already knew the answer, but felt he had to think out loud at this moment.
'Sir, just what our men our carrying with us. We left the supply wagons behind.'
'Get back up to Frederick, see if any shops have blasting powder. Check the depot here as well.'
'Sir, I doubt that we'll find any. Both armies have been through here twice in the last year.'
George nodded in agreement. Four or five barrels under a main trestle would do the trick, but to find that many now might take hours.
'We've got to destroy that bridge, Lieutenant.'
Trying to burn it might sound easy but he knew it wouldn't be. He'd have to get at least a couple of cords of kindling wood. There was enough of that in a wood rick next to the depot, but hauling it out there, placing it under a trestle, with Phil's boys popping away from the other side at less than a hundred yards would be damn difficult.
Schultz looked over at the bridge and seemed lost in thought.
The lieutenant suddenly grinned.
'Sir, there are two locomotives in the depot up in Frederick, both with passenger cars and boxcars. Maybe we could use those.'
Custer grinned, too.
'I always enjoyed the sight of a good train wreck. Get on it, Lieutenant.'
East Bank, Monocacy Creek
7:00 A.M.
Jeb Stuart reined in, an exhausted, begrimed captain coming up to him on foot and saluting. 'Capt. Phil Duvall, sir, Third Virginia.' 'What is going on here?' Stuart asked. 'Sir, didn't you get the telegraph message we sent out an hour ago?'
'I've been riding up here, Captain,' Jeb said, exasperated. 'No, I did not get the telegraph message.'
'Sir, we've been withdrawing in front of Custer's Brigade since yesterday, from Hanover down to here. We tried to hold the depot on the other side of the river, but he pushed us back about twenty minutes ago. He has at least three regiments over there.'
Jeb looked toward the bridge, the far side obscured by fog.
'How many men over there?'
'Like I said, sir, a brigade. I'd guess at a thousand or so.' 'You couldn't hold?'
Phil pointed to the exhausted men, still mounted, who were gathered behind him.
'Sir, we put up a fight, kept them back for a half hour or so, but if we'd stayed five minutes longer, sir,' he sighed, 'well, we'd either be dead or prisoners now.'
Jeb contained his exasperation. It was obvious that Du-vall's men had put up a fight: At least a quarter of them were nursing wounds, while a score of horses without riders was testimony to those left behind.
'Where can I maneuver here?' Jeb asked.
'Sir, down there to the south, about two hundred yards downstream you got a covered bridge, double wide. To the north about two miles or so, I'm told there's a stone bridge. I suspect there's a number of fords here as well.' Stuart nodded.
