sounded loud to him. Moreover, Morrell got the idea that people needed to mumble around Custer, to make horrified comments about the outrageous things he said.
Major Dowling said, “Sir, of course we will have the cavalry in place, ready to take advantage of whatever opportunities arise for using it.”
“Of course we will,” Custer said. “Pity so many men these days carry the carbine instead of the saber. I put the saber to good use in the War of Secession. ‘Go in, Wolverines!’ ” he called reminiscently. “ ‘Give ’em hell!’ And we did.”
“But, sir, weren’t you carrying a carbine yourself during the Second Mexican War?” Dowling asked.
“Well, yes,” Custer admitted with a frown. “Even so, gleaming steel terrifies in a way that bullets can’t match.”
Morrell studied Dowling in open admiration. Custer’s adjutant was plainly very good at guiding the general commanding First Army away from courses that held no profit (to say nothing of guiding him out of the nineteenth century) and toward things that needed doing or needed doing in a particular way. Morrell commonly dealt with superior officers who proved difficult by ignoring them as much as he could. Learning other ways of handling the problem could be useful.
“When do we move, sir?” Morrell asked. He was aggressive, too, and wanted to lead the barrels into battle.
“Ground’s still damper than I’d like,” Colonel Sherrard said. “We’ll lose a lot fewer machines to bogging if we wait till the countryside dries out a bit more. That could matter.”
“We’ll have to move in more artillery support, too,” Dowling added. “That will also get easier as the roads dry out.”
“From what I’ve seen up in Philadelphia, the bombardments that go on for a week or so don’t do as much good as everyone thought they would when we started using them,” Morrell said. “The Rebs dig in like moles, and the shelling only shows right where we’re headed.”
“They’ve come up with something new,” Sherrard said. “It’s particularly good against enemy artillery. You give them an opening barrage of phosgene gas shells, make them put on their gas helmets. Hell of a lot of fun to try and serve a piece in a gas helmet, you know.”
“They’ve been harassing gunners like that as long as we’ve had gas shells,” Morrell said.
“I know,” Ned Sherrard said. “But they’ve got a new wrinkle on it. After that first round of phosgene, they saturate the area with puke-gas shells; the antigas cartridges that protect against phosgene don’t do a thing to stop it. Then, when the Reb gunners yank off their helmets so they can heave, they hit ’em with another phosgene barrage.”
Morrell considered. Having considered, he said, “That’s…devilish, sir. Whoever thought of it was probably the Marquis de Sade’s cousin.” He paused. “It’s also going to tie the Rebs into knots.”
“And, a day and a half later, it’ll give your artillery fits, because the Rebs will do it to us, too,” Abner Dowling said. “That’s the way this war has gone, right from the start.”
“I don’t think we’ll be able to move till next month,” Sherrard said. “When we do, we’d better hit hard.”
“That’s true,” Dowling agreed. “If we don’t break through this time, we’ll never get another chance. Everyone will be watching how we do. Teddy Roosevelt said as much. If we don’t measure up-” He pointed a thumb at the ground, a gesture straight from a Roman amphitheater.
“We’ll smash them.” Custer sounded sublimely confident. Had his performance matched his confidence, he would have been in front of Mobile, not Nashville. But confidence was never wasted. “On Remembrance Day, if the weather is good, we’ll smash them.”
“On Remembrance Day,” Morrell repeated. Major Dowling and Colonel Sherrard both nodded. Morrell said it again, softly: “On Remembrance Day.”
Nellie Semphroch had seldom felt more out of place than she did on dismounting from a hired carriage in front of St. John’s Church. Looking south across Lafayette Square, she could see the White House, still battered and sad- looking from the shell hits it had taken when the Confederate States captured the capital of the USA. Presidents worshiped at St. John’s; it was not normally for the likes of her. But these were not normal times.
She turned to Hal Jacobs, who sat beside her on the seat behind the driver. “Well, here we are,” she said.
“Let us make the best of it, then,” he answered. He looked like what he was: a dignified man without a great deal of wealth. His somber black suit, black derby, and wing collar with four-in-hand tie were correct enough for a wedding, but in no way stylish. Smiling at Nellie, he said, “You look lovely today-but then, I think that of you every day.”
“Foosh,” she said; his compliments never failed to make her nervous. She ran her hands down the pleated skirt of her peach silk dress.
“Edna was very kind to ask that I be the one to give her away,” Jacobs said. “I know it is only because she has no men who are close kin, but it was very kind.”
“So it was,” Nellie said, and hoped the subject would drop-with a thud. She knew why Edna had asked the favor of Hal Jacobs: her daughter was doing some heavy-handed matchmaking. She also knew Jacobs had accepted not least for the spying he could do among the Confederate officers who made up the bulk of the wedding party.
They stood around in front of the white-painted church, their dress butternut uniforms shining with gold braid, their kepis almost as fancy as those French officers would wear, many of them with ceremonial swords belted on their hips. As the driver handed Nellie down from the chariot, she listened to them chatting about the war. No doubt Hal Jacobs was listening, too-intently.
But, as he offered her his arm and she, despite misgivings, had to accept or be rude in public, she knew the chance to spy was not the only reason he’d so readily accepted Edna’s invitation. He was glad of her matchmaking; he wanted a match with Nellie.
No one seemed to care what Nellie herself thought. Nellie could not remember the last time anyone had cared what she thought.
As if to prove that, here came Lieutenant Nicholas H. Kincaid, his uniform as gaudy as a lieutenant’s could be, the creases sharp as razors. “Good morning, ma’am,” he said, beaming at her. “Isn’t it a lovely day?”
“It will do,” she answered. If he’d cared what she thought, he would have let her daughter alone. All he cared about, though, was stretching Edna out naked on a bed. He was a man. What point to expecting anything else of him?
He turned to Hal Jacobs. “Sir, when you give her away, you can be sure I’ll take her, and you can be sure I’ll take good care of her, too.”
“That is very good, Lieutenant,” Jacobs said. “That is as it should be.”
Kincaid pointed into the church. “They must have put Edna inside somewhere when she got here a couple of minutes ago. My pals hustled me off, though, so I don’t know for certain: bad luck to see the bride before the wedding, you know.”
“Yes,” Nellie said. Shabby Washingtonians-and, except for collaborators, there was no other kind of Washingtonians-walking by paused to stare at the wedding party. The Rebs could have public gaiety in the middle of the war. For anyone else, it was a distant memory.
“I hope everything goes as it should,” Jacobs said in his deliberate way. “I hope everything goes very well.”
“Yes.” Nellie sounded abstracted. One of those shabby Washingtonians on the other side of H Street…She lowered her voice to the next thing to a whisper: “Mr. Jacobs-Hal. Is that Bill Reach over there?”
“Why-” Jacobs raised his bushy eyebrows. “Why, I believe it is. What can he be doing here? I must go over and-”
Now Nellie took hold of his arm with great firmness. “You must do nothing of the sort. What you must do is come in with me and help me marry my fool of a daughter to this great Rebel oaf she’s chosen. If you do anything else”-she played what she devoutly hoped was a trump-“I’ll never speak to you again.”
