"The battle can't be put
off any longer, and we're bound to smash 'em in the morning."
They remained in the darkness for a while, trying to see what was passing
toward the Southern lines, but they could see little. There was some
rifle firing after a while, and the occasional deep note of a cannon,
mostly at random and the little group walked back.
"I'm going to sleep, Dick," said Warner. "I've just remembered that
I'm an invalid and that if I overtask myself it will be a bad thing for
McClellan to-morrow. The colonel doesn't want us any longer, and so here
goes."
"I follow," said Pennington. "The dry earth is good enough for me.
May I stay on top of it for the next half century."
Warner and Pennington slept quickly, but Dick lay awake a long time,
listening to the stray rifle shots and the distant boom of a cannon at
far intervals. After a while, he looked at his watch and saw that it
was midnight. It was more than an hour later when slumber overtook him,
and while he and his comrades lay there the last of Jackson's men were
coming with the help that Lee needed so sorely.
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