“But suppose General Johnston has given your covering forces the slip?” Colonel Lassan spoke excellent English in a British accent which James, whose indigestion had not improved with the passing hours, found rather irritating. “You are naturally communicating with your troops in the Shenandoah by telegraph?” Colonel Lassan continued with his needling enquiries.

“We know General Johnston was fully engaged by our forces two days ago,” James assured Colonel Lassan.

“But two days is more than sufficient time to sidestep a covering force and ride the trains to Manassas, is it not?” the Frenchman asked.

“I think it most unlikely.” James tried to sound coolly dismissive.

“You will recall,” Colonel Lassan persisted, “that our great victory over Franz Joseph at Solferino was caused by the speed with which our emperor moved the army by train?”

James, who did not know where Solferino was and knew nothing of any battle there and had never heard of the French emperor’s railroad achievements, nodded wisely, but then gallantly suggested that the rebel forces of the Confederacy were hardly capable of imitating the achievements of the French army.

“You had better hope not,” Lassan said grimly, then trained his field glasses on a far hill where a rebel telegraphist was sending a message. “You are confident, Captain, that your flanking force will be on time?” Lassan asked.

“They should be arriving at any moment, sir.” James’s confidence was belied by the lack of any evidence that fighting had indeed broken out in the rebel rear, though he consoled himself that the intervening distance would surely prevent any such evidence being visible. That proof would come when the Confederate forces defending the stone bridge began their panicked flight. “I’ve no doubt our flanking force is attacking at this very moment, sir,” James said with as much certainty as he could muster, then, because he was so proud of Yankee efficiency, he could not resist adding two words, “as planned.”

“Ah! Planned! I see, I see,” Colonel Lassan responded gnomically, then shot a sympathetic glance at James. “My father was a very great soldier, Captain, but he always liked to say that the practice of war is much like making love to a woman—an activity full of delights, but none of them predictable and the best of them capable of inflicting grievous injury on a man.”

“Oh, I like that!” The Chicago newspaperman scribbled in his notebook.