Major Bird drew his sword. He had still not loaded his Le Mat revolver. He gave the sword an experimental slash, then hoped to God he would not have to use it. To Bird’s way of thinking last-ditch bayonet charges belonged in the history books or in romance novels, not in present day actuality, though Bird had to admit the Legion’s bayonets looked foully effective. They were long slender blades with a wicked upward curve at their tips. Back in Faulconer County the Colonel had insisted the men practice with their bayonets; and had even hung a cow’s carcass from a low branch to make a realistic target, but the carcass had rotted and the men could not be induced to attack it. Now, with the sweat making white channels through the powder stains on their faces, those same men readied themselves for a bout of real bayonet practice.

The northerners, encouraged by the lull in southern rifle fire, began advancing again. A fresh battery of southern artillery had reached the right flank of Evans’s line and the newly arrived gunners cracked their canister and roundshot across the face of the federal attack, persuading the northerners to hurry. Three northern bands were now playing in rivalry, driving the heavy fringed flags forward through the smoke wraiths that hung above the meadow that had been so battered by shells and roundshot that the sulfurous stink of the powder smoke was laced with the sweeter smell of new cut hay.

Major Bird looked at his old-fashioned watch, blinked, and looked again. He held the watch to his ear, thinking it must have stopped, yet he could still hear it ticking steadily away. He had somehow thought it was afternoon already, but it was only half past ten. He licked his dry lips, hefted the sword and looked back to the approaching enemy.

The bugle called.

One false note, a pause, then it rang a clean, clear triple of notes, then another triple, a heartbeat’s pause, and suddenly the officers and sergeants were shouting at the southern line to get up and go. For a second no one moved, then the gray line at the wood’s shell-torn and bullet-stripped edge stirred into life.