Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1954 by Rebel Mail Runner (v1.1) Page A

the
trenches, a-hollerin’ for you-all.”
                 Gulping
the hot brew, Grimes opened the door, and Barry peered past him into the gray
morning.
                 Soldiers
milled in the yard and on the wharf. Some wore ragged gray, some butternut
pants and jackets, some faded old blue garments
captured from the enemy. There was a roar from many throats.
                 “Cap’n
Ab Grimes! Where’s our mail?”
                 “Yieee-hee! Mail ho!”
                 Stepping
out, Grimes waved his cup for silence. The cries died away, and expectant eyes
fixed on the mail runner.
                 “Don’t
make any pellmell charge,” he warned. “Let’s have a mail orderly from each
regiment, to take the letters for distribution. Pass the word, and give us
room.”
                 Another ear-splitting yell. Grimes smiled at Barry and led
the way out on the wharf, where the dugout had been placed in a shed that
served for guard house. Two young sentinels kept close watch over it.
                Now Barry had a daylight look at Vicksburg . The ground rose inland to a great swelling
height, as though the town had hunched its shoulder and lifted houses and
streets. A shell burst somewhere among the houses, with a roaring flash. He
started violently, but the soldiers around him barely flinched.
                 He
and Grimes loosened the boxes and carried them into view. Another yell rose
from the throng. A group of men came close, carrying sacks—the mail orderlies
from the Missouri regiments.
                 “Here’s
a hatchet to bust open the boxes,” volunteered one.
                 “Take
that thing away!” snapped Grimes. “I want tinners’ shears.”
                 Someone
else brought the shears. Grimes carefully reopened the boxes, one by one, and
Barry passed out the mail. Each orderly received bundle after bundle of
letters, stowing them in his sack. When all the mail was distributed, the
orderlies bore their burdens through the eager crowd. Grimes watched.
                 “See
why my job is worth-while, Barry?” he inquired.
                 “I
certainly do, Captain. I’m glad I could help.”
                Then there was a sudden yelling
surge of soldiers toward them. Grimes and Barry found themselves seized and
hoisted by a dozen hands, and despite their protests they were carried shoulder
high back to the house. They struggled to the ground at last and retreated
inside, fairly wafted through the door by cheers and rebel yells that almost
drowned the explosions of the beginning cannonade.
                 In
the front room waited a square-faced man with the shoulder straps of a colonel
on his gray tunic. Grimes saluted quickly.
                 “Colonel
Cockrell,” he cried joyously. “You still command the First Missouri?”
                 “I
command the whole Missouri Brigade, Captain Grimes,” replied the colonel. “And
I want to talk to you about your crazy blockade-running.”
                 “What
was wrong with it?” protested Grimes.
                 The
square face grinned. “Nothing at all. I’m only hoping
you can carry answering letters out again.” “I mean to try, sir. Let me present
my helper, Barry Mills.”
                 Just
then the old man of the house announced breakfast. Colonel Cockrell sat down
with them at a kitchen table and ate corn bread and molasses. They had just
started when a tremendous blast rang out, apparently just outside. Barry almost
spilled his cup of sweet-potato coffee.
                 “That
was a hooter,” remarked Colonel Cockrell. “The civilians have dug caves along
the streets and in the yards, and they shelter there when the bombardment’s lively.
Now, about this young man—Mr. Barry Mills—”