In an America that might have been, two war orphans from a divided nation, one in the north and one in the south, meet across a vast battlefield, striking out to forge a future together in the west. It's 1892, the fourth and bloodiest year of the Ci...
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The Rangers followed the river, travelling along farm trails, logging roads, old keelboat tracks, and anything else they could find that bordered it. The river meandered back and forth, and twice Clem led them across country on shortcuts rather than follow its twists and turns. All the while Clem kept checking his watch and compass. On towards evening they began to meet sentries, and more and more often they were challenged to identify themselves. Late that afternoon they came across artillery emplacements being dug by teams of Negro slaves.
"Yes, sir," said the white sergeant in charge of the slave's guards. He pulled off his helmet and wiped his brow, like he had actually been doing work. "There is fun a comin' across that river and with a little luck, we will be gone somewhere else when the party starts." They all paused and looked at the river. "Sometimes," he said to himself, "I can hear their bugles."
"Be a bad place for us for them to cross," Jake said. "No good roads in here."
"Yessa. I guess that's why we're a diggin'!" the sergeant said.
There were more teams digging trenches closer to the river, and Clem felt that these and the artillery positions were important enough that they needed to be marked on the map. So they pulled down the little table off of one of the Army mares and pulled out the map from its leather tube. "I'm pretty sure we're here," said Clem, tapping with his pencil. Deke couldn't see how Clem knew which river loop they were on. When asked, Clem said, "Well, I'm not absolutely sure. I'm guessing based on directions and distances we've travelled, and of course eyeballing the shape of the river loop. Of course the map itself might be wrong. Rivers shift too. But I don't think we're too far off."
From then on Clem not only stopped to check his compass and watch, but sat atop his horse with his binoculars at every high point they came to, scanning the countryside, especially the far shore. He often found things to note on the map. Whenever they stopped to rest, Clem would let Deke look around with the binoculars too, but only if he told Clem what he saw in Morse code.
As they followed the river, the sound of the front grew louder and more distinct. Deke could make out specific thumps sometimes, and at night there was a glow on the horizon to the east.
The day came when Deke saw the first obvious Union position he'd ever seen. It was an artillery battery on the other side of the river on a low bluff down across the water. Deke could see the earthworks across the river but nothing else until Clem pulled out a telescope and perched it on a tripod. It was shiny brass and Clem let Deke look through it. He could see tiny figures in blue lounging on the earthworks parapet and the muzzles of four cannon.
"There's probably more we can't see," Clem said. "They're there to keep our boats from crossing."
Deke felt like he was seeing some sort of mythical beast as he looked at the Union soldier boys. He'd heard so much about them, and now there they were. Up until then, he almost hadn't believed they really existed.
