The Girls of Gettysburg by Bobbi Miller Page A

plunged, until at last the itching eased to tolerable. Her head just barely above the water, she let the pond’s coolness ease her soreness.
    Good great glory
. She moaned and shook her head, remembering how carefully she had carried her boots across the Potomac. Now they were covered in muck.
    â€œHey, strawfoot!” a voice called from the woods.
    â€œJiggers,” another chuckled.
    Annie stayed nose deep in the water. Little moonlight filtered through the tree cover, but she could see the long shadow stretching across the shore. Dylan and Jasper!
    â€œSo, strawfoot, come and get your britches!”

CHAPTER TWENTY

    She was done for!
    Annie stayed put, stirring the water very little. She couldn’t go deep enough, or far away enough, to hide. If Dylan took another step, he’d see her in all her glory.
    â€œPrivates!” another voice boomed in the distance, and all three—Dylan and Jasper on the pond’s edge, and Annie in the water—snapped to as a soldier stepped into the moonlight. “Haven’t learnt your lesson yet? You two get back to camp now. Step lively. Gideon wants you
yesterday
. And you in the water”—he threw Annie her britches—“move it quick!”
    â€œYes, sir!” Annie boomed, slipping into her pants.
    The soldier stepped back into the shadows, stomping through the woods in a hasty retreat. Annie climbed out of the water, wringing her shirt dry and shaking out her boots.
    As she entered the camp, she found Dylan and Jasper crouched before the fire in front of the tent.
    â€œHow’s them woods, strawfoot?” Still smelling like latrine sweat, Dylan smirked, winking at Jasper.
    Gideon spat. He eased next to the fire, tapping his pipe, and the skirmish was over.
    Others of the Ninth walked into the camp, too, sitting between Dylan and Annie, crowding around the fire, aiming to keep the peace.
    â€œI, for one, am spoiling for a good fight,” one spoke up. “ThemFederals are a bunch of thieves with no regard for personal rights. We’ve been putting those blue-belly cowards in their place all along. Let’s finish the job so we can go home.”
    â€œHear! Hear!” rose a cheer.
    â€œHeard tell they bayonet the prisoners of war, slash their throats, and cut their tongues out. Uncivilized they are, just plain scum.”
    â€œWe can always have James here sit on them,” Gideon said then, lighting his pipe. “It seems to do the trick.”
    Chuckles rumbled through the crowd. Even Dylan had to crack his crooked grin, still rubbing his chest. Annie smiled, too, turning and smoothing the pages of William’s book.
    â€œSergeant?” Jasper spoke up. “What was the fiercest battle you ever saw?”
    Gideon puffed more circles as he searched his memory. He had seen the battle between the ironclads, the USS
Monitor
and the CSS
Virginia
. He had seen his home city, Portsmouth, burned to the ground by the Federals. He had fought in the battle of Seven Pines and in the Seven Days Campaign, where the company fought courageously at Malvern Hill. There wasn’t too much he hadn’t seen.
    â€œBoys”—he lit his pipe slowly, and drew a breath—“there was one particularly gruesome fight. A group of us had gone foraging one warm night and came to rest on the banks of a river. Now just so happens, across the very same river camped a bunch of blue boys. And by and by they noticed us. ‘How’s old Jeff?’ one called out. ‘Come to Richmond and see for yourself,’ I yelled back. ‘Enough with the jawing,’ he shouted back. And we knew the battle was begun. Then, by thunder, this Federal took to singing a round of “Yankee Doodle.” Not to be outdone, we sang two rounds of “Dixie.” They opened fire with “Hail, Columbia,” and we fired back with “Bonnie Blue Flag.” Then it was all quiet. We thought we won this battle. Then