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* * * * *
 This looks like a good spot.
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Twenty minutes after leaving John, Lauren stopped beside Jill as the latter dropped
the lunch hamper and squinted down the hill. The fog had thinned and the half light of
the approaching dawn made it difficult to see too far yet.
Spectators were being kept well behind the battle. Lauren wondered if that should
really be the case. If they wanted to know what it was like during the war, shouldn t
they be right down there in the middle of it instead of on the hill just behind a row of
cannon? She d never been to the real battlefield just a few miles away. Today s
reenactment would be held on a field in remembrance. The actual field, according to
John, was too precious a treasure to sully with the damage their reenactment would do
to the national park.
They stood about thirty feet back and a little above a line of men manning the
several dozen Union cannon and getting them ready to fire. Unlike the mock battle at
the museum a few weeks ago, no announcer came out to narrate this battle. No
civilities, no acknowledgement of the spectators as audience.
The sun hadn t yet made an appearance, although the heralds were all there.
Between tufts of lifting fog, the last few stars winked one last time and disappeared as
the birds began their morning songs. A faint breeze stirred the cornstalks in the field
below her, their rustle soft in the early morning light.
Off to her left, a cannon roared and Lauren jumped, her fists balling and her eyes
raking the cornfield beyond. A puff of tell-tale smoke came from the center on the other
side. Had the Confederates been the ones to start the action? Suddenly Lauren couldn t
remember anything she d read about this blasted battle except that the cornfield had
been a place of death and destruction. Between the multiple charges between the
cornstalks and the constant cannon fire, both the men in the corn and the crop itself had
been leveled by the end.
How many men had gathered to re-create this fight today? Lauren swallowed hard
as voices in front of her called out commands,  Ram!  Sight the piece!  Clear! The
gunner s orders mingled and Lauren wondered how they knew which voice belonged
to their crew.
 Ready!  Fire! A cannon burst forth with noise and white smoke. And then, with
no further ado, another, and another and another. The Union cannon answered the
Confederate guns, volley for volley, and the battle had begun. She put her hands over
her ears and Jill was beside her, not saying anything since there was nothing one could
say in the face of such fury.
But Jill stood there and Lauren nodded, taking deep breaths tainted with the taste
of gunpowder. Bitter was the taste in her mouth and in her nose, and Lauren took
another deep breath, the scent doing more to chase away her demons than anything
else. Modern warfare smelled different than this.
She could just make out a group of men picking their way between the rows of tall
corn. Part of her wanted to shout, to warn them away from what she knew would
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happen. Clenching her fists, she watched as another cannon volley went off and scores
of the foot soldiers fell to the ground.
The sun rose to her left, illuminating a scene straight from Hieronymus Bosch. As
the last tendrils of fog lifted, the sun shone on a peaceful summer morning. Stray wisps
ascended to the heavens, slowly disappearing into the sky. Men screamed and fell to
the earth as smoke from the cannon mingled with the dissipating fog.
The cannon fired constantly. Lauren had prepared for the barrage and although her
chest felt tight, no sign of panic reared its ugly head. Maybe Dr. Butters was right. PTSD
wasn t something that could be cured but it could be managed.
And still the cannon rumbled. During the actual battle, it was said the thunder of
the cannon could be heard nearly fifty miles away at Harper s Ferry. Would they hear it
there today? The hills took every bellow and amplified it, turning it back on itself to
echo again and again and again.
The air stung her eyes now as the breeze lifted the smoke. Others moved back but
Lauren remained where she was, stubbornly refusing to give in. To move back was to
let the war win.
Jill was at her elbow, shouting something in her ear. But the cannon deafened her. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]