Abner & Me by Dan Gutman Read Free Book Online Page B

“It gets pretty loud out here.”
    I didn’t see anybody around who looked like a general. I guessed that the 151st Pennsylvania was scattered across the cemetery in the fighting and these four guys found themselves in this ditch. Some of the smoke had cleared from the field now. I could see off into the distance.
    Little John told me he knew about ten different drum calls. There’s a drumbeat that means “march,” and a drumbeat that means “left face,” and another drumbeat that means it’s time to eat. I asked him to play me a few of them, but he said he couldn’t because it might confuse the soldiers.
    â€œWhy do you have to carry a gun if you’re the drummer?”
    â€œIt ain’t my gun,” he said matter-of-factly. “I took it off a dead man. Like he said, we need every man we got.”
    Suddenly, a shrieking, high-pitched scream came out of the distant woods. It sounded like a wounded animal.
    â€œWhat’s that?” I asked, turning to look for the source of the sound. The hairs on my arm were standing up.
    â€œThe Rebel yell,” Little John said, putting down his drum and picking up his rifle.
    â€œHere they come again!” shouted Joshua.
    In the distance, a long line of men started to appear. There were maybe a thousand of them, coming out of the woods. They were walking toward us.
    â€œHold your fire,” Joshua said calmly, aiming his gun. “Don’t use up any ammunition until they get close.”
    â€œWhat should I do?” I asked Little John.
    â€œWait till he gives the word,” he advised. “Then fire at anything gray.”
    The army marching toward us was still very far away, but I could make out Confederate flags and men on horses. To the sides of me, Union soldiers were rushing out from behind trees and tombstones to get into position. Some were wheeling cannons out of the woods.
    The Confederates were coming closer, and I could see that they were trotting now.
    â€œFire!” somebody shouted, and a blast of guns erupted on the left and right of me. A few Confederate soldiers stumbled and fell. The others kept right on coming, pulling together to fill in the holes left by the men who had fallen.
    â€œKeep low! Keep low! Stay alert!” shouted Joshua as he rushed to reload his rifle.
    The Confederates stopped for a moment to aim and shoot. A few bullets zipped by. I ducked down into the ditch.
    As the Confederates got closer, I could see that only some of them were wearing military uniforms. Most were in tattered old clothes. Few of them had shoes. Some of them had rags wrapped around their feet.
    I couldn’t pull the trigger.
    â€œWhat’s the matter?” Joshua demanded after firing his second shot. “Is your gun jammed?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œThen fire that thing!”
    â€œI…don’t know if I can…”
    â€œAre you an American?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œWell, then fight like an American!”
    They were getting closer, and then they were running toward us, screaming that horrible Rebel yell the whole time.
    I didn’t want to shoot. I didn’t want to hit a human being. But there were human beings running toward us and they wanted to hit me. So I pulled the trigger. A yellow-blue flash shot out of the end of the musket, and I was rocked backward.
    I didn’t know if I hit anything. I rushed to reload.
    â€œJoey!” Mom yelled from the bottom of the ditch. She was still helping Willie. “What are you doing?”
    â€œProtecting you!” I shouted. “Stay down!”
    It was a firestorm. Even though each man couldonly shoot once every twenty seconds, the roar of gunfire was continuous. There were thousands of us.
    Union cannons were booming too. I always thought they just fired cannonballs. But as I was reloading, I could see men shoving these big cans down the barrels of a cannon. Then, when it was fired, stuff sprayed out of