A colored sergeant bawled out a private for going around with filthy boots. But for his dialect, he sounded like every other sergeant Bradford had ever heard. The major wondered how often either Negro had worn shoes before joining the U.S. Army. Not very, not unless he missed his guess. They had them now, though.
And they acted like soldiers now. Would they act like soldiers when bullets flew and cannonballs screamed through the air? Bradford shook his head. He had a hard time believing it.
He shrugged. Before long, Forrest was bound to go back down to Mississippi. Then these coons would go away, too, and whether they could fight or not wouldn't matter a bit.
II
“COME ON, RIDE HARD!” COLONEL Robert McCulloch called as the Second Missouri Cavalry (C.S.) squelched west toward Brownsville, Tennessee. “You don't want those bastards from Mississippi to get ahead of you, do you?”
Matt Ward laughed when he heard that. “How many times has Black Bob talked about those Mississippi fellows?” he asked the man riding behind him. “He think maybe we forgot about 'em since ten minutes ago?”
“Beats me,” Zachary Bartlett answered. He was doing his best to keep a pipe going in the rain, and not having much luck. Ward had given up trying to smoke till he got somewhere dry. A splat and a hiss declared that the pipe had just taken another hit. “Goddamn thing,” Bartlett said without rancor.
“Goddamn rain,” Ward said, and his friend nodded. He went on,
“How long till we get to this Brownsville place, anyway?”