“What can you do about it?” Griffiths asked. “A dry rag?”

“Even better than that, sir,” Pound said. He was stocky and wide-shouldered-built like a brick, really. His brown hair had begun to go gray and to retreat at the temples. His eyes were pale in a broad face more Scots than English: marksman’s eyes. He pulled out a small bottle half full of clear liquid. “Absolute alcohol,” he explained. “I’ll rub a little where it’ll do the most good. It evaporates like anything, and it’ll take the moisture with it.” He suited action to words.

The distributor cap went back on. So did the louvers that protected the engine from small-arms fire while letting its heat escape. Pound scrambled down from the engine compartment. “Fire it up!” Bergman yelled to the driver.

There was a cough, a bang, and then the flatulent roar of a barrel engine coming to life. “Nicely done, Sergeant!” Griffiths said.

“Thank you, sir.” Pound clambered up to the turret and opened his hatch. He paused before climbing in and sitting down behind the gun. “Shall we get on with it?”

“I hope so, anyway,” Griffiths answered. “If this rain starts thawing out the ground, though, we’re liable to bog down.”

Pound didn’t think that likely. It was a little above freezing, but only a little. He guessed the rain would turn to sleet or snow before long. But he didn’t want to argue with Griffiths-which, considering how firmly armored in his own competence he was, was no small compliment to the young officer.

They rattled west in company with six or eight more barrels and several squads of foot soldiers. Only two of the barrels were the old models, with an inch-and-a-half gun. The improved machines, of which Pound’s was one, featured an upgunned, uparmored turret and a more powerful engine to handle the extra weight. Their 2.4-inch cannon still weren’t a match for the three-inchers new Confederate barrels carried, but they were the biggest guns the turret ring in the chassis would allow. And they were good enough to give the U.S. machines a fighting chance against the best the enemy could throw at them.