“Let go!” exclaimed Dick. “I've seen a man whom I know to be a spy, and a most dangerous one, too.”
They could find no trace of Slade. Dick returned crestfallen to his blanket, but he recalled something now definitely and clearly. Slade was the little man whom he had seen carrying the log the morning he left General Grant's camp, on his mission.
The sergeant, who had never stirred from his own blanket, sat up when Dick returned.
“Slade himself. He must have seen me jump up, because he vanished like a ghost. But I gained something. I know now that I saw him here in our uniform just before I started to find Colonel Hertford. That was why I was followed.”
“The cunning of an Indian. Well, we'll be on the watch for him now, but I imagine he's already on the way to Jackson with the news of our advance and an estimate of our numbers. We can't do anything to head him off.”
On the second day after joining the column Dick was ahead with the cavalry, riding beside Colonel Hertford, and listening to occasional shots in their front on the Jackson road. Both believed they would soon be in touch with the enemy. Sergeant Whitley, acting now as a scout, had gone forward through a field and in a few minutes galloped back.
“The enemy is not far away,” he said. “They're posted along a creek, with high banks and in a wood. They've got a strong artillery too, and I think they about equal us in numbers.”
Dick carried the report to the commander of the column, and soon the trumpets were calling the men to battle. The crackle of rifle shots ahead increased rapidly. The skirmishers were already pulling trigger, and, as Dick galloped back to Hertford he saw many puffs of white smoke down the road and in the fields and woods on either side. The Union men began to cheer. In the West they had suffered no such defeats as their brethren in the East, and every pulse beat with confidence. As the whole line moved forward the Southern cannon began to crash and their shells swept the road.
The cavalry were advancing in a field, but they were yet held back to a slow walk. Dick heard many impatient exclamations, but he knew the restraint was right. He saw the accuracy of the Southern gunners. They were driving the Northern infantry from the road. Their fire was rapid and deadly, and, for a while, the Union army was checked.