medical officer to whom
Drew had by chance delivered those saddlebags of drugs, and if Abram
Buford had not been a division commander, Drew might not have been able
to push through his transfer. But Cowan had spoken to Forrest, and
General Buford had known both the Barretts and the Mattocks all his
life.

Boyd had recovered speedily from the leg wound, but his convalescence
from heat exhaustion and the ensuing complications was still in
progress, though he had reached the point that only General Buford's
strict orders had kept him from this second raid into enemy territory.
Now he was safe in a private home in Meridian, where he was being
treated as a son of the house, and Drew had even managed to send a
letter to Cousin Merry with that information. He only hoped that she had
received it.

As for the change in commands, Drew was content. Perhaps the more so
since the news had come less than two weeks earlier that John Morgan was
dead. He had gone down fighting, shooting it out with Yankee troopers in
a rain-wet garden in Tennessee on a Sunday morning. Men were dying,
dead ... and maybe a cause was dying, too. Drew's thought flinched away
from that line now, trying to keep to the job before them. There was the
abandoned stockade to destroy, the trestle and bridge to knock to
pieces, and if they had time, the tracks to tear up, heat, and twist out
of shape.

Wilkins stood behind a pile of wood cut for engine fuel. "They are on
the run, all right. Headin' toward Pulaski."

"Think they'll make a stand there?"

"One guess is as good as another. If they do, we'll smoke them out. Keep
'em busy and chase 'em clean out of their hats and back to camp."

The destruction of the blockhouse and the trestle could be left to the
army behind; the scouts moved on again.

"The boys are havin' themselves a time." Kirby returned to his post with
the advance. "Tyin' bowknots in rails gits easier all the time. When
this heah campaign is over, we'll know more 'bout takin' railroads apart
then the fellas who make 'em know 'bout puttin' 'em together."

"Trouble!" Drew reined in Hannibal and waved to Wilkins. "There's a
picket up there...."

Kirby's gaze followed the other's pointing finger. "Kinda green at the
business," he commented critically. "Sorta makin' a sittin' target of
hisself. Like to tickle him up with a shot. We don't git much action
outta this."

"I'd say we're plannin' to go in now."

A squad of Buford's advance fil