“I agree with you, sir,” Dowling said, for once telling Custer the unvarnished truth. “We just have to hope the people back home haven’t got too sick of the war to want to fight it through to the finish.”
“They had better not try quitting,” Custer growled. “If Debs calls the troops home, we’ll have a brand-new American Revolution, mark my words.”
Dowling did mark them. They filled him with horror. His head whipped around. After a moment’s panic, he heartily thanked God. Nobody but he had heard Custer. As casually as he could, he said, “Armed rebellion against the government of the United States is treason, sir.”
“I know that.” Custer sounded testy, not repentant. “Still some Rebs left alive who need hanging, by God, unless their own niggers shot ’em for us. Too much to hope for, that, I daresay. Now you listen to me, Major.” Dowling, who had done his share and more of listening, made himself look attentive. Custer resumed: “I don’t want a rebellion, not even a little bit. Do you understand me? What I want is to make a rebellion unnecessary, and that means victory, to give the people the idea-the true idea, mind you-that we stand on the edge of the greatest triumph in the history of mankind.”
“The Rebs are still fighting hard, sir,” Dowling said, in what had to be the understatement of this or any other decade: the front hadn’t moved a mile closer to the White House since the enormous U.S. offensive opened. “So are the Canadians, which forces us to divide our efforts.”
“Teddy Roosevelt bit off more than he could chew, right at the start of the war,” Custer said. This, from a man whose notion of reconnaissance was a headlong charge at an obstacle with everything he had, struck Major Dowling as a curious utterance-which, for once, did not mean it was wrong.
Rather to Dowling’s relief, the debate on grand strategy stopped then, for one of Custer’s division commanders came up, stood under the awning, and waited to be noticed. He waited a while, too; Custer was jealous of his own prerogatives. At last, grudgingly, he said, “Good morning, Brigadier General MacArthur.”
“Good morning, sir.” Brigadier General Daniel MacArthur came to stiff attention, which made him tower even more over both Custer and Dowling. Dowling understood why Custer was touchy around this particular subordinate. MacArthur was, visibly, a man on the rise. At thirty-two, he was the youngest division commander in the U.S. Army. Unlike earlier conflicts, this was one where an officer had a devil of a time making a name for himself by pluck and dash. As far as anyone could do that in an age of machine guns and trenches and barbed wire, Daniel MacArthur had done it.
He made sure people knew he’d done it, too, which was one reason he’d got his division. In some ways, he and Custer were very much alike, though both of them would have angrily turned on Dowling had he been rash enough to say such a thing. Still, as far as the adjutant was concerned, the long ivory holder through which MacArthur chain-smoked cigarettes was as much an affectation as Custer’s gold-dyed locks.
MacArthur said, “Sir, we need a breakthrough. The Army needs one from us, and the country needs one from us.”
“The very thing I was saying to my adjutant not five minutes ago,” Custer replied. He looked up at the young, lean, ramrod-straight officer standing beside him. His smile was cynical and infinitely knowing. Dowling would not have wanted that smile aimed at him. After pausing to cough, Custer went on, “And you wouldn’t mind having a breakthrough for yourself, either, would you, Daniel?”
“The country’s needs come first, sir,” MacArthur answered, and sounded as if he meant it. Maybe he even believed it. But he was still very young. Dowling saw how he tensed, almost as if he’d seen a beautiful woman walk by. Yes, he lusted after a breakthrough, all right.
“We’ve been pounding the Rebs for weeks now,” Custer said. “They haven’t given us anything at all, and we haven’t been able to take much. They know as well as we do that the White House line is the last thing keeping our guns from letting Nashville know the full taste of war.”
“Yes, sir,” MacArthur said, and pulled a map from the breast pocket of his uniform. Unlike Custer, who was old-fashioned enough to relish the epaulets and other fancy accoutrements accruing to his rank, MacArthur wore an ordinary officer’s uniform set apart only by the single silver stars of his rank: ostentatious plainness, as opposed to ostentatious display. He unfolded the map. “I believe I know how to get past them, too.”
Custer put on his reading glasses, a concession of sorts. “Let’s see what you have in mind, General.”
“Misdirection.” Daniel MacArthur spoke the word solemnly, as if it were the capstone of a magic spell. Dowling figured he’d cooked his own goose then and there; Custer had about as much use for misdirection as an anteater did for snowshoes. The dashing division commander (and how many major generals gnashed their teeth at that, when they led only brigades?) said, “As you know, my men are stationed on our far left, in front of Cottontown.”
“Yes, yes,” Custer said impatiently, though Dowling wouldn’t have bet more than half a dollar that he’d been sure where in the line MacArthur’s formation did belong.
“We have found to our cost how strong the Confederate defenses due south and southwest of our position are,” MacArthur said. Custer nodded, those peroxided curls flapping at the back of his neck. MacArthur continued, “Aerial reconnaissance suggests, though, that the Rebels’ line is weaker toward the southeast. If we strike in that direction, toward Gallatin, we can set our men to taking lines less formidably manned, thereby giving them the opportunity to swing back toward Nashville, cutting in behind the entrenchments that have delayed them so long.”
Custer sucked at something between two of his false teeth. Abner Dowling scratched his chin. “Sir,” he said, “it’s not a bad scheme.” He suspected he sounded surprised. He didn’t much care for MacArthur, having seen in Custer what the passage of years was likely to do to such a man.
Custer studied the map a while longer. MacArthur had used bright blue ink to show exactly what he wanted to do. “No,” Custer said at last, “it’s not.” He sounded imperfectly enamored of it, but seemed to recognize it was a better plan than any he’d come up with. Since most of his plans amounted to nothing more than finding the enemy and attacking him (not necessarily in that order), that did not say as much as it might have otherwise.
Unlike the general commanding First Army, MacArthur did his homework ahead of time. The map was not the only sheet of paper lurking in his breast pocket. Handing Custer a typewritten list, he said, “Here are the additional artillery requirements for the assault, sir, and other ancillaries as well.”
“See what you think of this, Major,” Custer said, and passed the sheet to Dowling. Precise control of details had never been his strong suit.
MacArthur puffed and puffed, blowing smoke into Dowling’s face as if it were phosgene gas. Dowling read rapidly through the list before turning to Custer. “Sir, he wants all the heavy artillery concentrated on his division’s front, and he also wants almost all of our barrels for the assault.”
“Moving the heavy artillery will take time,” Custer said, “especially with the roads as muddy as they have been lately. I’m sure we can move some of it, but asking for all asks for too much.”
“Even half the First Army reserve would probably be adequate,” MacArthur said. He was smarter than Custer had ever been, Dowling thought: he knew enough to ask for more than he really wanted, to help assure his getting at least that much. He couldn’t quite keep the eagerness from his voice as he asked, “And the barrels-?”