The Mountain: An Event Group Thriller Read Online Free PDF

Stuart,” he said, refreshing the sergeant major’s memory with the rank he had at the time they served together in Texas.
    “I know who you are, sir, and I wish to gather no memory wool with you.” The sergeant major finally looked down at the general. “Nor do I wish to recall our past service together, sir. The captain I served with was a United States cavalry officer. The man who stands before me here on this dark night is a traitor”—the sergeant major looked away—“to not only his country, but also to the men we buried along those dry riverbeds in Texas.”
    Stuart lowered his eyes and his head and moved his horse to the carriage door and then leaned over and pulled the door’s handle. He looked down and inside the dry compartment and his eyes widened, and he hated himself for allowing the man to see his surprised expression.
    “Young man, you are allowing rainwater to enter my carriage, so if you would not have me drown, may I suggest you close the door and get me to the man I came here to see. I’m rather chilled to the bone and my whiskey flask is running dangerously low.”
    Jeb Stuart closed the carriage door and then straightened in his saddle. He turned to his second-in-command and nodded his head. The captain eased his horse up to face the carriage driver but the sergeant major kept his eyes straight ahead. Stuart watched the exchange.
    “You will follow these men closely. Any variation in our route that is not initiated by my men, and you will be shot as spies. Do I make myself clear, Sergeant Major?”
    “The sergeant major knows how to follow orders,” Stuart said as he sadly turned away from his old friend, knowing that no matter the outcome of this war, it would take years to heal the wounds of the country. Stuart guided his horse back to the driver of the carriage.
    “I’m glad you’ve survived thus far in this insanity, Sergeant Major. So few of us have,” he said and then eased his horse into the trees and vanished.
    The small but stout sergeant major watched his old commanding officer leave the clearing and then he lowered his eyes.
    “He’s tired. The war is finally getting to his conscience, I believe,” the captain said by way of explaining Stuart’s behavior.
    Finally the bearded sergeant major broke his spell after the shock of seeing the one-time U.S. Cavalry officer in the garish gray uniform of a Confederate general, and slowly glanced down at the captain and, with rainwater flooding from the leather bill of his cap, cleared his throat.
    “That man was born to fight and he won’t give a good goddamn for his conscience until one side or the other wins. No, Captain, that is a soldier,” he said and then took the reins and whipped them upon the team, drawing the carriage forward to follow his old friend who was now his bitter enemy.
    The Confederate captain watched the carriage vanish into the line of trees with his men closely following. He was amazed to hear the sergeant major describe Stuart as a traitor complete with hate-filled eyes, and then to hear the same man turn around and praise his old commanding officer as a friend would have.
    The war was taking a toll on the very fabric that made the country great—the division of brother against brother and friend against friend would be the death of the dream.
    The war had to stop and stop soon.
    HEADQUARTERS, ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA
    The old man saw the wagons overflowing with wounded as they slogged their way through the rain-soaked, tree-trunk corduroy road the engineers had laid down just a few weeks before when the intact Army of Northern Virginia headed headlong into the disaster that had become Robert E. Lee’s only blemish on his Confederate war record—Gettysburg. The lone passenger inside the dry interior of the ornate carriage saw the misery that had become the new face of Lee’s undefeatable army. He leaned back in his seat and knew that the South would never smile again after Pennsylvania. He tipped