"Charles L. Harness-Quarks at Appomatox" - читать интересную книгу автора (Harness Charles L)

"Sir?"
"Never mind. The war's over, Potter. Signal General Gordon. He knows what to do."
"But-- "
"Get on with it, Potter."
* * *


Wilmer McLean had a horrid sinking feeling in his gut. He knew now that the Almighty had had his eye
on him in this war, from start to finish. On July 21, 1861, General Beauregard had requisitioned
McLean's fine farmhouse near Manassas, and had just sat down to dinner, when a cannonball crashed
into the dining room fireplace, thereby announcing that the federals were on their way to Richmond. So
Wilmer McLean had sold out and moved south and west, to the village of Appomattox Court House,
and here had built an even finer house, where by all logic he should have been able to farm in peace and
quiet, out of the path of armies.
But Fate had decreed otherwise. For just now his carriage circle and his front yard and his porch and
is parlor swarmed with more generals and lesser officers-- of both sides-- than there were bees in his
blossoming apple trees.
They all stopped talking a moment and made a path for an unkempt, slouched-over officer in a
mud-spattered blue uniform. "Is General Lee up?" he asked. Somebody said yes, and he walked up on
the porch and into Wilmer McLean's house.
***


"The rest is easy, General Lee," said General Gordon. "Our troops just march off down that road
there, stack arms in the field at the right, and then they go home."
"There's a line of Yankees along the roadside," said Major Potter uneasily.
"Don't worry, Potter," said Lee. "That's Chamberlain's brigade. Just to keep order. Decent chap,
Chamberlain. Used to be a college professor."
"There go my boys," said Gordon. "I'd better get out there with them."
"Yes, of course," said Lee. "Go on."
The officer cantered away.
From somewhere ahead a bugle shrilled. It echoed and re-echoed down the road. Then General Lee
and his aide heard a hoarse shout, repeated up and down the blue line along the road, then the slapping
of thousands of rifles on hardened palms.
Major Potter stood up in his stirrups. "My God, sir! What-- !"
"It's all right, Major," said Lee quietly. "General Chamberlain has just given his Yanks the order for
'carry arms.' It's the 'marching salute'-- the highest honor fighting men can give other fighting men." His
eyes began to glow. "And look at Gordon. He's standing his horse up. His sword is out, and he's
ordering... our boys to return... the salute." He coughed softly. "Dusty hereabouts, Potter."
"Yes, sir."
The United States, thought Lee. Both sides are going to try. We've got the future. It's all ahead of us.
There for the taking. Science, that's what we need. Math. Chemistry. Physics. That's the road for our
young people. And we need a vision. This fellow Verne has a vision. Get his books.
Potter was trying to ask him something. "What now, sir?"
Back to earth. "Where do you live, Major?"
"Florida, sir. My folks have a little farm on the Atlantic side."
"I was there in '61, trying to strengthen the forts. Where is your farm, Potter?"
"You probably never heard of it, sir, a place called Cape Canaveral."
"Oh, but I have, Potter."
"Really, sir?" The ex-officer looked at the man in gray with pleasure and astonishment, but no