The longest silence in Colonel Hazard's woefully short life came in the wake of his last wavering plea. On this moment turned the fate of the Petersburg National Battlefield and the honor of the South. Hazard held his breath until his ribs hurt.
"Well, hell," a man said, "if the Yanks care about old Virginny enough to swallow their pride, I guess we can chow down on a little cold crow and accept their help."
"Beats this hardtack and flap-doodle," another barked.
"Not that they'll be much comfort in battle, being New Englanders. Everyone knows New Englanders can't shoot worth a lick."
Colonel Rip Hazard let the hot, pent-up air of Virginia out of his Southern lungs and closed his ears to squeeze back the stinging tears of pride.
"With the North and South reunited against a common foe," he said in a choking voice, "how much chance does the thrice-damned enemy have?"
". . . HOW MUCH CHANCE does the thrice-damned enemy have?"
At a mobile command post van south of Petersburg, Virginia, a short-sleeved man removed headphones from his ears and snapped a console switch.
"This is Task Force Coordinator Moise," he said into a filament mike suspended before his mouth.
"Go ahead, Task Force Coordinator Moose."
"The Sixth Virginia Recreational Foot has enlisted the Forty-fourth Rhode Island Artillery and the First Mass Cavalry to stand against us."
"Damn good-for-nothing Rebels."
"Advise, please."
"Continue monitoring operations. If fighting breaks out, decamp."
" Roger. Moise out."
AFTER THE VITTLE were consumed and the last of the coarse-grained chicory coffee imbibed, Colonel Rip Hazard ordered his men to turn in for the night. They repaired to their five-hundred-dollar replica pup tents and pulled the coarse wool blankets high to their chins to keep out the evening chill. One by one they dropped off to fitful sleep, knowing that with the dawn the hated Union would return to a place it had not been welcome since the malevolent moles of the Fortyeighth Pennsylvania had tunneled under the Confederate fort and set off eight thousand pounds of black powder, blasting some three hundred Johnny Rebs into eternity while creating the infamous crater to these one hundred thirty unforgiving years ago.
The enemy did not come with the break of dawn. They skulked in before first light.
Corporal Adam Price had picket duty. He leaned against an oak tree, fortified with camp coffee and listening to his bowels grumble and gurgle as they struggled to move nineteenth-century bacon-grease-softened hardtack through his twentieth-century digestive system.
Somewhere a twig snapped, and he snatched up his custom-made replica Harper's Ferry Minie musket and advanced, calling softly, "W-who goes there?"
A Minie ball came whistling back to shatter his rifle stock and right arm with a single resounding crash.
The explosion of pain in his brain sent him crashing backward, stumbling and crawling blindly. When his vision cleared Corporal Price lay on his stomach.
Through the dense thicket, men in smart blue uniforms with gold shoulder boards and light blue piping advanced purposefully, faces hard and muskets pointed at him. Some wielded the dreaded Sharps carbine.
"You-you men be from the First Massachusetts?" he asked, gulping.
Before an answer could come, a familiar voice called, "Price! Call out, man!"
"Colonel Hazard!" Price screamed. "It's them Yank devils!"
"'What?"
"The infernal Yankees! They've a-come early! And they're firing lead ball!"
A volley of Minie balls converged on Corporal Price's head, shattering his thick skull like a ceramic bowl.
And the Second Battle of the Crater was on.
HISTORY WOULD DULY RECORD that the Sixth Virginia Recreational Foot fell defending its ancestral territory from a low-down Northern incursion. Of the thirty-five men in the regiment, all but eleven were lost that day, including Colonel Lester "Rip" Hazard, who would be buried on the spot where he died with the true words "The Hope of Virginia" inscribed on his marble headstone.
Most of the defenders were shot dead in their tents as they stirred at the first dull sounds of skirmish.
Colonel Hazard perished giving a good account of himself after stumbling upon the ruined body of Corporal Adam Price. He had his Spencer repeater up to his shoulder when the Minie balls began arriving in the general vicinity of his head and rib cage, which were promptly shot to kindling. Hazard got off four consecutive point-blank shots before succumbing to his wounds.
History did not record that he fired blanks. Some truths are too painful to endure.
THE NEXT MORNING the ragged survivors of the Sixth Virginia Recreational Foot lay in wait along the Richmond-Petersburg Turnpike outside Petersburg, Virginia, for the Forty-fourth Rhode Island Weekend Artillery.
When the Forty-fourth Rhode Island obligingly came roaring up the road in their chartered buses, pickup trucks bearing Virginia license plates rolled out of concealment, blocking their path.
Elements of the Forty-fourth Rhode Island stepped out of their vehicles in curiosity and confusion. They saw familiar gray uniforms pop up from behind the barricade. Those without rifles in hand reached instinctively for them. Old hatreds die hard.
The Forty-fourth Rhode Island were cut down to the last man by the Sixth Virginia Foot, who this time were not firing blanks.
This engagement was dubbed by the victors the Battle of Redressment and by the losers the Massacre at Colonial Heights.
By the time the motorcycles of the First Mass Cavalry happened along an hour later, the Virginia National Guard had been called out and everyone was packing live ammunition.
The Second American Civil War had commenced. And no one suspected it was only prologue to a wider conflict.
Chapter 2
His name was Remo and he was on strike.
"No results, no work," he said into the telephone receiver, and promptly hung up. The phone immediately began ringing.
Remo let it ring. As far as he was concerned, it could ring forever and ever.
A squeaky voice called from the floor above. "Why does that noisy device continue to vex us?" the voice asked in a querulous tone.
"It's only Smith," Remo called back.
"He has work?" the squeaky voice demanded.
"Who cares? I'm on strike."
Faster than seemed possible, a wispy figure appeared in the doorway of Remo's sparsely furnished bedroom. "You have struck Smith?" asked Chiun, Reigning Master of Sinanju, in hazel-eyed horror.