"Well, General, looks like that's it for you." Cruickshank stared at him.

"Quite a few tons of explosives in those warehouses," McDougal said quietly. "Light them off and you'll burn down half the city. Now, frankly, I don't care about them rich folks, but it'll ruin us being able to work here for a long time to come."

"Orders are orders," Cruickshank said coldly. McDougal did not reply. He simply stuck his hands in his pockets.

Two more trains backed into the station, one carrying wounded, the second, a single passenger car. The second came to a halt at the main depot, and after several minutes an escort of Confederate soldiers came out, struggling to maneuver a stretcher out the door, the body on it draped with a Union flag.

"That must be him," McDougal said.

Cruickshank did not reply. He watched as the small entourage stepped down from the train and then walked off, a Confederate officer helping to hold up a young woman, all of them oblivious to the spreading confusion, the rumble of explosions.

"Cruickshank!"

He looked up and saw a small carriage coming across the yard, jostling and shaking as it crossed the tracks. He recognized the man as Judah Benjamin.

The driver of the carriage, wearing what to Cruickshank appeared to be a strange small round cap, reined in, and Judah stepped down.

"You've heard?"

"Ah, yes, sir. At least that there's fighting."

"There's a flotilla of Yankee ships coming up the harbor loaded with troops. Fort McHenry is bombarding our positions, and General Pickett will undoubtedly pull back without putting up much of a fight."

Cruickshank did not reply.

"Where's the telegraph station?"

"This way, your honor," McDougal said with a smile and led Judah off.

Cruickshank, unsure what to do next, finally turned to one of his lieutenants and told him to round up all the men of their command at once. They were to leave their packs, just grab their rifles, and come on the double.

He looked at the man with the strange hat in the carriage.

The man smiled, extended his hand, and introduced himself.

"Do me a favor, General," Gunther asked.. "Yes, sir?"

"Keep an eye on my friend. He has a hard road ahead, as do you. I shall keep you both in my prayers."

McDougal came out of the telegraph office, motioning to the train that had brought in McPherson, and began to shout orders.

With amazing speed the yard crew set to work, the locomotive and the lone passenger car shifted over to a sidetrack with a water tank, crew swinging over the pipe to refill the tender, other men scrambling to toss up wood, others with large oilcans checking the drive wheels, while yet others opened the journal boxes of the passenger car and, from buckets, slathered in hunks of grease.

"All but five of the men are reported in, sir."

Cruickshank turned to see his rough-looking detachment lining up, nearly a hundred men in all.

"Who is missing?"

"Oh, Vem Watson and several of his friends." The others chuckled.

"Where the hell are they?"

The lieutenant looked up at Gunther.

"Are you a man of the cloth, sir?" the lieutenant asked, features a bit red.

"A rabbi."

"What?"

"He's Jewish," one of the men shouted. "Go on," Cruickshank snapped.

"Well, Vern and his friends went down to a house of ill repute, said they'd be back by noon, and you wouldn't notice them missing."

Cruickshank sighed.

"Well, let the Yankees roust them out of bed. Now get aboard that train."

The men broke ranks and ran to the passenger car, piling in to overflowing, some scrambling up onto the roof, others atop the wood tender, a few even perching on the cowcatcher.

Judah came out of the telegraphy office, followed by several Confederate soldiers who had been manning the post. He walked up to Cruickshank.

"We're leaving now. That Mr. McDougal said he'd have a train ready for us."

"Over there, sir."

Judah nodded, walked over to the carriage, and extended his hand to Gunther.

"God be with you, my friend," Gunther said.

"Someday, when this is all over, come to Richmond as my guest," Judah said.

"We'll see," Gunther said sadly.

Judah. looked straight into his eyes, smiled, then, taking his carpetbag, he headed for the train. Gunther turned his carriage about and rode off.

Cruickshank found himself alone looking over at the row of warehouses stockpiled with munitions, boots, tents, heavy machinery that was to be transported back to Richmond to aid in artillery production, crates of tools, armored plating for ironclads, rail for track, machinery to make breechloading carbines, tens of thousands of horseshoes.

It'll take ten minutes to set it ablaze, he thought, and what a fire that will be.

He noticed as well that McDougal's workmen stood about, gazing at him. A few had picked up shovels, heavy wrenches, pry bars, axes, and picks.

He could order his men out of the car, one volley would scatter the workmen, and they could then level this damn place. In the distance he could hear more explosions and the distant crying of a mob, rioting yet again.

McDougal came up to his side.

"Your train is ready. General. You have a clear road up to Relay Station, then a thirty-minute delay until a convoy of a dozen trains passes on both tracks, though I dare say that plan will change now, what with you having all them locomotives up there and not wanting them back here."

A dozen locomotives, all they could have carried, Cruickshank thought. Enough' to equal two thousand wagons of supplies.

"Just one question, McDougal, and be honest for once, damn it," Cruickshank asked, gaze still fixed on the warehouse.

"Anything at all, General, sir."

"You were playing me double the whole time, weren't you?"

McDougal laughed softly.

"Honesdy? An Irishman to an Englishman turned rebel?"

Cruickshank looked him the eyes.

"Honesdy."

"Of course I was, sir."

"Why?"

"Wouldn't you if we was reversed? You know, Cruickshank, though you're a bloody Englishman by birth, why you ever sided with them is beyond me. Slavery, all that. It's no different than the way we was treated in Ireland or you in the slums of Liverpool.

"So if you be wishing to shoot me, go ahead. But my boys over there, they might not have guns, but you should see the way they can swing a pick or pry bar into a man's head when they got to. And if you try to burn the warehouses, that's what you'll face."

Cruickshank was silent.

"Don't do it," McDougal said quietly. "I wouldn't want our friendship here to end in a bloody brawl. Besides, you'll bum half the city down and things here are hard enough as it is. My men have families, as do I."

Their gazes held for several seconds.

"A deal then," Cruickshank said, "the last of our deals."

"Go on."

"Help me to load two or three trains with ammunition, and I'll spare everything else."

"How do I know you won't burn it anyhow, once loaded up?"

"You have my word on it." McDougal hesitated then nodded.

"Deal."

McDougal turned to his men and started to shout orders, Cruickshank doing the same to his own command, having them stack arms.

Within minutes hundreds were at work at a pitch Cruickshank had not seen once across the last several days. Cases of small-round ammunition were lugged out and hauled into boxcars or carted over to the train where Judah still waited and piled into the passenger compartment. Boxes of artillery shells, two men to a box, were trotted out and put on flatcars.

Locomotives were uncoupled while the crews worked, moved up to the engine houses, where fuel and water were taken on, grease and oil checked, then returned to the cars and hooked up.

It took little more than an hour to have three entire trains loaded up.