He knew that the Southerners would have sharpshooters and skirmishers ahead of their main force. They would lie behind stones, trees and brush and at any moment one of them might pick him off. The Confederate force seemed to incline to the side of the valley, opposite the slope on which he lay, and he was hopeful that the fact would keep him hidden until the masses of his own people could charge into the gap.
It was painful work to flatten his body out behind a stone and lie there. No trees or bushes grew near enough to give him shade, and the afternoon sun began to send down upon him direct rays that burned. He wondered how long it would be until the Union brigades came. It seemed to him that they were doing a tremendous amount of waiting. Nothing was to be gained by this long range cannon fire. They must charge home with the bayonet.
He raised himself a little in order that he might peep over the stone and see if the charge were coming, and then with a little cry he dropped back, a fine gray powder stinging his face. A rifle had been fired across the valley and a bullet chipping the top of the rock sheltering Dick warned him that he was not the only sharpshooter who lay in an ambush.
Peeping again from the side of the rock, he saw curls of blue smoke rising from a point behind a stone just like his own on the other side of the valley. It was enough to tell him that a Southern sharpshooter lay there and had marked him for prey.
Dick’s anger rose. Why should anyone seek his life, trying to pick him off as if he were a beast of prey? He had been keeping quiet, disturbing nobody, merely seeking a chance to escape, when this ruthless rebel had seen him. He became in his turn hot and fiercely ready to give bullet for bullet. Smoke floating through the pass and the flash of the cannon, made him more eager to hit the sharpshooter who was seeking so hard to hit him.
Watching intently he caught a glimpse of a gray cap showing above the rock across the valley, and, raising his light rifle, he fired, quick as a flash. The return shot came at once, and chipped the rock as before, but he dropped back unhurt, and peeping from the side he could see nothing. He might or might not have slain his enemy. The gray cap was no longer visible, and he watched to see if it would reappear.
He heard the sound of a great cannonade before the mouth of the pass, and he saw his own people advancing in force, their lines extending far to the left and right, with several batteries showing at intervals. Then came the rebel yell from the pass and as the Union lines advanced the Southerners poured upon them a vast concentrated fire.
Dick, watching through the smoke and forgetful of his enemy across the valley, saw the Union charge rolled back. But he also saw the men out of range gathering themselves for a new attack. Within the pass preparations were going on to repel it a second time. Then he glanced toward the opposite rock and dropped down just in time. He had seen a rifle barrel protruding above it, and a second later the bullet whistled where his head had been.
He grew angrier than ever. He had left that sharpshooter alone for at least ten minutes, while he watched charge and repulse, and he expected to be treated with the same consideration. He would pay him for such ferocity, and seeing an edge of gray shoulder, he fired.
No sign came from the rock, and Dick was quite sure that he had missed. The blood mounted to his head and surcharged his brain. A thousand little pulses that he had never heard of before began to beat in his head, and he was devoured by a consuming anger. He vowed to get that fellow yet.
Lying flat upon his stomach he drew himself around the edge of the rock and watched. There was a great deal of covering smoke from the artillery in the pass now, and he believed that it would serve his purpose.