Shell

On the third day of the conflagration Mark Lange walked to the meetinghouse and found all the pews scattered outside. Union officers were seated upon them idly smoking cigars and playing tic tac toe on them with pocket knives. Inside the meetinghouse the Army of the Potomac's commander poured over maps laid on the Long Table and concluded the next hammer blow would land on the center. The short-tempered commanding general angrily demanded who he was. Mark said, "I'm the the pastor of this church!"

General Meade replied, "The hell you say, sir! This is the headquarters of the Army! Now get out of my sight, parson, or I'll put a musket in your hand and stand you up on yonder stone--"

The general was interrupted by a crash as the church filled with flying wood splinters. Confederate artillery had opened a furious barrage. He ran out of the meetinghouse picking splinters out of his skin and barking orders. His officers on the pews began to scatter as shells burst nearby.

Union artillery was brought up to answer Confederate guns but Lange remained inside. Perhaps he thought his presence would move God to spare the building, but solid shot made gaping holes in the walls. Mark clasped his hands and prayed, "Lord, forgive your stiff-necked servant. Your will was that we move west, not north!"

Two shells from Lee's main battery burst over the roof of the church. It was dark and Mark felt enormous pain wracking his entire body. He heard a male voice say, "Take great care, Anael. There is a man alive in this pile of wood and he is injured."

Another voice acknowledged him. With each painful motion of debris the light seemed to increase. A last huge pine beam was removed and Mark saw this Anael was not a woman as he first thought from the sound of the voice, but perhaps a very tall boy. Anael moved the wood as though it weighed very little.

Then Mark saw who was speaking in the more masculine voice. He was much shorter than Anael, with a face filled with compassion and dark eyes that glittered in light filtering through trees that surrounded him. He said, "Do not be afraid, Mark Lange. A large splinter of wood has pierced your kidney. You also have a broken leg you cannot feel because timber is pinching it. But we must lift the beam, and you will most certainly feel that."

Mark could only manage to gasp for help. The short man told Anael to lift the beam. To Mark, everything seemed to turn red. His face was frozen in astonishment at the pain, greater than any he had ever felt, and he fainted from the overbrimming flow of it.