Part 15 (1/2)
”No,” said Davies, promptly, ”she got to the hospital by merest accident. Louis Cranston's throat was sore, and he was coughing a great deal. She went for medicine, and I happened to meet her on the way.”
”But they said there was such a romantic scene; he wept and clung to her hand, and----”
Here Burroughs opportunely and somewhat aggressively burst into a guffaw of derisive laughter. ”Miss Loomis is just one of those admirable women,” said he, ”that empty-headed idiots prate about. I wish other people had half her sense.” A luckless way of essaying the defence of the absent, for it reflected on many a woman present.
”Fie! Dr. Burroughs,” exclaimed Mrs. Flight. ”Your blushes give you away, even more than your words. Don't you be falling in love with Miss Loomis. She's aiming higher than one room and a kitchen and a thousand a year.” Whereupon there was shrill laughter, and further accusation and indignant protest from the ill-starred medico. And Davies, who ought to have rejoiced in the loyalty of such admiration for his friend and whilom nurse, was conscious of a pang of annoyance and aversion. The entrance of the old chaplain and his wife, and dark, swarthy Leonard with the handsome partner of his joys and sorrows, gave instant turn to the conversation. In a very few minutes Mrs. Flight and two younger matrons took their departure, Almira following them with rustic regretfulness, and exchanging some whispered confidences at the door, which brought new flush to Davies's anxious face. Mrs. Leonard was speaking of a recent visit ”up the road,” as in those days the Union Pacific in its westward climb to the Rockies was referred to. She had had such a lovely visit to Fort Russell, and had so much to tell about affairs in that particularly swell regiment, the --th, and the Truscotts had entertained her at such a pretty dinner; Mrs. Truscott was charming, and Mrs. Stannard was such a n.o.ble woman, and they were all so interested in Mr. Ray's engagement. It was practically announced. He was to be married to Miss Sanford--an heiress and a great catch--early in June, and this led to the chaplain speaking of Ray, whom in days gone by he was p.r.o.ne to look upon with little favor, if not indeed as a ne'er-do-well. ”I always feared that he would fall, and I am so rejoiced in this new phase to his character.”
”Oh, _I_ met Mr. Ray!” exclaimed Almira, delightedly. ”He was ordered in to General Sheridan on some duty late in the summer, and some of the young officers, Percy's cla.s.smates, said he was such a brave fellow.”
”What did the old officers say?” asked Leonard, with a twinkle in his black eyes, but not the vestige of a grin under his heavy moustache.
”They? Oh, I don't remember their saying anything about _him_. They said lots of lovely things about Percy.”
”Yes. That's right. I can understand their omitting no opportunity of doing that. One learns to be something of a courtier even in Chicago, when on staff duty, and as for Was.h.i.+ngton, service there is a liberal education in diplomacy. One never knows who may have the strongest pull with the President in the event of a vacancy in the staff corps.”
”Leonard,” said the chaplain, gravely, ”you're a born cynic and a pessimist to boot. Have we no generous impulses in the army?”
”Lots of 'em. Lots of 'em, chaplain, especially in the line and on the frontier, where we can afford to pat a fellow on the back, since we know that's about the extent of the reward he'll ever get. It's when we're in big society in the East, above all in Was.h.i.+ngton, one has to be guarded in what he says, or first thing he knows he'll be hoisting some fellow over his own head in a moment of enthusiasm. No. I know just how you regard me, but I spent six weeks of a three months' leave in Was.h.i.+ngton last winter, and sat night after night at the club, or day after day among the army crowd at the Ebbitt, or in some fellow's den at the Department, and never once did I hear one word of frank, outspoken, fearless praise of some other fellow's work or deeds, unless it were to his face. Ask a man flat-footed if that wasn't a capital scout of Striker's last winter in the Tonto Basin, or if Jake Randlett hadn't done a daring thing in going all alone through the Sioux country to drum up Crow scouts for Crook's command, or what he thought of Billy Ray's cutting his way out through the Cheyennes to bring help to Wayne last June, and ten to one he'll hum and haw and say yes, he _did_ hear something about that, and now that I mentioned it he believed Striker or Jake or Billy had really behaved quite creditably, but the whole tone was significant of nothing like what some other fellow I might mention, modesty only forbidding, would have done under similar circ.u.mstances.'
It's just the d.a.m.nation of faint praise. The trouble with the whole gang of those fellows seems to be a mortal dread lest somebody's eyes should be deflected from the valor of the warriors at Was.h.i.+ngton to that of the warriors on the plains. What recognition do you suppose Ray will ever get for that feat? General Crook says it's useless to recommend him for brevet, because the Senate wouldn't confirm it, and the reason they won't is that those hangers-on about the capital don't mean to let such rewards be given to the men on the frontier. And yet this sort of thing doesn't happen only in Was.h.i.+ngton. It was a cavalry officer who said of that very affair that Ray was simply a reckless fellow under a cloud, with everything to gain and nothing to lose, and that doing a reckless thing was just as much a matter of instinct with him as battle is to a bull-dog.”
It was unusual to see Leonard warm up in this way. Besides the chaplain and the silent host, there were three officers in the dreary little bachelor den at the moment. Each and every one seemed surprised at the adjutant's outbreak, but not one of them at the concluding revelation.
”No need to ask who that was,” said Captain Hay, with a prefatory ”Humph.” ”It savors of Devers from first to last. That man is a born iconoclast. He pulls down everybody's idols and sneers at what he cannot pull down,--our ideals.”
”Well, now let me ask you,” said the chaplain, a man whose broad charity led him at any and all times to the defence of the absent. ”Without detracting in the faintest degree from the heroism and value of Mr.
Ray's exploit, are there not degrees of personal bravery, are there not possibilities of an order of courage higher even than his? As I recall him, he was what I should term a fearless man, brave to a fault; but have we not in the army tens and perhaps hundreds of honorable gentlemen who are as keenly susceptible to the thrill of danger as Ray is apparently dead to it? Have I not heard man after man say how his own knees trembled or his comrade's cheek blanched at the whistle of the first bullets of the battle? And as for this Indian campaigning, can there be a warfare imagined in which the percentage of peril is so great, the possibilities of ambush, surprise, sudden death in the midst of fancied security so constant, the daily and nightly circ.u.mstances so full of incessant nervous strain? Now, who is the better soldier,--the really braver, or, perhaps better, the more courageous man,--he who rides the trail utterly reckless of or insensible to its peril, or he who, sighting danger in every bush, scenting death on every breeze, looking every instant for the war-whoop, the death-wound, nevertheless so bears himself with all his faculties in hand as to seem calm, serene, confident, and stands ready for death or duty at any moment? I have always held that the Christian gentleman was the highest type of the highest order of courage; the man who replaced the fatalism of the Mahometan with the sustaining faith of the soldier of the Cross. But I see you think I'm in the pulpit and preaching again,” said he, smiling at Leonard. ”We both warmed up to our hobby.”
They were silent a moment. Across the wintry night the trumpets were singing the lullaby of the crowded garrison, and hurrying footsteps told of belated subalterns speeding to their companies to supervise the roll-calls. Leonard rose to his full height and threw his cloak over his broad shoulders.
”We are more in accord in this matter than you think, perhaps, chaplain; only the man doesn't live who could be insensible to the danger of cutting his way through a band of encircling Cheyennes. I've heard of no braver deed in many a year than Ray's. I doubt if we'll hear of truer grit or courage in many more.”
”Perhaps not, Leonard,” said the chaplain, as the adjutant paused an instant at the threshold to say he would return the moment he had received the reports. ”Perhaps not, nor would I say one word to underrate the heroism of Ray's exploit; but when we do hear of another I look to hear of it in some fellow as firm in his faith as he is in his sense of honor and duty, and some day we shall see.”
But Leonard did not return in five minutes nor in ten, and Mrs. Leonard grew anxious. ”This never happens unless something unusual has occurred.” Captain Hay stepped through the hall and opened the outer door.
”There are lights dancing about over there on the parade near 'A'
Troop's quarters. I wonder what's up. Hullo, Sanders! That you? When did you get back? Did you get your man?”
”Got two of 'em,” was the breezy answer. ”T'other one disguised as a gentleman in cits and just about starting on the night train for the West,--the gifted Mr. Howard, clerk of 'A' Troop.”
Mrs. Davies was standing just within the parlor door at the moment, blus.h.i.+ng over the praises lavished on her by the chaplain's impulsive helpmeet and trying hard to say civil and appropriate things to her guests. The officers, one and all, had edged into the hall-way in eagerness to hear the news.
”What was it Mr. Sanders said?” asked Mrs. Leonard, anxious to know what detained her husband. Hay half turned.
”He says they arrested two men, one of them apparently deserting, being in civilian dress and aboard the train,--Captain Devers's new clerk, Howard.”
And then every one in the parlor saw that Mrs. Davies was seized as with sudden faintness. She turned very white and grasped at the nearest chair for support. ”I'm only dizzy, not ill, or I don't know what it is,” she protested, as they crowded round her, and Davies came quickly in, conscious that something was amiss. Nor did she recover her color or her calm. Nervous, fluttering answers only could she give to their sympathetic inquiries, and when presently Leonard reappeared, cool and imperturbable as ever, she was evidently relieved to see her guests departing. The adjutant explained his detention by saying he had gone to the colonel's with Sanders, who had galloped ahead, leaving his guard to bring along the prisoners in an ambulance, Paine too drunk to be able to move. They would hardly arrive before eleven.
”The colonel desires to see you at the office at eight o'clock in the morning,” said he in low tone to Cranston. ”Howard has been away all day,--since guard-mounting, in fact,--and no report was made of it.