Part 5 (1/2)
Tears of joy rolled down Sam's damaged face.
”I've brought you those photographs of the hazing, too,” said Smith with a laugh. And he produced two small prints from his pocket. Sam took them with trembling hands and gazed at them with rapture. One of them represented Cleary and Jinks tied to the stake, apparently about to be burned to death, and Sam was delighted to see the ultra-perfect position which he had a.s.sumed. The other photograph had been taken the moment after Sam's immersion in the tub. He could see his hands clutching the rim, while his legs were widely separated in the air.
”It might be General Meriden as well as me,” he cried joyously. ”n.o.body could tell the difference.”
”That's so,” said Smith.
”I shall always carry them next my heart,” said Sam. ”How can I thank you enough? I am sorry that I can't black your boots this week.”
”Oh! never mind,” said Smith magnanimously, looking down at his feet.
”Cleary does them pretty well. You'll be out before long.”
When Sam was discharged from the hospital the cadet corps had struck camp and gone into barracks for the year. The summer maidens, too, had fled, and East Point soon settled down to the monotony of winter work.
Every cadet looked forward already to the next summer: the first cla.s.s to graduation; the second to the glories of first-cla.s.s supremacy in camp and ballroom; the third cla.s.s to their two months' furlough as second-cla.s.s men; but the fourth cla.s.s had happier antic.i.p.ations than any of the rest, for they were to be transformed in June from ”beasts”
into men, into real third-cla.s.s cadets, with all the rights and privileges of human beings. Sam's dream was also irradiated with the hope of winning the affections of the fair Miss Hunter, to whom he had never addressed a word, but of whose interest he felt a.s.sured. He did not know where the a.s.surance came from, but he had little fear of Saunders now. Next summer Saunders would be away on leave, anyhow. Sam knew, if no one else did, that he had actually fought for the hand of Miss Hunter; and, tho he had been defeated, had not Smith admitted that his defeat was a practical victory? He felt that he had won Miss Hunter's hand in mortal combat, and he dismissed from his mind all doubt on the subject.
CHAPTER IV
War and Business
[Ill.u.s.tration]
Marian Hunter was, as we have already surmised, a lady of experience.
She was possessed, as is not uncommonly the case with young ladies at East Point, of an uncontrollable pa.s.sion for things military. Manhood and bra.s.s b.u.t.tons were with her interconvertible terms, and the idea of uniting her young life to a plain civilian seemed to her nothing less than shocking. The pleasures of her first two or three summers at East Point and of her first half-dozen engagements had partaken of the bliss of heaven. The engagements had never been broken off, they had simply dissolved one into the other, and she had felt herself rising from step to step in happiness. Naturally her conquests filled her with a supreme confidence in her charms. She was not especially fickle by nature, but she discovered that a first-cla.s.s cadet, particularly if he was an officer and had black feathers in his full-dress hat, was far more attractive to think of than a supernumerary second lieutenant a.s.signed to duty in some Western garrison. Gradually, however, she found herself less certain of winning whom she would. The compet.i.tion of young girls some two or three years her junior became threatening. She was obliged to give up cadet officers for privates, and then first-cla.s.s privates for third-cla.s.s privates, as the hotel waiter had explained to Sam. At the time of Sam's arrival at the Point she was having more difficulty than ever before, and she became thoroughly frightened. She took up with Saunders because he alone came her way, but the engagement was a poor makes.h.i.+ft, and she could not get up any enthusiasm over it. She could hardly pretend to be in love with him, and she felt conscious that she had a foolish prejudice in favor of straight noses. What was she to do? If she was to marry at all in the army--and how could she marry anywhere else?--she must soon make up her mind. Her experience now stood her in good stead. Had she not seen these very first-cla.s.s cadet officers only three years before as mere despised ”beasts,” doing all kinds of drudgery for their oppressors? Had she not seen her _fiance_, Saunders, himself, a short twelvemonth ago, with nose intact, slinking like a pariah about the post? She had learned the lesson which the younger girls had yet to learn, that from these unpromising chrysalises the most gorgeous b.u.t.terflies emerge, and like a wise woman she began to study the fourth cla.s.s. Sam stood out from his fellows, not indeed as supremely handsome, altho he was not bad-looking, but rather as the soldier _par excellence_ of his cla.s.s. Marian was an expert in judging the points of a soldier, and she saw at once that he was the coming man. She could not make his acquaintance or speak to him, but she could smile and thus lay the foundations of success for next year. It would be easy thus to reach the heart of a lonely ”beast.” And she smiled to a purpose, and it was that smile that won the untried affections of Sam Jinks.
When June at last came and the new fourth-cla.s.s men began to arrive, Sam felt a new life surge into his soul. For a year he had been duly meek and humble, for such it behooved a fourth-cla.s.s man to be. Now, however, he began to entertain a measureless pride, such being the proper frame of mind of a man in the upper cla.s.ses. He watched the hotel sedulously to learn when Miss Hunter had made her appearance. One morning he saw her, and she smiled more distinctly than ever. He knew that his felicity was only a short way off. He must wait two weeks until the graduation ball and the departure of the old first cla.s.s; then he could undertake to supplant the absent Saunders, who probably knew the history of Miss Hunter and was not unprepared for his fate.
Meanwhile great events had occurred, and thrown East Point into a state of excitement. The country was at war. Congress had determined to free the downtrodden inhabitants of the Cubapine Islands from the tyranny of the ancient Castalian monarchy. A call for volunteers had been issued, and the graduating cadets were to be hurried to the seat of war. During this agitation news arrived of a great naval victory. The mighty Castalian fleet had been annihilated with great loss of life, while the conquerors had not lost a man and had scarcely interrupted their breakfast in order to secure this crus.h.i.+ng triumph. It was in the midst of such reports as these that the susceptible hearts of Sam Jinks and Marian Hunter came together. The graduating cla.s.s had gone, and Sam had for two days been a full third-cla.s.s man. For the first time he had occupied the front rank at dress-parade, and seen clearly the officer in command, the adjutant flitting about magnificently, the band parading up and down and turning itself inside out around the towering drum-major, the line of spectators behind, the bright faces and gay parasols, and among them the black eyes of Marian looking unmistakably at him. When at the end of the parade the company officers marched up to salute and the companies were dismissed, Sam saw a member of the new first cla.s.s talking to her. He was now on an equality with all the cadets, and he boldly advanced and asked for an introduction. At last he had her hand in his, and as he pressed it rather harder than the occasion warranted, he felt his pressure returned. Sam's fate was sealed. He made no formal proposal, it was unnecessary. The engagement was a thing taken for granted. It was a novel experience for Marian as well as for Sam, as now for the first time she meant business. It is impossible in cold ink to reproduce the ecstasies of those many hours on Flirtation Walk, during which Sam opened his heart. For the first time in his life he had found a person as deeply interested in military matters as he was, and as much in love with military glory. He told her his whole history, including the lead soldiers and the Boys' Brigade.
He laid bare to her his ambition to be a perfect soldier--a hero. He told her how disappointed he was to find no other cadet so completely wrapped up in his profession as he was, and how in her alone he had now realized his ideal not only of womanhood, but also of appreciation of the soldier's career. He rehea.r.s.ed the thrilling experiences of hazing, and went over the fight in detail and told her how Saunders had brought it about.
”The horrid wretch!” she exclaimed, throwing her arms about his neck and kissing him. ”I'm so glad they didn't break your nose.”
”Are you really?” he asked, and as he read the truth in her eyes a weight was rolled from his soul.
He showed her the little lead officer with the plume, which he always carried as a mascot in his breast-pocket, and also the two hazing photographs which kept it company. She was delighted with them all.
”Oh! you will be a hero,” she cried. ”I am sure of it, and what a time we shall have of it, you dear thing!”
With his spare time thus occupied Sam did not see much of Cleary, who now shared another tent. One afternoon late in September he was on the way to the gate of the hotel grounds where he was accustomed to wait until Miss Hunter came out and joined him, when Cleary called him aside.
”Sam,” he said, ”I've got something of importance to say to you. Can't you come with me now?”
”Can't,” said Sam. ”Miss Hunter's waiting for me.”
”Well, then, beg off to-morrow afternoon. I must have a long talk with you.”
”All right,” answered Sam reluctantly. ”If I must, I must, I suppose.”