"SHE IS COMING HERE!"
The valley of the Minneconjou was looking its loveliest in the joyous
sunshine of mid-May. The post had been enlarged to meet the needs of the
increasing garrison. A colonel of infantry had been sent to assume
command, there being now two of his battalions at the station and only
one squadron, of four troops, of Ray's old regiment, the --th Cavalry.
At any moment our friend of that name and many years, now become
lieutenant-colonel in his own right, could expect orders for the
Philippines, and he was ready as ever, though there were just a few
reasons why he hated to go. It had been decided that Marion, his wife,
hitherto his almost inseparable companion, should not venture to Manila.
The detail at most would not exceed two years. It might cover only one,
for it was certain that, with the coming enlargement of the army, Ray
would soon be promoted to the full rank of colonel, and that would
probably bring him home again, for, as things had been going in Samar
and Mindanao, colonels were in that sort of campaigning about as useful
as most of them in church. Keen young captains and lieutenants were in
demand. Field officers, so-called, were of less account in the field
than in fortified places. Occasionally a sizable column--a major's
command perhaps--would push forth into the jungle, where it speedily had
to split up into small detachments, probing in single file, and in
pursuit of scattering bands of ladrones or banditti, the bamboo or the
mountain trail. Moreover, much of the vim and spirit had been taken out
of the soldiery, officers and men, old and young, by the fate of the
more daring and energetic of their number, who had fallen victims, not
to lance or bullet of lurking foe at the front, but rather "the slings
and arrows of outrageous fortune" at the rear. A powerful party at home
had shown far more concern over the alleged ill-treatment of the few
insurgent bands than their actual treachery to our men-at-arms. Officers
and men listened in silence to the public rebukes and sentences
administered to the leaders who had shed their gloves and fought the
insurrecto with weapons far more effective, yet infinitely less deadly,
than fire and steel. Officers and men in silence set forth upon their
next ordered expedition, and in silence returned and announced the
result--practically nothing. Elusive and flitting little bands of native
warriors, vanishing like shadows among the thickets, were not to be
trapped by the methods prescribed for dealing with an army arrayed in
front of Washington. "Don't come unless you have to," wrote Major Blake
from the hospital at Manila to Billy Ray at Minneconjou. "The
courts-martial of Hill and Dale and Langham have taken the heart out of
our fellows. The young officers say they dare not go out for fear they
might do some damage somewhere."
So Ray, who had fought Indians all over the West for many a
year--sometimes, it is true, coming in for a Puritanical scorching from
press and pulpit in far New England, where, two hundred years ago, with
prayerful zest our forefathers burned witches at the stake and put
Pequots to the sword--now found himself shrinking from the task of
tackling savages with gloves who treated men without mercy. Marion, as
has been said, was not to accompany him to the Islands and be near to
counsel and to comfort. She was not too well now, and had had many an
anxiety. Billy, Junior, when he should have been studying for West
Point, had been spooning over a pretty girl not yet in long dresses, and
Sandy, their firstborn, the soldier boy, had come home from the Islands
wounded in body and soul. The scar of the bullet would not be long
healing, but the sting of that other shock and sorrow, who could say
what that might yet import? for Sandy would not speak of it. Sandy would
not so much as refer to his brief dream of bliss and the girl that
inspired it. Sandy had come to them at Minneconjou to recuperate,
detached from his own regiment "for such light duty as he might be able
to perform" with his father's squadron of the old --th. Sandy was a sad
and silent man. "Let him alone to beat it out in time," said the
soldier-father. "It is the only way." But Marion's mother heart yearned
over her boy and his wordless sorrowing. He must have loved that
beautiful but unprincipled creature with all his fervent young heart.
Colonel Stone, who was now in command at Minneconjou, had known the Rays
for years and was firmly their friend. Without so much as a hint from
any source, he had divined that Sandy's low spirits were not the result
of that bullet wound. He could not but note the solicitude with which
his cavalry friend and oft-time fellow-campaigner regarded the silent
young soldier, his eldest son. Colonel Stone had suggested at first that
Sandy be put at surveying the reservation--something to keep him long
hours each day in the open air. But barely six months had elapsed since
the Engineers, under orders from department headquarters, had completed
with chain, rod and transit thorough plotting of the six mile square, to
the end that a very finely finished map was received almost at the time
the colonel first broached the subject. Sandy could not yet take part in
the sharp mounted drills that were his father's delight. Something had
to be done to give him measurably congenial occupation. He could not
play tennis, croquet or billiards. He would not play poker or find
solace in Scotch highballs. He might have derived some comfort from
reading and study, but Priscilla was beset with desire to prescribe his
reading and guide his studies, for Priscilla, being several years his
senior in age and many volumes his superior in reading, was ever mindful
of the mission which no conscientious woman should be without. Priscilla
had thought to start a school for the children of the garrison, but
found that many of the elders were driven every day to town and its high
school, while most of the mites were corraled each morning in the
basement of the post chapel, pupils of a sergeant schoolmaster whose
success had been quite remarkable, so much so that parents were
reluctant--and their progeny rebellious--when other and more modern
methods, Priscilla's, were suggested. It must be owned that the little
ones from the start found Miss Sanford unsympathetic, if not impossible.
Children love being catechized as little as do their elders, and they
resented it that this somewhat prim, yet by no means unprepossessing,
spinster should consider it her duty and her privilege to cross-question
them as to their infantile responsibilities and, all uninvited, to
undertake supervision of their noisy sports. Finding no opening for a
day school, Miss Sanford had sought to interest the weans in an
afternoon reading class. The first day or two the major's spacious
quarters were well filled, so were the children with alluring goodies
they could thoroughly appreciate. But when sermons began to take the
place of sandwiches, and moral admonitions and questionings were
administered in lieu of lemonade and lady-fingers, Miss Sanford's
kindergarten dissolved in air and the would-be gentle monitress in
disappointed tears. Uncle Will had whimsically striven to console her
with the promise of better luck when school stopped in June, but Aunt
Marion had smilingly though silently shaken her head. She knew
Priscilla's propensities of old. She had convictions, said Aunt Marion,
and theories as to how children should be taught to see the serious side
of life. Priscilla was suffering from an accumulation of pent-up zeal
and enthusiasm that was yet to find an outlet.
Then one day the outlet came.
Lieutenant Parker, "Exchange officer," so-called, was suddenly ordered
to duty at West Point, and Colonel Stone asked Sandy Ray if he would
take his place. "Strictly speaking," said he, "I should name one of my
own officers, but I have other work for all of them, and lots of it. You
have really very little else just now that you can do, except, perhaps,
go to stables."
Now, if there was one institution more than another at Minneconjou
against which Priscilla Sanford had set her seal, it was the post
Exchange. In all her months of residence under Uncle Will's, the
major's, roof, never once had the others there sheltered forgotten the
day of her first acquaintance with the subject. Sandy was still beyond
seas, but Billy, Junior, was of the household when, just as they took
their place at table for luncheon, the husband and father spoke:
"Maidie wife, they have some capital cider at the Canteen and I ordered
some sent over."
Miss Sanford looked up inquiringly over her poised spoonful of soup.
"The--Canteen?" she asked.
"Yes. The Post Exchange, it is called officially. It's the post shop,
restaurant, club, amusement hall, etc.," answered the head of the house,
while Marion, his wife, glanced just a trifle nervously at her niece.
"But why--Canteen? It isn't, is it, a--bar?" And Miss Sanford's tone
betrayed the depth of her disapprobation of the name.
"Yes, and no," said Uncle Will pleasantly, his dark eyes twinkling under
their heavy brows and lashes. He rather liked to have 'Cilla mount her
successive hobbies, and thought it better, as a rule, to let her air her
theories first in the sanctity of the family circle. "After
experimenting a hundred years or so we found it wiser to prescribe the
drinks as well as the meats of our men, and to provide a place for them
at home where they can have rational amusement and refreshment, rather
than send them out into the world where they get the worst of
everything."
"But, uncle, do you mean you let--you encourage--these young soldiers
to--drink?" And the slender gold chain of Miss Sanford's intellectual
_pince nez_ began to quiver, as did the lady's sensitive nostrils.
"Encourage? No! Let? Yes, so long as it is nothing but sound beer or
light wine--things we buy for them from the most reliable dealers and
provide them practically at cost. You see they have their own clubroom,
and billiards, checkers, chess, dominoes, coffee, cake and sandwiches.
It keeps them here. It helps and contents them. They can't drink more
than is good for them."
"Is it good for them that they should drink--at all?" demanded
Priscilla.
"Possibly not. The ascetic in everything would be, physically perhaps,
the ideal soldier. But precious few soldiers are ascetics, though many
are total abstainers."
"Then why not all, since it is best for so many?"
"Because, 'Cilla, a large number refuse to be abstainers, and we can't
make them. They won't enlist or serve if such conditions are imposed. If
forbidden to use mild and carefully selected stimulant here they will go
elsewhere and get the vilest the frontier can furnish, to the ruin of
their stomachs, reputation and moral nature. We teach temperance--not
intolerance."
But Priscilla had been reared in the shadow of the stanch old
Calvanistic church and the strictest of schools.
"I--cannot see how you dare place such temptation in their way," said
she. "You thereby take their souls in the hollow of your hand and become
responsible----Oh!"--with a shudder of genuine distress and
repugnance--"I knew--I had heard--there was drinking; but I never
supposed it was countenanced, _encouraged_ by--by those who ought to be
their shield against such temptation and trouble." And here Priscilla's
words were oddly reminiscent of the editorial columns of the _Banner of
Light_ and certain other most excellent organs of the Prohibition
element.
"We do it to keep them from vastly worse temptation and trouble,
Priscilla," said the veteran soldier kindly, and signaling Marion not to
interpose. "You are right, dear, in the abstract, but we have to deal
with men as we find them. We would be glad indeed of ideals, but the
ideal doesn't, as a rule, enlist."
"The Bible teaches us it stingeth like an adder," said Priscilla
solemnly, with suggestive glance at Billy, Junior, whom she but
yesterday had rebuked for sipping claret at the colonel's dinner.
"The Bible also tells us Who turned water into wine at a certain
marriage feast," said Uncle Will, his mustache twitching.
Whereat Priscilla flushed; the tears started to her eyes; she arose and
left the table, her soup unfinished. It was one thing to quote the
Scriptures in support of her views; it was quite another to array them
on the other side. When Aunt Marion went to Priscilla's room a little
later, with a tray of tea and comfits and a word of gentle
expostulation, she found her niece in anything but melting mood. To
Priscilla's mind such argument as Uncle Will's was impious. To Aunt
Marion's suggestion that at least it was from like authority with her
own, Priscilla could find no better reply than "That's different."
Down in her heart of hearts Priscilla thought it a grave mistake on part
of somebody that the episode of the marriage of Cana of Galilee had any
place in Holy Writ. Indeed it may be hazarded that, long schooled by the
_Banner_ and the eloquent lessons of her favorite preachers, Priscilla
could have listened with becoming modesty, but no surprise, had it been
suggested that she undertake the preparation of an expurgated edition of
the Word.
At the date of this initial clash Uncle Will was still commanding the
post. Stone, with the Sixty-first, came later. Priscilla, finding her
uncle ever smilingly tolerant of her views, but never shaken in his own,
had first essayed an inspection of the Canteen--she would not call it
the Exchange--and then had descended upon the chaplain--a gentle divine,
gifted with much faith but little force, a kindly, sweet-tempered cleric
ever ready to follow if never to lead in good work that demanded
personal push and energy. Priscilla had spent sleepless hours in thought
over the situation. She could not abolish the Canteen since the law
("The law _and_ the prophets," said Uncle Will, though Priscilla would
not hear) sustained it. She could, she reasoned, conduct a rival
establishment that should wean the soldier from the false faith to the
true, and to this end she sought the aid of the cassock.
Uncle Will had taken her, at her request, to see the objectionable
institution, and she had peered curiously about the cozy interior. At
sight of their much honored squadron leader, the few troopers at the
tables, busy with checkers, dominoes or billiards, had sprung to
attention, facing him and the grave-eyed lady by his side, and there
stood in soldierly respect. Ray smilingly acknowledged their homage,
bade them go on with their games; he merely wished his niece from the
East "to see how we manage to live in the West." Then he showed her the
bookshelves and the reading room with its illustrated weeklies and
magazines, the well-furnished writing tables whereat certain young
soldiers were working at their letters home; the refreshment counter,
with its appetizing little stack of sandwiches and polished urn of
steaming coffee, and all this Priscilla saw without sign of surrender.
What she looked for she did not find--symptoms of the inevitable
intoxication and debauchery to be expected wherever liquor was sold or
used. Some of the men had half-emptied beer glasses at their elbow. Two
German non-commissioned officers were sipping appreciatively the wine of
their native Rhineland as they chatted in quiet comfort over their
little table at the window. A veteran sergeant stepped forward and
begged the honor of tendering the colonel and the lady a glass of their
wine, and again every man was on his feet as Ray drank to their health,
and Priscilla thanked their entertainers and said she would be glad of a
little coffee--she never used wine. She was silent as she came away--all
was so orderly, so cheery; the men seemed so content with their
surroundings, so pleased that "the colonel" (never did they forget his
volunteer title) should come to see them. She owned that--yes--they
looked very--decent _now_, but--but, it was only the first step; it was
what it all _led_ to, said she, that made it so dangerous, so dreadful!
Indeed, the mere fact that all was so well ordered made it, presumably,
to Priscilla's mind, all the more alluring and terrible. It was the
devil's way always, she had been taught--imperceptible, inviting,
insidious. Priscilla prayed long that night and pondered. She had almost
decided on a campaign of conquest and overthrow, when the new commander
came, and in Colonel Stone she found an obstacle quite as firm as Uncle
Will--and far less tolerant.
Meantime, however, Priscilla had organized her "Soldiers' Advancement
Association"; had started in a vacant set of quarters a rival to the
Canteen, where even better coffee and sandwiches could be had and much
more improving conversation, but no beer, and Priscilla was presently in
the seventh heaven; so many soldiers came she had to send for more seats
and more supplies. Every evening after dinner, putting behind her the
unworthy, if worldly, impulse to go and join in the music or the dance,
Priscilla met her martial friends and pupils, learned their soldier
names, something of their history and much of their needs. The chaplain
at first was quite assiduous in his attendance, but the chaplain, she
speedily decided, was slow, prosy, unconvincing. He did not seem to
_stir_ them as they should be stirred, and when one night the kindly old
gentleman failed to come, and his goodwife sent word she feared her
husband had caught a heavy cold, Priscilla took the Word, as the French
would say; read the chapter of her choice; expounded vehemently after
the manner of her favorite exhorters, and came home radiant. No less
than six of the men had come to her to thank her for her soul-stirring
words, and to say that if they had had such teaching as that in their
past they would never have brought sorrow to a mother's heart, as some
of them feared they had. Uncle Will's eyebrows went up significantly
when Priscilla named her converts, and once or twice, as he sat writing
to Blake that night in his little den, sounds as of irrepressible
chuckling came from that sanctum, and Marion slipped in to say a word of
caution. Priscilla, however, at last had found her opportunity and could
not be laughed out of it. The chaplain was warned, he said, that
exposure to the wintry night air was hazardous, and he was reluctantly
compelled to withdraw, and Priscilla, by no means reluctantly, to part
with him. She was in desperate earnest and in the full tide of apparent
success, with all Minneconjou watching with absorbed if mischievous
interest. Priscilla's mourners' bench, it must be owned, was graced by
the presence of one or two veteran troopers, the mention of whose names
was enough to start the risibilities of that godless array, "the Mess."
There was Shaughnessy, who had served six enlistments and never kept the
chevrons six months at a time. There was Kelly, the "champeen
thrumpether," who could blow "Taps" that would bring tears to your eyes
one day and maledictions on his head the next. There was Costigan, who
had been "bobtailed" out of two of the best regiments of infantry of the
service, and only "taken on" in Ray's old troop by special permission,
because of his undeniable valor in Indian campaign and the fact that
when he let whisky alone there was not a neater, nattier soldier, Horse,
Foot or Dragoon, to be found in the field. Priscilla had indeed gathered
in some of the reprobates, and sought to reach more. She begged that, in
accordance with their plaintive request, the inmates of the guard-house,
immortal "Company Q," might be allowed the benefit and privileges of the
Association. Had not He said He came not to call the just but the
sinners to repentance? and, as Uncle Will whimsically remarked, "If what
Priscilla wants are sinners--she's got 'em."
And this was the state of things when Stone arrived; took command,
reinforced the garrison with eight stout companies and band of the
Sixty-first, and the guard-house with a score of military malefactors
who, hearing of Miss Sanford's Soldiers' Advancement Association, begged
leave to partake of its blessings, including the coffee and sandwiches.
Then Stone suddenly "tumbled to the scheme," as Billy, Junior, a fierce
skeptic from the start, described it. Then Stone himself attended a
meeting, to the obvious embarrassment of the congregation, though
Priscilla beamed upon him in the sudden belief that here indeed was a
heart worth the moving. What Stone saw was quite enough to convince him
of the utter absurdity of permitting the further attendance of, at
least, the guard-house contingent, but he would not wound Priscilla or,
without abundant reason, disturb the edifice builded under Ray's
administration. The Association might even have lived and thrived
another week on Priscilla's ministrations--and at Ray's expense--for
daily coffee and sandwiches for all comers, forty odd, at least, was
proving costly. It was "Company Q" itself that broke it up. The
privilege and the darkness combined enabled certain of its unhallowed
spirits to smuggle whisky into the prison room, and, thus stimulated, a
gifted ex-professional of the "dramatic line" set up a wonderfully if
wickedly witty burlesque of the evening's lecture, to the irrepressible,
and presently uproarious, mirth of his fellow-jailbirds. It was just
what Stone was expecting, and so far from ordering it stopped, he sent
for Ray and bade him listen. Then the post and the squadron commander
shook hands in silence. "You see for yourself," said Stone. "I, too,
have been expecting it," said Ray. Then the guard was sent in. The
impious revel was suddenly and summarily squelched. Then Ray gently told
Priscilla the sinners could come no more, but mercifully would not tell
her much, at least, that he had heard. So the Soldiers' Advancement
Association retrograded in numbers to less than half, and then, as
others not at the moment under guard took alarm, to less than a dozen.
But Priscilla wrapped herself up in the nine that were left, and, as all
barrack room was now needed, for these they fitted up a little apartment
in the basement of the major's quarters, and then came Sandy Ray, as has
been said, and spring was turning to summer, and Priscilla's band of
stalwarts had been reduced to six, and of these six the apple of her
spiritual eye was Blenke.
One of the recruits, regimental and bibli-classical, was Blenke, but
already a marked man. Small of stature, lithe, slender and sinewy, with
dainty little hands and feet, with pallid face and regular features and
great big, mournful brown eyes that looked pleadingly into those of his
superiors, Blenke wore the uniform of a private with the ease and grace
and care of a dandy subaltern. Blenke's gloves and shoes could not be
furnished by the quartermaster's department; they did not deal in such
small sizes; but Blenke brought with him all he could need of such items
for months to come. Blenke was a silent fellow in barracks. Blenke never
whistled or sang. Blenke rarely spoke and never smiled. It was not that
Blenke's face was set in gloom, but an air of gentle melancholy hung
ever about him. He made no intimates, sought no confidences and gave
none among the men. Whatever he was put to do he did surprisingly well.
Corporal Donovan, detailed to drill him when he, with the rest of the
little party, arrived, informed the first sergeant that "that young
feller knew more settin'-up drill than any non-com at the post." So it
proved also with the manual of arms. Blenke was an expert. When put into
a squad for aiming and position drill, Blenke had nothing to learn, and
his shooting and gallery practice was on a par with the best. They sent
him out to the rifle range west of the post and there he "qualified" at
known distance and excelled at the silhouettes, and still he declared he
had never before "taken a blanket." He learned his drill and shooting
with the militia, he said; gave "clerk" as his occupation and wrote a
beautiful hand, though his spelling at times might be criticised. Blenke
had a watch, card-case, shirts, shoes and underwear that told of better
days. Blenke, apparently, had no vices. He neither drank, smoked,
chewed, gambled nor, unless closely pressed as to his past, was he
believed to lie. Blenke looked about him a bit before going either to
church or town. Then Blenke began appearing regularly at chapel service,
and then, modestly, sought permission to enter Miss Sanford's Soldiers'
Advancement Association, where speedily he attracted the especial notice
of that devoted and devotional young woman. Then Blenke offered his
services as writer, copyist, etc., and Priscilla, being much occupied,
gladly installed him at a desk whereat he spent much time when not
elsewhere on duty, and all the while, neat, handy, silent, unobtrusive,
yet seeing everything with those deep, mournful, watchful eyes, Blenke
found means to make himself more and more useful, and presently to
communicate the fact that though his present lot was humble there had
been "advantages" in the past, there were ambitions for the future. To
begin with, he wished to transfer into the cavalry. He knew little, he
said, of the relative merits of those arms before enlisting. He had seen
much since, he said, to convince him that for a young man of spirit the
cavalry offered opportunities not to be looked for in the infantry.
This, he judged, would not displease the squadron commander, whose
influence through Miss Sanford he earnestly sought, and so it resulted
that Blenke, little by little, was far more frequently to be found about
the major's quarters than his own.
Ray did not like it. Neither did Blenke's captain, yet neither wished to
throw cold water on Priscilla's efforts, and really nothing could be
less obtrusive or more precise and soldierly than Blenke. He never
presumed to speak except in answer to questions. He was scrupulous in
dress, bearing, conduct and military courtesy. His salute was precision
itself. His captain really wished to make him a corporal, but a veteran
first sergeant respectfully protested. "The men wouldn't stand for it,
sir, and him not two months in the company." Sandy Ray, who came home in
mood to carp at anything, liked it least of all that he should be
forever encountering Blenke about the lower floor or around the walks
and quarters. But Priscilla was forever talking of Blenke's helpfulness,
his piety, high character, and his modest hopes. Blenke was beginning to
talk with her about studying for a commission. Blenke was beginning to
be disliked among the men because he ignored them so.
Then one day came the expected. Lieutenant-Colonel Ray, --th Cavalry,
was ordered to proceed at once to San Francisco, and thence by transport
to Manila. Then came tidings of deaths in the Islands, and retirements
at home, and, six months sooner than he had hoped for such a thing,
Oswald Dwight saw the gold leaves of a major dangling before his mental
vision, and the night before Colonel Ray was to bid his loved ones
good-by and take train for the coast, and he and Marion, arm in arm,
were coming home from some parting calls, they saw Blenke standing at
their gate, a telegraphic message in his hand; Priscilla and Billy,
Junior, following, closed upon the elders as Ray tore open the envelope.
Blenke, having delivered it, stood scrupulously at attention just beyond
the gate, gazing with his mournful eyes straight out at the flagstaff in
the middle of the parade. Ray read, turned a bit pale, and glanced
hurriedly about him as though in search of someone. Sandy was not in
sight. He was busy with the affairs of the Canteen.
"What is it, Will?" asked Marion anxiously, her gloved hand trembling a
bit upon his arm.
"Of all things--queer," said Ray. "Dwight gets my squadron, and--_she's_
coming with him."
Then unaccountably Private Blenke's forage-cap, always worn well
forward, tilted off and fell at his feet.