Billy Gray was indeed in close arrest and the grim prophecy was
fulfilled--Colonel Canker was proving "anything but a guardian angel to
him." The whole regiment, officers and men, barring only the commander,
was practically in mourning with sorrow for him and chagrin over its own
discomfiture. Not only one important prisoner was gone, but two; not only
two, but four. No man in authority was able to say just when or how it
happened, for it was Canker's own order that the prisoners should not be
paraded when the guard fell in at night. They were there at tattoo and at
taps "all secure." The officer of the guard, said several soldiers, had
quite a long talk with one of the prisoners--young Morton--just after
tattoo, at which time the entire guard had been inspected by the
commanding officer himself. But at reveille four most important prisoners
were gone and, such was Canker's wrath, not only was Gray in arrest, but
the sergeant of the guard also, while the three luckless men who were
successively posted as sentries during the night at the back of the
wooden shell that served as a guardhouse--were now in close confinement
in the place of the escaped quartette.
Yet those three were men who had hitherto been above suspicion, and there
were few soldiers in the regiment who would accept the theory that any
one of the three had connived at the escape. As for the sergeant--he had
served four enlistments in the --teenth, and without a flaw in his record
beyond an occasional aberration in the now distant past, due to the
potency of the poteen distilled by certain Hibernian experts not far from
an old-time "plains fort," where the regiment had rested on its march
'cross continent. As for the officers--but who would suppose an officer
guilty of anything of the kind--a flagrant military crime? And yet--men
got to asking each other if it were so that Bugler Curran had carried a
note from the prisoner, Morton, to Mr. Gray about 2:30 that afternoon?
And what was this about Gray's having urged Brooke to swap tours with him
an hour later, and what was that story the headquarters clerks were
telling about Mr. Gray's coming to the adjutant and begging to be allowed
to "march on" that evening instead of Brooke? It wasn't long before these
rumors, somehow, got to Canker's ears, and Canker seemed to grow as big
again; he fairly swelled with indignation at thought of such turpitude on
part of an officer. Then he sent for Gray--it was the afternoon following
the sailing of the ships with the big brigade--and with pain and
bewilderment and indignation in his brave blue eyes the youngster came
and stood before his stern superior. Gordon, who sent the message, and
who had heard Canker's denunciatory remarks, had found time to scribble a
word or two--"Admit nothing; say nothing; _do_ nothing but hold your
tongue and temper. If C. insists on answers say you decline except in
presence of your legal adviser." So there was a scene in the commander's
tent that afternoon. The morning had not been without its joys. Along
about ten o'clock as Gray sat writing to his father in his little canvas
home, he heard a voice that sent the blood leaping through his veins and
filled his eyes with light. Springing from his campstool and capsizing it
as he did so, he poked his curly head from the entrance of the tent--and
there she was--only a dozen feet away--Major Lane in courteous
attendance, Mr. Prime sadly following, and Miss Prime quite content with
the devotions of Captain Schuyler. Only a dozen feet away and coming
straight to him, with frank smiles and sympathy in her kind and winsome
face--with hand outstretched the moment she caught sight of him. "We
wanted to come when we heard of it yesterday, Mr. Gray," said Amy
Lawrence, "but it was dark when we got back from seeing the fleet off,
and uncle was too tired in the evening. Indeed we are all very, very
sorry!" And poor Billy never heard or cared what the others said, so
absorbed was he in drinking in her gentle words and gazing into her soft,
dark eyes. No wonder he found it difficult to release her hand. That
brief visit, filled with sweetness and sunshine, ought to have been a
blessing to him all day long, but Canker caught sight of the damsels as
they walked away on the arms of the attendant cavaliers--Miss Lawrence
more than once smiling back at the incarcerated Billy--and Canker
demanded to be informed who they were and where they had been, and Gordon
answered they were Miss Lawrence of Santa Anita, and Miss Prime of New
York--and he "reckoned" they must have been in to condole with Mr.
Gray--whereat Canker snarled that people ought to know better than to
visit officers in arrest--it was tantamount to disrespect to the
commander. It was marvelous how many things in Canker's eyes were
disrespectful.
So he heard these stories with eager ears and sent for Gray, and thought
to bully him into an admission or confession, but Gordon's words had
"stiffened" the little fellow to the extent of braving Canker's anger and
telling him he had said all he proposed to say when the colonel called
him up the previous day. The result of that previous interview was his
being placed in close arrest and informed that he should be tried by
general court-martial once. So he had taken counsel, as was his right,
and "counsel" forbade his committing himself in any way.
"Then you refuse to divulge the contents of that note and to say why you
were so eager to go on guard out of your turn?" said Canker, oracularly.
"That in itself is sufficient to convince any fair-minded court of your
guilt, sir." Whereat Gordon winked at Billy and put his tongue in his
cheek--and Billy stood mute until ordered, with much asperity, to go back
to his tent.
But there were other things that might well go toward convincing a court
of the guilt of Lieutenant Gray, and poor Billy contemplated them with
sinking heart. Taking prompt advantage of his position as officer of the
guard, he had caused the young prisoner to be brought outside the
guardhouse, and as a heavy, dripping fog had come on the wings of the
night wind, sailing in from the sea, he had led the way to the sheltered
side, which happened to be the darkest one, of the rude little building,
and had there bidden him tell his story. But Morton glanced uneasily at a
sentry who followed close and was hovering suspiciously about. "I cannot
talk about--the affair--with that fellow spying," he said, with an eager
plea in his tone and a sign of the hand that Gray well knew and quickly
recognized. "Keep around in front. I'll be responsible for this
prisoner," were his orders, and, almost reluctantly, the man left. He was
a veteran soldier, and his manner impressed the lieutenant with a vague
sense of trouble. Twice the sentry glanced back and hesitated, as though
something were on his mind that he must tell, but finally he disappeared
and kept out of the way during the brief interview that immediately
followed. The prisoner eagerly, excitedly began his explanation--swiftly
banishing any lingering doubts Gray might have entertained as to his
innocence. But he had come from a stove-heated guardroom into the cold
sea wind off the Pacific--into the floating wisps of vapor that sent
chill to the marrow. He was far too lightly clad for that climate, and
presently he began to shiver.
"You are cold," said Gray, pityingly. "Have you no overcoat?"
"It's at my tent--I never expected to spend this night here. I've been
before the summary court, fined for absence, and thought that would end
it, but instead of that I'm a prisoner and the man who should be here is
stalking about camp, planning more robberies. Yet I'd rather associate
with the very worst of the deserters or dead beats inside there," and the
dark eyes glanced almost in horror--the slender figure shook with mingled
repulsion and chill--"than with that smooth-tongued sneak and liar.
There's no crime too mean for him to commit, Mr. Gray, and the men are
beginning to know it, though the colonel won't. For God's sake get me out
of this before morning--" And again the violent tremor shook the lad from
head to foot.
"Here--get inside!" said Gray impulsively. "I'll see the adjutant at once
and return to you in a few minutes. If you have to remain until the
matter can be investigated by the General it might be----"
"It would be--" vehemently interrupted Morton, then breaking off short as
though at loss for descriptive of sufficient strength. He seemed to swell
with passion as he clinched his fists and fairly stood upon his toes an
instant, his strong white teeth grinding together. "It would be--simply
hell!" he burst in again, hoarse and quivering. "It would ruin--everything!
Can't the General give the order to-night?" he asked with intense
eagerness, while the young officer, taking him by the arm, had led him
again to the light of the guardhouse lamps at the front. The sergeant and a
group of soldiers straightened up and faced them, listening curiously.
"It may be even impossible to see the General," answered Gray doubtfully.
"Take Morton into the guardroom till I get back, sergeant, and let him
warm himself thoroughly." Don't put him with the prisoners till I return,
and so saying he had hastened away. Gordon, his friend and adviser, had
left camp and gone visiting over in the other division. The lights at
general headquarters were turned low. Even now, after having heard proofs
of the innocence of the accused soldier, Gray knew that it was useless to
appeal to the colonel. He could not understand, however, the feverish,
almost insane, impatience of the lad for immediate release. Another day
ought not to make so great a difference. What could be the reason--if it
were not that, though innocent of the robbery of the storehouse, or of
complicity in the sale of stolen goods, some other crime lay at his door
which the morrow might disclose? All the loyalty of a Delta Sig was
stretched to the snapping point as Gray paused irresolute in front of the
adjutant's tent, his quest there unsuccessful. The sergeant-major and a
sorely badgered clerk were working late over some regimental
papers--things that Morton wrote out easily and accurately.
"I suppose, sir, it's no use asking to have the prisoner sent up here
under guard," said that jewel of a noncommissioned officer. "Yet the
colonel will be savage if these papers ain't ready. It will take us all
night as things are going."
Gray shook his curly head. "Go ask, if you like, but--Morton's in no
shape to help you----"
"Has he been drinking, sir?" said the sergeant-major, in surprise. "I
never knew him----"
"Oh, it isn't that," said Gray hastily, "only he's--he's got--other
matters on his mind! Bring me his overcoat. He said it was in his tent,"
and the young officer jerked his head at the patch of little "A" tents
lined up in the rear of those of the officers.
"Get Morton's overcoat and take it to him at the guardhouse," snapped the
staff sergeant to the clerk. "Be spry now, and no stopping on the way
back," he added--well aware how much in need his assistant stood of
creature comfort of some surreptitious and forbidden kind. The man was
back in a moment, the coat rolled on his arm.
"I'll take it," said Gray simply. "You needn't come."
"Go on with it!" ordered the sergeant as the soldier hesitated. "D'ye
think the service has gone to the devil and officers are runnin' errands
for enlisted men? An' get back inside two minutes, too," he added with
portent in his tone. The subaltern of hardly two months' service felt the
implied rebuke of the soldier of over twenty years' and meekly accepted
the amendment, but--a thought occurred to him: He had promised Morton
paper, envelopes and stamps and the day's newspapers--the lad seemed
strangely eager to get all the latter, and vaguely Billy remembered
having heard that Canker considered giving papers to prisoners as
equivalent to aid and comfort to the enemy.
"Take it by way of my tent," said he as they started, and, once there it
took time to find things. "Go back to the sergeant-major and tell him I
sent you," said Gray, after another search. "He needs you on those
papers."
And when the officer of the guard returned to the guardhouse and went in
to the prisoner, the sergeant saw--and others saw--that, rolled in the
soldier's overcoat he carried on his arm, was a bundle done up in
newspaper. Moreover, a scrap of conversation was overheard.
"There's no one at the General's," said the officer. "I see no way
of--fixing it before morning."
"My God, lieutenant! There--must be some way out of it! The morning will
be too late."
"Then I'll do what I can for you to-night," said Mr. Gray as he turned
and hurriedly left the guardroom--a dozen men standing stiffly about the
walls and doorway and staring with impassive faces straight to the front.
Again, the young officer had left the post of the guard and gone up into
camp, while far and near through the dim, fog-swept aisles of a score of
camps the bugles and trumpets were wailing the signal for "lights out,"
and shadowy forms with coat collars turned up about the ears or capes
muffled around the neck, scurried about the company streets ordering
laughter and talk to cease. A covered carriage was standing at the curb
outside the officers' gate--as a certain hole in the fence was
designated--and the sentry there posted remembered that the officer of
the guard came hurrying out and asked the driver if he was engaged. "I'm
waiting for the major," was the answer.
"Well, where can one order a carriage to-night without going clear to
town?" inquired Gray. "I want one--that is--I wish to order one at once."
And the driver who knew very well there were several places where
carriages could be had, preferred loyalty to his own particular stable
away in town, and so declared there was none.
"You can telephone there, if you wish, sir," he added.
"And wait till morning for it to get here? No! I'll get it--somehow."
And that he did get it somehow was current rumor on the following day,
for the sentries on the guardhouse side of camp swore that a closed
carriage drove down from McAllister Street for all the world as though it
had just come out of the park, and rolled on past the back of the
guardhouse, the driver loudly whistling "Killarney," so that it could be
heard above the crunching of the wheels through the rough, loose rock
that covered the road, and that carriage drew up not a hundred yards
away, while the lieutenant was out visiting sentries, and presently they
saw him coming back along the walk, stopping to question each sentry as
to his orders. Then he returned and inquired if all was quiet among the
prisoners, and then went and put out his light in the tent reserved for
the officer of the guard, and once more left his post, briefly informing
the sergeant of the guard he was going to the officer of the day. Then it
was ascertained that he had visited half a dozen places in search of that
veteran captain, and appeared much disturbed because he could not find
him. In half an hour he was back, asking excitedly of the sentry in rear
of the guardhouse if a carriage had come that way. It had, said the
sentry, and was waiting down the street. Gray hurried in the direction
indicated, was gone perhaps three minutes, and returned, saying that the
sentry must be mistaken, that no carriage was there. But the sentry
reiterated his statement that it had been there and had been waiting for
some time, and must have disappeared while he was temporarily around at
the opposite side of the building. This was about 11 P.M.
Then when Gray appeared at reveille Morton had disappeared.
"It's not the sergeant let them fellers out," said the regimental
oracles. "This is no ten-dollar subscription business." And so until late
in the afternoon the question that agitated the entire range of
regimental camps was: "How did those fellows break away from the prison
of the --teenth?" Then came a clue, and then--discovery.
By order of Lieutenant-Colonel Canker a board of officers had been
convened to investigate the matter, and after questioning everybody whom
"Squeers" had already badgered with his assertions, threats and queries,
they went to the guardhouse and began a thorough inspection of the
premises. The wooden building stood in the midst of a waste of sand blown
in from the shore line by the strong sea wind. It was perched on
something like a dozen stout posts driven into the soft soil and then the
space between the floor level and the sand was heavily and stoutly
boarded in--thick planks being used. Between the floor and the sand was a
space of about eighteen inches vertical, and a dozen men could have
sprawled therein--lying at full length--but to escape would have required
the connivance of one or more of the sentries surrounding the building
and the ripping off of one or more of the planks. In his keen anxiety
Canker accompanied the Board on its tour of investigation--a thing the
Board did not at all like--and presently, as was his wont, began running
things his own way. It had been found useless to question the soldiers of
the guard. Not a man could be found to admit he knew the faintest thing
about the escape. As for the prisoners, most of them reckless,
devil-may-care rascals, they grinned or leered suggestively, but had
nothing to tell.
"We'll have this boarding ripped off," said Canker decisively, "and see
what they've got secreted under there. I shouldn't be surprised to find a
whisky still in full blast, or a complete gambling outfit--dash, dash 'em
to dash and dashnation! Send for a carpenter, sergeant."
The carpenter came, and he and two or three of the guard laid hold of one
end of the plank after its nails were drawn, and with little exertion
ripped it off the other posts. Then everybody held his breath a minute,
stared, and a small majority swore. So far from its being open to cats,
cans and rubbish, the space on that side was filled solid with damp,
heavy sea sand--a vertical wall extending from floor to ground. Canker
almost ran around to the opposite side and had a big plank torn off
there. Within was a wall as damp, solid and straight as that first
discovered, and so, when examined, were the other two sides provided.
Canker's face was a study, and the Board gazed and was profoundly happy.
At last the colonel exploded:
"By Jupiter! They haven't got away at all, then! There isn't a flaw in
the sand wall anywhere. They must be hiding about the middle now. Come
on, gentlemen," and around he trotted to the front door. "Sergeant," he
cried, "get out all the prisoners--all their bedding--every blessed thing
they've got. I want to examine that floor."
Most of the guardhouse "birds" were out chopping wood, and Canker danced
in among the few remaining, loading them with bedding belonging to their
fellows until every item of clothing and furniture was shoved out of the
room. One member of the Board and one only failed to enter with his
associates--a veteran captain who read much war literature and abhorred
Canker. To the surprise of the sentry he walked deliberately over to the
fence, climbed it and presently began poking about the wooden curb that
ran along the road, making a low revetment or retaining wall for the
earth, cinders and gravel that, distributed over the sand, had been
hopefully designated a sidewalk by the owners of the tract. Presently he
came sauntering back, and both sentries within easy range would have
sworn he was chuckling. Canker greeted him with customary asperity.
"What do you mean, sir, by absenting yourself from this investigation,
when you must have known I was with the Board and giving it the benefit
of the information I had gathered?"
"I was merely expediting matters, colonel. While you were looking for
where they went in I was finding where they got out."
"Went in _what_? Got out of what?" snapped Canker.
"Their tunnel, sir. It's Libby on a small scale over again. They must
have been at work at it at least ten days." And as he spoke, calmly
ignoring Canker and letting his eyes wander over the floor, the veteran
battalion commander sauntered across the room, stirred up a slightly
projecting bit of flooring with the toe of his boot and placidly
continued. "If you'll be good enough to let the men pry this up you _may_
understand."
And when pried up and lifted away--a snugly fitting trapdoor about two
feet square--there yawned beneath it, leading slantwise downward in the
direction of the street, a tunnel through the soft yielding sand, braced
and strengthened here and there with lids and sides of cracker-boxes.
"Now, if you don't mind straddling a fence, sir, I'll show you the other
end," said the captain, imperturbably leading the way, and Canker,
half-dazed yet wholly in command of his stock of blasphemy, followed. At
the curb, right in the midst of a lot of loose hay from the bales dumped
there three days before, the leader dislodged with his sword the top of a
clothing box that had been thickly covered with sand and hay--and there
was the outlet. "Easy as rolling off a log, colonel," said old Cobb, with
a sarcastic grin. "This could all be done without a man you've blamed and
arrested being a whit the wiser. They sawed a panel out of the floor,
scooped the sand out of this tunnel, banked it solid against the weather
boarding inside, filled up the whole space, pretty near, but ran their
tunnel under fence and sidewalk, crawled down the gutter to the next
block out of sight of the sentries, then walked away free men. Those
three thieves who got away were old hands. The other men in the
guardhouse were only mild offenders, except Morton. 'Course he was glad
of the chance to go with 'em. I s'pose you'll release my sergeant and
those sentries now."
"I'll do nothing of the kind," answered Canker, red with wrath, "and your
suggestion is disrespectful to your commanding officer. When I want your
advice I'll ask for it."
"Well, Mr. Gray will be relieved to learn of this anyhow. I suppose I may
tell _him_," hazarded the junior member, mischievously.
"Mr. Gray be ----. Mr. Gray has everything to answer for!" shouted the
angered colonel. "It was he who telephoned for a carriage to meet and run
those rascals off. Mr. Gray's fate is sealed. He can thank God I don't
slap him into the guardhouse with his chosen associates, but _he_ shan't
escape. Sergeant of the guard, post a sentry over Lieutenant Gray's tent,
with orders to allow no one to enter or leave it without my written
authority. Mr. Gray shall pay for this behind the prison bars of
Alcatraz."