Six months ago had anyone told me that the day would come when I would
feel thankful for the loss of my grandfather, I would have struck him.
But for the last week I have been almost thankful that he is dead. The
worst that could occur has happened. I am in bitter disgrace, and I
am grateful that grandfather died before it came upon me. I have been
dismissed from the Academy. The last of the “Fighting” Macklins has
been declared unfit to hold the President’s commission. I am cast out
irrevocably; there is no appeal against the decision. I shall never
change the gray for the blue. I shall never see the U. S. on my
saddle-cloth, nor salute my country’s flag as it comes fluttering down
at sunset.
That I am on my way to try and redeem myself is only an attempt to patch
up the broken pieces. The fact remains that the army has no use for me.
I have been dismissed from West Point, in disgrace. It was a girl who
brought it about, or rather my own foolishness over a girl. And before
that there was much that led up to it. It is hard to write about it, but
in these memoirs I mean to tell everything--the good, with the bad. And
as I deserve no excuse, I make none.
During that winter, after the death of my grandfather, and the spring
which had followed, I tried hard to do well at the Point. I wanted
to show them that though my grandfather was gone, his example and his
wishes still inspired me. And though I was not a studious cadet, I was
a smart soldier, and my demerits, when they came, were for smoking in my
room or for breaking some other such silly rule, and never for slouching
through the manual or coming on parade with my belts twisted. And at the
end of the second year I had been promoted from corporal to be a cadet
first sergeant, so that I was fourth in command over a company of
seventy. Although this gave me the advantage of a light after “taps”
until eleven o’clock, my day was so taken up with roll-calls, riding and
evening drills and parade, that I never seemed to find time to cram my
mechanics and chemistry, of which latter I could never see any possible
benefit. How a knowledge of what acid will turn blue litmus-paper red is
going to help an officer to find fodder for his troop horses, or inspire
him to lead a forlorn hope, was then, and still is, beyond my youthful
comprehension.
But these studies were down on the roster, and whether I thought well
of them or not I was marked on them and judged accordingly. But I cannot
claim that it was owing to them or my failure to understand them that my
dismissal came, for, in spite of the absence of 3’s in my markings and
the abundance of 2’s, I was still a soldierly cadet, and in spite of the
fact that I was a stupid student, I made an excellent drill-master.
The trouble, when it came, was all my own making, and my dismissal was
entirely due to an act of silly recklessness and my own idiocy. I had
taken chances before and had not been caught; several times I ran the
sentries at night for the sake of a noisy, drunken spree at a road-side
tavern, and several times I had risked my chevrons because I did not
choose to respect the arbitrary rules of the Academy which chafed my
spirit and invited me to rebellion. It was not so much that I enjoyed
those short hours of freedom, which I snatched in the face of such
serious penalties, but it was the risk of the thing itself which
attracted me, and which stirred the spirit of adventure that at times
sways us all.
It was a girl who brought about my dismissal. I do not mean that she was
in any way to blame, but she was the indirect cause of my leaving
the Academy. It was a piece of fool’s fortune, and I had not even the
knowledge that I cared in the least for the girl to console me. She was
only one of the several “piazza girls,” as we called certain ones of
those who were staying at Cranston’s, with whom I had danced, to whom
I had made pretty speeches, and had given the bell button that was sewn
just over my heart. She certainly was not the best of them, for I can
see now that she was vain and shallow, with a pert boldness, which I
mistook for vivacity and wit. Three years ago, at the age of twenty, my
knowledge of women was so complete that I divided them into six classes,
and as soon as I met a new one I placed her in one of these classes and
created her according to the line of campaign I had laid down as proper
for that class. Now, at twenty-three, I believe that there are as many
different kinds of women as there are women, but that all kinds are
good. Some women are better than others, but all are good, and all are
different. This particular one unknowingly did me a great harm, but
others have given me so much that is for good, that the balance side
is in their favor. If a man is going to make a fool of himself, I
personally would rather see him do it on account of a woman than for any
other cause. For centuries Antony has been held up to the scorn of the
world because he deserted his troops and his fleet, and sacrificed the
Roman Empire for the sake of Cleopatra. Of course, that is the one thing
a man cannot do, desert his men and betray his flag; but, if he is going
to make a bad break in life, I rather like his doing it for the love
of a woman. And, after all, it is rather fine to have for once felt
something in you so great that you placed it higher than the Roman
Empire.
I haven’t the excuse of any great feeling in my case. She, the girl at
Cranston’s, was leaving the Point on the morrow, and she said if all I
had sworn to her was true I would run the sentries that night to
dance with her at the hop. Of course, love does not set tests nor ask
sacrifices, but I had sworn that I had loved her, as I understood the
world, and I told her I would come. I came, and I was recognized as
I crossed the piazza to the ball-room. On the morning following I was
called to the office of the Commandant and was told to pack my trunk. I
was out of uniform in an hour, and that night at parade the order of the
War Department dismissing me from the service was read to the assembled
battalion.
{Illustration: We walked out to the woods.}
I cannot write about that day. It was a very bright, beautiful day, full
of life and sunshine, and I remember that I wondered how the world could
be so cruel and unfeeling. The other second classmen came in while I was
packing my things to say that they were sorry. They were kind enough;
and some of them wanted me to go off to New York to friends of theirs
and help upset it and get drunk. Their idea was, I suppose, to show the
authorities how mistaken they had been in not making me an officer. But
I could not be civil to any of them. I hated them all, and the place,
and everyone in it. When I was dismissed my first thought was one of
utter thankfulness that my grandfather died before the disgrace came
upon me, and after that I did not much care. I was desperate and
bitterly miserable. I knew, as the authorities could not know, that no
one in my class felt more loyal to the service than myself; that I would
have died twenty deaths for my country; that there was no one company
post in the West, however distant from civilization, that would not have
been a paradise to me; that there was no soldier in the army who would
have served more devotedly than myself. And now I was found wanting
and thrown out to herd with civilians, as unfit to hold the President’s
commission. After my first outbreak of impotent rage--for I blamed
everyone but myself--remorse set in, and I thought of grandfather and
of how much he had done for our country, and how we had talked so
confidently together of the days when I would follow in his footsteps,
as his grandchild, and as the son of “Fighting Macklin.”
All my life I had talked and thought of nothing else, and now, just as
I was within a year of it, I was shown the door which I never can enter
again.
That it might be easier for us when I arrived, I telegraphed Beatrice
what had happened, and when I reached the house the same afternoon
she was waiting for me at the door, as though I was coming home for
a holiday and it was all as it might have been. But neither of us was
deceived, and without a word we walked out of the garden and up the hill
to the woods where we had last been together six months before, Since
then all had changed. Summer had come, the trees were heavy with leaves,
and a warm haze hung over the river and the Palisades beyond We seated
ourselves on a fallen tree at the top of the hill and sat in silence,
looking down into the warm, beautiful valley. It was Beatrice who was
the first to speak.
“I have been thinking of what you can do,” she began, gently, “and it
seems to me, Royal, that what you need now is a good rest. It has been a
hard winter for you. You have had to meet the two greatest trials that I
hope will ever come to you. You took the first one well, as you should,
and you will take this lesser one well also; I know you will. But you
must give yourself time to get over this--this disappointment, and to
look about you. You must try to content yourself at home with mother and
with me. I am so selfish that I am almost glad it has happened, for now
for a time we shall have you with us, all to ourselves, and we can take
care of you and see that you are not gloomy and morbid. And then when
the fall comes you will have decided what is best to do, and you will
have a rest and a quiet summer with those who understand you and love
you. And then you can go out into the world to do your work, whatever
your work is to be.”