WITH the elasticity of youth the boys slept away their fatigue during
the night, but woke up the next morning ravenously hungry.
"What in the world are we goin' to do for grub, Si?" asked Shorty, as
soon as he got his eyes fairly open.
"Oi know what Oi'm goin' to do," said Hennessey. "Oi'm goin to show
the foinest pace av shprinting back to camp that has been sane in these
parts since our roight bruk that day at Chickamaugy. No grass'll grow
under me fate, Oi tell yez. And as I pass through your camp Oi'll foind
yer Captain, and tell the fix you're in, and to sind out some rations."
"But even if he does send them at once, they can't git here till
evenin', and I hate powerfully to let him and the rest know that we
didn't have sense enough to take care o' our victuals after we'd drawed
'em," said Si.
"If it was only one, or even two days, I'd let the boys starve it out,
as a good lesson to 'em," said Shorty. "But three seems like cruelty to
dumb beasts."
"But what'll they say about us in camp?" groaned Si. "They'll have the
grand laugh on me and you, and every one o' the boys. I'd ruther go on
quarter rations for a month than stand the riggin' they'll give us, and
have Capt. McGillicuddy give me one look when he asks the question about
how we come to lose all our rations so soon? He'll think me a purty
Sarjint to send out into the country in charge o' men, and you a fine
Corpril."
"Say," said Shorty, his face illuminated with a bright idea. "We might
report the rations 'lost in action.' That'd fix it fine. We had two good
fights, and come out ahead. That'll tickle the Captain so that he won't
be partickler what we report."
"Hurroo!" echoed Hennessey; "that's the ticket."
"But we didn't lose 'em in action, and to say so'd be a lie," answered
Si, whose conscience had none of the easy elasticity of his partner's.
"We could report 'em burnt up by lightnin','but we won't. They was
lost by sheer, dumbed carelessness, that me and you and the boys should
knowed better than to've allowed. That's all there is of it, and that's
what I'm goin' to report, if I have to."
"Great Jehosephat," exploded Shorty; "you kin certainly be the
stubbornest mule over nothin', Si Klegg, that I ever seen. We've done
fightin' enough to excuse sich a report, or any that we've a mind to
make."
"Nothin' kin justify a lie," persisted the obdurate Si.
"Holy smoke! bigger men than you--lots bigger--have squared up their
accounts that way. Didn't all the Captains in the rijiment, and the
Quartermaster and Commissary, and, for what I know, the Chaplain and the
Colonel, git clean bills o' health after the battle o' Stone River, by
reportin' everything that they couldn't find 'lost in action?'"
"Yis," added Hennessey, "and didn't my Captain, after Chickamaugy, git
us all new uniforms and complete kits, by reportin' iverything 'lost in
action?' Smart man, my Captain, Oi tell yez."
"Well, I don't think any the more o' them for it. We spiled our rations
before the fightin' begun, they'd bin spiled if there'd bin no fightin',
and I haint going to send no other words, if I've got to send any word."
"Who the divil's goin' to carry this word, Oi'd like to know, Misther
Klegg?" broke in Hennessey. "Are you goin' to put words into my mouth,
Misther Klegg? Oi'll tell your Captain just fwhat Oi plaze, about
you and your foight and your rations. Oi want no more worrids wid
ye. Attintion, min! Shoulder, a-r-m-s! Roight face! Forward, foile
left!--M-a-r-c-h!"
"I s'pose I ain't responsible for any o' the fairy tales with which
that wild Mick'll fill up the Captain," said Si, self-consolingly, as
Hennessey and his squad marched away in quick time. "He'll put a rich,
red, County Connaught color on everything that's happened out here, and
the Captain'll believe as much as suits him. Anyhow, Hennessey'll not
say anything to our disadvantage, and probably the Captain'll send out
some rations by fast mule express."
"Yes," accorded Shorty; "we'll git some rations from camp by this
evenin'. Cap will look out for that. Meanwhile, I'll take out two or
three o' the boys on a scout into the country, to see if we can't pick
up something to eat."
"Humph," said Si, skeptically, "you'll find mighty poor pickin', after
them Ohio boys 's bin out here three days. What they haint taken has
been rooted in the ground."
"Yes; they're awful foragers and thieves," assented Shorty. "All Ohio
boys is. I'm glad I'm from Injianny. Still, I've generally bin able to
find something, even after the Ohio boys had bin there."
"Well, I think we'd better first go back and see about them rebels that
we wounded last night. They may be sufferin' awfully, and we oughtn't to
think about something to eat, before doin' what we kin for them."
"That's so," assented Shorty. "I'd a-gone back last night, but we was
all so dead tired."
"Well, I'll take two o' the boys and go back. You stay here with the
rest, and hold the mill. I'll git back as soon's I kin, and then you kin
take a couple o' the boys and go out foragin'."
Calling Alf Russell and Monty Scruggs to follow him, Si started back to
the scene of the skirmish of the night before. The woods looked totally
different, under the bright Spring sunshine, from what they had seemed
in the chill, wet blackness of the previous night. Buds were bursting
and birds singing, and all nature seemed very blithe and inspiring.
"Gracious, what a difference daylight makes in the woods," murmured
Monty Scruggs. "Tain't a bit like Hohenlinden.
"'Tis morn, but scarce yon lurid sun
Can pierce the war-clouds rolling dun,
Where furious Frank and fiery Hun
Shout 'mid their sulphurous canopy."
"You'd think, from the way the bird 's singing, and the flowers
blooming, that there'd never been a gun fired within a hundred miles o'
here."
"Seems like we only dreamed all that happened last night," accorded Alf
Russell. "There's nothing in the woods or the ground that looks as it
did then, and I can't hardly make myself believe that this is the way we
come."
"Well, here's something that'll convince you it wasn't a dream," said
Si, as they made their way through the broken and trampled brush, and
came to a little knoll, on which the final fight had been made, and
where were gathered the wounded rebels. There were three of these; the
man whom Shorty had shot in the shoulder, the one whom Si knocked down
by a stunning blow on the head, and the one who had been hit in
the thigh by a shot from the boys, and who was the "pardner" of the
recalcitrant man of the previous evening. He was still there, caring for
his comrades. The men who had been shot were so faint from loss of blood
that they could scarcely move, and the man whom Si had struck was only
slowly recovering consciousness.
The unhurt rebel was standing there with his gun in hand, and had
apparently been watching their approach for some time.
"My parole was out at daylight," he said, as they came up. "The sun's
now nearly an hour high. I ain't obleeged to be good no more, and I
could' 've drapped one o' yo'uns when y' fust turned offen the road, and
got away. I s'pose I'd orter've done hit, and I'd a great mind ter, but
suthin' sorter held me back. Onderstand that?"
"You'd a' bin a nice man to've shot at us when we wuz comin' to help
your comrades," said Si, walking up coolly toward him, and getting near
enough to prevent his leveling his gun, while he held his own ready
for a quick blow with the barrel. "We needn't've come back here at all,
except that we felt it right to take care o' the men that got hurt."
"Come back to take keer o' the men that yo'uns swatted last night?" said
the rebel incredulously. "That haint natural. 'Taint Yankee-like. What'd
yo'uns keer for 'em, 'cept to see if they'uns's dead yit, and mebbe gin
'em a prod with the bayonit to help 'em along? But they'uns's mouty nigh
dead, now. They'uns can't last much longer. But I'll kill the fust
one o' yo'uns that tries to prod one o' they'uns with a bayonit. Let
they'uns alone. They'll soon be gone."
"What're you talkin' about, you dumbed fool?" said Si, irritably. "We
haint no Injuns nor heathens, to kill wounded men. We're Injiannians and
Christians, what read the Bible, and foller what it says about lovin'
your enemies, and carin' for them what despitefully use you--that is,
after you've downed 'em good and hard."
"Does your Bible say that ere?" asked the rebel.
"Yes, indeed."
"Well, hit must be a new-fangled kind of a Yankee Bible. The only Bible
I ever seed was a piece o' one that used t' be in dad's house, and I've
done heared strangers read hit aloud hundreds o' times, and hit said
nothin' like that. Hit had lots in it 'bout killin' every man and
man-child, and hewin' 'em to pieces afore the Lord, but nothin' 'bout
lovin' and takin' keer o' them that wuz fernest ye."
"Well, it's in there, all the same," said Si impatiently, "and you must
mind it, same's we do. Come, drop that gun, and help us take care o'
these men. They ain't goin' to die. We won't let 'em. They're all right.
Just faint from loss o' blood. We kin fix 'em up. Set your gun agin'
that beech there, and go to the branch and git some water to wash their
wounds, and we'll bring 'em around all right."
There was something so masterful in Si's way, that the rebel obeyed. Si
set his own gun down against a hickory, in easy reach, and had the boys
do the same. He had naturally gained a good deal of knowledge of rough
surgery in the army, and he proceeded to put it to use. He washed the
wounds, stayed the flow of blood, and to take the rising fever out of
the hurts, he bound on them fresh, green dockleaves, wet with water.
After the man he had struck had had his face washed, and his head
thoroughly doused with cold water, he recovered rapidly and was soon
able to sit up, and then rise weakly to his feet.
The rebel looked on wonderingly.
"Well, yo'uns is as good doctrin' hurts as ole Sary Whittleton, and
she's a natural bone-setter," he said.
"Well, don't stand around and gawk,", said Si snappishly. "Help. What's
your name?"
"Gabe Brimster."
"Well, Gabe, go down to the branch and git some more water, quick as you
kin move them stumps o' your'n. Give the men all they want to drink,
and then pour some on their wounds. Then go there and cut some o' them
pawpaws, and peel their bark, to make a litter to carry your pardner
back to the mill. Boys, look around for guns. Smash all you kin find on
that rock there, so they won't be of no more use. Bust the locks good,
and bend the barrels. Save two to make the handles of the litter."
Si proceeded to deftly construct a litter out of the two guns, with some
sticks that he cut with a knife, and bound with pawpaw strips.
A few days before, Si, while passing near the hospital, saw a weak
convalescent faint and fall. He rushed to the Surgeon's tent, and that
officer being busy, handed him a small bottle with a metal top, and
filled with strong ammonia, telling him to unscrew the top and hold the
bottle under the man's nose. He did so, with the effect of reviving
him. Si thrust the bottle into his pocket, to help the man back to
the hospital, and forgot all about it, until one after another of his
present patients overdid himself, had a relapse, and fainted away. Si
happened to feel his bottle, drew it out, unscrewed the top, thrust it
under their noses, and revived them.
Gabs's eyes opened wider at each performance. He had never seen a bottle
with a metal top, or one that unscrewed, or anything that seemed to
effect such wonderful changes by merely pointing it at a man. His
mountaineer intellect, prone to "spells" and "charms," saw in it at once
an instrument of morta: witchcraft. With a paling face, he began edging
toward his gun. Busy as Si had been, he had kept constantly in mind the
possibility of Gabe's attempting some mischief, and did not let himself
lose sight of the rebel's gun. He quickly rose, and with a few strides,
placed himself between Gabe and his gun.
[Illustration: MR. YANK, DON'T CONJURE ME. 135]
"Where are you goin'?" he said sternly.
"I'm a-gwine away," replied the man, in terror-stricken accents. "I'm
a-gwine away mouty quick. I don't want to stay here no longer."
"Indeed you're not goin' away. You'll stay right with us, and help us
take care o' your comrades."
"I'm a-gwine away, I tell y'," shrieked Gabe. "I'm gwine right away.
I'm skeered o' yo'uns. Yo'uns is no doctor, nor no sojer. Yo'uns is a
conjure-man, and a Yankee conjure-man, too--wust kind. Yo'uns 've bin
puttin' spells on them men, and yo'uns'll put a spell on me. I've felt
hit from the fust. I'm a-gwine away. Le'me go, quick."
Si caught the man roughly by the shoulder with his left hand, and raised
his right threateningly. It still had the bottle in it. "You're not
goin' a step, except with us," he said. "Go back there, and 'tend to
your business as I told you, or I'll break you in two."
The sight of the dreadful bottle pointed at him completely unnerved the
rebel. He fell on his knees.
"O, Mister Yank--Mister Conjure-man! don't put no spell on me. Pray to
God, don't! I had one on me wunst, when I was little, and liked to've
died from hit. I haint no real rebel. I wuz conscripted into the army,
or I wouldn't be foutin' yo'uns. I won't fout no more, if yo'uns'll not
put a spell on me. 'Deed I won't! I swar to God I wont!"
And he raised his right hand in testimony.
"Put a spell on you? Conjure you? What dumbed nonsense!" ejaculated Si,
and then his eyes caught the rebel's fastened on the bottle in his hand,
and a gleam of the meaning entered his mind. He had no conception of
the dread the mountaineers have of being "conjured," but he saw that
something about the bottle was operating terrifically on the rebel's
mind and took advantage of it. He was in too much of a hurry to inquire
critically what it was, but said: "Well, I won't do nothin' to you, so
long's you're good, but mind that you're mighty good, and do just as I
say, or I'll fix you. Git up, now, and take hold o' your pardner's feet,
and help me lift him on the litter. Then you take hold o' the front
handles. Monty, throw your gun-sling over your shoulder, and take hold
o' the rear handles. The two o' you carry this man back. Alf, throw your
gun-sling over your shoulder, put your arm under this man's, and help
him along. I'll help this man."
They slowly made their way back toward the mill. As they came on the
crest of the last rise, they saw Shorty and the rest eagerly watching
for them. Shorty and the others ran forward and helped them bring the
men in. Shorty was particularly helpful to the man he had shot. He
almost carried him in to the mill, handling him as tenderly as if a
child, fixed a comfortable place for him on the floor with his own
blankets, and took the last grains of his coffee to make him a cup. This
done, he said:
"I'm goin' out into the country to try and find some chickens to make
some broth for you men. Come along, Harry Joslyn, Gid Mackall and little
Pete."
The country roundabout was discouragingly poor, and had been thoroughly
foraged over. But Shorty had a scent for cabins that were hidden away
from the common roads, and so escaped the visitations of ordinary
foragers. These were always miserably poor, but generally had a
half-dozen chickens running about, and a small store of cornmeal and
sidemeat. Ordinarily he would have passed one of these in scorn, because
to take any of their little store would starve the brood of unkempt
children that always abounded. But now, they were his hope. He had been
playing poker recently with his usual success, and as the bets were in
Confederate money, he had accumulated quite a wad of promises to "Pay in
gold, six months after the ratification of a Treaty of Peace between
the Confederate States and the United States." He would make some
mountaineer family supremely happy by giving them more money than they
had ever seen in their lives, in exchange for their stock of meal,
chickens and sidemeat. They would know where to get more, and so the
transaction would be a pleasant one all around.
In the meanwhile, little Pete had visions of killing big game in the
mountain woods. The interminable forest suggested to him dreams of bear,
deer, buffalo, elk, and all the animals he had read about. It would be
a great thing to bring down an elk or a deer with his Springfield rifle,
and then be escorted back' to camp in triumph, with the other boys
carrying his game. He kept circling through the woods, in sight or
hearing of the others, expecting every minute to come upon some animal
that would fill his youthful sanguine hopes.
Shorty at last found a poor little cabin such as he had been looking
for. It was hidden away in a little cove, and had never been visited
by the men of either army. It had the usual occupants--a weak-eyed,
ague-smitten man, who was so physically worthless that even the
rebel conscripters rejected him; a tall, gaunt woman, with a vicious
shrillness in her voice and a pipe in her mouth; a half score of mangy
yellow dogs, and an equal number of wild, long-haired, staring children.
They had a little "jag" of meal in a bag, a piece of sidemeat, and a
half-dozen chickens. The man had that morning shot an opossum, lean from
its Winter fasting. Shorty rejected this contemptuously.
"I've bin mighty hungry in my time," said he, "but I never got quite
so low down as to eat anything with a tail like a rat. That'd turn my
stummick if I was famishin'."
The man looked on Shorty's display of wealth with lack-luster eyes, but
his wife was fascinated, and quickly closed up a deal which conveyed to
Shorty all the food that they had. Just as Shorty had completed payment,
there came a shot from little Pete's rifle, and the next instant that
youth appeared at the edge of the cornpatch extending up hill from the
cabin, hatless, and yelling at the top of his voice. Shorty and the
others picked up their guns and took position behind the trees.
"What's the matter, Pete?" asked Shorty, as the boy came up, breathless
from his long run. "Rebels out there?"
"No," gasped Pete. "I was hunting out there for a deer, or a elk, or
a bear, when suddenly I come acrost the queerest kind of an animal. It
looked more like a hog than anything else, yet it wasn't a hog, for it
was thinner'n a cat. It had long white tusks, longer'n your hand, that
curled up from its mouth, little eyes that flashed fire, and great long
bristles on his back, that stood straight up. I shot at it and missed
it, and then it run straight at me. I made for the fence as hard as I
could, but it outrun me and was gaining on me every jump. Just as I clim
the fence it a-most ketched me, and made a nip not six inches from my
leg. I could hear him gnash them awful tusks o' his'n."
"Humph," said the woman. "He's run acrost Stevenson's old boar, that
runs in them woods up thar, and is mouty savage this time o' year. He'd
take a laig offen a youngster quicker'n scat, if he ketched him. He done
well to run."
Shorty and the others walked up to the fence and looked over. There was
the old razor-back King of the woods still raging around sniffing the
air of combat.
"Why, it's only a hog, Pete!" said Shorty.
"Only a hog!" murmured Pete with shamed heart.
"That a hog?" echoed the others. "Well, that's the queerest looking hog
I ever saw."
"It's a hog all the same," Shorty assured them. "A genuine razor-back
hog. But he's got the secession devil in him like the people, and you
want to be careful of him. He ain't fit to eat or I'd kill him. Let's
git back to the mill."