If there is a happier time in a young fellow's life than cadet
furlough, I do not know where to find it. Geordie's home-coming was
something there is little room to tell of in our brief story of his
cadet days. Fort Reynolds had improved but slightly in the two years
of his absence; even the quartermaster had to admit that, and lay the
blame on Congress; but Pops had improved very much—very much indeed, as
even his erstwhile rival, young Breifogle, now a valued book-keeper in
the First National Bank, could not but admit. Mrs. Graham's pride in
her stalwart boy, Buddie's glory in his big brother, and the doctor's
stubborn Scotch effort not to show his satisfaction were all matters
of kindly comment in the garrison. After a few days, during which he
was seldom out of his mother's sight or hearing, she kissed him fondly,
and bade him get to his mountaineering again, for she knew the boy
longed for his gun and the heart of the Rockies. He could have had
half of Lane's troop as escort and companions had the wishes of the
men been consulted, but on the three or four expeditions Buddie, at
least, was ever with him; and after the long day's ride or tramp the
boys would spread their blankets under the whispering trees, and, feet
to the fire, Bud's chin in his hands, and adoring Pops with all his
eyes, there for an hour or more he would coax his cadet brother for
story after story of the Point. In August Connell came out and spent
ten delicious days with them—the first time he had ever set foot in any
garrison; and it was lovely to see how Mrs. Graham rejoiced in her big
boy's faithful friend and chum; how Bud admired, yet could not quite
understand how or why, either as scholar or sergeant, Connell could
or should stand higher than Pops. He pestered both by the hour with
questions about their companies, the other sergeants, corporals, etc.
He hung to them by day, and bitterly resented having to be separated
from them by night. He could not be made to see why he should not go
everywhere they went, do everything they did.
Connell, it must be owned, found Bud a good deal of a nuisance at
times, and even brother Geordie's patience was sometimes tried. Bud
was too big and aggressive now to command sympathy, otherwise there
would have been something actually pathetic in his grievance at not
being allowed to accompany the two cadets when they attended certain
"grown-up" parties to which they were invited in town. The officers and
ladies at the post made much of the young fellows; McCrea could not
do enough for them; and as for the troopers, the best horses and the
hounds were ever at their service, and old Sergeant Feeny delighted
their hearts by always insisting on "standing attention" and touching
his cap to the two young gentlemen. This he was not at all required
to do, as they were only half-way to their commissions, as Geordie
blushingly pointed out to him.
"But it's proud I am to salute ye, sir," said the veteran; "and then
don't the regulations say a cadet ranks any sergeant in the army? Sure
you and Mr. Connell are my supariors in law if ye are my juniors in
years and chiverones."
[Illustration: "'BUT IT'S PROUD I AM TO SALUTE YE, SIR,' SAID THE
VETERAN"]
The officers gave a dance one evening, and Pops and Connell, as was
perfectly proper, attired themselves in their newest gray coats, with
the gleaming chevrons and lozenge of first sergeants, and immaculate
white trousers set off by the sash of crimson silk net. The ladies,
young and old, declared the cadet uniform far more effective than the
army blue; and some of the young matrons who had first seen their
future husbands when wearing the cadet gray were quite sentimentally
affected at sight of it again. Then there were three or four very
pretty girls at the fort, visiting their army home for vacation, and
others in town, and all attended the hops; and both Geordie and Connell
were thankful they had been so well drilled in dancing. Altogether,
they had ten days of bliss they never will forget; and when Connell had
to go, everybody at Reynolds saw that Miss Kitty Willet, the major's
bonny blue-eyed daughter, was wearing on her bangle bracelet a new bell
button that must have come from right over Jim Connell's heart.
And then, all too soon for the loving mother, it was time for Pops to
hasten back to the banks of the Hudson, and gird up his loins for the
great race of the third year.
"Pops," said McCrea, "you are going back to what I hold to be the
hardest of the four years, and going withal to duties which, more than
any others in the cadet battalion, call for all the grit there is in a
man. A young fellow who does his whole duty as first sergeant _must_
make enemies among the careless, the slouchy, and the stubborn in his
company. I hold that no position in the battalion is so calculated to
develop all that is soldierly and manly in a cadet as that of first
sergeant. There are always upper class men who expect to be treated
with consideration, even when they set bad examples; then there are
yearlings always trying to be 'reekless' just to excite the envy of
the plebes. You'll find it the toughest place you ever had to fill;
but go at it with the sole idea of being square and soldierly, and
in spite of all they may say or do you'll win the enduring respect
of the very men who may buck against you and abuse you in every way.
As for popularity, throw all idea of it to the winds; it isn't worth
having. Teach them to respect you, and their esteem and affection will
certainly follow."
Again and again, on the long way back to the Point, Geordie pondered
over what his friend had said, and made up his mind to act accordingly.
"Sergeant-major may sound bigger," said Connell, as the two comrades,
reunited on the journey, were having their last night's chat together
in the sleeper, "but in point of importance in the corps of cadets it
simply isn't in it alongside that of first sergeant. My father can't
break himself of the old fashions of the war days. He was 'orderly'
sergeant, as they called it in '61, and he takes more stock in my being
'orderly' than my being in the 5's."
One day later and they were again in uniform and on duty, and Pops
found himself calmly looking over his company, just seventy strong.
The very first names he saw gave him a twinge of premonition—Frazier
and Jennings. The latter, found deficient in one of his studies and
accorded a re-examination in June, had been turned back to join the
new Second Class; and he and Frazier had decided to live together in
Company B, taking a third-floor area room in the fourth division,
while Geordie, with Ames for his mate, moved in opposite Cadet Captain
Bend, who occupied the tower room on the second floor. Everybody was
surprised at Jennings's transfer from Company A, where he had served
three years, to B, with whose captain and first sergeant both he had
had difficulty in the past. Moreover, there was no little comment on
his living with Frazier, for the few who are known as "turnbacks" in
the corps are usually most tenacious about living with some member of
their original class. But Randal, the new first captain, was glad to
get so turbulent a spirit as Jennings out of his ranks, and Jennings
was of such a height as to enable him to fit in very well, as the
battalion was sized in those days on the left of A or the right of B.
Frazier's class rank was now only 17. A story was in circulation
that he had written to no less than five of the class, begging them
to room with him, and promising to "brace up" this year; but this
was confidential matter, and the cadets whose names were given could
neither affirm nor deny. One thing was certain: Frazier had not been
benefited by his furlough. He was looking sallow and out of condition.
His father's health showed no improvement, so he told his chums;
neither did his father's affairs, but this he told nobody. Like a
number of other deluded people, Benny believed wealth essential to high
repute.
For the first week no friction was apparent. Pops had speedily
memorized his roster, and mapped out his plans for the daily routine.
He had to attend guard-mounting every morning now, which took away
something like forty minutes from possible study-time, and perhaps
twenty minutes to half an hour were needed in making out the morning
reports and other papers. On the other hand, he had the benefit of
more exercise by day, and a light after taps until eleven o'clock. All
through the Fourth Class year cadets are compelled to attend daily
gymnastic exercise under a most skilful teacher; after that it is
optional, and, as all get a fair amount of out-door work except during
the winter months, very many cadets fail to keep up the training of
the plebe year. Not so Pops and Connell. Regularly every day these
young athletes put in half an hour with the Indian clubs, determined
that when the drills were discontinued they would keep up systematic
training in the "gym." But within the first fortnight after their
return to barracks, Connell, coming over to compare notes as usual,
quietly said they might as well add sparring to the list.
"We may need that more than we think, Pops. That fellow Jennings is
stirring up trouble, unless I am mistaken."
Now there are all manner of little points against which a cadet first
sergeant has constantly to be warring, or his company will become lax
and unsoldierly. Unless promptly and firmly met, there are always a
number of old cadets who want to saunter to their places at drum-beat,
who will be, if allowed, always just a little slow, whose coats are
not buttoned throughout or collars not adjusted when they fall in, who
are unsteady in ranks, who answer to their names either boisterously
or ludicrously, who slouch through the manual when not actually on
parade, holding it to be undignified in an old cadet to observe the
motions like a plebe, who are never closed up to the proper distance at
the final tap of the drum—in fine, in a dozen little ways, unless the
first sergeant is fearless and vigilant, and demands equal vigilance of
his assistants, the _morale_ of the company is bound to go down. First
Class men and yearlings are generally the men at fault; plebes, as a
rule, do the best they know how, for otherwise no mercy is shown them.
Very much in this way did the "custom" strike Connell and Pops. What
with roll-calls, recitations, riding, and the brisk evening drills and
parade, Geordie had no time to think of anything beyond his duties.
But Connell said that Jennings had been over talking to some of his
former class-mates, who were old stagers in Company D, and who were
doing a good deal of talking now among themselves about the impropriety
of appointing as their first sergeant a fellow from the right wing
of the battalion who was not imbued with the time-honored tenets and
traditions of the left-flank company. First Class men, said they, had
always enjoyed certain privileges, as became gentlemen of their high
standing, who were to become officers in less than a year, and one day
it was decided they should sound Connell as to what his views might
be, and the result was not at all to their liking. Connell couldn't be
made to see that, because they were speedily to don the army blue, they
should meantime be allowed to discredit the cadet gray.
"There's no reason that I can see," said Connell, "why First Class men
shouldn't be just as soldierly in ranks as other cadets, and every
reason why they should."
Then a B Company committee of two informally dropped in on Pops with a
similar query, and got almost the same answer. Whereupon the committee
said that the class had taken counsel together on the subject. They
courted no trouble whatever, but simply gave Graham to understand that
it wasn't "customary" to hold a First Class man in the ranks to the
same rigid performance of the manual and the same precise carriage
that would be exacted of a plebe. Neither could they be held to strict
account in such trivial affairs as falling in for roll-call with coats
unbuttoned or collars awry or belts twisted, or for other little
matters of the kind, and any reports given them for such would be
"regarded as personal." Whereupon they took their leave, and Geordie
met Con with a broad Scotch grin on his face.
"Jennings is at the bottom of it all," said Connell. "He wants them,
however, to start the move over in D Company, because he can't initiate
anything of the kind under Bend. You understand."
"Well, to my thinking, and according to the way I was brought up," said
Geordie, "such specimens should be court-martialled and dismissed the
service. Men who have no higher idea of duty than that are not fit to
be officers in the army."
"We-el," said philosopher Con, "they are boys only a little older
than plebes, so far as knowledge of the world is concerned. The more
I look at it the more I see just how comically juvenile we are in a
way. When we were plebes, dozens of our class were never going to speak
to those fellows of the yearlings, and never, never going to devil
plebes. Within a year most of us were hobnobbing with the class above
and lording it over the class below. As yearlings, lots of our fellows
hated the first sergeants, who made us stand round, and we weren't
going to have anything to do with them. Now we who are sergeants not
only mean to make the yearlings toe the mark, but the First Class men
as well, and they are going to force a fight on us for doing the very
thing that in three or four years from now any one of their number
who happens to be on duty here as an instructor will report a first
sergeant for not doing. The whole corps says that when '_it_' comes
back here as an officer it won't forget it ever was a cadet, as every
officer seems to do the moment he gets here, and you can bet your sash
and chevrons it will do just exactly as the officers seem to do to-day.
Now these fellows have an overweening idea of their importance because
they are so soon to be graduates. That seems something very big from
our point of view, and yet about the first thing a second lieutenant
has to learn when he gets to his regiment is that he doesn't amount
to a hill of beans. He's nothing but a plebe all over again. There's
Jim Forester; when he was cadet officer of the day and we were plebes,
didn't we think him just a little tin god on wheels? Recollect what a
bully voice he had, and how he used to swing old D Company? But what
did he amount to at Fort Reynolds last summer? Nothing but a low-down
second lieutenant going on as officer of the guard, drilling squads,
and—do you remember how the colonel jumped him that morning for some
error in the guard list? Why, Geordie, you and I were of much more
account at the fort than he was. And now here are these fellows kicking
against the pricks. They don't want to be soldierly, because it's too
plebelike in view of their coming shoulder-straps. We-el, they've just
got to, that's all there is about it. Where are the gloves?"
And with that the two Westerners doffed their coats, donned the
"mittens," and hammered away at each other as they were in daily habit
of doing, and had been doing more or less for many a month of their
Third Class year, Sayers and other experts coaching and occasionally
taking hold for a brisk round or two on their own account. It was
well understood that both Badger and Coyote were in tip-top trim and
training. Meanwhile no trouble occurred in Connell's company worth
speaking of, and little of consequence in B, but it was brewing.
Three or four seniors had been deservedly reported for minor offences
exactly as Geordie said they should be, but they were gentlemen who
took it without audible comment and as a matter of course. Then came
an experiment. Mr. Curry, a First Class man of rather slender build
and reputation, one of the Jennings set, backed deliberately into ranks
one morning at reveille, and stood there leisurely buttoning his coat,
glancing at Graham out of the corner of his eye. Geordie had just about
reached the B's in his roll, and stopped short.
"Curry, fall out and button that coat."
Curry reddened, but did not budge.
Pops budged, but did not redden. If anything he was a trifle paler as
he stepped quickly over opposite the left of the company. His voice was
low and firm:
"Curry, fall out at once and button that coat."
Only two buttons were by this time left unfastened. It took but a
second to snap them into place. And then—
"My coat is buttoned," said Curry.
"It was unbuttoned throughout when you fell in ranks, and you know it.
You also heard my order to fall out, and disobeyed it," was Graham's
answer. Then back to his post he went, finished roll-call, reported
"All present, sir," to Cadet Captain Bend, who had silently watched the
affair, very possibly thinking it just as well to let Graham settle it
for himself. And the next night after parade the following reports were
read out in the clear tones of the cadet adjutant:
"Curry—Buttoning coat in ranks at reveille.
"Same—Continuing same after being ordered to fall out.
"Same—Replying to first sergeant from ranks at same."
Before Graham had thrown off his belts Mr. Jennings appeared, and with
much majesty of mien proceeded to say:
"Mr. Graham, you have taken advantage of Mr. Curry's size, and in his
name and in that of the First Class I am here to demand satisfaction."
"Go for Connell," said Geordie, with a quiet nod to Ames.
Next morning Mr. Jennings did not appear at reveille at all. It seems
that the demand was honored at sight. Cadet Captain Bend cut supper and
risked his chevrons to see that fight. Connell's heart was up in his
mouth just about half the time as he seconded his sergeant comrade. It
was a long-fought, longer remembered battle, and ended only within five
minutes of call to quarters—Jennings at last, as had been predicted
two years before, utterly used up, and Geordie, though bruised and
battered, still in the ring.