Aladdin was jolted miserably down the Peninsula in a white ambulance, which mules dragged through knee-deep mud and over flowing, corduroy roads. He had fever in his whole body, anguish in one leg, and hardly a wish to live. But at Fort Monroe the breezes came hurrying from the sea, like so many unfailing doctors, and blew his fever back inland where it belonged. He lay under a live-oak on the parade ground and once more received the joy of life into his heart. When he was well enough to limp about, they gave him leave to go home; and he went down into a ship, and sailed away up the laughing Chesapeake, and up the broad Potomac to Washington. There he rested during one night, and in the morning took train for New York. The train was full of sick and wounded going home, and there was a great cheerfulness upon them all. Men joined by the brotherhood of common experience talked loudly, smoked hard, and drank deep. There was tremendous boasting and the accounting of unrivaled adventures. In Aladdin’s car, however, there was one man who did not join in the fellowship, for he was too sick. He had been a big man and strong, but he looked like a ghost made of white gossamer and violet shadows. His own mother would not have recognized him. He lay back into the corner of a seat with averted face and closed eyes. The more decent-minded endeavored, on his account, to impose upon the noisy a degree of quiet, but their efforts were unavailing. Aladdin, drumming with his nails upon the windowpane, fell presently into soft song:
Give me three breaths of pleasureAfter three deaths of pain,And make me not remeasureThe ways that were in vain.
Men grew silent and gathered to hear, for Aladdin’s fame as a maker of songs had spread over the whole army, and he was called the Minstrel Major. He felt his audience and sang louder. The very sick man turned a little so that he, too, could hear. Only the occasional striking of a match or the surreptitious drawing of a cork interrupted. The stately tune moved on:
The first breath shall be laughter,The second shall be wine;And there shall follow afterA kiss that shall be mine.
Somehow all the homing hearts were set to beating.
Roses with dewfall ladenOne garden grows for me;I call them kisses, maiden,And gather them from thee.
The very sick man turned fully, and there was a glad light of recognition in his eyes.
Give me three kisses only—Then let the storm break o’erThe vessel beached and lonelyUpon the lonely shore.
If Aladdin’s singing ever moved anybody particularly, it was Aladdin, and that was why it moved other people. He sang on with tears in his voice
Give me three breaths of pleasureAfter three deaths of pain,And I will no more treasureThe hopes that are in vain.
There was silence for a moment, more engaging than applause, and then applause. Aladdin was in his element, and he wondered what he would best sing next if they should ask him to sing again, and this they immediately did. The train was jolting along between Baltimore and Philadelphia. There was much beer in the bellies of the sick and wounded, and much sentiment in their hearts. Aladdin’s finger was always on the pulse of his audience, and he began with relish:
Oh, shut and dark her window isIn the dark house on the hill,But I have come up through the lilac walkTo the lilt of the whippoorwill,With the old years tugging at my handsAnd my heart which is her heart still.
There was another man in the car whose whole life centered about a house on a hill with a lilac walk leading up to it. He was the very sick man, and a shadow of red color came into his cheeks.
They said, “You must come to the house once more,Ere the tale of your years be done,You must stand and look up at her window again,Ere the sands of your life are run,As the night-time follows the lost daytime,And the heart goes down with the sun.”
There were tears in the very sick man’s eyes, for the future was hidden from him. Aladdin sang on:
Though her window be darkest of every one,In the dark house on the hill,Yet I turn to it here from this ruin of grass,She has leaned on that window’s sill,And dark it is, but there is, there isAn echo of light there still!
There was great applause from the drunk and sentimental. And Aladdin lowered his eyes until it was over. When he raised them it was to encounter those of the very sick man. Aladdin sprang to his feet with a cry and went limping down the aisle.
“Peter,” he cried, “by all that’s holy!”
All the tenderness of the Celt gushed into Aladdin’s heart as he realized the pitiful condition and shocking emaciation of his friend. He put his arm gently about him, and thus they sat until the journey’s end. In New York they separated.
Aladdin rested that night and boarded an early morning train for Boston. He settled himself contentedly behind a newspaper, and fell to gathering news of the army. But it was difficult to read. A sentence beginning like this: “Rumors of a savage engagement between the light horse under” would shape itself like this: “I am going to see Margaret to-morrow—to-morrow—to-morrow—I am going to see Margaret to-morrow-tomorrow—and God is good—is good—is good.”
Oddly enough, there was another man in the car who was having precisely the same difficulty in deciphering his newspaper. At about the same time they both gave up the attempt; and their eyes met. And they laughed aloud. And presently, seated together, they fell into good talk, but each refrained pointedly from asking the other where he was going.
With a splendid assumption of innocence, they drove together across Boston, and remarking nothing on the coincidence, each distinctly heard the other checking his luggage for Portland, Maine.
Side by side they rolled out of Portland and saw familiar trees and hills go by. Presently Aladdin chuckled:
“Where are you going, Peter, anyway?” he said.
“Just where you are,” said Peter.
“Peter,” said Aladdin, presently, “it seems to me that for two such old friends we are lacking in confidence. I know precisely what you are thinking about, and you know precisely what I am. We mustn’t play the jealous rivals to the last; and to put it plainly, Peter, if God is going to be good to you instead of me, why, I’m going to try and thank God just the same. A personal disappointment is a purely private matter and has no license to upset old ties and affections. Does it occur to you that we are after the same thing and that one of us isn’t going to get it?”
“We won’t let it make any difference,” said Peter, stoutly.
“That’s just it,” said Aladdin. “We mustn’t.”
“The situation—” Peter began.
“Is none the less difficult, I know. Here we are with a certain amount of leave to occupy as we each see fit. And, unfortunately, there’s only one thing which seems fit to either of us. And, equally unfortunately, it’s something we can’t hold hands and do at the same time. Shall I go straight from the station to Mrs. Brackett’s and wait until you’ve had your say, Peter?—not that I want to wait very long,” he added.
“That wouldn’t be at all fair,” said Peter.
“Do you mind,” said Aladdin after a pause, “telling me about what your chances are?”
Peter reddened uncomfortably.
“I’m afraid they’re not very good, ‘Laddin,” he said. “She—she said she wasn’t sure. And that’s a good deal more apt to mean nothing than everything, but I can’t straighten my life out till I’m sure.”
“My chances,” said Aladdin, critically, “shouldn’t by rights be anywhere near as good as yours, but as long as they remain chances I feel just the same as you do about yours, and want to get things straightened out. But if I were any kind of a man, I’d drop it, because I’m not in her class.”
“Nonsense,” said Peter.
“No, I’m not,” said Aladdin, gloomily. “I know that. But, Peter, what is a man going to do, a single, solitary, pretty much good-for-nothing man, with three great bouncing Fates lined up against him?”
Peter laughed his big, frank laugh.
“Shall we chuck the whole thing,” said Aladdin, “until it’s time to go back to the army?”
“No,” said Peter, “that would be shirking; it’s got to be settled one way or another very quickly.” He became grave again.
“I think so, too, Peter,” said Aladdin. “And I think that if she takes one of us it will be a great sorrow for the other.”
“And for her,” said Peter, quietly.
“Perhaps,” said Aladdin, whimsically, “she won’t take either of us.”
“That,” said Peter, “should be a great sorrow for us both.”
“I know,” said Aladdin. “Anyway, there’s got to be sorrow.”
“I think I shall bear it better,” said Peter, “if she takes you, ‘Laddin.”
A flash of comparison between his somewhat morbid and warped self and the bigness and nobility of his friend passed through Aladdin’s mind. He glanced covertly at the strong, emaciated face beside him, and noted the steadiness and purity of the eyes. A little quixotic flame, springing like an orchid from nothing, blazed suddenly in his heart, and for the instant he was the better man of the two.
“I hope she takes you, Peter,” he said.
They rolled on through the midsummer woods, heavy with bright leaves and waist-deep with bracken; little brooks, clean as whistles, piped away among immaculate stones, and limpid light broken by delicious shadows fell over all.
“Who shall ask her first?” said Aladdin. Peter smiled. “Shall we toss for it?” said Aladdin. Peter laughed gaily. “Do you really want it to be like that?” he said.
“What’s the use of our being friends,” said Aladdin, “if we are not going to back each other up in this of all things?”
“Right!” said Peter. “But you ought to have the first show because you mentioned it first.”
“Rubbish!” said Aladdin. “We’ll toss, but not now; we’ll wait till we get there.”
Peter looked at his watch.
“Nearly in,” he said.
“Yes,” said Aladdin. “I know by the woods.”
“Did you telegraph, by any chance?” said Peter. “Because I didn’t.”
“Nor I,” said Aladdin; “I didn’t want to be met.”
“Nor I,” said Peter.
“The sick man and the lame man will take hands and hobble up the hill,” said Aladdin. “And whatever happens, they mustn’t let anything make any difference.”
“No,” said Peter, “they mustn’t.”
Our veterans walked painfully through the town and up the hill; nor were they suffered to go in peace, for right and left they were recognized, and people rushed up to shake them by the hands and ask news of such an one, and if Peter’s bullet was still in him, and if it was true, which of course they saw it wasn’t, that Aladdin had a wooden leg. Aladdin, it must be owned, enjoyed these demonstrations, and in spite of his lameness strutted a little. But Peter, white from the after effects of his wound and weary with the long travel, did not enjoy them at all. Then the steep pitch of the hill was almost too much for him, and now and again he was obliged to stop and rest.
The St. Johns’ house stood among lilacs and back from the street by the breadth of a small garden. In the rear were large grounds, fields, and even woods. The place had two entrances, one immediately in front of the house for people on foot, and the other, a quarter of a mile distant, for people driving. This latter, opening from a joyous country lane of blackberry-vines and goldenrod, passed between two prodigious round stones, and S-ed into a dark and stately wood. Trees, standing gladly where God had set them, made a screen, impenetrable to the eye, between the gateway and the house.
Here Peter and Aladdin halted, while Aladdin sent a coin spinning into the air.
“Heads!” called Peter.
Aladdin let the piece fall to the ground, and they bent over it eagerly.
“After you,” said Peter, for the coin read, “Tails.”
Aladdin picked up the coin, and hurled it far away among the trees.
“That’s our joint sacrifice to the gods, Peter,” he said.
Peter gave him five cents.
“My share,” he said.
“Peter,” said Aladdin, “I will ask her the first chance I get, and if there’s nothing in it for me, I will go away and leave the road clear for you. Come.”
“No,” said Peter; “you’ve got your chance now. And here I wait until you send me news.”
“Lord!” said Aladdin, “has it got to be as sudden as this?”
“Let’s get it over,” said Peter.
“Very good,” said Aladdin. “I’ll go. But, Peter, whatever happens, I won’t keep you long in suspense.”
“Good man,” said Peter.
Aladdin turned his face to the house like a man measuring a distance. He drew a deep breath.
“Well—here goes,” he said, and took two steps.
“Wait, ‘Laddin,” said Peter.
Aladdin turned.
“Can I have your pipe?”
“Of course.”
Aladdin turned over his pipe and pouch. “I’m afraid it’s a little bitter,” he said.
Again he started up the drive; but Peter ran after him.
“‘Laddin,” he cried, “wait—I forgot something.”
Aladdin came back to meet him.
“Aladdin,” said Peter, “I forgot something.” He held out his hand, and Aladdin squeezed it.
“Aladdin,” said Peter, “from the bottom of my heart I wish you luck.”
When they separated again there were tears in the eyes of both.
Just before the curtain of trees quite closed the view of the gate, Aladdin turned to look at Peter. Peter sat upon one of the big stones that marked the entrance, smoking and smoking. He had thrown aside his hat, and his hair shone in the sun. There was a kind of wistfulness in his poise, and his calm, pure eyes were lifted toward the open sky. A great hero-worship surged in Aladdin’s heart, and he thought that there was nothing that he would not do for such a friend. “He gave you your life once,” said a little voice in Aladdin’s heart; “give him his. He is worth a million of you; don’t stand in his way.”
Aladdin turned and went on, and the well-known house came into view, but he saw only the splendid, wistful man at the gate, waiting calmly, as a gentleman should, for life or death, and smoking smoking.
Even as he made his resolve, a lump of self-pity rose in Aladdin’s throat. That was the old Adam in him, the base clay out of which springs the fair flower of self-sacrifice.
He tried a variety of smiles, for he wished to be easy in the difficult part which he had so suddenly, and in the face of all the old years, elected to play. “He must know by the look of me,” said Aladdin, “that I do not love her any more, for, God help me, I can’t say it.”
He found her on the broad rear veranda of the house. And instead of going up to her and taking her in his arms,—for he had planned this meeting often, as the stars could tell, he stood rooted, and said:
“Hallo, Margaret!”
He acted better than he knew, for the great light which had blazed for one instant in her eyes on first seeing him went out like a snuffed candle, and he did not see it or know that it had blazed. Therefore his own cruelty was hidden from him, and his part became easier to play. They shook hands, and even then, if he had not been blinded with the egotism of self-sacrifice, he might have seen. That was his last chance. For Margaret’s heart cried to her, “It is over,” and in believing it, suddenly, and as she thought forever, an older sweetness came in her face.
“You’ve changed, Aladdin,” she said.
“Yes, I’m thinner, if possible,” said Aladdin, “almost willowy. Do you think it’s becoming?”
“I am not sure,” said Margaret. “The fact remains that I’m more than glad to see you.”
Aladdin fumbled for speech.
“I’m still a little lame, you see,” he said apologetically, and took several steps to show.
“Very!” said Margaret, in such a voice that Aladdin wondered what she meant.
“But it doesn’t hurt any more.”
“Then that’s all right.”
“Where’s Jack?” he asked at length.
Margaret became very grave.
“I’m afraid we’ve betrayed our trust, Aladdin,” she said. “Because only yesterday he slipped away and left a little note to say that he was going to enlist. We’re very much distressed about it.”
“Perhaps it’s better so,” said Aladdin, “if he really wanted to go. Did he leave any address?”
“None whatever; he simply vanished.”
“Ungrateful little brute!” said Aladdin. Then he bethought him of Peter. “I’ll come back later, Margaret,” he said, “but it behooves me to go and look up the good Mrs. Brackett.”
He hardly knew how he got out of the house. He felt like a criminal who has been let off by the judge.
The sun was now low, and the shadows long and black. Aladdin found Peter where he had left him, balancing on the great stone at the entrance, and sending up clouds of smoke. He rose when he saw Aladdin, and he looked paler and more worn. “Peter,” said Aladdin, “from the bottom of my heart I wish you luck.”
Aladdin had never seen just such a look as came into Peter’s eyes; at once they were full of infinite pity, and at peace with the whole world.
“Peter,” said Aladdin, “give me back my pipe.” His voice broke in spite of himself, for he had given up golden things. “I—” he said, “I’ll wait here a little while, but if—if all goes well, Peter, don’t you bother to come back.”
They clasped hands long and in silence. Then Peter turned with a gulp, and, his weakness a thing of the past, went striding up the driveway. But Aladdin sat down to wait. And now a great piping of tree-frogs arose in all that country. Aladdin waited for a long time. He waited until the day gave way to twilight and the sun went down. He waited until the twilight turned to dark and the stars came out. He waited until, after all the years of waiting and longing, his heart was finally at peace. And then he rose to go.
For Peter had not yet come.
“Where are the tall men that marched on the right,That marched to the battle so handsome and tall?They ‘ve been left to mark the places where they saw the foemen’s faces,For the fever and the lead took them all, Jenny Orde,The fever and the lead took them all.“I found him in the forefront of the battle, Kenny Orde,With the bullets spitting up the ground around him,And the sweat was on his brow, and his lips were on his sword,And his life was going from him when I found him.“We lowered him to rest, Jenny Orde,With your picture on his breast, Jenny Orde,And the rumble of pursuit was the regiment’s saluteTo the man that loved you best, Jenny Orde.”
As a dam breaking gives free passage to the imprisoned waters, and they rush out victoriously, so Vicksburg, starving and crumbling in the West, was about to open her gates and set the Father of Waters free forever. That was where the Union hammer, grasped so firmly by strong fingers that their knuckles turned white, was striking the heaviest blows upon the cracking skull of the Confederacy. On the other hand, Chancellorsville had verged upon disaster, and the powers of Europe were waiting for one more Confederate victory in order to declare the blockade of Southern ports at an end, and to float a Southern loan. That a Confederate victory was to be feared, the presence in Northern territory of Lee, grasping the handle of a sword, whose splendid blade was seventy thousand men concentrated, testified. That Lee had lost the best finger of his right hand at Chancellorsville was but job’s comfort to the threatened government at Washington. That government was still, after years of stern fighting, trying generals and finding them wanting. But now the Fates, in secret conclave, weighed the lots of Union and Disunion; and that of Disunion, though glittering and brilliant like gold, sank heavily to the ground, as a great eagle whose wing is broken by the hunter’s bullet comes surely if fiercely down, to be put to death.
Early on the morning of July 1, 1863, Lee found himself in the neighborhood of a small and obscure town named Gettysburg. A military invasion is the process of occupying in succession a series of towns. To occupy Gettysburg, which seemed as possible as eating breakfast, Lee sent forward a division of a corps, and followed leisurely with all his forces. But Gettysburg and the ridges to the west of Gettysburg were already occupied by two brigades of cavalry, and those, with a cockiness begotten of big lumps of armed friends approaching from the rear, determined to go on occupying. This, in a spirit of great courage, with slowly increasing forces, against rapidly increasing forces, they did, until the brisk and pliant skirmish which opened the business of the day had grown so in weight and ferocity that it was evident to the least astute that the decisive battle of the New World was being fought.
There was a pretty girl in Manchester, Maryland (possibly several, but one was particularly pretty), and Aladdin, together with several young officers (nearly all officers were young in that war) of the Sixth Army Corps, rather flattered himself that he was making an impression. He was all for making impressions in those days. Margaret was engaged to marry Peter—and a pretty girl was a pretty girl. The pretty girl of Manchester had several girls and several officers to tea on a certain evening, and they remained till midnight, making a great deal of noise and flirting outrageously in dark corners. Two of the girls got themselves kissed, and two of the officers got their ears boxed, and later a glove each to stick in their hat-bands. At midnight the party broke up with regret, and the young officers, seeking their quarters, turned in, and were presently sleeping the sleep of the constant in heart. But Aladdin did not dream about the pretty girl of Manchester, Maryland. When he could not help himself—under the disadvantage of sleep, when suddenly awakened, or when left alone—his mind harped upon Margaret. And often the chords of the harping were sad chords. But on this particular night he dreamed well. He dreamed that her little feet did wrong and fled for safety unto him. What the wrong was he knew in his dream, but never afterward—only that it was a dreadful, unforgivable wrong, not to be condoned, even by a lover. But in his dream Aladdin was more than her lover, and could condone anything. So he hid her feet in his hands until those who came to arrest them had passed, and then he waked to find that his hands were empty, and the delicious dream over. He waked also to find that it was still dark, and that the Sixth Army Corps was to march to a place called Taneytown, where General Meade had headquarters. He made ready and presently was riding by his general at the head of a creaking column, under the starry sky. In the great hush and cool that is before a July dawn, God showed himself to the men, and they sang the “Battle-hymn of the Republic,” but it sounded sweetly and yearningly, as if sung by thousands of lovers:
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift swordHis truth is marching on.
The full sunlight gives man poise and shows him the practical side of things, but in the early morning and late at night man is seldom quite rational. He weakly allows himself to dwell upon what was not, is not, and will not be. And so Aladdin, during the first period of that march, pretended that Margaret was to be his and that all was well.
A short distance out of Manchester the column met with orders from General Meade and was turned westward toward Gettysburg. With the orders came details of the first day’s fight, and Aladdin learned of the officer bringing them, for he was a Maine man, that Hamilton St. John was among the dead. Aladdin and the officer talked long of the poor boy, for both had known him well. They said that he had not been as brilliant as John, nor as winning as Hannibal, but so honest and reliable, so friendly and unselfish. They went over his good qualities again and again, and spoke of his great strength and purity, and of other things which men hold best in men.
And now they were riding with the sun in their eyes, and white dust rolled up from the swift feet of horses and men. Wild roses and new-mown grass filled the air with delightful fragrance, and such fields as were uncut blazed with daisies and buttercups. Over the trimmed lawns about homesteads yellow dandelions shone like stars in a green sky. Men, women, and children left their occupations, and stood with open mouths and wide eyes to see the soldiers pass. The sun rose higher and the day became most hot, but steadily, unflinchingly as the ticking of a clock, the swift, bleeding, valiant feet of the Sixth Army Corps stepped off the miles. And the men stretched their ears to hear the mumbled distant thunder of artillery—that voice of battle which says so much and tells so little to those far off. The Sixth Corps felt that it was expected to decide a battle upon Northern soil for the North, and marching in that buoyant hope, left scarcely a man, broken with fatigue and disappointment, among the wild flowers by the side of the way.
If you have ever ridden from Cairo to the Pyramids you will remember that at five miles’ distance they look as huge as at a hundred yards, and that it is not until you actually touch them with your hand that you even begin to realize how wonderfully huge they really are. It was so with the thunders of Gettysburg. They sounded no louder, and they connoted no more to the column now in the immediate vicinage of the battle, than they had to its far-distant ears. But presently the column halted behind a circle of hills, and beheld white smoke pouring heavenward as if a fissure had opened in the earth and was giving forth steam. And they beheld in the heavens themselves tiny, fleecy white clouds and motionless rings, and they knew that shells were bursting and men falling upon the slopes beyond the hills.
A frenzy of eagerness seized upon the tired feet, and they pressed upward, lightly, like dancers’ feet. Straps creaked upon straining breasts, and sweat ran in bubbles. Then the head of the column reached the ridge of a hill, and its leaders saw through smarting eyes a great horseshoe of sudden death.
That morning Peter Manners had received a letter, but he had not had a chance to open and read it. It was a letter that belonged next to his heart, as he judged by the writing, and next to his heart, in a secure pocket, he placed it, there to lie and give him strength and courage for the cruel day’s work, and something besides the coming of night to look forward to. For the rest, he went among the lines, and smiled like a boy released from school to see how silently and savagely they fought.
The Sixth Corps rested wherever there was shade along the banks of Rock Creek, and gathered strength and breath for whatever work should be assigned to it.
Aladdin, sharing a cherry-pie with a friend, shivered with excitement, for there was a terrific and ever-increasing discharge of cannons and muskets on the left, and it seemed that the time to go forward again and win glory was at hand. Presently one came riding back from the battle. His face was shining with delight, and, sitting like a centaur to the fiery plunges of his horse, he swung his hat and shouted. It was Sedgwick’s chief of staff, McMahon, and he brought glorious news, for he said that the corps was to move toward the heavy firing, where the fighting was most severe.
Then the whole corps sprang to its feet and went forward, tearing down the fences in its path and trampling the long grass in the fields. A mile away the long, flowery slopes ended in a knobbed hill revealed through smoke. That was Little Round Top, and its possession meant victory or defeat. The corps was halted and two regiments were sent forward up the long slope. To them the minutes seemed moments. They went like a wave over the crest to the right of the hill, and poured down into the valley beyond. Here the blue flood of men banked against a stone wall, spreading to right and left, as the waters of a stream spread the length of a dam. Then they began to fire dreadfully into the faces of their enemy, and to curse terribly, as is proper in battle. Bullets stung the long line like wasps, and men bit the sod.
Aladdin was ordered to ride up Little Round Top for information. Half-way up he left his horse among the boulders and finished the laborious ascent on foot. At the summit he came upon a leaderless battery loading and firing like clockwork, and he saw that the rocks were strewn with dead men in light-blue Zouave uniforms, who looked as if they had fallen in a shower from the clouds. Many had their faces caved in with stones, and terrible rents showed where the bayonet had been at work, for in this battle men had fought hand to hand like cave-dwellers. Bullets hit the rocks with stinging blows, and round shot screamed in the air. Sometimes a dead man would be lifted from where he lay and hurled backward, while every instant men cried hoarsely and joined the dead. In the midst of this thunder and carnage, Aladdin came suddenly upon Peter, smiling like a favorite at a dance, and shouted to him. They grinned at each other, and as Aladdin grinned he looked about to see where he could be of use, and sprang toward a gun half of whose crew had been blasted to death by a bursting shell. The sweat ran down his face, and already it was black with burning powder. The flash of the guns set fire to the clothing of the dead and wounded who lay in front, and on the recoil the iron-shod wheels broke the bones of those lying behind. It was impossible to know how the fight was going. It was only possible to go on fighting.
There was a voice in front of the battery that kept calling so terribly for water that it turned cold the stomachs of those that heard. It came from a Confederate, a general officer, who had been wounded in the spine. Occasionally it was possible to see him through the smoke. Sometimes a convulsion seized him, and he beat the ground with his whole body, as a great fish that has been drawn from the water beats the deck of a vessel. It was terrible to look at and hear. Bullets and shot tore the ground about the man and showered him with dust and stones. Aladdin shook his canteen and heard the swish of water. It seemed to him, and his knees turned to water at the thought, that he must go out into that place swept by the fire of both sides, and give relief to his enemy. He did not want to go, and fear shook him; but he threw down the rammer which he had been serving, and drawing breath in long gasps, took a step forward. His resolve came too late. A blue figure slipped by him and went down the slope at a run. It was Manners. They saw him kneel by the dying Confederate in the bright sunlight, and then smoke swept between like a wave of fog. The red flashes of the guns went crashing into the smoke, and on all sides men fell. But presently there came a star-shaped explosion in the midst of the smoke, hurling it back, and they saw Manners again. He was staggering about with his hands over his eyes, and blood was running through his fingers. Even as they looked, a shot struck him in the back, and he came down. They saw his splendid square chest heaving, and knew that he was not yet dead. Then the smoke closed in, but this time another figure was hidden by the smoke. For no sooner did Aladdin see Peter fall than he sprang forward like a hound from the leash. Aladdin kneeled by Manners, and as he kneeled a bullet struck his hat from his head, and a round shot, smashing into the rocky ground a dozen feet away, filled his eyes with dirt and sparks. There was a pungent smell of brimstone from the furious concussions of iron against rock. A bullet struck the handle of Aladdin’s sword and broke it. He unstopped his canteen and pressed the nozzle to Manners’ lips. Manners sucked eagerly, like an infant at its mother’s breast. A bullet struck the canteen and dashed it to pieces. The crashing of the cannon was like close thunder, and the air sang like the strings of an instrument. But Aladdin, so cool and collected he was, might have been the target for praises and roses flung by beauties. He put his lips close to Peter’s ear, and spoke loudly, for the noise of battle was deafening.
“Is it much, darlint?”
Manners turned his bleeding eyes toward Aladdin.
“Go back, you damn little fool!” he said.
“Peter, Peter,” said Aladdin, “can’t you see?”
“No, I can’t. I’m no use now. Go back; go back and give ‘em hell!”
Aladdin endeavored to raise Peter in his arms, but was not strong enough.
“I can’t lift you, I can’t lift you,” he said.
“You can’t,” said Peter. “Bless you for coming, and go back.”
“Shut up, will you?” cried Aladdin, savagely. “Where are you hit?”
“In the back,” said Peter, “and I’m done for.”
“The hell you are!” said Aladdin. Tears hotter than blood were running out of his eyes. “What can I do for you, Peter?” he said in a husky voice.
Manners’ blackened fingers fumbled at the buttons of his coat, but he had not the strength to undo them.
“It’s there, ‘Laddin,” he said.
“What’s there?” said Aladdin. He undid the coat with swift, clever fingers.
“Let me hold it in my hands,” said Peter.
“Is it this—this letter—this letter from Margaret?” asked Aladdin, chokingly, for he saw that the letter had not been opened.
A shower of dirt and stones fell upon them, and a shell burst with a sharp crash above their heads.
“Yes,” said Peter. “Give it to me. I can’t ever read it now.”
“I can read it for you,” said Aladdin. He was struggling with a sob that wanted to tear his throat.
“Will you? Will you?” cried Peter, and he smiled like a beautiful child.
“Sure I will,” said Aladdin.
With the palm of his hand he pressed back the streaming sweat from his forehead twice and three times. Then, having wiped his hands upon his knees, he drew the battered fragment of his sword, and using it as a paper-knife, opened the letter carefully, as a man opens letters which are not to be destroyed. Then his stomach turned cold and his tongue grew thick and burred. For the letter which Margaret had written to her lover was more cruel than the shell which had blinded his eyes and the bullet which was taking his life.
“‘Laddin—” this in a fearful voice.
“Yes.”
“Thank God. I thought you’d been hit. Why don’t you read?”
Aladdin’s eyes, used to reading in blocks of lines rather than a word at a time, had at one glance taken in the purport of Margaret’s letter, and his wits had gone from him. She called herself every base and cruel name, and she prayed her lover to forgive her, but she had never had the right to tell him that she would marry him, for she had never loved him in that way. She said that, God forgive her, she could not keep up the false position any longer, and she wished she was dead.
“There’s a man at the bottom of this,” thought Aladdin. He caught a glimpse of Peter’s poor, bloody face and choked.
“I—it—the sheets are mixed,” he said presently. “I’m trying to find the beginning. There are eight pages,” he went on, “fighting for time,” and they ‘re folded all wrong, and they’re not numbered or anything.”
Peter waited patiently while Aladdin fumbled with the sheets and tried, to the cracking-point, to master the confusion in his mind.
Suddenly God sent light, and he could have laughed aloud. Not in vain had he pursued the muse and sought after the true romance in the far country where she sweeps her skirts beyond the fingers of men. Not in vain had he rolled the arduous ink-pots and striven manfully for the right word and the telling phrase. The chance had come, and the years of preparation had not been thrown away. He knew that he was going to make good at last. His throat cleared of itself, and the choking phlegm disappeared as if before a hot flame of joy. His voice came from between his trembling lips clear as a bell, and the thunder of battle rolled back from the plain of his consciousness, as, slowly, tenderly, and helped by God, he began to speak those eight closely lined pages which she should have written.
“My Heart’s Darling—” he began, and there followed a molten stream of golden and sacred words.
And the very soul of Manners shouted aloud, for the girl was speaking to him as she had never spoken before.