Dick followed, the captain into the colonel's tent, and Rodney sat on his horse and looked around while he awaited his return. He thought of what the captain had said regarding the Continentals at Valley Forge, but did not see that there could be any comparison drawn between the two armies. Price's men seemed to be well clothed, provisions were plenty, and as for their arms, they had an abundance of them such as they were, and a charging enemy would find their double-barrel shotguns bad things to face at close quarters. But a few months later the comparison was a good one. During the "little Moscow retreat," after the battle of Pea Ridge (which Van Dorn's ambition led him to fight contrary to orders), along a route where there were neither roads nor bridges, through a region from which the inhabitants had all fled, leaving the country "so poor that a turkey buzzard would not fly over it," with no train of wagons, or provisions to put in them if there had been, and no tents to shelter them from the cold, biting winds and sleet and snow—when Rodney Gray found himself and companions in this situation he thought of the Continentals, and wondered at the patriotism that kept them in the ranks. But it wasn't patriotism that kept Price's men together. It wasfearand nothing else.
But this dark picture was hidden from Rodney's view as he sat there on his horse waiting for his friend Dick Graham to come out of the colonel's tent. The martial scenes around him, the military order that everywhere prevailed, the companies and regiments drilling in the fields close by, the inspiriting music that came to his ears—these sights and sounds filled him with enthusiasm; and if any one had told him that the time would come when he would think seriously of deserting the army and turning his back upon the cause he had espoused, Rodney Gray would have been thunder struck. But the time came.
Having transacted his business with the colonel, Dick Graham came out of the tent and mounted his horse.
"Of course I had to wait until the captain had made his report," said he, in a suppressed whisper, "and in that way I happened to hear a little about yourself and Tom Barton. I knew enough to keep still in the presence of my superiors, but I did want to ask the captain to say more about Tom Barton. Was it Percival?"
Rodney winked first one eye and then the other and Dick was answered.
"It's the strangest thing I ever heard of, and I am in a hurry to know all about it, Come on; our company is up at the end of the street. We occupy the post of honor on the right of the line, because we are the only company in the regiment that is fully uniformed. We'll leave our horses at the stable line, and Captain Jones will make a State Guard of you before you know it."
Not to dwell too long upon matters that have little bearing upon our story, it will be enough to say that Rodney was duly presented to Captain Jones, who was informed that he had come all the way from Louisiana to join a partisan company. He was a Barrington boy, well up in military matters, and desired to be sworn into the State service without the loss of time. Dick was careful not to say too much for fear that he should let out some secrets that Rodney had not yet had opportunity to tell him. Of course the captain was delighted to see the recruit from Louisiana, shook him by the hand as if he had been a younger brother, and sent for an officer to take his descriptive list. He was not required to pass the surgeon, and the oath he took was to the effect that he would obey Governor Jackson and nobody else. This being done Dick took him off to introduce him to the members of his mess.
"But before I do that," said Dick, halting just outside the captain's tent and drawing Rodney off on one side, "I want to know just where you stand, and whether or not you have had any reason to change your politics since I last saw you. Are you as good a rebel as you used to be?"
"I never was a rebel," exclaimed Rodney, with some heat. "I am ready to fight for my State at any time; but I deny the right of my Governor to compel me to obey such a man as General Lacey. I didn't want to be sworn into the Confederate army, and that was what sent me up here."
"That's all right," replied Dick. "I'm glad things turned out that way; otherwise you wouldn't be in my company now. But you don't seem to be as red-hot as you used to be. You say you don't believe in burning out Union men."
"I certainly do not. I believe in fighting the men, but not in abusing the women and children."
"The Union women are like our own—worse than the men," answered Dick. "That is what I was trying to get at, and I must warn you to be careful how you talk to anybody but me; and I, being an officer of the State Guard, can't stand too much treasonable nonsense," he added, drawing himself up to his full height and scowling fiercely at his friend.
"I suppose not; but I don't see that there is anything treasonable in my saying that I don't believe in making war upon those who cannot defend themselves."
"If some of those defenseless persons had been the means of getting you bushwhacked and your buildings destroyed, you might think differently. But come on, and I will make you acquainted with some of the best among the boys."
There were only two "boys" in the tent into which he was conducted, and they were almost old enough to be gray-headed; and as they were getting ready to go on post, Rodney had little more than time to say he was glad to know them. Then Dick said he had some writing to do for the captain that would keep him busy for half an hour, and in the meantime Rodney would have to look out for himself.
"Here's a late copy of theRichmond Whig, if you would like to see it," said one of his new messmates, who having thrown a powder horn and bullet pouch over his shoulder, stood holding a long squirrel rifle in one hand while he extended the paper with the other. "There's an editorial on the inside that may interest you. If the man who wrote it had been trying to express the sentiments of this mess he could not have come nearer to them. Good-by for a couple of hours."
When he was left alone in the tent Rodney hunted up the editorial in question and read as follows:
"We are not enough in the secrets of our authorities to specify the day on which Jeff Davis will dine at the White House, and Ben McCulloch take his siesta in General Siegel's gilded tent. We should dislike to produce any disappointment by naming too soon or too early a day; but it will save trouble if the gentlemen will keep themselves in readiness to dislodge at a moment's notice. If they are not smitten, however, with more than judicial blindness, they do not need this warning at our hands. They must know that the measure of their iniquities is fall, and the patience of outraged freedom is exhausted. Among all the brave men from the Rio Grande to the Potomac, and stretching over into insulted, indignant and infuriated Maryland, there is but one word on every lip 'Washington'; and one sentiment in every heart vengeance on the tyrants who pollute the capital of the Republic!"
The paper was full of such idle vaporings as these, but they fired Rodney Gray's Southern heart to such an extent that he was almost ready to quarrel with Dick Graham when the latter came into the tent an hour later, and began discussing the situation in his cool, level-headed way.
"Yes; I have seen the article," said he, when Rodney asked him what he thought of it, "and it is nothing but the veriest bosh."
"Dick Graham, how dare you?" exclaimed Rodney.
"Oh, I have heard such talk as that before, and right here in this tent from boys who have known me ever since I was knee-high to a duck," replied Dick. "'The tyrants who pollute the capital of the Republic!' The men who are there, are there because they got the most votes; and in this country the majority rules. That's me. Now mark what I tell you: The majority of the people will say that this Union shall not be broken up."
"Then you believe that might makes right, do you?"
"I don't know whether I do or not. If we have the power, we have the right to rise up and shake off the existing form of government and form one that will suit us better. Abe Lincoln said so in one of his speeches, and that's his language almost word for word. But whether the Northern people, having the power, have the right to make us stay in the Union when we don't want to, is a question that is a little too deep for me."
"They have neither the power nor the right," said Rodney angrily. "But you always were as obstinate as a mule, and we can't agree if we talk till doomsday. Now listen while I tell you what I have been through since I said good-by to you in the Barrington depot."
To repeat what he said would be to write a good portion of this book over again. He told the story pretty nearly as we have tried to tell it, with this difference: He touched very lightly upon the courage he had displayed and the risk he had run in helping Tom Percival out of the corn-crib in the wood-cutters' camp, although he was loud in his praises of Tom's coolness and bravery. Dick Graham found it hard to believe some parts of the narrative.
"So Tom wasn't satisfied with risking his neck by going to St. Louis to see Lyon, but had to come back through Iron and St. Francois counties and try to raise another company of Home Guards there. He's either all pluck or else plum crazy."
"He's got a straight head on his shoulders; I'll bear witness to that," replied Rodney. "What do you suppose he will do at home? Where's his company?"
"When the hunter blows his horn his puppies will howl," answered Dick. "His men are scattered here and there and everywhere; but he knows where to find them, and if we ever meet those troops that are concentrating at Springfield, we'll meet Tom Percival. You did a neighborly act when you shoved him your revolver. I wouldn't have given much for you if that—man what's his name?—Westall had found it out. Those Emergency men are nothing but robbers and murderers."
"That was about the idea I formed of them, and I say they ought to be put down if this war is going to be conducted on civilized principles. Where were you when Lyon captured that camp at St. Louis?"
"I was getting ready to go to Booneville. I was in that scrimmage and have smelled powder on half-a-dozen occasions."
"Was that a Secession camp or not?"
"Not as anybody knows of," replied Dick. "It was composed of the State militia which the Governor had ordered out for drill. Under the law he had a right to call them out."
"Now what's the use of your trying any of your jokes on me?" demanded Rodney. "You don't believe a word you have said, and I know it. Be honest now, and have done with your nonsense."
"Well, General Frost, who commanded the camp, assured Captain Lyon that he was not hostile to the government," answered Dick. "But when Lyon got hold of it, he found that the two main streets were named Davis and Beauregard; that a good portion of the men were in rebel uniform; and that they were mostly armed with government muskets which you Louisiana fellows stole out of the Baton Rouge arsenal. Lyon's action in that matter was what caused the riots. I'll say one thing in your private ear: The old flag floats over St. Louis and it's going to stay there."
"I'm not going to get into any argument with you, but you will see that you are wrong. We must have that city in order to command the Mississippi to the Gulf. Wasn't Jackson's proposition and Price's, that the State should remain neutral, a fair one?"
"That's a question that will be settled when this war is over, and not before."
"How do you make that out?"
"If there is such a thing as State Rights, it was a fair proposition; if there isn't, it wasn't. It implies the right of a State to make terms with the government; and that is the very point we are wrangling over. There's but one way to decide it, and that is by force of arms."
"Do you still think we are going to be whipped?"
"I am sure of it."
"And if we are, will you give up the doctrine of State Rights?"
"I'll have to. I can't do anything else. But such talk will lead us into argument, and you say you don't want to argue. I have been in a fever of suspense ever since you sent that second telegram to my father in St. Louis. In it you said, in effect, that you would start up the river on the first boat; and father wrote me that when he got it, he was ready to dance."
"With delight?" asked Rodney.
"Not much. With apprehension. He supposed you were coming up with your whole company. You asked him, for the company, if Price would accept you, and he met Price on the street and showed him the dispatch. Price said he would be glad to do it; and when you sent word that you were coming, father thought, of course, that you were all coming, and he knew that if you did, Lyon would make prisoners of the last one of you the moment you touched the levee."
"Your father didn't give us credit for much sense, did he?" said Rodney, with some disgust in his tones. "The boys wouldn't come and so I had to come alone. I hope that second dispatch did not put your father to any trouble, but I was obliged to send it to throw those telegraph operators off my track and blind them to my real intentions. I suppose that St. Louis cotton-factor was on the watch?"
"Of course; and the minute he put his eyes on that roan colt, he would have pointed you and him out to the soldiers. Your second dispatch frightened father, but it did not put him to any trouble. About that time he received a hint that he was being watched, that he was believed to be hanging about the city for the purpose of picking up information that would do us rebels some good, and so he dug out. He's at home now; and if we get a chance, we'll ride down there some dark night. I should like to have you acquainted."
"Thank you. I'll go any time you say the word; but why do you persist in speaking of our side as 'rebels'? I say we are not. We simply desire to resume the powers which our forefathers were foolish enough to delegate to the general government. Why, the great State of New York, in adopting the Federal Constitution, reserved the right to withdraw from the Union in case things were not run to suit her."
"Yes; but the great State of New York isn't foolish enough to try any such game as that. She'd be whipped so quick that it would make her head swim; and that's just what is going to happen to South Carolina. But you always was as obstinate as a mule, and. I don't care to get into any argument with you."
Rodney Gray was now a full-fledged partisan; but the company to which he was attached was more like mounted infantry than cavalry, for with the exception of the commissioned officers, there was scarcely one among the men who was provided with a saber. The most of Price's men were armed with shotguns and hunting rifles, and in some respects were superior to cavalry. They could move rapidly, fight as infantry, and if worsted in the engagement, jump on their horses and make a quick retreat. Their uniform was cadet gray with light blue slashings, and so nearly like the one that had been worn by the Barrington students, that all Dick Graham had to do to pass muster on dress parade was to add a sergeant'schevronsto the old uniform he had worn at school. Rodney Gray was an "odd sheep in the flock," but Dick had two suits of clothes, one of which his friend Rodney always wore when he was on duty, for Captain Jones was somewhat particular, and wanted his men to appear well on post and when they were ordered out for drill. The mail-carrier who took Rodney's first letter to his father from the camp, took also an order for a full outfit which was addressed to a merchant tailor in Little Rock. Being shut off from St. Louis by Lyon's advancing troops, all the mail, with the exception of some secret correspondence which was kept up during the whole of the war, was sent by courier to Little Rock and New Madrid, and from these places forwarded to its destination in the South.
Rodney Gray arrived at Price's camp during the latter part of June; and almost immediately became aware that preparations were being made for an event of some importance. There was much scouting going on, although he and Dick took no part in it, much to their regret, and now and then there was a skirmish reported. The junction of Price's forces with those of Jackson and Rains, which Siegel hoped to prevent by a rapid march upon Neosho, took place at Carthage, as we have said; but in spite of this Siegel resolved to attack. He left Neosho on the 4th of July, and on the 6th, fought the battle of Carthage against a greatly superior force. Rodney's regiment was in the thickest of it. It tried to outflank Siegel in order to seize his wagon train, but could not stand against the terrible cross-fire of the Union artillery, which mowed them down like blades of grass. The first man killed in Rodney's company was the one who had given him that copy of theRichmond Whig. While charging at Rodney's side he was struck in the breast by a piece of shell, and in falling almost knocked the Barrington boy out of his saddle. There was no time to be frightened or to think of lending a helping hand to his injured comrade, for the line in the rear was coming on, yelling like mad, and anything that opposed its progress would have been run down; anything, perhaps, except that well-managed battery on their right, whose steady, merciless fire was more than living men could endure. They broke and fled, and were not called into action again that day; for when Siegel, finding that he could not take the town, withdrew from the field for the purpose of effecting a junction with another Union force stationed at Mount Vernon, midway between Carthage and Springfield, the road he followed led through thick woods in which mounted troops could not operate. Here the Union commander, aided by his superior artillery and long range rifles, held his own until darkness came on and the Confederates retreated. It was a drawn battle. The Confederates did not dare renew the attack, and Siegel was afraid to hold the field long enough to give his weary troops a chance to rest. He marched all night and reached his destination the next day.
[Illustration: THE CHARGE OF THE RANGERS.]
When the orderly sergeant of Rodney's company came to make out his report, he found that there were six men missing out of seventy-three. One out of twelve was not a severe loss for an hour's fight (when Picket's five thousand made their useless charge at Gettysburg they lost seven men out of every nine), but it was enough to show Rodney that there was a dread reality in war. He told Dick Graham that as long as he lived he would never forget the expression that came upon the face of the comrade who fell at his side, the first man he had ever seen killed. He did not want to go to sleep that night, for fear that he would see that face again in his dreams.
"They say a fellow gets over feeling so after a while," was the way in which Dick sought to comfort and encourage him. "But I'll tell you what's a fact: I don't believe that a man in full possession of his senses can ever go into action without being afraid."
General Lyon's advance troops having been forced to retreat, the boys began to wonder what was to be the next thing on the programme, and it was not long before they found out. Notwithstanding the confident prediction of the captain who commanded the scouting party that had rescued him from the power of the Union men at Truman's house (that fifteen thousand Confederates would be enough to meet and whip the twenty thousand Federals that Lyon was supposed to be concentrating at Springfield), Price began falling back toward Cassville, striving as he went to increase his force by fair means or foul. His mounted troopers carried things with a high hand. If a citizen, listening to their patriotic appeals, shouldered his gun, mounted his horse and went with them, he was a good fellow, a brave man, and his property was safe; but if he showed the least reluctance about "falling in," he was at once accused of being a Union man and treated accordingly. Price wanted fifty thousand men; but, as he afterward told the people of Missouri, less than five thousand, out of a male population of more than two hundred thousand, responded to his calls for help. It may or may not be a fact that that small number comprised all the men that were sworn into the State service; but it is a fact that he commanded more than eight thousand men at the battle of Carthage, and more than twenty thousand at the siege of Lexington. Price's object in falling back toward Cassville was to meet McCulloch with his seven thousand four hundred men who were coming up from Arkansas to reinforce him, and to draw Lyon as far as possible from his base of supplies. These forces met at Crane Creek, and almost immediately there began a conflict of authority between Price and McCulloch, the former urging and the latter opposing an attack upon the Union troops at Springfield. The dispute was finally settled by General Polk, who sent an order all the way from Columbus, Kentucky, commanding McCulloch to advance at once. Observe that he did not include Price in the order, for at this period of the war the Confederate authorities respected State Rights after a fashion of their own (they did not even remove their capital from Montgomery to Richmond until Virginia had given them her gracious permission to do so), and gave no signs of a leaning toward the despotism which they established in less than twelve months.
Meanwhile General Lyon, whose position was one of the greatest danger, could not wait to be attacked. He had weakened his army by garrisoning all the places he seized during his advance and now he had only seven thousand troops left. Even this small force was rapidly growing less, for as fast as their terms of enlistment expired, they were permitted to return to their homes; provisions were getting scarce; and General Fremont, who had lately assumed command of the Western Department, could not send him any reinforcements from St. Louis. So the only thing the Union commander could do to stop the Confederate advance and extricate himself from the dangers with which he was surrounded, was to assume the offensive.
The historian tells us that there was something sublime in that bold march of Lyon on the night of the 9th of August, with a force of five thousand men, to Wilson's Creek, to meet in the morning an army numbering anywhere between fifteen and twenty thousand. His only hope of success lay in a surprise; but there was where he was disappointed, for it so happened that at the time he made his advance, the enemy was making preparations to attack him on four sides at once; but while they were thinking about it, they were assailed by two columns, one in front and the other on the flank. This brought about the battle of Wilson's Creek, which, next to Bull Run, was the severest engagement of the year. General Lyon was killed while leading a bayonet charge at the head of an Iowa regiment. Major Sturgis, on whom the command devolved, ordered a retreat after six hours of useless fighting, and the Confederates were too badly cut up to prevent his leisurely withdrawal. But, after all, that battle was a Union victory, for it "interposed a check against the combined armies of the Confederacy from which they could not readily recover." This one fight taught the "dashing Texan Ranger" McCulloch that there was a bit of difference between meeting a sterling Union soldier like Lyon, and a traitor like Twiggs who would surrender on demand, and a short time afterward he withdrew into Arkansas, leaving Price to continue the campaign, or disband his State troops and go home, just as he pleased. At least that is what history says about it; but when Rodney and Dick asked their captain why it was that the two armies separated after going to so much trouble to get together, the reason given was:
"We're waiting for orders from the War Department at Richmond. It will take a good while for them to get here, and in the meantime we don't want to impoverish the country. Price will stay here to watch the enemy, who have retreated toward Rolla, which is a hundred miles from here, and McCulloch will go into Arkansas to recruit his army. When the orders arrive we shall know what we are going to do next."
Of course it goes without saying that Rodney and Dick did soldiers' duty during the light at Wilson's Creek and in the subsequent movements of Price's troops, which resulted in the siege and capture of Lexington; but they did not see Tom Percival or hear of him, nor did they find opportunity to visit Dick Graham's home.
While General Fremont was fortifying St. Louis so that he could hold it with a small force, and use the greater portion of his army in the movements he was planning against Price, the latter heard a piece of news that sent him Northward by rapid marches.
Price's men had not been long on the march before Dick Graham, who seemed to have a way of finding out things that were hidden from almost everybody else, told Rodney, confidentially, that their objective point was Warrensburg, and that Price's motive in going there was to capture money to the amount of a hundred thousand dollars, which was being conveyed by a detachment of Federal troops to Lexington. The prospect of securing so valuable a prize was an incentive, and men who were so weary that the near approach of an enemy would not have kept them from falling out of the ranks, marched night and day without a murmur of complaint. Some of the way they moved at double-quick; but they might as well have spared themselves the pains, for when they reached Warrensburg they found the place deserted.
"This shows how impossible it is to trust anybody these times," saidRodney, in deep disgust.
Their regiment having gone into camp, the two friends were strolling about the town to see what they could find, and the first thing they discovered was not at all calculated to allay the indignation they felt at being outwitted by the vigilant Federals. It was a rough charcoal sketch on the wall of a building they passed during their walk. It represented a lean, long-haired, ragged rebel dancing in an ecstacy of rage over an empty money-box. The soldier who drew the sketch was an artist of no mean order, and the picture told its story as plainly as words.
"It proves that the Yankees knew we were coming and what we were coming for," continued Rodney. "It's an insult, and I hope we will not go back until we have thrashed them for it most soundly."
The army rested for two days at Warrensburg, and then moved upon Lexington, whither the money had been conveyed; but Rodney and Dick had no hopes of wearing the new uniforms and wrapping themselves in the warm blankets that their share of the hundred thousand would purchase for them, if they had it. They were afraid they wouldn't get any of it, and this fear was confirmed when their advance guard was severely repulsed by less than half a regiment of Home Guards who were found strongly entrenched at Lexington. The attack, which was renewed on the 12th of September, after Colonel Mulligan arrived with his Irish brigade, bringing the strength of the garrison up to twenty-five hundred men, was even more disastrous than the first, and Price retired to wait until his supplies of ammunition could be brought up. He waited six days, and during that time not a soldier was thrown into the garrison, while Price saw his own army growing daily. Every man in the country for miles around, and every boy, too, who was strong enough to handle a gun, "rushed to Lexington to take part in the victory to which Price invited them." The few Union men there were left in that part of the State came with the rest, because it was the only thing they could do to save themselves and their property from the vengeance of the rebels. The real battle began on the 18th, and on the afternoon of the 20th, after fifty-two hours of constant fighting, when his ammunition and provisions were almost exhausted and his supply of water entirely cut off, the brave colonel, who afterward died on the field of Winchester
"And dying—'Lay me downAnd save the flag!' he cried,"
gave up the struggle, and surrendered a worn-out garrison of two thousand five hundred men to an army of more than twenty thousand. It was a grand victory—almost as grand as the one Beauregard won over Anderson at Fort Sumter. By it Price secured "a great number of stands of arms, a considerable quantity of ammunition, a vast amount of commissary stores, and nine hundred thousand dollars in hard cash." He did not abuse his power but paid tribute to the courage of the men who had so long resisted him by releasing the soldiers on parole, and keeping the officers only as prisoners.
Having accomplished his object and rallied to his standard all the scattered bands of partisans in Northern Missouri, and hearing that Fremont was advancing upon him, while Hardee, who was to support him by moving up the river from New Madrid, had been driven back, Price turned and ran, sending his mounted troopers to threaten several points at once, misleading the Federals who had hastily assembled to harass his rear, and thus securing an almost unobstructed road for his retreat. These advance troopers had a few engagements, and Rodney and Dick took part in the most of them, but Price could neither be overtaken nor stopped. The two friends were among the first to ride into Neosho, a little town in the southwestern part of the State, toward which the march had been directed, and the first man they met gave them some information that struck them dumb with surprise and indignation. He was a farmer who had just sold a load of provisions to the soldiers, and he drove his empty wagon out of the road to let the regiment pass.
"We're into the mud now as deep as the rest of 'em," said he, as Rodney's company rode by. "If Caroliny gets stretched up by the neck, we-uns will have to be stretched, too."
"What do you mean by that?" inquired Captain Jones.
"The Legislator is over there in that house," replied the farmer, "andthey've just give out some kind of a paper saying that this State ofMissoury don't belong to the old Union no more, but is one of theConfedrit States of Ameriky."
"Do you mean that the State has seceded?" cried the captain, while his men looked at him and at one another as if they could not understand what the farmer was trying to tell them. "There's cheek for you. Why, the whole of the State, except this part of it right around here, is over-run with Yankees."
"I don't know nothing about that," replied the farmer; and he was obliged to turn around on his seat and shout the words, for Rodney's company had been riding straight ahead all the time. "It's only what I heard. Mebbe you'll find somebody up the street that can tell you all about it."
The story was so improbable that the boys could not make up their minds to believe it. The Legislature, which had run almost as far as it could get without going over the line into Arkansas, had no authority over the State, three-fourths of whose territory was under the control of the Union forces, and level-headed Dick Graham did not hesitate to say, in the presence and hearing of his captain, that if the Legislature had passed an Act of Secession, they were idiots, the last one of them. But the Confederate authorities Were given to doing foolish things. Read the proclamation Jefferson Davis issued from Danville while he was running for his life!
"If that is true we are in a pretty fix," said Rodney, as soon as he could speak. "I came up here to keep out of the Confederate army, and now I am made a Confederate in spite of myself. And so are you. You are under control of the government at Richmond now, and next week you may be ordered to Virginia."
"But I'll not go," exclaimed Dick. "I'll serve right where I am until my time is out, and then I'll go home. But look here. The Richmond government can't order me out of Missouri without violating the very principle we are fighting for—State Rights. They canaskme to go, but just see how utterly inconsistent they will be if they try to compel me to go."
"I hope you are right, but I wouldn't be afraid to bet anything I've got that you are wrong," answered Rodney; and his friend's words did not in the least encourage him. "That would be the right way to do things, but you ought to see that it wouldn't be sensible. What's the use of having Confederate soldiers if they are not to obey the orders of the Confederate government? If it suits them to do it, those fellows in Richmond will ride rough-shod over State Rights."
"Oh, they won't do that," exclaimed Dick, waving his hands up and down in the air. "They can't do it. Their government will fall to pieces like a rope of sand if they try it."
The boys wondered what their general would think of the situation, and when the artillery came into town they found out. A few sections of it wheeled into line at a gallop, and celebrated the secession of the State by firing one hundred guns. Rodney and Dick were intensely disgusted. They listened in a half mutinous way when the adjutant read the act the next day on dress parade, and tossed up their caps and shouted with the rest; but they did these things for the same reasons that impelled hundreds of others in camp to do them—because they knew it would not be safe to show any lack of enthusiasm.
The fact that they were no longer State troops but full-fledged Confederates was not fully impressed upon Rodney and his fellow soldiers until some months later, when the Richmond government was all ready to put its despotic plans into execution. Probably the general commanding saw that there was much dissatisfaction among his men, and did not think it prudent to draw the reins too tight. He drilled his troops a little oftener and a little harder, and was rather more particular about granting furloughs, and this gave the boys no ground for complaint; but they were constantly harassed by the fear that the future had something ominous in store for them.
Price retreated as Fremont advanced, and a second battle was fought at Wilson's Creek, during which the commander of the Union forces made a cavalry charge that is still spoken of as one of the most brilliant episodes of the war. But when Fremont was displaced by Hunter, the latter fell back toward Rolla, thus allowing Price to recover the ground from which he had just been driven. He was prompt to take advantage of the opportunity, this time directing his columns toward Kansas, with the intention of getting supplies for his troops, and cutting the State off from all communication with St. Louis. But Halleck succeeded Hunter on the 18th of November, and before a month had passed away Price in turn was compelled to retreat, his men being captured by the thousand, together with large quantities of arms and supplies of ammunition and provisions. It began to look now, to quote from Dick Graham, as though the boot was on the other foot. Instead of running the Yankees out of Missouri, the Yankees had run them out, fairly and squarely, for when Price went into camp it was over the line in the State of Arkansas. Every one of the plans that the Confederates had made for keeping the State in their possession and capturing St. Louis, had been broken up by the strategy of the Union generals. The battle of Belmont, which took place in the month of November, has been called a Confederate victory, but it was not so in reality. General Grant didn't fight that engagement because he cared a cent for Belmont, for he knew he could not hold it if he got it. All he wanted was to keep the Confederates from sending troops from Columbus, Kentucky, to co-operate with Price in Missouri. He accomplished his object by keeping Polk busy at home, and Price was driven into Arkansas.
"And we are here with him," said Dick to his friend Rodney, as the two lay beside their camp-fire at Cove Creek, talking over the situation. "We said we never would go out of Missouri."
"That is what you said," replied Rodney. "After the farce those old women went through up there at Neosho, taking the State out of the Union when they had no authority over it, I knew we were going to see trouble. And mark my words: we have only seen the beginning of it."
Either General Halleck's army was not as strong as he would like to have had it, or else he over-estimated the strength of the enemy, for he fell back and the Confederates went into winter quarters, Price at Springfield and McCulloch just over the line into Arkansas. Now the two friends had time and opportunity for visiting, but there was no one for them to visit. Dick showed Rodney where his father's house and Mr. Percival's had once stood, but there was nothing left of them but blackened ruins. The rebels had "done the business" for one, and Union men had "cleaned out" the other. Dick fully expected to find it so, for he had often seen such evidence of vandalism and hatred during his long marches through the State. The boys afterward learned that Dick's father and mother had taken refuge with friends in Little Rock, while Mr. Percival's family had, in some mysterious way, succeeded in reaching St. Louis. Rodney was depressed by the sight of the ruins, and thanked his lucky stars that his father and mother lived in a State in which such things never could be done. The few Union men there were in and around Mooreville would never dare trouble his folks, and the Yankees would not be able to penetrate so far into the Confederacy.
Garrison duty, as the boys called their life in winter quarters, was most distasteful to them, and it was with great delight that they listened to the rumors which early in February came up from McCulloch's camp, to the effect that the two armies were to take the field again at once, but that their campaign was to be in a different direction. These rumors did not say that the Richmond government had decided to give up the struggle in Missouri and turn its attention to more important points, but the men, who talked freely in the presence of their officers, declared that that was what the new move would amount to. They were to proceed to New Madrid to operate with the Army of the Center in checking the advance of the Federals, who were threatening Island No. 10.
For once rumor told the truth and the move was made, though not in the way Rodney and Dick thought it would be. One Sunday morning there was a terrible uproar made by a scouting party which came tearing into camp with the information that General Curtis's army, forty thousand strong, was close upon Springfield and more coming. This rumor was also true; and "Old Pap Price," as his men had learned to call him, who was not much of a fighter but a "master hand at running," made haste to get his wagon-train out of the way. To quote once more from Dick Graham, it was hardly worth the trouble, for the oxen were so lean and weak that they could scarcely walk, and the wagons, which were fit for nothing but fire-wood, were loaded with a lot of rubbish that was of little value. But "Old Pap" was bent on saving everything he had, and could not have worked harder to take this train to a place of security if it had been freighted with the money he captured at Lexington. The retreat soon became a rout. The whole country was thrown into a state of alarm, and people came flocking from all directions, bringing with them the few household effects that the different raiding parties had left them. Price kept up a running fight until some of McCulloch's troops came up, and then the Federal advance was checked.
If General Curtis intended this sudden movement for a surprise he could not have selected a better time for it, and if he had kept his two columns together, instead of sending Siegel off with thirteen thousand men to operate in another quarter, Price's army would have "been eliminated from the problem of war," and the battle of Pea Ridge would not have been fought. McCulloch's army was divided, and McCulloch himself was away in another direction surveying a route for the march to New Madrid; and Price, relying upon the inhabitants to keep him posted in regard to the movements of our forces, as well as upon the supposed impassable condition of the roads in his front, was whipped before he knew there was an enemy anywhere within reach of him. Then followed a disastrous retreat of an army without provisions or tents, along a muddy road, through a snow storm so blinding that one could scarcely see ten feet ahead of him, and it went on until it was stopped by a telegram from General Van Dorn, who had been appointed to command the Confederate Army of the West because Price and McCulloch could not agree. The new general, who declared that "all retrograde movements must be stopped at once," and that "henceforth the army must press on to victory," arrived on the 2d of March, drove Siegel out of Bentonville on the 5th, and on Friday and Saturday fought the battle of Pea Ridge—a thing that he might as well have let alone, for he did not do what he set out to do. He retreated one way, while General Curtis went another and settled down to await reinforcements. Van Dorn gave his men to understand that he was not beaten, but he couldn't stop to pursue Curtis, because his orders compelled him to at once proceed with all his available force to join the Army of the Center on the Mississippi.
Then came that dreary march to Van Buren of which we have spoken, and which was a little ahead of anything Rodney had ever dreamed of. The weary and hungry soldiers had long since ceased to expect anything from the commissary department, which had disappeared as completely as though it had never existed, and provisions of every sort were so scarce that the different regiments and companies were obliged to break into little squads and forage on their own account, the only instructions they received being to the effect that they were to get to Van Buren as soon as they could. As Dick and Rodney had the reputation of being excellent foragers, and were known to be well supplied with gold, they had no difficulty in keeping the members of their mess together. The gold brought them corn bread, chickens and milk when Confederate scrip would have failed, and when they came to compare notes with the rest of the regiment at Van Buren, they found that they had fared very well. The bulk of Price's army had passed on ahead of them, going down into cellars and up into garrets, and poking about in hay-mows and stacks in search of provender that had been hastily concealed by the anxious citizens, and Rodney often wondered how McCulloch's men, who brought up the rear, managed to keep body and soul together.
It was a dreary time taken all around, but their troubles did not end when they arrived at Van Buren, as they hoped they would. It is true they again came within sight of a commissary department with an abundance of provisions, a quartermaster's department with a lot of mixed-up baggage and camp equipage, blankets and overcoats that had been thrown off and left at different places along the route, and here they were allowed to rest until the stragglers came up and reported; but their march was not ended. Their destination was Pocahontas, which was nearly two hundred miles farther on.
It was while they were enjoying a much needed rest in camp at Van Buren that they heard one piece of news that raised them to the highest pitch of excitement, and two others that brought their spirits down to zero. The first was brought to camp by a member of Dick's mess who had somehow managed to get hold of a paper containing a greatly exaggerated account of the first day's fight at Pittsburg Landing.
"Listen to this, boys," he shouted, as the mess gathered around him and the soldiers came running from all directions to see what the excitement was about. "'If we've been worsted here in the West, our friends in the East have made up for it by sweeping everything before them. Grant, the Yankee general, has been surprised at Shiloh, his army driven pell-mell through their camp and down under the bank of the river, where their gunboats saved them. Johnston lived long enough to see the Yankees in full flight and then he was killed; but Beauregard, who took his place, telegraphs that "certain destruction awaits the enemy on the morrow."' That would be—let me see. Why, this paper is two weeks old," he added, in a disappointed tone, glancing at the date.
"No matter; we whipped them," exclaimed Rodney; and when some one proposed three cheers for the Army of the Center, he pulled off his cap and joined in with a will.
Captain Jones, who brought with him a longer face than any of his company had ever seen him wear before, sauntered up while the cheering was going on, and asked what it was all about. When he learned that they were happy over the glorious news from Shiloh, he said, as he drew a couple of papers from his pocket:
"You fellows are away behind the times. That news is old, and Beauregard hollered before he was out of the woods. Read this later account," he continued, handing one of the papers to Dick, and placing a finger upon the column to which he wished to draw attention. "And after you have read that, take the other paper and see what it says about conscription."
The captain turned on his heel and walked away, but looked back with an expression of astonishment on his face when he heard one of his men exclaim:
"Has the Richmond government really passed a Conscription Act? Then I say bully for the Richmond government. There are lots of sneaks in our town who shouted 'sick 'em,' to us, but who were too cowardly to put on a uniform themselves. If they have got to come in whether they want to or not, I am a Confederate from this minute. Read about the battle first, sergeant, and then we'll hear about the conscription law."
Dick complied, and before he got through there were some angry and astonished men standing around him.
Sergeant Graham first read aloud the account of the second day's fighting at Pittsburg Landing; but of course the fact that Beauregard had sustained a crushing defeat and been forced to retire from Corinth, was carefully concealed. It was to be expected, the paper said, that twenty-five thousand fresh men would turn the tide of battle in favor of the enemy, but even against these overwhelming odds the Confederates had held their own until noon, and then left the field in good order.
"I don't see anything to feel bad over in that account," said Rodney, whose war-like spirit arose every time he heard a glowing story of a fight. "We knew when we went into this thing that the Yankees could raise more men than we could, and we expected to fight against big odds. Now for the conscripts," and when Rodney said this, he thought of Tom Randolph, and hoped that he would be the first Mooreville citizen to "draw a prize."
He thought he could imagine how Tom would look and feel after he had made a campaign with a foot or more of mud under his feet, dripping storm-clouds over his head and not so much as a crumb of corn bread in his haversack, and laughed silently as he pictured him at a smoking camp-fire with a lot of veterans "poking fun" at him. His own term of service would soon expire, and he hoped he should reach home in time to see Tom march out with the first squad of conscripts that left Mooreville; but as Dick proceeded to read the abstract of the Act as it appeared in the paper, all the while pushing the sheet farther and farther from him as his amazement and anger increased, Rodney found that the situation was not quite so amusing as he thought, and that he, Rodney Gray, was in a worse box than his friend, Tom Randolph. It was the first general conscription law of the Confederacy, and "it withdrew every non-exempt citizen, between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five, from State control, and placed him absolutely at the disposal of the President during the war." When Dick had read this far he looked at his comrades to see what they thought of it.
"Why, it's—it's—the Czar of Russia couldn't do worse," exclaimed the first one who recovered control of his tongue. "It's a fraud—a despotic act. Where are our State Rights now, I should like to know?"
"Go on," said Captain Jones, who stood on the outskirts of the group but within hearing distance. "There's worse to come."
Dick Graham, who did not see how anything could be worse, went on with his reading and found that the Act "annulled all contracts made with volunteers for short terms, holding them to service for two years additional, should the war continue so long; and all twelve months' recruits, below eighteen and over thirty-five years, who would otherwise have been exempted by this law, were to be retained in service for ninety days after their term expired."
"Hey—youp!" yelled Dick, dancing about like one demented. "Our own government is ten times worse than the one we are fighting against, and every one of us was a fool for ever putting on a gray jacket. Why didn't they tell us all this in the first place, so that we might know what there was before us? It's a fraud and a cheat and a swindle and a—and a—what are you about?" he added, turning almost fiercely upon his captain, who elbowed his way through the excited group and tried to take the paper from his hand. "I'll not obey the orders of the Richmond government, and that's all there is about it."
"I was going to direct your attention to something else," replied the captain, paying no heed to the sergeant's rudeness. "But since you are so nearly beside yourself I don't suppose you can read it, and so I had better tell you what it is. You say you will not obey the orders of the Richmond government?"
"That is what I said, and I will stick to it," exclaimed Dick. "They have no right—"
"Hold on a bit," the captain interposed.
"They may not have the right but they have the power, and you will have to give in. They offer you inducements to re-enlist for two years. You will be regarded as volunteers, and be allowed the privilege of changing your officers and electing new ones."
This was a big inducement indeed. The men laughed derisively when they heard it.
"If you don't volunteer, but insist on leaving the army when your term of service expires, you will never get out of the camp," continued the captain. "You will be conscripted."
"I don't care if I am," answered Dick, indignantly. "I'll not do duty."
"Then you will be treated as a mutineer and run the risk of being shot without the benefit of a drum-head court-martial," said the captain; whereupon the men backed off, thrust their hands into their pockets and looked at him and at one another. "I tell you, boys, this is no time for foolishness," the captain went on, earnestly. "Ever since Bull Run the Northern people have been showing the mettle that's in them. That defeat got their blood up and they mean business. They have more volunteers than they want. Their armies are growing stronger every day, while ours are growing weaker every hour. To be honest, there isn't half the patriotism now there was among us when these troubles first begun. Desertions are alarmingly frequent, and voluntary enlistments are almost entirely suspended. We must have men to fight our battles, or else surrender our cherished liberties to such Hessians and Tories as Curtis brought against us at Pea Ridge."
"And whipped us with," added one of the men; and the captain couldn't contradict him, for it was the truth. He could only look at him reproachfully.
"'Is Sparta dead in your veins?'" exclaimed the captain, quoting from the speech of Spartacus to his fellow gladiators. "Are you willing to give up whipped and permit a lot of Regicides and Roundheads to put their feet on your necks?"
Taking this for his text the officer spoke earnestly for ten minutes, drawing largely from the fiery editorials of the Southern papers, which he had read so often that he had them by heart, and trying his best to infuse a little of his own spirit into the angry, scowling men who had crowded around him, but without any very flattering success. There was but one thought in their minds—they had been duped by the Richmond government, which had so suddenly developed into a despotism that it was plain the machinery for it had been prepared long before. They could not go home even for a short time to visit their friends after their term of service had expired, and it is no wonder that they felt sore over it. Seeing that he could not arouse their patriotism, the captain next tried to arouse their combativeness.
"On the same day that the battle of Shiloh was decided against us, there was another struggle settled a hundred miles nearer to us," said he. "That too went against us. Island No. 10, the stronghold that was to have kept the enemy from going down the Mississippi, has fallen, and the way is open to Memphis."
"But the Yankees will never get there," exclaimed Rodney. "When I came up the river on theMollie Able, I heard a man say we had a fleet building there that would eventually take Cairo and St. Louis too."
"I certainly hope he was right, but things don't seem to point that way now," replied the captain.
"That is good news for us in one respect," Dick Graham remarked. "New Madrid must have fallen too, and if that is the case, we'll not be ordered there. It's too late. We'll stay in our own State."
The captain shook his head, and his men knew by the expression on his face that he had something yet to tell them.
"There's where you are wrong," said he. "We are going to Memphis as quick as we can get there, and from Memphis we shall go to Corinth to join the army under Beauregard. I am sorry you boys feel so about it, but I really don't see how you are going to help yourselves. Now brace up and do your duty like men, as you always have done it. I don't want to see any of you get into trouble, but you certainly will if you kick over the traces."
This last announcement was altogether too much for the men, who turned away in a body, muttering the heaviest kind of adjectives, "not loud but deep." When the two boys were left alone with the captain the latter inquired:
"How old are you?"
"Seventeen," growled Rodney.
"Well, you will have to stay in ninety days after your term expires.Will that make you eighteen?"
"No, it wouldn't; and if it did they would be careful not to say so."
"Then I don't see what reason you have to get huffy over a thing that can't be helped," continued the officer. "We must have men, and if they will not come in willingly, they must be dragged in. We can't be subdued; we never will consent to be slaves. But you two will get out all right."
"We knew it all the while; at least I thought of it," replied Dick, "but I didn't want to mention it while the rest of the boys were around. They are mad already, and it might make them worse to know that we two are better off than they are."
"But I want to tell you that you will make a big mistake if you accept your discharges," the captain went on to say. "You ought by all means to stay in until this thing is settled and the invaders driven from our soil. You'll wish you had when you see the boys come home covered with glory. And then think of the possibilities before you! You are bound to be promoted, and that rapidly. If I had your military education I would not be satisfied with anything short of a colonelcy."
"Well, you may have it, and since you want it, I hope you will get it; but I wouldn't accept it if it were offered to me," answered Dick, turning on his heel. "I'll not serve under such a fraud of a government as this has turned out to be a day longer than I can help. I'll take my discharge as soon as they will condescend to give it to me, and then they can hunt somebody to fill my place. I'll never volunteer again, and sooner than be conscripted I'll take to the woods."
"Now, sergeant, you know you wouldn't do any such thing," said the captain.
"Yes, I would," Dick insisted. "There is a principle at the bottom of this whole thing that is most contemptible; but what more could you expect of men who induced us to enlist by holding out the promise of an easy victory? 'The North won't fight!' This looks like it. We're whipped already."
These were the sentiments of thousands of men who wore gray jackets in the beginning of 1862, but it wasn't every one who dared express them as boldly as Dick Graham did, nor was it every officer who would have listened as quietly as did Captain Jones. Everything went to show that the officers had been drilled in the parts they were expected to perform long before the men dreamed that such a thing as a Conscription Act was thought of; for, as a rule, all discussion regarding the policy of the Richmond government was "choked off" with a strong hand. In some armies, Bragg's especially, the men were treated "worse than their niggers ever were." They dared not speak above a whisper for fear of being shoved into the guard-house; and "when some regiments hesitated to avail themselves of this permission (to volunteer) they were treated as seditious, and the most refractory soldiers, on the point of being shot, only saved their lives by the prompt signature of their comrades to the compact of a new enlistment." Things were not quite as bad as this in Price's army, but still Captain Jones thought it best to tell his men, especially the out-spoken Dick Graham, that they had better be a little more guarded in their language, unless they were well acquainted with those to whom they were talking. They went to Memphis, as the captain said they would, marching over a horrible road and leaving some of their artillery stuck in the mud at Desarc on White River, and from Memphis they went to Corinth forty miles farther on, packed in box cars like sheep, and on top like so much useless rubbish. Their train was rushed through at such a rate of speed that the men on top shouted to the engineer:
"Go it. Let out two or three more sections of that throttle. Run us off into the ditch and kill us if you want to. There are plenty more men where we came from."
Rodney Gray afterward declared that he had never seen a grander sight than Beauregard's camp presented when the troops from the West marched through it, greeted everywhere by the most vociferous cheering, to take their positions on the right. Their arrival brought the strength of the army up to more than a hundred thousand men, and, somewhat to their surprise, they were introduced to their new comrades as "Invincibles." At any rate that was what General Bragg called them in an address which he issued to his soldiers a few days afterward:
"The slight reverses we have met on the sea-board have worked us good as well as evil," was what he said in the vain hope of blinding his troops to the real magnitude of the disaster that had recently befallen the Confederacy. "The brave troops so long retained there have hastened to swell your numbers, while the gallant Van Dorn and invincible Price, with the ever-successful Army of the West, are now in your midst, with numbers almost equaling the Army of Shiloh."
The "slight reverses" to which the general so gingerly referred were the passage of Forts Jackson and St. Philip by Farragut's fleet, the annihilation of the Confederate gunboats and the capture of New Orleans; and these "slight reverses" were almost immediately followed by the defeat of the gunboats that had been building at Memphis, and of which the Confederates expected such great things. But the rank and file of the army were not so easily deceived. They knew well enough that the accounts that came to them through the papers were "doctored" on purpose for them, and were fully sensible of the fact that the loss of these important points, Memphis and New Orleans, were disasters most discouraging. When they were in the presence of those to whom they knew they could speak freely, they sneered at the efforts made by their superiors to belittle the Union victories, and laughed to scorn Mayor Monroe and the "city fathers" for the attitude they had seen fit to assume while Farragut's powerful fleet held the Crescent city under its guns. If the pompous little mayor, by folding his arms and standing in front of that loaded howitzer when the marines came ashore to hoist the Stars and Stripes over the Custom House, desired to show the people of New Orleans and the country at large what a brave man he was, he failed of his object, for the men who had faced cannon on the field of battle had nothing but contempt for him and his antics.
"He has made himself a laughing-stock for all time to come," was what Rodney Gray thought about it. "That was all done for effect, for there was not the slightest danger that the Yankees would fire that howitzer at him while he was going through his monkey-shines. If he is such an awful brave man, why didn't he follow that naval officer to the roof of the Custom House and jerk the Union flag down the minute it was hauled up?"
"Or why doesn't he shoulder a musket and fall in with us?" chimed in Dick. "One short campaign through Missouri mud would take some of that nonsense out of him."
There were a good many in the army who thought that the constant maneuvering and skirmishing that followed during the next few weeks were not kept up because a great battle was expected, but for the purpose of giving the men so much to do that they could not get together and talk over the discouraging news they had recently heard. There was one engagement fought, that of Farmington, which resulted in a victory for the Confederates, and taught them at the same time that they were mistaken in supposing that our troops would not venture so far into the country that they would be out of the reach of help from the gunboats, which had rendered them such important service at the battle of Pittsburg Landing. Of course Rodney and Dick marched and skirmished and fought with the rest, but they didn't care much whether they whipped or got whipped, for the feelings that took them away from home and friends and into the army, had long since given place to others of an entirely different character. They didn't care as much for State Rights and Southern independence as they did once, and if they ever got home again the Richmond government might go to smash for all they could do to save it. Two questions engrossed their minds, and formed the principal subjects of their conversation: Would they be permitted to leave the service when the year for which they enlisted expired; and if so, how was Dick Graham going to get across the river into Missouri now that Memphis had fallen, and the Mississippi as far down as Vicksburg was in possession of the Federals?
In regard to the first question—there was one thing which the boys were afraid would work against them. While nearly all the line officers of the regiment remained with them, the field officers who had come with them from the West had disappeared, some being promoted, some discharged and others being sent to the hospital, new ones had taken their places and a new staff had been appointed.
"And a lovely staff it is," said Dick, expressing the sentiments of every man in his company. "I can see now why that Conscription Act was passed. It was to make room for a lot of government pets, who are too fine to go into the ranks, but who are allowed to come here and shove out veterans when they cannot tell the difference between 'countermarch by file right' and 'right by twos.' Our new colonel doesn't know who we are or what we have done, and cares less; and when we go to him for our discharges, he will throw so much red-tape in our way that we can't get out. That's what I am afraid of."
As to the other question—how Dick Graham was to get over the river—that was something that could be settled when they had their discharges in their pockets. First and foremost Dick would go home with Rodney; and after he had taken a good long rest, and learned all about the means of communication between the two shores (they were positive there must be some regular means of communication, because Dick had received two letters from home since he had joined the Army of the Center), Rodney would take his chances of seeing him safely across the river. But their discharges must be their first care, and they came much easier than they dared hope for. One day Rodney was detailed to act as guard at brigade headquarters, and the first officer to whom he presented arms was one whose face was strangely familiar to him. It was his new brigade commander, and a wild hope sprung up in Rodney's breast. The energetic, soldier-like manner in which he handled his piece attracted the notice of the general, who seemed to be in good humor, and who unbent from his dignity long enough to remark:
"You have been well drilled, sentry."
"Yes, sir; at Barrington Military Academy," replied Rodney, with a good deal of emphasis on the last words.
This had just the effect the boy meant it should have. The general stopped and looked curiously at him, and Rodney, instead of keeping his eyes "straight to the front and striking the ground at the distance of fifteen paces," returned his superior's gaze with interest.
"Haven't I seen you before?" the latter asked at length.
"Yes, sir; aboard the steamerMollie Able, going up the river a year ago," answered Rodney. "You were Captain Howard then."
The boy had no business to say all this, and no one in the army knew it better than he did. It was his place to wait and be questioned; but he couldn't do it. There was too much at stake—his discharge and Dick's. The general did riot appear to notice this breach of military etiquette. On the contrary he smiled and said, pleasantly:
"I remember you perfectly. You were on your way to join Price, and your presence here proves that you found him. When you are relieved I want to see you."
"Very good, sir," replied Rodney, bringing his piece to a shoulder and resuming his walk. "If that man's word is worth anything," he added, mentally, when the general disappeared in his tent, "Dick Graham and I will be free men when our year and three months are up, and you just say that much to your folks and tell 'em it's confidential. He as good as said that he would do something for me if he could, and now I will try him on; but there's one thing I'll not promise to do: I won't re-enlist until I get a good ready, and if I can help myself, that time will never come."
Rodney walked his beat as if he were treading on air, and wished his friend Dick would happen along about the time he was relieved, so that he might tell him that he believed he had found a powerful friend in their new brigade commander. At the end of two hours, having been relieved from post and obtained the necessary permission from the officer of the guard, Rodney presented himself at the door of General Howard's tent, and sent his name in by the orderly.