"Headquarters Co. Q, 200th Injianny Volunteer Infantry,Murfreesboro, Aprile the 16th eighteen hundred & sixtythree."
The sweat stood out in beads upon his forehead after this effort, but it was as nothing compared to the strain of deciding how he should address his correspondent. He wanted to use some term of fervent admiration, but fear deterred him. He debated the question with himself until his head fairly ached, when he settled upon the inoffensive phrase:
"Respected Lady."
The effort was so exhausting that he had to go down to the spring, take a deep drink of cold water, and bathe his forehead. But his determination was unabated, and before the sun went down he had produced the following:
"i talk mi pen in hand 2 inform U that ive reseeved the SOXU so kindly cent, & i thank U 1,000 times 4 them. They areboss sox & no mistake. They are the bossest sox that everwuz nit. The man is a lire who sez they aint. He dassent telMe so. U are a boss nitter. Even Misses Linkun can't hold acandle 2 U."The sox fit me 2 a t, but that is becaws they are nit sowel, & stretch."
"I wish I knowed some more real strong words to praise her knitting," said Shorty, reading over the laboriously-written lines. "But after I have said they're boss what more is there to say? I spose I ought to say something about her health next. That's polite." And he wrote:
"ime in fair helth, except my feet are" locoed, & i weigh156 pounds, & hope U are injoying the saim blessing."
"I expect I ought to praise her socks a little more," said he, and wrote:
"The SOX are jest boss. They outrank anything in the Army ofthe Cumberland."
After this effort he was compelled to take a long rest. Then he communed with himself:
"When a man's writin' to a lady, and especially an educated lady, he should always throw in a little poetry. It touches her."
There was another period of intense thought, and then he wrote:
"Dan Elliott is my name,& single is my station,Injianny is mi dwelling place,& Christ is mi salvation."
"Now," he said triumphantly, "that's neat and effective. It tells her a whole lot about me, and makes her think I know Shakspere by heart. Wonder if I can't think o' some more? Hum—hum. Yes, here goes:
"The rose is red, the vilet's blue;ime 4 the Union, so are U."
Shorty was so tickled over this happy conceit that he fairly hugged himself, and had to read it overseveral times to admire its beauty. But it left him too exhausted for any further mental labor than to close up with:
"No moar at present, from yours til death."Dan Elliott,"Co. Q, 200th injianny Volunteer Infantry."
He folded up the missive, put it into an envelope, carefully directed to Miss Jerusha Ellen Briggs, Bad Ax, Wis., and after depositing it in the box at the Chaplain's tent, plodded homeward, feeling more tired than after a day's digging on the fortifications. Yet his fatigue was illuminated by the shimmering light of a fascinating hope.
THE 200th Ind. Volunteer Infantry had been pushed out to watch the crossings of Duck River and the movements of the rebels on the south bank of that narrow stream. The rebels, who had fallen into the incurable habit of objecting to everything that the "Yankees" did, seemed to have especial and vindictive repugnance to being watched.
Probably no man, except he be an actor or a politician, likes to be watched, but few ever showed themselves as spitefully resentful of observation as the rebels.
Co. Q was advanced to picket the north bank of the river, but the moment it reached the top of the hill overlooking the stream it had to deploy as skirmishers, and Enfield bullets began to sing viciously about its ears.
"Looks as if them fellers think we want to steal their old river and send it North," said Shorty, as he reloaded his gun after firing at a puff of smoke that had come out of the sumach bushes along the fence at the foot of the hill. "They needn't be so grouchy. We don't want their river—only to use it awhile. They kin have it back agin after we're through with it."
"Blamed if that feller didn't make a good lineshot," said Si, glancing up just above his head to where a twig had been clipped off the persimmon tree behind which he was standing. "He put up his sights a little too fur, or he'd 'a' got me."
Si took careful aim at where he supposed the lurking marksman to be and fired.
There was a waving of the tops of the bushes, as if the men concealed there had rushed out.
"Guess we both landed mighty close," said Shorty triumphantly. "They seem to have lost interest in this piece o' sidehill, anyway."
He and Si made a rush down the hill, and gained the covert of the fence just in time to see the rails splintered by a bunch of shots striking them.
"Lay down, Yanks!" called out Shorty cheerily, dropping into the weeds. "Grab a root!"
To the right of them they could see the rest of Co. Q going through similar performances.
Si and Shorty pushed the weeds aside, crawled cautiously to the fence, and looked through. There was a road on the other side of the fence, and beyond it a grove of large beech trees extending to the bank of the river. Half concealed by the trunk of one of these stood a tall, rather good-looking young man, with his gun raised and intently peering into the bushes. He had seen the tops stir, and knew that his enemies had gained their cover. He seemed expecting that they would climb the fence and jump down into the road. At a little distance to his right could be seen other men on the sharp lookout.
Shorty put his hand on Si to caution and represshim.
With his eyes fixed on the rebel, Shorty drew his gun toward him. The hammer caught on a trailing vine, and, forgetting himself, he gave it an impatient jerk. It went off, the bullet whistling past Shorty's head and the powder burning his face.
The rebel instantly fired in return, and cut the leaves about four feet above Shorty.
"Purty good shot that, Johnny," called out Shorty as he reloaded his gun; "but too low. It went between my legs. You hain't no idee how tall I am."
"If I couldn't shoot no better'n you kin on a sneak," answered the rebel, his rammer ringing in his gun-barrel, "I wouldn't handle firearms. Your bullet went a mile over my head. Must've bin shootin' at an angel. But you Yanks can't shoot nary bit—you're too skeered."
"I made you hump out o' the bushes a few minutes ago," replied Shorty, putting on a cap. "Who was skeered then? You struck for tall timber like a cotton-tailed rabbit."
"I'll rabbit ye, ye nigger-lovin' whelp," shouted the rebel. "Take that," and he fired as close as he could to the sound of Shorty's voice.
Shorty had tried to anticipate his motion and fired first, but the limbs bothered his aim, and his bullet went a foot to the right of the rebel's head. It was close enough, however, to make the rebel cover himself carefully with the tree.
"That was a much better shot, Yank," he called out. "But ye orter do a powerful sight better'n that on a sneak. Ye'd never kill no deer, nor rebels nuthor, with that kind o' shootin'. You Yanks aregreat on the sneak, but that's all the good it does, yet ye can't shoot fer a handful o' huckleberries."
"Sneaks! Can't shoot!" roared Shorty. "I kin outshoot you or any other man in Jeff Davis's kingdom. I dare you to come out from behind your tree, and take a shot with me in the open, accordin' to Hardee's tactics. Your gun's empty; so's mine. My chum here'll see fair play; and you kin bring your chum with you. Come out, you skulkin' brindle pup, and shoot man fashion, if you dare."
"Ye can't dare me, ye nigger-stealin' blue-belly," shouted the rebel in return, coming out from behind his tree. Shorty climbed over the fence and stood at the edge of the road, with his gun at order arms. Si came out on Shorty's left, and a rebel appeared to the right of the first. For a minute all stood in expectancy. Then Shorty spoke:
"I want nuthin' but what's fair. Your gun's empty; so's mine. You probably know Hardee's tactics as well as I do."
"I'm up in Hardee," said the rebel with a firm voice.
"Well, then," continued Shorty, "let my chum here call off the orders for loadin' and firin', and we'll both go through 'em, and shoot at the word."
"Go ahead—I'm agreed," said the rebel briefly.
Shorty nodded to Si.
"Carry arms," commanded Si.
Both brought their guns up to their right sides.
"Present arms."
Both courteously saluted.
"Load in nine times—Load," ordered Si.
Both guns came down at the same instant, each man grasped his muzzle with his left hand, and reached for his cartridge-box, awaiting the next order.
"Handle cartridges."
"Tear cartridges."
"Charge cartridges," repeated Si slowly and distinctly. The rebel's second nodded approval of his knowledge of the drill, and sang out:
"Good soldiers, all of yo'uns."
"Draw rammer," continued Si,
"Turn rammer."
"Ram cartridge."
Shorty punctiliously executed the three blows on the cartridge exacted by the regulations, and paused a breath for the next word. The rebel had sent his cartridge home with one strong thrust, but he saw his opponent's act and waited.
"Return rammer," commanded Si. He was getting a little nervous, but Shorty deliberately withdrew his rammer, turned it, placed one end in the thimbles, deliberately covered the head with his little finger, exactly as the tactics prescribed, and sent it home with a single movement. The rebel had a little trouble in returning rammer, and Shorty and Si waited.
"Cast about,"
"Prime!"
Both men capped at the same instant.
"Ready!"
Shorty cocked his piece and glanced at the rebel, whose gun was at his side.
"Aim!"
Both guns came up like a flash.
The Duel. 139
Si's heart began thumping at a terrible rate. He was far more alarmed about Shorty than he had ever been about himself. Up to this moment he had hoped that Shorty's coolness and deliberation would "rattle" the rebel and make him fire wildly. But the latter, as Si expressed it afterward, "seemed to be made of mighty good stuff," and it looked as if both would be shot down.
"Fire!" shouted Si, with a perceptible tremor in his voice.
Both guns flashed at the same instant. Si saw Shorty's hat fly off, and him stagger and fall, while the rebel dropped his gun, and clapped his hand to his side. Si ran toward Shorty, who instantly sprang up again, rubbing his head, from which came a faint trickle of blood.
"He aimed at my head, and jest scraped my scalp," he said. "Where'd I hit him? I aimed at his heart, and had a good bead."
"You seem to have struck him in the side," answered Si, looking at the rebel. "But not badly, for he's still standin' up. Mebbe you broke a rib though."
"Couldn't, if he's still up. I must file my trigger Gun pulls too hard. I had a dead aim on his heart, but I seem to've pulled too much to the right."
"Say, I'll take a turn with you," said Si, picking up his gun and motioning with his left hand at the other rebel.
"All right," answered the other promptly. "My gun ain't loaded, though."
"I'll wait for you," said Si, looking at the cap on his gun. A loud cheer was heard from far to the right, and Co. Q was seen coming forward on a rush, with the rebels in front running back to the river bank. Several were seen to be overtaken and forced to surrender.
The two rebels in front of the boys gave a startled look at their comrades, then at the boys, and turned to run. Si raised his gun to order them to halt.
"No," said Shorty. "Let 'em go. It was a fair bargain, and I'll stick to it. Skip out Johnnies, for every cent you're worth."
The rebels did not wait for the conclusion of the sentence, but followed their comrades with alacrity.
The boys ran forward through the woods to the edge of the bank, and saw their opponents climbing up the opposite bank and getting behind the sheltering trees. Si waited till his particular one got good shelter behind a large sycamore, and then sent a bullet that cut closely above his head.
This was the signal for a general and spiteful fusillade from both sides of the river and all along the line. The rebels banged away as if in red-hot wrath at being run across the stream, and Co. Q retorted with such earnestness that another company was sent forward to its assistance, but returned when the Irish Lieutenant, who had gone forward to investigate, reported:
"Faith, its loike the divil shearing a hog—all cry and no wool at all."
So it was. Both sides found complete shelter behind the giant trunks of the trees, and each fired at insignificant portions of the anatomy allowed to momentarily protrude beyond the impenetrable boles.
After this had gone on for about half an hour those across the river from Si and Shorty called out:
"Say, Yanks, ye can't shoot down a beech tree with a Springfield musket, nohow ye kin do it. If we'uns hain't killin' more o' yo'uns than yo'uns is a-killin' o' we'uns, we'uns air both wastin' a powerful lot o' powder an' lead and good shootin'. What d' yo'uns say to King's excuse for awhile?"
"We're agreed," said Si promptly, stepping frombehind the tree, and leaving his gun standing against it.
"Hit's a go," responded the rebels, coming out disarmed. "We'uns won't shoot no more till ordered, an' then'll give yo'uns warnin' fust."
The Overture for Trade. 144
"All right; we'll give you warning before we shoot," coincided Si.
"Say, have yo'uns got any Yankee coffee thatyou'll trade for a good plug o' terbacker?" inquired the man whom Si had regarded as his particular antagonist.
"Yes," answered Si. "We've got a little. We'll give you a cupful for a long plug with none cut off."
"What kind of a cupful?" asked the bartering "Johnny."
"A big, honest cupful. One o' this kind," said Si, showing his.
"All right. Hit's to be strike measure," said the rebel. "Here's the plug," and he held up a long plug of "natural leaf."
"O. K.," responded Si. "Meet me half way."
The truce had quickly extended, and the firing suspended all along the line of Co. Q. The men came out from behind their trees, and sat down on the banks in open view of one another.
Si filled his cup "heaping-full" with coffee, climbed down the bank and waded out into the middle of the water. The rebel met him there, while his companion and Shorty stood on the banks above and watched the trade.
"Y're givin' me honest measure, Yank," said the rebel, looking at the cup. "Now, if ye hain't filled the bottom o' yer cup with coffee that's bin biled before, I'll say y're all right. Some o' yo'uns air so dod-gasted smart that y' poke off on we'uns coffee that's bin already biled, and swindle we'uns."
"Turn it out and see," said Si.
The rebel emptied the cup into a little bag, carefully scrutinizing the stream as it ran in. It was all fine, fragrant, roasted and ground coffee.
"Lord, thar's enough t' last me a month with keer," said the rebel, gazing unctuously at the rich brown grains. "I won't use more'n a spoonful a day, an' bile hit over twice. Yank, here's yer terbacker. I've made a good trade. Here's a Chatanooga paper I'll throw in to boot. Got a Northern paper about ye anywhar?"
Si produced a somewhat frayed Cincinnati Gazette.
"I can't read myself," said the rebel, as he tucked the paper away. "Never l'arned to. Pap wuz agin hit. Said hit made men lazy. He got erlong without readin', and raised the biggest fambly on Possum Crick. But thar's a feller in my mess kin read everything but the big words, and I like t' git a paper for him to read to the rest o' we'uns."
"Was your pardner badly hurt by mine's shot?" asked Si.
"No. The bullet jest scraped the bone. He'll be likely to have a stitch in his side for awhile, but he's a very peart man, and won't mind that. I'm s'prised he didn't lay your pardner out. He's the best shot in our company."
"Well, he was buckin' agin a mighty good shot, and I'm surprised your pardner's alive. I wouldn't 've given three cents for him when Shorty drawed down on him; but Shorty's bin off duty for awhile, and his gun's not in the best order. Howsumever, I'm awful glad that it come out as it did. His life's worth a dozen rebels."
"The blazes you say. I'd have you know, Yank, that one Confederit is wuth a whole rijimint o' Lincoln hirelings. I'll—"
"O, come off—come off—that's more o' your old five-to-one gas," said Si irritatingly. "I thought we'd walloped that dumbed nonsense out o' your heads long ago. We've showed right along that, man for man, we're a sight better'n you. We've always licked you when we've had anything like a fair show. At Stone River you had easy two men to our one, and yit we got away with you."
"'Tain't so. It's a lie. If hit wuzzent for theDutch and Irish you hire, you couldn't fight we'uns at all."
"Look here, reb," said Si, getting hot around the ears, "I'm neither a Dutchman nor an Irishman; we hain't a half dozen in our company. I'm a better man than you've got in your regiment. Either me or Shorty kin lick any man you put up; Co. Q kin lick your company single-handed and easy; the 200th Injianny kin lick any regiment in the rebel army. To prove it, I kin lick you right here."
Si Wants a Fight 147
Si thrust the plug of tobacco into his blouse pocket and began rolling up his sleeves.
The rebel did not seem at all averse to the trial and squared off at him. Then Shorty saw the belligerent attitude and yelled:
"Come, Si. Don't fight there. That's no place. If you're goin' to fight, come up on level ground, where it kin be fair and square. Come up here, or we'll go over there."
"O, come off," shouted the rebel on the other side. "Don't be a fool, Bill. Fist-foutin' don't settle nothin'. Come back here and git your gun if ye want to fout. But don't le's fout no more to-day. Thar's plenty of it for ter-morrer. Le's keep quiet and peaceful now. I want powerfully to take a swim. Air you fellers agreed?"
"Yes; yes," shouted Shorty. "You fellers keep to your side o' the river, and we will to ours."
The agreement was carried into instantaneous effect, and soon both sides of the stream were filled with laughing, romping, splashing men.
There was something very exhilarating in the cool, clear, mountain water of the stream. The boysgot to wrestling, and Si came off victorious in two or three bouts with his comrades.
"Cock-a-doodle-doo," he shouted, imitating the crow of a rooster. "I kin duck any man in the 200th Injianny."
The challenge reached the ears of the rebel with whom Si had traded. He was not satisfied with the result of his conference.
"You kin crow over your fellers, Yank," he shouted; "but you dassent come to the middle an' try me two falls outen three."
Si immediately made toward him. They surveyed each other warily for a minute to get the advantages of the first clinch, when a yell came from the rebel side:
"Scatter, Confeds! Hunt yer holes, Yanks! The Cunnel's a-comin'."
Both sides ran up their respective banks, snatched up their guns, took their places behind their trees, and opened a noisy but harmless fire.
SHORTY had always been conspicuously lacking in the general interest which his comrades had shown in the mails. Probably at some time in his life he had had a home like the rest of them, but for some reason home now played no part in his thoughts. The enlistment and muster-rolls stated that he was born in Indiana, but he was a stranger in the neighborhood when he enrolled himself in Co. Q.
His revelations as to his past were confined to memories of things which happened "when I was cuttin' wood down the Mississippi," or "when I was runnin' on an Ohio sternwheel."
He wrote no letters and received none. And when the joyful cry, "Mail's come," would send everybody else in the regiment on a run to the Chaplain's tent, in eager anticipation, to jostle one another in impatience, until the contents of the mailpouch were distributed, Shorty would remain indifferent in his tent, without an instant's interruption in his gun cleaning, mending, or whatever task he might have in hand.
A change came over him after he sent his letter to Bad Ax, Wis. The cry, "Mail's come," would makehim start, in spite of himself, and before he could think to maintain his old indifference. He was ashamed, lest he betray his heart's most secret thoughts.
The matter of the secure transmission of the mails between camp and home began to receive his earnest attention. He feared that the authorities were not taking sufficient precautions. The report that John Morgan's guerrillas had captured a train between Louisville and Nashville, rifled the mail car, and carried off the letters, filled him with burning indignation, both against Morgan and his band and the Generals who had not long ago exterminated that pestiferous crowd.
He had some severe strictures on the slovenly way in which the mail was distributed from the Division and Brigade Headquarters to the regiments. It was a matter, he said, which could not be done too carefully. It was a great deal more important than the distribution of rations. A man would much rather lose several days' rations than a letter from home. He could manage in some way to get enough to live on, but nothing would replace a lost letter.
Then, he would have fits of silent musing, sometimes when alone, sometimes when with Si in the company, over the personality of the fair stocking-knitter of Wisconsin and the letter he had sent her. He would try to recall the exact wording of each sentence he had laboriously penned, and wonder how it impressed her, think how it might have been improved, and blame himself for not having been more outspoken in his desire to hear from her again. He would steal off into the brush, pull out the socksand letter, which he kept carefully wrapped up in a sheet of the heavy letter paper, and read over the letter carefully again, although he knew every word of it by heart. These fits alarmed Si.
"I'm af eared," he confided to some cronies, "that rebel bullet hurt Shorty more'n he'll let on. He's not actin' like hisself at times. That bullet scraped so near his thinkery that it may have addled it. It was an awful close shave."
"Better talk to the Surgeon," said they. "Glancing bullets sometimes hurt worse'n they seem to."
"No, the bullet didn't hurt Shorty, any more than make a scratch," said the Surgeon cheerfully when Si laid the case before him. "I examined him carefully. That fellow's head is so hard that no mere scraping is going to affect it. You'd have to bore straight through it, and I'd want at least a six-pounder to do it with if I was going to undertake the job. An Indiana head may not be particularly fine, but it is sure to be awfully solid and tough. No; his system's likely to be out of order. You rapscallions will take no care of yourselves, in spite of all that I can say, but will eat and drink as if you were ostriches. He's probably a little off his feed, and a good dose of bluemass followed up with quinine will bring him around all right. Here, take these, and give them to him."
The Surgeon was famous for prescribing bluemass and quinine for every ailment presented to him, from sore feet to "shell fever." Si received the medicines with a proper show of thankfulness, saluted, and left. As he passed through the clump if bushes he was tempted to add them to thecollection of little white papers which marked the trail from the Surgeon's tent, but solicitude for his comrade restrained him. The Surgeon was probably right, and it was Si's duty to do all that he could to bring Shorty around again to his normal condition. But how in the world was he going to get his partner to take the medicine? Shorty had the resolute antipathy to drugs common to all healthy men.
It was so grave a problem that Si sat down on a log to think about it. As was Si's way, the more he thought about it, the more determined he became to do it, and when Si Klegg determined to do a thing, that thing was pretty nearly as good as done.
"I kin git him to take the quinine easy enough," he mused. "All I've got to do is to put it in a bottle o' whisky, and he'd drink it if there wuz 40 'doses o' quinine in it. But the bluemass's a very different thing. He's got to swaller it in a lump, and what in the world kin I put it in that he'll swaller whole?"
Si wandered over to the Sutler's in hopes of seeing something there that would help him. He was about despairing when he noticed a boy open a can of large, yellow peaches.
"The very thing," said Si, slapping his thigh. "Say, young man, gi' me a can o' peaches jest like them."
Si took his can and carefully approached his tent, that he might decide upon his plan before Shorty could see him and his load. He discovered that Shorty was sitting at a little distance, with his back to him, cleaning his gun, which he had taken apart.
"Bully," thought Si. "Just the thing. His handsare dirty and greasy, and he won't want to tech anything to eat."
He slipped into the tent, cut open the can, took out a large peach with a spoon, laid the pellet of bluemass in it, laid another slice of peach upon it, and then came around in front of Shorty, holding out the spoon.
"Open your mouth and shut your eyes, Shorty," he said. "I saw some o' the nicest canned peaches down at the Sutler's, and I suddenly got hungry for some. I bought a can and brung 'em up to the tent. Jest try 'em."
He stuck the spoon out towards Shorty's mouth. The latter, with his gunlock in one hand and a greasy rag in the other, looked at the tempting morsel, opened his mouth, and the deed was done.
"Must've left a stone in that peach," he said, as he gulped it down.
"Mebbe so," said Si, with a guilty flush, and pretending to examine the others. "But I don't find none in the rest Have another?"
Shorty swallowed two or three spoonfuls more, and then gasped:
"They're awful nice, Si, but I've got enough. Keep the rest for yourself."
Si went back to the tent and finished the can with mingled emotions of triumph at having succeeded, and of contrition at playing a trick on his partner. He decided to make amends for the latter by giving Shorty an unusually large quantity of whisky to take with his quinine.
Si was generally very rigid in his temperance ideas, He strongly disapproved of Shorty'sdrinking, and always interposed all the obstacles he could in the way of it. But this was an extraordinary case—it would be "using liquor for a medicinal purpose"—and his conscience was quieted.
Co. Q had one of those men—to be found in every company—who can get whisky under apparently any and all circumstances. In every company there is always one man who seemingly can find something to get drunk on in the midst of the Desert of Sahara. To Co. Q's representative of this class Si went, and was piloted to where, after solemn assurances against "giving away," he procured a halfpint of fairly-good applejack, into which he put his doses of quinine.
In the middle of the night Shorty woke up with a yell.
"Great Cesar's ghost!" he howled, "what's the matter with me? I'm sicker'n a dog. Must've bin them dodgasted peaches. Si, don't you feel nothin'?"
"No," said Si sheepishly; "I'm all right. Didn't you eat nothin' else but them?"
"Naw," said Shorty disgustedly. "Nothin' but my usual load o' hardtack and pork. Yes, I chawed a piece o' sassafras root that one of the boys dug up."
"Must've bin the sassafras root," said Si. He hated to lie, and made a resolution that he would make a clean breast to Shorty—at some more convenient time. It was not opportune now. "That must've bin a sockdologer of a dose the Surgeon gave me," he muttered to himself.
Shorty continued to writhe and howl, and Si madea hypocritical offer of going for the Surgeon, but Shorty vetoed that emphatically.
"No; blast old Sawbones," he said. "He won't do nothin' but give me bluemass, and quinine, and I never could nor would take bluemass. It's only fit for horses and hogs."
Toward morning Shorty grew quite weak, and correspondingly depressed.
"Si," said he, "I may not git over this. This may be the breakin' out o' the cholera that the folks around here say comes every seven years and kills off the strangers. Si, I'll tell you a secret. A letter may come for me. If I don't git over this, and the letter comes, I want you to burn it up without reading it, and write a letter to Miss Jerusha Ellen Briggs, Bad Ax, Wis., tellin' her that I died like a man and soldier, and with her socks on, defendin' his country."
Si whistled softly to himself. "I'll do it. Shorty," he said, and repeated the address to make sure.
The crisis soon passed, however, and the morning found Shorty bright and cheerful, though weak.
Si was puzzled how to get the whisky to Shorty. It would never do to let him know that he had gotten it especially for him. That would have been so contrary to Si's past as to arouse suspicion. He finally decided to lay it where it would seem that someone passing had dropped it, and Shorty could not help finding it. The plan worked all right. Shorty picked it up in a few minutes after Si had deposited it, and made quite an ado over his treasure trove.
"Splendid applejack," he said, tasting it; "little bitter, but that probably comes from their usingdogwood in the fires when they're 'stilhn'. They know that dogwood'll make the liquor bitter, but they're too all-fired lazy to go after any other kind o' wood." He drank, and as he drank his spirits rose. After the first dram he thought he would clean around the tent, and make their grounds look neater than anybody else's. After the second he turned his attention to his arms and accouterments. After the third he felt like going out on a scout and finding some rebels to vary the monotony of the camp-life. After the fourth, "Groundhog," unluckily for himself, came along, and Shorty remembered that he had long owed the teamster a licking, and he felt that the debt should not be allowed to run any longer. He ordered Groundhog to halt and receive his dues. The teamster demurred, but Shorty was obdurate, and began preparations to put his intention into operation, when the Orderly-Sergeant came down through the company street distributing mail.
Shorty Wants to Fight Groundhog 157
"Shorty," he said, entirely ignoring the bellicosity of the scene, "here's a letter for you."
Shorty's first thought was to look at the postmark. Sure enough, it was Bad Ax, Wis. Instantly his whole demeanor changed. Here was something a hundred times more important than licking any teamster that ever lived.
"Git out, you scab," he said contemptuously. "I haint no time to fool with you now. You'll keep. This won't."
Groundhog mistook the cause of his escape. "O, you're powerful anxious to fight, ain't you, till you find I'm ready for you, and then you quiet down. I'll let you know, sir, that you mustn't give me no more o' your sass. I won't stand it from you. You jest keep your mouth shet after this, if you know when you're well off."
The temptation would have been irresistible to Shorty at any other time, but now he must go off somewhere where he could be alone with his letter, and to the amazement of all the spectators he made no reply to the teamster's gibes, but holding theprecious envelope firmly in his hand, strode off to the seclusion of a neighboring laurel thicket.
His first thought, as he sat down and looked the envelope over again, was shame that it had come to him when he was under the influence of drink. He remembered the writer's fervent Christianity, and it seemed to him that it would be a gross breach of faith for him to open and read the letter while the fumes of whisky were on his breath. He had a struggle with his burning desire to see the inside of the envelope, but he conquered, and put the letter back in his pocket until he was thoroughly sober.
But he knew not what to do to fill up the time till he could conscientiously open the letter. He thought of going back and fulfilling his long-delayed purpose of thrashing Groundhog, but on reflection this scarcely commended itself as a fitting prelude.
He heard voices approaching—one sympathetic and encouraging, the other weak, pain-breathing, almost despairing. He looked out and saw the Chaplain helping back to the hospital a sick man who had over-estimated his strength and tried to reach his company. The man sat down on a rock, in utter exhaustion.
Shorty thrust the letter back into his blousepocket, sprang forward, picked the man up in his strong arms, and carried him bodily to the hospital. It taxed his strength to the utmost, but it sobered him and cleared his brain.
He returned to his covert, took out his letter, and again scanned its exterior carefully. He actually feared to open it, but at last drew his knife and carefully slit one side. He unfolded the inclosure ascarefully as if it had been a rare flower, and with palpitating heart slowly spelled out the words, one after another:
Shorty Reading the Letter 160
"Bad Ax, Wisconsin,"April the Twenty-First, 1863."Mister Daniel Elliott, Company Q, 200th Indiana VolunteerInfantry."Respected Sir: I taik my pen in hand toe inform you that Iam wel, and hoap that you aire in joyingthe saimblessing. For this, God be prazed and magnified forever."
"Goodness, how religious she is," said he, stopping to ruminate. "How much nicer it makes a woman to be pious. It don't hurt a man much to be a cuss—at least while he's young—but I want a woman to be awfully religious. It sets her off more'n anything else."
He continued his spelling exercise:
"I am verry glad that my sox reached you all rite, that theyfell into the hands of a braiv, pious Union soldier, and hefound them nice."
"Brave, pious Union soldier," he repeated to himself, with a whistle. "Jewhilikins, I'm glad Bad Ax, Wis., is so fur away that she never heard me makin' remarks when a mule-team's stalled. But I must git a brace on myself, and clean up my langwidge for inspection-day."
He resumed the spelling:
"I done the best I could on them, and moren that no one cando. Wimmen cant fite in this cruel war, but they ought allto do what they can. I only wish I could do more. But thewimmen must stay at home and watch and wait, while the mengo to the front."
"That's all right. Miss Jerusha Ellen Briggs," said he, with more satisfaction. "You jest stay at home and watch and wait, and I'll try to do fightin' enough for both of us. I'll put in some extra licks in future on your account, and they won't miss you from the front."
The next paragraph read:
"I should like to hear more of you and yourregiment.The only time I ever beared of the 200th Indiana regimentwas in a letter writ home by one of our Wisconsin boys andpublished in the Bad Ax Grindstone, in which he said theywuz brigaded with the 200th Indiana, a good fightingregiment, but which would stele even the shoes off thebrigade mules if they wuzzent watched, and sumtimes whenthey wuz. Ime sorry to hear that any Union soldier is athief. I know that our boys from Wisconsin would rather diethan stele."
"Steal! The 200th Injianny steal!" Shorty flamed out in a rage. "Them flabbergasted, knock-kneed, wall-eyed Wisconsin whelps writin' home that the Injiannians are thieves! The idee o' them longhaired, splay-footed lumbermen, them chuckleheaded, wap-sided, white-pine butchers talking about anybody else's honesty. Why, they wuz born stealin'. They never knowed anything else. They'd steal the salt out o' your hardtack. They'd steal the lids off the Bible. They talk about the 200th Injiannny! I'd like to find the liar that writ that letter. I'd literally pound the head offen him."
It was some time before he could calm himself down sufficiently to continue his literary exercise. Then he made out: