CHAPTER 24
146 lines✦
he roarings that had stretched in a long line of sound across theface of the forest began to grow intermittent and weaker. Thestentorian speeches of the artillery continued in some distantencounter, but the crashes of the musketry had almost ceased.The youth and his friend of a sudden looked up, feeling adeadened form of distress at the waning of these noises, whichhad become a part of life. They could see changes going onamong the troops. There were marchings this way and that way.A battery wheeled leisurely. On the crest of a small hill was thethick gleam of many departing muskets. The youth arose. “Well, what now, I wonder?” he said. Byhis tone he seemed to be preparing to resent some newmonstrosity in the way of dins and smashes. He shaded his eyeswith his grimy hand and gazed over the field. His friend also arose and stared. “I bet we’re goin’ t’ gitalong out of this an’ back over th’ river,” said he. “Well, I swan!” said the youth. They waited, watching. Within a little while the regimentreceived orders to retrace its way. The men got up grunting fromthe grass, regretting the soft repose. They jerked their stiffenedlegs, and stretched their arms over their heads. One man sworeas he rubbed his eyes. They all groaned “O Lord!” They had asmany objections to this change as they would have had to aproposal for a new battle. They trampled slowly back over the field across which theyhad run in a mad scamper. The regiment marched until it had joined its fellows. Thereformed brigade, in column, aimed through a wood at the road.Directly they were in a mass of dust-covered troops, and were trudging along in a way parallel to the enemy’s lines as these hadbeen defined by the previous turmoil. They passed within view of a stolid white house, and saw infront of it groups of their comrades lying in wait behind a neatbreastwork. A row of guns were booming at a distant enemy.Shells thrown in reply were raising clouds of dust and splinters.Horsemen dashed along the line of intrenchments. At this point of its march the division curved away from thefield and went winding off in the direction of the river. When thesignificance of this movement had impressed itself upon theyouth he turned his head and looked over his shoulder towardthe trampled and debris-strewed ground. He breathed a breath ofnew satisfaction. He finally nudged his friend. “Well, it’s allover,” he said to him. His friend gazed backward. “B’Gawd, it is,” he assented.They mused. For a time the youth was obliged to reflect in a puzzled anduncertain way. His mind was undergoing a subtle change. It tookmoments for it to cast off its battleful ways and resume itsaccustomed course of thought. Gradually his brain emerged fromthe clogged clouds, and at last he was enabled to more closelycomprehend himself and circumstance. He understood then that the existence of shot and counter-shot was in the past. He had dwelt in a land of strange, squallingupheavals and had come forth. He had been where there was redof blood and black of passion, and he was escaped. His firstthoughts were given to rejoicings at this fact. Later he began to study his deeds, his failures, and hisachievements. Thus, fresh from scenes where many of his usualmachines of reflection had been idle, from where he hadproceeded sheeplike, he struggled to marshal all his acts. At last they marched before him clearly. From this presentview point he was enabled to look upon them in spectatorfashion and to criticise them with some correctness, for his newcondition had already defeated certain sympathies. Regarding his procession of memory he felt gleeful andunregretting, for in it his public deeds were paraded in great andshining prominence. Those performances which had beenwitnessed by his fellows marched now in wide purple and gold,having various deflections. They went gayly with music. It was pleasure to watch these things. He spent delightful minutesviewing the gilded images of memory. He saw that he was good. He recalled with a thrill of joy therespectful comments of his fellows upon his conduct. Nevertheless, the ghost of his flight from the firstengagement appeared to him and danced. There were smallshoutings in his brain about these matters. For a moment heblushed, and the light of his soul flickered with shame. A specter of reproach came to him. There loomed thedogging memory of the tattered soldier—he who, gored bybullets and faint for blood, had fretted concerning an imaginedwound in another; he who had loaned his last of strength andintellect for the tall soldier; he who, blind with weariness andpain, had been deserted in the field. For an instant a wretched chill of sweat was upon him at thethought that he might be detected in the thing. As he stoodpersistently before his vision, he gave vent to a cry of sharpirritation and agony. His friend turned. “What’s the matter, Henry?” hedemanded. The youth’s reply was an outburst of crimson oaths. As he marched along the little branch-hung roadway amonghis prattling companions this vision of cruelty brooded over him.It clung near him always and darkened his view of these deeds inpurple and gold. Whichever way his thoughts turned they werefollowed by the somber phantom of the desertion in the fields.He looked stealthily at his companions, feeling sure that theymust discern in his face evidences of this pursuit. But they wereplodding in ragged array, discussing with quick tongues theaccomplishments of the late battle. “Oh, if a man should come up an’ ask me, I’d say we got adum good lickin’.” “Lickin-—in yer eye! We ain’t licked, sonny. We’re goin’down here aways, swing aroun’, an’ come in behint ’em.” “Oh, hush, with your comin’ in behint ’em. I’ve seen all ’athat I wanta. Don’t tell me about comin’ in behint—” “Bill Smithers, he ses he’d rather been in ten hundred battlesthan been in that heluva hospital. He ses they got shootin’ in th’night-time, an’ shells dropped plum among ’em in th’ hospital.He ses sech hollerin’ he never see.” “Hasbrouck? He’s th’ best off’cer in this here reg’ment. He’s a whale.” “Didn’t I tell yeh we’d come aroun’ in behint ’em? Didn’t Itell yeh so? We—” “Oh, shet yeh mouth!” For a time this pursuing recollection of the tattered mantook all elation from the youth’s veins. He saw his vivid error,and he was afraid that it would stand before him all his life. Hetook no share in the chatter of his comrades, nor did he look atthem or know them, save when he felt sudden suspicion thatthey were seeing his thoughts and scrutinizing each detail of thescene with the tattered soldier. Yet gradually he mustered force to put the sin at a distance.And at last his eyes seemed to open to some new ways. He foundthat he could look back upon the brass and bombast of his earliergospels and see them truly. He was gleeful when he discoveredthat he now despised them. With this conviction came a store of assurance. He felt aquiet manhood, nonassertive but of sturdy and strong blood. Heknew that he would no more quail before his guides whereverthey should point. He had been to touch the great death, andfound that, after all, it was but the great death. He was a man. So it came to pass that as he trudged from the place of bloodand wrath his soul changed. He came from hot plowshares toprospects of clover tranquilly, and it was as if hot plowshareswere not. Scars faded as flowers. It rained. The procession of weary soldiers became abedraggled train, despondent and muttering, marching withchurning effort in a trough of liquid brown mud under a low,wretched sky. Yet the youth smiled, for he saw that the worldwas a world for him, though many discovered it to be made ofoaths and walking sticks. He had rid himself of the red sicknessof battle. The sultry nightmare was in the past. He had been ananimal blistered and sweating in the heat and pain of war. Heturned now with a lover’s thirst to images of tranquil skies, freshmeadows, cool brooks—an existence of soft and eternal peace. Over the river a golden ray of sun came through the hosts ofleaden rain clouds.
✦