Back to The Red Badge of Courage
The Red Badge of Courage
By Stephen Crane
Day 8 Audio |
CHAPTER 19
The youth stared at the land in front of him. Its
foliages now seemed to veil powers and horrors. He was unaware of the machinery
of orders that started the charge, although from the corners of his eyes he saw
an officer, who looked like a boy a-horseback, come galloping, waving his hat.
Suddenly he felt a straining and heaving among the men. The line fell slowly
forward like a toppling wall, and, with a convulsive gasp that was intended for
a cheer, the regiment began its journey. The youth was pushed and jostled for a
moment before he understood the movement at all, but directly he lunged ahead
and began to run.
He fixed his eye upon a
distant and prominent clump of trees where he had concluded the enemy were to be
met, and he ran toward it as toward a goal. He had believe throughout that it
was a mere question of getting over an unpleasant matter as quickly as possible,
and he ran desperately, as if pursued for a murder. His face was drawn hard and
tight with the stress of his endeavor. His eyes were fixed in a lurid glare. And
with his soiled and disordered dress, his red and inflamed features surmounted
by the dingy rag with its spot of blood, his wildly swinging rifle, and banging
accouterments, he looked to be an insane soldier.
As the regiment swung from
its position out into a cleared space the woods and thickets before it awakened.
Yellow flames leaped toward it from many directions. The forest made a
tremendous objection.
The line lurched straight
for a moment. Then the right wing swung forward; it in turn was surpassed by the
left. Afterward the center careered to the front until the regiment was a
wedge-shaped mass, but an instant later the opposition of the bushes, trees, and
uneven places on the ground split the command and scattered it into detached
clusters.
The youth, light-footed,
was unconsciously in advance. His eyes still kept note of the clump of trees.
From all places near it the clannish yell of the enemy could be heard. The
little flames of rifles leaped from it. The song of the bullets was in the air
and shells snarled among the treetops. One tumbled directly into the middle of a
hurrying group and exploded in crimson fury. There was an instant spectacle of a
man, almost over it, throwing up his hands to shield his eyes.
Other men, punched by
bullets, fell in grotesque agonies. The regiment left a coherent trail of
bodies.
They had passed into a
clearer atmosphere. There was an effect like a revelation in the new appearance
of the landscape. Some men working madly at a battery were plain to them, and
the opposing infantry's lines were defined by the gray walls and fringes of
smoke.
It seemed to the youth that
he saw everything. Each blade of the green grass was bold and clear. He thought
that he was aware of every change in the thin, transparent vapor that floated
idly in sheets. The brown or gray trunks of the trees showed each roughness of
their surfaces. And the men of the regiment, with their starting eyes and
sweating faces, running madly, or falling, as if thrown headlong, to queer,
heaped-up corpses-- all were comprehended. His mind took a mechanical but firm
impression, so that afterward everything was pictured and explained to him, save
why he himself was there.
But there was a frenzy made
from this furious rush. The men, pitching forward insanely, had burst into
cheerings, moblike and barbaric, but tuned in strange keys that can arouse the
dullard and the stoic. It made a mad enthusiasm that, it seemed, would be
incapable of checking itself before granite and brass. There was the delirium
that encounters despair and death, and is heedless and blind to the odds. It is
a temporary but sublime absence of selfishness. And because it was of this order
was the reason, perhaps, why the youth wondered, afterward, what reasons he
could have had for being there.
Presently the straining
pace ate up the energies of the men. As if by agreement, the leaders began to
slacken their speed. The volleys directed against them had had a seeming
windlike effect. The regiment snorted and blew. Among some stolid trees it began
to falter and hesitate. The men, staring intently, began to wait for some of the
distant walls fo smoke to move and disclose to them the scene. Since much of
their strength and their breath had vanished, they returned to caution. They
were become men again.
The youth had a vague
belief that he had run miles, and he thought, in a way, that he was now in some
new and unknown land.
The moment the regiment
ceased its advance the protesting splutter of musketry became a steadied roar.
Long and accurate fringes of smoke spread out. From the top of a small hill came
level belchings of yellow flame that caused an inhuman whistling in the air.
The men, halted, had
opportunity to see some of their comrades dropping with moans and shrieks. A few
lay under foot, still or wailing. And now for an instant the men stood, their
rifles slack in their hands, and watched the regiment dwindle. They appeared
dazed and stupid. This spectacle seemed to paralyze them, overcome them with a
fatal fascination. They stared woodenly at the sights, and, lowering their eyes,
looked from face to face. It was a strange pause, and a strange silence.
Then, above the sounds of
the outside commotion, arose the roar of the lieutenant. He strode suddenly
forth, his infantile features black with rage.
"Come on, yeh fools!" he
bellowed. "Come on! Yeh can't stay here. Yeh must come on." He said more, but
much of it could not be understood.
He started rapidly forward,
with his head turned toward the men, "Come on," he was shouting. The men stared
with blank and yokel-like eyes at him. He was obliged to halt and retrace his
steps. He stood then with his back to the enemy and delivered gigantic curses
into the faces of the men. His body vibrated from the weight and force of his
imprecations. And he could string oaths with the facility of a maiden who
strings beads.
The friend of the youth
aroused. Lurching suddenly forward and dropping to his knees, he fired an angry
shot at the persistent woods. This action awakened the men. They huddled no more
like sheep. They seemed suddenly to bethink themselves of their weapons, and at
once commenced firing. Belabored by their officers, they began to move forward.
The regiment, involved like a cart involved in mud and muddle, started unevenly
with many jolts and jerks. The men stopped now every few paces to fire and load,
and in this manner moved slowly on from trees to trees.
The flaming opposition in
their front grew with their advance until it seemed that all forward ways were
barred by the thin leaping tongues, and off to the right an ominous
demonstration could sometimes be dimly discerned. The smoke lately generated was
in confusing clouds that made it difficult for the regiment to proceed with
intelligence. As he passed through each curling mass the youth wondered what
would confront him on the farther side.
The command went painfully
forward until an open space interposed between them and the lurid lines. Here,
crouching and cowering behind some trees, the men clung with desperation, as if
threatened by a wave. They looked wild-eyed, and as if amazed at this furious
disturbance they had stirred. In the storm there was an ironical expression of
their importance. The faces of the men, too, showed a lack of a certain feeling
of responsibility for being there. It was as if they had been driven. It was the
dominant animal failing to remember in the supreme moments the forceful causes
of various superficial qualities. The whole affair seemed incomprehensible to
many of them.
As they halted thus the
lieutenant again began to bellow profanely. Regardless of the vindictive threats
of the bullets, he went about coaxing, berating, and bedamning. His lips, that
were habitually in a soft and childlike curve, were now writhed into unholy
contortions. He swore by all possible deities.
Once he grabbed the youth
by the arm. "Come on, yeh lunkhead!" he roared. "Come one! We'll all git killed
if we stay here. We've on'y got t' go across that lot. An' then"--the remainder
of his idea disappeared in a blue haze of curses.
The youth stretched forth
his arm. "Cross there?" His mouth was puckered in doubt and awe.
"Certainly. Jest 'cross th'
lot! We can't stay here," screamed the lieutenant. He poked his face close to
the youth and waved his bandaged hand. "Come on!" Presently he grappled with him
as if for a wrestling bout. It was as if he planned to drag the youth by the ear
on to the assault.
The private felt a sudden
unspeakable indignation against his officer. He wrenched fiercely and shook him
off.
"Come on yerself, then," he
yelled. There was a bitter challenge in his voice.
They galloped together down
the regimental front. The friend scrambled after them. In front of the colors
the three men began to bawl: "Come on! come on!" They danced and gyrated like
tortured savages.
The flag, obedient to these
appeals, bended its glittering form and swept toward them. The men wavered in
indecision for a moment, and then with a long, wailful cry the dilapidated
regiment surged forward and began its new journey.
Over the field went the
scurrying mass. It was a handful of men splattered into the faces of the enemy.
Toward it instantly sprang the yellow tongues. A vast quantity of blue smoke
hung before them. A mighty banging made ears valueless.
The youth ran like a madman
to reach the woods before a bullet could discover him. He ducked his head low,
like a football player. In his haste his eyes almost closed, and the scene was a
wild blur. Pulsating saliva stood at the corners of his mouth.
Within him, as he hurled
himself forward, was born a love, a despairing fondness for this flag which was
near him. It was a creation of beauty and invulnerability. It was a goddess,
radiant, that bended its form with an imperious gesture to him. It was a woman,
red and white, hating and loving, that called him with the voice of his hopes.
Because no harm could come to it he endowed it with power. He kept near, as if
it could be a saver of lives, and an imploring cry went from his mind.
In the mad scramble he was
aware that the color sergeant flinched suddenly, as if struck by a bludgeon. He
faltered, and then became motionless, save for his quivering knees. He made a
spring and a clutch at the pole. At the same instant his friend grabbed it from
the other side. They jerked at it, stout and furious, but the color sergeant was
dead, and the corpse would not relinquish its trust. For a moment there was a
grim encounter. The dead man, swinging with bended back, seemed to be
obstinately tugging, in ludicrous and awful ways, for the possession of the
flag.
It was past in an instant
of time. They wrenched the flag furiously from the dead man, and, as they turned
again, the corpse swayed forward with bowed head. One arm swung high, and the
curved hand fell with heavy protest on the friend's unheeding shoulder.
CHAPTER 20
When the two youths turned with the flag they saw
that much of the regiment had crumbled away, and the dejected remnant was coming
slowly back. The men, having hurled themselves in projectile fashion, had
presently expended their forces. They slowly retreated, with their faces still
toward the spluttering woods, and their hot rifles still replying to the din.
Several officers were giving orders, their voices keyed to screams.
"Where in hell yeh goin'?"
the lieutenant was asking in a sarcastic howl. And a red-bearded officer, whose
voice of triple brass could plainly be heard, was commanding: "Shoot into 'em!
Shoot into 'em, Gawd damn their souls!" There was a melee of screeches, in which
the men were ordered to do conflicting and impossible things.
The youth and his friend
had a small scuffle over the flag. "Give it t' me!" "No, let me keep it!" Each
felt satisfied with the other's possession of it, but each felt bound to
declare, by an offer to carry the emblem, his willingness to further risk
himself. The youth roughly pushed his friend away.
The regiment fell back to
the stolid trees. There it halted for a moment to blaze at some dark forms that
had begun to steal upon its track. Presently it resumed its march again, curving
among the tree trunks. By the time the depleted regiment had again reached the
first open space they were receiving a fast and merciless fire. There seemed to
be mobs all about them.
The greater part of the
men, discouraged, their spirits worn by the turmoil, acted as if stunned. They
accepted the pelting of the bullets with bowed and weary heads. It was of no
purpose to strive against walls. It was of no use to batter themselves against
granite. And from this consciousness that they had attempted to conquer an
unconquerable thing there seemed to arise a feeling that they had been betrayed.
They glowered with bent brows, but dangerously, upon some of the officers, more
particularly upon the red-bearded one with the voice of triple brass.
However, the rear of the
regiment was fringed with men, who continued to shoot irritably at the advancing
foes. They seemed resolved to make every trouble. The youthful lieutenant was
perhaps the last man in the disordered mass. His forgotten back was toward the
enemy. He had been shot in the arm. It hung straight and rigid. Occasionally he
would cease to remember it, and be about to emphasize an oath with a sweeping
gesture. The multiplied pain caused him to swear with incredible power.
The youth went along with
slipping uncertain feet. He kept watchful eyes rearward. A scowl of
mortification and rage was upon his face. He had thought of a fine revenge upon
the officer who had referred to him and his fellows as mule drivers. But he saw
that it could not come to pass. His dreams had collapsed when the mule drivers,
dwindling rapidly, had wavered and hesitated on the little clearing, and then
had recoiled. And now the retreat of the mule drivers was a march of shame to
him.
A dagger-pointed gaze from
without his blackened face was held toward the enemy, but his greater hatred was
riveted upon the man, who, not knowing him, had called him a mule driver.
When he knew that he and
his comrades had failed to do anything in successful ways that might bring the
little pangs of a kind of remorse upon the officer, the youth allowed the rage
of the baffled to possess him. This cold officer upon a monument, who dropped
epithets unconcernedly down, would be finer as a dead man, he thought. So
grievous did he think it that he could never possess the secret right to taunt
truly in answer.
He had pictured red letters
of curious revenge. "We ARE mule drivers, are we?" And now he was compelled to
throw them away.
He presently wrapped his
heart in the cloak of his pride and kept the flag erect. He harangued his
fellows, pushing against their chests with his free hand. To those he knew well
he made frantic appeals, beseeching them by name. Between him and the
lieutenant, scolding and near to losing his mind with rage, there was felt a
subtle fellowship and equality. They supported each other in all manner of
hoarse, howling protests.
But the regiment was a
machine run down. The two men babbled at a forceless thing. The soldiers who had
heart to go slowly were continually shaken in their resolves by a knowledge that
comrades were slipping with speed back to the lines. It was difficult to think
of reputation when others were thinking of skins. Wounded men were left crying
on this black journey.
The smoke fringes and
flames blustered always. The youth, peering once through a sudden rift in a
cloud, saw a brown mass of troops, interwoven and magnified until they appeared
to be thousands. A fierce-hued flag flashed before his vision.
Immediately, as if the
uplifting of the smoke had been prearranged, the discovered troops burst into a
rasping yell, and a hundred flames jetted toward the retreating band. A rolling
gray cloud again interposed as the regiment doggedly replied. The youth had to
depend again upon his misused ears, which were trembling and buzzing from the
melee of musketry and yells.
The way seemed eternal. In
the clouded haze men became panic-stricken with the thought that the regiment
had lost its path, and was proceeding in a perilous direction. Once the men who
headed the wild procession turned and came pushing back against their comrades,
screaming that they were being fired upon from points which they had considered
to be toward their own lines. At this cry a hysterical fear and dismay beset the
troops. A soldier, who heretofore had been ambitious to make the regiment into a
wise little band that would proceed calmly amid the huge-appearing difficulties,
suddenly sank down and buried his face in his arms with an air of bowing to a
doom. From another a shrill lamentation rang out filled with profane allusions
to a general. Men ran hither and thither, seeking with their eyes roads of
escape. With serene regularity, as if controlled by a schedule, bullets buffed
into men.
The youth walked stolidly
into the midst of the mob, and with his flag in his hands took a stand as if he
expected an attempt to push him to the ground. He unconsciously assumed the
attitude of the color bearer in the fight of the preceding day. He passed over
his brow a hand that trembled. His breath did not come freely. He was choking
during this small wait for the crisis.
His friend came to him.
"Well, Henry, I guess this is good-by-John."
"Oh, shut up, you damned
fool!" replied the youth, and he would not look at the other.
The officers labored like
politicians to beat the mass into a proper circle to face the menaces. The
ground was uneven and torn. The men curled into depressions and fitted
themselves snugly behind whatever would frustrate a bullet. The youth noted with
vague surprise that the lieutenant was standing mutely with his legs far apart
and his sword held in the manner of a cane. The youth wondered what had happened
to his vocal organs that he no more cursed.
There was something curious
in this little intent pause of the lieutenant. He was like a babe which, having
wept its fill, raises its eyes and fixes upon a distant toy. He was engrossed in
this contemplation, and the soft under lip quivered from self-whispered words.
Some lazy and ignorant
smoke curled slowly. The men, hiding from the bullets, waited anxiously for it
to lift and disclose the plight of the regiment.
The silent ranks were
suddenly thrilled by the eager voice of the youthful lieutenant bawling out:
"Here they come! Right onto us, b'Gawd!" His further words were lost in a roar
of wicked thunder from the men's rifles.
The youth's eyes had
instantly turned in the direction indicated by the awakened and agitated
lieutenant, and he had seen the haze of treachery disclosing a body of soldiers
of the enemy. They were so near that he could see their features. There was a
recognition as he looked at the types of faces. Also he perceived with dim
amazement that their uniforms were rather gay in effect, being light gray,
accented with a brilliant-hued facing. Too, the clothes seemed new.
These troops had apparently
been going forward with caution, their rifles held in readiness, when the
youthful lieutenant had discovered them and their movement had been interrupted
by the volley from the blue regiment. From the moment's glimpse, it was derived
that they had been unaware of the proximity of their dark-suited foes or had
mistaken the direction. Almost instantly they were shut utterly from the youth's
sight by the smoke from the energetic rifles of his companions. He strained his
vision to learn the accomplishment of the volley, but the smoke hung before him.
The two bodies of troops
exchanged blows in the manner of a pair of boxers. The fast angry firings went
back and forth. The men in blue were intent with the despair of their
circumstances and they seized upon the revenge to be had at close range. Their
thunder swelled loud and valiant. Their curving front bristled with flashes and
the place resounded with the clangor of their ramrods. The youth ducked and
dodged for a time and achieved a few unsatisfactory views of the enemy. There
appeared to be many of them and they were replying swiftly. They seemed moving
toward the blue regiment, step by step. He seated himself gloomily on the ground
with his flag between his knees.
As he noted the vicious,
wolflike temper of his comrades he had a sweet thought that if the enemy was
about to swallow the regimental broom as a large prisoner, it could at least
have the consolation of going down with bristles forward.
But the blows of the
antagonist began to grow more weak. Fewer bullets ripped the air, and finally,
when the men slackened to learn of the fight, they could see only dark, floating
smoke. The regiment lay still and gazed. Presently some chance whim came to the
pestering blur, and it began to coil heavily away. The men saw a ground vacant
of fighters. It would have been an empty stage if it were not for a few corpses
that lay thrown and twisted into fantastic shapes upon the sward.
At sight of this tableau,
many of the men in blue sprang from behind their covers and made an ungainly
dance of joy. Their eyes burned and a hoarse cheer of elation broke from their
dry lips.
It had begun to seem to
them that events were trying to prove that they were impotent. These little
battles had evidently endeavored to demonstrate that the men could not fight
well. When on the verge of submission to these opinions, the small duel had
showed them that the proportions were not impossible, and by it they had
revenged themselves upon their misgivings and upon the foe.
The impetus of enthusiasm
was theirs again. They gazed about them with looks of uplifted pride, feeling
new trust in the grim, always confident weapons in their hands. And they were
men.
CHAPTER 21
Presently they knew that no firing threatened them.
All ways seemed once more opened to them. The dusty blue lines of their friends
were disclosed a short distance away. In the distance there were many colossal
noises, but in all this part of the field there was a sudden stillness.
They perceived that they
were free. The depleted band drew a long breath of relief and gathered itself
into a bunch to complete its trip.
In this last length of
journey the men began to show strange emotions. They hurried with nervous fear.
Some who had been dark and unfaltering in the grimmest moments now could not
conceal an anxiety that made them frantic. It was perhaps that they dreaded to
be killed in insignificant ways after the times for proper military deaths had
passed. Or, perhaps, they thought it would be too ironical to get killed at the
portals of safety. With backward looks of perturbation, they hastened.
As they approached their
own lines there was some sarcasm exhibited on the part of a gaunt and bronzed
regiment that lay resting in the shade of the trees. Questions were wafted to
them.
"Where th' hell yeh been?"
"What yeh comin' back fer?"
"Why didn't yeh stay
there?"
"Was it warm out there,
sonny?"
"Goin' home now, boys?"
One shouted in taunting
mimicry: "Oh, mother, come quick an' look at th' sojers!"
There was no reply from the
bruised and battered regiment, save that one man made broadcast challenges to
fist fights and the red-bearded officer walked rather near and glared in great
swashbuckler style at a tall captain in the other regiment. But the lieutenant
suppressed the man who wished to fist fight, and the tall captain, flushing at
the little fanfare of the red-bearded one, was obliged to look intently at some
trees.
The youth's tender flesh
was deeply stung by these remarks. From under his creased brows he glowered with
hate at the mockers. He meditated upon a few revenges. Still, many in the
regiment hung their heads in criminal fashion, so that it came to pass that the
men trudged with sudden heaviness, as if they bore upon their bended shoulders
the coffin of their honor. And the youthful lieutenant, recollecting himself,
began to mutter softly in black curses.
They turned when they
arrived at their old position to regard the ground over which they had charged.
The youth in this
contemplation was smitten with a large astonishment. He discovered that the
distances, as compared with the brilliant measurings of his mind, were trivial
and ridiculous. The stolid trees, where much had taken place, seemed incredibly
near. The time, too, now that he reflected, he saw to have been short. He
wondered at the number of emotions and events that had been crowded into such
little spaces. Elfin thoughts must have exaggerated and enlarged everything, he
said.
It seemed, then, that there
was bitter justice in the speeches of the gaunt and bronzed veterans. He veiled
a glance of disdain at his fellows who strewed the ground, choking with dust,
red from perspiration, misty-eyed, disheveled.
They were gulping at their
canteens, fierce to wring every mite of water from them, and they polished at
their swollen and watery features with coat sleeves and bunches of grass.
However, to the youth there
was a considerable joy in musing upon his performances during the charge. He had
had very little time previously in which to appreciate himself, so that there
was now much satisfaction in quietly thinking of his actions. He recalled bits
of color that in the flurry had stamped themselves unawares upon his engaged
senses.
As the regiment lay heaving
from its hot exertions the officer who had named them as mule drivers came
galloping along the line. He had lost his cap. His tousled hair streamed wildly,
and his face was dark with vexation and wrath. His temper was displayed with
more clearness by the way in which he managed his horse. He jerked and wrenched
savagely at his bridle, stopping the hard-breathing animal with a furious pull
near the colonel of the regiment. He immediately exploded in reproaches which
came unbidden to the ears of the men. They were suddenly alert, being always
curious about black words between officers.
"Oh, thunder, MacChesnay,
what an awful bull you made of this thing!" began the officer. He attempted low
tones, but his indignation caused certain of the men to learn the sense of his
words. "What an awful mess you made! Good Lord, man, you stopped about a hundred
feet this side of a very pretty success! If your men had gone a hundred feet
farther you would have made a great charge, but as it is--what a lot of mud
diggers you've got anyway!"
The men, listening with
bated breath, now turned their curious eyes upon the colonel. They had a had a
ragamuffin interest in this affair.
The colonel was seen to
straighten his form and put one hand forth in oratorical fashion. He wore an
injured air; it was as if a deacon had been accused of stealing. The men were
wiggling in an ecstasy of excitement.
But of a sudden the
colonel's manner changed from that of a deacon to that of a Frenchman. He
shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, well, general, we went as far as we could," he said
calmly.
"As far as you could? Did
you, b'Gawd?" snorted the other. "Well, that wasn't very far, was it?" he added,
with a glance of cold contempt into the other's eyes. "Not very far, I think.
You were intended to make a diversion in favor of Whiterside. How well you
succeeded your own ears can now tell you." He wheeled his horse and rode stiffly
away.
The colonel, bidden to hear
the jarring noises of an engagement in the woods to the left, broke out in vague
damnations.
The lieutenant, who had
listened with an air of impotent rage to the interview, spoke suddenly in firm
and undaunted tones. "I don't care what a man is--whether he is a general or
what-- if he says th' boys didn't put up a good fight out there he's a damned
fool."
"Lieutenant," began the
colonel, severely, "this is my own affair, and I'll trouble you--"
The lieutenant made an
obedient gesture. "All right, colonel, all right," he said. He sat down with an
air of being content with himself.
The news that the regiment
had been reproached went along the line. For a time the men were bewildered by
it. "Good thunder!" they ejaculated, staring at the vanishing form of the
general. They conceived it to be a huge mistake.
Presently, however, they
began to believe that in truth their efforts had been called light. The youth
could see this conviction weight upon the entire regiment until the men were
like cuffed and cursed animals, but withal rebellious.
The friend, with a
grievance in his eye, went to the youth. I wonder what he does want," he said.
"He must think we went out there an' played marbles! I never see sech a man!"
The youth developed a
tranquil philosophy for these moments of irritation. "Oh, well," he rejoined,
"he probably didn't see nothing of it at all and god mad as blazes, and
concluded we were a lot of sheep, just because we didn't do what he wanted done.
It's a pity old Grandpa Henderson got killed yestirday--he'd have known that we
did our best and fought good. It's just our awful luck, that's what."
"I should say so," replied
the friend. He seemed to be deeply wounded at an injustice. "I should say we did
have awful luck! There's no fun in fightin' fer people when everything yeh do--
no matter what--ain't done right. I have a notion t' stay behind next time an'
let 'em take their ol' charge an' go t' th' devil with it."
The youth spoke soothingly
to his comrade. "Well, we both did good. I'd like to see the fool what'd say we
both didn't do as good as we could!"
"Of course we did,"
declared the friend stoutly. "An' I'd break th' feller's neck if he was as big
as a church. But we're all right, anyhow, for I heard one feller say that we two
fit th' best in th' reg'ment, an' they had a great argument 'bout it. Another
feller, 'a course, he had t' up an' say it was a lie--he seen all what was goin'
on an' he never seen us from th' beginnin' t' th' end. An' a lot more stuck in
an' ses it wasn't a lie--we did fight like thunder, an' they give us quite a
sendoff. But this is what I can't stand-- these everlastin' ol' soldiers,
titterin' an' laughin', an then that general, he's crazy."
The youth exclaimed with
sudden exasperation: "He's a lunkhead! He makes me mad. I wish he'd come along
next time. We'd show 'im what--"
He ceased because several
men had come hurrying up. Their faces expressed a bringing of great news.
"O Flem, yeh jest oughta
heard!" cried one, eagerly.
"Heard what?" said the
youth.
"Yeh jest oughta heard!"
repeated the other, and he arranged himself to tell his tidings. The others made
an excited circle. "Well, sir, th' colonel met your lieutenant right by us--it
was damnedest thing I ever heard--an' he ses: 'Ahem! ahem!' he ses. 'Mr.
Hasbrouck!' he ses, 'by th' way, who was that lad what carried th' flag?' he ses.
There, Flemin', what d' yeh think 'a that? 'Who was th' lad what carried th'
flag?' he ses, an' th' lieutenant, he speaks up right away: 'That's Flemin', an'
he's a jimhickey,' he ses, right away. What? I say he did. 'A jimhickey,' he ses--those
'r his words. He did, too. I say he did. If you kin tell this story better than
I kin, go ahead an' tell it. Well, then, keep yer mouth shet. Th' lieutenant, he
ses: 'He's a jimhickey,' and th' colonel, he ses: 'Ahem! ahem! he is, indeed, a
very good man t' have, ahem! He kep' th' flag 'way t' th' front. I saw 'im. He's
a good un,' ses th' colonel. 'You bet,' ses th' lieutenant, 'he an' a feller
named Wilson was at th' head 'a th' charge, an' howlin' like Indians all th'
time,' he ses. 'Head 'a th' charge all th' time,' he ses. 'A feller named
Wilson,' he ses. There, Wilson, m'boy, put that in a letter an' send it hum t'
yer mother, hay? 'A feller named Wilson,' he ses. An' th' colonel, he ses: 'Were
they, indeed? Ahem! ahem! My sakes!' he ses. 'At th' head 'a th' reg'ment?' he
ses. 'They were,' ses th' lieutenant. 'My sakes!' ses th' colonel. He ses:
'Well, well, well,' he ses. 'They deserve t' be major-generals.'"
The youth and his friend
had said: "Huh!" "Yer lyin' Thompson." "Oh, go t' blazes!" "He never sed it."
"Oh, what a lie!" "Huh!" But despite these youthful scoffings and
embarrassments, they knew that their faces were deeply flushing from thrills of
pleasure. They exchanged a secret glance of joy and congratulation.
They speedily forgot many
things. The past held no pictures of error and disappointment. They were very
happy, and their hearts swelled with grateful affection for the colonel and the
youthful lieutenant.
Day Nine Text | The Red Badge of Courage |
English I Stories | Evans Homepage |