"I think that I should like a furlough."
The other was irritated, almost fierce.
"Send in your application and I will see that it is granted. That's all. Good-day. Captain Windham, it remains for me to say that you have done very well—remarkably well—and appear to be exhausted in proportion. I repeat, you have done very well."
"I think"—Gard paused at the door—"I think it was Daddy Joe."
"Good-day, sir!"
Gard went down the steps, and wondered at his caring so little whether he had done well or not. He did not know why he had wanted to irritate that irritable but powerful official. It had seemed at the time to have points of interest. Probably if one cared about a military career it would not be wise to irritate officials, and, if one did not, it lacked interest.
"He thinks himself something, that one. But"—untying his horse—"I suppose he is." And he rode down the great avenue, whistling. "The Campbells are coming—trala!"
Hundreds of flags hung from windows and waved over buildings. The white dome of the capitol rose up in the distance against the sky. A regimental band was playing a quickstep somewhere near. Towards the river the trunk of the half-built monument stood, purposing in time to commemorate one thought to have been something in his time.
"This sort of thing is no great success. There must be something wrong with me. I think I'll go to Italy. Rhymes! What, ho! I will be a poet. Let the Campbells come, let the Campbells go. It's a foolish tune." Why so enthusiastic at bowling over one's inoffensive brethren in mortality? That sounded like Jack Mavering, another homeless adventurer and piece of fragmentary pottery, who did not care, either, about the commander of the Army of the Potomac, and might be taking lunch now in that restaurant with the gilt sign, the resort of correspondents and small officers. Italy! The Citronen blühen there, and one was either a monk or an artist, or in love with an almond-eyed shepherdess—was something with a denomination, at least, and an ideal for a perquisite. He would go and tell Helen and Mrs. Mavering. Helen would dislike his not caring, and say so, in fact, with vigor. He might omit it and enlarge on Italy.
"I wonder what she'll say? I shouldn't like it if she looked disappointed."