A Soldier's Trial: An Episode of the Canteen Crusade

by Charles King

It was another lovely summer morning, sweet, moist and still. The squadron had been out as usual, but the drill had been anything but snappy or spirited. Every officer knew, and most men decided, that something was weighing heavily on the major's mind, for, though he labored conscientiously through his duties, comments and corrections were few, and, to the surprise of all, he even dismissed the troops some few minutes before the sounding of the recall. Captain Washburn looked back over his shoulder at the tall, spare, sinewy figure riding slowly, even dejectedly, with downcast eyes and troubled visage, back toward the big quarters at the end of the row, and shook his own head as he marveled what would be the outcome of all this foreboding. Minneconjou had breathed freer, for all its subdued chatter, over the elimination of Captain Foster from the column of probabilities. Minneconjou had seen little of the lovely Mrs. Dwight of late, for though she appeared at every dance, several dinners and on many a drive, few women had speech with her, thanks to Foster's incessant supervision, and, looking at another woman without unlimited conversation is not "seeing" her as understood in feminine society. Since Foster's departure the previous day only the doctor and the maid had been admitted to the presence of Mrs. Dwight, though there had been callers with "kind inquiries." It was now time for guard-mounting and the busy routine of another day. One after another prettily gowned matrons and maids began to appear on the verandas and flit from door to door, and the band marched forth and took its station on the parade and the details were being inspected by the sergeants in front of their quarters, while, well over toward the west end of the big quadrilateral, a dozen army-bred lads of various ages, from fourteen down to five, were gleefully surrounding a pair of Indian ponies recently bought for the doctor's twin boys. Prominent in the group, Jimmy Dwight, ever a prime favorite, was bestriding the more promising of the pair, a wall-eyed, surly-looking pinto, and, as perhaps the most accomplished horseman in the lot, was trying to make the unwilling brute show his paces, a thing that only an Indian, as a rule, can successfully do. Officers on their way to their company duty stopped to see the fun. The adjutant paused before signaling to the drum major and said a laughing word of caution to the merry crowd, lest their gleeful shouts and laughter should disturb the dignity of the coming ceremony. The senior surgeon, coming forth from his quarters, Silver Hill's morning journal just received, open in his hand, moved an adjournment to the rear of the administration building. But the colonel himself, likewise provided by a rushing newsboy with a fresh copy of our morning contemporary, sallied forth from his gate and shouted encouragement to the plucky little rider. "Stick to him, Jimmy boy, and you others don't yell so; keep quiet, and the pony will tire of kicking."

Then he and the doctor fell into converse over the telegraphic headline, and then the bugles pealed adjutant's call, the band crashed merrily into "Hands Across the Sea," and the details of the twelve companies came marching jauntily forth upon the green. The colonel, with soldierly appreciation in his eyes, stood watching the sharp, snappy formation of the line, the paper dangling unheeded from his thumb and forefinger, while the surgeon, more alive to the news of the day than the niceties of military duty, turned over the outer page, began to scan the headlines of the inner column, as suddenly, impulsively, unthinkingly startled the colonel by the exclamation "God!" Stone whirled about in sudden anxiety. For a moment the doctor simply stared and read, then glanced at the post commander, and, without a word, handed him the sheet. Stone, too, stared, started, looked quickly into the surgeon's face, and then said: "Let's get inside." So together these veterans of their respective corps quit the field and the sight of men and boys and went to confer within the depth of the vine-shaded veranda.

At that same moment the tall, gaunt form of Major Dwight was seen to issue from the front doorway of the first quarters on the southward line, the field officer's roomy house, and, looking neither to the right nor the left, straight, stern and rigidly erect, he strode forth upon the grassy parade, heading for the merry group about the ponies. The band had ceased its spirited march music. The adjutant had assigned officers and non-commissioned officers to their posts. The lieutenant commanding had ordered "Inspection arms!" and once again the strain of sweet music swept across the green carpeted quadrangle, and Marion Ray, seated on her piazza far down the line, chatting with a neighbor who had just dropped in, lifted her head and listened. It was one of Margaret's old favorites, a song she used to sing and loved to sing, a song played by many an army band for many a year, and it seemed never to grow wearisome or stale—"Happy Be Thy Dreams." With her thoughts all of Margaret and her eyes following her thoughts, she arose, stepped to the rail, looking for little Jim, whom she had recently seen but seldom, and then caught sight of the major a long distance away, bearing straight and swift upon the romping group at the westward end of the parade. Barely twenty minutes before, as she was giving Sandy his coffee, for Sandy had come down late after a restless, almost sleepless night, she had heard Dwight's deep tones at the front gate in earnest conversation with Priscilla, who now had entirely disappeared. More than once of late the two had been in talk over some of Priscilla's schemes, but the housemaid said she thought Miss Sanford had gone now with the major down the row, perhaps to Lieutenant Thornton's. Why should they go thither? Priscilla had been so very silent, subdued and, it was hoped, contrite since the exposure of her correspondence with the Banner that Mrs. Ray marveled at her early resumption of the old dominant way; for, though low-voiced and almost reluctant, for her, Priscilla's words to the major had been spoken firmly, unflinchingly. Only two or three of these words had reached the ears of her aunt; the others were not sufficiently loud or articulate, but whatever they were, they had led to immediate action, for the major had departed, Priscilla with him, and, anxiously, inspired partially by the music, partially by some indefinable sense of something going sadly amiss, something that should be stopped at once, Marion stepped forward, gazed eastward down the row and saw Priscilla in close conversation with little Mrs. Thornton, only five doors away, and then, all in a flash, she remembered——

Sandy, before starting for his office, had gone back to his room. He at least was on hand and ready to act in case she needed him, but as yet she did not call. Forgetful, for the moment, of her visitor, she stood clasping the rail and staring, inert and even possibly fascinated, along the westward line, following intently and with startled, troubled eyes the major's movements. Others, too, had noted both among the spectators along that front and among the laughing lads themselves. By this time the ponies had been favored with new riders and the riders with every conceivable suggestion as to what to attempt. Jimmy had given place to Harold Winn, and rejoicefully was bidding him clamp tighter with his legs and knees and keep his hands down on the withers, but too late. A sudden lunge with his heels, a dive with his shaggy head, and the spunky little brute, half-savage as a result of all-savage training, had propelled his would-be conqueror sprawling to the edge of the gleaming waters of the acequia, and a shout of mingled delight and derision went up from a dozen boy throats, and Jimmy, helping his playmate, unhurt but shaken, to his feet, caught sight of the loved form speeding toward them over the green, and, bubbling over with fun, laughter, high health and spirits, just as of old went bounding joyously, confidently, to meet him.

Of just what was passing in Oswald Dwight's bewildered mind that morning God alone could judge and tell. All his soldier life he had loved truth and hated a lie. All his fond and confident teaching of his only boy, Margaret's darling and his hope and pride, had been to speak the truth, frankly, fearlessly, fully, first, last and all the time. "Never fear to come to me with anything you may have done. Never let anything tempt you to swerve from the truth and the whole truth. Nothing you can ever say or do will ever so hurt me as will a lie." And so, fearlessly and fully, from the time Jim had begun to prattle he had learned to own his little faults, sure of sympathy and forgiveness. He had learned to strive to conquer them for the sake of the love and trust that was so unfailing, and in response to the grave but ever gentle admonition, and it had been the father's fond belief for years that between him and his only son there lived utter confidence and faith, that Jim would ever shrink from a lie and never from him. Between the two, father and son, never had there seemed to come a shadow, until of late that darkly beautiful face had for the time, at least, replaced—that other. Since then, time and again when Dwight spoke of his pride and trust in Jim, the new wife had listened, unresponsive. Since that last night in Naples, whenever Dwight spoke of his confidence in Jimmy's word she had sometimes looked up appealingly, timidly, as though she longed to believe as he believed, yet could not—quite. Sometimes she had looked away. Once or twice she had ventured a faint negation. Jimmy would not deliberately tell a falsehood; oh, she was sure of that, but, like all children, she said, when suddenly accused, the impulse would be to deny, would it not? and then—had not the major observed?—did he not remember—that Jimmy was just a bit—imaginative? Dwight puzzled over her apparent unbelief.

But very recently he had noticed other little things that vaguely worried him. Could it be that, as his boy grew older and mingled more with other boys, he was learning to be influenced more by them and less by the father? Could it be that he was seeing, hearing, things, to speak of which he dared not? There might be things of which he would be ashamed. Certainly the father had seen at times, since the homeward voyage, a certain hesitancy on part of the son, and within the past few days, for the first time in Jimmy's life, Dwight had noted symptoms of something like avoidance, concealment, embarrassment, something that told his jealous, over-anxious heart the boy no longer utterly confided in the man. It was late the previous evening when the little fellow had returned with his stanch friend, Sergeant French, and a fine string of trout, happy, radiant, proud of his success, but so tired he could hardly keep his eyes open long enough to undress and get to bed. Dwight had met him at the door, cautioning silence on mamma's account, and the young face that beamed up at his, all delight and eagerness at first, clouded almost instantly at the word. Jimmy did not even care for the tempting supper set aside for him—he had had such a big lunch, he said, in smothered tone, as he prattled eagerly to his father and showed his finny prizes, and sipped at his glass of milk. But Dwight had been brooding over little things that had come to him since Foster's assisted emigration. He had returned straight from his conference with Stone and the surgeon to find Inez reduced to the sofa and smelling salts—to tell her at once that their guest was gone, not because of a fracas with Ray, as Foster had furiously declared, but because of telegraphic orders from Washington that had come, possibly, as the result of Foster's own telegraphic inquiries of Saturday and Sunday. Not for a star would Dwight let his wife suppose that Foster's protracted visit had given him the least uneasiness! But the maid, that pert and flippant young person so much in evidence about the house, so indispensable to Inez, so intangibly a nuisance to him, kept flitting in and out, with her persistent, "Madame should compose herself"; "Madame should not try to talk."

The "young person's" nationality, Dwight believed, was Swiss-Italian, rather than French. They had picked her up in Milan, but her professional interests, it seems, were advanced by the adoption of French methods and mannerisms. She had early striven to establish herself as companion rather than maid, to be called Mademoiselle rather than Félicie, but the dragoon had sharply drawn the line, and in the beginning, at least, the man was master. As ills accumulated, however, and masculine strength deferred to feminine weakness, he succumbed to their wishes, with the result that the ascendency of the domestic was becoming a matter of gossip. Once established at the post, Félicie's swift methods of acquiring knowledge of all that was going on about her, and unlimited means of imparting the same to her mistress, had quite speedily established confidential relations to which the putative master of the house was a stranger. There is a garrison "Service of Security and Information" that differs widely from that of the field—and is even more comprehensive.

Félicie had heard the various versions of the affray at Ray's office. Félicie had heard of the lamentable affair of Georgie Thornton's injury and its cause, and Félicie had been quick to see and suggest how this incident might be utilized in case Master James could not be persuaded to forget that, when he came hurrying in from church the previous day, mamma, who had been too ill to arise at ten o'clock, was in most becoming morning toilet tête-à-tête with Captain Foster in the parlor. Félicie had even assured Madame that she could and would influence Master James accordingly, and this, too, after one unsuccessful attempt on Sunday. Félicie had fairly flown, all sympathy and helpfulness, to fetch Master James fresh, cool water, towels, ice for the back of his neck, a preventive the most assured for nose-bleed, and all this despite Jimmy's repellent silence, for the lad shrank from her instinctively. She had then striven to coax him to promise that he would mention to no man that mamma was dressed and downstairs: it would so annoy the doctor, who had said she should remain in bed, and, indeed, she (Félicie) and the dear captain had remonstrated with mamma, and were even then striving to persuade mamma to return to her room, as later she had to when—Master James came so hurriedly in. The only response had been a blank look of bewilderment and dislike and an uncompromising: "Well, 'spose somebody asks me?"

All this, of course, was known at the moment only to the three; but, as luck would have it, when Dwight came walking slowly homeward from church with Mrs. Ray, communion service ended, Jim had run to meet them, the nose-bleed already forgotten, and, to the father's "I hope you didn't disturb mamma, my boy. She was trying hard to sleep," the little man had promptly, impulsively responded: "No, indeed, daddy, mamma is up and dressed——" And then he remembered, faltered, blushed.

Dwight did not question his boy about his new mamma. That was another thing from which the father shrank. He saw the lad's sudden confusion, and knew that something was being held back, but it was something that should be held back. In all his teachings as to utter frankness, truth, confidence, he, of course, had never meant that his boy should be a tale-bearer—above all that he should ever come with tales of his new mamma; yet Dwight, unfortunately, had never given him to understand that there were matters, now that the boy was growing older and observant, concerning which no confidences were expected or invited. But it had set him to thinking—to questioning Inez as to her sudden recovery, and again, more pointedly that Monday afternoon between the hour of his visit with the colonel and his ominous symptoms at parade, thereby bringing on a fit of nerves for her and a swimming of the head for himself. It was while he was waiting for Jimmy's home-coming that Félicie—ostentatiously bustling to and fro, all sympathy for Madame in her prostration and anxiety as to M'sieu, the Commandant—had contrived to intimate that Monsieur James had been so imprudent as to rush, all ensanguined, into the presence of Madame, and now and under such circumstances, and in virgin modesty, Félicie's eyelids drooped, "Madame should be spared all possibility of shock or emotion." Under any other circumstances with what a thrill would he have listened to her words! Did not Monsieur conceive? And Madame's heart and sympathies so all-responsive! Had they not already been lacerated by the story of the suffering of the little George, an infant, oh, heaven, the most amiable! But assuredly Monsieur James had apprised his father of all that had taken place. He, too, was an infant the most amiable, and Dwight, overwrought and bewildered, before Jimmy went to his bed that night, had again asked him what all this meant about Georgie Thornton, and, looking squarely into his father's face, with Margaret's soul speaking from his clear, unflinching, fearless eyes, the little man had said again, "Why, daddy, I haven't an idea! I didn't even hear he was hurt until you told me."