They did, and it so happened that their table was set where Bill West could not but see them. It seemed to Marcus that Rhonda laughed a little more than was usual and a little more than was necessary.
That night white men and black carried each their own dead into the outer darkness beyond the range of the camp fires and buried them. The graves were smoothed over and sprinkled with leaves and branches, and the excess dirt was carried to the opposite side of the camp where it was formed in little mounds that looked like graves.
The true graves lay directly in the line of march of the morrow. The twenty-three trucks and the five passenger cars would obliterate the last trace of the new-made graves.
The silent men working in the dark hoped that they were unseen by prying eyes; but long into the night a figure lay above the edge of the camp, hidden by the concealing foliage of a great tree, and observed all that took place below. Then, when the last of the white men had gone to bed, it melted silently into the somber depths of the forest.
Toward morning Orman lay sleepless on his army cot. He had tried to read to divert his mind from the ghastly procession of thoughts that persisted despite his every effort to sleep or to think of other things. In the light of the lantern that he had placed near his head harsh shadows limned his face as a drawn and haggard mask.
From his cot on the opposite side of the tent Pat O'Grady opened his eyes and surveyed his chief. "Hell, Tom," he said, "you better get some sleep or you'll go nuts."
"I can't sleep," replied Orman wearily. "I keep seein' White. I killed him. I killed all those blacks."
"Hooey!" scoffed O'Grady. "It wasn't any more your fault than it was the studio's. They sent you out here to make a picture, and you did what you thought was the thing to do. There can't nobody blame you."
"It was my fault all right. White warned me not to come this way. He was right; and I knew he was right, but I was too damn pig-headed to admit it."
"What you need is a drink. It'll brace you up and put you to sleep."