“By the way the folks in this town are acting, keeping so aloof and not over friendly, they consider us as good as licked already,” put in Henry Brewer. “‘You are all dead men’—wasn’t that the comforting word from the black-faced villain who handed us over the mutton?” he appealed to Jerry.
Jerry nodded.
“But they said the same about you in Vera Cruz,” he added.
“Yis, an’ they thought the same at Cerry Gordo,” Sergeant Mulligan asserted. “An’ the same they thought in Pueblo, whin the purty gurls cried to see us set out. But for all that we’re still terrible able to punish flesh-an’-blood victuals. Wid full stomicks an’ Scott to lade us on we go.”
XV
OUTGUESSING GENERAL SANTA ANNA
In the morning the clouds had vanished. The day was as warm as midsummer; in the east and southeast the great peaks of Iztaccihuatl and Popocatepetl stood out white and sharp and clear; large Lake Chalco shimmered in lanes of water through reeds and floating meadows; across it, and farther in the northwest, the City of Mexico appeared plainly, its towers and high roofs glistening in the sun.
Everything looked peaceful. After the camp had performed its fatigue duties, the men were set at work cleaning their equipment. Jerry finished early and was free to wander.
By all talk throughout the regiment the situation was serious. The City of Mexico was in sight, but it was surrounded by lakes and bogs, and batteries of heavy guns, and fortifications manned by thirty thousand or more Mexican soldiers.
After a while he espied an officer seated by himself, apart, upon a pile of old clay bricks and studying a map. It was Lieutenant Grant, busy figuring the problem. Jerry went to him and saluted.