“Ye’re damn right we’ll have to fight!” said Absalom. “Our Government kain’t stand that.”
“The sergeant here will tell you,” went on David Joslin, after a time. “The Government wants volunteers, up to forty—that’ll let me in. It may be some of you boys will want to go along. Maybe it’s our time come at last!”
And now, all at once, swiftly, exultantly, gloriously unrestrained, the full gift of tongues fell upon David Joslin, as he stood there in the open street of a mountain village in a forgotten land! Suddenly the clouds cleared in front of him. He saw, and was content now with what he saw. Now he knew his life had not been in vain; that yet it might be of worth; that on ahead, if he should be spared to win it, lay the great, wide education of life and citizenship, and a share in the building and the keeping of a world! He spoke in such fashion that all his own longings, his own yearnings for his country and his people became apparent to them now, so that they listened in trust and awe and reverence; as well as in somber anger when he swung to the great summons. Had there been David Joslins throughout the land, the American Army had been a matter of a week, a day, and we had not been laggard in Freedom’s great day of peril.
“There’s goin’ to be a draft, a conscription,” said the sergeant in explanation after a time.
“Draft be damned!” said Absalom Gannt, and spoke the mind of all. “Thar kain’t nobody draft us, not even the Government. We’ll go ahead of ary draft.”
“They won’t let you go, Absalom. You’re too old,” said Sergeant Talley to him, smiling.
“Too old! Who—me? I’d like to see ary man tells me I’m too old to fight,” rejoined that stark citizen.
“Twenty-one to thirty-one,” smiled Sergeant Talley. “Up to forty, if you volunteer.”
“Well, that lets me in, anyway,” said Chan Bullock, and there were nods through the little crowd. Only the older men turned face to face, shaking their heads.
“It hain’t no ways reas’ner’ble to let the boys go alone,” said old Absalom Gannt. “It hain’t no ways right, an’ it wouldn’t do—we’ll all go out together, that’s what we’ll do! Davy Joslin, ye’ll have to go, too—I reckon ye’ll have to lead us—Outside.”