“Do please, Captain, set a regular hour for this drill, and make us stick to it, just as in the regular army. I promise I’ll not oversleep again—I’ll try not, I mean. Will you?”
“Sure, Little One, and I’ll app’int you First Leftenant, Company B, San Leon Life Guards. Halt!”
He stopped and faced his followers:
“It has been proposed ’t we make this a regular company, same as Company A, of the boys. I second the proposition. I’d be proud to train ye, if so be you’ll hold up your end the musket. I mean, no shirkin’ duty and bein’ marched to the guard house, or sentinel work, for bad behavior. Put on your thinkin’ caps and keep ’em on a minute. Down to West Point, where some of us is hankerin’ to be, they don’t allow no lyin’. A broken promise is the worst kind of a lie. So before you pledge your word, gals and boys alike, you—think. Think hard, think deep. I’ll time ye. When one minute is up, to the second, I’ll call for your answer. Everybody turn their eyes inside themselves and—think.”
With that the wise and shrewd old fellow pulled his silver time-piece from his pocket and placed it in the hollow of his hand. Then he fixed his eyes upon its white face and stood motionless, watching the second hand make its little circuit. When the sixty seconds had been counted, he held up his hand with profound gravity and called:
“All in favor of forming a new Company, say ‘Aye!’ Contrary ‘No!’”
Every hand went up—but Leslie’s. Every voice uttered an earnest “Aye!” save his, and Dorothy flashed an indignant, as well as disappointed glance upon him, exclaiming:
“Oh! What a mean—I mean, what a rude boy! When all your guests are just suffering to be soldiers, you go and spoil the whole business. Why do you do that?”
The lad flushed. He had been duly instructed by both parents in the duties of a host, even a young one; and he knew it was his business to see that all his guests were helped to enjoy themselves as they, not he, desired. It was the first time that he had had any responsibility of this sort and it didn’t greatly please him. Now when he found they were all looking at him in that aggrieved way he tossed his head, thrust his hands into his pockets, and answered:
“I know I proposed it and thought I’d like it, but I’ve changed my mind and now think it would get to be a confounded nuisance. I’ve never done anything, regularly, as you talk about, and I don’t see any use in beginning at this late day when—”