Again Corporal Raynes grinned sheepishly.
"Yes, sir! they had their rifles taken, and so are no longer combatants in a military sense. My rifle is missing also, sir."
"My, my, my!" murmured Captain Cortland in a tone of mock commiseration. "Then the scout who plundered you all may as well return all the property. But of course, Corporal, you and the two other men will continue to be non-combatants as long as the sham fighting lasts."
"Those are Captain Freeman's orders, sir."
Again Captain Cortland turned toward Hal Overton, nodding a signal. Hal stepped away briskly, but came back bearing the pair of shoes, the rifles and the canteens.
"Private Overton is the scout who entered your lines alone and brought about the discomfiture of C Company," Captain Cortland announced, smilingly.
The captain walked away while Corporal Raynes, sitting on the ground, drew on his shoes and laced them, while a lot of B Company's men stood about and grinned over his discomfiture.
"Corporal, you're sure good sleepers over in C Company," laughed Private Hyman. "You fellows want to look out that, some night, you don't get taken in by a lot of amateur hunters from New York."
"Great guns, what's going to happen to the regular Army, when it's getting so that a whole company of infantry can't guard its own property?" another B Company man wanted to know.
Corporal Raynes and his two comrades had to stand a lot of good-natured joshing from the crowding men of B Company.