“And you’ll never hear the like again,” answered Rodney. “But I do not look for any more. Two cousins are all I have.”
The corporal laughed and rode on up the road to meet the expected raiders, and the lieutenant told his sergeant to call in the men who were still holding their positions on the skirmish-line which had been formed when that warning dust was seen rising above the tree-tops. He told Charley Bowen that he could remain behind to receive orders from Colonel Grierson when he arrived, and detailed two troopers to keep watch on him and Marcy Gray.
“This isn’t at all regular; I ought to take those conscripts to Baton Rouge, and I am soldier enough to know it,” said the lieutenant, addressing himself to Rodney. “But you seem to be all right with that corporal, and if you and he can make it all right with Colonel Grierson I shall be glad of it. I have heard your cousin’s story and should be glad to listen to the additions I know you can make to it, but haven’t time just now.”
“It confirms one’s faith in human nature to meet a kind-hearted soldier now and then,” said Rodney, who knew that the lieutenant could have compelled the conscripts to go on with him if he had been so disposed. “I am very grateful to you, and will do you a good turn if I get half a chance. Whenever you scout through this country drop in and have a bowl of milk. I can’t offer you any to-day, for your men have made away with all I had. Good-by. This is what I get by befriending escaped prisoners,” he added mentally, as he started on a run for the house. “If I hadn’t taken so much trouble to help that corporal where would Marcy be now?”
As it was, he was lying at his ease on Rodney’s bed instead of riding along the dusty road toward Baton Rouge, reeling in his seat from very weakness. Charley Bowen sat close by holding his hand, and the two troopers who had been detailed to guard them were lounging on the gallery just outside the window. The hand that rested in Bowen’s palm was not white like its owner’s face, but very much swollen and discolored, and Rodney noticed it at once.
“What’s the matter?” he inquired. “How did you get hurt?”
“He was triced up by the thumbs till he fainted,” replied Bowen, speaking for his comrade.
Rodney’s face turned all sorts of colors.
“General Lee himself couldn’t make me believe that the punishment was deserved,” said he through his teeth. “That boy drilled alongside of me for almost four years at the Barrington Military Academy, and a better soldier never shouldered a musket. He knows more than the man who triced him up. What was it done for?”
“Because Marcy didn’t shoot a Yankee prisoner whose hand was inside the deadline,” replied Bowen.