"It must have been so, and we have been standing here, doing nothing, when aid might have been given!" said Crawford, in self-reproach, and forgetting how little a man with one arm can do in the way of carrying out people from a burning building. "Yet no—stop! No, Bob, that scream was not the last of the person's life, for didn't you notice, we heard it twice, and the last time after the house had fallen in? After that house fell, no one inside of it ever screamed, and so—"
"And so," said Webster, interrupting, "there is somebody, not in the house, who screamed? That is what you mean, and by Jupiter, Jack, you are right!"
"Now we must look the other side of the house," said Crawford. "Some poor creature, badly burned, may have crawled out from the flames and be lying there in agony."
So there might have been, truly! And what a strange riddle is human nature, even on that other side—mercy! We but a little while ago considered the ease with which a man born with the warmest aspirations for human good, might become eager for the destruction of life, when that life belonged to a foeman: let the opposite spectacle be considered, of a man who had just been plunging into the thick of a hand-to-hand fight, estimating human heads as of no more value than cocoa-nuts, and human lives as something to be taken without a shudder or a pang of compunction,—a few minutes afterwards speaking of a "poor creature" whose life might be threatened by fire, and speaking of that "poor creature" with all the tenderness of a mother or a lover! And is this inconsistent? No—it is consistent to the last degree. The brave man is the pitiful man; and while he may consider a hecatomb necessary for a cause, he regards one life sacrificed unnecessarily, as murder. "Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm, is all unfit to live!" says one of the old poet-philosophers. And are worms therefore never to be trodden upon? Not so, by any means! The adverbial adjective "needlessly" explains the broad distinction. Not one worm, even the creeping, crawling and disgusting caterpillar, for cruelty or even for neglect: millions of worms, whether caterpillar or human worm of the dust, for a sacred cause and a great duty!
"Yes, come on around the house. The heat is not so great now, and we must see if there is anything living here," was the reply of Webster to the last suggestion of Crawford; and they at once followed the yard as closely round as the burning ruins would permit. They heard no repetition of the sound; nor could they see any sign of human life. Behind the house, hillward, stood a small barn and stables, while a wood-shed and some other small outbuildings stood on the eastern side of the enclosure. These had been nearly connected with the house by board fences, and in two places those fences had taken fire and threatened to carry the flames to the other buildings. But the evening had been calm, and the fire had not run many yards along the fences before it became extinguished for want of compelling wind and quick fuel.
A proposition from Webster that they should search the outbuildings for the source of the cry, was negatived by Crawford, who thought it very likely, after all his previous confidence, that some of the Confederate troops, who had certainly held the woods at one time during the day, might be located in the barn—not dangerous, perhaps, if undisturbed, but very likely to be troublesome if two soldiers, one with one arm and both on a very blind errand, should go stumbling about in the dark too miscellaneously.
"Well," said Webster, "no doubt you are right, Jack, as you almost always are. In that case we have nothing to do but to get back to camp and look a little more closely after that shivered arm of yours, for there is certainly no one near the edge of the fire."
"Hark!" said Crawford, as they started to retrace their stops around the house, and move away. They were within a few steps of what appeared to be a wood-shed, standing on the east side of the enclosure, and some forty or fifty feet from the house. "Hark!"
"Well, what is it? I heard nothing!" said Webster, who had been listening exclusively for another shriek.
"Well, I heard something, and it was a groan!" said Crawford.