“Certainly not. Well, my boy, Henry Bradbury says God bless you! Do you hear? God bless you!”
So, after the ice had been thus broken, Bob explained fully the project he had in mind; there were a score of things to be talked about, a hundred questions to be asked on either side, and a hundred answers to be given. And before they were quite aware of it they had reached the station at Carbon Creek. But the train would not be due yet for nearly an hour. Learning that Bob had not had his breakfast, the veteran compelled him to go across the road with him to the Eagle Hotel.
“Get up the best breakfast you know how for this young man and me,” he said to the landlord. “Ham and eggs and potatoes and biscuits and pancakes and coffee and all the fixin’s. I want you to remember,” he added to Bob, “I want you to remember, some morning when you’re eating hard-tack and salt pork, and drinking black and muddy coffee,—I want you to remember the breakfast Henry Bradbury bought for you at the Eagle Hotel at Carbon Creek the morning you started for the war.”
And Bob did remember it. Many times he remembered it in the days that were to come.
In due time the stage pulled up at the station, the train came in, and Bob said good-by to his veteran friend and stepped on board. He had but one change of cars to make, the one at Scranton, and, late in the afternoon, he reached Phillipsburg and walked across the river to Easton. The provost-marshal’s office was already closed for the day, and Bob had to content himself with finding a modest hotel where he could stay over night and wait patiently for what the morning might bring. After supper he strolled out into the street. Reaching the public square, he saw a hundred newly arrived drafted men formed into a company and drilled in military movements. They were very awkward, indeed. Bob thought that the company of boys at home could have done far better. But, later in the evening, when a body of seasoned veterans, belonging to the invalid corps, reached the city, and marched, with fine precision, up the street to the square, and stacked their arms and were dismissed, he looked upon them with deep admiration. This was something like. The moving ranks, the rhythmic tramp, the glistening arms, the stirring music of the fife and drum, all this had a fascination for the boy such as he had never experienced before. When the troops were dismissed one of the officers, meeting and greeting a comrade on the corner where Bob was waiting, stood for a moment and talked with him.
“Yes,” Bob heard him say, “we’ve got a little provost duty to do up in this end of the state. There were a good many in some sections who didn’t respond to the draft. Some of them are already in, the rest we’re going to round up. One of the most notorious of these fellows is a man by the name of Bannister. I’m going after him myself, when I get through around here. I’ll give him four days from now to make his peace with Uncle Sam, and if he don’t do it something will drop. I’m going after him and I intend to get him, dead or alive.”
The soldiers passed on, and Bob, pale of face and much troubled in heart, went back to his hotel more determined than ever to take his father’s place in the ranks if, by any possible means, so desirable a substitution could be made.
Notwithstanding his anxiety and the many noises in the streets, he slept fairly well, and at nine o’clock on the following morning he presented himself at the office of the provost-marshal. Many were already waiting to see that officer, and Bob had to take his place in line and await his turn. Most of those who swarmed about the marshal’s office were drafted men who were there to urge their claims for exemption from service on account of physical disability. Many were present with substitutes whom they had hired to serve for them. Some who had failed to respond to the notice of draft were being brought in by members of the provost-guard, to answer for their neglect or disobedience.
When Bob’s turn finally came and he was ushered into the provost-marshal’s office, he did not quite know how to state his errand. A man in captain’s uniform sat behind a long table, busily writing. There were two or three clerks in various parts of the room, and soldiers with side-arms stood guard at the door.
The provost-marshal looked up from his writing and saw Bob.