“Well, that’s a little under age, but I guess you can get in. Uncle Sam needs soldiers pretty bad. I guess they’ll take you.”
“I believe I’ll try it. It looks this way to me. If I get to be a soldier and have a good record, then if they do get father, whatever happens to him it won’t be quite so bad for the rest of us if I’ve proved my loyalty.”
“That’s right! I don’t believe you’re going to help him by enlisting, but if worst comes to worst men are going to forget your father’s disgrace in thinking of your bravery. Will you do it? Will you enlist?”
“Yes, Sergeant Anderson, I will.”
“Then I’ll tell you what to do. You go with me. In an hour I shall start back to the South to join my regiment. I’ll take you along. I’ll get you into my company. I’ll get you into my mess. I’ll stand by you, and take care of you, and share with you, because you’re a hero already, and I’m proud of you!”
The sergeant’s eyes dimmed as he grasped the boy’s hand and shook it enthusiastically.
“Thank you!” replied Bob. “I’m no hero; and I may disgrace you; but I’ll go, and I’ll do the very best I can.”
“Good! Be at the depot across the bridge yonder in an hour, and I’ll meet you there. The train leaves at eleven o’clock.”
The sergeant hurried away, and Bob went back to his hotel to get his baggage. It occurred to him to write a brief letter to Seth Mills, and he did so, telling him what had happened at Easton and giving him permission to repeat to his father and mother so much or so little of the information as he saw fit. Then he hurried to the railroad station and there, promptly at the hour agreed upon, he met Sergeant Anderson. At eleven o’clock they boarded the train for Harrisburg, and from thence, with little delay, they went to Washington. It was late at night when they reached the capital city, and Bob was very tired. They passed through the jostling crowds at the railroad station and sought a rooming house, not far away, with which Sergeant Anderson was familiar, stopping on the way to get a meagre luncheon at a near-by restaurant. They were not long in seeking their beds, and they had no sooner laid themselves down than the young officer fell into a heavy and restful sleep.
But Bob was not so fortunate. The events of the day were still very fresh and vivid in his mind, and he could not readily dismiss the memory of them. It had all been so novel, so exciting, so nerve-racking, for this boy of seventeen, who never before in his life had been fifty miles distant from his native town. Yet he was not discontented or unhappy. On the contrary, so far as the wisdom of his course was concerned, his mind was perfectly at rest. His only anxiety was on account of his father and mother, who would be worrying about him at home. Yet he felt that he had done right. Whatever now might happen to his father, permanent escape from the Federal authorities, or arrest, imprisonment, and death, he knew that his own record as a Union soldier would help to save the family from complete disgrace. Moreover, the ambition of years was about to be realized, he was soon to be enlisted in the ranks of his country’s soldiers, and march and fight under the folds of the old flag. So, with this thought in his mind to temper the anxiety for his father in his heart, he fell into a calmer, deeper sleep than he had known before in many months.