It was not long after this interview that Sergeant McCormack’s qualities as a soldier and a gentleman were put severely to the test. There was to be an exhibition drill on a certain evening, at the armory, to which drill people of the city who were interested in the military proficiency of the men of Company E were invited.
There is always something attractive about this handling of rifles by an entire company, with its rhythmic movements, its click and clash, its sudden and startling changes, and the picturesque way in which it brings out the muscular alertness of the men. People were fond of coming to see such exercises. Moreover, following the drill, there were to be gymnastic contests, such as cane wrestling, pole pulling, tug of war, etc. It had been the aim of Captain Murray to keep his men interested by an appeal to their social and amusement-loving natures as well as to their ambition to excel in military proficiency. This was one reason why the company, as a whole, was always loyal and contented, and why it was possible to keep the ranks full of excellent soldierly material.
On this particular evening Sergeant McCormack, dressed in uniform, was hurrying from his home to the armory. His mother and his sisters were to go a little later in the car with his Aunt Sarah.
It so chanced that on the foot-walk of the Main Street Bridge, just where he had met him and had his first interview with him two years before, he met Hugo Donatello.
“I suppose,” said the young radical, half jocosely, “that you now go for instruction of how to destroy the proletariat with the rifle, including me, myself?”
“Well,” replied Hal, “so far as you are concerned, I don’t know but you deserve to be destroyed, newspaper and all. That was a fierce article you had in last week about the National Guard.”
“But was it not true, what I said?”
“No. The Guard is made up of right-minded men, trying to serve their country and their State in the fairest possible way.”
“You do not yet know. No military is just or fair, nor can be. They are under orders of politicians. Politicians are controlled by capitalists. Capitalists conspire to crush workers. So there; what would you?”
He threw out his hands with a gesture which meant that there could be no other conclusion.