“So I saluted, and went on a jog-trot after ‘L,’ with my field-case bumping and banging against my hip, and”—
“And mighty sour you were at the detail!” I hazarded, getting up and going over to the mantel after a supply of matches.
“And caught up with The Thieves just after they’d got well into the bush,” said Bones, without noticing my interruption. “Well, I reported to Curtis, and got orders to march either in the line of file-closers or at the rear of the column; and choosing the latter alternative, I trudged along quite contentedly, a little N.C.S. all by myself. It was a cloudy day, with just enough coolness in the air to make marching pleasant, and I thoroughly enjoyed the tramp along the leafy, grass-grown path. The boys joked and guyed each other—we were marching route-step—and once they started in on a song with a jolly, swinging refrain to it, but Curtis shut ’em up in short order, for he didn’t care to have his progress too widely advertised.
“Now, Elliott had said that a march of something like three-quarters of a mile would bring us into the desired position for flanking the colonel’s hostile forces, and he’d cautioned Curtis not to cover his ground in less than half an hour; so we strolled along slowly and took things easily. But when, after travelling for the best part of an hour, we had seen no signs of a clearing, why, we rather began to wonder where we were at, and wherefore. You see, we were making our way through the thickest of thick cover, there wasn’t in the whole outfit such an article as a compass, and there was no sun to tell us which way our noses pointed.
“‘This begins to grow blamed ridiculous,’ said Curtis, after we’d patiently footed it for about two miles and a half. ‘I’m not so dead sure about our not being lost. But I’ve had my orders. “Follow copy if it takes you out of the window” is a good enough rule for me’—in civil life, you know, Curtis was a newspaper man—‘and so I’ll heel-and-toe it over this blossoming path until we land in the middle of next week.’
“‘Hello!’ he broke out a moment later, ‘the advance guard begins to show signs of life!’ And with that he halted the company, as the sergeant—who, with two men, had preceded the company by a hundred yards or so—came running back towards us. ‘Well, sergeant, what is it? Are we in sight of land yet?’
“‘I haven’t seen anything, sir,’ reported the sergeant, ‘but I just heard something like shouting, and after that a few shots; not volleys, just scattering pops.’
“‘The skirmishers starting in, most likely,’ commented Curtis, ‘though that wouldn’t account for the shouting.’
“‘But the sound appeared to come from our left,’ went on the sergeant; ‘and that seems queer.’
“‘From your left?’ repeated Curtis, break-off a small twig and thoughtfully chewing one end of it. ‘The deuce it did! Then we’ve marched half ’round a circle, or else the colonel’s flanked us. According to all the rules of the game the enemy ought to be engaged on our right. ‘Tention! Silence in the ranks!’