For Thaine Aydelot, to whom Decoration Day was a sacred Sabbath always, this greatest of all indignities cut deep where a man’s soul feels keenest. And when transport after transport sailed out of the San Francisco harbor, loaded with regiments for the Philippines, and still the Twentieth Kansas was left in idle waiting on the dreary sand lots of Camp Merritt and the Presidio reservation, the silent campaign that really makes a soldier was waged daily in Thaine and his comrades.
“Don’t complain, boys,” Captain Clarke admonished his 306 company. “We’ll be ready when we are called, and that’s what really counts.”
Other commanders of the regiment gave the same encouragement. So the daily drilling went on. The sons of the indomitable men and women who had conquered the border ruffian, the hostile Plains Indian, and the unfriendly prairie sod, these sons kept their faith in themselves, their pride in the old Kansas State that bore them, and their everlasting good humor and energy and ability to learn. Such men are the salt of the earth.
Todd Stewart made a brave struggle, but his slide on the muddy ground at Camp Leedy was his military undoing, and his discharge followed.
“I’m going to start back to old Grass River tomorrow,” he said to Thaine Aydelot, who had called to see him with face aglow. “I’ve made the best fight I could, but the doctor says the infantry needs two legs, and neither one wooden. But best of all, Thaine, Jo has written that she wants me to come home. It’s not so bad if there’s a welcome like that waiting. She is slowly overcoming her dislike for country life. But I can’t help envying you.”
“Oh, you’ll stand on both feet all right when you get them both on the short grass of the prairie again, and, as you say, the welcome makes up for a good many losses.”
Something impenetrable came into his eyes for the moment only and then the fire of enthusiasm burned again in them, for Thaine’s nerves were a-tingle with the ambition and anticipation of the young soldier waiting immediate orders, and he changed the subject eagerly.
“I came to tell you something, Todd. We are to sail 307 the seas on the next transport to Manila, sure. And we’ll see service yet, all right.”
Thaine threw his cap in air and danced about the bed in his enthusiasm.
“Glory be! Won’t Fred Funston do things when he hits the Orient? Best colonel that ever had the U. S. military engines to buck against.”