“A darned sight good Hal’s carcass will do ye!” he said, shaking his fist defiantly in the direction of the foe, “but the wust is your own this hot weather, if you don’t bury him decently;” then turning to the lifeless gore, he continued: “Poor Hal! I’m kinder sorry you are dead. You had now and then a streak of good about you, and I’m sorry we ever quarreled, I be, upon my word, and I wish you could hear me say so; but you can’t, knocked into a cocked up hat as you are, poor Hal. If there was a spot on your face as big as a sixpence that wasn’t smashed into a jelly, I’d kiss you just for the old woman’s sake, but I swan if I can stomach it! I might your hands, perhaps,” and bending lower, Bill’s lips touched the clammy fingers of the dead.
There was something in the touch which brought to Bill’s heart a pang similar to the one he felt when he saw his brother fall, and rising to his feet, he said, mournfully:
“Good-bye, old Hal, I’m going now; I wish you might go, too. Good-bye,” and wiping away a tear which felt much out of place on his rough cheek, Bill walked away, saying to himself, “Poor Hal. I didn’t s’pose I had such a hankerin’ for him. Didn’t s’pose I cared for nobody; but such a day’s work as this finds the soft spot in a feller’s heart if he’s got any. Poor Hal! Mother’ll nigh about raise the ruff!”
Thus soliloquizing Bill moved on, not rapidly as others did, but rather leisurely than otherwise. He seemed to be benumbed, and did not care much what became of himself. Wading the stream he trudged on, now wondering “What the plague they all were running for, when they’d got the rascals licked,” and again anathematizing the shot which fell around him.
“S’pose I care for you,” he said, hitting a spent ball a kick. “S’pose I care if I do get killed? better do that than to run.”
Then reflecting that to be shot in the back was not considered a distinguished mark of honor, he hastened his lagging steps until the shelter of the wood was reached. Bill was very tired, and feeling comparatively safe, determined not to travel farther until he had had some rest. Hunting out a thick clump of underbrush near a stream of water, where he would be sheltered from observation, he crawled into its midst, and was ere long sleeping soundly, wholly oblivious to the strange sights and sounds around him, as squad after squad of soldiers hurried by.
Meanwhile George Graham was sitting faint and weary beneath the tree, when the first token of the retreat met his view.
“See, they are running,” Isaac said, grasping his sound arm in some affright. “Let us run, too. You lean on me, and I’ll lead you safely through.”
“With a bitter groan, George attempted to rise, but sank back again from utter exhaustion. A species of apathy had stolen over him, and he would rather stay there and die, he said, than make the attempt to flee. He did not think of Annie, until Isaac, bending down, said, entreatingly:
“It will be horrid for Annie to know you died, when you might have got away. Try for Annie’s sake, can’t you?”