“Sergeant Maydew,” said a captain, “take six men and go occupy that scrub-oak clump down there. Watch that ravine and pick them off if they come up it.”
Billy Maydew and the six fairly filled the tuft of bushes halfway down the hill. “Jest as snug as a bug in a rug!”
“They’ll get it hot if they come up that gully! It’s a beautiful—what did Steve use to call it?—‘avalanche’!”
“I kind of miss Steve. He had his uses. He’d keep up even a yaller dog’s self-esteem. Even a turkey-buzzard could say, ‘I am better than thou.’ Every time I got down in the mouth and began to think of my sins I just looked at Steve and felt all right.”
“Reckon the army’ll ever get him again? Reckon his sore foot’ll ever get well?”
“He’d better not come back to the Sixty-fifth,” said Sergeant Billy Maydew. He spoke with slow emphasis. “The day Steve Dagg comes back to the Sixty-fifth Billy Maydew air goin’ to be marched to the guardhouse for killing a polecat.”
The six smiled, smiled with grimness. “Ef you do it, Sergeant, reckon the Sixty-fifth, from the colonel down, ’ll appear for you and swear you did a public service!”
Dave Maydew moved his head aside, then softly raised his rifle. The others did likewise. There was a pause so utter that they heard each other’s breathing and the dry Zrrrr! of a distant grasshopper.
Dave lowered the rifle. “I see now! ’T wa’n’t nothing but a squirrel.”
“Reckon ’t won’t do to shoot him? Squirrel stew—”