“I thought so too, Jock. A little monotony would be fine variety. But a man must take his medicine, y’u know, and not squeal.” Jones had lowered his voice, and now spoke without satire to the boy whom he had in a curious manner taken under his protection.
“Look at what they give us for a blanket to sleep in,” said Cumnor. “A fellow can see to read the newspaper through it.”
“Look at my coat, Cumnor.” It was Sergeant Keyser showing the article furnished the soldier by the government. “You can spit through that.” He had overheard their talk, and stepped up to show that all were in the same box. At his presence reticence fell upon the privates, and Cumnor hauled his black felt hat down tight in embarrassment, which strain split it open half-way round his head. It was another sample of regulation clothing, and they laughed at it.
“We all know the way it is,” said Keyser, “and I’ve seen it a big sight worse. Cumnor, I’ve a cap I guess will keep your scalp warm till we get back.”
And so at two in the morning F troop left the bunks it had expected to sleep in for some undisturbed weeks, and by four o’clock had eaten its well-known breakfast of bacon and bad coffee, and was following the “awful old man” down the north bank of the Boisé, leaving the silent, dead, wooden town of shanties on the other side half a mile behind in the darkness. The mountains south stood distant, ignoble, plain-featured heights, looming a clean-cut black beneath the piercing stars and the slice of hard, sharp-edged moon, and the surrounding plains of sage and dry-cracking weed slanted up and down to nowhere and nothing with desolate perpetuity. The snowfall was light and dry as sand, and the bare ground jutted through it at every sudden lump or knoll. The column moved through the dead polar silence, scarcely breaking it. Now and then a hoof rang on a stone, here and there a bridle or a sabre clinked lightly; but it was too cold and early for talking, and the only steady sound was the flat, can-like tankle of the square bell that hung on the neck of the long-eared leader of the pack-train. They passed the Dailey ranch, and saw the kittens and the liniment-bottle, but could get no information as to what way E-egante had gone. The General did not care for that, however; he had devised his own route for the present, after a talk with the Indian guides. At the second dismounting during march he had word sent back to the pack-train not to fall behind, and the bell was to be taken off if the rest of the mules would follow without the sound of its shallow music. No wind moved the weeds or shook the stiff grass, and the rising sun glittered pink on the patched and motley-shirted men as they blew on their red hands or beat them against their legs. Some were lucky enough to have woollen or fur gloves, but many had only the white cotton affairs furnished by the government. Sarah the squaw laughed at them: the interpreter was warm as she rode in her bright green shawl. While the dismounted troopers stretched their limbs during the halt, she remained on her pony talking to one and another.
“Gray Fox heap savvy,” said she to Mr. Long. “He heap get up in the mornin’.”
“Thet’s what he does, Sarah.”
“Yas. No give soldier hy-as Sunday” (a holiday).
“No, no,” assented Mr. Long. “Gray Fox go téh-téh” (trot).