‘Well, if this doesn’t beat everything I ever saw or heard of!’ he gasped. ‘What will you do with him, general? Shall I take him to the provost-marshal for a round dozen, or will you have him shot right away? For my part, I think he deserves the rest of the breakfast for his impudence.’
‘Silence!’ said the general severely, though his eyes twinkled.—’ What were you doing there?’ he demanded of Ephraim.
The Grizzly drew himself up and saluted. ‘I beg yewr parding, ginrul,’ he answered in a weak, whining tone; ‘I war jest parsing the windy, and when I looked in and see that right down, first-clarse spread, I tell yew I jest felt I had ter hev some.’
Lucius quivered with amazement. The Grizzly was coming out in a new line. The soft Southern voice with its clipped syllables was gone, and in its place was the slow drawl and marked nasal twang of the New Englander. The very expression of the face was changed, though this Lucius could not see. The natural shrewdness was gone out of it, and only good-humoured, dull vacancy reigned in its stead.
‘Upon my word, you are a nice young man,’ said the general, smiling in spite of himself at Ephraim’s ridiculous appearance. ‘What do you mean, sir, by making free with my breakfast? Don’t you know I could have you court-martialed and shot for this?’
‘Oh lordy, lordy! don’t you do that, ginrul,’ whined Ephraim, seemingly in a paroxysm of terror. ‘I’ll never dew it again. Yew don’t know how hungry I war. Lemme off, ginrul! Lemme off!’ He clasped his hands supplicatingly.
The brigadier exploded again, and Shields, with a good-natured laugh, said: ‘Well, we’ll consider what is to be done with you. Who are you, and to what regiment do you belong?’
‘Number twenty, Company D, the “Trailing Terrors,”’ drawled Ephraim.
‘What! You are one of Spriggs’s “Trailing Terrors,” are you? By Jove! you look it. Why did you not come out just now when your commanding officer was here?’
‘Bekase he war telling lies!’ boldly answered Ephraim to the supreme astonishment of Lucius; ‘and I never could abide lies.’