Then I went mad with hatred of the rebels, I was mad with everything, with everybody, jostling Chatter's horses into place, snatching the traces up and hooking on, swearing at Red's bungling attempts to help me. I shouted at Chatter to keep his hair on for I wouldn't let him be scalped.
I dragged him, all white with snow out of the drifts, hoisted him to the sleigh, and tumbled him into the sleigh-bed all of a heap. There was Sarde in the sleigh-bed telling me to make haste, for he had business with the officer commanding, needed swift transport. I hated him for the trick he had played on a woman, I hated him for Joe Chambers' death, I hated him too much to look at him, or speak, but jumped to the driver's seat, and standing on it to get a better purchase, lashed the team to a gallop hoisting them over the drifts in flying snow surf and a hail of lead.
And then I heard a yell from the rear, shouts that a wounded man was being left behind. I must go back. But Sarde heard nothing of that, and cared for nothing except his errand to the commanding officer.
"Drive on!" he shouted at me as I swung the team. "Drive on! I order you to drive on!"
I swung the sleigh sharp to spill him, drove back to where some fellows were lifting the wounded man, then, standing on the seat I threatened Sarde with my whip.
"Get out, you cur!" I screamed at him. "You're a coward! A coward! Hear, you chaps! I charge this man with cowardice in the field! Get out of my sleigh or I'll flog you!"
The wounded man was lifted on board, the rest of the chaps piled in to ease him through the jolting, and once more I swung my team round to a gallop joining the retreat through clouds of flying snow. A sharp jolt brought us up to the firm ground of the road, and I swerved right, tailing in with the outfit at a swinging trot.
We had left twelve men dead in the field, we had eight wounded in the sleighs—one of them dying. We knew that we were thrashed, had let red war loose on all the settlements.
The last dropping shots astern gave way to silence, the glare was no longer blinding in our eyes, our confused rush found itself and was a disciplined column in retreat. In the presence of wounded and dying men a hushed quiet fell upon us like that of the Holy Eucharist. I drove on, praying.
Then I remembered Sarde with a sudden bitterness, and called back laughing, "Say, boys, where's Sarde, the coward?"