“Jimmie Rogers ses I’ll have t’ fight him after th’ battle t’-day,” announced the friend as he again seated himself. “He ses he don’t allow no interferin’ in his business. I hate t’ see th’ boys fightin’ ’mong themselves.”
The youth laughed. “Yer changed a good bit. Yeh ain’t at all like yeh was. I remember when you an’ that Irish feller—” He stopped and laughed again.
“No, I didn’t use t’ be that way,” said his friend thoughtfully. “That’s true ’nough.”
“Well, I didn’t mean—” began the youth.
The friend made another deprecatory gesture. “Oh, yeh needn’t mind, Henry.”
There was another little pause.
“Th’ reg’ment lost over half th’ men yestirday,” remarked the friend eventually. “I thought ’a course they was all dead, but, laws, they kep’ a-comin’ back last night until it seems, after all, we didn’t lose but a few. They’d been scattered all over, wanderin’ around in th’ woods, fightin’ with other reg’ments, an’ everything. Jest like you done.”
“So?” said the youth.
Chapter XV.
The regiment was standing at order arms at the side of a lane, waiting for the command to march, when suddenly the youth remembered the little packet enwrapped in a faded yellow envelope which the loud young soldier with lugubrious words had intrusted to him. It made him start. He uttered an exclamation and turned toward his comrade.