“You can make my life a —— on earth, of course,” he said after a lengthy silence. His voice had a deep husk in it.
“Sure,” I agreed. “Listen, Marston. You always were a good soldier, as far as I know; leaned over backward to live up to regulations, and a hound on discipline. But you were without exception the rottenest officer I ever saw, and the nastiest and most unfair man a poor cadet ever had over him. You were enough all by yourself to ruin the morale of every cadet at Donovan Field. You’ll make a —— sight better sergeant than you did an officer.”
“And you were about the funniest sample of a soldier that any army, including the Mexican, ever had,” he told me doggedly, and in his brooding light eyes that glow burned brighter. “You came lounging in as though you didn’t give a —— for any orders or discipline whatever, and tried to do just what you —— pleased. And you’re no more an army man right now than you were before.
“Oh, I’ve heard plenty about you. You’ve pulled off a few good flying stunts, but you’re not a soldier and never will be. And by —— if you think I’m going to lick your boots because you, a young squirt who never had any responsibility about him, is an officer and I’m only a sergeant——”
“Pull in your neck, Marston; you’re stretching it,” I advised him. “You’d better thank your lucky stars that I’m not going to try to get even with you for what you put me through. I’m a flyer now, but I can still look back at the months when I was bound up in the effort to get to be a flyer, and the stuff you put me through.
“But Marston, I’m going to relieve the spleen that’s gathered in my system. As long as you’re under me you soldier as you never did before. I’ll show you no favors, but I’ll not pick on you until you slip. Then you’re going to get it right in the neck. Meanwhile, Marston, do you remember the day just before inspection when you dressed me down in front of the troops, and called me a nice, pretty name which cast certain aspersions on my ancestry?”
He stood there and said nothing, but the ferocious gleam in his eyes said plenty. No doubt he had brooded for years after slipping back from the grade of major to that of sergeant. Some drop, I’ll say.
“We’re quiet and alone, Marston. Temporarily I’m taking off these pretty little collar ornaments, and forgetting that I’m a looey in this man’s army. And I’m going to beat you half to death, —— willing, as between man and man. And whoever wins, we’ll walk out of here and the past’ll be forgotten as long as you’re a soldier.”
He hesitated briefly.
“If I beat you up, Evans, I’ll pay through the nose for it. You’ve got all summer to pay me up for a fight, and you’ll do it. I can’t win.”