Part 10

Some one in the middle of barracks was attempting to search out with a pocket-flash the cause of the excitement.

'Use of--star--shells--specially successful--'gainst active enemy--in No Man’s Land,' droned the great voice of small Squirmy in a far corner.

And the disturbance subsided with several chuckles, allowing Ruggs to dispose himself upon his rumpled sheets without further fire upon him.

In the morning, as he stood in ranks at reveille, he was secretly relieved to note the Meter’s normal appearance, and his life-sized pencil, though that active instrument was spelling out death to some career possibly at that moment. Degradation to the name of Ruggs had not yet come; the chance to be included among the commissioned few at the end of camp lay before him as a possibility.

He was wakened smartly from his musings. 'Dress up, put up your arm! you still asleep?'

The Duke, who had been a sergeant in the National Guard for six years, realized that, since the Meter was near at hand, it was a fortunate time to make penetrating corrections. The awe and respect which had bestowed on him the name of Duke on account of his knowledge of the rudiments, were now, in the squad over which he had tyrannized as acting corporal, beginning to wane.

Ruggs put up his arm, every bristling hair of his mouse-colored head erect with fury. It was difficult for a man fifteen years out of college, who had by dint of energy and foresight worked his way to the superintendency of one of the largest banking houses in the East, to take orders from a grocery clerk much younger and of slight education. 'Every kind of military communication should be impersonal.' These words of the Meter came to him opportunely. He fastened his mind on the details for the following day which the first sergeant was then reading out, and was rewarded.

'For company commander to-morrow--Ruggs!'

'He-re!' His voice came all cracked and husky.

'You’d better get onto those drill regs and get up that company stuff,' admonished the Duke at breakfast. 'I always find I can get along better after givin' it a once-over, no matter how well I know it.'

Ruggs made no reply. He was lost in the thought of the chance he had waited for through thirty-five days of slavery. His opportunity had come.

It was a red-letter day because of another circumstance. For the first time he had been called by name by the Meter at the morning conference.

The elation was so great that, when a note from Alice in the noon mail told him that she would spend the week-end near the camp, he had only time to reflect on what joy his success in handling the company would bring her. Every spare minute during the afternoon and evening he concentrated on close-order drill. Not satisfied with the snatches thus taken, he disappeared after taps, with his books and a small improvised stool, into the lavatory, where there was still a faint light from two badly arranged bulbs. There he delved into combat work and reviewed the company drill. It was one o’clock before he crawled dizzily into bed, with reveille before him at five-thirty.

He woke at five with a start. This was the day of his trial. Although he had stood at the head of ventures involving millions, no day of his life had seemed to him so full of hazard. The fact that he had made good in civil life, he understood, meant nothing in his favor in a military way. For only the previous week Cyrus Long, an industrial manager, with a salary of fifteen thousand a year, had been told plainly by the Meter that he could not make good. And Cy had left with the first failure of a lifetime in his wake.

When Ruggs, making every inch of his five feet eleven count as the Meter approached, commanded 'Company, attention!' his accent was very unlike the ideal one he had planned to use. He noted the men in ranks eyeing him as much as to say, 'Well, how are you going to handle us this morning?'

'Give the company ten minutes' close-order drill, after which proceed with fifteen minutes of extended order under battle conditions.'

The Meter shot the words out in two definite explosions.

It was the first time that such instructions had been issued, but Ruggs asked no questions.

'Squads right!' he sang out (meaning secretly squads left); then added, 'March!' in a surprised and subdued tone that he had not intended.

On the whole the first of the drill went along fairly well, except that at times some of the men were unable to hear his commands, and _he_ knew that _they_ knew that he continually meant _right_ when he said _left_, and vice versa--which did not add to his authority. But he was too honest to 'bluff' the matter before the Meter, each time admitting the error by a loud 'As you were!' and setting them straight without delay.

When the extended order part of the drill began, he inadvertently made his deployment so that one flank fanned out across the commanding officer’s lawn.

'Halt your company!' roared the Meter. 'Company commander report here!'

Ruggs yelled a demoralized 'Halt!' and ran to the captain.

'Who’s in command of this company?'

'I am, sir.'

'It doesn’t appear so; or possibly you wanted them to dance over the colonel’s lawn?'

'No, sir.'

'Then why did you put them there?'

'I didn’t mean to, sir.'

'You didn’t mean _not_ to, did you?'

'No, sir.'

'You lead your command out over a fire-swept zone, and after it is decimated, you make a report that you didn’t mean to place it there. How will that look when the dead are counted?'

'Not very well, sir.'

'Go place your company where it belongs.'

Ruggs saluted and ran toward the centre of the line, yelling at the top of his lungs, 'Assemble, _assemble_, ASSEMBLE _over here_!'

'Come back!' shouted the Meter.

But Ruggs was so intent on gathering up the tramplers of the colonel’s lawn that he did not hear.

'Company commander--Mr. Ruggs!' repeated the Meter, putting all his power against his diaphragm.

Ruggs returned, his thick chest heaving, his hair matted, and a drop of perspiration clinging to the end of his big Roman nose.

'How was this drill to be conducted?' snapped his torturer.

'Under battle conditions, sir.'

'Do you suppose that the company stretched over a space of two hundred yards, while the barrage fire was going on, could hear such caterwauling as you’ve been attempting? What should you do?'

'Use whistle and signal, sir.'

'Have I not directed you to do so heretofore?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Either malicious or wooden--take your choice! Proceed with your drill.'

Cut to the quick, Ruggs thought hard what to do in his predicament. The studious, sleepless night was beginning to tell on him, but he called to his memory the signal for 'Assemble' and blew a stout blast on his whistle. He felt the Meter behind his back making damaging notes in the book, and the glances of his fellows before him betraying pity and superiority. The number of errors increased with the length of the drill. Each time the Meter summoned him, the criticisms were more caustic. At last he waved his arms in unknown combinations and directions. But whenever the Meter stopped him, he was able, with much teeth-gritting that made his jaw muscles swell his cheeks, to set the movement straight without excitement.

In the afternoon, during a march along the road, the Meter directed the company to be halted and its commander to report to him.

'Mr. Ruggs, you see that little bluff about four hundred yards to the left of this road?'

'Yes, sir.'

'You have been marching along here as the advance party to your advance guard, when suddenly you receive a burst of fire from that bluff, which you estimate to be directed by about a platoon. What do you do?'

'I’d tell them to--'

'I didn’t ask you what you’d tell. I asked you what you’d do.'

'I’d put them, sir--'

'Put who?'

'I’d put the company--'

'You speak of the company as if it were a bird-cage or a jack-knife.'

'Sir, I just wanted--'

'I just asked you what YOU would do--do you get it?'

By this time Ruggs was so aroused that every fibre of his mind was alert. Instead of being more confused, he was able to concentrate more acutely than before. He pulled his whistle from his pocket and blew it almost in the Meter’s face, at the same time signaling to the company to deploy and lie down.

'That will do.' snorted the Meter. 'March your company back to barracks!'

Ruggs replaced his whistle in his pocket in a hang-dog way which showed that he was convinced that his doom was sealed.

'Squads right!' he commanded. 'As you were! I mean, squads left!--Oh, steady! Squads right about! March!'

The company, at route step, had become a ripple of mirth from end to end.

'O Ruggsie!' shouted the Duke, 'I know a good civilian tailor!'

The remark brought on a quantity of local laughter, and Naughty did not help matters much by starting, 'Keep the home fires burning.'

That evening the flank of Company Number 1 individually condoled with Ruggs, who was trying to decipher how he could be so full of so many different kinds of mistakes.

'He’s got the raspberry all right,' commented the Duke, before a large group, including Ruggs.

The 'raspberry,' be it said, was the name applied to the Sword of Damocles suspended by the Meter. When he called a failing candidate into the orderly room and implied that a resignation would be in order, that lost soul was known the company over as 'getting the raspberry,' or 'rasp.'

II

Just before taps, after life had become subdued through study, the small red-headed form of Squirmy was observed making its way to the centre of the long room. He was dressed in a black overcoat fished from the bottom of a trunk. A white tie torn from a stricken sheet made a flaring bow at his neck, and goggles and an old cap-cover served as headgear. He carried in his hand a Webster’s Unabridged, which he placed on an old box previously used for the same purpose.

'_St!_ The Exhorter of Squad 21!' came in whispers from a dozen throats; and the room became still.

Squirmy searched his half-dressed congregation witheringly over the tops of his spectacles. Then from his small body proceeded slow tones of thunder,--

'And the Lord said unto Moses, "Squads right!" (Dramatic pause.)

'But Moses--not being a military man--commanded, "Squads left!" (Longer pause.)

'And great--was the confusion--among the candidites.

'Peace be with you,' he concluded, pointing an accusing finger at Ruggs; and the company went to bed holding their abdomens.

After the last drill on Saturday Alice arrived with her machine, chauffeur, and chaperone. When she spied Ruggs across the parade, with twenty-two pounds of office flabbiness gone, his hardened muscles holding his shoulders and neck erect underneath his khaki, an unmistakable admiration filled her wide hazel eyes.

For a moment his gladness was unalloyed, and the disappointments of crowded barracks and tangled drills faded utterly away. But as the day wore on, the pleasure grew limp in the face of the bleak future. His mind was repeatedly met with the question, 'Shall I tell her?' and he always turned on himself with the reply, 'I am not yet through.'

The unacknowledged dullness between them finally drove them into the distraction of a movie theatre. There, in the darkness, she caught stealthy glimpses of his tightened jaw and distressed face.

'It’s going to be very hard on him; he’ll be so disappointed,' she said to herself.

At the same time, while apparently following the antics of Mary Pickford, he was thinking, 'It’s going to be so hard on her! She’ll be so disappointed in me!'

When she had gone, and he found himself once more seated on his bunk in desolation, he berated himself violently:--

'I must have treated her badly. This will not do. I’ve never given up before. I’ve got to pull myself up to my best if it’s only a corporal’s job. It’s better to be a _man_ than a higher-up anyway. Good God, I can serve better by going where I’m put than where I want to _be put_! True patriotism, after all, is filling the niche, whatever--'

'Say, Ruggsie,' burst in the Duke from the side door, 'big doin’s here Monday. Big review for a Russian general. This company is goin' to be divided into two--A and B companies.'

Ruggsie was silent.

'Don’t you care anything about it?' continued the Duke.

'I’m not interested in reviews--to be frank.'

'Say, old fellow, you don’t need to get so down because you tied up that drill the other day. Course, there’s a great deal to know about this military game. At first I was pretty green myself. May be in a second camp you can get onto the stuff.'

Ruggs was not desirous of discussing the matter with the Duke, who, having been given the natural opportunity, filled the gap with conversation.

'You know the Meter called me and that Reserve Lieutenant Sullivan into the orderly room and told us we were goin' to be in command of the two companies. He went over with us just how we were goin' to do. He’s a first-rate chap--the Meter is. First we line up along the road near the gate, and then we march to the parade-ground and review. I know every command I’m goin' to give right down in order--could say 'em off backwards. That’s the way to know your drill.'

At supper the Duke leaned over the table toward Vance, a broker from Wall Street who had spent the previous summer at Plattsburg, and observed confidentially,--

'Do you know, Vance, I’d like to have you as my first lieutenant when I’m a captain. You suit me O.K. I like the way you drill.'

Vance, immaculately neat and clean-shaven, acknowledged the remark with a bow and went on eating. Mortimer, just out of Dartmouth, aged twenty-two, gazed at the Duke with that deference with which Gareth first looked upon Lancelot.

At three o’clock Monday afternoon the twenty companies of the training camp were drawn up ready to display themselves to the Russian general. Automobiles were parked thickly on the roadways, making a black, gray, and brown banded circle around the parade-ground. Under the dense fringe of trees, the many-colored gowns of the women edged the green like a thick hedge of sweet peas. The heat and stillness had settled down over the camp tensely.

The dignitary, eagerly awaited, was overdue. The Duke, as he wiped the perspiration from his hat-band in front of the long column of companies standing at ease, congratulated himself on the certainty with which he would give the appropriate commands at various points before him on the level stretch of grass. Conscious fingering of his pistol-holster indicated his belief in the Meter’s choice.

A half-hour passed and the general had not arrived. All at once, the band, contrary to plan, started to move diagonally across the parade-ground. A mounted orderly popped out from a group of regular officers and galloped straight toward the Duke.

'The major’s compliments,' he announced. 'The ceremony along the road-side will be dispensed with. You are to march your company to the line for review at once, sir.'

The field music struck up adjutant’s call, which was the signal for the first company to form line.

'Squads left!' shouted the Duke in most military fashion.

It was the command that he had rehearsed to start the company from the roadway to the ceremony proper--the opposite direction from the one toward the spot where the line should now be formed.

'March!' he added, without seeing his error. And the company wheeled off toward the woods away from the visitors, away from the band, away from everybody.

'Damn me!' he muttered, looking back over his shoulder at the vanishing goal. Then he roared, 'Column left! March!'

Again he had steered the head of the column in an opposite direction from the one intended. B and C companies were now directly between his objective and his organization, which was marching farther away with every step. He realized that he had taken time enough to be well on the way toward, instead of away from, the spot where the adjutant was waiting for him.

'Squadsleftmarch!' he bellowed desperately.

The company, in the shape of an L, not having completed the turn in column, now accordioned its flanks toward each other, intermingling inextricably. The organization became at once a crowd of fellows with rifles.

'Halt! Halt! Halt!' the Duke exploded; and immediately fell into helpless bewilderment.

There was a dreadful pause, during which beads of perspiration dropped from his face, making black spots on his starched clothing. His arm and fingers twitched and he blinked horribly.

'What a steadying influence he’ll have on Vance!' whispered some one near Ruggs, who, through compassion, was unable to feel mirthful.

The same orderly galloped up for the second time and delivered an ultimatum from the major in no uncertain language. Several platoon leaders sprang forward and succeeded in getting the company started in the right direction. But the strain had weakened the Duke’s nerve to such an extent that he was slow in dressing his company and failed to give 'Eyes right' in time, when actually passing in review under the scrutiny of the general himself.

And all this time the Meter had been hovering about, using his eyes mightily and his mouth not at all.

Back in barracks when ranks were broken, there were no remarks made openly on the leadership of the Duke. He had been a trusty drill-master and, it was reported, had a 'stand-in' with the Meter. It was not discreet to taunt him.

Indeed, it had been such a soakingly hot proceeding--the whole review--that most of the men were glad enough to grasp what little comfort they could without more ado. The extra marching beforehand had not helped to cool them off, mentally or physically. Under the single thin roof that separated them from the sun, the atmosphere, besides being hot, was excessively oppressive. As soon as they could get rid of their rifles, belts, and coats, they tossed them away in any direction. Those who arrived inside first, and consequently had a chance for the shower-bath, peeled off every soggy garment.

They were in this chaotic state of dishabille when a cry rose from the first squad, 'Man the port-holes!' Immediately one hundred and sixty male beings struggled for a view from the eastern windows.

'It’s the general--the whole party!' exclaimed one of the first.

'They’re coming in here,' volunteered another.

The crowd surged back and the voice of the acting first sergeant could be heard in an effort to prepare the company for inspection. They hurled their belongings into place with the speed and accuracy of postal clerks. Two nude unfortunates were without ceremony ejected into the cold world on the side of barracks farthest from the Russian advance. History does not record what ever became of them. A bather clad only in a scant towel and a scanter piece of soap, while making his entrance from the shower where he had splashed in ignorance of the coming invasion, was, to his amazement and resentment, forced suddenly into the lavatory, where, he was given to understand, he must remain. Ruggs, most incompletely dressed, coiled himself up underneath his cot behind two lusty suitcases.

When the general came down the aisle, the candidates standing fully clad at the foot of their bunks, at 'attention,' gave the impression of having waited for him nonchalantly in that position ever since the review. Mattress-covers were smoothed, bedding folded, clothing hung neatly, and all evidence of hurry or confusion effaced.

But the Meter smiled a Mona Lisa smile as the door closed upon generals, colonels, aides-de-camp, and himself.

'Rest,' shouted the acting first sergeant, and the company collapsed into tumultuous laughter. Wet under-clothing, matches, and cigarettes, were hauled from beneath mattresses, equipment from behind pillows, and knick-knacks from yawning shoe-tops.

In the midst of all this turmoil one of the doors reopened and the Meter stepped inside. Some one near him murmured a half-hearted 'Attention!' and all who were within earshot arose--all except one. At that moment Ruggs found himself halfway up from between the cots, his head and body upright and his legs fast asleep under him.

'Mr. Ruggs, I seem to see more of you than I did a moment ago.'

If the Meter had returned for a purpose, all idea of it vanished now, for he turned and disappeared, leaving Ruggs to bear his chagrin and to blush down as far as his legs.

That night Squirmy took his text from the book of Currussians, and gave a splendid and inspiriting talk on how Moses, although he had been found by the King’s daughter in the bulrushes, had nothing on Ruggs, who was discovered by the King himself among the valises. 'And be it said,' concluded the exhorter, 'that both foundlings wore the same uniform.'

III

The first of August was close at hand. Rumors kept coming up like the dawn 'on the road to Mandalay.' The 'makes' (those recommended for commissions), it was said, had already had their names sent to Washington. Before and after drills, members of the company were being constantly summoned into the orderly room for interviews, the purport of which was leaking out through the camp. A reserve captain had been given his walking papers. Squirmy was to be a second lieutenant; Naughty, a first lieutenant; and Vance, a captain.

The Duke had just been summoned. As he made his way up the aisle to the front of barracks, hushed whispers ran around from circle to circle: 'Will he get a captaincy or just a lieutenancy out of it?' And many a covetous eye followed his retreating figure.

At dinner he had not returned. In the afternoon and during the next day his place in the squad was vacant. It began to be rumored that he had been sent away on some special detail, perhaps to France.

In the evening Ruggs, having finished his supper early, was surprised to find the Duke in civilian attire sitting on the cot he had occupied, which was now divested of all its former accompaniments.

'Good-bye,' began the Duke, extending a cold hand rather ungraciously. 'Jus' turned in all my stuff.'

'Leaving?' queried Ruggs.

'Yep, got the rasp all right!'

There was an awkward pause, which was filled by the Duke’s interest in the lock of his suitcase, after which he continued haltingly,--

'Meter called me in and told me no use to stay here--said my experience was all right--but because I’d had so much, he expected more. Told me any man that got fussed up and couldn’t get out of an easy hole without help after six years' trainin' was no good for leadin' men. Said he couldn’t trust men’s lives to me, and so he couldn’t give me a commission. Gave me a lot of guff like that, with no sense to it. He’s a hell of a man!'

'Do you mean to say you’re discharged--and that’s all?' Ruggs was plainly astounded.

'You bet; that’s the end of the little Duke of Squad 15. Be good to yourself. Say good-bye to the fellows for me, will you?'

Several men strolled back from supper. The Duke casting a furtive glance in their direction as much as to say, 'I don’t care to meet any of them any more,' added a 'So long,' and disappeared, suitcase in hand, through the side door.

'What chance for me,' thought Ruggs, 'if the Duke gets the raspberry?'

That night he carefully smoothed out a civilian suit and placed it on a hanger at the head of his cot. He also wrote several letters to business friends at home. He did not write to Alice.

Excitement for the next few days was severe. Some were not eating their meals, few were sleeping much, and all were stale. The physical training had truly been intensive, but the mental strain had been breaking. Friends greeted each other in a preoccupied way, and the nightly singing had grown feeble.