Part 11

"The fifer and drummer were not soldiers. The man with the flag is One-Arm Ojam, who was in Pickett's great charge at Gettysburg, and he's in full Confederate gray."

So he was, even to a gray hat, with the Stars and Bars on its front, and a long gray plume at its side, and the magnificent Southern swagger with which he bore the colors was--after the flag itself--the grandest feature of the procession. The multitude on both sides of the street applauded wildly, but the old soldiers marched as steadily as if they were on duty, for the uniforms and muskets were recalling old times in their fulness. Suddenly, as the procession reached the front of the store, Post-Commander Caleb Wright, sword in hand, shouted:--

"Halt! Front! Right--dress! Front! Present--arms!"

To the front came the muskets, Caleb's sword-hilt was raised to his chin, Ojam drooped the flag, and Philip doffed his hat.

"Why did they do that, I wonder?" asked Grace.

"Oh, some notion of Caleb's, I suppose," Philip replied.

"Shoulder--arms!" shouted Caleb. "Order--arms! Three cheers for the uniforms!"

Eighteen slouch hats waved in the air, an eighteen-soldier-power roar arose, the fife shrieked three times, the drummer rolled three ruffles. Then One-Arm Ojam, the flag rested against his armless shoulder, waved his gray hat picturesquely, and roared:--

"Three cheers for the giver of the uniforms!"

When a second round of cheering ended, a man in the ranks shouted "Speech!" and the word was echoed by several others. Then Philip, while his wife's lips became shapeless in wide-mouthed wonder, removed his hat and said:--

"Fellow-Americans, the uniforms weren't a gift. They're merely a partial payment, on my own account, for what you did for mine and me when I was very young. This is one of the proudest days of my life; for though I took the measure of each of you by guess-work, no man's clothes seem a very bad fit." Then he returned abruptly into the store, followed by his wife, who exclaimed:--

"You splendid, dreadful fellow! You were letting me believe that Caleb did it!"

"So he did, my dear. 'Twas your telling me the story of Caleb's pension that set me thinking hard about the old soldiers and what they did, and of how little consideration they get. Besides, I'm always wishing to do something special to please Caleb, and this was the first chance I'd seen in a long time. His fear of One-Arm Ojam being estranged if the Post got into uniform troubled me for a day or two, but I seem to have taken Ojam's measure--in both senses--quite well."

Suddenly Grace began to laugh, and continued until she became almost helpless, Philip meanwhile looking as if he wondered what he had said that could have been so amusing.

"If your Uncle Jethro could have been here!" she said as soon as she could.

"To be horrified at the manner in which a lot of his money has been spent? If I'm not mistaken, 'twill have been the cheapest advertising this establishment ever did, though I hadn't the slightest thought of business while I was planning it."

"That isn't what I meant," Grace said. "I was thinking of your uncle's disgust when he learned that one of your reasons for wishing to live in New York was that you might study art. Your studies never went far beyond sketching the human figure, poor boy; but if he were here to-day, and you were to tell him that your art studies, such as they were, had enabled you to guess correctly the proportions of eighteen suits of men's clothes, imagine his astonishment--if you can."

Then the laughter was resumed, and Philip assisted at it, until Caleb entered the store and said:--

"We've been comparin' notes,--the boys an' me, an' we've agreed that it beat any surprises we had in the war; for there, we always knowed, the surprises was layin' in wait for us a good deal of the time. How you managed it beats me."

"Phil, didn't even Caleb know what was going on?"

"Not until he left the store about half an hour ago."

"Oh, you splendid, smart--"

"Spare my blushes, dear girl. As to the things, Caleb, I had them addressed to Black Sam, whom I let into the secret, and I had them wagoned at night from the railway to the bath-house, where he unpacked them and hid them in one of his rooms."

"I want to know! But what put you up to thinkin' o' doin' the greatest thing that--"

"'Twas a story my wife told me, about the way you dispose of your pension. 'Twas all of your own doing, after all, you see."

Caleb looked sheepish, said something about the "boys" becoming uneasy unless the march was resumed, and made haste to rejoin his command, but stopped halfway to the door, and said:--

"Mebbe 'tain't any o' my business, but as I'm Commander of the Post, an' yet you've been managin' it most o' the mornin', an' I hadn't time to ask the why an' wherefore o' things,--how did you get Ojam to carry our flag?"

"Oh, I dared him."

"An' he, bein' a Southerner, wouldn't take a dare?"

"On the contrary, it needed no dare. He said he'd been longing for such a chance for many years; for you'd reminded him one day that he was an American, and that plain American was good enough for you. 'Twas a case exactly like that of the uniforms, Caleb; 'twas you that did it--not I."

Again Caleb looked sheepish, and this time he succeeded in rejoining his command and marching it toward the cemetery, followed by the entire populace.

"We may as well go, too," said Philip, closing the store.

"But not empty-handed," Grace said, snatching a basket from a hook and hurrying into her garden, where she quickly cut everything that showed any color or bloom, saying as she did so:--

"Perhaps they don't use flowers here, but 'twill do no harm to offer them."

"I'll get out the horse and buggy; that basket will be very heavy," said Philip.

"Not as heavy as the veterans' guns--and some widow's memories," Grace replied; "so let us walk."

Together they hurried along the dusty road and joined the irregular procession of civilians that followed the veterans. The Claybanks "God's acre" bore no resemblance to the park-like cemeteries which Grace had seen near New York, nor did it display any trace of the neatness which marked the little enclosure in which rested the dead of Grace's native village. A man with a scythe had been sent in on the previous day, to make the few soldiers' graves approachable; but weeds and brambles were still abundant near the fence, and Grace shuddered when she saw that most of the graves were marked only by lettered boards instead of stones, and that tiny graves were numerous. Evidently Claybanks was a dangerous place for infants.

Soon she saw that the usefulness of flowers on Decoration Day was not unknown at Claybanks, and, as the "Ritual of the Dead" had already been read and as the veterans were informally passing from grave to grave, she made her way to Caleb, and said reproachfully:--

"Why didn't you ask me for some flowers?"

"I 'lowed that I would," Caleb replied, looking at Grace's basket, "but Mis' Taggess came to me, an' says she, 'Don't you do it, or she'll cut everything in sight,' an' from the looks o' things I reckon that's just what you've done. It's a pity, too, for we hain't got many soldier-dead, an' their graves is pretty well covered."

"In the paht of the Saouth that I come from," ventured One-Arm Ojam, "ev'rybody's graves has flowers put on 'em on Memorial Day, an' the women an' children do most of it."

"You Grand Army men won't feel hurt if the custom is started here, will you?" Grace asked of Caleb.

"Not us!" was the reply; so Grace begged the women and children to assist her, and within a few moments every grave in the cemetery had a bit of bloom upon it, and the women had informally resolved that the custom should be followed thereafter on Decoration Day.

Then the Grand Army Post was called to order, and marched back to the town, led by the fifer and drummer and followed by the people.

"Is that all?" Grace asked, when the store had been reopened, and Caleb entered, unclasped his sword-belt, and gazed affectionately at the sword.

"All of what?"

"All of the day's ceremonies."

"In one way, yes, but we vets have a sort o' camp-fire; we get together in my room, after dark, an' swap yarns, an' sing songs, an' have somethin' to eat an' drink, an' manage to have a jolly good time."

"I hope you'll leave the windows open while you sing."

"We'll have to all the time, I reckon, the weather bein' as hot as 'tis, but I know the boys'll be pleased to hear that you asked it."

"Oh, wouldn't I like to be a mouse in the corner to-night!" Grace said after she had laid away the very last of the supper dishes and dropped into a hammock-chair on the coolest side of the house. "A mouse in the corner, and hear the war-stories those veterans will tell! They looked so unlike themselves to-day."

"Possibly because of Caleb's bath-house," Philip suggested, "although I don't doubt that Caleb would be gracious enough to hint that the new uniforms also had some transforming effect."

"What do you suppose they will have to eat and drink in Caleb's room? I wish I dared make something nice and send it in. Let me see; we've a lot of the potted meats and fancy biscuits and other things that I ordered from the city a week or two ago, to abate the miseries of summer housekeeping. I could make half a dozen kinds of biscuit sandwiches in ten minutes, and I could give them iced tea with lemon and sugar, and oh--"

"Well?"

"There's been so much excitement to-day that I entirely forgot the grand surprise I'd planned for some of the farmers' wives. I declare 'tis too bad! Our ice-cream freezer came last week, you know, and this morning I made the first lot, and I was going to serve saucers of it to some of the women who came to the store--it seems that ice-cream is unknown in this country. But your surprise, of putting the Grand Army men into uniforms, put everything else out of my mind for the day. Let's bring it from the ice-house, and send it over to Caleb's room to the veterans!"

"My dear girl, the cream will keep till to-morrow, so do try to possess your soul in peace, and leave those veterans to their own devices. Old soldiers are reputed to be willing to eat and drink anything or nothing if they may have a feast of war-stories."

"When do you suppose they'll begin to sing?"

"Not having been a soldier, I can't say. Perhaps not at all, if Caleb's plan of keeping the drinking men from liquor has succeeded."

"Phil, don't be so horrid. Oh!--what is that?"

It was the beginning of a song--not badly sung, either--"'Tis a Way We Have in the Army." Some of the words were ridiculous, but there could be no criticism of the spirit of the singers. Advancing cautiously, under cover of semi-darkness and the brushwood arbor, Grace saw so many figures near the front of the house that she could not doubt that the Grand Army Post was tendering her or her husband the compliment of a serenade, so she applauded heartily. Another song, "There's Music in the Air," followed, and yet another, both in fair time and tune.

"I'm going to find out whom those leading voices belong to," Grace said. "Light the lamps, won't you?" Then she stepped from the arbor, and said:--

"Thank you very much, gentlemen, but my husband and I are real selfish people, so we won't be satisfied until you come into the house and sing us all the army songs you know."

Two or three veterans started to run, but they were stopped by others. Grace heard them protesting that they were not of the singers, so she hurried out and declared that she would forego the anticipated pleasure rather than break up their own party; so within a moment or two the entire Post, with One-Arm Ojam, were in the parlor, where some stared about in amazement, while others looked as distressed as cats in a strange kitchen. But host and hostess pressed most of them into seats, and Caleb stood guard at the door, having first whispered to Grace:--

"The pianner'll hold 'em--but don't play 'Marchin' through Georgy,' please; we take pains not to worry One-Arm Ojam."

Grace whispered to Philip, who left the room; then she seated herself at the piano and rattled off "Dixie" with fine spirit. Soon she stopped, looked about inquiringly, and asked:--

"Can't any of you sing it? Now!"

Again she attacked the piano. Some one started the song, darkey-fashion, by singing one bar, the others joining vociferously in the second; this was repeated, and then all gave the chorus, and so the song went on so long as any one could recall words. This was followed, at a venture, by "Maryland, my Maryland," for which the Union veterans had one set of words, and Ojam another, although the general effect was good. The ice was now broken, and the men suggested one song after another, for most of which Grace discovered that she knew the airs--for while the war created many new songs, it inspired little new music.

The singing continued until the guests became hoarse, by which time Philip entered with iced lemonade made with tea, and Grace followed with sandwiches and biscuits and cake, which prompted some of the men to tell what they did not have to eat in the army. From this to war-stories was but a short step, and as every veteran, however stupid, has at least one war-story that is all his own, the host and hostess enjoyed a long entertainment of a kind entirely new to them. Meanwhile Grace was pressing refreshments on the men individually, but suddenly she departed. When she returned, in a few moments, she bore a tray covered with saucers of ice-cream, and the astonishment which the contents produced, as it reached the palates of the guests, made Grace almost apoplectic in her endeavors to keep from laughing.

"What is it?" whispered a veteran who had not yet been served to one who was ecstatically licking his spoon.

"Dog my cats if I know!" was the reply, as the man took another mouthful. "It tastes somethin' like puddin'--an' custard--an' cake--an' like the smell of ol' Mis' Madden's vanilla bean,--an'--" but just then the questioner was given an opportunity to taste for himself, after which he said:--

"It beats the smell o' my darter's hair-ile--beats it all holler."

"I reckon," said Caleb, who had inspected the freezer on its arrival, and had been wildly curious as to its product, "I reckon it's ice-cream."

"What? That stuff that there's jokes about in the newspapers sometimes,--jokes about gals that's too thin-waisted to hug, but can eat barl's of it?"

"Yes; that's the stuff."

"The dickens! Well, ef I was a gal, I'd let out tucks all day long an' durn the expense, if my feller'd fill my bread-basket with stuff like that. Must be frightful costly, though."

"Not more'n plain custard, Mis' Somerton says."

"Wh-a-a-a-a-at? Say, Caleb, I'm goin' to j'in the church, right straight off. No more takin' any risks o' hell for me, thank you, for it stands to reason that they can't make ice-cream down there."

When the contents of the freezer were exhausted, Philip, who never smoked, opened a box of fine cigars which he had ordered from the East, with a view to business with visiting lawyers in the approaching "Court-week." Then the joy of the veterans was complete; the windows were opened, for, as Caleb said, no mosquito would venture into such a cloud, and it was not until midnight that any one thought to ask the time.

"I'm afeared," said Caleb, after all the other guests had departed, "that you'll have a mighty big job o' dish-washin' to-morrow, but--"

"But 'twas richly worth it," Grace said, and Philip assented.

"That's very kind o' you, but 'tain't what I was goin' to say, which was that I'll turn in and help, if you'll let me, an' another thing is, you've put an end to any chance of any of the boys takin' a drink of anythin' stronger than water to-night, an' you've made sure of some new customers, too."

"Oh, Caleb!" Grace said, "can't we do anything hearty for its own sake, without being rewarded for it?"

"Nary thing!" Caleb replied. "That's business truth, an' Gospel truth, too."

FOOTNOTE:

[1] In most states of the American Union the 30th of May is a legal holiday called Decoration Day, the purpose being to honor, by various means, the memory of the soldiers who died in defence of the Union in the great Civil War of 1861-65. More than a quarter of a million survivors of the Union army are members of a fraternal society called the Grand Army of the Republic, which is divided into about seven thousand local branches called Posts. The organization is military in form, each post having a body of officers with military titles and insignia. All posts carry the national colors in their parades, and are expected to be uniformed in close imitation of the service dress of the army of the United States. A few posts bear arms, and each member of the order wears a medal made by the national government from cannon captured from the enemy. The posts always parade on Decoration Day, and at cemeteries where soldiers of the Union army have been interred they read their "Ritual of the Dead" and decorate the graves with flags and flowers. In recent years the order has decorated the graves of dead Confederates also, and there have been many friendly interchanges of civilities and hospitalities between the Grand Army of the Republic and the Southern survivors' organization known as The United Confederate Veterans--an order which has about fifty thousand members.

XVII--FOREIGN INVASION

"WELL, Caleb," said Philip, on the day after Decoration Day, "how did the bath-house opening-day pan out?"

"First-rate--A 1," Caleb replied, rubbing his hands, and then laughing to himself a long time, although in a manner which implied that the excitement to laughter was of a confidential nature. But this merely piqued curiosity, so Philip said:--

"Do you think it fair to keep all the fun to yourself, you selfish scamp? Don't you know that things to laugh at are dismally scarce at this season of the year? As the boys say when another boy finds something, 'Halves.'"

"Well," said Caleb, "the fact is, some of the customers was scared to death, Black Sam says, for fear they'd catch cold after the bath. I'd expected as much of some of our G. A. R. boys,--mentionin' no names,--so I'd took down to the house a dozen sets o' thin underclothin' that I'd ordered on suspicion. I always wear it--I learned the trick from one of our hospital doctors in the army, an' it gives me so much comfort that I talked it up to other men, but 'twas a new idee 'round here, an' ev'rybody laughed at me. The baths, though, scared a lot o' the boys into tryin' it. All day long they were kind o' wonderin', out loud, whether it was the cleanin' up or the underclothes that made 'em feel so much better'n usual; so I says to 'em, 'What's the matter with both? No one thing's ev'rythin', unless mebbe it's religion, an' even that loses its holt if you squat down with it an' don't do nothin' else.' 'But,' says some of 'em, 'what's to be did when the underclothes gets dirty?' 'Put on some clean ones,' says I, 'or wash the old ones overnight, 'fore you go to bed--that's what I done ev'ry night, when I was so poor that I couldn't afford a change.' Well, some of 'em'll do it, 'cause they're too poor to buy, but you'd better telegraph for a stock o' them thin goods; for when they don't find thick shirts an' pants stickin' to 'em all day, while they're at work, they'll be so glad o' the change that they'll want to stock up. They'll find out, as I've always b'lieved, that underclothes, an' plenty of 'em, is a means o' grace."

"More business for the store, as usual," said Philip.

"Yes," said Caleb, "but 'twon't be a patch to the run there'd be on ice-cream machines--if there was plenty of ice to be had. Some o' the boys from the farmin' district stopped with me last night, thinkin' it was better to get some sleep 'fore sun-up than go out home an' wake their folks up halfway between midnight and daylight, to say nothin' o' scarin' all the dogs o' the county into barkin', and tirin' out hosses that's got a day's work before 'em. Well, 'fore turnin' in, they said lots o' nice things--though no nicer than they ought--about the way they had been treated at your house, an' 'bout the way you both acted, as if you an' them had been cut from the same piece, but--"

"Don't make me conceited, Caleb."

"I won't; for, as I was goin' to say, they come back ev'ry time to the friz milk, as they called it, an' how they wished their wives knew how to make it, an' what a pity 'twas there wa'n't ice-houses all over the county. Well--partly with an eye to business, knowin' that most any of 'em could stand the price of a freezer, an' the others could do it, too, if they'd save the price o' liquor they drink in a month or two--I says:--

"'Well, why don't you make 'em? You could do it o' slabs you could split out o' logs from your own woodland, an' the crick freezes ev'ry winter, when you an' your hosses has got next to nothin' to do. Besides havin' ice-cream from milk that you've all got more of than you know what to do with, you could kill a critter once in a while in the summer, an' keep the meat cool; you could have fresh meat off an' on, instead o' cookin' pork seven days o' the week in hot weather, when it sickens the women an' children to look at it.' They 'lowed that that was so, an' they jawed it over for a while, an'--well, three or four ice-houses are goin' up, between farms, next winter, an' we'll sell some freezers, an' some men'll let up on drinkin'; for the worst bum o' the lot 'lowed that he'd trade his thirsty any time, an' throw in a quart o' Bustpodder's best to boot, for a good square fill o' friz milk."

"So even ice-cream is a means of grace, Caleb--eh?" said Philip.

"That's what it is, an' I notice, too, that you don't laugh under your mustache, like you used to do, when mention's made o' means o' grace."

But what rose is without its thorn? In the course of a few days the word went about, among the very large class to whom everything is fuel for the flame of gossip, that a lot of the Grand Army men had been taken into the Somerton house, and found it a palace, the things in which must have cost thousands of dollars, and that it was a shame and an outrage that money should have been made out of the poor, overworked country people to support two young stuck-ups from the city in more luxury than Queen Elizabeth ever dreamed of; for who ever read in history books of Queen Elizabeth having ice-cream? and didn't the history books say that she had only rushes on her floors, instead of even a rag carpet, to say nothing of picture carpets like the Somertons'?

When the rumor reached the store, Philip ground his teeth, but Grace laughed.

"I believe you'd laugh, even if they called your husband a swindler," said Philip.

"Indeed I would, at anything so supremely ridiculous," Grace said. "Wouldn't you, Caleb?"

"I reckon I would. Anyhow, it sounds a mighty sight better than the noise Philip made; besides, it's healthier for the teeth. It shows 'em off better, too."

"Now, Mr. Crosspatch, how do you feel?"

"Utterly crushed. But what are you going to do about it?"

"I'm going to make those gossips ashamed of themselves."

"How?"

"By refurnishing the parlor for the summer. The dust is ruining our nice things, so the change will be an economy. I'll do it so cheaply that almost any farmer in the county can afford to copy it, to the great delight of his wife, as well as himself. Let--me--see--" and Grace dropped her head over a bit of paper and a pencil, and Caleb looked at her admiringly, and winked profoundly at Philip, and then hurried into the back room so that his impending substitute for an ecstatic dance should not disturb the planner of the coming parlor decorations.