Under Fire Part 12

"Come back here, my man," ordered Davies, in low, stern voice, while Miss Loomis, without one instant of hesitation, threw off her cloak, drew a chair to the bedside, and laid her soft white hand upon the tumbled head of the wretched boy. Unwillingly, sullenly, the man obeyed.

"You are Paine, of 'A' troop, are you not?"

"Yes, sir. And the captain's orders and the doctor's were that he shouldn't have a drop."

"Never mind that. When did he get here? How did he come?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "COME BACK HERE, MY MAN."

Page 180.]

"With the mail-carrier this morning, from the agency, sir, and he'd been drinking on the way and got to going harder as soon as he reached the post. The captain ordered him confined and the doctor sent him here. But my orders was----"

"Never mind your orders. What I want to know is, who detailed you, and when were you detailed for hospital duty?"

"The captain sent me over, sir, after Brannan was taken in, and he's been begging like that for a drink for an hour back."

Meantime, with great sobs shaking his form, Brannan lay there saying no articulate word. Miss Loomis gently drew an arm from underneath his head. "Let me have your wrist, Brannan," she gently said. "You know your old nurse of last summer, don't you?" And in another moment her practised touch was on the sufferer's pulse. In silence Davies awaited the result. Her eyes filled with grave anxiety as she counted the feeble fluttering,--a mere shadow of the vigorous throb of a soldier's heart.

"This man ought not to be here--neglected," she murmured to Davies.

Then, rising, she turned to the attendant. "Go at once to Dr. Burroughs and say that Miss Loomis asks him to come here as quick as he can."

And Private Paine concluded it best to go without further words. The steward, returning to his post, was met at the steps by the young contract surgeon coming over from his corner on the run. A moment more and the two stood in presence of the sufferer and of his nurse. She smiled kindly upon the new-comers. "I sent for you, doctor, because I knew you had not been informed of Brannan's state. His pulse----" and here she lowered her voice so that only Burroughs and Davies could hear,--"is so thin and wiry as to be almost gone. My father would say he needed stimulant at once, and treatment later. See for yourself."

And the daughter of the well-known and beloved old army surgeon knew her ground and never faltered. Burroughs made brief examination and no remonstrance. In another minute the steward was administering brandy and water in a tablespoon while, anxious to re-establish himself, the young doctor was explaining. "I had no previous knowledge of the case," he stammered. "Captain Devers told me of the man's arrival and downfall, and I ordered him into hospital at his request, and,--yes,--I did say no stimulants of any kind. The captain so urged, and of course that would be the customary mode of treatment in most cases, but in a case like this, of course, had I been aware----"

"Oh, certainly," she interposed, with the same gracious smile and manner. "It was because I knew you hadn't been made aware. Now we'll soon be able to make him comfortable, and then when he's on his feet again he can tell us how it all happened." Again her white hand was laid upon the haggard forehead. "Courage, Brannan. Don't worry. We'll get you to sleep presently. Now, doctor, I want to send some medicine and a note to Mrs. Cranston. With your permission I mean to stay here a while."

"I will be your messenger, Miss Loomis," said Davies, "as the attendant doesn't seem to have returned, and then I can let Mrs. Davies know that I shall come here again, myself."

As he sped along the row, note and medicine phial in hand, Davies was surprised to see his captain's storm-door wide open and a light s.h.i.+ning through the transom within. A light was moving through the parlor, too, but Davies paid no further heed, left the note and medicine in Mrs.

Cranston's hands with brief explanatory word, then hurried back to Boynton's quarters. He had turned down the light when he went out for his walk and had left his wife in the darkness of her room, trying, presumably, to go to sleep. He found the lights turned on again, and Almira, a heavy shawl bundled about her shoulders, sitting with white, scared face, trembling and twitching, at the big coal base-burner in what was called the parlor.

"Why, Mira!" he cried. "What has happened? Are you ill?" And he bent over as though to fold her in his arms, but she shrank away.

"Don't!" she cried. "I was frightened. You--you were gone so long. I thought you'd never come back." Then to his utter amaze she burst into a wild fit of hysterical weeping. "Oh, take me away,--take me away from this dreadful place, or I shall die,--I shall die!"

CHAPTER XIV.

Mr. Davies was very late in returning to the hospital that night. For nearly half an hour Almira sobbed and s.h.i.+vered and refused to be comforted, and yet failed to explain. To his urgent plea to be told the cause of her fright and distress she could give no intelligible reply.

"Oh, I don't know. I heard noises, or voices, or something. I was all--all unstrung, I suppose. You--you talked to me so strangely, so cruelly the other night, and I've--I've been thinking of it all day--all day, and when you went away--and didn't come back, I--I thought all sorts of things. I supposed you'd gone there, you know where,--to those women,--those women who despise me and show it." It brought on fresh moans and tragic wringing of hands, and new outpouring of salty tears when he presently told her where he had been, but she would not listen to the cause of his detention at the hospital. It was more than enough that he had been out walking with her,--with _her_, in the dead of night. That seemed the only fact she cared to grasp, and that she crooned over with bitter wailing until his patience was exhausted.

"This is childish and absurd!" he said. "It is unworthy of you, my wife, and unjust to Miss Loomis as well as unjust to me. It is not possible that this has caused all your terror and distress. What noises--what sounds did you hear?"

But these now she had forgotten. In the light of his confession, as she termed it, all other calamities had faded into naught. He gradually calmed her sufficiently to induce her to return to bed, but when he announced that he must go again to the hospital to see how Brannan was getting on, her lamentations were piteous. In vain he reminded her that Brannan was her own cousin, the only son of her aunt and benefactress.

She would listen to none of it. Brannan was only an excuse to enable him again to go and meet Miss Loomis, and finally, with white face and set, rigid lips, Davies turned and left the house, walking rapidly to the hospital.

Miss Loom is still bent over the patient, who seemed now dozing. Dr.

Burroughs sat beside her at the moment, but had been away, he explained, to see old Fritz again. A new attendant, a shy, awkward young fellow from Devers's troop, was hovering about the bedside, and Davies glanced at him inquiringly. "What became of Paine?" he asked, and the steward shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.

"Captain Devers took him away," was the answer. The doctor arose and stood by Davies a minute.

"I don't know what to make of that captain of yours," he said. "Either he or I will keep out of this hospital in future. He came here and 'raised Cain' with my steward to-night, all on account of Brannan; then went over to the troop barracks foaming like a mad bull. I fancy he means to make it rather lively for you."

"Never mind me, doctor, so long as this poor boy's coming out all right.

How is he?"

"Doing nicely now, but--I wish I'd understood the case before. I'm bound to say Captain Devers misled me entirely. _She's_ the doctor he needed,"

said he, with a jerk of his head towards the grave, beautiful girl bending over the soldier's pillow, one hand still slowly, tenderly stroking back the dark hair about his temples.

"Will you say good-night to her for me and escort her home? Mrs. Davies is not well and I must return to her," said Davies, "that is,--unless I am needed here."

"No, go by all means. Only I may need you at the colonel's office in the morning when this thing has to be fought out. Dodge your captain, meantime, if you can."

"I know of no reason why I should dodge him or anybody," said Davies, with rising color. "I have done no wrong."

But on the steps without, as he hurried away, the lieutenant met a man who differed with him as to that--who differed with most people as to everything, and that he had been working up the case in his own mind against his subaltern there was no room for doubt.

"By what right, sir, do you a.s.sume to over-ride my authority and undo my orders? Time and again last summer I had occasion to caution you against interference in the handling of the men and the management of the troop, and now no sooner do you rejoin than here you are taking advantage of my being probably abed and asleep to countermand my positive instructions and overthrow my efforts at discipline."

Without one word of reply Mr. Davies a.s.sumed the position of attention and stood like a soldier before his furious commander. "I say again, sir," began Devers, "that you have deliberately sought to deride my authority and have connived at the disobedience of my orders. You knew perfectly well what orders I had given in the case of Brannan, and you dared to set them aside."

Still not a word in reply.

"This silence is contemptuous. Why don't you speak, sir?"

"I simply deny each and every allegation, Captain Devers."

"Denial is ridiculous, Mr. Davies! Haven't I the evidence of my own senses,--of the steward and the attendant? Don't I know? By G.o.d, sir----"

"One moment. Oblige me, captain. I wish to behave with all deference and respect, but when you use blasphemy----"

"Oh, blasphemy be d.a.m.ned! Don't attempt to teach me! I've had too much of your puritanical, psalm-singing business. I condoned your wretched misconduct of last September in the hope that you might do better, but now the time has come for you to be given the lesson you deserve. Things have reached a pretty pa.s.s when an officer who leads his men into ambush and then deserts them in their extremity----"

"Captain Devers!"

"No dramatics now. You're not in the pulpit----" The steward came forth at the moment, and with instant modulation of tone Devers went on. "You may not realize what you have done, but you have done it all the same, despite every effort of mine to teach you the proper course----What is it, steward?" he broke off, as though suddenly aware of that official's presence.

"The doctor's compliments, sir, and the new man the captain has sent over to relieve Paine seems to lack intelligence; he won't do at all as an attendant."

"Tell the doctor I sent the best I had, and that he begged to be relieved because he couldn't serve so many masters. When the post surgeon hears of this night's work he will doubtless have his say as to the manner in which his subordinates have trifled with their duties. I will make no change.--You appear to be waiting, Mr. Davies. That's all, sir, for to-night. You may go."

With a face almost as white as the snowy expanse of the parade, the lieutenant still stood there, quivering with wrath and wrong. He looked as though a torrent of reply were trembling on his lips, yet by supreme effort he curbed the impulse. His chest heaved once or twice. His lips were twitching. His hands were clenched and convulsive, but at last, with one long look into his captain's eyes while the latter was going on to say something about the necessity of his junior's accepting his admonition in proper spirit, Davies turned abruptly and sprang down the steps. Two soldiers stood there in the dusk, where they must have heard every word that was said. One was the new company clerk, Howard, the other Paine. Neither lifted a hand in salute to the officer. Both turned their backs and feigned to be deeply interested in conversation of their own.

It was Mr. Hastings's duty that week to supervise reveille roll-call and attend morning stables. He was surprised, therefore, as he went bounding over the parade, to see his junior sub on the porch wrapped in a heavy overcoat. Presently, after reporting to the post adjutant, as was the local custom, the various officers came scattering back to their own firesides, the infantry subs to turn in for another snooze, the cavalry to swallow a cup of coffee before going down to stables. Sanders hailed the lonely figure with characteristic levity.