Robert W. Chambers

“ Cap in hand, straight in his saddle, he saluted the passing flag; a sunburnt trooper called out: “That’s right, son! Bully for you!”
The boy turned his pony and raced along the column under a running fire of approving chaff from the men, until he came abreast of the bandmaster once more, at whom he stared with fascinated and uncloyed satisfaction.
Into a broad common wheeled the cavalry; the boy followed on his pony, guiding the little beast in among the mounted men, edging as close as possible to the bandmaster, who had drawn bridle and wheeled his showy horse abreast of a group of officers. ”

“ There was, of course, no cheering; a handkerchief fluttered from a gallery here and there, but Sandy River was loyal only in spots, and the cavalry pressed past groups of silent people, encountering the averted heads or scornful eyes of young girls and the cold hatred in the faces of gray-haired gentlewomen, who turned their backs as the ragged guidons bobbed past and the village street rang with the clink-clank of scabbards and rattle of Spencer carbines.5
But there was a small boy on a pony who sat entranced as the weather-ravaged squadrons trampled by. ”

“ It was a boyish-looking rider who mounted at the Colonel’s tent and went cantering away through the warm, misty rain, mail pouch and sabre flopping.
There was no need for her to inquire the way. She knew Waycross, the Carryl home, and John Deal’s farm as well as she knew her own home in Sandy River.
The drizzle had laid the dust and washed clean the roadside grass and bushes; birds called expectantly from fence and thorny thicket, as the sun whitened through the mist above; butterflies, clinging to dewy sprays, opened their brilliant wings in anticipation ”

“ The cavalry horses of the escort hung their heads, as though dully enduring the uproar; the horses of the field ambulances parked near the orchard were being backed into the shafts; the band of an infantry regiment, instruments flashing dully, marched up, halted, deposited trombone, clarion and bass drum on the grass and were told off as stretcher-bearers by a smart, Irish sergeant, who wore his cap over one ear. ”

“ The wild music of “Garryowen” set the horses frantic—and the men, too. The band, still advancing at a walk, was dropping rapidly behind. A bullet hit kettle-drummer Pillsbury, and he fell with a grunt, doubling up across his nigh kettle-drum. A moment later Peters struck his cymbals wildly together and fell clean out of his saddle, crashing to the sod. Schwarz, his trombone pierced by a ball, swore aloud and dragged his frantic horse into line.
“Right dress!” said the bandmaster blandly, mastering his own splendid mount as a bullet grazed its shoulder. ”

“ Sometimes, mending the last shreds of her cambric finery, she thought of her girlhood, of the white porches at Sandy River; and always, always, the current of her waking dream swung imperceptibly back to that swift crisis in her life—a flash of love—love at the first glance—a word! and his regiment, sabres glittering, galloping pell-mell into the thundering inferno between the hills.... And sunset; and the wounded passing by wagon loads, piled in the blood-soaked hay ”

“ From moment to moment, homing or outgoing bees sped like bullets across her line of vision; the hives were busy now that a gleam of pale sunshine lay across the grass. One bee, leaving the hive, came humming around the Cherokee roses. The Messenger saw the little insect alight and begin to scramble about, plundering the pollen-powdered blossom. The bee was a yellow one.175
Suddenly the Messenger gathered bridle and touched her hat; and away she spurred, putting her horse to a dead run. ”

“ All that sunny afternoon she lay on the colonel’s camp bed, hands tightly clenched on her breast, eyes closed sometimes, sometimes wide open, gazing at the sun spots crawling on the tent wall.
To her ears came bugle calls from distant hills; drums of marching columns. Sounds of the stirring of thousands made tremulous the dim silence of the tent.
Dreams long dead arose and possessed her—the confused dreams of a woman, still young, awakened from the passionless lethargy of the past. ”

“ How feverish you are! I think that your regiment believes you roamed away while suffering from sunstroke.... Their Colonel is a good friend of mine. Tell him you’re sorry.”
His head lay heavily on her shoulder; she laid a fresh hand over his eyes.
“If the South is right, if we of the North are right, God knows better than you or I, Roy.... And if you are so bewildered that you have no deep conviction either way I think you may trust Him who set you among Kay’s Cavalry.... God never betrayed a human soul in honest doubt.” ”

“ The blanket on the bed she spread upon the floor, laid in it her saddle and bridle, boots, papers, map, and clothing, and made a bundle; then slinging it on her slender back, she carried it up the ladder to the loft under the roof.
Ten minutes later she lay on the bed below, the back of one hand across her closed eyes, breathing deeply as a sleeping child—the most notorious spy in all America, the famous “Special Messenger,” carrying locked under her smooth young breast a secret the consequence of which no man could dare to dream of. ”

“ While she was managing to dry herself and dress, her horse limped off into the grassy swale below to drink in the stream and feed among the tender grasses.
Before she drew on the homespun gown she tucked her linen map into an inner skirt pocket, flat against her right thigh; then, fastening on the shabby skirt, she rolled up her riding habit, laid it with lantern, revolver, saddle, bridle, boots, and bags, in the hollow and covered all over with heaps of fragrant dead leaves and branches. ”

“ Men? The valley was suddenly alive with them, choking the roads in heavy silent lines; they were in the lanes, they plodded through the orchards, they swarmed across the hills, column on column, until the entire country seemed flowing forward in steady streams. Sandy River awoke, restlessly listening; lights glimmered behind darkened windows; a heavier, vaguer rumor grew, hanging along the hills. It increased to a shaking, throbbing monotone, like the far dissonance of summer thunder! ”

“ Her voice was obliterated in the noisy outburst of bugles sounding the noon sick-call.
They went out together, where the Messenger’s horse was tied under the trees. Beyond, through the pines, glimmered the tents of an emergency hospital. And now, in the open air not very far away, they could hear picket firing.
“Do be careful,” said the blue-eyed Nurse. “They say you do such audacious things; and every day somebody says you have been taken, or hanged, or shot. ”

“ His uniform was entirely different from the regulation—he wore a blue forage cap with short, heavy visor of unpolished leather shadowing the bridge of his nose; his dark blue jacket was shell-cut; over it he wore a slashed dolman trimmed at throat, wrists and edges with fur; his breeches were buff; his boots finished at the top with a yellow cord forming a heart-shaped knot in front; at his heels trailed the most dainty and rakish of sabres, light, graceful, curved almost like a scimiter. ”

“ With a nervous stroke she drove the punt far out into the darkness, then fell into a measured, swinging motion, standing nearer the stern than the bow. There was no sound now but the lapping of water and the man’s thick breathing; she strove to pierce the darkness between them, but she could see only a lumpish shadow in the bow where he crouched.
“I reckon you’re Roy Allen,” she began, but he cut her short:
“Damn it! What’s that to you?” ”

“ A guidon danced by; more guns, more caissons, then a trampling, plunging gallop, a rattle of sabres—and the battery had passed.
“What is that heavy sound behind the hills?” whispered the boy.
“The river rushing over the shallows—perhaps a train on the trestle at Oxley Court House—” She listened, resting her rounded chin on her hands. “It is thunder, I think. Go to bed now for a while——”
“Hark!” said the boy, laying his small hand on hers.
“It is thunder,” she said again. “How white the dawn is growing. Listen to the birds—is it not sweet?” ”

“ But always at dawn the sun burned off the mist, rising in stupefying splendor; the oily river glided on; not a leaf moved, not a creature. And the kitten slept on the porch, heedless of inviting grass stems whisked for her and the ball of silk rolled past her in temptation.
Half lying there, propped against a tree trunk in the heated shade, cotton bodice open, sleeves rolled to the shoulders, the Special Messenger mended her linen with languid fingers. Perspiration powdered her silky skin from brow to breast, from finger to elbow, shimmering like dew when she moved. Her dark hair fell, unbound ”

“ The Special Messenger lay perfectly still and flat, watching, listening, waiting, coolly alert for a shadow of a chance to slip out and through the pass; but there was to be no such chance now, for a dozen troopers came into view, running their lean horses at top speed, and wheeled straight into the pass. A full squadron followed, their solid galloping waking clattering echoes among the rocks. Then her delicate ears caught a distant, ominous sound—nearer, louder, ringing, thudding, jarring, pounding—the racket of field artillery arriving at full speed. ”

“ The sun was dipping between a cleft in the hills, flinging out long rosy beams across the misty valley. The mocking birds had ceased, but a thrasher was singing in a tangle of Cherokee roses under the western windows.
While they stood there the sun dipped so low that nothing remained except a glowing scarlet rim.
“Hark!” whispered the boy. Far away an evening gunshot set soft echoes tumbling from hill to hill, distant, more distant. Strains of the cavalry band rose in the evening silence, “The Star Spangled Banner” floating from the darkening valley. Then silence ”

“ Everywhere, always, death, or the preparation for death—every road and footpath crammed with it, every field trampled by it, every woodland shattered by it, every stream running thick with its pollution. The sour smell of marching men, the stale taint of unclean fires, the stench of beasts—the acrid, indescribable odor that hangs on the sweating flanks of armies seemed to infect sky and earth.
A trooper, munching an apple and carrying a truss of hay, passed, cap cocked rakishly, sabre banging at his heels ”

“ Now—what is it, dear, you wish to tell me?”
“Oh, I forgot; truly I did, Celia—but a general is coming to visit me to-night, if you can possibly manage it, and I’m so glad you hung out the flag—and Moses can serve the Madeira, can’t he?”
“What general?” inquired his sister uneasily. And her brother’s explanations made matters no clearer. “You remember what the Yankee cavalry did before,” she said anxiously. “You must be careful, Billy, now that the quarters are empty and there’s not a soul in the place except Mose.”
“But, Celia! the general is a gentleman. I shook hands with him!” ”

“ Why, he ain’t dead, is he?”
“He died at Sandy River—that day,” she said gently. “Don’t you remember?”
“No, sir; our bandmaster wasn’t killed at Sandy River.”
She looked at him amazed, almost frightened.
“What do you mean? He is dead. I—saw him die.”
“It must have been some other bandmaster—not Captain Stanley.”
“I saw the bandmaster of your regiment, the Fourth Missouri Cavalry, brought into that big white house and laid on my—on a bed——” She stared at the boy, caught him by the sleeve: “He is dead, isn’t he? Do you know what you are telling me? Do you understand what I am saying?” ”

“ An artilleryman came along and dropped a bundle of picks and shovels which he was carrying to the gunners, who had begun the emplacements; the boyish Major dismounted, subduing his excitement with a dignified frown; and for a while he was very fussy and very busy, aiding the battery captain in placing the guns and verifying the depression.
The position of the masked battery was simply devilish; every gun, hidden completely in the oak-scrub, was now trained on the pass. ”

“ A red-haired old man, in his shirt sleeves, carrying a fishing pole, was running down the road, chased by two gray-jacketed troopers. He ran well, throwing away his pole and the200 string of slimy fish he had been carrying; but, half way across the stream, they rode him down and caught him, driving their horses straight into the shallow flood; and a few moments later a fresh squad of cavalry trotted up, forced the prisoner to mount a led horse, and, surrounding him, galloped rapidly away southward. ”

“ Hark! Horsemen are passing at a gallop. What is it you wish—to see them? But they are gone, dear. If any of our soldiers come, you shall see them. That makes you happy?—that is what you desire?—to see one of our own soldiers? If they pass, I shall go out and bring one here to you—truly, I will.” She paused, marveling at the strange light that glimmered across the ravaged visage.23 Then she blew out the dip and stole into the hall.
“Billy!” she called, hearing him fumbling at the front door.
“Oh, Celia! The cavalry trumpets! Do you hear? I’m going out. Perhaps he may pass the house.” ”

“ Mount your men.”
Ten minutes later the regiment, band ahead, marched out of Sandy River and climbed the hill, halting in the road that passed the great white mansion. As the outposts moved forward they encountered a small boy on a pony, who swung his cap at them gayly as he rode. Squads, dismounted, engaged in tearing away the rail fences bordering the highway, looked around, shouting a cheery answer to his excited greeting; the colonel on a ridge to the east lowered his field glasses to watch him; the bandmaster saw him coming and smiled as the boy drew bridle beside him, saluting. ”

“ The story—already in its 150th thousand—is, perhaps, the author’s favorite piece of work.
THE YOUNGER SET
is also of the social comédie humaine of America, with its scenes laid in New York and on Long Island. Here again, behind a romance of love and of society complications, Mr. Chambers conceals his philosophic suggestions that may be gathered from the title. The younger set comes into our society fresh and unspoiled with each generation, and in its way contributes something of freshness, something of vigor to keep the social world from going down hill on a grade of decadence. ”

“ The sentries were looking after the major; she dropped her sunbonnet, stooped to recover it, and straightened up, the hidden hand grenade slipping from the crown of the bonnet into her bodice between her breasts.
A thousand eyes seemed watching her as, a trifle pale, she strolled on aimlessly, swinging the recovered sunbonnet; she listened, shivering, for the stern challenge to halt, the breathless shout of accusation, the pursuing trample of heavy boots. And at last, quaking in every limb, she ventured to lift her eyes. Nobody seemed to be looking her way ”

“ After the inner camp lines had been passed the regiment halted while a troop was detailed as flankers and an advanced guard galloped off ahead. Along the road behind, the guns of the Rhode Island Battery came thudding and bumping up, halting with a dull clash of chains.
Stanley said: “This is one of Baring’s pet raids; we’ve done it dozens of times. Once our entire division rode around Beauregard; but I didn’t see the old, blue star division flag this time, so I guess we’re going it alone. Hello! There’s infantry! We must be close to the extreme outposts.” ”

“ I lived in New York, but I thought the South was in the right. Then they drafted me; and I tried to tell them it was an outrage, but they gave me the choice between Fort Lafayette and Kay’s Cavalry.... And I took the Cavalry and waited.... I wouldn’t have gone as far as to fight against the flag—if they had let me alone.... I only had my private opinion that the South was more in the right than we—the North—was.... I’m old enough to have an opinion about niggers, and I’m no coward either.... They drove me to this; I didn’t want to kill people who were more in the right than we were.... ”