CHAPTER XI
THAT C COMPANY CORPORAL EATS CROW
"COMPANY, halt!"
Then, just a little later:
"C Company, halt!"
The long, dusty line of khaki-clad soldiers, at the word, dropped out of ranks, finding seats on the ground near where they had left the ranks.
Behind the men, now stopped, the wagon train came up and also halted.
Not far from the head of the line that morning stood the log cabin of the old-time hunter.
Though the military did not suspect it, a sharp pair of old eyes peered out through a chink in the cabin wall.
Then the cabin door opened, the old-time hunter sauntering slowly forth.
At sight of him Corporal Raynes, C Company, tried to shrink into smaller space than he had ever succeeded in occupying before.
"Which side won the tom-fool match?" inquired the aged hunter of a pleasant-faced young man on whose shoulders glistened the plain straps of a second lieutenant.
"B Company won the miniature manœuvres by capturing C Company, if that's what you mean, sir," replied Lieutenant Dick Prescott pleasantly.
"B Company?" cried the old man almost indignantly. "Why, B Company stood for the Japs, didn't they!"
"Not that I've heard, sir," answered Prescott. "B Company and C Company represented two forces that were supposed to be hostile to each other. Neither side was designated by the name of any country."
"Why, that's dinged strange!" uttered the old hunter. "A lot of your camp wagons went by yesterday, and there was a feller from one of 'em, who told me he belonged to C Company, and that C Company was supposed to be the Americans, and B Company was the Japs. Now, I've always hated the Japs!"
"Did you ever see any Japanese, sir?" asked Lieutenant Prescott.
"Nope, young man; but what's that got to do with hating 'em? Well, as I was saying, that C Company feller on one of the wagons told me about B Company being the Japs, and he asked me if I would like to help along the licking of B Company. So I done the best I could."
"By sending two young B Company soldiers across the wilderness, to that elevation over yonder?" inquired Captain Cortland, who had heard the conversation.
"The C Company feller told me that it would help lick the company that was standing for the Japs," explained the old man, his face an interesting study as he gazed from one officer's face to another.
Captain Freeman had not yet heard the story of how Hal and Noll had come to be in his camp at dark. He had been denied that knowledge by the laughing officers of B Company. But Freeman had been near enough to hear the hunter's explanation, and now C Company's commander thought he saw a whole lot of sudden light.
"Pass the word for Corporal Raynes!" he shouted.
Raynes heard, and shivered. Yet he was a soldier; there was but one thing to do. Quaking in his restored shoes, Raynes rose and marched briskly forward, halting and saluting before his captain.
"Is this the man who was on one of the wagons, and who told you to send two B Company men hiking across a wilderness of rock?" asked Captain Freeman.
"That's the very man," declared the old hunter.
Hal and Noll had been looking on from a little distance. Now they caught Captain Cortland's signal to come up, and obeyed.
"Are these the two young men you sent, sir, on that wild-goose chase off over the rocks?" asked Captain Freeman, pointing over towards the bunkies.
"They sure are," nodded the hunter.
Captain Freeman turned, fixing the quaking Raynes with a glance that brought the victim scant comfort.
"Corporal Raynes, you were despoiled by Overton while on outpost night before last. Then, yesterday afternoon, you fixed up a practical joke on Overton and Terry in order to pay Overton back for his conduct to you the night before?" queried Captain Freeman.
"Yes, sir," admitted Raynes, feeling as though he would like to sink about a mile into the ground.
"Corporal Raynes," continued his captain, half scathingly and half quizzically, "you have proved a most valuable man to your company during this period of field duty. First, while on outpost duty, you allow yourself to be despoiled of your rifle, shoes and canteen. Then, in your humorous efforts to get even, you perpetrate a near-joke that sends the enemy's two best scouts where they will be right on hand to learn our plans and betray us to the enemy. Corporal Raynes, you have covered yourself with glory indeed! Return to your company."
Like wildfire the story spread down the line. Raynes had to endure jeering looks from nearly two hundred men.
"Ain't it fearful how these kids gain glory from the very things that other folks do to smash 'em?" demanded Private Bill Hooper hoarsely in the ear of Private Dowley.
"It's a long lane of luck that has no turning," growled Dowley.
"After what I've seen of their luck, I'm almost afraid to put up any job against 'em," confessed Hooper.
"You never did have much sand or wit, I reckon," snarled Dowley.
"Are you still going to try to bring the kid soldiers to disgrace?" asked Hooper in an eager undertone.
"If I do, I don't believe you'll be much help."
"But I'd like to know – "
"Bill Hooper, if I need your help in anything I'll be sure to let you know."
"Now, Dowley, you needn't be so warm-tongued about it," urged Hooper. "Of course, if there's any safe scheme for fixing the records of these kids, I'm plumb crazy to have a hand in it, and that you know, Dowley."
"Did the last thing we put up – spoiling Kid Overton's rifle – get traced back to us?" demanded Dowley.
"Now, that scheme didn't work much trouble to the kid," complained Hooper. "He was in bad for half a day, then got a new rifle, and has been receiving bouquets ever since."
"You wait – watch and listen," urged Dowley. "You won't be very much older when you'll hear something drop that'll fix Overton if he happens to be around."
"I wish you'd tell me," half whined Bill Hooper.
"I will, if I want your help," remarked Dowley dryly.
"Well, so long as the kid is chased out of this regiment, I don't care who does it."
"Fall in!" rang down the line.
"I'm glad I know who put up that job on us," laughed Private Overton, as he stepped to his place in ranks.
"But I wonder how it feels to be Corporal Raynes just now?" hinted Private Terry facetiously.
"I hope he won't get reduced to the ranks as a consequence," observed Hal.
"That would he rather rough. But I don't believe Captain Freeman will do anything like that."
Just before noon the troops were halted, then marched, by companies, into a field. The order to pitch camp was given.
It was really too bad, but one of the wagons drove up and the men on it began to unload bear carcasses. All this bear meat was dumped before B Company's line. C Company men tried not to look in that direction at all, for C Company's share in the bear meat was to be – none.
Early that morning Captain Cortland had sent the wagon and men to recover the bear carcasses from the cave. The bears had been promptly "skinned" and dressed before loading them into the wagon.
From still another wagon sounded the whines of the five cubs. These were to be taken back to Fort Clowdry, there to be fattened and served at the coming Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner of B Company's men. A few months later these cubs would be "a good size for killing."
"To the victors belong the spoils." The two older bears had been killed as already related, and the cubs found by B Company scouts within C Company's "territory."
Out were tumbled the Army cookstoves. Men of B Company cut up the meat. Soon the odor of baking and roasting meats was on the air. Other willing helpers to the cook were trimming off pieces of meat for broiling.
It was torment to hungry C Company men to smell the appetizing odors and to meet the grins with which B Company men favored them.
B Company must wait a while for its dinner, but was willing. The men of C Company, to stop, as far as possible, the pangs of longing and the watering of mouths, fell to at once to cook their own monotonous bacon.
"See here, Freeman, there's going to be an abundance of bear meat," remarked Captain Cortland, going over to his fellow company commander. "Your men may as well have some of it."
"Not under the circumstances under which the meat was obtained," replied Captain Freeman firmly. "Let the men of my company realize that they were disgracefully worsted, and that they have no cause for complaint."
So the men of one company sat down to a meal of hard tack, bacon and coffee, while B Company men waited for a better feast.
At last B's spread was ready.
"My man," said Captain Cortland to his dog-robber, "cut off some nice pieces of bear meat and take them over to the officers of C Company with my compliments."
But the dog-robber soon returned, bearing the platter on which the meat still lay.
"Captain Freeman's compliments, sir, but he says that the officers of C Company will endure a deserved disappointment along with their men."
Ere B Company's feast ended a commotion started that appeared to come from behind C Company's street.
Hal, dropping his ration plate to the ground, leaped up.
"Look, Noll!" he called laughingly. "Corporal Raynes is certainly 'getting his.' Wow! Look at the fracas!"
As a matter of fact, Raynes, at this moment, was being made the recipient of most unwelcome attentions.
He was being tossed in a blanket.
This is the most emphatic and picturesque way that soldiers have of displaying their displeasure against a man. It is a torment that is also inflicted on any soldier who is accused of being "too fresh."
Eight soldiers had hold of an ordinary army blanket, holding to it by the edges.
Several other soldiers had started in pursuit of Corporal Raynes. Though that non-com ran for all he was worth, he was captured, overpowered and dragged to the blanket.
Willing hands caught him up, throwing him into the slack of the blanket.
"Heave her, boys!"
Instantly, before Raynes could scramble to his feet and escape, the slack blanket was hauled taut.
Up into the air some four feet shot Corporal Raynes's sprawling figure.
Down he came again, into the slack, but just as promptly he was tossed again. This time the victim went up more than five feet into the air.
"Stop it!" gasped the victim from up in the air.
But no one was in a mood to stop it. Higher and higher shot the body of the unpopular corporal, until he was going up ten feet or more at nearly every toss.
It is a most ludicrous punishment to look at, but the victim of this strenuous prank feels that it is more than ridicule. He is always certain that an outrage is being carried on against him.
"Sto-o-op it!" gasped Raynes weakly.
Under the merciless tossing and consequent jolting nearly all the breath had left his body.
"Give him a few more tastes," advised three or four of C Company's men who stood in the front rank of those looking on.
Of course it was a breach of discipline, in a way, for privates to toss a non-commissioned officer, but neither Captain Freeman nor either of his lieutenants interfered. The non-com is not always safe, by any means, from blanket tossing.
At last, however, the blanket was dropped to the ground, and Corporal Raynes, breathless and very red-faced, was allowed to roll off the woolen surface.
As the corporal lay on the ground one of the men voiced the feeling of all his comrades in C Company by muttering grimly:
"Put up jobs that supply B's men with fresh meat and leave us out, will you?"
CHAPTER XII
THE CALL TO DEADLY WORK
FOR the next three days the men were to remain at the present camp.
Instruction in the erecting of temporary field fortifications was to follow.
But Hal and Noll missed the first afternoon of this work, for they were sent over to Mason City as orderlies to Lieutenant Prescott, who, as acting commissary officer to the reunited companies, went to buy fresh foodstuffs.
Two wagons were also dispatched, the young lieutenant riding with the driver on one of the wagons, while the soldier boys rode on the other wagon.
Mason City nestled in among the mountains in what was considered one of the best health sections of Colorado. The "city" would have been termed a village back in the east. It contained four hotels, two sanitariums, a small theatre and other public buildings. It was to this town that many eastern consumptives came.
The native population of the town was less than a thousand souls. Consumptives and other travelers added a usual average of about eighteen hundred more people.
The streets were lively with people when the two wagons drove into the town.
"You men may just as well enjoy yourselves for a couple of hours, for I shall be busy in looking through the markets," announced Lieutenant Prescott, as the soldier boys climbed down from their wagon. "Report to me at the Mason House at six sharp. Remember, won't you, that's it a soldier's business to be punctual to the fraction of a minute?"
"Yes, sir," replied Hal Overton, as the soldier boys saluted.
Lieutenant Prescott strode off down the street, a splendidly military figure in his officer's khaki uniform which, despite the hardships of the last days, he had kept almost immaculate.
"A mighty fine young officer," murmured Noll, gazing admiringly after the lieutenant.
"One of the best that they turn out of West Point, I reckon," replied Private Overton.
Then the two young privates devoted themselves to sight-seeing.
Punctually at the moment, however, both were in the lobby at the Mason House.
Lieutenant Prescott stepped in at the same moment.
"I'll register you here for a room to-night, men," he said, returning their salutes. "You will also have your evening meal in the dining room. I shall not need your services until morning. Report to me at this spot at 8.30 to-morrow morning."
"Very good, sir," replied both soldier boys, once more saluting.
"Say, a hotel meal will seem like a real luxury – what?" breathed Hal.
"I wonder if it's ready?" murmured Noll.
"We'll find out."
The dining room was open. After going to the wash room, and making themselves as presentable as possible, the two young soldiers stepped into the dining room, the head waiter showing them to seats.
"There's the lieutenant over there at another table," whispered Noll.
"I guess he's as glad as we are to have a civilized meal again. But has it struck you, Noll, that the government does things in pretty good shape when it pays for putting up two private soldiers at a fine hotel like this?"
What neither soldier boy suspected was that Lieutenant Prescott was paying the bill for them out of his own pocket – this as a silent remembrance of their work in bringing victory to B Company.
By the time that the meal was nearly over the soldier boys observed that a man who looked as if he might be a native of Mason City had seated himself at the same table with Lieutenant Prescott, and was engaged in earnest, low-voiced conversation with that young officer.
Soon after a waiter came to the table where Hal and Noll sat.
"The lieutenant wants to speak with you as soon as you have finished," announced the waiter. "Don't go to him until you're through eating, though."
Noll finished his last few bites of dessert, Hal his coffee. Then both young men rose, quietly crossing the dining room. The soldier boys, as they moved with erect carriage and easy motion, were full of a soldierly grace of appearance that they did not begin to suspect.
Nor did they imagine that strangers in the hotel dining room were paying any heed to them until they heard a man's voice say approvingly:
"Regulars."
"Yes; they're the real thing," agreed another male voice. "You'll know a regular wherever you see one. The men of the regular Army can't be beat."
"You sent for us, sir?" asked Hal, pausing beside the lieutenant's table and saluting.
"Yes," nodded Prescott. "Follow me from the dining room. I have something to say to you."
Prescott and the stranger passed out ahead. Hal and Noll kept in their wake, about fifteen feet to the rear. Lieutenant Prescott and the stranger entered an elevator, the soldier boys following. The young officer led the way to his room.
"Now, then," resumed Prescott, wheeling about on the soldier boys, "I have had a very peculiar request made to me to-night – by this gentleman."
The stranger nodded.
"Mason City," continued the lieutenant, "is usually a very orderly place. There are only two policemen here – a night and a day officer. Besides, there is one peace officer – Deputy Sheriff Coates. Now, it happens that Coates is ill in bed, and his physician absolutely forbids him to leave his bed inside of a week."
"That's right," nodded the stranger.
"And the policemen are needed on the street. Besides, I am informed that the two local policemen are neither of them quite the sort of men who are fitted for some work that has come up."
"Also quite right," nodded the stranger.
"Therefore," went on the young lieutenant, "Deputy Sheriff Coates, hearing that soldiers are in town, has sent to me asking my help in arresting one of the most dangerous characters at present at liberty anywhere in the United States. Now, if I am to undertake this work, I must have assistance. The question comes, men – "
Lieutenant Prescott paused, scrutinizing keenly the faces of the soldier boys.
"Are you men ready to aid me in arresting this desperate character, who is as deadly as a rattler, and always ready to turn himself loose with a pair of guns?"
"I am very sorry, sir," replied Hal, saluting, "that the lieutenant should feel it at all necessary to ask the question."
"I am obliged to ask you," answered Prescott, "and also to inform you that you are both at liberty to refuse, for this is not legally the duty of a soldier under the circumstances. You may refuse without subjecting yourselves to criticism."
"But we have no thought of refusing, sir," Hal answered, not even considering it necessary to glance at his bunkie. "We'll follow the lieutenant anywhere, and do anything that he directs."
"But, my men, you and I may all three of us be killed in this enterprise."
"Fearful, sir!" replied Noll half dryly. "Yet I've always supposed it part of a soldier's duty to be killed at need."
"In the discharge of military duties, yes," agreed Lieutenant Prescott. "But this is not military duty in any sense. If you go into it you must understand that you are acting voluntarily, to aid the civil authorities of this state and county."
"May I ask a question, sir?" – from Hal.
"Certainly," replied the young officer.
"You are proposing to risk your life, aren't you, sir?"
"Yes."
"Then we'll take the same risk, sir. We don't need to ask anything more. Lead us where you wish, and into what you please, sir."
"Thank you, men," acknowledged Lieutenant Prescott heartily. Then, turning to the stranger, he added:
"I told you I didn't think I was mistaken in these men."
"You certainly are not," agreed the stranger.
"Now, for the next step, I must wire the regimental commander, Colonel North, asking his permission that these men and myself engage in the enterprise. I anticipate the colonel's consent. Therefore, as soon as I have sent the telegram, sir, you may lead us to the house of Coates."
Lieutenant Prescott then left the room.
"I suppose you boys wonder who I am?" smiled the stranger.
"Thank you, sir," Hal replied quietly. "When the lieutenant wants us to know he'll tell us. No offense intended, sir."
"Nor any taken," replied the stranger, with a laugh. "You regulars surely do go along, just sticking to orders, and not caring for anything outside of orders."
Second Lieutenant Prescott soon returned to the room.
"I've sent my wire, Mr. Dent. Now we are at your disposal. Lead the way, sir."
As the soldier boys followed their officer, a dozen feet to the rear, from the hotel, they certainly felt far more curiosity than they would have admitted to any one else.
CHAPTER XIII
THE APPOINTMENT WITH SUPREME DANGER
"YOU think you can manage it?" asked Deputy Sheriff Coates anxiously, after a long talk by the side of the sick bed.
"I am sure we can," nodded Lieutenant Richard Prescott cheerily.
"I hate to ask such favor of you," went on Coates in a tone of real regret. "But Jack Blick simply has to be arrested, and there doesn't seem any other way."
"Don't worry any more about it, Mr. Coates," urged the young lieutenant.
It seemed odd to see one as young as Prescott using this soothing tone to the weather-tanned, middle-aged peace officer who, for a score of years, had been known as a terror to evil-doers. But Coates was flat on his back now, and there was a man to be captured who was known as one of the most dangerous men in the country.
During the conversation Hal and Noll had remained seated at some distance from the bed. The soldier boys had listened, but had said nothing. Nor had Dent, who turned out to be the local postmaster, said much, either.
"Blick is just waiting for a letter that holds money to take him somewhere else," Coates continued, plucking at the bed clothes. "If he gets that letter in the morning, he'll be out of sight and away before I can get help here. As I've told you, the stage comes here only twice a week, and it is out of the question to get real help through in case Blick makes his last trip to the post office to-morrow morning. If he gets a letter then, and finds the expected funds in it, it's my belief that he'll be on his way among the hills five minutes afterwards. That is, of course, Lieutenant, if you're not there to stop him."
"If he appears and is recognized, we'll stop him," smiled Lieutenant Prescott with the confidence of a trained man who cannot admit defeat.
"But be mighty sure you get the drop on Jack Blick, Lieutenant. If you soldiers make the slightest blunder after Blick knows you're there for him, he'll drill all three of you. If you once let Blick get a gun out of his pocket then one or two of you will die – sure. The fellow is as quick as lightning, and he always shoots to kill at the first shot!"
"I have heard of that kind of man before," replied Mr. Prescott composedly.
"Don't you doubt that they exist, either, Lieutenant," warned the deputy sheriff earnestly. "Don't forget, either, that Jack Blick is the most dangerous man of that type."
"What a pity you don't know where Blick is staying," sighed Lieutenant Prescott regretfully. "It would be much more to my liking to turn him out of bed in the middle of the night."
"None of us have been able to find the least trace of his stopping place," put in Postmaster Dent. "Not that we haven't tried. Wherever Blick's hiding place is, it's a secure one."
The plans for the attempt at capture were then made and fully discussed until every one present understood fully.
Jack Blick, "wanted" for two killings and half a dozen train and stage holds-ups, was here in Mason City in disguise. He had always been smooth faced, but now he wore a heavy beard. He had made other alterations in his appearance. At the post office he inquired for letters for Arthur Dade. As a part of his disguise Blick pretended to be a consumptive, and on even rather warm days, he appeared in a light top-coat. This was the information that Coates gave Lieutenant Prescott.
"That's so he can carry revolvers in either side pocket; don't forget that," urged the deputy sheriff. "Watch Blick's hands when he takes 'em out of his pockets."
Blick's identity had been learned from the police of San Francisco. In that latter city Blick's sister lived. It was believed that she might correspond with her brother, and so the police of San Francisco had arranged with the local post office people for a chance to inspect the address of every letter that Juliette Blick mailed. These addresses had been run down, and the one at Mason City had proved to be the correct one for her brother.
"I am afraid you have tired yourself out, Mr. Coates," suggested Prescott, rising. "As we now know all that can help us, I propose to leave after sending your nurse in to you."
"My nurse?" cried the deputy, almost resentfully. "Me, under a nurse's care, when there's a job at hand like catching Jack Blick!"
"We'll do our very best, sir, to take your place," promised Lieutenant Prescott. Then a new thought coming to him, he added:
"I think, Mr. Coates, perhaps we had better wait until Mr. Dent goes down to the Mason House to see whether there is an answer to the telegram I sent Colonel North. I may have to see you again, just for a moment."
Once outside the sick room, the three soldiers stepped into the little parlor of the house.
"As postmaster, Mr. Dent, you are well enough known to have no difficulty in getting the hotel people to hand you any message that may have come for me."
Then Mr. Dent left them.
"Seat yourselves, men," urged Lieutenant Prescott, himself dropping into a chair. "Now, I think that, with three of us, we're going to have a rather easy time to-morrow if Blick really shows up at the post office. Of course, now that we've undertaken this thing, we simply can't allow ourselves to make any flukes."
"As I understand it, sir," smiled Hal Overton, "any mistakes that any of us make will form the basis of the undertaker's bill to our families at home."
"That's the best possible way of stating the case," laughed the young lieutenant lightly. "Just for the sake of being able to remain in the good old service we've got to avoid making any bad breaks while Blick is at hand."
Thirty minutes went by ere the postmaster of Mason City returned.
"Had to wait. Message just came. I brought it at once," explained Dent, whose breathing showed that he had hurried.
Lieutenant Prescott took the little yellow envelope, breaking it open.
"Pardon me for reading it," he said.
Then a smile broke over his features.
"It's O. K.," he announced, dropping the paper to his lap. Then he picked it up again, saying:
"Listen!"
This was the dispatch that he read, addressed to himself and signed by Colonel North:
"Permission granted to yourself and Privates Overton and Terry to make arrest if possible, but only after all three have been legally sworn in as special deputy sheriffs of the county. Obey and submit to the civil authorities in every way."
"Hurrah!" Hal could not restrain himself from saying.
"What a bully old colonel commands 'Ours,'" breathed Noll Terry.
"Ours" is the term given his regiment by every soldier, whether officer or enlisted man.
"I'm glad to see, men, that you're pleased. Now, as I thought might be possible when leaving Mr. Coates, we shall have to see him again for just a moment."
"To be sworn in as special deputies?" inquired Postmaster Dent.
"Exactly," nodded Lieutenant Prescott.
They were soon again at the sick man's bedside, the young officer explaining their errand.
"Hold up your hands, all three of you," directed Deputy Coates.
Then and there he swore them in formally as special deputy sheriffs in the service of the county.
"Dent, go to the third drawer in that cabinet and take out three badges, will you?" asked Mr. Coates.
"These badges will be in the best place if we pin them to our flannel shirts, and then button our blouses over them," suggested Prescott, setting the example.
"I'll go out ahead of you now," proposed the postmaster. "Arrange to be in the little alley-way back of the post office at half past six in the morning."
"Six thirty to the minute," Lieutenant Prescott promised.
Once outside, the lieutenant told the bunkies to return to the hotel together. Then he left them.
Just on the dot of 6.30 the next morning Lieutenant Prescott and his two soldier boys were at the meeting place.
Postmaster Dent was ahead of them, and quickly admitted them through the rear door of the post office building.
"Now, we've just time to hurry into readiness," whispered Dent, rubbing his hands. "The office opens sharp at seven!"