"I got tired of lumberin' an' I wandered out west, where I served three
years on horseback in the regular army, fightin' the Indians. Good
fighters they are, too. Mighty hard to put your hand on 'em. Now
they're there an' now they ain't. Now you see 'em before you, an' then
they're behind you aimin' a tomahawk at your head. They taught us a big
lot that I guess we can use in this war. Come on, Dick, I guess them
banquet halls are spread, an' I know we're ready."
Not much order was preserved in the beaten brigade, which had become
separated from the rest of the retreating army, but the spirits of all
were rising and that, so Sergeant Whitley told Dick, was better just now
than technical discipline. The Northern army had gone to Bull Run with
ample supplies, and now they lacked for nothing. They ate long and well,
and drank great quantities of coffee. Then they put out the fires and
resumed the march toward Washington.
They stopped again an hour or two after midnight and slept until
morning. Dick lay on the bare ground under the boughs of a great oak
tree. It was a quarter of an hour before sleep came, because his
nervous system had received a tremendous wrench that day. He closed
his eyes and the battle passed again before them. He remembered, too,
a lightning glimpse of a face, that of his cousin, Harry Kenton, seen
but an instant and then gone. He tried to decide whether it was fancy
or reality, and, while he was trying, he fell asleep and slept as one
dead.
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