Chapter 7

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_ CHAPTER VII

Billy Gray was indeed in close arrest and the grim prophecy was fulfilled--Colonel Canker was proving "anything but a guardian angel to him." The whole regiment, officers and men, barring only the commander, was practically in mourning with sorrow for him and chagrin over its own discomfiture. Not only one important prisoner was gone, but two; not only two, but four. No man in authority was able to say just when or how it happened, for it was Canker's own order that the prisoners should not be paraded when the guard fell in at night. They were there at tattoo and at taps "all secure." The officer of the guard, said several soldiers, had quite a long talk with one of the prisoners--young Morton--just after tattoo, at which time the entire guard had been inspected by the commanding officer himself. But at reveille four most important prisoners were gone and, such was Canker's wrath, not only was Gray in arrest, but the sergeant of the guard also, while the three luckless men who were successively posted as sentries during the night at the back of the wooden shell that served as a guardhouse--were now in close confinement in the place of the escaped quartette.

Yet those three were men who had hitherto been above suspicion, and there were few soldiers in the regiment who would accept the theory that any one of the three had connived at the escape. As for the sergeant--he had served four enlistments in the --teenth, and without a flaw in his record beyond an occasional aberration in the now distant past, due to the potency of the poteen distilled by certain Hibernian experts not far from an old-time "plains fort," where the regiment had rested on its march 'cross continent. As for the officers--but who would suppose an officer guilty of anything of the kind--a flagrant military crime? And yet--men got to asking each other if it were so that Bugler Curran had carried a note from the prisoner, Morton, to Mr. Gray about 2:30 that afternoon? And what was this about Gray's having urged Brooke to swap tours with him an hour later, and what was that story the headquarters clerks were telling about Mr. Gray's coming to the adjutant and begging to be allowed to "march on" that evening instead of Brooke? It wasn't long before these rumors, somehow, got to Canker's ears, and Canker seemed to grow as big again; he fairly swelled with indignation at thought of such turpitude on part of an officer. Then he sent for Gray--it was the afternoon following the sailing of the ships with the big brigade--and with pain and bewilderment and indignation in his brave blue eyes the youngster came and stood before his stern superior. Gordon, who sent the message, and who had heard Canker's denunciatory remarks, had found time to scribble a word or two--"Admit nothing; say nothing; do nothing but hold your tongue and temper. If C. insists on answers say you decline except in presence of your legal adviser." So there was a scene in the commander's tent that afternoon. The morning had not been without its joys. Along about ten o'clock as Gray sat writing to his father in his little canvas home, he heard a voice that sent the blood leaping through his veins and filled his eyes with light. Springing from his campstool and capsizing it as he did so, he poked his curly head from the entrance of the tent--and there she was--only a dozen feet away--Major Lane in courteous attendance, Mr. Prime sadly following, and Miss Prime quite content with the devotions of Captain Schuyler. Only a dozen feet away and coming straight to him, with frank smiles and sympathy in her kind and winsome face--with hand outstretched the moment she caught sight of him. "We wanted to come when we heard of it yesterday, Mr. Gray," said Amy Lawrence, "but it was dark when we got back from seeing the fleet off, and uncle was too tired in the evening. Indeed we are all very, very sorry!" And poor Billy never heard or cared what the others said, so absorbed was he in drinking in her gentle words and gazing into her soft, dark eyes. No wonder he found it difficult to release her hand. That brief visit, filled with sweetness and sunshine, ought to have been a blessing to him all day long, but Canker caught sight of the damsels as they walked away on the arms of the attendant cavaliers--Miss Lawrence more than once smiling back at the incarcerated Billy--and Canker demanded to be informed who they were and where they had been, and Gordon answered they were Miss Lawrence of Santa Anita, and Miss Prime of New York--and he "reckoned" they must have been in to condole with Mr. Gray--whereat Canker snarled that people ought to know better than to visit officers in arrest--it was tantamount to disrespect to the commander. It was marvelous how many things in Canker's eyes were disrespectful.

So he heard these stories with eager ears and sent for Gray, and thought to bully him into an admission or confession, but Gordon's words had "stiffened" the little fellow to the extent of braving Canker's anger and telling him he had said all he proposed to say when the colonel called him up the previous day. The result of that previous interview was his being placed in close arrest and informed that he should be tried by general court-martial once. So he had taken counsel, as was his right, and "counsel" forbade his committing himself in any way.

"Then you refuse to divulge the contents of that note and to say why you were so eager to go on guard out of your turn?" said Canker, oracularly. "That in itself is sufficient to convince any fair-minded court of your guilt, sir." Whereat Gordon winked at Billy and put his tongue in his cheek--and Billy stood mute until ordered, with much asperity, to go back to his tent.

But there were other things that might well go toward convincing a court of the guilt of Lieutenant Gray, and poor Billy contemplated them with sinking heart. Taking prompt advantage of his position as officer of the guard, he had caused the young prisoner to be brought outside the guardhouse, and as a heavy, dripping fog had come on the wings of the night wind, sailing in from the sea, he had led the way to the sheltered side, which happened to be the darkest one, of the rude little building, and had there bidden him tell his story. But Morton glanced uneasily at a sentry who followed close and was hovering suspiciously about. "I cannot talk about--the affair--with that fellow spying," he said, with an eager plea in his tone and a sign of the hand that Gray well knew and quickly recognized. "Keep around in front. I'll be responsible for this prisoner," were his orders, and, almost reluctantly, the man left. He was a veteran soldier, and his manner impressed the lieutenant with a vague sense of trouble. Twice the sentry glanced back and hesitated, as though something were on his mind that he must tell, but finally he disappeared and kept out of the way during the brief interview that immediately followed. The prisoner eagerly, excitedly began his explanation--swiftly banishing any lingering doubts Gray might have entertained as to his innocence. But he had come from a stove-heated guardroom into the cold sea wind off the Pacific--into the floating wisps of vapor that sent chill to the marrow. He was far too lightly clad for that climate, and presently he began to shiver.

"You are cold," said Gray, pityingly. "Have you no overcoat?"

"It's at my tent--I never expected to spend this night here. I've been before the summary court, fined for absence, and thought that would end it, but instead of that I'm a prisoner and the man who should be here is stalking about camp, planning more robberies. Yet I'd rather associate with the very worst of the deserters or dead beats inside there," and the dark eyes glanced almost in horror--the slender figure shook with mingled repulsion and chill--"than with that smooth-tongued sneak and liar. There's no crime too mean for him to commit, Mr. Gray, and the men are beginning to know it, though the colonel won't. For God's sake get me out of this before morning--" And again the violent tremor shook the lad from head to foot.

"Here--get inside!" said Gray impulsively. "I'll see the adjutant at once and return to you in a few minutes. If you have to remain until the matter can be investigated by the General it might be----"

"It would be--" vehemently interrupted Morton, then breaking off short as though at loss for descriptive of sufficient strength. He seemed to swell with passion as he clinched his fists and fairly stood upon his toes an instant, his strong white teeth grinding together. "It would be--simply hell!" he burst in again, hoarse and quivering. "It would ruin--everything! Can't the General give the order to-night?" he asked with intense eagerness, while the young officer, taking him by the arm, had led him again to the light of the guardhouse lamps at the front. The sergeant and a group of soldiers straightened up and faced them, listening curiously.

"It may be even impossible to see the General," answered Gray doubtfully. "Take Morton into the guardroom till I get back, sergeant, and let him warm himself thoroughly." Don't put him with the prisoners till I return, and so saying he had hastened away. Gordon, his friend and adviser, had left camp and gone visiting over in the other division. The lights at general headquarters were turned low. Even now, after having heard proofs of the innocence of the accused soldier, Gray knew that it was useless to appeal to the colonel. He could not understand, however, the feverish, almost insane, impatience of the lad for immediate release. Another day ought not to make so great a difference. What could be the reason--if it were not that, though innocent of the robbery of the storehouse, or of complicity in the sale of stolen goods, some other crime lay at his door which the morrow might disclose? All the loyalty of a Delta Sig was stretched to the snapping point as Gray paused irresolute in front of the adjutant's tent, his quest there unsuccessful. The sergeant-major and a sorely badgered clerk were working late over some regimental papers--things that Morton wrote out easily and accurately.

"I suppose, sir, it's no use asking to have the prisoner sent up here under guard," said that jewel of a noncommissioned officer. "Yet the colonel will be savage if these papers ain't ready. It will take us all night as things are going."

Gray shook his curly head. "Go ask, if you like, but--Morton's in no shape to help you----"

"Has he been drinking, sir?" said the sergeant-major, in surprise. "I never knew him----"

"Oh, it isn't that," said Gray hastily, "only he's--he's got--other matters on his mind! Bring me his overcoat. He said it was in his tent," and the young officer jerked his head at the patch of little "A" tents lined up in the rear of those of the officers.

"Get Morton's overcoat and take it to him at the guardhouse," snapped the staff sergeant to the clerk. "Be spry now, and no stopping on the way back," he added--well aware how much in need his assistant stood of creature comfort of some surreptitious and forbidden kind. The man was back in a moment, the coat rolled on his arm.

"I'll take it," said Gray simply. "You needn't come."

"Go on with it!" ordered the sergeant as the soldier hesitated. "D'ye think the service has gone to the devil and officers are runnin' errands for enlisted men? An' get back inside two minutes, too," he added with portent in his tone. The subaltern of hardly two months' service felt the implied rebuke of the soldier of over twenty years' and meekly accepted the amendment, but--a thought occurred to him: He had promised Morton paper, envelopes and stamps and the day's newspapers--the lad seemed strangely eager to get all the latter, and vaguely Billy remembered having heard that Canker considered giving papers to prisoners as equivalent to aid and comfort to the enemy.

"Take it by way of my tent," said he as they started, and, once there it took time to find things. "Go back to the sergeant-major and tell him I sent you," said Gray, after another search. "He needs you on those papers."

And when the officer of the guard returned to the guardhouse and went in to the prisoner, the sergeant saw--and others saw--that, rolled in the soldier's overcoat he carried on his arm, was a bundle done up in newspaper. Moreover, a scrap of conversation was overheard.

"There's no one at the General's," said the officer. "I see no way of--fixing it before morning."

"My God, lieutenant! There--must be some way out of it! The morning will be too late."

"Then I'll do what I can for you to-night," said Mr. Gray as he turned and hurriedly left the guardroom--a dozen men standing stiffly about the walls and doorway and staring with impassive faces straight to the front. Again, the young officer had left the post of the guard and gone up into camp, while far and near through the dim, fog-swept aisles of a score of camps the bugles and trumpets were wailing the signal for "lights out," and shadowy forms with coat collars turned up about the ears or capes muffled around the neck, scurried about the company streets ordering laughter and talk to cease. A covered carriage was standing at the curb outside the officers' gate--as a certain hole in the fence was designated--and the sentry there posted remembered that the officer of the guard came hurrying out and asked the driver if he was engaged. "I'm waiting for the major," was the answer.

"Well, where can one order a carriage to-night without going clear to town?" inquired Gray. "I want one--that is--I wish to order one at once."

And the driver who knew very well there were several places where carriages could be had, preferred loyalty to his own particular stable away in town, and so declared there was none.

"You can telephone there, if you wish, sir," he added.

"And wait till morning for it to get here? No! I'll get it--somehow."

And that he did get it somehow was current rumor on the following day, for the sentries on the guardhouse side of camp swore that a closed carriage drove down from McAllister Street for all the world as though it had just come out of the park, and rolled on past the back of the guardhouse, the driver loudly whistling "Killarney," so that it could be heard above the crunching of the wheels through the rough, loose rock that covered the road, and that carriage drew up not a hundred yards away, while the lieutenant was out visiting sentries, and presently they saw him coming back along the walk, stopping to question each sentry as to his orders. Then he returned and inquired if all was quiet among the prisoners, and then went and put out his light in the tent reserved for the officer of the guard, and once more left his post, briefly informing the sergeant of the guard he was going to the officer of the day. Then it was ascertained that he had visited half a dozen places in search of that veteran captain, and appeared much disturbed because he could not find him. In half an hour he was back, asking excitedly of the sentry in rear of the guardhouse if a carriage had come that way. It had, said the sentry, and was waiting down the street. Gray hurried in the direction indicated, was gone perhaps three minutes, and returned, saying that the sentry must be mistaken, that no carriage was there. But the sentry reiterated his statement that it had been there and had been waiting for some time, and must have disappeared while he was temporarily around at the opposite side of the building. This was about 11 P.M.

Then when Gray appeared at reveille Morton had disappeared.

"It's not the sergeant let them fellers out," said the regimental oracles. "This is no ten-dollar subscription business." And so until late in the afternoon the question that agitated the entire range of regimental camps was: "How did those fellows break away from the prison of the --teenth?" Then came a clue, and then--discovery.

By order of Lieutenant-Colonel Canker a board of officers had been convened to investigate the matter, and after questioning everybody whom "Squeers" had already badgered with his assertions, threats and queries, they went to the guardhouse and began a thorough inspection of the premises. The wooden building stood in the midst of a waste of sand blown in from the shore line by the strong sea wind. It was perched on something like a dozen stout posts driven into the soft soil and then the space between the floor level and the sand was heavily and stoutly boarded in--thick planks being used. Between the floor and the sand was a space of about eighteen inches vertical, and a dozen men could have sprawled therein--lying at full length--but to escape would have required the connivance of one or more of the sentries surrounding the building and the ripping off of one or more of the planks. In his keen anxiety Canker accompanied the Board on its tour of investigation--a thing the Board did not at all like--and presently, as was his wont, began running things his own way. It had been found useless to question the soldiers of the guard. Not a man could be found to admit he knew the faintest thing about the escape. As for the prisoners, most of them reckless, devil-may-care rascals, they grinned or leered suggestively, but had nothing to tell.

"We'll have this boarding ripped off," said Canker decisively, "and see what they've got secreted under there. I shouldn't be surprised to find a whisky still in full blast, or a complete gambling outfit--dash, dash 'em to dash and dashnation! Send for a carpenter, sergeant."

The carpenter came, and he and two or three of the guard laid hold of one end of the plank after its nails were drawn, and with little exertion ripped it off the other posts. Then everybody held his breath a minute, stared, and a small majority swore. So far from its being open to cats, cans and rubbish, the space on that side was filled solid with damp, heavy sea sand--a vertical wall extending from floor to ground. Canker almost ran around to the opposite side and had a big plank torn off there. Within was a wall as damp, solid and straight as that first discovered, and so, when examined, were the other two sides provided. Canker's face was a study, and the Board gazed and was profoundly happy.

At last the colonel exploded:

"By Jupiter! They haven't got away at all, then! There isn't a flaw in the sand wall anywhere. They must be hiding about the middle now. Come on, gentlemen," and around he trotted to the front door. "Sergeant," he cried, "get out all the prisoners--all their bedding--every blessed thing they've got. I want to examine that floor."

Most of the guardhouse "birds" were out chopping wood, and Canker danced in among the few remaining, loading them with bedding belonging to their fellows until every item of clothing and furniture was shoved out of the room. One member of the Board and one only failed to enter with his associates--a veteran captain who read much war literature and abhorred Canker. To the surprise of the sentry he walked deliberately over to the fence, climbed it and presently began poking about the wooden curb that ran along the road, making a low revetment or retaining wall for the earth, cinders and gravel that, distributed over the sand, had been hopefully designated a sidewalk by the owners of the tract. Presently he came sauntering back, and both sentries within easy range would have sworn he was chuckling. Canker greeted him with customary asperity.

"What do you mean, sir, by absenting yourself from this investigation, when you must have known I was with the Board and giving it the benefit of the information I had gathered?"

"I was merely expediting matters, colonel. While you were looking for where they went in I was finding where they got out."

"Went in what? Got out of what?" snapped Canker.

"Their tunnel, sir. It's Libby on a small scale over again. They must have been at work at it at least ten days." And as he spoke, calmly ignoring Canker and letting his eyes wander over the floor, the veteran battalion commander sauntered across the room, stirred up a slightly projecting bit of flooring with the toe of his boot and placidly continued. "If you'll be good enough to let the men pry this up you may understand."

And when pried up and lifted away--a snugly fitting trapdoor about two feet square--there yawned beneath it, leading slantwise downward in the direction of the street, a tunnel through the soft yielding sand, braced and strengthened here and there with lids and sides of cracker-boxes. "Now, if you don't mind straddling a fence, sir, I'll show you the other end," said the captain, imperturbably leading the way, and Canker, half-dazed yet wholly in command of his stock of blasphemy, followed. At the curb, right in the midst of a lot of loose hay from the bales dumped there three days before, the leader dislodged with his sword the top of a clothing box that had been thickly covered with sand and hay--and there was the outlet. "Easy as rolling off a log, colonel," said old Cobb, with a sarcastic grin. "This could all be done without a man you've blamed and arrested being a whit the wiser. They sawed a panel out of the floor, scooped the sand out of this tunnel, banked it solid against the weather boarding inside, filled up the whole space, pretty near, but ran their tunnel under fence and sidewalk, crawled down the gutter to the next block out of sight of the sentries, then walked away free men. Those three thieves who got away were old hands. The other men in the guardhouse were only mild offenders, except Morton. 'Course he was glad of the chance to go with 'em. I s'pose you'll release my sergeant and those sentries now."

"I'll do nothing of the kind," answered Canker, red with wrath, "and your suggestion is disrespectful to your commanding officer. When I want your advice I'll ask for it."

"Well, Mr. Gray will be relieved to learn of this anyhow. I suppose I may tell him," hazarded the junior member, mischievously.

"Mr. Gray be ----. Mr. Gray has everything to answer for!" shouted the angered colonel. "It was he who telephoned for a carriage to meet and run those rascals off. Mr. Gray's fate is sealed. He can thank God I don't slap him into the guardhouse with his chosen associates, but he shan't escape. Sergeant of the guard, post a sentry over Lieutenant Gray's tent, with orders to allow no one to enter or leave it without my written authority. Mr. Gray shall pay for this behind the prison bars of Alcatraz." _

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