On Picket Duty, and Other Tales | Page 6

then got tired, so I keep it like an old fool, as I am. Yes, that's
the bit of lead that would have done for me, if Mary's likeness hadn't
been just where it was."
"You'll like to show her this when you go home, won't you?" said Dick,
as he took up the bullet, while Phil examined the marred picture, and
Thorn poised the little thimble on his big finger, with a sigh.
"How can I, when I don't know where she is, and camp is all the home

I've got?"
The words broke from him like a sudden cry, when some old wound is
rudely touched. Both of the young men started, both laid back the relics
they had taken up, and turned their eyes from Thorn's face, across
which swept a look of shame and sorrow, too significant to be
misunderstood. Their silence assured him of their sympathy, and, as if
that touch of friendlessness unlocked his heavy heart, he eased it by a
full confession. When he spoke again, it was with the calmness of
repressed emotion; and calmness more touching to his mates than the
most passionate outbreak, the most pathetic lamentation; for the coarse
camp-phrases seemed to drop from his vocabulary; more than once his
softened voice grew tremulous, and to the words "my little girl," there
went a tenderness that proved how dear a place she still retained in that
deep heart of his.
"Boys, I've gone so far; I may as well finish; and you'll see I'm not
without some cause for my stern looks and ways; you'll pity me, and
from you I'll take the comfort of it. It's only the old story,--I married her,
worked for her, lived for her, and kept my little girl like a lady. I should
have known that I was too old, too sober, for a young thing like that;
the life she led before the pinch came just suited her. She liked to be
admired, to dress and dance and make herself pretty for all the world to
see; not to keep house for a quiet man like me. Idleness wasn't good for
her, it bred discontent; then some of her old friends, who'd left her in
her trouble, found her out when better times came round, and tried to
get her back again. I was away all day, I didn't know how things were
going, and she wasn't open with me, afraid, she said; I was so grave,
and hated theatres so. She got courage, finally, to tell me that she wasn't
happy; that she wanted to dance again, and asked me if she mightn't. I'd
rather have had her ask me to put her in a fire, for I did hate theatres,
and was bred to; others think they're no harm. I do; and knew it was a
bad life for a girl like mine. It pampers vanity, and vanity is the Devil's
help with such; so I said No, kindly at first, sharp and stern when she
kept on teasing. That roused her spirit. 'I will go!' she said, one day.
'Not while you're my wife,' I answered back; and neither said any more,
but she gave me a look I didn't think she could, and I resolved to take

her away from temptation before worse came of it.
"I didn't tell her my plan; but I resigned my place, spent a week or more
finding and fixing a little home for her out in the wholesome country,
where she'd be safe from theatres and disreputable friends, and maybe
learn to love me better when she saw how much she was to me. It was
coming summer, and I made things look as home-like and as pretty as I
could. She liked flowers, and I fixed a garden for her; she was fond of
pets, and I got her a bird, a kitten, and a dog to play with her; she
fancied gay colors and tasty little matters, so I filled her rooms with all
the handsome things I could afford, and when it was done, I was as
pleased as any boy, thinking what happy times we'd have together and
how pleased she'd be. Boys, when I went to tell her and to take her to
her little home, she was gone."
"Who with?"
"With those cursed friends of hers; a party of them left the city just then;
she was wild to go; she had money now, and all her good looks back
again. They teased and tempted her; I wasn't there to keep her, and she
went, leaving a line behind to tell me that she loved the old life more
than the new; that my house was a prison, and she hoped I'd let her go
in peace. That