Under Fire | Page 7

coming again. He couldn't have been drinking to
any extent since enlistment or he could not be where she said he was,
and knew he was, on daily duty as clerk in the office of the adjutant at
the barracks. So far from its indicating downfall, degradation, it was the
one ray of hope of better days. She looked at him, joy and incredulity
mingling in her swimming eyes. "Then why does everybody I've
consulted, even our rector, urge me to leave no stone unturned to get
him out of it, even if we have to buy him a place at West Point?" was
her query. And again Cranston found it hard to control his
muscles--and his temper. Had it come to this?--that here in his old
home the accepted idea of the regular soldier was that of something
lower than the refuse of the prisons and reformatories? He could only
tell her that it was because they knew no better. Up to the time of her
boy's determination to enter the army had there been one single
moment in the last five years when he had been free from his habits of
drinking? asked Cranston. No, not one. And yet that step was her
conception of final degradation. What had occurred, he asked, to make
her feel renewed anxiety, to cause her to seek a cadetship for him?
Because the boy had written that recruits were soon to be sent to
cavalry regiments out on the plains, and he had asked to go. The
thought was terror. And Mrs. Barnard had learned that a congressman
from the interior of the State had a cadetship to dispose of, but he lived
at Urbana, the very place where poor Harry had spent his two months
in the retreat, and then had disbehaved so afterwards. And Mr. Goss,
the congressman, wanted references,--wanted him to pass examination,
which he could not do, because he's only been a little while at school.
Harry wrote a beautiful hand, and had read everything--everything, but
he hated anything like arithmetic as a study, and Cranston had to smile
and tell her that that in itself put West Point out of the question. But,
said he, if he has ambition and ability, why not encourage him to

persevere where he is and win commission from the ranks as many
another boy had done? Bless the mother heart! That, too, had occurred
to her, but they had told her it would take two years at least, whereas
Harry was a born leader, a born commander. That boy could step right
out now and command an army if need be, she said, and no doubt
believed it; but when she wrote to Mr. Cooper about it (and Mr. Cooper
it seems was Colonel Cooper, the boy's commanding officer), that
gentleman replied that while the young soldier had certainly conducted
himself in a most exemplary way and had given promise of being an
ornament to the service,--"He used those very words," said she,
producing the colonel's letter. "See, 'an ornament to the service,'"--still,
the colonel could hardly promise that the boy could rise above the
grade of sergeant inside of two years.
Cranston recognized the handwriting, and took the letter. "I know
Colonel Cooper," he said, "and he means just exactly what he writes.
Mrs. Barnard, I am glad you came. I am glad to take a weight off your
mind. I wish your friends and advisers were here that I might say this in
their presence, especially our good rector, but I say to you with all my
heart, I congratulate you on the step your boy has taken. I honestly
believe he has done better for himself than you could do for him, and I
advise you to let him go and learn campaigning on the frontier. It will
make a man of him if anything will," and he added under his breath, "or
kill him."
"And if you meet my boy, you'll help him? You'll be a friend to him?"
she smiled through her tears. "God bless you for so helping me."
"I'll help him every way I know how," said Cranston.
And so they parted. She infinitely comforted, he oddly impressed. But
Mrs. Barnard felt that fate was still against her and her boy when, four
weeks later, flashed the news of savage battle with the Sioux, of
Captain Cranston shot through the body and fearfully wounded in the
fierce encounter.
CHAPTER II.

Fifty seats in the parquette had been reserved for the members of the
class graduated from West Point on the beautiful morning of the 12th
of June. The brilliant auditorium was thronged with friends of the
young fellows. Officers of the Academy were seated in the boxes,
interested no more in the play than in the