FORE:Lieut.-Col. Billings's eye lighted on Shorty, with an expression of having seen him somewhere.He and Shorty were down on their faces as he spoke. The others obeyed more slowly and clumsily. The rebel volley cut the limbs and bushes over their heads, and whistled viciously through the damp air and the darkness.
FORE:"Nonsense," Shorty replied to their eager entreaties; "all the companies in the 200th Injianny is good, prime, first-classbetter'n the companies in ary other rijimint. You're playin' in great luck to git into any one o' 'em, I tell you. You might've got into one o' 'em rijimints that're back there at Nashville guardin' fortifications, or one o' 'em that lost their colors at Chickamaugy. I'd ruther be the tail end o' the 200th Injianny, than the Drum Major o' any other."Cadnan kept telling himself that where Marvor had gone he, too, could go. But Marvor had had a plan, and Cadnan had none.
FORE:"Very likely," said Shorty, helping Pete Skidmore on with his blanket-roll. "The job ain't done till it is done, and there's lots o' rebels over there yit who need lickin'. Now's the best time to finish it. This ain't nothin' to Stone River and Chickamaugy. Got your canteen full, Pete? Better fill it before we start. Take mine, too. Don't go any further'n that first spring there, for I don't want to take no chances on losin' you again."
THREE:"Well, there's orders and orders," said Shorty, philosophically. "Most of 'em you obey to the last curl on the letter R, and do it with a jump. Some of 'em you obey only when you have to, and take your chances at improving the State o' Tennessee by buildin' roads and diggin' up stumps in the parade ground if you're ketched not mindin'. Of them kind is the orders agin gamblin'."
THREE:As ill-tempered as tired, the boys roused up from the ground, and began taking their guns from the stacks. Harry Joslin snatched his out first, and the stack, falling over, the bayonet points struck Gid Mackall's face. The angry Gid responded with a blow landed on the side of Harry's head. In an instant the two clinched, and the others, who were in no better humor, began striking at one another in blind temper. Si and Shorty snatched the two principals apart with a good deal of violence and much show of their own tempers.
