CHAPTER VII.
The youth cringed as if discovered in a crime. By heavens, they had wonafter all! The imbecile line had remained and become victors. He couldhear cheering.
He lifted himself upon his toes and looked in the direction of thefight. A yellow fog lay wallowing on the treetops. From beneath itcame the clatter of musketry. Hoarse cries told of an advance.
He turned away amazed and angry. He felt that he had been wronged.
He had fled, he told himself, because annihilation approached. He haddone a good part in saving himself, who was a little piece of the army.He had considered the time, he said, to be one in which it was the dutyof every little piece to rescue itself if possible. Later the officerscould fit the little pieces together again, and make a battle front. Ifnone of the little pieces were wise enough to save themselves from theflurry of death at such a time, why, then, where would be the army? Itwas all plain that he had proceeded according to very correct andcommendable rules. His actions had been sagacious things. They hadbeen full of strategy. They were the work of a master's legs.
Thoughts of his comrades came to him. The brittle blue line hadwithstood the blows and won. He grew bitter over it. It seemed thatthe blind ignorance and stupidity of those little pieces had betrayedhim. He had been overturned and crushed by their lack of sense inholding the position, when intelligent deliberation would haveconvinced them that it was impossible. He, the enlightened man wholooks afar in the dark, had fled because of his superior perceptionsand knowledge. He felt a great anger against his comrades. He knew itcould be proved that they had been fools.
He wondered what they would remark when later he appeared in camp. Hismind heard howls of derision. Their density would not enable them tounderstand his sharper point of view.
He began to pity himself acutely. He was ill used. He was troddenbeneath the feet of an iron injustice. He had proceeded with wisdomand from the most righteous motives under heaven's blue only to befrustrated by hateful circumstances.
A dull, animal-like rebellion against his fellows, war in the abstract,and fate grew within him. He shambled along with bowed head, his brainin a tumult of agony and despair. When he looked loweringly up,quivering at each sound, his eyes had the expression of those of acriminal who thinks his guilt and his punishment great, and knows thathe can find no words.
He went from the fields into a thick woods, as if resolved to buryhimself. He wished to get out of hearing of the crackling shots whichwere to him like voices.
The ground was cluttered with vines and bushes, and the trees grewclose and spread out like bouquets. He was obliged to force his waywith much noise. The creepers, catching against his legs, cried outharshly as their sprays were torn from the barks of trees. Theswishing saplings tried to make known his presence to the world. Hecould not conciliate the forest. As he made his way, it was alwayscalling out protestations. When he separated embraces of trees andvines the disturbed foliages waved their arms and turned their faceleaves toward him. He dreaded lest these noisy motions and criesshould bring men to look at him. So he went far, seeking dark andintricate places.
After a time the sound of musketry grew faint and the cannon boomed inthe distance. The sun, suddenly apparent, blazed among the trees. Theinsects were making rhythmical noises. They seemed to be grindingtheir teeth in unison. A woodpecker stuck his impudent head around theside of a tree. A bird flew on lighthearted wing.
Off was the rumble of death. It seemed now that Nature had no ears.
This landscape gave him assurance. A fair field holding life. It wasthe religion of peace. It would die if its timid eyes were compelled tosee blood. He conceived Nature to be a woman with a deep aversion totragedy.
He threw a pine cone at a jovial squirrel, and he ran with chatteringfear. High in a treetop he stopped, and, poking his head cautiouslyfrom behind a branch, looked down with an air of trepidation.
The youth felt triumphant at this exhibition. There was the law, hesaid. Nature had given him a sign. The squirrel, immediately uponrecognizing danger, had taken to his legs without ado. He did notstand stolidly baring his furry belly to the missile, and die with anupward glance at the sympathetic heavens. On the contrary, he had fledas fast as his legs could carry him; and he was but an ordinarysquirrel, too--doubtless no philosopher of his race. The youth wended,feeling that Nature was of his mind. She re-enforced his argument withproofs that lived where the sun shone.
Once he found himself almost into a swamp. He was obliged to walk uponbog tufts and watch his feet to keep from the oily mire. Pausing atone time to look about him he saw, out at some black water, a smallanimal pounce in and emerge directly with a gleaming fish.
The youth went again into the deep thickets. The brushed branches madea noise that drowned the sounds of cannon. He walked on, going fromobscurity into promises of a greater obscurity.
At length he reached a place where the high, arching boughs made achapel. He softly pushed the green doors aside and entered. Pineneedles were a gentle brown carpet. There was a religious half light.
Near the threshold he stopped, horror-stricken at the sight of a thing.
He was being looked at by a dead man who was seated with his backagainst a columnlike tree. The corpse was dressed in a uniform thatonce had been blue, but was now faded to a melancholy shade of green.The eyes, staring at the youth, had changed to the dull hue to be seenon the side of a dead fish. The mouth was open. Its red had changed toan appalling yellow. Over the gray skin of the face ran little ants.One was trundling some sort of a bundle along the upper lip.
The youth gave a shriek as he confronted the thing. He was for momentsturned to stone before it. He remained staring into the liquid-lookingeyes. The dead man and the living man exchanged a long look. Then theyouth cautiously put one hand behind him and brought it against a tree.Leaning upon this he retreated, step by step, with his face stilltoward the thing. He feared that if he turned his back the body mightspring up and stealthily pursue him.
The branches, pushing against him, threatened to throw him over uponit. His unguided feet, too, caught aggravatingly in brambles; and withit all he received a subtle suggestion to touch the corpse. As hethought of his hand upon it he shuddered profoundly.
At last he burst the bonds which had fastened him to the spot and fled,unheeding the underbrush. He was pursued by a sight of the black antsswarming greedily upon the gray face and venturing horribly near to theeyes.
After a time he paused, and, breathless and panting, listened. Heimagined some strange voice would come from the dead throat and squawkafter him in horrible menaces.
The trees about the portal of the chapel moved soughingly in a softwind. A sad silence was upon the little guarding edifice.