The Red Acorn

He laughed heartily at his own sarcasm, but Abe was not to be moved by such frivolity, and answered glumly:

“O, yes; laugh about it, if you choose. That’s your way: giggle over everything. But when I play background, I want it to be with something worth while in the foreground. I don’t hanker after making myself a foil to show off such fellers as our officers are, to good advantage.”

“That don’t bother me any more than it does a mountain to serve as a background for a nanny goat and a pair of sore-eyed mules!”

“Yes, but the mountain sometimes has an opportunity to drop an avalanche on ‘em.”

At this point of the discussion they arrived at the company grounds, and had scarcely time to snatch up their guns and don their belts before the company moved out to take its place in the regimental line.

The occasion of Lieutenant Alspaugh’s elaborate personal ornamentation now manifested itself. By reason of Captain Bennett’s absence, he was in command of the company, and was about to make his first appearance on parade in that capacity. Two or three young women, of the hollyhock order of beauty, whom he was very anxious to impress, had been brought to camp, to witness his apotheosis into a commanding officer.

The moment, however, that he placed himself at the head of the company and drew sword, the chill breath of distrust sent the mercury of his self-confidence down to zero. It looked so easy to command a company when some one else was doing it; it was hard when he tried it himself. All the imps of confusion held high revel in his mind when he attempted to give the orders which he had conned until he supposed he had them “dead-letter perfect.” he felt his usually-unfailing assurance shrivel up under the gaze of hundreds of mercilessly critical eyes. He managed to stammer out:

“ATTENTION, COMPANY! FORWARD, FILE RIGHT, MARCH!”

But as the company began to execute the order, it seemed to be going just the opposite to what he had commanded, and he called out excitedly:

“Not that way! Not that way! I said ‘file right,’ and you’re going left.”

“We are filing right,” answered some in the company. “You’re turned around; that’s what’s the matter with you.”

So it was. He had forgotten that when standing facing the men, he must give them orders in reverse from what the movement appeared to him. This increased his confusion, until all his drill knowledge seemed gone from him. The sight of his young lady friends, clad in masses of primary colors, stimulated him to a strong effort to recover his audacity, and bracing himself up, he began calling out the guide and step, with a noisy confidence that made him heard all over the parade ground:

“Left! left! left! Hep! hep! hep! Cast them head and eyes to the right!”

Trouble loomed up mountainously as he approached the line. Putting a company into its place on parade is one of the crucial tests of tactical proficiency. To march a company to exactly the right spot, with every man keeping his proper distance from his file-leader—“twenty-eight inches from back to breast,” clear down the column, so that when the order “front” was given, every one turns, as if on pivot, and touches elbows with those on each side of him, in a straight, firm wall of men, without any shambling “closing up,” or “side-stepping” to the right or left,—to do all this at word of command, looks very simple and easy to the non-military spectator, as many other very difficult things look simple and easy to the inexperienced. But really it is only possible to a thoroughly drilled company, held well in hand by a competent commander. It is something that, if done well, is simply done well, but if not done well, is very bad. It is like an egg that is either good or utterly worthless.

Alspaugh seemed fated to exhaust the category of possible mistakes. Coming on the ground late he found that a gap had been left in the line for his company which was only barely sufficient to receive it when it was aligned and compactly “dressed.”

In his nervousness he halted the company before it had reached the right of the gap by ten paces, and so left about one-quarter of the company lapping over on the one to his left. Even this was done with an unsightly jumble. His confusion as to the reversal of right and left still abode with him. He commanded “right face” instead of “front,” and was amazed to see the whole one hundred well-drilled men whirl their backs around to the regiment and the commanding officer. A laugh rippled down the ranks of the other companies; even the spectators smiled, and something sounded like swearing by the Adjutant and Sergeant-Major.

Alspaugh lifted his plumed hat, and wiped the beaded perspiration from his brow with the back of one of the yellow gauntlets.

“Order an ‘about face,’” whispered the Orderly-Sergeant, whose face was burning with shame at the awkward position in which the company found itself.

“ABOUT—FACE!” gasped Alspaugh.

The men turned on their heels.

“Side-step to the right,” whispered the Orderly.

“Side-step to the right,” repeated Alspaugh, mechanically.

The men took short side-steps, and following the orders which Alspaugh repeated from the whispered suggestions of the Orderly, the company came clumsily forward into its place, “dressed,” and “opened ranks to the rear.” When at the command of “parade-rest,” Alspaugh dropped his saber’s point to the ground, he did it with the crushed feeling of a strutting cock which has been flung into the pond and emerges with dripping feathers.

He raised his heart in sincere thanksgiving that he was at last through, for there was nothing more for him to do during the parade, except to stand still, and at its conclusion the Orderly would have to march the company back to its quarters.

But his woes had still another chapter. The Inspector-General had come to camp to inspect the regiment, and he was on the ground.

Forty years of service in the regular army, with promotion averaging one grade every ten years, making him an old man and a grandfather before he was a Lieutenant-Colonel, had so surcharged Col. Murbank’s nature with bitterness as to make even the very air in his vicinity seem roughly astringent. The wicked young Lieutenants who served with him on the Plains used to say that his bark was worse than his bite, because no reasonable bite could ever be so bad as his bark. They even suggested calling him “Peruvian Bark,” because a visit to his quarters was worse than a strong does of quinia.

“Yeth, that’th good,” said the lisping wit of the crowd. “Evely bite ith a bit, ain’t it? And the wortht mutht be a bitter, ath he ith.”

The Colonel believed tha the whole duty of man consisted in loving the army regulations, and in keeping their commandments. The best part of all virtue was to observe them to the letter; the most abhorrent form of vice, to violate or disregard even their minor precepts.

His feelings were continually lacerated by contact with volunteers, who cared next to nothing for the FORM of war-making, but everything for its spirit, and the martinet heart within him was bruised and sore when he came upon the ground to inspect the regiment.

Alspaugh’s blundering in bringing the company into line awakened this ire from a passivity to activity.

“I’ll have that dunderhead’s shoulder-straps off inside of a fortnight,” he muttered between his teeth.

The unhappy Lieutenant’s inability to even stand properly during the parade, or repeat an order intensified his rage. When the parade was dismissed the officers, as usual, sheathed their swords, and forming a line with the Adjutant in the center, marched forward to the commanding and inspecting officers, and saluted. Then the wrath of the old Inspector became vocable.

“What in God’s name,” he roared, fixing his glance upon Alspaugh so unmistakably that even the latter’s rainbow-clad girls, who had crowded up closely, could not make a mistake as to the victim of the expletives. “What in God’s name, sir,” repeated the old fellow with purpling face, “do you mean by bringing your company on to the ground in that absurd way, sir? Did you think, sir, that it was a hod of brick—with which I have no doubt you are most familiar—that you could dump down any place and any how, sir? Such misconduct is simply disgraceful, sir, I’d have you know. Simply disgraceful, sir.”

He paused for breath, but Alspaugh had no word of defense to offer.

“And what do you mean, sir,” resumed the Inspector, after inflating his lungs for another gust, “what in the name of all the piebald circus clowns that ever jiggered around on sawdust, do you mean by coming on parade dressed like the ringmaster of a traveling monkey-show, sir? Haven’t you any more idea of the honor of wearing a United States sword—the noblest weapon on earth, sir—than to make yourself look like the drum-major of a band of nigger minstrels, sir! A United States officer ought to be ashamed to make a damned harlequin of himself, sir. I’d have you to understand that most distinctly, sir!”

The Inspector’s stock of breath, alas, was not so ample as in the far-off days when his sturdy shoulders bore the modest single-bar, instead of the proud spread eagle of the present. Even had it been, the explosive energy of his speech would have speedily exhausted it. Compelled to stop to pump in a fresh supply, the Colonel of the regiment took advantage of the pause to whisper in his ear:

“Don’t be too rough on him, please. He’s a good man but green. Promoted from the ranks for courage in action. First appearance on parade. He’ll do better if given a chance.”

The Inspector’s anger was mollified. Addressing himself to all the officers, he continued in a milder tone:

“Gentlemen, you seem to be making progress in acquiring a knowledge of your duties, though you have a world of things yet to learn. I shall say so in my report to the General. You can go to your quarters.”

The line of officers dissolved, and the spectators began to melt away. Alspaugh’s assurance rose buoyantly the moment that the pressure was removed. He raised his eyes from the ground, and looked for the young ladies. They had turned their backs and were leaving the ground. He hastened after them, fabricating as he walked an explanation, based on personal jealousy, of the Inspector’s treatment of him. He was within a step of overtaking them when he heard one say, with toss of flaunting ribbons, and hoidenish giggle:

“Did you EVER see ANY-body wilt as Alspaugh did when old Bite-Your-Head-Off-In-a-Minute was jawing him? It was so awfully FUNNY that I just thought I SHOULD DIE.”

The sentence ended with the picturesque rapid CRESCENDO employed by maidens of her type in describing a convulsive experience.

“Just didn’t he,” joined in another. “I never saw ANY-thing so funny in all my BORN DAYS. I was AFRAID to look at either one of YOU; I knew if I DID I would BURST RIGHT OUT laughing. I couldn’t’ve HELPED it—I know I COULDN’T, if I’d’a knowed I’d’a DIED the next MINUTE.”

“This would seem to be a pretty good time to drop the fellow,” added the third girl, reflectively.

Alspaugh turned and went in another direction. At the 9 o’clock roll-call he informed the company that the Inspector was well pleased with its appearance on parade.

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