The Deserter, and Other Stories

l house, always surrounded in summer by sunflowers and hollyhocks and peonies that enwrapped it as

or little house were only of the simple, old sorts,-the Baltimore Belle, the yellow Scotch and the ordinary pink brier,-but they bore thick clusters of delightful blossoms.

beck to beg for flowers. Often they found her sitting out in her yard among the plants she loved-a mild-faced, patient little woman, with thin,

tly familiar to everybody in the district. Strangers driving past used to stop their buggies and admire the place; and

uite lifeless, seated as of old in the garden, with the old patient, w

and the family Bible had vanished. The cottage was taken for the mortgage upon it, and its meagre contents

One of these two names, the last in the list, was that of the boy, now made an orphan, the Benjamin of the widow's flock. He was described on the yel

whose face might suggest some acuteness and more resol

lot who used to go down, of a summer evening, to dive off the spring-board into the deep pool below the mill-dam. This r

ry, now packing "heave-powders" for the local horse-doctor. He had been employed in the mills and in the tannery, and he

e Hornbecks since any one could remember had been musicians-playing the fiddle or whatever else you liked

ving stock could scarcely be expected

himself wishing to be a drummer-boy. The notion struck all the neighbors as quite appropriate. Lafe was a capital drummer. Kind old

and his lifelong familiarity with instruments made him a handy boy to have about. Before lo

the ridge where he hoped to see the fighting beyond, he had

gh it all by the side of the file-leader, valiantly pounding their sheep-skins as the shot and shell screame

yed about in camp, playing selections outside the general's headquarters while he a

ance was begun, and battles were in the air all about them-even now the bandsmen merely gave the warriors a tune or two to start them off, and then ingl

chapter, and smashed its way down the steep hillside, crushing the brush and rooting up vines as it went, snapping saplings like pipestems

de stretched up the incline to mark the track of the fallen boulder

mbered over now to the open space. Then he stood looking up and down in a puzzled way, rubbing his head. His clothes w

, however, was nothing but a scalp scratch. He cared more about the tremendous bark one of his shins had got,

e way under them. His wits were still woolgathering under the combined scare and tumble, and he began mechanically poking about among the under

elf, and was gone. Lafe straightened hims

en bent all his powers of hearing for

om of bigger guns, some far off, others seemingly near, all mingling here among th

urroundings carefully. The impenetrable wall of foliage shut out the valley from him even more completely th

rch to the right and left. He knew so little of how he himself had escaped deat

ntained. The boy, like the rest, spoke and thought of all these alien comrades as "Dutchmen," and he was far from comprehending that that outlandish name "Foldeen

jokes on the long march, when the cold and driving rain had soured every

he was very fond of the "Dutchman," and w

he yelled

came a guttural reply,

about him with a cheerful eye, trying to trace the direction

away down the hill, and beckoned him, enforcing at the same t

in a minute was bending close b

his voice almost to a whisper in defe

is much worse," he murmured

can thank our stars we weren't bo

dicated with a sidewise nod of the head that sp

e crest of a little mound which jutted out slightly from the descending face o

round was clear, and the short grass told Lafe's practised eye that it was pasture land. Beyond,

made by the uniforms of men, who lay sprawled in various unnatural postures, flat on the green earth. Most of them were on their faces, and

most of a long, cold night in the previous November. This experience guided him now to remark a curious thing. No musket

hting was over, and skinned everythin

leafy cover. The boy shifted his position, and craning his neck over the other's shoulder, saw that just below them, where the asce

ternut instead of blue. Here, too, there was no sign of life, but only that fixed a

ere?" whisp

breath. "Dere is some, what you call it,

. In one corner of the breastwork there was to be seen a big pile of accoutrements-knapsacks, muske

make it out?"

gainst our men, and drove 'em off. Then they went out, and gathered up these traps, and brought 'e

e dem second men of our

fter 'em, up th

he objected. "Ven dey take some place like dis, den dey s

" mused Lafe, after a pause. He had n

thing to eat?" he suggested. "Come on!" he added persuasively. "

id, dot's all,"

urged the boy, "and that's better than starvi

ot's all right. You are prisoner; dot's all. Ven dey catch me, den it goes one, two, dree

e. "They don't shoot

" persisted Foldeen, gloomily. "I was

of enlightened surprise,

aid, after a little, "and I'll ta

arms to the ledge below. The footing was not quite easy; but by hanging to the vines he managed to work

ch he had entered from the open rear. The more terrible signs of the conflict which ha

to go straight to the heap of knapsacks p

and some woollen things which might be socks. Pushing his hand under thes

p it

p it

med abruptness. A burly man, with a rough, sandy stubble of beard about his fac

atisfaction at noting that the st

s face, and the instinct of