Si Klegg Experiences Of Si And Shorty On The Great Tullahoma Campaign Part 27

"Jehosephat, how good that tastes," said Shorty, speaking still faintly, but far more freely than at first, after he had drained the canteen.

"Sonny, run and git some more; and mind you fill the canteen full this time. I feel as if I could drink up the Mississippi River. Say, boys, what's happened? Appearintly, I got a sock-dologer on my head from some feller who thought I was too fresh. I'm afraid I'll have a spell o'

headache. But we got the flag, didn't we?"

"Yo're b.l.o.o.d.y right we did," said Wat; "hand we wolloped them bloomin'

rebels till they 'unted their 'oles hin the woods."

"That's good enough," said Shorty, sinking back.

"The column's movin' agin," said Abel Waite, turn ing his attention to his team.

Shortly after daybreak the team limped painfully up the slope of Mission Ridge, through Rossville Gap, on either side of which stood Thomas's indomitable army in battle array, sternly defying the rebel hosts of Bragg and Longstreet, which swarmed over the hills and valleys in front, but without much apparent appet.i.te for a renewal of the dreadful fray.

"Where do you men belong? What have you got in that wagon? Where are you going?" demanded the Provost officer in the road.

"We belong to the 200th Hinjianny. We've got two badly-wounded men and ha lot o' hammynition in the wagon. We want to find our regiment," an swered Wat Burnham.

"Stop your wagon right there. We need all the ammunition we can get.

Lift your wounded men into that ambulance, and then go up to that side of the gap. Your division is up there somewhere."

It was late in the afternoon before the overworked Surgeon in the field hospital at Chattanooga, in which Si and Shorty were finally deposited, found time to examine them.

"You got a pretty stiff whack on your head, my man," he said to Shorty, as he finished looking him over; "but so far as I can tell now it has not fractured your skull. You Hoosiers have mighty hard heads."

"Reglar clay-k.n.o.b whiteoak," whispered Shorty; "couldn't split it with a maul and wedge. Don't mind that a mite, since we got that flag. But how's my pardner over there?"

"I think you'll pull through all right," continued the Surgeon, "if you don't have concussion of the brain. You'll have to be--"

"No danger o' discussion of the brains," whispered Shorty. "Don't carry 'em up there, where they're liable to get slubbed. Keep 'em in a safer place, where there's more around 'em. But how's my pardner?"

"You'll come through all right," said the Surgeon smiling. "You're the right kind to live. You've got grit. I'll look at your partner now."

He went to Si and examined him. Shorty turned on his side and watched him with eager eyes. His heart sickened as he saw the Surgeon's face grow graver as he proceeded. The Surgeon probed the bullet's track with his fingers, and drew out a piece of folded letter paper stained with blood. Instinctively he unfolded it, and read through the ensanguined smears, written in a cramped school-girl hand:

"Dear Si: Though I did not have the heart to say it, Ime yours till death, and Ime sure you feel the same way.

Annabel."

"I'm much afraid the end has come too soon to a brave as well as loving heart," said the Surgeon sadly.

"Doctor, he can't die. He mustn't die," said Shorty in agony. "The regiment can't spare him. He's the best soldier in it, and he's my pardner."

"He may live, but it's a very slender chance," said the Surgeon. "Men live in this war against all science and experience, and it is possible that he may."

"Major," said Lieut. Bowersox, coming in, "I understand that two of my men were brought in here wounded. The report which was sent North this morning gave them as killed. If you have them here I want to correct it and save their people sorrow."

"One of them," answered the Surgeon, "has no thought of dying, and will, I'm sure, pull through. I am sorry I cannot say the same for the other.

It he lives it will be a wonder."

"Neither of us is a-going to die till we've put down this d.a.m.ned rebellion, and got home and married our girls," gasped Shorty with grim effort. "You can jist telegraph that home, and to ole Abe Lincoln, and to all whom it may concern."

And he fell back exhausted on his blanket.

CHAPTER XVIII. A DISTURBING MESSAGE

THE DEACON HURRIEDLY LEAVES FOR CHATTANOOGA.

THAT evening Lieut. Bowersox sent a telegram to Deacon Klegg. It had to be strictly limited to 10 words, and read:

JOSIAH KLEGG, ESQ.,

Somepunkins Station, Ind.:

Josiah not killed. Hospital at Chattanooga. Badly wounded.

E. C. BOWERSOX.

It did not arrive at Sumpunkins Station, three miles from the Deacon's home, until the next forenoon. The youth who discharged the multifarious duties of Postmaster, pa.s.senger, freight and express-agent, baggage-master, and telegraph operator at Sumpunkins Station laboriously spelled out the dots and dashes on the paper strip in the instrument.

He had barely enough mastery of the Morse alphabet to communicate the routine messages relating to the railroad's business aided by the intelligence of the conductors and engineers as to what was expected of them. This was the first outside message that he had ever received, and for a while it threatened to be too much for him, especially as the absence of punctuation made it still more enigmatical. He faithfully transcribed each letter as he made it out and then the agglomeration read:

"Josiamn otkildho spitalat chatano ogabadl ywounded ecbower sox."

"Confound them smart operators at Louisville and Jefferson ville," he grumbled, scanning the scrawl. "They never make letters plain, and don't put in half of 'em, just to worrit country operators. I'd like to take a club to 'em. There's no sort o' sense in sich sending. A Philadelphia lawyer couldn't make nothing out of it. But I've got to or get a cussing, and mebbe the bounce. I'll try it over again, and see if I can separate it into words. Why in thunder can't they learn to put a s.p.a.ce be tween the words, and not jumble the letters all to gether in that fool fas.h.i.+on?"

The next time he wrote it out:

"J. O. S. I am not kild Hospital at Chattanooga badly wounded E. C.

Bower sox."

"That begins to look like something," said he, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "But who is J. O. S.? n.o.body o' them initials in this neighbor hood. Nor E. C. Bower. Deacon Klegg can't know any of 'em. Then, how's the hospital badly wounded Bower? What's that about his socks? I'll have to try it over again as soon as No. 7, freight, gets by."

After No. 7 had gotten away, he tackled the message again:

"No, that sixth letter's not an m, but an h. H is four dots, and m is two dashes. It's specks in the paper that makes it look like an h. I'll put in some letters where they're needed. Now let's see how it'll read:"

228 SI KLEGG.

"Josiah Nott killed Hospital at Chattanooga. Badly wounded E. C. Bower sox."

"That seems to have more sense in it, but I don't know any Josiah Nott in this country. Does it mean that he killed a man named Hospital at Chattanooga, and badly wounded E. C. Bower in the socks? That don't seem sense. I'll try it again."

The next time he succeeded in making it read:

"Josiah Nott killed. Hospital at Chattanooga. Badly wounded E. C.

Bower's ox."