“When did you come?”
“Arrived at sundown.”
“Where from?”
“Salt Lake.”
“Are you in the service?”
“No. Trade.”
“Pirate trade, I reckon.”
“What do you know about it?”
“I saw you when you came. I recognized your master.
He is a bad sort. Trap-robber, horse-thief, squaw-man, renegado—Hank
Butters—I know him very well. Stole you, didn’t he?”
“Well, it amounted to that.”
“I thought so. Where is his pard?”
“He stopped at White Cloud’s camp.”
“He is another of the same stripe, is Blake Haskins.”
(Aside.) They are laying for Buffalo Bill again, I guess.
(Aloud.) “What is your name?”
“Which one?”
“Have you got more than one?”
“I get a new one every time I’m stolen. I used
to have an honest name, but that was early; I’ve forgotten it.
Since then I’ve had thirteen aliases.”
“Aliases? What is alias?”
“A false name.”
“Alias. It’s a fine large word, and is in my line;
it has quite a learned and cerebrospinal incandescent sound. Are
you educated?”
“Well, no, I can’t claim it. I can take down bars,
I can distinguish oats from shoe-pegs, I can blaspheme a saddle-boil
with the college-bred, and I know a few other things—not many;
I have had no chance, I have always had to work; besides, I am of low
birth and no family. You speak my dialect like a native, but you
are not a Mexican Plug, you are a gentleman, I can see that; and educated,
of course.”
“Yes, I am of old family, and not illiterate. I am a
fossil.”
“A which?”
“Fossil. The first horses were fossils. They date
back two million years.”
“Gr-eat sand and sage-brush! do you mean it?”
“Yes, it is true. The bones of my ancestors are held
in reverence and worship, even by men. They do not leave them
exposed to the weather when they find them, but carry them three thousand
miles and enshrine them in their temples of learning, and worship them.”
“It is wonderful! I knew you must be a person of distinction,
by your fine presence and courtly address, and by the fact that you
are not subjected to the indignity of hobbles, like myself and the rest.
Would you tell me your name?”
“You have probably heard of it—Soldier Boy.”
“What!—the renowned, the illustrious?”
“Even so.”
“It takes my breath! Little did I dream that ever I should
stand face to face with the possessor of that great name. Buffalo
Bill’s horse! Known from the Canadian border to the deserts
of Arizona, and from the eastern marches of the Great Plains to the
foot-hills of the Sierra! Truly this is a memorable day.
You still serve the celebrated Chief of Scouts?”
“I am still his property, but he has lent me, for a time, to
the most noble, the most gracious, the most excellent, her Excellency
Catherine, Corporal-General Seventh Cavalry and Flag-Lieutenant Ninth
Dragoons, U.S.A.,—on whom be peace!”
“Amen. Did you say her Excellency?”
“The same. A Spanish lady, sweet blossom of a ducal house.
And truly a wonder; knowing everything, capable of everything; speaking
all the languages, master of all sciences, a mind without horizons,
a heart of gold, the glory of her race! On whom be peace!”
“Amen. It is marvellous!”
“Verily. I knew many things, she has taught me others.
I am educated. I will tell you about her.”
“I listen—I am enchanted.”
“I will tell a plain tale, calmly, without excitement, without
eloquence. When she had been here four or five weeks she was already
erudite in military things, and they made her an officer—a double
officer. She rode the drill every day, like any soldier; and she
could take the bugle and direct the evolutions herself. Then,
on a day, there was a grand race, for prizes—none to enter but
the children. Seventeen children entered, and she was the youngest.
Three girls, fourteen boys—good riders all. It was a steeplechase,
with four hurdles, all pretty high. The first prize was a most
cunning half-grown silver bugle, and mighty pretty, with red silk cord
and tassels. Buffalo Bill was very anxious; for he had taught
her to ride, and he did most dearly want her to win that race, for the
glory of it. So he wanted her to ride me, but she wouldn’t;
and she reproached him, and said it was unfair and unright, and taking
advantage; for what horse in this post or any other could stand a chance
against me? and she was very severe with him, and said, ‘You ought
to be ashamed—you are proposing to me conduct unbecoming an officer
and a gentleman.’ So he just tossed her up in the air about
thirty feet and caught her as she came down, and said he was ashamed;
and put up his handkerchief and pretended to cry, which nearly broke
her heart, and she petted him, and begged him to forgive her, and said
she would do anything in the world he could ask but that; but he said
he ought to go hang himself, and he must, if he could get a rope;
it was nothing but right he should, for he never, never could forgive
himself; and then she began to cry, and they both sobbed, the
way you could hear him a mile, and she clinging around his neck and
pleading, till at last he was comforted a little, and gave his solemn
promise he wouldn’t hang himself till after the race; and wouldn’t
do it at all if she won it, which made her happy, and she said she would
win it or die in the saddle; so then everything was pleasant again and
both of them content. He can’t help playing jokes on her,
he is so fond of her and she is so innocent and unsuspecting; and when
she finds it out she cuffs him and is in a fury, but presently forgives
him because it’s him; and maybe the very next day she’s
caught with another joke; you see she can’t learn any better,
because she hasn’t any deceit in her, and that kind aren’t
ever expecting it in another person.
“It was a grand race. The whole post was there, and there
was such another whooping and shouting when the seventeen kids came
flying down the turf and sailing over the hurdles—oh, beautiful
to see! Half-way down, it was kind of neck and neck, and anybody’s
race and nobody’s. Then, what should happen but a cow steps
out and puts her head down to munch grass, with her broadside to the
battalion, and they a-coming like the wind; they split apart to flank
her, but she?—why, she drove the spurs home and soared
over that cow like a bird! and on she went, and cleared the last hurdle
solitary and alone, the army letting loose the grand yell, and she skipped
from the horse the same as if he had been standing still, and made her
bow, and everybody crowded around to congratulate, and they gave her
the bugle, and she put it to her lips and blew ‘boots and saddles’
to see how it would go, and BB was as proud as you can’t think!
And he said, ‘Take Soldier Boy, and don’t pass him back
till I ask for him!’ and I can tell you he wouldn’t have
said that to any other person on this planet. That was two months
and more ago, and nobody has been on my back since but the Corporal-General
Seventh Cavalry and Flag-Lieutenant of the Ninth Dragoons, U.S.A.,—on
whom be peace!”
“Amen. I listen—tell me more.”
“She set to work and organized the Sixteen, and called it the
First Battalion Rocky Mountain Rangers, U.S.A., and she wanted to be
bugler, but they elected her Lieutenant-General and Bugler. So
she ranks her uncle the commandant, who is only a Brigadier. And
doesn’t she train those little people! Ask the Indians,
ask the traders, ask the soldiers; they’ll tell you. She
has been at it from the first day. Every morning they go clattering
down into the plain, and there she sits on my back with her bugle at
her mouth and sounds the orders and puts them through the evolutions
for an hour or more; and it is too beautiful for anything to see those
ponies dissolve from one formation into another, and waltz about, and
break, and scatter, and form again, always moving, always graceful,
now trotting, now galloping, and so on, sometimes near by, sometimes
in the distance, all just like a state ball, you know, and sometimes
she can’t hold herself any longer, but sounds the ‘charge,’
and turns me loose! and you can take my word for it, if the battalion
hasn’t too much of a start we catch up and go over the breastworks
with the front line.
“Yes, they are soldiers, those little people; and healthy,
too, not ailing any more, the way they used to be sometimes. It’s
because of her drill. She’s got a fort, now—Fort Fanny
Marsh. Major-General Tommy Drake planned it out, and the Seventh
and Dragoons built it. Tommy is the Colonel’s son, and is
fifteen and the oldest in the Battalion; Fanny Marsh is Brigadier-General,
and is next oldest—over thirteen. She is daughter of Captain
Marsh, Company B, Seventh Cavalry. Lieutenant-General Alison is
the youngest by considerable; I think she is about nine and a half or
three-quarters. Her military rig, as Lieutenant-General, isn’t
for business, it’s for dress parade, because the ladies made it.
They say they got it out of the Middle Ages—out of a book—and
it is all red and blue and white silks and satins and velvets; tights,
trunks, sword, doublet with slashed sleeves, short cape, cap with just
one feather in it; I’ve heard them name these things; they got
them out of the book; she’s dressed like a page, of old times,
they say. It’s the daintiest outfit that ever was—you
will say so, when you see it. She’s lovely in it—oh,
just a dream! In some ways she is just her age, but in others
she’s as old as her uncle, I think. She is very learned.
She teaches her uncle his book. I have seen her sitting by with
the book and reciting to him what is in it, so that he can learn to
do it himself.
“Every Saturday she hires little Injuns to garrison her fort;
then she lays siege to it, and makes military approaches by make-believe
trenches in make-believe night, and finally at make-believe dawn she
draws her sword and sounds the assault and takes it by storm.
It is for practice. And she has invented a bugle-call all by herself,
out of her own head, and it’s a stirring one, and the prettiest
in the service. It’s to call me—it’s
never used for anything else. She taught it to me, and told me
what it says: ‘It is I, Soldier—come!’
and when those thrilling notes come floating down the distance I hear
them without fail, even if I am two miles away; and then—oh, then
you should see my heels get down to business!
“And she has taught me how to say good-morning and good-night
to her, which is by lifting my right hoof for her to shake; and also
how to say good-bye; I do that with my left foot—but only for
practice, because there hasn’t been any but make-believe good-byeing
yet, and I hope there won’t ever be. It would make me cry
if I ever had to put up my left foot in earnest. She has taught
me how to salute, and I can do it as well as a soldier. I bow
my head low, and lay my right hoof against my cheek. She taught
me that because I got into disgrace once, through ignorance. I
am privileged, because I am known to be honorable and trustworthy, and
because I have a distinguished record in the service; so they don’t
hobble me nor tie me to stakes or shut me tight in stables, but let
me wander around to suit myself. Well, trooping the colors is
a very solemn ceremony, and everybody must stand uncovered when the
flag goes by, the commandant and all; and once I was there, and ignorantly
walked across right in front of the band, which was an awful disgrace:
Ah, the Lieutenant-General was so ashamed, and so distressed that I
should have done such a thing before all the world, that she couldn’t
keep the tears back; and then she taught me the salute, so that if I
ever did any other unmilitary act through ignorance I could do my salute
and she believed everybody would think it was apology enough and would
not press the matter. It is very nice and distinguished; no other
horse can do it; often the men salute me, and I return it. I am
privileged to be present when the Rocky Mountain Rangers troop the colors
and I stand solemn, like the children, and I salute when the flag goes
by. Of course when she goes to her fort her sentries sing out
‘Turn out the guard!’ and then . . . do you catch that refreshing
early-morning whiff from the mountain-pines and the wild flowers?
The night is far spent; we’ll hear the bugles before long.
Dorcas, the black woman, is very good and nice; she takes care of the
Lieutenant-General, and is Brigadier-General Alison’s mother,
which makes her mother-in-law to the Lieutenant-General. That
is what Shekels says. At least it is what I think he says, though
I never can understand him quite clearly. He—”
“Who is Shekels?”
“The Seventh Cavalry dog. I mean, if he is a dog.
His father was a coyote and his mother was a wild-cat. It doesn’t
really make a dog out of him, does it?”
“Not a real dog, I should think. Only a kind of a general
dog, at most, I reckon. Though this is a matter of ichthyology,
I suppose; and if it is, it is out of my depth, and so my opinion is
not valuable, and I don’t claim much consideration for it.”
“It isn’t ichthyology; it is dogmatics, which is still
more difficult and tangled up. Dogmatics always are.”
“Dogmatics is quite beyond me, quite; so I am not competing.
But on general principles it is my opinion that a colt out of a coyote
and a wild-cat is no square dog, but doubtful. That is my hand,
and I stand pat.”
“Well, it is as far as I can go myself, and be fair and conscientious.
I have always regarded him as a doubtful dog, and so has Potter.
Potter is the great Dane. Potter says he is no dog, and not even
poultry—though I do not go quite so far as that.
“And I wouldn’t, myself. Poultry is one of those
things which no person can get to the bottom of, there is so much of
it and such variety. It is just wings, and wings, and wings, till
you are weary: turkeys, and geese, and bats, and butterflies, and angels,
and grasshoppers, and flying-fish, and—well, there is really no
end to the tribe; it gives me the heaves just to think of it.
But this one hasn’t any wings, has he?”
“No.”
“Well, then, in my belief he is more likely to be dog than
poultry. I have not heard of poultry that hadn’t wings.
Wings is the sign of poultry; it is what you tell poultry by.
Look at the mosquito.”
“What do you reckon he is, then? He must be something.”
“Why, he could be a reptile; anything that hasn’t wings
is a reptile.”
“Who told you that?”
“Nobody told me, but I overheard it.”
“Where did you overhear it?”
“Years ago. I was with the Philadelphia Institute expedition
in the Bad Lands under Professor Cope, hunting mastodon bones, and I
overheard him say, his own self, that any plantigrade circumflex vertebrate
bacterium that hadn’t wings and was uncertain was a reptile.
Well, then, has this dog any wings? No. Is he a plantigrade
circumflex vertebrate bacterium? Maybe so, maybe not; but without
ever having seen him, and judging only by his illegal and spectacular
parentage, I will bet the odds of a bale of hay to a bran mash that
he looks it. Finally, is he uncertain? That is the point—is
he uncertain? I will leave it to you if you have ever heard of
a more uncertainer dog than what this one is?”
“No, I never have.”
“Well, then, he’s a reptile. That’s settled.”
“Why, look here, whatsyourname”
“Last alias, Mongrel.”
“A good one, too. I was going to say, you are better
educated than you have been pretending to be. I like cultured
society, and I shall cultivate your acquaintance. Now as to Shekels,
whenever you want to know about any private thing that is going on at
this post or in White Cloud’s camp or Thunder-Bird’s, he
can tell you; and if you make friends with him he’ll be glad to,
for he is a born gossip, and picks up all the tittle-tattle. Being
the whole Seventh Cavalry’s reptile, he doesn’t belong to
anybody in particular, and hasn’t any military duties; so he comes
and goes as he pleases, and is popular with all the house cats and other
authentic sources of private information. He understands all the
languages, and talks them all, too. With an accent like gritting
your teeth, it is true, and with a grammar that is no improvement on
blasphemy—still, with practice you get at the meat of what he
says, and it serves. . . Hark! That’s the reveille. . .
.
[THE REVEILLE]
“Faint and far, but isn’t it clear, isn’t it sweet?
There’s no music like the bugle to stir the blood, in the still
solemnity of the morning twilight, with the dim plain stretching away
to nothing and the spectral mountains slumbering against the sky.
You’ll hear another note in a minute—faint and far and clear,
like the other one, and sweeter still, you’ll notice. Wait
. . . listen. There it goes! It says, ‘It is I,
Soldier—come!’ . . .
[SOLDIER BOY’S BUGLE CALL]
. . . Now then, watch me leave a blue streak behind!”
