The Little Colonel's Hero

  CHAPTER XV.

  THE SENTRY'S MISTAKE

  Promptly on Thursday, at the time appointed, the orderly rode over to CampWalton to escort the party back to the camp at Calkin's Cliff. The fourboys led the way on their ponies; the rest piled into a great farm wagonfilled with straw, that had been procured from one of the neighbouringfarms for the occasion.

  Hero followed obediently, when the Little Colonel ordered him to jump upbeside her, but he turned longing eyes on the orderly, whom he hadwelcomed with strong marks of pleasure. It was only their second meeting,but Hero seemed to regard him as an old friend. He leaped up to lick hisface, and bounded around him with quick, short barks of pleasure that, forthe moment, gave Lloyd a jealous pang. She was hurt that Hero should showsuch an evident desire to follow him in preference to her.

  "I don't see what makes Hero act so," she said to Mrs. Walton.

  "The orderly certainly must bear a strong resemblance to some one whomHero knew and loved in France," she replied. "You have owned him less thantwo months, and he has been away from France only a year, you mustremember. Everything must seem strange to him here. He was not brought upto play with children, as many St. Bernards are.

  "The other night, at the entertainment, I wondered many times what Heromust think of his strange surroundings. His life here is different inevery way from all that he has been used to. A dog trained from puppyhoodto the experiences of soldier life would naturally miss the excitement ofcamp as much as a soldier suddenly retired to the life of a privatecitizen."

  "Oh, deah!" sighed Lloyd, "I wish he could talk. I'd ask him if he isunhappy. _Are_ you homesick, old fellow?"

  She took his great head between her little hands and looked earnestly intohis eyes as she asked the question.

  "_Do_ you wish you were back in the French army, following the ambulancesand hunting the wounded soldiahs? Seems to me you ought to like it so muchbettah heah in Kentucky, with, nothing to do but play and eat and sleep,and be loved by everybody."

  "But an army dog can't get away from his training any easier than a man,"laughed the orderly, as he rode on beside the wagon. "It is a part of him.Hero is a good soldier, and no doubt feels a greater joy in obeying whathe considers a call to duty, than in riding in the wagon at his ease, withthe ladies."

  "You know a great deal, perhaps, of this society for the training ofambulance dogs," said Mrs. Walton.

  "Yes," he replied. "I am deeply interested in it. My brother at home keepsme informed of its movements, and has written me much of Herr Bungartz'smethods. I think I shall have no difficulty in putting the dog through hismanoeuvres, especially as he seems to recognise me and in some way connectme with his past life."

  Fife and drum welcomed the party as they drove into camp, and the partywere at once escorted to seats where they could watch the drill and thesham battle. It was a familiar scene to the General's little family, andto Miss Allison, who had visited more than one army post. But some of thegirls put their fingers in their ears when the noise of the rapid firingbegan. Hero was greatly excited.

  Soon after the noise of the sham battle ceased, the field was prepared forthe dog's trial. Men were hidden behind logs, stretched out in ditches,and left lying as if dead, in the dense thicket that skirted one side ofthe field, for wounded animals, either men or beasts, instinctively crawlaway to die under cover.

  With hands almost trembling in their eagerness, Lloyd fastened the flaskand shoulder-bags on the dog. He seemed to know that something unusual wasexpected of him, and wagged his tail so violently that he nearly upset theLittle Colonel. He watched every movement of the orderly, who, with a RedCross brassard on his arm, was acting as chief of the improvised ambulancecorps.

  "Will you give him the order, Miss Lloyd?" he asked, turning politely tothe little girl. Lloyd had pictured this moment several times on the wayover, thinking how proud she would be to stand up like a real LittleColonel and send her orders ringing over the field before the wholeadmiring regiment. But now that the moment had actually come, she blushedand shrank back, timidly. She was not sure that she could say the strangeFrench words just as the Major had taught them to her, when such a crowdof soldiers were standing by to hear.

  "Oh, _you_ do it, please," she asked.

  "If you will tell me the exact words he has been accustomed to hearing,"answered the orderly.

  Lloyd stammered them out, greatly embarrassed, feeling that herpronunciation must have grown quite faulty from lack of practice under theMajor's careful training. The orderly repeated them in an undertone, then,turning to Hero, gave the order in a clear, deep voice, that seemed tothrill the dog with its familiar ring. Instantly at the sound he startedout across the field. Not a thing that had been taught him in his long,careful training was forgotten.

  The first man he found was lying in a ditch, apparently desperatelywounded. Hero allowed him to help himself from his flask, and drag abandage from the bags on his back. Then, standing with his hind feet inthe ditch and his fore feet resting on the bank above him, he gave voiceuntil the men by the ambulance heard him, and came toward him carrying astretcher.

  "Look at him!" exclaimed Mrs. Walton, who with the party and several ofthe officers had walked down to the hospital tent. "He knows he has donehis duty well. Did you ever see a dog manifest such delight! He fairlywriggles with joy!"

  The praise of the men bearing the stretcher, and especially of theorderly, seemed to send the dog into a transport of happiness. The secondman lay far on the outskirts of the field, hidden by a thicket of hazelbushes. This time Hero's frantic barking brought no reply. The men actedas if deaf to his appeals of help, so in a few minutes, evidently thinkingthey were beyond the range of his voice, he picked up the man's cap in hismouth, and ran back at the top of his speed.

  "Good dog!" said the orderly, taking the cap he dropped at his feet. "Goback now and lead the way."

  "If that man had really been wounded, and had crawled under that thicket,"said Colonel Wayne, "we never could have found him alone. Only the senseof smell could lead to such a hiding-place. The ambulance might havepassed there a hundred times and never seen a trace of him."

  The hunt went on for some time; before it closed, every man personating akilled or wounded soldier was located and carried to the hospital tent.When the tired dog was finally allowed to rest, he dropped down at theorderly's feet, panting.

  "That, was certainly fine work," said the Colonel, stooping to pat Hero'ssides. "I suppose nothing could induce you to give him up to the army?"he asked, turning to Lloyd.

  "Oh, no, no, no!" cried Lloyd, as if alarmed at the suggestion, andpressing Hero's head protectingly against her shoulder. If she had beenproud of him before, she was doubly proud of him now. He had won theadmiration of the entire regiment. Never had he been so praised andpetted. When Mrs. Walton called her party together for their homewarddrive, it was plain to be seen that Hero was loath to leave the camp. Aword from the orderly would have kept him, despite Lloyd's commands tojump up into the wagon.

  As the boys rode on ahead again, Keith said, "It does seem too bad toforce that dog into being a private citizen when he is a born soldier."

  "Did you hear what Colonel Wayne told mamma as we left?" asked Ranald. "Hetold her that it was reported that some of the animals had escaped fromthe circus that was in Louisville yesterday, and that a panther and someother kind of a beast had been seen in these woods. He laughed and askedher if she didn't want him to send a guard over to our camp. Of course hewas only joking, but when she saw that I had heard what he said, she toldme not to tell the girls; not to even mention such a thing, or they'd beso frightened they'd want to break camp and go straight home."

  "It would be fun to scare them," said Rob, "but you'd better believe I'llnot say anything if there's any danger of having to go home sooner onaccount of it."

  "We've got to go day after to-morrow anyhow," said Keith, gloomily. "Iwish I could miss another week of school, but I know papa wouldn't let me,even if the camp didn't br
eak up."

  "Come on!" called Ranald, who had pushed on ahead. "Let's hurry back andhave a good swim before supper."

  Not satisfied with the excitement of the day, the girls were no sooner outof the wagon than some one started a wild game of prisoners' base. Thenthey played hide-and-seek among the rocks and trees around the waterfall,and while they were wiping their flushed faces, panting after the longrun, Kitty proposed that they should have a candy pulling.

  Dinah made the candy, but the girls pulled it, running a race to see whosewould be the whitest in a given time. Their arms ached long before theywere done. By the time the boys came stumbling up the hill from their longswim in the creek, it would be hard to say which group was most tired.

  "I'm sure we'll all want to turn in early to-night," said Mrs. Walton atsupper. Freddy was yawning widely, and Elise was almost asleep over herplate. "You are all tired."

  "All but Hero," said Miss Allison, offering him a chicken bone. "He restedwhile the others played. You'd like to go through your game every day.Wouldn't you, old boy?"

  There was no story-telling around the camp-fire that night. They gatheredaround it, even before the light died out in the sky. Ranald had hisguitar and Allison her mandolin, and they thrummed accompaniments awhilefor the others to sing. But a mighty yawn catching Margery in the middleof a verse, and Mrs. Walton discovering both Jamie and Freddy sound asleepon the rug beside her, she proposed that they all go to bed an hourearlier than usual.

  The Little Captain vowed he was too sleepy to blow a single toot on hisbugle, so they went to their tents without the usual sounding of taps. Itwas not long before every child was asleep, worn out by the day's hardplay. Mrs. Walton lay awake sometime listening to the sounds outside thetent. The crackling of underbrush and rustle of dry leaves was familiarenough in the daytime, but they seemed strangely ominous now that thelights were out. She could not help thinking of what the Colonel had toldher of the escaped panther. She imagined the panic it would make if itshould suddenly appear in their midst. Then she thought of Hero'sprotecting presence, and, raising herself on her elbow, she looked acrossthe tent to where she knew he lay asleep. At first she could not see eventhe ruff of white that made the collar around his tawny throat, for themoon had slipped behind a cloud, but as she raised herself on her elbow,and peered intently through the darkness, the faint misty light shone outagain, and she saw Hero plainly, the Little Colonel's outstretched handresting on his broad back. Then she lay down again, this time to sleep,and soon all the little camp was wrapped in the peace and rest of perfectsilence.

  Half an hour later Hero lifted his head from between his paws andlistened. Something seemed calling him. He did not know what. Being only adog, he could not analyse the thoughts passing through his brain. Arestlessness seized him. He longed to be back among the familiar sightsand sounds of soldier life. This little play camp, where children tried tomake him romp continually, was not home. Locust was not home. This strangenew country full of unfamiliar faces and foreign voices was not home. Butthe orderly's voice reminded him of it. Over there were bearded men anddeep voices, and strong hands, guns, and the smell of powder; fife anddrum, and canteens and knapsacks; things that he had seen daily in hissoldier life.

  Was it some call to duty that thrilled him, or only a homesick longing? Ashe listened with head up, there came ringing, clear and silvery throughthe night, the bugle notes from the other camp. At the first sound Herowas on his feet. He moved noiselessly toward the tent flap, only partiallyfastened, and flattening himself against the ground wriggled out.

  And if he gave no thought to the little mistress, dreaming inside thetent, if he left without regret the life of ease and loving care to whichshe had brought him, it was not because he was ungrateful, but because hedid not understand. To him his old life woke and called him in the bugle'sblowing. To him duty did not mean soft cushions, and idle days, and thefollowing of a happy-hearted child at play. It meant long marches and theguarding of ambulances and the rescue of the dead and dying. A truesoldier's heart beat in the dog's shaggy body, and, obedient to hisinstinct and training, he answered the summons when it sounded. With long,swinging steps he set out in the direction of the bugle-call, taking theroad through the woods that the wagon had travelled that day, and downwhich he had watched the orderly disappear. No, not deserting his duty,but, as he understood it, hurrying back, with faithful heart to the causethat had always claimed him.

  Now and then the moon, coming out fitfully from, behind the clouds, shoneon his great tawny body, touching the white curls of his ruff with a lineof silver. Then he would be lost in darkness again. But he swung onunerringly, until he was almost in sight of the camp. A little farther ona sentry paced up and down the picket-line that ran along the edge of thewoods. Hero travelled on toward him, the dry dead leaves rustling underhis paws, and now and then a twig crackling with his weight.

  The sentry paused and, listened, wondering what kind of an animal wascoming toward him in the darkness.

  "Halt! Who goes there?" he called, sharply. The moon, peeping out at thatinstant, seemed to magnify the size of the great creature in his path. Hethought of the panther and the other wild beast, whatever it was,supposed to be roaming about in the woods. Then the moon disappeared assuddenly as it had lighted up the scene, and the big paws still patteredon toward him in the darkness, regardless of his repeated challenge.

  As the underbrush crackled again with the weight of the great body nowalmost upon him, the sentry raised his rifle. A shot rang out, arousingthe camp not yet fully settled to sleep. The echo bounded back from thestartled hills, and rolled away over the peaceful farms and orchards,growing fainter and fainter, until only a whisper of it reached the whitetent where the Little Colonel lay dreaming. Then the moon shone out again,and the sentry, going a few paces forward, looked down in horror at thesilent form stretched out at his feet.