CHAPTER V
OFF TO CRIPPLE CREEK
Jack and Tom Binns waited only to see the surrender of Hardport beforeJack turned the car about and made for Bremerton, taking the direct roadthis time, since the advance of General Bean and his division of the Redarmy had swept aside all danger from the invading Blue forces. Theoutposts, of course, which Jack had had to dodge as he scouted inadvance of the Red advance guard, had all been driven back uponHardport, and they were prisoners of war now, and the way was clear forthe day, at least.
Captain Durland listened with scarcely concealed enthusiasm to Jack'sclear and concise account of what had been accomplished.
"You two saved the day," he said, finally. "We would have been in a verytight hole indeed if you hadn't cut the railroad, which was the onlything that made it possible for General Bean to effect the capture ofHardport as he did."
"How is that, sir?" asked Jack. "I thought we gave him usefulinformation, and I cut the railroad because there seemed to be a goodchance to do it, without thinking very much of the consequences of doingso."
"Why, if you hadn't cut the railroad," said Durland, "General Blisswould have thrown a division into Hardport as soon as he heard at hisheadquarters, by telegraph, that the place was threatened. Then he couldhave moved troops over from Mardean, where I imagine he had at least acouple of regiments, and General Bean's brigade would have been in atrap that would have been absolutely impossible to escape from. Now it'sall different. We've got Hardport. By this time General Bean hasunquestionably theoretically destroyed the railroad bridge and hasartillery mounted so that the guns will have to be captured beforeGeneral Bliss can make an attempt to rebuild it."
"I see! If the bridge is covered with guns, the theory is that the enemycouldn't do any work, eh?"
"Exactly! They've got to work in a narrow place, and they'd be blown topieces, a squad at a time, while they were trying to work. That was thedecisive move of the whole action. What did General Bean say to you?"
"He said it was good work, sir, and that he was going to speak to you ofit."
"Excellent, Jack! I am very pleased that one of my Scouts should haveplayed so important a part in the first decisive engagement of thecampaign. And General Bean is the sort of a man who is sure to see thatyou get the credit for what you've done."
"What shall we do next, sir?"
"I'll hold you in reserve until I get further orders from headquarters,I think. General Harkness evidently plans an aggressive fight from thevery outset. I have heard nothing from his headquarters direct as yet,but I probably shall pretty soon. I shall send in a report of GeneralBean's success at Hardport at once, though he has probably done thatalready."
The Scouts were working well all along the line. The enemy, as PeteStubbs had reported, had crossed the State line in some small force atMardean. Two regiments had occupied that village, which was on the Redside of the line, and had thrown out skirmishers for a couple of milesin both directions. Warner, one of the Raccoon Patrol, had beencaptured, but he was the only one of the Troop who had not made good hisescape in the face of the enemy's advance, and even he had accomplishedthe purpose for which he had been sent out, since he had managed towig-wag the news of the advance of a troop of cavalry before they hadrun him down, and the news had been flashed all along the line, fromScout to Scout, until it had reached Durland.
The wireless was not in use here, though experiments were being madewith a field wireless installation some miles away, but the Scouts didnot need it. They were spread out within plain sight of one another, andwith their little red and white flags they sent messages by the Morsealphabet, and in a special code, as fast as wireless could have done.They also were prepared to use, when there was a bright sun, which wasnot the case that day, the heliograph system, which sends messages forgreat distances.
In that system of field signalling, extensively employed by the Britishduring the Boer war, since wireless had not at that time been at allperfected, a man stands on a slight elevation, and catches the rays ofthe sun on a great reflector. Those flashes are visible for many milesin a clear atmosphere, in a flat country, and the flashes, of course,are practically instantaneous.
"We don't need to worry about wireless for communications of a fewmiles," said Durland. "The system of signalling that depends on seeingflashes, smokes, flags and other signals, is as old as warfare, really.The Indians, in this country, used to send news an astonishing distancein an amazingly short time. They used smokes, as we know, since we haveall worked out those signals ourselves from time to time. And allnations in time of war have employed relays of men with flags, stationedat fixed intervals for scores of miles, for the sending of despatchesand important news. Napoleon used the system on a great scale, and,until the telegraph was invented and made practicable for field work,that was the only way it could be done."
"The telegraph was first used in our Civil War, wasn't it, sir?" askedTom Binns.
"Yes. But even then it was done in a very crude way. There was none ofthe modern elaborate work of field telegraph systems. Nowadays, you see,an army builds its telegraph lines as it goes along. Then they weredependent upon the lines already built, mostly along the railroadtracks. The first really great war in which such systems were in use wasthe struggle between Russia and Japan. The French and the Germans didn'thave them in their war."
A few minutes later an orderly from the building in which the fieldtelegraph station had been established came running up to Durland.
"Despatch from General Harkness, Captain," he said, saluting, andDurland took the slip of paper. He flushed with pleasure as he read it.
"Concentrate your troop at Hardport," he read. "Send Danby and companionin scout car ahead, to report to me for special duty. Congratulations onhis splendid work, reported to me fully by General Bean."
"That is the sort of thing that makes it worth while to do good work,"he said. "I think we saved General Harkness from an embarrassingposition this morning, and it is good to think that he appreciates whatwe were able to do. Get along, now, Jack, and report to headquartersjust as soon as you can."
There was now no need to take the grey car through the fields as Jackretraced their course over the straight road from Bremerton. They metpickets, but those they met, who had heard something of the deeds Jackhad already accomplished, cheered his progress now, since this was nolonger the enemy's country but a part of Red territory, by virtue ofBean's swift and successful attack of the morning. The soldiers they sawwere a part of their own army, and Jack waved his hand in gratefulacknowledgment of the cheers that pursued them as they sped by.
"Those fellows are regulars," he told Tom, as they passed one smalldetachment. "It makes you feel good to think that they regard us ascomrades in arms, doesn't it, Tom? Those fellows know what they'reabout, and they must regard some of our militia as a good deal of ajoke."
"I don't think that's a bit fair, Jack," said Tom. "The militia havetheir own work to do most of the time, and they do the best they canwhen they turn soldiers. And if we had a war, the regulars wouldn't beable to go very far without help--they must know that!"
"They're not mean about it, Tom. They help the militia as much as theycan when they're in camp together, and teach them the tricks of thetrade. But they're trained men who don't do anything but work at theirsoldiering, and the trained men always feel a bit superior to thevolunteers."
"Some countries have a much bigger army than we do, don't they, Jack?"
"Indeed they do! Why, in Europe, in every country except England, everyman has to serve in the army, unless he's too weak to do it. You see,they have possible enemies on all sides of them. Over here we don'trealize how lucky we are to have the sea guarding us from the mostdangerous enemies we might have. We haven't any reason to fear troublewith England, and Canada, of course, isn't any better off than we whenit comes to an army. We could take care of them easily enough with thetrained troops we have. And Mexico, while they might fight us, couldn'tput up any sort of a real figh
t. The Mexicans couldn't invade thiscountry, and if we ever had to invade Mexico, we'd have all the time weneeded to train an army to go across and fight them, the way we didbefore. We may have to do that some time, but I hope not, becausefighting in the sort of country there is down there would mean an awfulloss of life."
"You mean that they know the country so well that a small force of themcould worry us and make a lot of trouble, even if we won all the bigbattles?"
"Yes. The Boers couldn't stand up to the British very long in theirfight, but they kept under arms and made the English armies work mightyhard to bring about peace."
"Well, I hope we never do have a war, Jack. This is only a game, ofcourse, but it gives you an idea of what the real thing would be like,and it must be dreadful. It makes me realize, somehow, what it mighthave been like in the Civil War, when we were killing one another.Somehow reading about those battles doesn't give you as much of an ideaof how it must have been as even a single morning of this sham war."
They were moving along fast as they talked, and they were in theoutskirts of Hardport now. The town was full of soldiers. General Bean'sbrigade had been reinforced by the arrival of nearly ten thousand moremen, and there were, altogether, about sixteen thousand troops there.General Harkness, thanks to Jack Danby and the quick wit of GeneralBean, who had understood the necessity of altering his plans for thecapture of the place when he got Jack's report, had made good his boastthat he would make the place his divisional headquarters for the night.
The place was all astir. Small automobiles, painted red, carriedbustling officers from place to place, delivering orders, preparing forthe next step in the defense of the State capital. General Harkness,Jack found, after making several fruitless inquiries of officers whoseemed to be too busy to bother with a small boy, who, had they knownit, was a far more important factor in the campaign than they were atall likely to be, had established his headquarters at the HardportHouse, the leading hotel of the town, and there Jack went.
He was kept waiting for some time, after he had stated his name, andthat he was under orders to report to the commanding general, but whenhe reached General Harkness he found him a pleasant, courteous man, andvery much pleased with the work that he and Tom Binns had done.
"Now," said the General, "I've got some more and very important work foryou to do. I've got to find out as soon as I can what the enemy's plansare. I don't expect you to do all of that, but you can play a part."
He walked over to a great wall map of the whole field of the operations,and pointed out a road on it.
"That road is the key to the situation this afternoon," he said."General Bean is pressing forward to reach it as soon as possible, andoccupy this bridge here in force. If he can get there in time, theenemy's advance will be checked. It is likely, in fact, that we may beable to force a decisive engagement there before the enemy is at allready for it. Our capture of Hardport to-day, you see, has given us agreat advantage. Before that, the enemy was in a position to choose hisfighting ground. He could make us meet him where he liked, and with allthe advantage of position in his favor. Now that will be no longerpossible for him. The ground at Cripple Creek Bridge here is the best wecould have, since, if General Bean can occupy the position there,General Bliss will have no choice but to give battle there, and I thinkwe can turn him back on his own mobilization point."
Jack saluted.
"I am to report on the number and disposition of the enemy's forcesabout Cripple Creek, then, sir?" he said.
"Those are your orders. I shall expect a report within two hours."
"Yes, General. I will do my best to have one within that time."
Off in the distance, as Jack whirled out of Hardport, and beyond thelast pickets of the Red army, he saw a cloud of dust spreading acrossthe country.
"There's General Bean," he said to Tom. "Gee, his fellows must be prettytired! They've fought a battle and captured a town already, and nowthey're off on a fifteen-mile march. Going some, I think!"
Cripple Creek was fifteen miles by the straight route the troops wereforced to take, but by short cuts and taking bad roads, Jack could reachit by less than nine miles of traveling.
"Keep your eyes skinned, Tom!" said Jack, as he drove along. "I've gotto watch the road, and we're in the enemy's country again with avengeance."