FullReads

Disregarding the broad hint to leave, Mr. Billings again spoke:

“Is it your wish, sir, that any punishment should be imposed on the men who were equally in fault with O’Grady?”

Buxton muttered something unintelligible from under his blankets.

“I did not understand you, sir,” said the lieutenant, very civilly.

Buxton savagely propped himself up on one elbow, and blurted out,–

“No, Mr. Billings! no! When I want a man punished I’ll give the order myself, sir.”

“And is it still your wish, sir, that I make O’Grady walk the rest of the way?”

For a moment Buxton hesitated; his better nature struggled to assert itself and induce him to undo the injustice of his order; but the “cad” in his disposition, the weakness of his character, prevailed. It would never do to let his lieutenant get the upper hand of him, he argued, and so the reply came, and came angrily.

“Yes, of course; he deserves it anyhow, by —-! and it’ll do him good.”

Without another word Mr. Billings turned on his heel and left him.

The command returned to garrison, shaved its stubbly beard of two weeks’ growth, and resumed its uniform and the routine duties of the post. Three days only had it been back when Mr. Billings, marching on as officer of the day, and receiving the prisoners from his predecessor, was startled to hear the list of names wound up with “O’Grady,” and when that name was called there was no response.

The old officer of the day looked up inquiringly: “Where is O’Grady, sergeant?”

“In the cell, sir, unable to come out.”

“O’Grady was confined by Captain Buxton’s order late last night,” said Captain Wayne, “and I fancy the poor fellow has been drinking heavily this time.”

A few minutes after, the reliefs being told off, the prisoners sent out to work, and the officers of the day, new and old, having made their reports to the commanding officer, Mr. Billings returned to the guard-house, and, directing his sergeant to accompany him, proceeded to make a deliberate inspection of the premises. The guard-room itself was neat, clean, and dry; the garrison prison-room was well ventilated, and tidy as such rooms ever can be made; the Indian prison-room, despite the fact that it was empty and every shutter was thrown wide open to the breeze, had that indefinable, suffocating odor which continued aboriginal occupancy will give to any apartment; but it was the cells Mr. Billings desired to see, and the sergeant led him to a row of heavily-barred doors of rough unplaned timber, with a little grating in each, and from one of these gratings there peered forth a pair of feverishly-glittering eyes, and a face, not bloated and flushed, as with recent and heavy potations, but white, haggard, twitching, and a husky voice in piteous appeal addressed the sergeant:

“Oh, for God’s sake, Billy, get me something, or it’ll kill me!”

“Hush, O’Grady,” said the sergeant: “here’s the officer of the day.”

Mr. Billings took one look at the wan face only dimly visible in that prison-light, for the poor little man shrank back as he recognized the form of his lieutenant:

“Open that door, sergeant.”

With alacrity the order was obeyed, and the heavy door swung back upon its hinges.

“O’Grady,” said the officer of the day, in a tone gentle as that he would have employed in speaking to a woman, “come out here to me. I’m afraid you are sick.”

Shaking, trembling, twitching in every limb, with wild, dilated eyes and almost palsied step, O’Grady came out.

“Look to him a moment, sergeant,” said Mr. Billings, and, bending low, he stepped into the cell. The atmosphere was stifling, and in another instant he backed out into the hall-way. “Sergeant, was it by the commanding officer’s order that O’Grady was put in there?”

“No, sir; Captain Buxton’s.”

“See that he is not returned there during my tour, unless the orders come from Major Stannard. Bring O’Grady into the prison-room.”

Here in the purer air and brighter light he looked carefully over the poor fellow, as the latter stood before him quivering from head to foot and hiding his face in his shaking hands. Then the lieutenant took him gently by the arm and led him to a bunk: