rned in some way,
the two had sought to escape, and had been headed off and killed in some
of the still unexplored ravines or _coulees_ farther to the southwest.
In either case, provided the major did not persist in his investigation
and so discover how very far Devers had led his troop away from sight or
support of Davies's men, and how utterly he had failed to carry out his
orders, the captain felt tolerably confident that all the blame would be
landed where it properly belonged,--on the shoulders of the dead and
defenceless lieutenant, whose reluctance to undertake the duty many had
observed, and whose womanish swoon at sight of the slaughtered men had
not only proved his unfitness for frontier service, but long delayed his
return to his party. Devers had always said Davies was entirely
overrated by the colonel and Truman and others; he had held all summer
that the lieutenant was a "molly-coddle;" he had been reproved more than
once for what they termed his injustice to his subaltern, and now Davies
had proved just exactly what he knew he would prove,--a carpet knight, a
prayer-meeting soldier, with neither grit nor brawn nor backbone; and if
he was killed, at least he had died in time to save the regiment from
having to blush for him in the future. Devers had served throughout the
war of the rebellion in a regiment that saw no end of hard fighting, but
always when he happened to be on sick-leave or detached service of some
kind, for in all of his years of service no man in his grade or corps
had so seldom been under fire, either in the South or on the plains.
With abilities unquestioned and opportunities second to none, it was
nevertheless observed of him at the close of the four years' struggle
that there, at least, was a man who hadn't even mustering or recruiting
service to fall back upon when "brevets" went scattering broadcast over
the army, showering like the rain upon the just and the unjust. He had
lived all through it without having become distinguished for anything
that might become a man, winning a name for himself principally for
consummate skill in getting out of what he was told to do without
getting into a scrape or out of the service. He became a tremendous
paper-fighter in the days that followed, however, and like some of our
war generals, could find the weak points in the armor of his comrades if
he couldn't in that of the enemy. He became a club-room critic of other
fellows' campaigns, companies, or