That leaves little doubt as to the man even
if I were not sure of the voice. I could hear your brutal swearing, sir,
loud over the prayers the chaplain was saying for the dead. Have you no
sense of decency at all?"

"How'n hell did I know there was any prayin' going on?" muttered Rix,
bending his scowling brows down over his shoe and tugging savagely at
the string.

"What was that remark, Rix?" asks the lieutenant, his grasp tightening
on the stick.

No answer.

"Rix, drop that shoestring; stand attention, and look at me," says the
officer, very quietly, but with setting teeth that no man fails to note.
Rix slowly and sullenly obeys.

"What was the remark you made just now?" is again the question.

"I said I didn't know they were praying," growls Rix, finding he has to
face the music.

"That sounds very little like your words, but--let it go. You knew very
well that men were dying here right within earshot when you were making
the air blue with blasphemy, and when better men were reverently silent.
It is the third time you have been reprimanded in a week. I shall see to
it that you are sent back to your company forthwith."

"Not while Lieutenant Hollins is quartermaster you won't," is the
insubordinate reply, and even the teamsters look scared as they glance
from the scowling, hanging face of Rix to the clear-cut features of the
officer, and mark the change that sweeps over the latter. His eyes seem
to flash fire, and his pallid face--thin with suffering and loss of
blood--flushes despite his physical weakness. His handsome mouth sets
like a steel-trap.

"Sergeant, get two of your men and put that fellow under guard," he
orders. "Stay where you are, Rix, until they come for you." His voice is
low and stern; he does not condescend to raise it for such occasion,
though there is a something about it that tells the soldier-ear it can
ring with command where ring is needed.

"I'd like to know what I've done," mutters Rix, angrily kicking at the
pebbles at his feet.

No answer. The lieutenant has walked back a pace and has seated
himself on a little bench. Another officer--a gray-haired and
distinguished-looking man, with silver eagles on his shoulders--is
rapidly nearing him and reaches the bank just in time to catch the next
words. He could have heard them farther back, for Rix is in a fury now,
and shouts aloud:

"If you knew your own interests--knew half that I know about your
affairs, Lieutenant Abbot--