The Red Badge of Courage

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There was a tattered man, fouled with dust,
blood and powder stain from hair to shoes, who
trudged quietly at the youth's side. He was lis-
tening with eagerness and much humility to the
lurid descriptions of a bearded sergeant. His
lean features wore an expression of awe and ad-
miration. He was like a listener in a country
store to wondrous tales told among the sugar
barrels. He eyed the story-teller with unspeak-
able wonder. His mouth was agape in yokel
fashion.

The sergeant, taking note of this, gave pause
to his elaborate history while he administered a
sardonic comment. "Be keerful, honey, you 'll
be a-ketchin' flies," he said.

The tattered man shrank back abashed.

After a time he began to sidle near to the
youth, and in a different way try to make him a
friend. His voice was gentle as a girl's voice
and his eyes were pleading. The youth saw
with surprise that the soldier had two wounds,
one in the head, bound with a blood-soaked rag,
and the other in the arm, making that member
dangle like a broken bough.

After they had walked together for some time
the tattered man mustered sufficient courage to
speak. "Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?"
he timidly said. The youth, deep in thought,
glanced up at the bloody and grim figure with
its lamblike eyes. "What?"

"Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?

"Yes," said the youth shortly. He quick-
ened his pace.

But the other hobbled industriously after him.
There was an air of apology in his manner, but
he evidently thought that he needed only to talk
for a time, and the youth would perceive that he
was a good fellow.

"Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?" he began
in a small voice, and then he achieved the forti-
tude to continue. "Dern me if I ever see fellers
fight so. Laws, how they did fight! I knowed
th' boys 'd like when they onct got square at it.
Th' boys ain't had no fair chanct up t' now, but
this time they showed what they was. I knowed
it 'd turn out this way. Yeh can't lick them boys.
No, sir! They're fighters, they be."

He breathed a deep breath of humble ad-
miration. He had looked at the youth for en-
couragement several times. He received none,
but gradually he seemed to get absorbed in his
subject.

"I was talkin' 'cross pickets with a boy from
Georgie, onct, an' that boy, he ses, 'Your fellers
'll all run like hell when they onct hearn a gun,'
he ses. 'Mebbe they will,' I ses, 'but I don't
b'lieve none of it,' I ses; 'an' b'jiminey,' I ses back
t' 'um, 'mebbe your fellers 'll all run like hell
when they onct hearn a gun,' I ses. He larfed.
Well, they didn't run t' day, did they, hey? No,
sir! They fit, an' fit, an' fit."

His homely face was suffused with a light of
love for the army which was to him all things
beautiful and powerful.

After a time he turned to the youth. "Where
yeh hit, ol' boy?" he asked in a brotherly tone.

The youth felt instant panic at this question,
although at first its full import was not borne in
upon him.

"What?" he asked.

"Where yeh hit?" repeated the tattered man.

"Why," began the youth, "I--I--that is--
why--I--"

He turned away suddenly and slid through
the crowd. His brow was heavily flushed, and
his fingers were picking nervously at one of his
buttons. He bent his head and fastened his eyes
studiously upon the button as if it were a little
problem.

The tattered man looked after him in aston-
ishment.

CHAPTER IX.

THE youth fell back in the procession until
the tattered soldier was not in sight. Then he
started to walk on with the others.

But he was amid wounds. The mob of men
was bleeding. Because of the tattered soldier's
question he now felt that his shame could be
viewed. He was continually casting sidelong
glances to see if the men were contemplating the
letters of guilt he felt burned into his brow.

At times he regarded the wounded soldiers
in an envious way. He conceived persons with
torn bodies to be peculiarly happy. He wished
that he, too, had a wound, a red badge of cour-
age.

The spectral soldier was at his side like a
stalking reproach. The man's eyes were still
fixed in a stare into the unknown. His gray,
appalling face had attracted attention in the
crowd, and men, slowing to his dreary pace, were
walking with him. They were discussing his
plight, questioning him and giving him advice.

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In a dogged way he repelled them, signing to them
to go on and leave him alone. The shadows of
his face were deepening and his tight lips seemed
holding in check the moan of great despair.
There could be seen a certain stiffness in the
movements of his body, as if he were taking
infinite care not to arouse the passion of his
wounds. As he went on, he seemed always look-
ing for a place, like one who goes to choose a
grave.

Something in the gesture of the man as he
waved the bloody and pitying soldiers away
made the youth start as if bitten. He yelled in
horror. Tottering forward he laid a quivering
hand upon the man's arm. As the latter slowly
turned his waxlike features toward him, the
youth screamed:

"Gawd! Jim Conklin!"

The tall soldier made a little commonplace
smile. "Hello, Henry," he said.

The youth swayed on his legs and glared
strangely. He stuttered and stammered. "Oh,
Jim--oh, Jim--oh, Jim--"

The tall soldier held out his gory hand. There
was a curious red and black combination of new
blood and old blood upon it. "Where yeh been,
Henry?" he asked. He continued in a monoto-
nous voice, "I thought mebbe yeh got keeled
over. There 's been thunder t' pay t'-day. I was
worryin' about it a good deal."

The youth still lamented. "Oh, Jim--oh, Jim
--oh, Jim--"

"Yeh know," said the tall soldier, "I was out
there." He made a careful gesture. "An',
Lord, what a circus! An', b'jiminey, I got shot--
I got shot. Yes, b'jiminey, I got shot." He
reiterated this fact in a bewildered way, as if he
did not know how it came about.

The youth put forth anxious arms to assist
him, but the tall soldier went firmly on as if pro-
pelled. Since the youth's arrival as a guardian
for his friend, the other wounded men had ceased
to display much interest. They occupied them-
selves again in dragging their own tragedies
toward the rear.

Suddenly, as the two friends marched on, the
tall soldier seemed to be overcome by a terror.
His face turned to a semblance of gray paste.
He clutched the youth's arm and looked all about
him, as if dreading to be overheard. Then he
began to speak in a shaking whisper:

"I tell yeh what I'm 'fraid of, Henry--I 'll tell
yeh what I 'm 'fraid of. I 'm 'fraid I 'll fall down
--an' then yeh know--them damned artillery
wagons--they like as not 'll run over me. That 's
what I 'm 'fraid of--"

The youth cried out to him hysterically: "I 'll
take care of yeh, Jim! I'll take care of yeh! I
swear t' Gawd I will!"

"Sure--will yeh, Henry?" the tall soldier
beseeched.

"Yes--yes--I tell yeh--I'll take care of yeh,
Jim!" protested the youth. He could not speak
accurately because of the gulpings in his throat.

But the tall soldier continued to beg in a
lowly way. He now hung babelike to the
youth's arm. His eyes rolled in the wildness of
his terror. "I was allus a good friend t' yeh,
wa'n't I, Henry? I 've allus been a pretty good
feller, ain't I? An' it ain't much t' ask, is it? Jest
t' pull me along outer th' road? I 'd do it fer you,
Wouldn't I, Henry?"

He paused in piteous anxiety to await his
friend's reply.

The youth had reached an anguish where the
sobs scorched him. He strove to express his
loyalty, but he could only make fantastic gestures.

However, the tall soldier seemed suddenly to
forget all those fears. He became again the
grim, stalking specter of a soldier. He went
stonily forward. The youth wished his friend to
lean upon him, but the other always shook his
head and strangely protested. "No--no--no--
leave me be--leave me be--"

His look was fixed again upon the unknown.
He moved with mysterious purpose, and all of
the youth's offers he brushed aside. "No--no--
leave me be--leave me be--"

The youth had to follow.

Presently the latter heard a voice talking
softly near his shoulders. Turning he saw that it
belonged to the tattered soldier. "Ye 'd better
take 'im outa th' road, pardner. There 's a batt'ry
comin' helitywhoop down th' road an' he 'll git
runned over. He 's a goner anyhow in about five
minutes--yeh kin see that. Ye 'd better take 'im
outa th' road. Where th' blazes does he git his
stren'th from?"

"Lord knows!" cried the youth. He was
shaking his hands helplessly.

He ran forward presently and grasped the
tall soldier by the arm. "Jim! Jim!" he coaxed,
"come with me."

The tall soldier weakly tried to wrench himself
free. "Huh," he said vacantly. He stared at the
youth for a moment. At last he spoke as if dimly
comprehending. "Oh! Inteh th' fields? Oh!"

He started blindly through the grass.

The youth turned once to look at the lashing
riders and jouncing guns of the battery. He was
startled from this view by a shrill outcry from
the tattered man.

"Gawd! He's runnin'!"

Turning his head swiftly, the youth saw his
friend running in a staggering and stumbling
way toward a little clump of bushes. His heart
seemed to wrench itself almost free from his
body at this sight. He made a noise of pain.
He and the tattered man began a pursuit. There
was a singular race.

When he overtook the tall soldier he began
to plead with all the words he could find. "Jim
--Jim--what are you doing--what makes you do
this way--you 'll hurt yerself."

The same purpose was in the tall soldier's face.
He protested in a dulled way, keeping his eyes
fastened on the mystic place of his intentions.
"No--no--don't tech me--leave me be--leave
me be--"

The youth, aghast and filled with wonder at the
tall soldier, began quaveringly to question him.
"Where yeh goin', Jim? What you thinking
about? Where you going? Tell me, won't you,
Jim?"

The tall soldier faced about as upon relentless
pursuers. In his eyes there was a great appeal.
"Leave me be, can't yeh? Leave me be fer a
minnit."

The youth recoiled. "Why, Jim," he said, in
a dazed way, "what's the matter with you?"

The tall soldier turned and, lurching danger-
ously, went on. The youth and the tattered
soldier followed, sneaking as if whipped, feeling
unable to face the stricken man if he should again
confront them. They began to have thoughts of
a solemn ceremony. There was something rite-
like in these movements of the doomed soldier.
And there was a resemblance in him to a devotee
of a mad religion, blood-sucking, muscle-wrench-
ing, bone-crushing. They were awed and afraid.
They hung back lest he have at command a
dreadful weapon.

At last, they saw him stop and stand motion-
less. Hastening up, they perceived that his face
wore an expression telling that he had at last
found the place for which he had struggled. His
spare figure was erect; his bloody hands were
quietly at his side. He was waiting with patience
for something that he had come to meet. He was
at the rendezvous. They paused and stood, ex-
pectant.

There was a silence.

Finally, the chest of the doomed soldier began
to heave with a strained motion. It increased in
violence until it was as if an animal was within
and was kicking and tumbling furiously to be
free.

This spectacle of gradual strangulation made
the youth writhe, and once as his friend rolled his
eyes, he saw something in them that made him
sink wailing to the ground. He raised his voice
in a last supreme call.

"Jim--Jim--Jim--"

The tall soldier opened his lips and spoke.
He made a gesture. "Leave me be--don't tech
me--leave me be--"

There was another silence while he waited.

Suddenly, his form stiffened and straightened.
Then it was shaken by a prolonged ague. He
stared into space. To the two watchers there
was a curious and profound dignity in the firm
lines of his awful face.

He was invaded by a creeping strangeness
that slowly enveloped him. For a moment the
tremor of his legs caused him to dance a sort of
hideous hornpipe. His arms beat wildly about
his head in expression of implike enthusiasm.

His tall figure stretched itself to its full height.
There was a slight rending sound. Then it began
to swing forward, slow and straight, in the man-
ner of a falling tree. A swift muscular contortion
made the left shoulder strike the ground first.

The body seemed to bounce a little way from
the earth. "God!" said the tattered soldier.

The youth had watched, spellbound, this
ceremony at the place of meeting. His face
had been twisted into an expression of every
agony he had imagined for his friend.

He now sprang to his feet and, going closer,
gazed upon the pastelike face. The mouth was
open and the teeth showed in a laugh.

As the flap of the blue jacket fell away from
the body, he could see that the side looked as if it
had been chewed by wolves.

The youth turned, with sudden, livid rage,
toward the battlefield. He shook his fist. He
seemed about to deliver a philippic.

"Hell--"

The red sun was pasted in the sky like a wafer.

CHAPTER X.

THE tattered man stood musing.

"Well, he was reg'lar jim-dandy fer nerve,
wa'n't he," said he finally in a little awestruck
voice. "A reg'lar jim-dandy." He thoughtfully
poked one of the docile hands with his foot. "I
wonner where he got 'is stren'th from? I never
seen a man do like that before. It was a funny
thing. Well, he was a reg'lar jim-dandy."

The youth desired to screech out his grief.
He was stabbed, but his tongue lay dead in the
tomb of his mouth. He threw himself again
upon the ground and began to brood.

The tattered man stood musing.

"Look-a-here, pardner," he said, after a time.
He regarded the corpse as he spoke. "He 's up
an' gone, ain't 'e, an' we might as well begin t'
look out fer ol' number one. This here thing is
all over. He 's up an' gone, ain't 'e? An' he 's all
right here. Nobody won't bother 'im. An' I
must say I ain't enjoying any great health m'self
these days."

100

The youth, awakened by the tattered soldier's
tone, looked quickly up. He saw that he was
swinging uncertainly on his legs and that his face
had turned to a shade of blue.

"Good Lord!" he cried, "you ain't goin' t'--
not you, too."

The tattered man waved his hand. "Nary
die," he said. "All I want is some pea soup an'
a good bed. Some pea soup," he repeated
dreamfully.

The youth arose from the ground. "I wonder
where he came from. I left him over there."
He pointed. "And now I find 'im here. And
he was coming from over there, too." He in-
dicated a new direction. They both turned
toward the body as if to ask of it a question.

"Well," at length spoke the tattered man,
"there ain't no use in our stayin' here an' tryin' t'
ask him anything."

The youth nodded an assent wearily. They
both turned to gaze for a moment at the corpse.

The youth murmured something.

"Well, he was a jim-dandy, wa'n't 'e?" said
the tattered man as if in response.

They turned their backs upon it and started
away. For a time they stole softly, treading
with their toes. It remained laughing there in
the grass.

"I'm commencin' t' feel pretty bad," said the
tattered man, suddenly breaking one of his little
silences. "I'm commencin' t' feel pretty damn'
bad."

The youth groaned. "O Lord!" He won-
dered if he was to be the tortured witness of
another grim encounter.

But his companion waved his hand reassur-
ingly. "Oh, I'm not goin' t' die yit! There too
much dependin' on me fer me t' die yit. No, sir!
Nary die! I CAN'T! Ye'd oughta see th' swad
a' chil'ren I've got, an' all like that."

The youth glancing at his companion could
see by the shadow of a smile that he was making
some kind of fun.

As they plodded on the tattered soldier con-
tinued to talk. "Besides, if I died, I wouldn't
die th' way that feller did. That was th' funniest
thing. I'd jest flop down, I would. I never seen
a feller die th' way that feller did.

"Yeh know Tom Jamison, he lives next door
t' me up home. He's a nice feller, he is, an' we
was allus good friends. Smart, too. Smart as a
steel trap. Well, when we was a-fightin' this
atternoon, all-of-a-sudden he begin t' rip up an'
cuss an' beller at me. 'Yer shot, yeh blamed
infernal!'--he swear horrible--he ses t' me. I
put up m' hand t' m' head an' when I looked at
m' fingers, I seen, sure 'nough, I was shot. I
give a holler an' begin t' run, but b'fore I could
git away another one hit me in th' arm an' whirl'
me clean 'round. I got skeared when they was
all a-shootin' b'hind me an' I run t' beat all,
but I cotch it pretty bad. I've an idee I'd
a' been fightin' yit, if t'was n't fer Tom Jami-
son."

Then he made a calm announcement: "There's
two of 'em--little ones--but they 're beginnin' t'
have fun with me now. I don't b'lieve I kin walk
much furder."

They went slowly on in silence. "Yeh look
pretty peek-ed yerself," said the tattered man at
last. "I bet yeh 've got a worser one than yeh
think. Ye'd better take keer of yer hurt. It
don't do t' let sech things go. It might be inside
mostly, an' them plays thunder. Where is it
located?" But he continued his harangue with-
out waiting for a reply. "I see 'a feller git hit
plum in th' head when my reg'ment was a-standin'
at ease onct. An' everybody yelled out to 'im:
Hurt, John? Are yeh hurt much? 'No," ses he.
He looked kinder surprised, an' he went on tellin'
'em how he felt. He sed he didn't feel nothin'.
But, by dad, th' first thing that feller knowed he
was dead. Yes, he was dead--stone dead. So,
yeh wanta watch out. Yeh might have some
queer kind 'a hurt yerself. Yeh can't never tell.
Where is your'n located?"

The youth had been wriggling since the intro-
duction of this topic. He now gave a cry of ex-
asperation and made a furious motion with his
hand. "Oh, don't bother me!" he said. He was
enraged against the tattered man, and could have
strangled him. His companions seemed ever to
play intolerable parts. They were ever uprais-
ing the ghost of shame on the stick of their
curiosity. He turned toward the tattered man as
one at bay. "Now, don't bother me," he re-
peated with desperate menace.

"Well, Lord knows I don't wanta bother any-
body," said the other. There was a little accent
of despair in his voice as he replied, "Lord
knows I 've gota 'nough m' own t' tend to."

The youth, who had been holding a bitter de-
bate with himself and casting glances of hatred
and contempt at the tattered man, here spoke in
a hard voice. "Good-by," he said.

The tattered man looked at him in gaping
amazement. "Why--why, pardner, where yeh
goin'?" he asked unsteadily. The youth looking
at him, could see that he, too, like that other one,
was beginning to act dumb and animal-like. His
thoughts seemed to be floundering about in his
head. "Now--now--look--a--here, you Tom
Jamison--now--I won't have this--this here
won't do. Where--where yeh goin'?"

The youth pointed vaguely. "Over there,"
he replied.

"Well, now look--a--here--now," said the
tattered man, rambling on in idiot fashion. His
head was hanging forward and his words were
slurred. "This thing won't do, now, Tom Jami-
son. It won't do. I know yeh, yeh pig-headed
devil. Yeh wanta go trompin' off with a bad
hurt. It ain't right--now--Tom Jamison--it ain't.
Yeh wanta leave me take keer of yeh, Tom Jami-
son. It ain't--right--it ain't--fer yeh t' go--
trompin' off--with a bad hurt--it ain't--ain't--
ain't right--it ain't."

In reply the youth climbed a fence and
started away. He could hear the tattered man
bleating plaintively.

Once he faced about angrily. "What?"

"Look--a--here, now, Tom Jamison--now--
it ain't--"

The youth went on. Turning at a distance he
saw the tattered man wandering about helplessly
in the field.

He now thought that he wished he was dead.
He believed that he envied those men whose
bodies lay strewn over the grass of the fields and
on the fallen leaves of the forest.

The simple questions of the tattered man had
been knife thrusts to him. They asserted a
society that probes pitilessly at secrets until all is
apparent. His late companion's chance persist-
ency made him feel that he could not keep his
crime concealed in his bosom. It was sure to be
brought plain by one of those arrows which
cloud the air and are constantly pricking, dis-
covering, proclaiming those things which are
willed to be forever hidden. He admitted that
he could not defend himself against this agency.
It was not within the power of vigilance.

CHAPTER XI.

HE became aware that the furnace roar of the
battle was growing louder. Great brown clouds
had floated to the still heights of air before him.
The noise, too, was approaching. The woods
filtered men and the fields became dotted.

As he rounded a hillock, he perceived that the
roadway was now a crying mass of wagons,
teams, and men. From the heaving tangle issued
exhortations, commands, imprecations. Fear was
sweeping it all along. The cracking whips bit
and horses plunged and tugged. The white-
topped wagons strained and stumbled in their
exertions like fat sheep.

The youth felt comforted in a measure by this
sight. They were all retreating. Perhaps, then,
he was not so bad after all. He seated himself
and watched the terror-stricken wagons. They
fled like soft, ungainly animals. All the roarers
and lashers served to help him to magnify the
dangers and horrors of the engagement that he

107
might try to prove to himself that the thing with
which men could charge him was in truth a
symmetrical act. There was an amount of pleas-
ure to him in watching the wild march of this
vindication.

Presently the calm head of a forward-going
column of infantry appeared in the road. It
came swiftly on. Avoiding the obstructions gave
it the sinuous movement of a serpent. The men
at the head butted mules with their musket
stocks. They prodded teamsters indifferent to
all howls. The men forced their way through
parts of the dense mass by strength. The blunt
head of the column pushed. The raving team-
sters swore many strange oaths.

The commands to make way had the ring of a
great importance in them. The men were going
forward to the heart of the din. They were to
confront the eager rush of the enemy. They felt
the pride of their onward movement when the
remainder of the army seemed trying to dribble
down this road. They tumbled teams about
with a fine feeling that it was no matter so long
as their column got to the front in time. This
importance made their faces grave and stern.
And the backs of the officers were very rigid.

As the youth looked at them the black weight
of his woe returned to him. He felt that he was
regarding a procession of chosen beings. The
separation was as great to him as if they had
marched with weapons of flame and banners of
sunlight. He could never be like them. He
could have wept in his longings.

He searched about in his mind for an ade-
quate malediction for the indefinite cause, the
thing upon which men turn the words of final
blame. It--whatever it was--was responsible for
him, he said. There lay the fault.

The haste of the column to reach the battle
seemed to the forlorn young man to be some-
thing much finer than stout fighting. Heroes, he
thought, could find excuses in that long seething
lane. They could retire with perfect self-respect
and make excuses to the stars.

He wondered what those men had eaten that
they could be in such haste to force their way to
grim chances of death. As he watched his envy
grew until he thought that he wished to change
lives with one of them. He would have liked to
have used a tremendous force, he said, throw off
himself and become a better. Swift pictures of
himself, apart, yet in himself, came to him--a
blue desperate figure leading lurid charges with
one knee forward and a broken blade high--a
blue, determined figure standing before a crimson
and steel assault, getting calmly killed on a high
place before the eyes of all. He thought of the
magnificent pathos of his dead body.

These thoughts uplifted him. He felt the
quiver of war desire. In his ears, he heard the
ring of victory. He knew the frenzy of a rapid
successful charge. The music of the trampling
feet, the sharp voices, the clanking arms of the
column near him made him soar on the red wings
of war. For a few moments he was sublime.

He thought that he was about to start for the
front. Indeed, he saw a picture of himself, dust-
stained, haggard, panting, flying to the front at
the proper moment to seize and throttle the dark,
leering witch of calamity.

Then the difficulties of the thing began to
drag at him. He hesitated, balancing awkwardly
on one foot.

He had no rifle; he could not fight with his
hands, said he resentfully to his plan. Well,
rifles could be had for the picking. They were
extraordinarily profuse.

Also, he continued, it would be a miracle if he
found his regiment. Well, he could fight with
any regiment.

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