The Red Badge of Courage
S >>
Stephen Crane >> The Red Badge of Courage
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 | 9 |
10 |
11
He fixed his eye upon a distant and promi-
nent clump of trees where he had concluded the
enemy were to be met, and he ran toward it as
toward a goal. He had believed throughout that
it was a mere question of getting over an unpleas-
ant matter as quickly as possible, and he ran
179
desperately, as if pursued for a murder. His
face was drawn hard and tight with the stress of
his endeavor. His eyes were fixed in a lurid
glare. And with his soiled and disordered dress,
his red and inflamed features surmounted by the
dingy rag with its spot of blood, his wildly
swinging rifle and banging accouterments, he
looked to be an insane soldier.
As the regiment swung from its position out
into a cleared space the woods and thickets be-
fore it awakened. Yellow flames leaped toward
it from many directions. The forest made a tre-
mendous objection.
The line lurched straight for a moment. Then
the right wing swung forward; it in turn was
surpassed by the left. Afterward the center
careered to the front until the regiment was a
wedge-shaped mass, but an instant later the
opposition of the bushes, trees, and uneven places
on the ground split the command and scattered
it into detached clusters.
The youth, light-footed, was unconsciously in
advance. His eyes still kept note of the clump of
trees. From all places near it the clannish yell
of the enemy could be heard. The little flames
of rifles leaped from it. The song of the bullets
was in the air and shells snarled among the tree-
tops. One tumbled directly into the middle of a
hurrying group and exploded in crimson fury.
There was an instant's spectacle of a man, almost
over it, throwing up his hands to shield his eyes.
Other men, punched by bullets, fell in gro-
tesque agonies. The regiment left a coherent
trail of bodies.
They had passed into a clearer atmosphere.
There was an effect like a revelation in the new
appearance of the landscape. Some men work-
ing madly at a battery were plain to them, and
the opposing infantry's lines were defined by the
gray walls and fringes of smoke.
It seemed to the youth that he saw every-
thing. Each blade of the green grass was bold
and clear. He thought that he was aware of
every change in the thin, transparent vapor that
floated idly in sheets. The brown or gray trunks
of the trees showed each roughness of their sur-
faces. And the men of the regiment, with their
starting eyes and sweating faces, running madly,
or falling, as if thrown headlong, to queer,
heaped-up corpses--all were comprehended. His
mind took a mechanical but firm impression, so
that afterward everything was pictured and ex-
plained to him, save why he himself was there.
But there was a frenzy made from this furious
rush. The men, pitching forward insanely, had
burst into cheerings, moblike and barbaric, but
tuned in strange keys that can arouse the dullard
and the stoic. It made a mad enthusiasm that, it
seemed, would be incapable of checking itself
before granite and brass. There was the deli-
rium that encounters despair and death, and is
heedless and blind to the odds. It is a temporary
but sublime absence of selfishness. And because
it was of this order was the reason, perhaps, why
the youth wondered, afterward, what reasons he
could have had for being there.
Presently the straining pace ate up the ener-
gies of the men. As if by agreement, the leaders
began to slacken their speed. The volleys di-
rected against them had had a seeming windlike
effect. The regiment snorted and blew. Among
some stolid trees it began to falter and hesitate.
The men, staring intently, began to wait for some
of the distant walls of smoke to move and dis-
close to them the scene. Since much of their
strength and their breath had vanished, they re-
turned to caution. They were become men
again.
The youth had a vague belief that he had run
miles, and he thought, in a way, that he was now
in some new and unknown land.
The moment the regiment ceased its advance
the protesting splutter of musketry became a
steadied roar. Long and accurate fringes of
smoke spread out. From the top of a small hill
came level belchings of yellow flame that caused
an inhuman whistling in the air.
The men, halted, had opportunity to see some
of their comrades dropping with moans and
shrieks. A few lay under foot, still or wailing.
And now for an instant the men stood, their rifles
slack in their hands, and watched the regiment
dwindle. They appeared dazed and stupid. This
spectacle seemed to paralyze them, overcome
them with a fatal fascination. They stared wood-
enly at the sights, and, lowering their eyes, looked
from face to face. It was a strange pause, and a
strange silence.
Then, above the sounds of the outside commo-
tion, arose the roar of the lieutenant. He strode
suddenly forth, his infantile features black with
rage.
"Come on, yeh fools!" he bellowed. "Come
on! Yeh can't stay here. Yeh must come on."
He said more, but much of it could not be under-
stood.
He started rapidly forward, with his head
turned toward the men. "Come on," he was
shouting. The men stared with blank and yokel-
like eyes at him. He was obliged to halt and
retrace his steps. He stood then with his back
to the enemy and delivered gigantic curses into
the faces of the men. His body vibrated from
the weight and force of his imprecations. And
he could string oaths with the facility of a maiden
who strings beads.
The friend of the youth aroused. Lurching
suddenly forward and dropping to his knees, he
fired an angry shot at the persistent woods. This
action awakened the men. They huddled no
more like sheep. They seemed suddenly to be-
think them of their weapons, and at once com-
menced firing. Belabored by their officers, they
began to move forward. The regiment, involved
like a cart involved in mud and muddle, started
unevenly with many jolts and jerks. The men
stopped now every few paces to fire and load,
and in this manner moved slowly on from trees
to trees.
The flaming opposition in their front grew
with their advance until it seemed that all for-
ward ways were barred by the thin leaping
tongues, and off to the right an ominous demon-
stration could sometimes be dimly discerned.
The smoke lately generated was in confusing
clouds that made it difficult for the regiment to
proceed with intelligence. As he passed through
each curling mass the youth wondered what
would confront him on the farther side.
The command went painfully forward until an
open space interposed between them and the
lurid lines. Here, crouching and cowering be-
hind some trees, the men clung with desperation,
as if threatened by a wave. They looked wild-
eyed, and as if amazed at this furious disturbance
they had stirred. In the storm there was an
ironical expression of their importance. The
faces of the men, too, showed a lack of a certain
feeling of responsibility for being there. It was
as if they had been driven. It was the dominant
animal failing to remember in the supreme mo-
ments the forceful causes of various superficial
qualities. The whole affair seemed incompre-
hensible to many of them.
As they halted thus the lieutenant again be-
gan to bellow profanely. Regardless of the vin-
dictive threats of the bullets, he went about
coaxing, berating, and bedamning. His lips,
that were habitually in a soft and childlike curve,
were now writhed into unholy contortions. He
swore by all possible deities.
Once he grabbed the youth by the arm.
"Come on, yeh lunkhead!" he roared. "Come
on! We'll all git killed if we stay here. We've
on'y got t' go across that lot. An' then"--the
remainder of his idea disappeared in a blue haze
of curses.
The youth stretched forth his arm. "Cross
there?" His mouth was puckered in doubt and
awe.
"Certainly. Jest 'cross th' lot! We can't
stay here," screamed the lieutenant. He poked
his face close to the youth and waved his ban-
daged hand. "Come on!" Presently he grap-
pled with him as if for a wrestling bout. It was
as if he planned to drag the youth by the ear on
to the assault.
The private felt a sudden unspeakable indig-
nation against his officer. He wrenched fiercely
and shook him off.
"Come on herself, then," he yelled. There
was a bitter challenge in his voice.
They galloped together down the regimental
front. The friend scrambled after them. In front
of the colors the three men began to bawl:
"Come on! come on!" They danced and gy-
rated like tortured savages.
The flag, obedient to these appeals, bended its
glittering form and swept toward them. The
men wavered in indecision for a moment, and then
with a long, wailful cry the dilapidated regiment
surged forward and began its new journey.
Over the field went the scurrying mass. It
was a handful of men splattered into the faces of
the enemy. Toward it instantly sprang the yel-
low tongues. A vast quantity of blue smoke
hung before them. A mighty banging made ears
valueless.
The youth ran like a madman to reach the
woods before a bullet could discover him. He
ducked his head low, like a football player. In
his haste his eyes almost closed, and the scene was
a wild blur. Pulsating saliva stood at the corners
of his mouth.
Within him, as he hurled himself forward, was
born a love, a despairing fondness for this flag
which was near him. It was a creation of beauty
and invulnerability. It was a goddess, radiant,
that bended its form with an imperious gesture to
him. It was a woman, red and white, hating and
loving, that called him with the voice of his
hopes. Because no harm could come to it he en-
dowed it with power. He kept near, as if it
could be a saver of lives, and an imploring cry
went from his mind.
In the mad scramble he was aware that the
color sergeant flinched suddenly, as if struck by a
bludgeon. He faltered, and then became motion-
less, save for his quivering knees.
He made a spring and a clutch at the pole.
At the same instant his friend grabbed it from the
other side. They jerked at it, stout and furious,
but the color sergeant was dead, and the corpse
would not relinquish its trust. For a moment
there was a grim encounter. The dead man,
swinging with bended back, seemed to be obsti-
nately tugging, in ludicrous and awful ways, for
the possession of the flag.
It was past in an instant of time. They
wrenched the flag furiously from the dead man,
and, as they turned again, the corpse swayed for-
ward with bowed head. One arm swung high,
and the curved hand fell with heavy protest on
the friend's unheeding shoulder.
CHAPTER XX.
WHEN the two youths turned with the flag
they saw that much of the regiment had crum-
bled away, and the dejected remnant was coming
slowly back. The men, having hurled themselves
in projectile fashion, had presently expended their
forces. They slowly retreated, with their faces
still toward the spluttering woods, and their hot
rifles still replying to the din. Several officers
were giving orders, their voices keyed to screams.
"Where in hell yeh goin'?" the lieutenant was
asking in a sarcastic howl. And a red-bearded
officer, whose voice of triple brass could plainly
be heard, was commanding: "Shoot into 'em!
Shoot into 'em, Gawd damn their souls!" There
was a melee of screeches, in which the men were
ordered to do conflicting and impossible things.
The youth and his friend had a small scuffle
over the flag. "Give it t' me!" "No, let me
keep it!" Each felt satisfied with the other's pos-
session of it, but each felt bound to declare, by
189
an offer to carry the emblem, his willingness to
further risk himself. The youth roughly pushed
his friend away.
The regiment fell back to the stolid trees.
There it halted for a moment to blaze at some
dark forms that had begun to steal upon its track.
Presently it resumed its march again, curving
among the tree trunks. By the time the depleted
regiment had again reached the first open space
they were receiving a fast and merciless fire.
There seemed to be mobs all about them.
The greater part of the men, discouraged,
their spirits worn by the turmoil, acted as if
stunned. They accepted the pelting of the bul-
lets with bowed and weary heads. It was of no
purpose to strive against walls. It was of no use
to batter themselves against granite. And from
this consciousness that they had attempted to
conquer an unconquerable thing there seemed
to arise a feeling that they had been betrayed.
They glowered with bent brows, but danger-
ously, upon some of the officers, more particu-
larly upon the red-bearded one with the voice of
triple brass.
However, the rear of the regiment was fringed
with men, who continued to shoot irritably at the
advancing foes. They seemed resolved to make
every trouble. The youthful lieutenant was per-
haps the last man in the disordered mass. His
forgotten back was toward the enemy. He had
been shot in the arm. It hung straight and rigid.
Occasionally he would cease to remember it, and
be about to emphasize an oath with a sweeping
gesture. The multiplied pain caused him to
swear with incredible power.
The youth went along with slipping, uncertain
feet. He kept watchful eyes rearward. A scowl
of mortification and rage was upon his face. He
had thought of a fine revenge upon the officer
who had referred to him and his fellows as mule
drivers. But he saw that it could not come to
pass. His dreams had collapsed when the mule
drivers, dwindling rapidly, had wavered and hes-
itated on the little clearing, and then had recoiled.
And now the retreat of the mule drivers was a
march of shame to him.
A dagger-pointed gaze from without his black-
ened face was held toward the enemy, but his
greater hatred was riveted upon the man, who,
not knowing him, had called him a mule driver.
When he knew that he and his comrades had
failed to do anything in successful ways that might
bring the little pangs of a kind of remorse upon
the officer, the youth allowed the rage of the baf-
fled to possess him. This cold officer upon a
monument, who dropped epithets unconcernedly
down, would be finer as a dead man, he thought.
So grievous did he think it that he could
never possess the secret right to taunt truly in
answer.
He had pictured red letters of curious revenge.
"We ARE mule drivers, are we?" And now he
was compelled to throw them away.
He presently wrapped his heart in the cloak
of his pride and kept the flag erect. He ha-
rangued his fellows, pushing against their chests
with his free hand. To those he knew well he
made frantic appeals, beseeching them by name.
Between him and the lieutenant, scolding and
near to losing his mind with rage, there was felt a
subtle fellowship and equality. They supported
each other in all manner of hoarse, howling pro-
tests.
But the regiment was a machine run down.
The two men babbled at a forceless thing. The
soldiers who had heart to go slowly were con-
tinually shaken in their resolves by a knowledge
that comrades were slipping with speed back to
the lines. It was difficult to think of reputation
when others were thinking of skins. Wounded
men were left crying on this black journey.
The smoke fringes and flames blustered al-
ways. The youth, peering once through a sud-
den rift in a cloud, saw a brown mass of troops,
interwoven and magnified until they appeared to
be thousands. A fierce-hued flag flashed before
his vision.
Immediately, as if the uplifting of the smoke
had been prearranged, the discovered troops
burst into a rasping yell, and a hundred flames
jetted toward the retreating band. A rolling
gray cloud again interposed as the regiment dog-
gedly replied. The youth had to depend again
upon his misused ears, which were trembling
and buzzing from the melee of musketry and yells.
The way seemed eternal. In the clouded haze
men became panicstricken with the thought that
the regiment had lost its path, and was proceed-
ing in a perilous direction. Once the men who
headed the wild procession turned and came push-
ing back against their comrades, screaming that
they were being fired upon from points which
they had considered to be toward their own lines.
At this cry a hysterical fear and dismay beset the
troops. A soldier, who heretofore had been am-
bitious to make the regiment into a wise little
band that would proceed calmly amid the huge-
appearing difficulties, suddenly sank down and
buried his face in his arms with an air of bowing
to a doom. From another a shrill lamentation
rang out filled with profane allusions to a general.
Men ran hither and thither, seeking with their
eyes roads of escape. With serene regularity, as
if controlled by a schedule, bullets buffed into
men.
The youth walked stolidly into the midst of
the mob, and with his flag in his hands took a
stand as if he expected an attempt to push him to
the ground. He unconsciously assumed the atti-
tude of the color bearer in the fight of the pre-
ceding day. He passed over his brow a hand
that trembled. His breath did not come freely.
He was choking during this small wait for the
crisis.
His friend came to him. "Well, Henry, I
guess this is good-by--John."
"Oh, shut up, you damned fool!" replied the
youth, and he would not look at the other.
The officers labored like politicians to beat
the mass into a proper circle to face the men-
aces. The ground was uneven and torn. The
men curled into depressions and fitted them-
selves snugly behind whatever would frustrate
a bullet.
The youth noted with vague surprise that the
lieutenant was standing mutely with his legs far
apart and his sword held in the manner of a cane.
The youth wondered what had happened to his
vocal organs that he no more cursed.
There was something curious in this little in-
tent pause of the lieutenant. He was like a babe
which, having wept its fill, raises its eyes and
fixes upon a distant toy. He was engrossed in
this contemplation, and the soft under lip quivered
from self-whispered words.
Some lazy and ignorant smoke curled slowly.
The men, hiding from the bullets, waited anx-
iously for it to lift and disclose the plight of the
regiment.
The silent ranks were suddenly thrilled by the
eager voice of the youthful lieutenant bawling
out: "Here they come! Right onto us,
b'Gawd!" His further words were lost in a roar
of wicked thunder from the men's rifles.
The youth's eyes had instantly turned in the
direction indicated by the awakened and agitated
lieutenant, and he had seen the haze of treachery
disclosing a body of soldiers of the enemy. They
were so near that he could see their features.
There was a recognition as he looked at the types
of faces. Also he perceived with dim amazement
that their uniforms were rather gay in effect,
being light gray, accented with a brilliant-hued
facing. Too, the clothes seemed new.
These troops had apparently been going for-
ward with caution, their rifles held in readiness,
when the youthful lieutenant had discovered
them and their movement had been interrupted
by the volley from the blue regiment. From the
moment's glimpse, it was derived that they had
been unaware of the proximity of their dark-
suited foes or had mistaken the direction. Al-
most instantly they were shut utterly from the
youth's sight by the smoke from the energetic
rifles of his companions. He strained his vision
to learn the accomplishment of the volley, but the
smoke hung before him.
The two bodies of troops exchanged blows in
the manner of a pair of boxers. The fast angry
firings went back and forth. The men in blue
were intent with the despair of their circum-
stances and they seized upon the revenge to be
had at close range. Their thunder swelled loud
and valiant. Their curving front bristled with
flashes and the place resounded with the clangor
of their ramrods. The youth ducked and dodged
for a time and achieved a few unsatisfactory
views of the enemy. There appeared to be many
of them and they were replying swiftly. They
seemed moving toward the blue regiment, step
by step. He seated himself gloomily on the
ground with his flag between his knees.
As he noted the vicious, wolflike temper of
his comrades he had a sweet thought that if the
enemy was about to swallow the regimental
broom as a large prisoner, it could at least have
the consolation of going down with bristles for-
ward.
But the blows of the antagonist began to
grow more weak. Fewer bullets ripped the air,
and finally, when the men slackened to learn of
the fight, they could see only dark, floating
smoke. The regiment lay still and gazed. Pres-
ently some chance whim came to the pestering
blur, and it began to coil heavily away. The men
saw a ground vacant of fighters. It would have
been an empty stage if it were not for a few
corpses that lay thrown and twisted into fantastic
shapes upon the sward.
At sight of this tableau, many of the men in
blue sprang from behind their covers and made
an ungainly dance of joy. Their eyes burned
and a hoarse cheer of elation broke from their
dry lips.
It had begun to seem to them that events were
trying to prove that they were impotent. These
little battles had evidently endeavored to demon-
strate that the men could not fight well. When
on the verge of submission to these opinions, the
small duel had showed them that the propor-
tions were not impossible, and by it they had
revenged themselves upon their misgivings and
upon the foe.
The impetus of enthusiasm was theirs again.
They gazed about them with looks of uplifted
pride, feeling new trust in the grim, always
confident weapons in their hands. And they
were men.
CHAPTER XXI.
PRESENTLY they knew that no firing threat-
ened them. All ways seemed once more opened
to them. The dusty blue lines of their friends
were disclosed a short distance away. In the
distance there were many colossal noises, but in
all this part of the field there was a sudden
stillness.
They perceived that they were free. The
depleted band drew a long breath of relief
and gathered itself into a bunch to complete
its trip.
In this last length of journey the men began
to show strange emotions. They hurried with
nervous fear. Some who had been dark and un-
faltering in the grimmest moments now could not
conceal an anxiety that made them frantic. It
was perhaps that they dreaded to be killed in
insignificant ways after the times for proper
military deaths had passed. Or, perhaps, they
thought it would be too ironical to get killed at
199
the portals of safety. With backward looks of
perturbation, they hastened.
As they approached their own lines there was
some sarcasm exhibited on the part of a gaunt
and bronzed regiment that lay resting in the
shade of trees. Questions were wafted to them.
"Where th' hell yeh been?"
"What yeh comin' back fer?"
"Why didn't yeh stay there?"
"Was it warm out there, sonny?"
"Goin' home now, boys?"
One shouted in taunting mimicry: "Oh,
mother, come quick an' look at th' sojers!"
There was no reply from the bruised and bat-
tered regiment, save that one man made broad-
cast challenges to fist fights and the red-bearded
officer walked rather near and glared in great
swashbuckler style at a tall captain in the other
regiment. But the lieutenant suppressed the
man who wished to fist fight, and the tall cap-
tain, flushing at the little fanfare of the red-
bearded one, was obliged to look intently at some
trees.
The youth's tender flesh was deeply stung by
these remarks. From under his creased brows
he glowered with hate at the mockers. He
meditated upon a few revenges. Still, many in
the regiment hung their heads in criminal fashion,
so that it came to pass that the men trudged with
sudden heaviness, as if they bore upon their
bended shoulders the coffin of their honor. And
the youthful lieutenant, recollecting himself, be-
gan to mutter softly in black curses.
They turned when they arrived at their old
position to regard the ground over which they
had charged.
The youth in this contemplation was smitten
with a large astonishment. He discovered that
the distances, as compared with the brilliant
measurings of his mind, were trivial and ridicu-
lous. The stolid trees, where much had taken
place, seemed incredibly near. The time, too,
now that he reflected, he saw to have been short.
He wondered at the number of emotions and
events that had been crowded into such little
spaces. Elfin thoughts must have exaggerated
and enlarged everything, he said.
It seemed, then, that there was bitter justice
in the speeches of the gaunt and bronzed vet-
erans. He veiled a glance of disdain at his fel-
lows who strewed the ground, choking with dust,
red from perspiration, misty-eyed, disheveled.
They were gulping at their canteens, fierce to
wring every mite of water from them, and they
polished at their swollen and watery features
with coat sleeves and bunches of grass.
However, to the youth there was a consider-
able joy in musing upon his performances during
the charge. He had had very little time pre-
viously in which to appreciate himself, so that
there was now much satisfaction in quietly think-
ing of his actions. He recalled bits of color that
in the flurry had stamped themselves unawares
upon his engaged senses.
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 | 9 |
10 |
11