Further on was a camp of insurgents--little, thin, brown fellows,
ragged, dirty, shoeless--each with a sugar-loaf straw hat, a Remington
rifle of the pattern of 1882, or a brand new Krag-Jorgensen donated by
Uncle Sam, and the inevitable and ever ready machéte swinging in a case
of embossed leather on the left hip. Very young they were, and very old;
and wiry, quick-eyed, intelligent, for the most part and, in
countenance, vivacious and rather gentle. There was a little creek next,
and, climbing the bank of the other side, Grafton stopped short, with a
start, in the road. To the right and on a sloping bank lay eight gray
shapes, muffled from head to foot, and Grafton would have known that all
of them were in their last sleep, but one, who lay with his left knee
bent and upright, his left elbow thrust from his blanket, and his hand
on his heart. He slept like a child.
Beyond was the camp of the regulars who had taken part in the fight. On
one side stood a Colonel, who himself had aimed a Hotchkiss gun in the
last battle--covered with grime and sweat, and with the passion of
battle not quite gone from his eyes; and across the road soldiers were
digging one long grave. Grafton pushed on a little further, and on the
top of the ridge and on the grassy sunlit knoll was the camp of the
Riders, just beyond the rifle-pits from which they had driven the
Spaniards. Under a tree to the right lay another row of muffled shapes,
and at once Grafton walked with the Colonel to the hospital, a quarter
of a mile away. The path, thickly shaded and dappled with sunshine, ran
along the ridge through the battlefield, and it was as pretty, peaceful,
and romantic as a lovers' walk in a garden. Here and there, the tall
grass along the path was pressed flat where a wounded man had lain. In
one place, the grass was matted and dark red; nearby was a blood-stained
hat marked with the initials "E. L." Here was the spot where the first
victim of the fight fell. A passing soldier, who reluctantly gave his
name as Blackford, bared his left arm and showed the newspaper man three
places between his wrist and elbow where the skin had been merely
blistered by three separate bullets as he lay fighting unseen enemies.
Further on, lay a dead Spaniard, with covered face.
"There's one," said the Colonel, with a careless gesture. A huge buzzard
flapped from the tree over the dead man as they passed beneath. Beyond
was the open-air hospital, where two more rigid human figures, and where
the wounded lay--white, quiet, uncomplaining.