Well garbed, groomed, and fed was Plume, a handsome, soldierly figure.
Very cool and placid was his look in the spotless white that even then
by local custom had become official dress for Sandy; but beneath the
snowy surface his heart beat with grave disquiet as he studied the
strong, rugged, somber face of the soldier on the floor.
Wren was tall and gaunt and growing gray. His face was deeply lined;
his close-cropped beard was silver-stranded; his arms and legs were
long and sinewy and powerful; his chest and shoulders burly; his
regimental dress had not the cut and finish of the commander's. Too
much of bony wrist and hand was in evidence, too little of grace and
curve. But, though he stood rigidly at attention, with all semblance
of respect and subordination, the gleam in his deep-set eyes, the
twitch of the long fingers, told of keen and pent-up feeling, and he
looked the senior soldier squarely in the face. A sergeant, standing
by the adjutant's desk, tiptoed out into the clerk's room and closed
the door behind him, then set himself to listen. Young Doty, the
adjutant, fiddled nervously with his pen and tried to go on signing
papers, but failed. It was for Plume to break the awkward silence, and
he did not quite know how. Captain Westervelt, quietly entering at the
moment, bowed to the major and took a chair. He had evidently been
sent for.
"Captain Wren," presently said Plume, his fingers trembling a bit as
they played with the paper folder, "I have felt constrained to send
for you to inquire still further into last night's affair--or affairs.
I need not tell you that you may decline to answer if you consider
your interests are--involved. I had hoped this painful matter might be
so explained as to--as to obviate the necessity of extreme measures,
but your second appearance close to Mr. Blakely's quarters, under all
the circumstances, was so--so extraordinary that I am compelled to
call for explanation, if you have one you care to offer."
For a moment Wren stood staring at his commander in amaze. He had
expected to be offered opportunity to state the circumstances leading
to his now deeply deplored attack on Mr. Blakely, and to decline the
offer on the ground that he should have been given that opportunity
before being submitted to the humiliation of arrest. He had intended
to refuse all overtures, to invite trial by court-martial or
investigation by the inspector general, but by no manner of means to
plead for reconsideration now; and here was the post commander, with
whom he had never served until they came to Sandy, a man who hadn't
begun to see the service, the battles, and campaigns that had fallen
to his lot, virtually accusing him of further misdemeanor, when he had
only rushed to save or succor. He forgot all about Sanders or other
witnesses. He burst forth impetuously: "Extraordinary, sir! It would have been most extraordinary if I hadn't
gone with all speed when I heard that cry for help."