Chapter XII: An Unexpected Friend at Court

During the remainder of the night none of the four Khaki Boys slept much. The very nature of Ignace's fragmentary information was calculated to keep his bunkies awake for a while. Ignace himself tossed restlessly about on his cot. Though his conscience did not trouble him, his nose pained him.

Dropping into fitful slumber just as dawn was graying in the east, he was cautiously awakened a little before first call by Roger, who was always first of the four to open his eyes in the morning.

"Sorry to do it, old man," apologized Roger in a whisper, "but we mayn't have another chance to talk. Get dressed as quietly as you can. I'm going to wake up Jimmy and Bob."

Bob and Jimmy next interviewed, the quartette dressed with noiseless speed. Directly after first call they gathered about Ignace, who in an undertone regaled them with an account of the fight.

"Now listen to me, Iggy," counseled Bob in low, guarded tones. "When you get on the carpet before the K. O. you tell him just what you told us and stick to it. Don't you let Bixton put it over you. Naturally he'll try it. It'll be your word against his."

"Too bad somebody else didn't see him at his dirty work," muttered Jimmy. "Wish we hadn't gone off to Tremont. Then this wouldn't have happened."

"What you should have done, Ignace, was just to hold onto him and raise an alarm." Roger's face indicated troubled sympathy.

"So think I," protested Ignace. "Get up quick an' try. Him no think I am the wake. Jus' I catch, him yell; hit me the nose. Then am I the mad. Hit too; ver' strong poonch. So is it the fight."

"So is it," commented Bob grimly. "You're in for it, Iggy. All you can do is to speak your little piece, and take your medicine like a lamb. You're in the Army now. Oh, boy!" The rueful intonation of this last brought the flicker of a smile to three very gloomy faces.

"Break away!" warned Jimmy _sotto-voce_, as he sighted Sergeant Dexter bearing down upon them.

As Roger had feared, the sergeant was on the trail of the belligerents, neither of whom were to be allowed to mingle with their comrades, pending the action of the commanding officer, to whom he had already sent a written report of the disturbance.

Following one o'clock Assembly that day, came the dread summons that saw both Ignace and Bixton dropped out of ranks and marched off to headquarters under guard, there to give an account of themselves to that awe-inspiring person, the K. O., which is Army vernacular for the commanding officer. It was a highly uncomfortable moment for both when they were brought into the presence of a most austere-faced commandant, whose penetrating blue eyes pierced them through and through, as they came to attention before his desk.

With him was Sergeant Dexter, who eyed the two with an expression of profound disgust. The sergeant was feeling decidedly sore over the whole affair. It put him in an unpleasant light. Having stared the culprits fairly out of countenance, Major Stearns proceeded, with due deliberation, to pick up the report from his desk, reading it aloud in a dry, hard tone that fully indicated his great displeasure.

"This is a full report of what occurred last night?" he asked, turning to Sergeant Dexter.

"It is, sir," replied the sergeant, saluting.

"What's your name? What have you to say for yourself?" he next rapped out severely, addressing Bixton. The man's left eye showed all too plainly the result of that scrimmage in the dark.

"Bixton, sir. What happened last night was not my fault, sir," returned Bixton, almost defiantly. "A little after eleven o'clock I woke up and found I was thirsty. I left my cot to get a drink of water. I crossed the room as quiet as I could, and started down the squad room. I stumbled a little in the dark and stopped for a minute. Next thing I knew a man had jumped on me and was trying to hit me. It surprised me so I yelled right out. He kept on hitting me, so I had to defend myself and----"

"That is no the trut'," came the angry contradiction. Ignace glared righteous indignation at his traducer. "Never I----"

"Silence!" thundered the K. O. "Don't you dare speak until you're told to talk!"

"'Scuse," muttered Ignace, too utterly abashed by the rebuke to be soldier-like.

"You state," the Major resumed his inquiry, "that this man here attacked you last night in the dark without cause?"

"Yes, sir."

"Humph! Have you ever before had any trouble with him?"

"Once before, sir." A baleful gleam of triumph shot into the man's pale eyes.

"When and where? Tell me about it."

"One day quite a while ago he was talking loud in barracks when I was trying to rest. I asked him to stop it, and he wouldn't pay any attention. Then I asked him again to stop making so much noise, and he jumped on me just the same as he did last night. He got me down and would have half-killed me if one of the fellows he runs with hadn't come in and pulled him off. As soon as I knew last night who was fighting me I wasn't surprised any more. I knew he'd been laying for me and so----"

"That will do." The major cut him off sharply.

Fixing a severe glance on Sergeant Dexter he asked, "Why didn't you make a report of this first fight between these two men?"

"I knew nothing about it," was the chagrined answer. "I was certainly _not_ in the barrack when it occurred."

"Humph!" came the dry repetition. "You seem to be hunting for trouble, my man," was the commanding officer's grim opinion, as he looked poor Ignace sternly over. "If you've anything to say, I'll hear it." The tone indicated that more than enough had already been said. "What's your name? Speak up."

Ignace drew a deep, sighing breath. Raising his head with a proud little air, which he had unconsciously borrowed from Jimmy, he said, with slow dignity: "I am one a Pole, Ignace Pulinski, sir. I am no the liar, sir. Now say I the trut' all. You no believe, I can no help." Quite unemotionally, and with frequent groping for a word that eluded him, Ignace proceeded in his broken speech to give a detailed account of Bixton's repeated churlish conduct toward himself since he had first encountered him in Company E's barrack. Neither did the K. O. interrupt him, but allowed him to go on talking, his keen eyes never leaving the Polish boy's stolid face.

"Yeserday my three Brothar get the pass," pursued Ignace doggedly. "Then I all 'lone. Bob say, 'you stay wake we come back.' I say, 'So will I.' Taps him come, I ver' sleepy, but no go sleep. So wait I an' watch. After while think now is mid the night. My Brothar no yet come. I look to the stair, then, know I no why, look round. I see this man--so." Ignace leaned forward to illustrate. "He have the hand reach out the rack Jimmy, my ver' bes' Brothar. I think he go steal something. Once we write the lettar. Leave on the shelf Jimmy. In morning no lettar. So las' night think him mebbe t'ief. I think catch, keep till sergeant come. Then him yell an' hit me the nose. So am I the mad. Hit, too; ver' strong poonch. So is it the fight," ended Ignace placidly, using the precise words in which he had recounted the fray to his bunkies.

"That's a big lie from beginning to end! He's trying to save his own face." This time it was Bixton who forgot himself. His face aflame, he turned menacingly upon his accuser. "You dirty, foreign trash----"

"Hold your tongue! Such language is unbecoming enough in itself, let alone in the presence of your commanding officer." The probing eyes of the commandant grew steely, his jaws came together with a snap on the last word. "The stories of you two men don't agree in the least, except on one point," he continued harshly. "You are both guilty of brawling and thus disgracing the Service. Sergeant----" Still standing at rigid attention, the non-com. tried to look even more attentive. "Bring the man you say knows something of this affair from the other room."

Smartly saluting, the sergeant wheeled and stepped to the door of an inner room. Flinging it open he disappeared, to return almost instantly with a soldier, whose dark, rugged face was set in purposeful lines.

"This is the man, sir," reported the sergeant.

Momentary consternation showed itself in Bixton's face as he viewed the unexpected witness; then a sneer played about his lips. Ignace, however, stared at the newcomer in blank, absolute wonder. The sergeant's report, read out by the K. O., had contained nothing about this third party, who, nevertheless, it seemed, had something to say about last night's disturbance. Now the Pole listened with strained attention as Private Schnitzel, the man whose acquaintance he had made only yesterday, made prompt replies to the major's preliminary questions.

"Tell me what you saw last night," commanded the K. O.

"I was awake and saw Bixton leave his cot last night, sir. He crossed the room and stopped, as well as I could see in the dim light, in front of the vacant cots that belong to the men that were away. I saw him reach out his hand. Then I heard him yell and knew someone had caught hold of him. I knew it must be Pulinski who had grabbed him, because he must have thought just as I did that Bixton was up to something crooked."

"Never mind what you thought," frowned the major. "Is that all you saw? You are holding nothing back?"

"That is all I saw, sir. I have told you everything I knew about _last night_, sir, except that I saw the fight and all that happened afterward when the sergeant came."

"What do you know concerning the trouble between these two men previous to this disgraceful affair?" The K. O. had caught the slight stress laid on Schnitzel's words, "last night." "Were you in the squad room when the first brawl between them took place?"

"Yes, sir."

"Give me an impartial account of it."

Schnitzel complied with a terse recital of the occurrence, which in every detail corroborated the statements which Ignace had made.

"Are you ready to take solemn oath, if necessary, that what you have just stated is absolutely true in every respect?"

"Yes, sir."

"Very good. That will be all for the present. You may go."

Saluting, Schnitzel wheeled and walked briskly from the room.

An oppressive silence fell as the sound of his retreating footfalls died out, during which the K. O. coldly scrutinized the pair before him. When at last he spoke, he addressed himself to Bixton.

"According to the testimony of two men, you were behaving in a suspicious manner when Pulinski attacked you. If you were on your way to get a drink of water, why did you stop to prowl about another man's cot?"

"I didn't stop on purpose, sir," denied Bixton. "I stumbled and nearly fell. In the dark it might have looked different to those two men, though."

"I'd advise you to carry yourself so straight hereafter that what you do won't 'look different' to any man in your barrack," was the sarcastic retort. "Mind your own business, and keep to your own side of the squad room.

"As for you," he stared hard at Ignace, "keep your too-ready fists to yourself. A rowdy who can't control himself isn't fit to be a soldier. Loss of self-control in war time has put more than one man against a blank wall, facing a firing squad. If you see a man acting in what you think is a suspicious manner, report him to your sergeant. Don't fly at him like a savage and start to pummel him. Leave discipline to your officers. That's what they're here for.

"You two men are both guilty of disgraceful and disorderly conduct. If you're ever brought on the carpet again for fighting or misbehavior in barracks it will go hard with you. You will be confined to your company street for thirty days, without privileges and with extra fatigue. If that doesn't teach you soldierly behavior, we have stronger methods of dealing with such ruffians as you."

Having delivered himself of a few further biting remarks relative to his highly uncomplimentary opinion of both men, the K. O. ordered them back to barracks, instructing the sergeant to keep a close watch on them, and see that his orders regarding them went into instant effect.

To Ignace it seemed unbelievable that he should be returning to barracks. He had fully expected to land in the guard-house for at least twenty days. He was divided between humiliation at the rebuke he had just received, and dazed happiness at the thought of again being with his Brothers. He was also deeply grateful to Schnitzel, whom he fully realized had tried to befriend him.

Though the commanding officer had reprimanded both himself and Bixton with impartial severity, Ignace could not know that of the two he had made a far better impression on the "ver' cross major." Behind Major Stearns' impassive features had lurked a certain sympathy for the man who had been too hasty with his fists in the protection of his friend's property. The K. O. was of the private opinion that whereas Ignace had told the truth, Bixton had lied. A keen student of human nature, he had arrived at a fairly correct estimate of the latter. The testimony against him had been too vague, however, on which to hold him for any charge other than that of disorderly conduct. He had, accordingly, been obliged to consider the two combatants as equally guilty. He was strongly of the belief, however, that Bixton would bear watching, and made mental note that he would instruct Sergeant Dexter to keep a special lookout in that direction.

Bixton's face was not good to see as he returned to barracks. He was consumed with a black and unreasoning rage against the world in general. Most of all he hated Schnitzel. Schnitzel had tried to "queer" him. Well, he had failed. Now he, Bixton, would never rest until he "got even" with the "nosey tattle-tale." He would "queer" Schnitzel no matter how long it took him. When he was through, Schnitzel would find himself in for something worse than a "bawling-out" from the K. O., extra fatigue and thirty days' loss of liberty and privileges.