The orderly proceeded to the position occupied by the field and staff officers of the regiment; and, a few moments later, came an order for Lieutenant Somers, with twenty of his men, selected for special duty, to report at the division headquarters.

"You are in luck, Somers; you will have a glorious opportunity to distinguish yourself," said Captain de Banyan, whose second lieutenant was ordered to the command of Somers's company.

"I don't know what it means," replied our lieutenant.

"Don't you, indeed?" added the captain with a smile. "Don't you know what special duty means? On the night before the battle of Solferino----"

"Excuse me, Captain de Banyan; but I am ordered to report forthwith,"

interrupted Somers, who had no desire to hear another "whopper."

The young lieutenant marched off, with his little force, to report as he had been directed. He knew his men well enough to enable him to make a good selection; and he was confident that they would stand by him to the last.

"Do you know Senator Guilford?" demanded the general, after Somers had pa.s.sed through all the forms of reporting.

"I do, general," replied the lieutenant, with a fearful blush, and with a wish in his heart that the distinguished Senator had minded his own business.

"He speaks well of you, Lieutenant Somers," added the general.

"I am very much obliged to him for his kindness; but I never saw him but once in my life."

"He asks a favor for you."

"I am very much obliged to him; but I don't ask any for myself, and I hope you will not grant it. If any favors are bestowed upon me, I prefer to earn them myself."

"Good!" exclaimed the general. "But I a.s.sure you and Senator Guilford that no man in this division of the army will get a position he does not deserve. I a.s.sure you, Lieutenant Somers, I should have thrown the Senator's letter among the waste paper, if I had not known you before. I remember you at Williamsburg; and you did a pretty thing in the wheat-field yesterday. You are just the man I want."

"Thank you, sir; I should be very glad to prove that your good opinion is well founded."

Apart from others, and in a low tone, the general gave his orders to Lieutenant Somers to undertake a very difficult and dangerous scouting expedition.

"Before sundown you will be a prisoner in Richmond, or a first lieutenant," added the general as Somers withdrew.

CHAPTER IX

LIEUTENANT SOMERS CHANGES HIS NAME AND CHARACTER

Like the major-generals in the army, Lieutenant Somers had strong aspirations in the direction of an independent command. Like those distinguished worthies, no doubt, he felt competent to perform bigger things than he had yet been called to achieve in the ordinary routine of duty. He had the blood of heroes in his veins; and, in spite of all he could do to keep his thoughts within the limits of modesty, he found them soaring to the regions of the improbable and fanciful. His imagination led him a wild race, and pictured him in the act of performing marvelous deeds of valor and skill.

Fancy is a blind and reckless leader; and it gave our hero oftentimes a command which his reason would not have permitted him to accept. What boys, and even what men, think, when stimulated by ambition, would be too ridiculous to put upon paper. If their thoughts could be disclosed to the impertinent eye of the world, the proprietors would blushingly disown and disclaim them.

Still, almost every live man and boy gives the reins to his fancy; and in the Army of the Potomac, we will venture to say, there were a hundred thousand privates and officers who permitted themselves to dream that they were brigadiers and major-generals; that they did big things, and received the grateful homage of the world. At any rate, Lieutenant Somers did, modest as he was, even while he felt that he was utterly incompetent to perform the duties inc.u.mbent on the two stars or the one star.

Experience had given him some confidence in his own powers; and there was something delightful in the idea of having an independent command. It was a partial, a very partial, realization of the wanderings of his vivid fancy. He felt able to do something which Lilian Ashford would take pleasure in reading in the newspapers; perhaps something which would prove his fitness for a brigadier's star at some remote period. Now, we have made all this explanation to show how Somers had prepared himself to accomplish some great thing. The mission with which he had been intrusted was an important one; and the safety of the whole left wing of the army might depend upon its faithful performance.

He was wrought up to the highest pitch of patriotic inspiration by the charge which had been laid upon him; and he was determined to bring back the information required of him, even if he had to fly through the air to obtain it. It was of no use to suggest impossibilities to a young man in such a frame of mind; he did not know the meaning of the word. To impress him with the importance of the duty intrusted to him, the general of division had given him a faint outline of the intended movements of the army. If the enemy ma.s.sed his forces in this direction, it was of vital necessity that the general should know it.

Thus prepared and thus inspired, Lieutenant Somers marched his little force to the point from which he proposed to operate. On his right hand there was a dense wood, on the border of which extended one of the numerous cross-roads that checker the country. On his left was another piece of woods, terminating in a point about a quarter of a mile from the road and in the center of a valley.

On the hill beyond was the intrenched line of the rebels. In front of it, at the foot of the slope, was a line of rifle-pits, which were occupied by the rebel pickets. The hill and the woods concealed the operations of the enemy; and no signal station was high enough to obtain the necessary information. The woods on both sides of the open s.p.a.ce were picketed by the rebels; and the rifle-pits in front were an effectual check to the advance of a small force, while a large one could not be sent up without bringing on a general engagement, which had been prohibited by the commanding general.

Lieutenant Somers surveyed the ground, and came to the conclusion that his chance of spending the night in Libby Prison was better than his chance of being made a first lieutenant. The rifle-pits had a chilling effect upon the fine dreams in which his fancy had indulged. He was not a grub, and could not burrow through the earth to the rebel lines; he had no wings, and could not fly over them. The obstacles which are so easily overcome in one's dreams appear mountain-high in real life. He looked troubled and anxious; but, having put his hand to the plow, he was determined not to turn back.

The best way to conquer a difficulty is to charge upon it; and this Somers decided to do, even though he had no well-defined plan for the accomplishment of his purpose. Avoiding the observation of the rebels in the rifle-pits, he moved round, and reached the point of woods on the left of the road.

"Excuse me, Lieutenant Somers," said Sergeant Hapgood with a military salute: "'tain't none o' my business, but I'd like to know where you are goin' to."

"Through this woods," replied Somers doggedly.

"You used to be a good boy, when you was a boy; and I hope you've said your prayers," replied old Hapgood, appalled at the prospect before his young friend.

"Don't you croak, uncle," added Somers.

"The rebels' pickets are up here, not twenty rods distant. Do you calculate to go through them, or over them?"

"Either--just as I can; but I am going through, somehow or other."

"It can't be done! Thunderation! you'll bring down the whole rebel army upon us! You don't think of going over there with only twenty men!"

"I do, uncle. I'm going over on that hill yonder, and I'm coming back again before night."

Hapgood tapped his forehead significantly with his finger to indicate that the young lieutenant had lost his senses.

"I was ordered to do it, and I am going to do it, uncle. You can set your mind at rest on that point."

"It can't be did!" said the old man positively. "I don't keer who told you to do it; it can't be did with less'n twenty thousand men. You will sacrifice yourself and all the rest of us."

"You may return to the camp, if you wish."

"Tom Somers--Lieutenant Somers," said the old man, much hurt by the words of the young officer, "you know I'm not afraid of anything; and I didn't expect you'd say that to me."

"Excuse me, uncle; I didn't mean it. Now, hear me a moment."

In a low tone, Lieutenant Somers told the sergeant the nature of his mission, and what depended upon its prompt and successful execution.

"He ought to have sent a division to do such a job," muttered the old man, taking off his cap, and scratching his bald head. "Howsomever, I'm ready to follow you wherever you choose to go."

"Forward, then," replied Somers; and they advanced cautiously through the woods till they came to a kind of bog-hole, beyond which they discovered the rebel pickets.

The party lay down on the ground, and crawled on the edge of the bog, till they obtained a fair view of the rebels.

"Now, uncle, the time has come, and my plan is formed," said Somers in a whisper. "When they discover you, retreat with the men as fast as you can. Fire on the rebels; but don't pay any attention to me."

"Where are you going?" demanded the old man.

"When you retire, I am going to roll into that gra.s.s. They will follow you; and, as soon as they have pa.s.sed me, I shall move forward."