The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Iron Game, by Henry Francis Keenan

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Title: The Iron Game A Tale of the War

Author: Henry Francis Keenan

Release Date: November 12, 2003 [EBook #10062]

Language: English

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[Transcriber's Note: The spelling inconsistencies of the original have been retained in this etext.]

The Iron Game

A TALE OF THE WAR

BY

HENRY F. KEENAN

    "Heavy and solemn the cloudy column
     Over the green fields marching came,
     Measureless spread like a table bread
     For the cold grim dice of the iron game."

1898

TO

BERNARD JOHN McGRANN

WHOSE LIFE AND CONDUCT EMBODY AND ILLUSTRATE

THE MANLINESS, MODESTY, AND WORTH

THAT FANCY DELIGHTS TO EMBALM IN FICTION

THIS BOOK IS INSCRIBED

BY ONE AMONG THE MANY WITNESSES OF HIS NOBLE CAREER

HENRY F. KEENAN

NEW YORK, 25th March, 1891.

CONTENTS

BOOK I.

THE CARIBEES.

CHAPTER

I.—THE BOY IN BLUE II.—FLAG AND FAITH III.—MALBROOK S'EN VA-T-EN GUERRE IV.—GUELPH AND GHIBELLINE V.—A NAPOLEONIC EPIGRAM VI.—ON THE POTOMAC VII.—THE STEP THAT COSTS VIII.—AN ARMY WITH BANNERS IX.—"THE ASSYRIAN CAME DOWN LIKE THE WOLF ON THE FOLD" X.—BLOOD AND IRON XI.—THE LEGIONS OF VARUS

BOOK II.

THE HOSTAGES.

XII.—THE AFTERMATH XIII.—A COMEDY OF TERRORS XIV.—UNDER TWO FLAGS XV.—ROSEDALE XVI.—A MASQUE IN ARCADY XVII.—TREASON AND STRATAGEMS XVIII.—A CAMPAIGN OF PLOTS XIX.—"HE EITHER FEARS HIS FATE TOO MUCH" XX.—A CATASTROPHE XXI.—THE STORY OF THE NIGHT XXII.—A CARPET-KNIGHT XXIII.—ALL'S FAIR IN LOVE AND WAR

BOOK III.

THE DESERTERS.

XXIV.—BETWEEN THE LINES XXV.—PHANTASMAGORIA XXVI.—IN THE UNION LINES XXVII.—"THE ABSENT ARE ALWAYS IN THE WRONG" XXVIII.—THE WORLD WENT VERY ILL THEN XXIX.—A WOMAN'S REASON XXX.—A GAME OF CHANCE XXXI.—TWO BLADES OF THE SAME STEEL XXXII.—THE LOST CARIBEES XXXIII.—FATHER ABRAHAM'S JOKE

BOOK I.

THE CARIBEES.

CHAPTER I.

THE BOY IN BLUE.

When expulsion from college, in his junior years, was visited upon Jack Sprague, he straightway became the hero of Acredale. And, though the grave faculty had felt constrained to vindicate college authority, it was well known that they sympathized with the infraction of decorum that obliged them to put this mark of disgrace upon one of the most promising of their students.

All his young life Jack had dreamed of West Point and the years of training that were to fit him for the glories of war. He knew the battles of the Revolution as other boys knew the child-lore of the nursery. He had the campaigns of Marlborough, the strategy of Turenne, the inspirations of the great Frederick, and the prodigies of Napoleon, as readily on the end of his tongue as his comrades had the struggles of the Giant Killer or the tactics of Robinson Crusoe. When, inspired by the promise of West Point, he had mastered the repugnant rubrics of the village academy, the statesman of his district conferred the promised nomination upon his school rival, Wesley Boone, Jack passionately refused to pursue the arid paths of learning, and declared his purpose of becoming a pirate, a scout, or some other equally fascinating child of nature delightful to the boyish mind.

When Jack Sprague entered Warchester College, he carried with him the light baggage of learning picked up at the Acredale Academy. At his entrance to the sequestered quadrangles of Dessau Hall, Jack's frame of mind was very much like the passionate discontent of the younger son of a feudal lord whose discrepant birthright doomed him to the gown instead of the sword.

Long before the senior year he had allured a chosen band about him who shared his eager aspiration for war, and when the other fellows dawdled in society or wrangled in debate, these young Alexanders set their tents in the college campus and fought the campaigns of Frederick or Napoleon over again. Jack did not give much heed to the menacing signs of civil war that came day by day from the tempestuous spirits North and South. A Democrat, as his fathers had been before him, he saw no probability of the pomp and circumstance of glorious war in the noisy wrangling of politicians. The defeat of Douglas, the Navarre of the young Democracy of the North, amazed him: but all thought of Lincoln asserting the national authority, and reviving the splendor of Jackson and Madison, was looked upon as the step between the sublime and the ridiculous that reasoning men refuse to consider.

When, however, the stupefying news came that a national garrison had been fired upon by the South Carolinians, in Charleston Harbor, the college boys took sides strongly. There were many in the classes from Maryland and Virginia. These were as ardent in admiration of their Southern compatriots as the Northern boys were for the insulted Union. Months passed, and, although the forces of war were arraying themselves behind the thin veil of compromise and negotiation, the public mind only languidly convinced itself that actual war would come.

The college was divided into hostile camps. The "Secessionists," led by Vincent Atterbury, Jack's old-time chief crony, went so far as to hoist the flag of the Montgomery (Jeff Davis's) government on the campus pole, one morning in April. A fierce fight followed, in which Jack's ardent partisans made painful havoc with the limbs of the enemy—Atterbury, their leader, being carted from the campus, under the horrified eyes of the faculty, dying, as it was thought. Then followed expulsion. When the solemn words were spoken in chapel, the culprit bore up with great serenity. But when he announced that he had enlisted in the army, then such an uproar, such an outburst, that the session was at an end. Even the grave president looked sympathetic. The like of it was never seen in a sober college since Antony with Cleopatra invaded the Academy at Alexandria. The boys flung themselves upon the abashed Jack. They hugged him, raised him on their shoulders, carried him out on the campus, and, forming a ring round him, swore, in the classic form dear to collegians, that they would follow him; that they would be his soldiers, and fight