The Weber Literary Journal A wave of acute nostalgia swept over the black boy. Home; the dogs; mom; the compelling odor of frying ham and boiling coffee on a morning like this; a roaring fire in the cracked and warped old cook-stove. No logic, no order. These images came uninvited in confused succession. The tears welled up into his eyes, and in the pit of his stomach came a nausea as if he would vomit. Here he was in this army like a rabbit in a box-trap. Nostalgia gave place to bitter meditations on his wrongs. The conscientious guard stood for this idleness as long as he could. Then his indignation overcame his judgment. He strode up behind the unconscious negro, and snarled, "Come ahn, Skunk, you ain't on no pension." And he accompanied the rebuke with a prick of the bayonet. To a bystander, it would have seemed as if the jab of the bayonet had released a powerful steel spring. The axe instantaneously left the ground, described a swift arc, and planted itself with a sickening crunch in the side of the guard's head. He fell with a grunt and lay still. Sherm, himself, was as astonished as anybody. His jaw dropped; he gaped in amazement at that horrible thing on the ground. But only for a second. His brain began to function with dizzy rapidity. He knew what happened to colored boys who dared to raise a hand against a white man. He remembered a young negro back home who had struck a white man with his fist. That young negro had been found the next morning dangling from the limb of a tree, face a blotchy purple, eyes and tongue protruding, neck stretched to a startling length, body riddled with bullets. This for striking a white man. My God! What would they do to a nigger for braining a white man? He must get away from here. Instinctively, he whirled about and ran for the river. The remaining prisoners were hastily gathered under one guard, while the other rushed to the colonel's office with his incoherent tale. By the time a sharpshooter reached the river bank, Sherm was half way across the river, swimming strongly a natural stroke, part side-stroke, part dog-fashion. The sharp-shooter was ex-provost-sergeant Stanger. He walked deliberately down the bank until he was even with the bobbing black object in the river. His eye traveled across the water to a point where the negro would probably land. Fifteen hundred yards, he decided. 14 The Weber Literary Journal He adjusted his sights. He would allow about three inches deflection for the wind. Then he squatted calmly to wait for the negro to swim the remaining four hundred yards. Sergeant Stanger's mind was not idle. For all his Teutonic serenity, he was very human. He made decisions according to emotion; justified his decisions by rationalization; and called the process reasoning. He could not blame the negro for bashing the head of one of those blank-blank-blank's. Himself, he would like to kill about a hundred of them. He glanced at the group of officers with their field glasses out behind the headquarters building. They knew his reputation as a marksman. They could see where his shots fell. They could not bust him for missing his target, but if they suspected him, they could find plenty of other excuses for doing so. He did not want to go to France, as he certainly would have to do if he lost out at headquarters. He was getting along in years and loved comfort. Why, even if he did kill the nigger, he would probably have to stand trial before a general courtmartial such is the inconsistency of a civilian army. Colonel said: "Get him," and handed out the ammunition, but there were no witnesses present at the time. In protecting himself from censure, the colonel might conceivably allow his memory to become faulty. Stranger things have happened. Stanger wished the negro would be so obliging as to drown. The Mississippi is full of dangerous undercurrents. It is no uncommon thing for swimmers to disappear under a seemingly placid surface to be found days later far down stream. The negro was almost across now. Stanger viciously pumped a cartridge into the breech. "Well, nigger," he half whispered, "I'll have to splatter a little mud in your face, anyway." Suddenly the black spot on the surface of the water vanished, only to reappear struggling frantically fifty feet downstream. "Lawdy," sputtered Sherm, "mighty close!" A few lusty strokes brought him into shallow water where the slippery bank was covered with a thin growth of willow brush. There he lay a few moments resting-exulting. Homeward bound now! He pulled himself up, and paused for a last look at the barracks. "Hot dawg!" he shouted. "Good-bye, ole ahmy. Ain't nev' go'n' see dis niggah no mo'." 15