After "taps" the company-room quieted save for snores and heavy breathing. But Newt, lying quiet on his cot, still staring at the shadows on the whitewashed wall, was not asleep, and Sergeant Peter Spooner was not asleep. The tropic night-quiet had settled over the empty streets of the city, and the footsteps of occasional pedestrians only emphasized the deep silence.
Suddenly there came to the ears of the private and the ears of the sergeant a far-away, but insistent sound, almost a ghost-sound in the vagueness with which it drifted across the roofs from the north. Yet it brought them both to their feet, and in an instant both stood together by the window. Now it was plain enough, and began swelling from a purring rattle to the crescendo of an approaching wind storm. Somewhere out there in the far distance was the constant splatter of Mausers like rain on a tin roof.
Instantly Sergeant Spooner was arousing B Company and turning them out. From the streets, too, five minutes ago quiet with a cemetery stillness, came a confusion of shouting and rushing, punctuated by the sounds of slamming doors and creaking shutters. Presently the clatter of hoofs and the brazen signals of bugles gave official notice of immediate action.
The men of B Company were dressing with the hurry of firemen, and Sergeant Spooner said quietly:
Then, almost as suddenly as the clamor of the streets rose, it died again, and the city lay silent once more except for the distant, unending roar of musketry.
At regimental headquarters officers were gathering, and companies were falling in under the vigorous exhortation of non-coms. Newt Spooner saw Major Falkins hurry into the room, through whose open door he could see Private Watson at a telegraph key. The major was buckling his saber-belt as he went. About the instrument pressed a cluster of battalion and company officers, crowding eagerly up for news and orders. In a subtle fashion the news from within floated out and communicated itself to the lines of men impatiently shuffling their feet in the streets. The fighting was all along the north front. That was where the Fifth Kentucky's outposts were stationed. That growing volume of Mauser argument, with the duller rumble of the Springfields, probably told of the Kentuckians holding hard against the pressure. Why did not the line fall into column and move forward? Why did they stand here waiting when they were needed there? Then came a rumor from the telegraph key that only two battalions were to go forward, while the third remained in town with the reserves.