Dick Prescott's Third Year at West Point Part 1

d.i.c.k Prescott's Third Year at West Point.

by H. Irving Hanc.o.c.k.

CHAPTER I

ON FURLOUGH IN THE OLD HOME TOWN

"My son, Richard. He is home on his furlough from the Military Academy at West Point."

Words would fail in describing motherly pride with which Mrs.

Prescott introduced her son to Mrs. Davidson, wife of the new pastor.

"I am very glad to meet you, Mr. Prescott," said Mrs. Davidson, looking up, for up she had to glance in order to see the face of this tall, distinguished-looking cadet.

d.i.c.k Prescott's return bow was made with the utmost grace, yet without affectation. His natty straw hat he held in his right hand, close to his breast.

Mrs. Davidson was a sensible and motherly woman, who wished to give this young man the pleasantest greeting, but she was plainly at a loss to know what to say. Like many excellent and ordinarily well-informed American people, she had not the haziest notions of West Point.

"You are learning to be a soldier, of course?" she asked.

"Yes, Mrs. Davidson," replied d.i.c.k gravely. Neither in his face nor in his tone was there any hint of the weariness with which he had so often, of late, heard this aimless question repeated.

"And when you are through with your course there," pursued Mrs.

Davidson, "do you enlist in the Army? Or may you, if you prefer, become a sailor in our--er--Navy?"

"Oh, I fear, Mrs. Davidson, that you don't understand," smiled Mrs. Prescott proudly. My son is now going through a very rigorous four years' course at the Military Academy. It is a course that is superior, in most respects to a college training, but that it is devoted to turning out commissioned officers for the Army.

When Richard graduates, in two years more, he will be commissioned by the President as a second lieutenant in the Army."

"Oh, I understood you to say that you were training to become a soldier, Mr. Prescott," cried Mrs. Davidson in some confusion.

"I did not understand that you would become an officer."

"An officer who is not also a good soldier is a most unfortunate and useless fellow under the colors," laughed d.i.c.k lightly.

"But it is so much more honorable to be an officer than to be a mere soldier!" cried the pastor's wife.

"We do not think so in the army, Mrs. Davidson," d.i.c.k answered more responsibility, to be sure, but we feel that the honor falls alike on men of all grades of position who are privileged to wear their country's uniform."

"But don't the officers look down on the common soldiers?" asked Mrs. Davidson curiously.

"If an officer does, then surely he has chosen the wrong career in life, madam," the cadet replied seriously. "We are not taught at West Point that an officer should 'look down' upon an enlisted man. There is a gulf of discipline, but none of manhood, between the enlisted man and his officer. And it frequently happens that the officer who is a graduate from West Point is called upon to welcome, as a brother officer, a man who has just been promoted from the ranks."

Mrs. Davidson looked puzzled, as, indeed, she was. But she suddenly remembered something that made her feel more at ease.

"Why, I saw an officer and some soldiers on a train, the other day," she cried. "The officer had at least eight or ten soldiers with him, under his command. I remember what a fine-looking young man he was. He had what looked like two V's on his sleeve, and I remember that they were yellow. What kind of an officer is the man who wears the two yellow V's?"

"A non-commissioned officer, Mrs. Davidson; a corporal of cavalry."

"Was he higher that you'll be when you graduate from West Point?"

"No; a corporal is an enlisted man, a step above the private soldier.

The sergeant is also an enlisted man, and above the corporal.

Above the sergeant comes the second lieutenant, who is the lowest-ranking commissioned officer."

"Oh, I am sure I never could understand it all," sighed Mrs. Davidson.

"Why don't they have just plain soldiers and captains, and put the captains in a different color of uniform? Then ordinary people could comprehend something about the Army. But in describing that young soldier's uniform, I forgot something, Mr. Prescott. That young soldier, or officer, or whatever he was, beside the two yellow V's, had a white stripe near the hem of his cuff."

"Just one white stripe?" queried d.i.c.k.

"Just one, I am sure."

"Then that one white stripe would show that the corporal, before entering the cavalry, had served one complete enlistment in the infantry."

"Oh, this is simply incomprehensible!" cried the new pastor's wife in comical dismay. "I am certain that I could never learn to know all these things."

"It is a little confusing at first," smiled d.i.c.k's mother with another show of pride. "But I think I am beginning to understand quite a lot of it."

Mrs. Davidson went out of the bookstore conducted by d.i.c.k's parents in the little city of Gridley. d.i.c.k sighed a bit wearily.

"Why don't Americans take a little more pains to understand things American?" he asked his mother, with a comical smile. "People who would be ashamed not to know something about St. Peter's, at Rome, or the London Tower, are not quite sure what the purpose of the United States Military Academy is."

Yet, though some people annoyed him with their foolish questions, he was heartily glad to be back, for the summer, in the dear old home town. So was his chum, Greg Holmes, also a West Point cadet, and, like Prescott, a member of the new second cla.s.s at the United States Military Academy. Both young men had now been in Gridley for forty-eight hours. They had met a host old-time friends, including nearly all of the High School students of former days.

Readers of "_d.i.c.k Prescott's First Year at West Point_" and of "_d.i.c.k Prescott's Second Year at West Point_," are familiar with the careers of the two chums, Prescott and Holmes, at the United States Military Academy. The same readers are also familiar with the life at West Point of Bert Dodge, a former Gridley boy, but who had been appointed a cadet from another part of the state. Our old readers are aware of the fact that Dodge had been forced out of the Military Academy for dishonorable conduct; that it was the cadets, not the authorities, who had compelled his departure, and that Dodge resigned and left before the close of his second year.

Readers of these volumes of the _High School Boys' Series_ know all about Bert Dodge in the course of his career at Gridley High School. Dodge, back in the old days in Gridley, had been a persistent enemy of d.i.c.k & Co., as Prescott and his five chums had always been called in the High School. Of those five chums Greg, as is well known, was d.i.c.k's comrade at West Point. Dave Darrin and Dan Dalzell were now mids.h.i.+pmen at the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis. Their adventures while learning to be United States Navel officers, are fully set forth in The Annapolis Series.

Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton had chosen to go West, where they became civil engineers engaged in railway construction through the wild parts of the country, as fully set forth in the _Young Engineers' Series_.

Just after Mrs. Davidson left the bookstore there were no customers left, so d.i.c.k had a few moments in which to chat with his mother.

"What has become of the fellow Dodge?" asked the young West Pointer.

"Oh, haven't I told you?" asked his mother. A shade of annoyance crossed her face, for she well knew that it was Dodge who, while at West Point, had nearly succeeded in having her son dismissed from the Service on a charge of which Dodge, not d.i.c.k, was guilty.

"No, mother; and I haven't thought to ask."

"Bert Dodge is here in Gridley at present. The Dodge family are occupying their old home here for a part of the summer."

"Do people here understand that Dodge had to resign from West Point in order to escape a court-martial that would have bounced him out of the Military Academy?" d.i.c.k inquired.

"No; very few know it. I have mentioned Dodge's disgrace to only one person beside your father."

"You told Laura Bentley?"

"Yes, d.i.c.k. She had a right to know. Laura has always been your loyal friend. When she reached West Point, last winter, expecting to go to a cadet hop with you, she remained at West Point until you had been tried by court-martial and acquitted on that unjust charge. Laura had a right to know the whole story."

"She surely had," nodded d.i.c.k.