"Cynthiana"--but now Forrest did not wait for Drew's affirmative answer--"and Harrisburg, Franklin.... It's a long line of battles, ain't it, boy? A long line. And you were nineteen last week. You know, Rennie, the Union Army gives medals to those they think have earned them." "I've heard tell of that, suh." The General's hand, brown, strong, went to the officer's hat weighing down a pile of papers on the table. With a quick twist, Forrest ripped off the tassled gold cord which distinguished it, smoothing out the loop of bullion between thumb and forefinger. "We don't give medals, Sergeant. But I think a good soldier might just be granted a birthday present without any one gittin' too excited about how military that is." He held out the cord, and Drew took it a bit dazedly. "Thank you, suh. I'm sure proud...." A wave of Forrest's hand put a period to his thanks. "A long line of battles," the General repeated, "too long a line--an end to it comin' soon. Did you ever think, boy, of what you were goin' to do after the war?" "Well, there's the West, suh. Open country out there--" Forrest's eyes were bright, alert. "Yes, and we might even hold the West. We'll see--we'll have to see. Your report accepted, Sergeant." It was plainly a dismissal. As Drew saluted, the General laid his hat back on the tallest pile of papers. Busy at the table, he might have already forgotten Drew. But the Kentuckian, pausing outside the door to examine the hat cord once more, knew that he would never forget. No, there were no medals worn in the ragged, thin lines of the shrinking Confederate Army. But his birthday gift--Drew's fist closed about the cord jealously--that was something he would have, always. Only, nowadays, how long was "always"? "That's a right smart-lookin' mount, Sarge!" Drew looked at the pair of lounging messengers grinning at him from the front porch of headquarters. He loosened the reins and led the bony animal a step or two before mounting. Shawnee, nimble-footed as a cat, a horse that had known almost as much about soldiering as his young rider. Then Hannibal, the mule from Cadiz, that had served valiantly through battle and retreat, to die in a Tennessee stream bed. And now this bone-rack of a gray mule with one lop ear, a mind of his own, and a gait which could set one's teeth on edge when you pushed him into any show of speed. The animal's long, melancholy face, his habit of braying mournfully in the moonlight--until Westerners compared him unfavorably with the coyotes of the Plains--had earned him the name Croaker; and he was part of the loot they had brought out of the bushwhackers' camp.