The Cup of Trembling, and Other StoriesFoote, Mary Hallock
General
The Cup of Trembling, and Other Stories
Foote, Mary Hallock
United States -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction
"Whose kid is that?" asked the man who walked beside Henniker, seeing
the gesture and the look that passed between the man and the boy. "He's
as handsome as they make 'em," he added, smiling.
Henniker did not reply in the proud word "Mine." A sudden heat rushed to
his eyes, his chest was tight to bursting. He pulled his hat down and
tramped along. The shuffling feet of the prisoners passed on down the
middle of the street; the double line of guards kept step on either
side. The dust arose and blended the moving shapes, prisoners and guards
together, and blotted them out in the distance.
Callie had not seen her old lover at all. "Great is the recuperative
power of the human heart." She had been looking at Corporal Niles, who
could not turn his well-drilled head to look at her. But a side-spark
from his blue eye shot out in her direction, and made her blush and
cease to smile. Corporal Niles carried his head a little higher and
walked a little straighter after that; and Callie went slowly through
the gates, and sat a long while on one of the benches in the park, with
her elbow resting on the iron scroll and her cheek upon her hand.
She was thinking about the Coxeyites' sentence, and wondering if the
cavalry would have to go down to the stockade prison on the Snake; for
in that case Corporal Niles would have to go, and the wedding be
postponed. Everybody knows it is bad luck to put off a wedding-day; and
besides, the yellow roses she had promised her corporal to wear would
all be out of bloom, and no other roses but those were the true cavalry
yellow.
But the cavalry did not go down till after the wedding, which took place
on the evening appointed, at the Meadows cottage, between "Sound off"
and "Taps." The ring was duly blessed, and the father's and mother's
kiss was not wanting. The primrose radiance of the summer twilight shone
as strong as lamplight in the room, and Callie, in her white dress, with
her auburn braids gleaming through the wedding-veil and her lover's
colors in the roses on her breast, was as sweet and womanly a picture
as any mother could wish to behold.
When little Ross came up to kiss the bride, he somehow forgot, and flung
his arms first around Corporal Niles's brown neck.
"Corporal, I'm twice related to the cavalry now," said he. "I had a
father in it, and now I've got an uncle in it."
"That's right," the corporal agreed; "and if you have any sort of luck
you'll be in it yourself some day."
"But not in the ranks," said Ross firmly. "I'm going to West Point, you
know."
"Bless his heart!" cried Callie, catching the boy in her arms; "and how
does he think he's going to get there?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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