“’Tallion saddle up!” The Major’s words were eager and shrill, became multiplied down the long mile. “Smoking lamp’s out!” The blue cloud dissolved on the air, the gnats descended in a swarm and the voices passed on--_Saddle up, saddle up_--while the battalion rose to its feet, not all at once but in a steady gradual surge, like rows of corn snapping back erect after the passing of a wind. Mannix got to his feet, began to sideslip in a cloud of dust down the embankment toward his company directly below. It was at the head of the column, right behind the command group. Culver, moving himself now down the hill, heard Mannix’s shout. It rang out in the dusk with deliberate authority, hoarse blunt command: “All right, H & S Company, saddle up, saddle up! You people get off your asses and straighten up!” Culver passed by him on his way to the command group: he stood surrounded by a cloud of gnats, hulking enormously above the company, hands balanced lightly on his hips, poised forward badgering the men like some obsessed, rakehell Civil War general before a battle: “All right, you people, we’re gonna walk thirty-six miles tonight and I mean walk! First man I see drop out’s gonna get police duty for two weeks, and that goes for everybody. You think I’m kidding you wait and see. There’s gonna be trucks going in for those that can’t make it but I don’t want to see anyone from H & S Company climbing on! If an old man with as much flab as I’ve got can make it you people can too....” There was a note, almost, of desperation in his voice. Culver, passing along the line of bedraggled, mournful-looking men, so few of whom looked like fabled marines, heard the voice rise to a taut pitch close to frenzy; it was too loud, it worried Culver, and he wished to caution him: no longer just admonishing the men to a simple duty, it was the voice of a man wildly fanatic with one idea: to last. “I want to hear no bitching out of you people! Take it easy on the water. You get shinsplints or blisters you see the corpsman, don’t come crying to me. When we get in I want to see all of you people....” Not because the hike was good or even sensible, Culver thought, but out of hope of triumph, like a chain-gang convict who endures a flogging without the slightest whimper, only to spite the flogger. Culver joined the command group, heard the Colonel say to the Major: “Looks like H & S Company’s going to make it _en masse_, Billy.” It was just as Culver feared, for although his words were pleasant enough, his face, regarding Mannix for a brief moment, had a look of narrow scrutiny, as if he, too, had detected in the Captain’s tone that note of proud and willful submission, rebellion in reverse. But there was no emotion in his voice as he turned quickly, with a glance at his watch, and said, “Let’s move out, Billy.”