“What’s that you say, Jones?”

It was Butler, marching by my side, that asked the question.

I stammered some reply.  I had been saying aloud, “Gay-le, Ka-me, Ka-mes,
Kay-me.”

The march continued.  I knew not whether we were passing through woods or fields.  My head was bent; my eyes looked on the ground, but saw it not.  My mouth was shut, but words rolled their sounds through my ears—­monotonous sounds with but one or two consonants and one or two vowels.

Suddenly association asserted itself.  I thought of Captain Haskell’s quotation from some Persian poet; what was the poet’s name?  I soon had it—­Khayyam—­pronounced Ki-yam, I added Khayyam and Kiyam to my list.  We marched on.

Why Knight?  I did not know.  My work seemed to revolve about K-h.  I felt greatly encouraged with Khayyam,—­pronounced Ki-yam,—­which had the K sound, and in form had the h.  But was there nothing more in Knight?  Nothing except the ultimate t and the long vowel, and the vowel I had also in Ki-yam; the lines converged every way toward Ki, or toward K-h-a-y, pronounced Ki.

Again I tried repeatedly, using the long sound of i:  “Gi-le, Ki-me, Ki-me, Ki-me, Ki-me,” and kept on repeating Ki-me, involuntarily holding to the unfamiliar sound.

For a long time I worked without any result, and I became greatly puzzled.  Then a help came.  The name was that of a doctor.  I repeated over and over, “Doctor Gay-le, Doctor Ka-me, Doctor Ka-mes, Doctor Kay-ne, Doctor Gi-le, Doctor Ki-me, Doctor Ki-mes, Doctor Ki-yam.”  The last name sounded nearly right.

The face of my dream was yet easily called up—­a swarthy face with bright black eyes and a great brow.  I repeated all the words again, and at each name I brought my will to bear and tried to fit the face to the name:  “Doctor Gay-le, they do not fit; Doctor Ka-me, they do not fit; Doctor Kay-ne; no; Doctor Gi-le; still less Doctor Ki-me, Doctor Ki-me, Doctor Ki-me.”

The words riveted me.  They did not satisfy me, yet they dominated all other words.  The strangeness of the name did not affect me; in fact, the name was neither strange nor familiar; and just because the name did not sound strange, I took courage and hope.  I reasoned that such a name ought to sound strange, and that it did not was cheering.  I was on the brink of something, I knew not what.

We stacked arms by the side of the road, and Ewell’s corps marched by on a road crossing ours; it took so long to go by that we were ordered to bivouac.

My brain was in a stir.  I asked myself why I should attach so great importance to the recovery of one man’s name, and I answered that this one name was the clew to my past life, and was the beginning of my future life; the recovery of one name would mean all recovery; I had resolved to never abandon the pursuit of this name, and I felt convinced that I should find it, and soon.  What was to result I would risk; months before, I had not had the courage to wish to know my past, but now I would welcome change.  I was wretched, alone in the world, tired of life; I would hazard the venture.  Then, too, I knew that if my former condition should prove unfortunate or shameful, I still had the chance to escape it—­by being silent, if not in any other way.  Nothing could be much worse than my present state.