He paused, looked round his audience, and then in a lower voice, said darkly,—­

“I ain’t a fool, an’ in that minute a man’s brain works at high pressure, and I saw it all!  I saw the little game of the brigadier to skunk away in my clothes and leave me to be captured in his.  But I ain’t a dog neither, and I mounted that horse, gentlemen, and lit out to where the men were formin’!  I didn’t dare to speak, lest they should know me, but I waved my sword, and by G-d! they followed me!  And the next minit we was in the thick of it.  I had my hat as full of holes as that ice strainer; I had a dozen bullets through my coat, the fringe of my epaulettes was shot away, but I kept the boys at their work—­and we stopped ’em!  Stopped ’em, gentlemen, until we heard the bugles of the rest of our division, that all this time had been rolling that blasted rear-guard over on us!  And it saved the fight; but the next minute the Johnny Rebs made a last dash and cut me off—­and there I was—­by G-d, a prisoner!  Me that had saved the fight!”

A ripple of ironical applause went round as Hooker gloomily drained his glass, and then held up his hand in scornful deprecation.

“I said I was a prisoner, gentlemen,” he went on bitterly; “but that ain’t all!  I asked to see Johnston, told him what I had done, and demanded to be exchanged for a general officer.  He said, ’You be d——­d.’  I then sent word to the division commander-in-chief, and told him how I had saved Gray Oaks when his brigadier ran away, and he said, ‘You be d——­d.’  I’ve bin ‘You be d——­d’ from the lowest non-com. to the commander-in-chief, and when I was at last exchanged, I was exchanged, gentlemen, for two mules and a broken wagon.  But I’m here, gentlemen—­as I was thar!”

“Why don’t you see the President about it?” asked a bystander, in affected commiseration.

Mr. Hooker stared contemptuously at the suggestion, and expectorated his scornful dissent.

“Not much!” he said.  “But I’m going to see the man that carries him and his Cabinet in his breeches-pocket—­Senator Boompointer.”

“Boompointer’s a big man,” continued his auditor doubtfully.  “Do you know him?”

“Know him?” Mr. Hooker laughed a bitter, sardonic laugh.  “Well, gentlemen, I ain’t the kind o’ man to go in for family influence; but,” he added, with gloomy elevation, “considering he’s an intimate relation of mine, by marriage, I should say I did.”

Brant heard no more; the facing around of his old companion towards the bar gave him that opportunity of escaping he had been waiting for.  The defection of Hooker and his peculiar inventions were too characteristic of him to excite surprise, and, although they no longer awakened his good-humored tolerance, they were powerless to affect him in his greater trouble.  Only one thing he learned—­that Hooker knew nothing of his wife being in camp as a spy—­the incident would have been too tempting to have escaped his dramatic embellishment.  And the allusion to Senator Boompointer, monstrous as it seemed in Hooker’s mouth, gave him a grim temptation.  He had heard of Boompointer’s wonderful power; he believed that Susy would and could help him—­Clarence—­whether she did or did not help Hooker.  But the next moment he dismissed the idea, with a flushing cheek.  How low had he already sunk, even to think of it!