The Colonel's Lady Read Online Free PDF Page B

schooling was over. Skiborsky told us about it one day after evening stables.
    “A sorrier lot,” he sneered, “I never saw in cavalry blue. But I can't waste the rest of your enlistment teachin' you to stay in the saddle.” He jutted his rocklike chin out, grinning at us, feeling our hate and enjoying it. “Morgan,” he said, “I guess you'll be first.” He walked behind the stables, unbuttoning his shirt.
    Morgan was stunned for a moment. “You're takin' off your stripes?” he asked suspiciously.
    Skiborsky peeled off his shirt and flung it aside. “That's right, bucko. Man to man.”
    Morgan's face split into an evil grin. In one quick movement he shrugged out of his suspenders and began unbuttoning his shirt. “I'm goin' to love this,” he murmured softly, dropping his shirt to the ground. Bare-chested, his lumpy muscles quivering along his thick shoulders and forearms, the Sergeant waited for him.
    “Enjoy it while you can, bucko.” He grinned.
    Morgan crouched slightly, stepped in. He circled the big sergeant warily, cautiously, the way you would approach a man with a knife. Abruptly, in a flash of movement, his left fist shot out and there was a sodden, wet sound as the knuckles smashed Skiborsky's mouth. He hit Skiborsky again, in his slightly bulging gut, before the big man could back away.
    Surprise shone momentarily in the Sergeant's eyes, but he never lost his grin. Morgan began circling him again. He lashed out in that sudden explosion of motion, but Skiborsky was ready this time. The big man backed down with his left forearm, knocking Morgan's fist aside. He stepped in quickly and swung his right fist as though he were wielding a saber. The blow landed on the side of Morgan's face. Skiborsky lashed out with his left and Morgan seemed to break in the middle. He went down gasping, his face an ugly green, his eyes sick. He went to his knees, to his elbows. He crawled in a small stupid circle, like a fly with its wings pinched off. Instinctively, Morgan got his back against the stable wall and began shoving himself up. He stood swaying, his fists clenched but hanging at his sides.
    “Had enough, Morgan?” Skiborsky asked, still grinning.
    “You sonofabitch!” the gaunt, sick Morgan grated.
    Skiborsky hit him again. This time Morgan fell like a rock, like a poled Texas steer. He doubled and hit the ground with his face and didn't move. Skiborsky took one deep breath, rubbed his hands along the legs of his trousers, and grunted.
    “All right, buckos, who's next?”
    He looked at me and then at Steuber. It wasn't at all the way I had expected it to be. I had expected a big crowd, the whole company gathered around, but there were only the two of us. Me and the big Dutchman. I began taking off my shirt.
    Steuber seemed to consider himself a disinterested bystander. He gazed thoughtfully at the unconscious Morgan, and then at me, and finally at Skiborsky. He shrugged. He could have broken the Sergeant's back, if he had wanted to bother. He was big enough and strong enough. He didn't want to. He had no quarrel with Skiborsky, so he merely shrugged and looked at me.
    “I'm next,” I said. I threw the shirt aside. It was what I had wanted for over two weeks and I wasn't letting the chance get away from me.
    I don't know how long the fight lasted. It seemed like a long time. I was almost as big as Skiborsky, and I wasn't soft. But the Sergeant knew things about fist fighting that I didn't. He had learned the hard way, in drunken brawls and company fights, and the marks and lumps and ill-healed wounds were still to be seen on his body. He took a fierce joy in not moving back and in fighting a man who wouldn't move back either. I vaguely remember knocking him down and standing there stupidly until he got up again. Skiborsky wasn't so considerate when his turn came.
    When I started to get up he knocked my head down with a slashing blow aimed at the back of my neck, and as I went down his knee jerked up and