The guards fell in beside Johnny with a military preciseness that impressed him to silence.

From somewhere near two men trotted up with a field stretcher, and upon it Cliff was laid, still unconscious.
"You sure beaned him right," one of them observed, looking up at Johnny with some admiration.
"Yes, and I'd like to bean the whole bunch of you the same way.

You fellows ain't making any hit with me at all," Johnny retorted uncivilly as he left under guard for headquarters.
A few minutes later he was standing alone before a man whose clean-cut, military bearing, to say nothing of the insignia of rank on his uniform, awed Johnny to the point of calling him "sir" and of couching his replies in his best, most grammatical English.

The guards had been curtly dismissed, for which he was grateful, and he had the satisfaction of stating his case in private.

Johnny did not want those fellows out there to hear just how easily he had been fooled.