"Then Captain Cranston is your informant in this business, colonel," said Devers, with an attempt at a sneer.

"Not at all," said the aide-de-camp, placidly. "Brannan's mother told us all about it. She is a very superior woman, and we dine there occasionally."

Devers stared blankly at the speaker just a moment, half incredulous, half resentful, then at last he realized that it was no pleasantry on the part of his visitor and, for once in his life, collapsed entirely.

That night Brannan was released and bidden to go to his troop and be patient. This time there was no doubt of his application being forwarded to regimental head-quarters, and there's no doubt, said the chaplain, who had a talk with him within an hour of his restoration to duty, that a week would see him en route to join Cranston's troop at Ogallalla. Devers was still commanding officer of the post, however, and gave the chaplain to understand that so long as the man remained at Scott the interests of discipline required that there should be no exhibition of exuberant triumph on his part or of further interference on the part of his spiritual sympathizers. He hated the chaplain by this time as much as he feared Cranston. Something had told him that the aide-de-camp's visit meant that the toils were tightening, and that even though the Gray Fox was away his great superior, the lieutenant-general, had an eye on the situation and an ear for the stories of his defamers. Devers felt that the inspector came because of sudden and direct appeal from Brannan's friends. He could not longer attribute it to Davies. Well, it would take a week or ten days anyhow before Brannan's orders could come, and a week was a long time to a man with a treacherous thirst.

But what Devers only suspected and did not know was that in the long consultation with Leonard that officer gave, by request, his version of the altercation which had taken place between himself and Devers, and of the events leading up to it. The staff officer brought with him the original report of the investigation made of the Antelope Springs affair and Devers's topographical sketch of the ground, trails and all, and Leonard's black eyes burned as he studied it. The aide-de-camp had some social calls to pay and left these papers in Leonard's hands while he was gone. "I have made a tracing of that map, colonel," said the adjutant, when after two hours the official returned. "I hope you don't object. I know you can't leave the originals with me."

"That's all right," was the answer. "Say, Leonard, who's that young cit with the swell team who came to take Mrs. Davies sleighing? I didn't catch the name."

"His name's Willett," said Leonard, briefly.

"What's he doing here?"

"Cattle."

"Cattle in Braska, perhaps, but here, I mean."

"I don't know," said Leonard to the officer. "I wish I did," said Leonard to himself. "If I did—I'd smash him."

Mr. Langston had driven out to the post with Willett that afternoon. He had other calls to pay, and this was Saturday, a favorite day for visiting at Braska. The Cranstons' house was topsy-turvy, everybody in the midst of packing, but Langston had a box of bon-bons which the ladies, or the boys, might enjoy as reminders of Chicago, and he rang. Miss Loomis herself, in cap and apron, opened the door. Her shapely, soft white hands were covered with the dust of books and papers she had been busily storing in the boxes, and her face flushed, just a bit, at sight of her visitor.

"I cannot shake hands with you, Mr. Langston, and, as you see, we're all at work, but welcome in. I'll call Mrs. Cranston."

"No. Don't," he said, hurriedly. "I only came to offer these trifles. I heard you were all busy packing and had hoped to hear that, after all, you were not going up to that forsaken spot. Is it true?"

"Certainly. Wherever Captain Cranston goes there goes his wife, and where she goes to live is my home and duty."

He stood looking steadfastly into her brave, beautiful face. He was tall and stalwart: she almost Juno-like in the grandeur of her form. He could not conceal the admiration that glowed in his eyes. He could not, dare not speak so soon the thoughts that had been surging in his brain, springing up from his very heart. What would he not give could she but accept the offer he longed to lay at her feet, that of a name, a love, a home wherein she should reign as queen, not live as a dependent. Such silences are eloquent. She turned quickly away. "Louis, tell mother Mr. Langston has come out to say good-by," said she, and Mrs. Cranston, not ten feet away, these being army quarters, had to appear.

"I didn't mean to say good-by here exactly," said Langston. "I rather planned to see you. I thought perhaps you'd honor me by breakfasting or lunching with me in Braska on your way," he said, hesitatingly. "They tell me ladies often——"

"Well, we go direct. Ours is the through express, Mr. Langston," said Mrs. Cranston, laughing, "and it's a hotel car we travel by. Braska is some distance off the air line."

"Braska doesn't seem to have been in your line at any time," he said, after a moment's pause. "I hear of frequent visits on the part of the other ladies, many of them, but you never honor us."

"Oh, we sometimes go there for shopping."

"But to Cresswell's, I mean, for luncheon or supper. They say he gives a very creditable spread, and as quite a number of the ladies go there at times, and Willett and Burtis have a little party there to-night in honor of some of your friends, I thought I might persuade you; but—of course—if you do not go that way," he concluded, vaguely.

"No, thank you, Mr. Langston, we do not—go that way."

"But I shall see you, both, again before you start, I hope," he said, addressing Mrs. Cranston, but palpably appealing to Miss Loomis in the weakness of a strong man deeply in love.

"It will be a pleasure," said Margaret, cordially. She wished him to come. She meant him to come. She saw and forgave the wandering eyes. He might come any day he pleased before the 25th. There would still be a box or a trunk for him to sit on; but now, she concluded, artfully, she must get right back to the boys a minute. They were trying on some clothes that had just come from home, and she'd return very soon. So saying she vanished. It was half an hour before she reappeared, and Langston was on his knees in the parlor—packing books. It was the sweetest work he had known in years.

But when he was finally gone Margaret turned impulsively to Agatha. "Do you think it possible that—that she can be going there—with him—to-night? No matter who else goes. She cannot realize what she's doing. Would you go—should I go to see her?"

Miss Loomis stood at the window, leaning her forehead against the cold pane and gazing silently out over the snowy expanse of the parade. "You would be too late, Margaret," she answered, presently, and drew back from the folds of the heavy curtain, and Mrs. Cranston seemed to read in her companion's face what was coming along the road.

Two double sleighs drove briskly past the window. First came Stone's old swan-head behind his sedate team of bays, but from a perfect nest of robes and furs a gay party waved their hands in laughing salutation. Mrs. Stone and Mrs. Flight on the back seat, Messrs. Darling and Tommy Dot opposite them in the body of the sleigh. Captain Pollock in the driver's perch with a fair companion whose husband was still detained at the agency, but wanted her to have the best time possible instead of moping at home. Then came Willett's stylish sleigh and team, Sanders on the back seat with Mrs. Darling, Almira blooming in her accustomed place by "Phaeton's" side. She neither bowed nor kissed her hand to Cranston's window, but smiled sweetly up into her companion's eyes.

Mr. Langston, meantime, was dining at the officers' mess, and presently when Mrs. Leonard came over to see if she could not help her neighbor a trifle in her packing, she unfolded some of the details of the Braska plan. Messrs. Burtis and Willett desired to entertain some of their fort friends in town; Colonel "Pegleg" was the only man at the post who owned a sleigh; Mrs. Stone was invited as a matter of course, and accepted, provided the colonel felt well enough to let her go, and it was duly settled that six of the party should go in her sleigh. The rest was easily arranged. Langston was only too glad to go out with Willett and spend the hours until the return of the party in calling and dining at the post, hoping thereby to obtain more than one glance at and more than a few words with Miss Loomis. It was nearly sundown when they started. It would be eleven before they got back. Long before that hour the lights in Cranston's quarters were out and all was silence and peace. Langston, strolling by after making his evening calls, looked long, as lovers will, at the window of the room he knew to be hers, then went resignedly over to the store and took a hand with the officers at a game for which at other times he had no use whatever,—pool. He had to do something to while away the time until the sleigh-bells came tinkling back, and that seemed to be the only thing going.

But midnight came before the foremost sleigh. Pollock safely tooled his party into the post as the twelve o'clock call was going the rounds. Oh, they had had a blissful time! a glorious time! Such a delightful supper,—partridges and celery and all manner of dainties from Chicago, and such oyster patties! to say nothing of Roederer ad libitum. Then they had danced, and then they had more supper, and then started home. Willett would be along in a minute.

But ten, twenty minutes sped and no Willett. Pegleg's horses, being homeward bound, had possibly made phenomenal time, and Willett, probably, was in no hurry. "It's about his last chance to have Mrs. Davies beside him," laughed Mrs. Stone, "so he's making the most of it." It was 12.30 when at last the bells of the New Yorker's sleigh were heard tinkling faintly at the corner, and presently the party came slowly into view. Only three now, and three silent, embarrassed if not evidently agitated people, for they seemed to whip up and hurry by the little knot of anxious faces gathered at the colonel's gate.

"Where's Mr. Sanders?" was the cry.

"Tell you in a minute!" shouted Willett, as he drove straight by to No. 12, where he sprang out, lifted Mira from the sleigh and almost bore her to the gate, Mrs. Darling following. Already Mr. Darling was hastening up the road to join his wife. At the door Willett simply had to turn back to his spirited team, as they were standing unhitched, and Mrs. Darling disappeared with Mira into the hall.

"Where's Sanders? What kept you?" panted Darling, hastening up.

"Hush! Don't make any fuss," muttered Willett. "He jumped out half a mile back. Some drunken men, or soldiers perhaps, gave us a little trouble. I'm going back after him now."

"Hold on one minute till I see my wife and I'll go with you," sang out Darling, as he ran into the house, where Mira had sunk nerveless into a big chair and was wildly imploring Mrs. Darling not to leave her.



CHAPTER XXII.

The Cranstons were ready to start on the 23d, but nothing was in readiness at Mrs. Davies's. On the contrary, that lovely and most interesting young woman was, according to her own account, as transmitted to the garrison by her now devoted friend and nurse, Mrs. Darling, in a state of prostration and could do nothing at all. Mr. Davies had been telegraphed for and was coming, and Dr. Rooke said she must be kept very quiet meanwhile,—so at least Mrs. Darling reported to sympathetic friends who called to inquire and possibly hoped to see. Bluff old Rooke himself was besieged with questions as to his fair patient, the nature of her malady and the cause of the sudden shock, and Rooke told some people not to bother her, others not to bother him, and others still not to bother themselves about her. She'd come out all right if left alone. It was Mrs. Cranston and Miss Loomis to whom he delivered himself of the last mentioned. He liked them both, which was more than he did most people, for this AEsculapian countryman of Carlyle had much of that eminent writer's sharpness of vision and bluntness of speech together with even more of his contempt for the bulk of his fellow-men. "No, Mrs. Cranston," said he, "don't wait a day for her. Start just as soon as you are ready, and don't give a thought to this little flibberty gibbet." And so the Cranstons, with Miss Loomis, bade farewell to Scott, and one radiant winter morning drove buoyantly away, almost all of the officers and ladies being out to wave them adieu. Hastings, with a brace of troopers, trotted alongside as they crossed the Platte and reported the camp wagon well on its way to Dismal River. "I never was so glad to leave a place in all my life," said Margaret to her friend, as they glanced back from the crest of the distant ridge that spanned the northern sky. "I never have been at a post where there were so few people I cared for." The driver halted his strong team at a level spot after a long, tortuous climb, and let the mules breathe a moment while his passengers took their final peep at the dim, dingy patch, far away upon the southward slopes beyond the willow-fringed river, which indicated the site of old Fort Scott. Already the snow had disappeared on many an open tract and lay deep only in the ravines and gullies, on the ice coat of the stream and in the dense undergrowth of the islands. To right and left for miles the broad valley lay beneath their eyes, the rigid line of the railway cutting a sharp, narrow slit across the level prairie in the lowlands, straight away eastward until all was merged in the misty, impenetrable veil at the horizon, while westward near the forks of the river, in long, graceful curve, it swept around an elbow of the snow-mantled stream and disappeared among the roofs and spires of far-away Braska. The boys, with the agile energy of their kind, had leaped out to scamper about on the rimy buffalo-grass, dull gray, dried and withered, yet full of nutriment for the little droves of horned cattle already browsing placidly along the slopes where but a few years before the Sioux and Cheyenne chased great herds of bison. Hastings and his men were riding along a hundred yards or so in front, and the two women were left to their own low-toned confidences.

"I cannot help it," said Mrs. Cranston, "it may be uncharitable, unkind, but I am simply glad she could not go with us. She does not like us,—me at least. She has pointedly avoided me, and I half believe it was to avoid going with us that she was taken ill. I only hope Wilbur will not misunderstand the matter."

"I think you are unjust, Margaret, in one thing at least. There was certainly some severe fright or shock Saturday night."

"Oh, a thing that might unstring a nervous, hysterical woman a few hours, perhaps, but it is no case of nerves or hysteria with her. She's a perfectly healthy country girl. Mrs. Darling, who isn't thoroughly strong and well, seems to have been very little affected."

"Mrs. Darling has been three years out here and is accustomed to frontier life. Mrs. Davies, probably, never had such an experience before, and she has been worried by these queer incidents that Mrs. Leonard tells us of,—those midnight whistlings and tappings at her window. Mrs. Davies is alone, her husband miles away at the agency. Everything has tended to worry the girl. I honestly feel sorry for her, Margaret. I'm sorry that she wouldn't let us be her friends."

"You are full of excuse for her, Agatha, and down in the bottom of your heart you know perfectly well she doesn't deserve it. I cannot forgive her for this flirtation with Mr. Willett. I only welcomed the idea of taking her with us because of the hope it gave me of breaking up that affair."

"Has it never occurred to you that she may have broken it off herself?—that besides this queer adventure with those drunken fellows there was something else to agitate her? Be just, Margaret. She came to us utterly inexperienced, even ignorant. She hasn't much mind, I'll admit, but she is innocent of wrong intent. Is it not possible that driving home he may have spoken to her in a way she could not mistake, and that that has had much to do with her prostration? If not, if she did not then and there forbid his coming near her again, how do you account for it that he has not once been out to the fort since Saturday?"

"Well, it's only three days, and the sleighing is practically ended."

"Yes, but he hasn't let forty-eight hours pass hitherto without a visit, so I'm told, and he has his buggy and wagon, and unless there was a rupture of some kind was it not more than likely he would be out Sunday or Monday? Wasn't it the proper thing, really, for him to call and inquire for her?"

But here the Concord rattled on again, the boys playing "giant strides" hanging to the boot at the back, and the driver, poking his head around the canvas wind-screen at the front, called out to Mrs. Cranston, "There's two of our fellows coming a couple of miles ahead, mum." And both ladies leaned from the wagon to strain their eyes in vain effort to distinguish the forms and faces of the distant party, Margaret half hoping that her soldier husband might have been able to stretch a point and ride far down to meet her, Miss Loomis half divining who it must be, and it was Miss Loomis who was right. Fifteen minutes further and the Concord halted again, and Mr. Hastings, with Davies at his side, rode up to the open door.

Even at a glance one could see how much he was changed in the service of those two months. The lines about his clear, thoughtful eyes had deepened and his face was thinner, despite the full, heavy, close-cropped beard, but there was no mistaking the joy with which he met and welcomed his friends and nurses of that long autumn's convalescence. He whipped off his gauntlets and flung them at Louis's head, as the boys came dancing about his horse, and then extended both hands in eager greeting to Mrs. Cranston, who was nearest him, and who frankly grasped and shook them in hearty, cordial fashion.

"Oh, how glad I am to see you!" she cried. "We thought to meet you at our first camp I had no idea you could come so fast." And by this time she had released his hands and he was bending farther in to extend the right to Miss Loomis, who welcomed him with friendly warmth, yet with that womanly reserve which seemed never separable from her.

"We did not stop at the Niobrara," said he. "We came right through and camped at Dismal River late last night. Did you see Mrs. Davies this morning? How did you leave her?" he asked, with grave anxiety.

"We left her very comfortable. Dr. Rooke said there was no occasion whatever for anxiety," answered Mrs. Cranston, tactfully evading the question as to "seeing her," and then, fearful lest he should be moved to repeat it, plunging impetuously ahead. "She was looking so bright and well, so lovely in fact, that none of us were prepared for her being ill. Of course you'll hear all about the excitement and adventure they met with, so I won't speak of it now. In deed, you know, we hardly know anything more about it ourselves than you do, for both Mrs. Davies and Mrs. Darling saw so little of what followed the first appearance of the fellows. Mr. Sanders jumped right out among them, it seems, and gave chase after some who ran. The one they afterwards captured was one of your recruits, Paine by name, and Mr. Sanders can tell you all about it when he gets back. He was sent up to Cheyenne. One or two men who have disappeared entirely are the suspected ones, and he is after them."

"But I don't understand," said Davies, gravely. "It seems incredible that even drunken soldiers should have attempted an indignity to a party of officers and ladies. Weren't you with them?"

"No; we were in the midst of packing, you know, and we weren't going anywhere. Indeed, it was an extraordinary thing and no one knows how to account for it, but you'll hear all about it at the fort, and I know you are eager to push ahead, and we'll see you so soon at the Ogallalla, so just tell me how you left my husband and you may gallop on."

How blithe and radiant was her face as she spoke! How could he suspect the dread that lurked behind it,—the artfulness of her effort to escape further questioning?

"The captain's as well as ever and counting the hours until your coming," he answered. "How thankful I am, for my wife's sake as well as my own, that you and Miss Loomis are to be so near us! Think of our having a house while the rest of you live in log huts! But if any sub would exchange with me I'd gladly give him the agency guard and the house and come and live in cantonments." Then with a parting shake of the hand he waved them on. The driver cracked his whip, the boys scrambled aboard, and away they went bowling on northward, while Davies and his single orderly turned again their horses' heads to the welcome awaiting them at Scott.

Margaret sank back in her seat with fluttering heart and a deep sigh of relief. "Thank heaven, that's over, and I have told nothing of any consequence, have I?" she murmured to her silent friend. "What will he say or think when he learns the truth? But you were saying Mr. Willett had not reappeared. For that matter neither had Mr. Burtis nor Mr. Langston. I believe they'll all be out to the fort this very day. Mr. Langston thought we were not to start, you know, until to-morrow."

No answer to this observation. Miss Loomis was quite well aware of the fact and had been, for her, an eager advocate of the earlier start the moment it was declared that Almira could not attempt to move.

"I didn't fib, did I?" asked Mrs. Cranston, after a moment of deep thought.

"No; you managed to control the examination quite successfully without it."

But people at Scott that afternoon were less skilful or less fortunate. Arriving nearly ten hours earlier than he was expected, Mr. Davies dismounted at his quarters and, tossing the reins to his orderly, quickly and noiselessly entered. He expected to find his wife an invalid in a darkened chamber. He strode in upon a cosey little party at luncheon, Almira presiding at the tea things in a most becoming negligee, and Mrs. Stone and Mrs. Darling nibbling at the dainties set before them, rising in surprise and some confusion as the young wife fluttered from her chair to the arms of her returned hero and becomingly precipitated herself upon his breast. The visitors managed to retire soon after luncheon was over, despite Almira's evident desire to hold one or both at her side, for in that brief quarter of an hour Davies learned, as the result of questions that presently became insistent, very much to deepen the grave anxiety in his grave face, very much that made him impatient to hear from other witnesses.

Over the interview between him and his now nervous and fluttering wife we need not linger. She read disapproval, even distrust in his eyes, in his grave, deep tones, and all the prostration of the three days previous showed forcible symptoms of immediate return. She knew she was going to be wretchedly ill again; she must have Mrs. Darling and Dr. Rooke. Oh, why had they taken Dr. Burroughs away? he was so much nicer, and Barnickel should go for Dr. Rooke at once; and Barnickel, who was unpacking the lieutenant's saddle-bags and blanket roll, said he knew the doctor had gone to town and there was no one but the steward about. Mr. Sanders was just back, said he, and some gentlemen from town with him; whereat Almira started nervously and with fear in her face, and Davies took his cap and, presently, his leave.

"I will ask Mrs. Darling to come to you at once," he said, gently, "but I must go and see Mr. Sanders." He stooped and kissed her flushed forehead and then turned slowly away. The instant he closed the hall door behind him she crept to the parlor window, watching him as he walked rapidly westward along the row; then, slipping the bolt, she flew back to her room, searching in the bureau drawer an instant, drew forth two or three little notes, tied with silken ribbon, also a bunch of faded violets. The next instant notes and violets were blazing in the parlor base-burner.

Davies went straight to Sanders's quarters. It was then only a little after two and no one happened to be visible along the row. Over at the barracks and office there was the customary drowsy silence that followed the mid-day meal of men who had to be up with the dawn, and at stables, drill, or exercise until the noon recall. But Mrs. Stone had hurried home to her colonel and told him of Davies's arrival, and the colonel was eager to see him. Mrs. Darling had similarly warned her consort, and Darling was as eager to dodge.

"Lieutenant Sanders has gone to report to Captain Devers," said the striker who answered Davies's ring, and Davies said he would come in and wait until his return. He wanted to get by himself and quietly think over Almira's fragmentary and reluctant account and admissions concerning this supper-party at Braska. He threw himself into Sanders's big arm-chair drawn up in front of the stove, and leaned his head on his thin, white hand. Trooper Hurley, Sanders's striker, acting under his usual instructions, presently reappeared with a decanter of whiskey, glasses, sugar, and spoon on a tray. "We're all torn up, sir, packing the lieutenant's traps for the move, but here's everything but bitters, or lemon, and I can get them in a moment, sir."

Davies wearily thanked him, but waved the proffered refreshment aside. Hurley deposited his tray on the table close to the lieutenant's elbow and tiptoed out.

"Did Mr. Sanders say he'd come back here?" called the visitor.

"No, sir," said Hurley, poking his head back in the door-way; "but he will, sir. He was sent for by Captain Devers before he had been ten minutes in the post, and he went as soon as he could change his clothes and get into uniform. Mr. Darling run in here just a few moments ago after him, but he was gone. Mr. Willett fetched him out from town, sir, along with some other gentlemen. They went over to the store."

"I'll wait a few minutes," said Davies. So Hurley hospitably brought the late papers and placed them within reach.

"There's pipes and tobacco if the lieutenant would like to smoke, and I'll be in the back room, sir, packing."

"Did you hear whether Mr. Sanders had succeeded in arresting the other men?"

"No, sir, he didn't. They couldn't be found and hadn't been heard of in Cheyenne, but Mr. Sanders said they had bought their tickets for there, and that they were on the train as far as Sidney anyhow. I heard him say that. They were a bad lot, sir, them two fellows, especially Howard. The men in 'A' Troop say he made many a ball for Paine to throw, and that he was the one that was always making trouble for Brannan."

Davies bowed silently. He remembered Howard well all through the long dismal summer, one of the very "likeliest looking" of the recruits, at first glance, and almost the only one of the lot whom Captain Devers seemed to fancy, yet Davies was surprised, when he rejoined after his sick-leave, to find him in the troop office instead of the drill squad. All through the regiment the story had gone the rounds of how Sanders had arrested him on the train in "cits" and evident intent to desert, and how Devers had ordered his release, virtually assuming responsibility for the entire affair, and no man could account for Devers's action in the matter except that it was Devers's, and therefore bound to be different from that which any other officer would have taken.

And it was Howard who, this time at least, had deserted for good, taking with him a garrison ne'er-do-well whose going was only a good riddance, and leaving as a captive in the hands of Lieutenant Sanders the luckless Paine, now languishing in the guard-house, while, under the orders of a nervous and evidently anxious post commander, parties were searching everywhere for the other two.

From the somewhat garbled and excited account given by the ladies at the luncheon-table, Davies had been able to gather only these particulars,—that, as the second sleigh was coming along, oh, just a little distance behind Colonel Stone's, and as they rounded a sharp turn at the head of one of the islands, a brilliant light flashed from the bank, so close to the horses that they shied violently, nearly toppling Mrs. Davies out, and in this flash they distinctly saw the face and form of a tall young man in dark slouch hat and civilian clothes, and the expression on his face was so wicked, and he was so ghastly pale that it looked like an apparition, and Mrs. Davies screamed and nearly fainted from the fright and shock, and Mr. Willett, who was driving, made a furious cut at the fellow with his whip, and then as the horses tore away in fright the occupants of the sleigh had just time to catch a glimpse of some soldier overcoats, and when at last Mr. Willett regained control of his horses, Mrs. Darling cried out that they must go back for Mr. Sanders. He had leaped right out among those brutes, and she was sure she had heard shots. Mrs. Davies admitted that here she protested against going back, so terribly was she frightened, but Mrs. Darling said that they must do so and Willett said that they must, and go they did, only to find the spot abandoned. Even when Willett called for Sanders there was no answer, and then they were dreadfully alarmed for fear he had met with violence, and Mrs. Darling took the reins while Willett searched, and Mrs. Davies, as she admitted, cowered under the buffalo robe, and then, all on a sudden, they heard the sound of angry voices, heard some one furiously denouncing Mr. Willett for lashing a gentleman with his whip, heard Willett curse the stranger for flashing a match purposely to frighten his horses,—some sneering reply to the effect that a man had a right to light a cigar on a public road, then Willett's voice calling the man a liar, then heavy blows and scuffle, and then Sanders came running up the road just in time, for the stranger had Mr. Willett down in the snow and was throttling him. He sprang up and dashed into the willows the instant he heard Sanders's voice, and that was the last seen of him, for Sanders's first care was for the civilian, who was bruised and choked, but, after all, not seriously hurt. He helped Willett back to his seat, bade him drive the ladies at once to the fort, but said he was going after those marauders, for two at least were soldiers. That was all. When Willett and Mr. Darling drove back they found that he had captured Paine, too drunk to run well, and that the others were gone. Next morning Trooper Howard was reported absent, and that settled the identity of the man in civilian dress. Mr. Willett had not been out at the post since the affair simply because he was nursing a black eye and a sprained thumb.

What Mrs. Darling and Mrs. Stone couldn't understand was what could possibly have prompted the man Howard to stand right on that little bank, close to the track, and there flash his phosphorus match. He must have known it would scare the horses even if it did not terrify the people. It was a reckless, diabolical thing to do, and then to think of his daring to strike and beat Mr. Willett afterwards. Mrs. Darling was full of indignation at his conduct; Mira was agitated, but had little to say. She was thinking of the cross-questioning that was inevitable when her supporters were gone.

And now, sitting there in Sanders's easy-chair, Davies was pondering over all that he had been told at the table, and the little that he had wrung from her reluctant lips, putting them together with the frequent questions asked him by the few women who had joined their husbands at the cantonment,—questions so frequent and persistent as to whether he often heard from his wife, and wasn't she soon coming, very soon, to join him, that even to his unsuspicious nature they carried a significance he could not down, and now it seemed that Almira had gone with a gay party to a supper and dance in town at a time when he supposed that she was spending her hours with his friends, the Cranstons, or in quiet and seclusion at her home. There, at least, he showed his inexperience, for in nine cases out of ten the friends the newly-arrived wife is surest to fancy in garrison are not those whose praises her lord has been sounding for six months ahead. Of the hops and dances and drives that had preceded this eventful evening he had as yet, mirabile dictu, heard nothing beyond Mira's own meagre account. In fact, he had no idea of them at all.

He was worn and weary after the long, hard eighty-mile ride. The fire was warm, the room still and peaceful; no sound broke the silence but Hurley's occasional step and soft whistle out in the "linter" at the rear where lay his packing-boxes. Possibly Davies may have become drowsy, dreamy, as he reclined there. At all events he never moved as a quick, nervous step came bounding across the veranda and into the hall. The door burst open and a voice, surely a little tremulous and agitated, spoke low and quickly.

"Where are you, Sanders? Oh, say, will you do me a favor? I can't—at least I don't want these other women to know. Was there ever such a streak of hell's luck as this? He's home. I've got to go. Will you see that Mrs. Davies gets this before to-night?"

And in the dim light of the little bachelor den, Percy Davies, slowly turning, was aware of a stylishly-dressed, handsome young civilian, whose face, though pale and apparently bruised, was vaguely familiar to him, in whose outstretched hand was a little box-shaped packet. Just then another step came bounding into the hall-way, into the room, and the lawful occupant of the quarters halted short at sight of the two tall, slender forms confronting each other, one that of the civilian, slowly recoiling toward the door with twitching, tremulous hands, and a face livid as death, the other, in cavalry undress, with bearded, haggard face, deeply lined, under whose heavy, bushy, overhanging brows a pair of blue eyes were blazing. For a moment not a word was spoken, then Davies broke the silence.

"Sanders, this gentleman wishes you to see that that package is promptly delivered to my wife, and I should be glad to see you as soon as possible at my quarters."

Not until the speaker had coolly stepped past them both and out of the room had Sanders recovered sufficient presence of mind to sing out, "All right, old man; I'll come." Then, as the outer door closed after the retiring officer, he whirled on Willett.

"You inveterate ass! How dare you haul me into this?"



CHAPTER XXIII.

Among the gentlemen from Braska visiting the post that afternoon was Mr. Langston, who drove thither full of eager anticipation, and hailed the first glimpse of the bright hues of the flag with a thrill of hope and joy. No spot in all God's green earth at that moment held in his eyes such vivid charm and interest. Ten minutes later no spot in all the world seemed so barren and desolate. The sunshine, the sailing clouds in the vault of blue, the chasing shadows along the slopes, the streaming colors of blue and white and scarlet at the tip of the swaying staff, the glint and sparkle of the accoutrements of the guard, the gaudy lining of the troopers' capes, were absolutely unaltered, yet the light had gone from his eyes—following the trail to the far Ogallalla. To him who loves a woman with all his heart there is more beauty in a mud-chinked hovel in a frontier fort where she may dwell than in all "the castled crags" of storied Rhineland or the cloud-capped towers and gorgeous palaces among the mirror lakes of Alpine Italy.



Langston learned of the departure five minutes after he reached the post, and lost all further interest in the day. He said he would "loaf" at the club room until Burtis and Willett got through their calls, which, said they, would occupy some hours,—two or three at least. Indeed, Willett "didn't know but what he might stay out with Sanders overnight" and let Burtis "tool the trap" back to Braska when he got ready. When, therefore, in less than forty minutes Willett's team was reported being hurriedly harnessed in the post trader's corral and that gentleman himself came bustling in with a pale, scared face that intensified the blue blotch under his eye, Langston was astonished. He was listlessly turning over the leaves of a magazine at the moment and seeking solace in a cigar. Willett looked nervously about him, bade the attendant bring him some brandy and soda, and threw himself into a chair in front of the stove.

"You look used up, Willett," said the elder. "What's the matter? Seen anything more of your midnight antagonist?"

"No, by heaven! I wish I had. I believe the devil himself has gone in league with the gang at this garrison. I never knew such a string of mishaps in all my life. Say, are you ready to go back?"

"Any time; but I thought you wanted to stay."

"Oh, so did you when you came out, Langston, and now you don't, and I'm simply in the same boat."

The attendant brought him a tall glass and poured the soda hissing into the brandy. Willett drank eagerly, then started for the door. "Come, then," he called; "the trap's ready—or ought to be." Langston knew it was not, so temporized.

"How about Burtis?" he asked.

"Burtis? Oh, I don't know or care. He can get back just the best way he knows how. There's an ambulance coming over to town to-night."

"Well, I think you ought to let him know, Willett."

"I have. I sent him word by Sanders, whom I just left."

"Very well, then I'll go with you now. Only stop one minute at Sanders's so that I can say good-by to him. He goes back to the agency to-morrow, I believe."

"Well, he isn't there. He's gone out to pay a call. Jump in."

But as they drove around the level road towards the northwest gate, and the long line of officers' quarters lay to their right front, two officers could be seen in earnest conversation at the front gate of No. 12, the farthest away.

"There's Sanders now," said Langston. "It won't take you five minutes out of your own way. Turn over there, won't you?"

"I can't. I—I've got to hurry, Langston. If you want to see him you can jump out, and I'll wait for you outside the gate."

"Well, if you're in a hurry that'll take much more time than if you drove. I'd have to walk both ways, don't you see?" was the cool answer. "Never mind, though; go ahead. Who's that with Sanders?"

Willett, who had turned red with confusion at his own blunder, turned redder at the question, then went gray again. "That's Lieutenant Davies," said he, briefly.

"Oh, then he's home. Why, how I'd like to meet him again! Here—just let me out, will you? and you go ahead. I'll come back with Burtis."

"No; come on with me, Langston. I'm in a devil of a fix and want your advice."

And as they bowled swiftly along homeward over the smooth, hard, prairie road, Langston admitted to himself, as Willett falteringly unfolded his tale, that the young man was indeed "in a devil of a fix,"—in what Langston, who was an old soldier, found it more descriptive to say, a damnable fix. He pondered over it a moment and then said, "I don't understand what you want me to do, Willett," and his tone was very cold. "I don't see how I can help you. From your own account you have behaved either like a fool or a blackguard, and what I can't fathom is why Davies's commanding officer, or some friend or comrade, did not warn you off weeks ago."

Now, admitting that in the absence of almost all his comrades in the field, and that it was distinctly his duty to protect the honor and interest of his regimental comrade, let us see to what extent Captain Devers felt disposed to exercise his prerogative and act against this indisputable wolf in the sheepfold. Precedents he did not lack. Everybody had heard how Colonel Atherton, of the —th, had served a would-be gallant whose attentions to a lady of the regiment, during the prolonged absence of her husband in the field, had become the talk of a big garrison. Everybody knew how old Tintop, when he made up his mind that Lieutenant B—— was becoming infatuated with Mrs. Captain Potiphar, calmly recommended B.'s immediate and indefinite detail at the Shoshone Agency, an isolated nook in the heart of the Wind River country where the mails got through only once a week in midwinter and no one but the mail rider thought of trying to get out. Colonel Pegleg, in the days of his original wife, had taken a fatherly interest in garrison matters, and instituted a system of post government that was almost patriarchal, especially when most of the men were absent in the field, but Mrs. Stone the second was made of flimsier stuff, and fond of gladness and gayety, dancing and feasting, and what she termed "an innocent flirtation" was harmless occupation so long as her own queendom was unimpaired. There can be no question, however, that she would long since have put her husband on the trail of this new disturber of the garrison peace but for the illness that followed Stone's sudden prostration. The command with its powers having devolved upon Devers, she could do nothing. It is a hard thing for a man to find himself by reason of illness suddenly stripped of the robe of command and forced to become only a lay figure, but it is harder yet to many a woman whose social powers were dependent mainly upon the rank of her husband to see herself, through his prostration, suddenly set aside as though of only vicarious consequence. Naturally, Mrs. Stone could not bear Captain Devers,—few of the women could,—and it was only through his own wife that the gossip of the garrison was apt to reach him, and Mrs. Devers had troubles of her own that seemed to stifle to a great extent her interest in those of her neighbors. She was neither young nor pretty; she shone not in society and had no great ambition in that direction. She had seen Mr. Willett's devotions to Mrs. Davies,—as who had not?—but with only languid interest. Such things concerned her less than they did those belles of the active list, who felt themselves thereby defrauded of attentions that had been quite lavishly, even if impartially, bestowed up to the time of Mrs. Davies's dawning on the social horizon. Actually, therefore, Captain Devers was not so much to blame as Langston thought, for of his own regiment only one officer was present to advise him, and Hastings's advice, as that officer had long since been informed, would be asked for when desired. In point of fact only three officers remained at the post for whose opinions Devers entertained any respect, Leonard, Rooke, and the chaplain, and he had quarrelled with the first and second, and treated with indignity the third, so that no one of the three now felt disposed to confer with him on any subject. This would not have deterred the chaplain in a matter of duty, however, for that honest and stalwart soldier of the cross was as ready to battle with himself as he was to take issue with the devil, but the chaplain had been absent for long days, and returned only when it was supposed that Mira would be whisked away to the agency with the Cranstons, and, safe in Percy's sheltering arms, be beyond the reach of harm or temptation.

There were other reasons, however, for Devers's inaction, and grave ones. Ever since the ominous visit of the staff officer from division head quarters he had felt that the ground was caving beneath his feet. For years had he been skimming along on the very verge of serious trouble, yet ever adroitly evading trial; always incurring censure, but escaping court-martial. One after another he had alienated or betrayed every commander under whom he had served. One after another he had lost the respect of every officer with whom he associated, and now he realized that if the regiment could but settle down somewhere for a few months, there would speedily follow a crystallization of the sentiment against him,—a deposit of all this floating mass of testimony now apparently held in solution, and the true inwardness of the tragedy of Antelope Springs, the falsity of his insinuations against Davies, the trickery of his methods, one and all be brought to light. Already, through Haney, he heard of the sensation created among the men by his defence of Howard, and of the depth of feeling among the old hands against this airy upstart recruit, not a year in service, who frequently boasted that he had more influence with "Cap." than all the rest of them put together. Haney himself could not cipher out the secret of Howard's importance, and was plainly and palpably jealous. Ever since early in the campaign, when young Brannan was pointed out to Devers as Miss Loomis's patient and as a trooper who wanted to get out of "A" troop and into "C,"—ever since the colonel and the major began interfering with Devers because of his open rebuke of Mr. Davies, it was noticed that Howard, a mere raw recruit, could get the captain's private ear at almost any time, and those were days when a soldier was not supposed to address his company commander on any point until he had first obtained the sanction of the first sergeant. Every man in the troop knew that soon after their arrival at Scott, Howard began to get letters from the East, and some of these contained money orders, which he had cashed in Braska. Some men in the troop, notably that babbling drunkard Paine, declared that in a little strong box he had brought with him Howard had some letters tied up in ribbon that he watched with jealous care. "New hands" who came out in the same batch of recruits said that at St. Louis Arsenal, whither they were shipped on enlistment, Brannan, Howard, and Paine had at first been very intimate, but that some coldness had sprung up and Brannan kept aloof from them. They were wild and full of "gall," Brannan was sad and sober. Howard used to write lots of letters then to some girl, Paine said, and go off and post them in obscure letter-boxes outside the gates when he could get leave, but he had quit writing long since, Haney knew, for he watched the new company clerk with jealous eyes. He knew and knew well that Howard was savagely glad when Brannan was sent to the reservation with Boynton's party. He noted that Howard became of a sudden fitful, restless, sullen, and then reckless and negligent of his work and eager to go frequently to Braska. Presently he heard things of him that made him believe Howard was contemplating desertion, and no sooner had Lieutenant Davies arrived than he became assured of it. "I had to serve under that damned, canting Methodist preacher," said Howard, "and I won't have him nosing around where I am. I'll desert first." Now, Haney had no objection to Howard's "skipping,"—it would be good riddance to dangerous timber,—but he wanted first to find out what was the secret of his dislike of Davies, whom most of the men, and all the better ones, had learned to respect and esteem. He plied Howard with questions, hints, suggestions, and whiskey, but Howard's head, or stomach, was stronger than he thought, and the liquor failed in the short time at his disposal to overcome it. With a few months the result would have been different. Howard once admitted, however, that he hated the lieutenant and had reason to, but that was all that Haney ever wormed out of him, but he and others were morally certain that Howard meant to desert when the very day of Paine's trip to Braska the company clerk disappeared. They counted on his court-martial and downfall when brought back to the post in "cits" by Sanders's squad. They were amazed at the abortive outcome of the affair, and then at last the gang that "had stood in with" the first sergeant as the surest means of keeping on the right side of the captain began to realize that here was a man with more "pull" than Haney, and the latter, feeling his influence going, determined that the time had come to regain it, cost what it might. He knew beyond peradventure who was the mysterious night prowler, knew why Captain Devers had ordered Paine to watch Brannan in hospital, he knew why, or believed he knew why, the captain was so down on Brannan and so fiercely bent on breaking him or driving him out. He knew that he could, if he would, lay before Mr. Leonard certain damaging facts in connection with Brannan's two relapses into drinking, and of Paine's detail to town that day when he was needed, as they knew he would be needed, at the adjutant's office. He required just one or two links more to make a chain so powerful he could twist his troop commander in its coils and dictate the terms of their future relations, but he needed Howard's testimony to complete the chain, and the liquor with which he tempted him, in and out of the office, at last began to take effect. Howard was getting more and more reckless, sullen, savage. He would get up at night and drink and dress and slip out of barracks and be gone an hour sometimes, yet so stealthy was he that when Haney strove to trail him he turned on him like a tiger and damned him for a spy, and still the sergeant felt that perseverance and whiskey would bring him triumph yet, when all on a sudden came the dramatic episode of that still Saturday night,—the flash that revealed him for one instant to the frightened revellers in Willett's sleigh and then covered his track in shadows impenetrable. All on a sudden Howard had vanished,—deserted in earnest this time, leaving his first sergeant in a tangle of unfinished toils and his captain in sore anxiety. It was the contemplation of his own meshes that blinded Devers to those which Willett would have thrown over Mira's pretty, curly, empty head.

The conversation between Sanders and Davies was very brief and decidedly grave. Sanders had at first assumed the light air of superiority of the old cadet toward the plebe, and, to head off questioning, plunged into that species of deprecatory and officious advice which is generally prefaced by, "Now, my dear boy, let me as a friend," etc., etc. Like the chaplain's wife, Sanders started with the best intentions, and just as she had excited Mira's resentment so had Sanders aroused Davies's wrath.

"Stop right there, Sanders, and say nothing about friendship until you explain that scene. Where is the packet you were asked to deliver to my wife?"

"I haven't it. I wouldn't touch it. You don't suppose I'd be a party to such a thing. The man was an ass to ask me, and I told him so."

"He doubtless reasoned that a man who could accompany the wife of a brother officer to a place of such miscellaneous character as Cresswell's would not be above carrying secretly to her that which he dare not send openly."

"He had no right to judge by it, Davies! Lots of ladies go there,—and Mrs. Stone matronized us."

"No ladies of our regiment have ever gone there, Sanders, until you accompanied my wife,—an inexperienced and ignorant child. What Mrs. Stone or her associates may have seen fit to do is no concern of mine. You know and I know that women like Mrs. Cranston, like Mrs. Truman, like Mrs. Leonard or Mrs. Wright would not go there under any circumstances, and the fact that a party of women from the fort was in one room simply served to attract a party of—very different women to the next."

"Then I'll bust Cresswell's head for him inside of twenty-four hours," exclaimed Sanders. "The idea of his daring to allow such people in there at such a time!"

"The idea of your not standing my friend—you, the only fellow-graduate of my regiment here at the post—and preventing my wife's being taken there at any time. Think of that, Sanders."

"Why, damn it, Parson, don't be so brutally unjust. I supposed if you cared a rap you'd have stopped it before."

"Stopped it before? Why, Sanders, what are you saying? You don't mean she—my wife—had been there before?" And all the indignation had gone from Davies's face. It was now white, almost awe-stricken.

For a moment Sanders knew not what to say. All at once there dawned upon him the realization that now through him, in this utterly untoward, clumsy, miserable way, was Davies for the first time being made aware of what common, every-day rumor said of his wife. He would have cut his tongue out rather than wilfully put in circulation a word of scandal, yet it had been reserved for him to bring to a husband's ears the first ill-omened tidings of a wife's misdoing.

"God forgive me, Davies, if I've blundered!" he burst out at last. "I'll never forgive myself. I supposed—they all talked of it so fully—freely together—I supposed you knew all about it. I never dreamed of harm in it. Mrs. Flight—or rather Mrs. Darling and she together—occasionally went there, and the other ladies had their husbands as a rule, or at least sometimes, and there was good sleighing, you know, between here and town, and absolutely nowhere else were the roads beaten. They sort of had to go there, don't you see?"

"Go there with whom?" said Davies, grasping the rail of the fence and breathing hard.

"Why, with Willett, of course; he was the only fellow that had a good turnout. He used to come for them, I believe, and sometimes he had Mrs. Darling and Mrs. Davies—he and Burtis—and sometimes Mrs. Flight."

"And do you mean that they—that these four, went there to Cresswell's? Do you know this, Sanders?"

"Well," said Sanders, "they were all talking and laughing about it, never dreaming of anything harmful or unbecoming. Why, Parson, old man, you mustn't be too strait-laced out here. You know it's the way of the West."

But Davies threw out his hand as though imploring silence, seemed about to speak again and ask another question, but finally turned without another word, and leaving Sanders standing dejectedly at the gate, re-entered his hall and closed the door behind him.



CHAPTER XXIV.

That night Dr. Rooke called twice at No. 12, and went away both times saying opprobrious things about his fellow-men and women. The chaplain, who had gone over to see Davies about three o'clock, presently went back for his wife, and that good-hearted woman remained until late at night. Mrs. Darling coming over in the early evening to congratulate dear Mira again on her husband's return and invite them both to dinner on the morrow, was met by Davies himself at the door, but not invited in. Her sweet smiles and words of greeting and proffers of hospitality were checked at sight of his stern, sad face. In brief words he told her Mrs. Davies was too ill to receive callers or accept invitations, and in response to her flurried "Is there anything in the world I can do?" coldly answered that Mrs. Darling had already done—too much.

In her natural and justifiable indignation, Mrs. Darling at once sought Mrs. Stone and Mrs. Flight. "They had an awful scene, I'm sure," said she, "for his face was as black as a storm, and I knew how it would be. Some one's been blabbing and making matters infinitely worse than they really were. What do you suppose will happen when he and Willett really meet?"

"They have met," cried Mrs. Flight, forgetful of her determination to keep at odds with Mrs. Darling in the bliss of imparting exciting news,—"they have met at Sanders's quarters, and there must have been something dreadful, because Willett came out, oh, with such a face! and went right over to the store and drove off to town. Sanders is all broken up about something. Flighty says he wouldn't tell anybody." And by "Flighty" the lady referred to her consort.

The awful scene of Mrs. Darling's imagination was really not very tragic. Almira had shut herself in her room in preparation for the coming visits of the doctor and Mrs. Darling. Her tea-gown being a most becoming garment, she was still enveloped in its soft and clinging folds, and had let her long, lustrous hair fall rippling down her back. She had once seen a queen of the emotional drama similarly gowned and groomed and a lasting impression was the consequence. The tea-gown and tumbling hair became Mira's conception of the proper make-up for wronged and injured and deeply-suffering wifehood. She had prepared to deluge the doctor with symptoms and Mrs. Darling with tears, but nearly an hour went by and neither came. Katty was clearing away the luncheon table, and to her Almira faintly appealed for tidings, and Katty said that the masther had come in for a minute and walked up and down in the parlor and gone to the front door himself to meet Mr. Sanders, and they were talking out in front. When the second time her husband entered the house she prepared to hide her face and refuse him a word, but he did not come near her. She heard him pacing up and down, up and down, at first with quick nervous stride and at last more slowly. Then he seemed to sit at his desk and write. She could hear him sigh heavily. What business had he to sigh? She was suffering for lack of sympathy, nursing, tender care. Why should he sit there sighing in that absurd fashion? She heard him go to the kitchen and tell Barnickel to take that note to the chaplain, and then he came back to write some more. She grew impatient, lonely. She determined to bring him to her side, and if possible to her feet again. Other men were abject enough; why should she be lorded over in this way? She threw herself again upon her bed and covered her eyes with her filmy handkerchief and faintly called "Percy!" As he did not hear she tried again, louder, and still he did not seem to be at her door listening for the slightest sign, and she was compelled to sit up and call loudly, not for him but for Katty.

And Katty, being out among the pots and pans and kettles, didn't hear her at all; so Davies went and summoned the girl, instead of going to Almira himself, as Almira thought he should have done. Presently Katty came out. The misthress wanted to know was the doctor ever coming—and Mrs. Darling? Then Davies entered the room and closed the door.

"Dr. Rooke has not yet returned, Mira," he said. "Mrs. Darling with my consent will not visit you again until you are experienced enough to know right from wrong. You never told me of these visits with her to Cresswell's or I should have forbidden them utterly. It never occurred to me that you would be tempted to go thither or I should have warned you. I do not blame you so much, my wife, as I do those who have so misled you. There are some things I have been told that are past my understanding, and that when you are well again I shall have to ask you to explain. Now rest as well as you can. The doctor will come to you just as soon as he returns to the post. Is there anything I can do to help you?"

But Mira burst into a wail. She didn't wish to see anybody—anybody but the doctor and Mrs. Darling. It was cruel, heartless, brutal on his part to come in and taunt and torment her when she was so helpless and ill. It was wicked to cut her off from the only friends she loved or who had been kind to her. She would have died of loneliness and misery while he was gone if it hadn't been for Mrs. Darling and for her friends. His friends hadn't come near her,—hadn't done anything for her, and now he was angry because, when she was neglected and scorned by them, others like Mrs. Darling had been good and kind to her. Oh, why couldn't she go home to her dear old father and the sisters who loved her, and weep her heart out on her m-m-mother's grave? Davies sadly realized that neither argument nor appeal would help matters. He heard the chaplain's ring at the outer door, and went to him with sore-laden heart. Later the two left the fair invalid to the care of the chaplain's wife and went in search of Leonard. Boynton, still unable to walk about, was occupying his old quarters next to the adjutant's, and, propped up in an easy-chair near the window, caught sight of his comrade, the captor of Red Dog, and eagerly beckoned him in. Davies had to go and shake hands, though at the moment he wished that he might avoid almost everybody.

"Why, Parson, old boy, you can't stand that agency work. It's making an old man of you now before half your time. You look ten years older. I hope you're not ill."

"No, not ill; a little tired and worn perhaps," said Davies. "We were just going in to see Leonard."

"Well, I wish you'd fetch him in here the first evening you can. There are some things that I want to talk over with you two, things that affect us both. Have you seen Differs?"

"No, not yet. I'll report to him at guard-mounting in the morning. The regulations say the first orderly hour, don't they?"

"Yes,—but you'd better report your arrival to him the moment he comes out of his house or else go to the office and do it. We've got a bone to pick with him, Parson, and I don't want you to get into any outside tangle. I'll be up and about in a couple of days, then we'll settle it with him."

For a man who had striven conscientiously to do his duty, it seemed to Davies, as he rejoined the chaplain, that he had become involved in tangles enough without seeking new ones. His friend had already rapped at Leonard's door and been informed that the adjutant was over at his office, so thither went the two, many eyes following them as they crossed the broad, brown level of the parade. The snow had disappeared entirely except in dirty hummocks along the pathways and walks whither it had been shovelled after the heavy fall. The post looked even less cheery and attractive than before. The few men moving about had the listless air of soldiers with nothing to do, going fat and "soft" for lack of vigorous exercise. Over in front of the colonel's quarters his sedate bay team was waiting, and presently that veteran, with Mrs. Stone and Tommy Dot and a striker in attendance, was aided down the steps and into his open carriage for a drive.

"Is it not late for them to take him out?" asked Davies. "Why don't they make an earlier start?"

"Ordinarily they have done so. To-day, though, he has been having a conference with your captain; rather an extended and trying one, I fancy, and not agreeable to either party. Captain Devers was leaving there as I returned to yours. Davies, my friend, there is a man who is a veritable Ishmael. His hand seems against every one and every man's hand against him. You could never have wronged him,—what on earth has set him against you?"

"Indeed," was the earnest answer, "I do not know;" and then, solemnly, Davies added, "Trouble seems the lot of many of us, yet even in one's saddest hour it is impossible not to feel sorrow and pity for one like him, who stands before his fellows an utterly friendless man."

The adjutant rose with an eager light in his dark eyes at sight of the two. "I have been hoping to see you, Davies," said he, "yet I knew you would have much to detain you at home. Mrs. Davies is better, I hope?"

"Mrs. Davies is not well, but I think the matter is not serious. I came first to report my arrival from the reservation. Mrs. Davies will go there with me just as soon as we can pack. Then the chaplain and I want to consult you personally about some important matters. Have you a spare half-hour?"

"Frankly, Davies, I haven't, and won't have until tattoo. There are some reports here that will occupy me pretty much every minute. Is it business that can wait until then?"

"It will have to," said Davies.

"Then let me get at once to the reason of my desiring to see you before to-night. Captain Devers has been called upon by department head-quarters to explain some discrepancies in an official report or two, and I was present at the long interview between him and the colonel this afternoon. Davies, have you ever seen a map or sketch of that ground north of Antelope Springs where you had your adventure last September?"

"No," said Davies, wondering.

"Then I want you to look at this, compare it with your recollections, and tell me how accurate it is, especially as to the tracing of the trails of the various parties."

The short winter day was already waning and the light in the dingy office growing dim. Leonard called for candles, then stretched a huge white blotter upon a wide-topped stand and spread open upon it the filmy sheet of tracing paper. An almost exact copy of Devers's map was thrown into bold, black relief, and for the first time Percy Davies saw the plan on which was based the report that, exonerating his captain, inferentially held him accountable for the massacre of his comrades at Antelope Springs.

"Why! when was this made?" he asked, in grave surprise. "Whose work is this?"

"It was made while you were lying ill at Cranston's up at the old post," said Leonard, calmly. "Had you never heard of the investigation?"

"Never."

"The general sent Mr. Archer of his staff up there to go over the ground with Devers and let him explain, if he could, why he got so far away from you and your people as to permit that tragedy to occur, especially after the orders he'd received from Major Warren. Devers cleared himself by proving to Archer's satisfaction that he obeyed his orders exactly and marched right along the ridge here. This trail, the one that runs due south, just west of the summit of the divide, was made by Devers's main command moving in support of you and your detachment. This one off here"—and Leonard's pencil rode lightly along another that skirted a ravine apparently two miles away from the ridge—"this one was made by his command the next day after you had been found by Warren's men," and Leonard was narrowly eying Davies as he spoke.

"Pardon me, Mr. Leonard, it was just the other way," said Davies, assuming that the adjutant in his personal ignorance of the facts was stating a theory. "Captain Devers never approached the ridge that evening. He was going farther away from it all the time. I had to gallop to catch him. This, out here to the southwest, is what might be called an approximation to his trail. I finally overtook him away out over here somewhere, across the ravine," and Davies indicated with the point of a pencil.

"Well, then who made this trail up here on the ridge? You must have crossed it twice before dark."

"There was no such trail there, sir, nor was there any party to make it. Everything in the battalion except my own little squad was away off to the southwest, anywhere from two to ten miles."

"You could swear to that, Davies? You remember it distinctly—despite your illness?"

"Swear to it? Certainly, sir," said Davies, with wonderment in his eyes. "So could McGrath, who was with me, if he were only alive. So could Devers himself, or Haney, or Finucane, or a dozen others of the command who must know that wasn't their trail."

"I fear me, Davies," said Leonard, gravely, "that some of the very men you name have told it, if not sworn to it, the other way, and that your captain has allowed it to be accepted as the basis of his release from accountability."

In the gloomy office the darkness was gathering thicker. At the head of the table, his coat thrown over his arm, his hat in his folded hands, stood the strong figure of the chaplain, his thoughtful brow shining in the light of the candles the clerks had placed upon the board. His was the first face to be seen by one entering the room from the hall-way, or peering in at the window, for the figures of Leonard and Davies, their backs to the entrance, were thrown in black silhouette against the glare; but as Leonard spoke the two who had been bending over the work drew slightly apart and gazed silently, significantly, into each other's faces, Leonard calm, massive, masterful, Davies searching, questioning, the light of a new and grave suspicion in his troubled eyes.

And looking on this picture,—on this triumvirate,—there stood on the porch without, close to the uncurtained window, a fourth form, heavy, massive almost as Leonard's, but far less soldierly. Then noiselessly this latter turned to the hall-way, and with cautious step drew near the open office door; the heavy arctics, which it was Devers's habit to wear so long as the weather was even moderately cold, deadened the sound of his footfalls, and now with beating heart the troop commander stood listening to what he could catch of the conversation within.

"It is absolutely false and misleading," said Davies, "and if it has been used, as you say, to clear him or anybody else, it should be exposed at once."

"That," said the adjutant, in his deep, deliberate tone, "is precisely what I believe, but needed your evidence to establish. Now you will excuse me from further talk about this or anything else until, say, after office hours to-morrow morning. I have much to attend to. If you and the chaplain will meet me at ten o'clock, we can settle various matters. Meantime I'll lock these papers in my desk." Across the dim hall-way, as the two friends left the office, stood the door of the sanctum of the post commander. It was just ajar, but there was no light beyond, and to all appearances the room was as deserted as it was dark. Rooke was just coming out of No. 12 as they returned thither.

"I'm glad you're home, Mr. Davies, and I'll be gladder when you've got that pretty little bunch of nerves and nonsense off my hands and off this military reservation."

"She will be well enough to travel—when?" asked Davies, as placidly as he could. Even when the wife of one's bosom has been behaving outrageously it isn't pleasant to hear it from one's neighbors, unasked.

"She could go to-morrow and be the better for it," said Rooke, bluntly. "What she needs is a firm hand and a change of scene—and surroundings. We're too volatile hereabouts." And this it seems was practically what he had told Almira herself, much to her scandal and dismay. She piteously asked why she couldn't see Dr. Burroughs; and was unfeelingly told that there was no reason whatever, provided she started to-morrow; that he was at Ogallalla and would be very glad to see her. "Once up there," said the old cynic, "you can have Burroughs and lollipops to your heart's content."

"Oh, doctor, but think of the peril, the danger," she moaned.

"Tut, woman, you'll be in no such danger there as here," he answered brusquely; and Davies found her weeping dejectedly, but weeping to no purpose. When morning came Barnickel and Katty were boxing up the lares and penates, and toward nightfall Mira herself was meekly, though not resignedly, bearing a hand. This indeed was not what she had pictured army life to be. Davies and the chaplain were to have joined Leonard as planned at ten o'clock. At nine the orderly came to the door of No. 12, and said that Mr. Leonard would be very much obliged if Mr. Davies would come to the office at once, and Davies went. Colonel Stone, as had been arranged, was once more restored to his desk in the office, and though looking gray and ten years older, was "on deck." He was absorbed in turning over some official papers, so Davies did not disturb him. He went into Leonard's den. The officer of the day was comparing the list of prisoners in the guard report with some memoranda on the adjutant's desk, but presently finished, shook hands with Davies and said welcome back to Scott, then went his way.

The moment he was gone Leonard whirled about in his chair. "Davies, you remember our locking those papers in this drawer last night?"

"Certainly."

"Well, look at it now, and as I found it ten minutes ago."

The drawer was absolutely empty.



CHAPTER XXV.

The closing week of March was marked by a furious snow-storm that swept the big prairie like a besom, but plugged up every coulee and ravine. For four days no communication had been held with the Ogallalla Agency. The wires were down, the road impassable, and Mrs. Davies had reached her new harbor of refuge none too soon. The quartermaster's ambulance bore the couple half-way to the new station, and Cranston's Concord came to meet and carry them the rest of the way. Mira's parting with her devoted lady friends at Scott was cut short by a start at early dawn, against which she rebelled faintly, but to no purpose. It had taken only two days to pack their few belongings. They spent the last night of their stay in Scott under Leonard's roof, and Mrs. Leonard did her best to cheer and gladden the mournful bride. It was of little avail, however. Almira was dimly beginning to see that her conduct had cost her the respect of those women most worth knowing, and that although the dreaded interrogatories which Percy was to put to her as soon as she was stronger were still in the future, his faith in and love for her, whatsover they might have been, were seriously shattered. In manner he was still grave, kind, and gentle almost as before, but everything like tenderness had vanished. One question he said he must ask her before they left Scott. Had she ever accepted any gifts or letters or anything from Mr. Willett? And Almira answered that once he had sent her just a few violets with a note inviting Mrs. Darling and her to drive with him the next day, but she had tossed them into the fire long ago. Nothing more, nothing else at any time? asked Davies, gravely, and Almira answered no. How could he torment her with such unjust suspicions? Far better would it be to let her return to the father and sisters who longed for and missed her, to her peaceful home where down in the bottom of her heart Mira knew she was not wanted by either father or sisters or step-mother. Davies looked graver, but questioned no longer. The day before their start Mr. Langston came out from Braska and inquired for Davies, and told him how glad he was to renew his acquaintance, and Davies greeted him with much reserve. This was the man who was travelling with Willett the June gone by, and just as it had at first affected Miss Loomis, so did the recollection now prejudice the officer against him. Langston saw it, but went quietly on with the business in hand.

"I am the bearer of a note to you from Mr. Willett, whose people, at least, are old friends of mine. He has gone home, at my advice, and it will be against my advice if he return here within a year. If he should do so, I wash my hands of him. It is not to make excuses for him or Burtis that I have come, but to ask you about one matter. On his way back to the agency your comrade Mr. Sanders came to town and heaped reproaches on Willett and on the proprietor of the restaurant, alleging that certain disreputable people were allowed to occupy the adjoining dining-room while the party from the fort was dancing. Cresswell was very indignant at the charge. He says that the party in the adjoining room was the family of old Pierre Robideau, from Kearney,—just himself, his wife and daughter, with a friend whom they called Mr. Powell, and it was Mr. Powell who paid the bill.

"Robideau is an old trader and trapper, but he and his people are honest and respectable as any in Braska, and the young man with them was supposed to be paying attention to the daughter. Robideau and his family went back to Kearney that night after a week's visit to friends up here in Braska. The daughter, Angie, had been here some time visiting a school friend. We feel sure you have made no such statement to Mr. Sanders without some strong ground of suspicion. May I ask how you heard it so soon after your arrival?"

"I heard it before I got here," said Davies, quietly, "though when it was told me I had no idea my wife was one of the party. My orderly was cold and tired and we stopped at the Scott station at the point where the road crosses the railway to give him a cup of coffee and water the horses. There were some trappers and plainsmen in there, and one of them was telling with much gusto of the performances of a soldier of our troop who deserted that night,—how he had chartered the adjoining room to that in which the officers and ladies were dancing and had a whirl to the officers' music with some ladies of his own choosing, and the girls lassoed a waiter and hauled him into their room and got a bottle of the officers' champagne——"

"Pardon me, Mr. Davies, but do not these plainsmen rather like to tell big stories at the expense of the officers,—the bigger the better?"

"I believe so, and paid little attention to it at first, but among the listeners was a scout who went through last summer's campaign with us and did good service. He rode over to the post with me, and on the way we met a sergeant and two men of 'A' Troop, returning from an unsuccessful pursuit of deserters. They told the same story with some additions, and said the fellow openly boasted in Braska that afternoon that he was going to the dance. Then the scout admitted reluctantly that he had heard the story from several sources, and gave the names of the women who were said to have been introduced there, and they were not Robideau's family. The sergeant had heard just what the scout had as to the identity of the intruders. Then on my arrival at home I learned that Mrs. Davies was one of the fort party, and Mrs. Stone and other ladies who were present referred to some rude creatures in a neighboring room who peeped and stared at the dancing. There was also awaiting me with my mail an anonymous letter, which I burned without reading through. Next I learned that the man who frightened them on the homeward way and then deserted after a fracas with Mr. Willett was Howard, of 'A' Troop, and that man's associations in town are matters of notoriety. That was the chain that led to my belief in the story."

Langston looked grave. "And Howard was probably Robideau's friend, though Cresswell didn't know it! He had been paying court to Robideau's daughter during her visit to Braska, always in civilian dress and always claiming to be a civilian clerk in the quartermaster's department with a salary of twelve hundred a year. I have seen her friends in town where she visited, and they are very plain, honest, and well-to-do people, whose daughter was sent to Illinois to school and met Angeline Robideau there. They had another friend living in Cheyenne, and when they were up there visiting her for a few days they said Mr. Powell was coming up to spend one evening,—Powell is the name they all knew him by, and the belief is that Angie was much fascinated by him, and had met him East before meeting him here. Mr. Davies, I am glad to relieve your mind of one uncomfortable theory in connection with this affair. I wish I could extenuate or explain Willett's conduct as easily, but that young man is a fool of the first magnitude."

Davies had taken the note handed him by Langston and was mechanically turning it and twisting it in his fingers. His impulse was to toss it, as he had the anonymous billet, into the fire. There was something about the handwriting of the former that was vaguely familiar to him even through its disguise, but Willett's scrawling superscription he had never seen. Something told him, however, that anything of which a man of Langston's calibre chose to be the bearer was entitled to consideration. He made no reply to Langston's closing words. He had fully made up his mind as to what his course should be, and what was the extent of Mira's misdoing. Just as he said to her, he blamed those who should have been her advisers and protectors far more than he blamed her, and as to this popinjay who had become infatuated with her beauty, though the lieutenant's blood boiled in wrath and indignation, his calmer judgment and his disciplined spirit tempered any and every expression. He had spent long, wakeful, prayerful hours in the silence and solemnity of the night, and no man knew the story of the struggle. He had trained himself to meet this man who had so openly and persistently shown himself a worshipper at the feet of his wife, and to meet him with cool contempt, yet the same hot blood that rioted in his veins when, long years before, he had downed the village scoffer who had ventured to ridicule his aged mother, now prompted him to horsewhip Willett should he venture again to visit the fort.

It was relief, therefore, to hear that he had gone.

At last he opened and read the note, a clumsy, cubbish attempt to explain his language in Sanders's room, and to say the package was absolutely nothing but some violets, to apologize for any and every annoyance he might have caused Mr. and Mrs. Davies, for whom he entertained nothing but sentiments of the most profound respect and esteem, and begging if ever they met again to be regarded as most sincerely their friend, etc.

"There is no answer," said Davies, as he finished it, a smile of contempt on his lips. "You must have known there couldn't be, did you not?"

"Well, I fancied as much. He had no friend to carry it for him unless I would, and the young idiot has gone off feeling profoundly wretched about the whole business, as he deserves to. Had I been here, as an old friend of his family, it would have been my right to warn him weeks ago, and to put a stop to his foolishness if he was not to be advised. More than that, Mr. Davies, I wish to say that ever since I met you on the train last June I felt an interest in you that would have prompted me to stand your friend in your absence whether I felt any interest in him or not. I should like to know you better and to convince you that I meant what I said when we parted there."

And Davies at last held out a cordial hand.

This was the afternoon before his early start, and though he left the post feeling that he had gained a friend worth having, Davies did not fully realize how dangerous a thing it was to leave a community of women, none of whom he had sought to placate and some of whom he had offended. Mrs. Darling had declared war against him, and Mrs. Stone, if not Mrs. Flight, was in full sympathy with her. How dare he say they were responsible for Mrs. Davies's flirtation? How dare he insinuate that they had led her to the forbidden shades of Cresswell's? There was a tempest in a teapot among Mrs. Stone's friends and associates over Mrs. Darling's account of his rebuke to her, for Mrs. Darling had deftly managed to include Mrs. Stone and Mrs. Flight in the scope of his condemnation, and very possibly old Peleg might have been wrought up to pitch of sympathetic resentment but for the fact that he was concentrating all of his shattered faculties on the mysterious robbery of the adjutant's desk.

Captain Devers, relieved at last from command of the post and overshadowed by vague sense of official condemnation, was now, in hopeful imitation of the Homeric Achilles, sulking in his tent. Invited by Colonel Stone to appear at the office and give his counsel as to the matter, Captain Devers had replied that in view of the discourtesies to which he had been subjected at the hands of the adjutant he could hardly be expected to care to visit the building except when compelled to do so, and having been relieved from command under circumstances indicative of disapproval of his methods, he should consider it indelicate on his part to say what he thought of the matter in question.

But the orderly trumpeter had told the sergeant-major that Captain Devers was on the piazza looking in the adjutant's window when the gentlemen were there examining the map, and that he entered the hall-way. The sergeant-major told Mr. Leonard, and Leonard was actually startled. He conveyed the information to Pegleg, and Pegleg sent his compliments to Captain Devers with the information that his immediate presence was desired, so Devers came, and shrewdly guessed what was the cause. Certainly, he said, he went to the office to get certain papers that he had left in the commanding officer's desk. He did look in for one instant through the adjutant's window, attracted by the unusual sight of the adjutant, the chaplain, and his own subaltern, of whose services he had been deprived, in apparent consultation. They were so absorbed in talk that they did not hear him as he entered his own office or when he left. Certainly he lit no candle; he needed none. He knew just where his papers were, got them, and came away. Did he leave before or after the others? Really, that was a matter he couldn't answer. He was absorbed in his own reflections when he came out and couldn't say whether the other gentlemen were there or not.

Pegleg asked whether he had any theory as to the disappearance of the batch of papers from Leonard's desk, and Devers said he had none whatever, he didn't know how the matter could be supposed to interest him. He did not inquire the means resorted to, but perhaps that was unnecessary, as the drawer had evidently been forced by a heavy chisel and the woodwork about the lock was crushed. Leonard glowered at him with stormy eyes during the brief interview but, true to his notions of subordination, asked no questions whatever. It was the colonel who presently gave it up as a hopeless job and dismissed the cavalryman with a brief, "Well, that will do, captain; I see you can't help us," and Devers left with livid, twitching face. He had no fear of Stone, weakened as he evidently was both physically and mentally by his recent shock. It was that silent, gloomy thunder-cloud of an adjutant he dreaded, and with good reason. There was an unsettled account between these men and one that Devers would have been glad indeed to drop, but Leonard was a man who never let go. "I hate to have you leave just now," he said to Davies, "for I know we shall need you presently."

But once more there was a week of no communication with the Ogallalla agency. Three days of blizzard and three of repairs before the flimsy telegraph line could be used again. Mrs. Davies, busily occupied in putting her new house in order, was aided by Mrs. McPhail and one of the ladies from the cantonment, who, happening to be visiting the agent's wife when the storm broke, found it pleasanter to remain there than go back to the log huts across that mile of blast-swept prairie. The Indians, with the stoicism of their race, huddled in their foul, smoky tepees instead of swarming about the agency, and except Davies's detachment none of the command appeared. It was therefore a rather busy time for Mira, as there was abundant opportunity for conversation, and both Mrs. McPhail and Mrs. Plodder rejoiced in so interested a listener. The three seemed to be getting along together famously, a fact which Davies noted with the same half-dreamy, half-amused smile. It was a relief in seeing her really interested in setting her little house to rights, but it was as evidently a relief to her that the otherwise inevitable visitors were blockaded by the storm. Davies really did not know which she dreaded most, the Cranstons or the Indians.