"Looking for Hogan, sir. I had promised Miss Sanford to return some books. I didn't presume to enter the house, and thought to leave a message with him. I desired, too, to see the lieutenant, sir. My application for transfer to the cavalry has been disapproved, and--I hoped that he might say just a word to help me."

"After that exploit of yours--last month?" And Ray's eyes grew angrier yet. "We have too many questionable characters as it is."

"Lieutenant," spoke the soldier, almost imploringly, "I am doing my best to live down that--most deplorable affair. I was drugged, sir. There can be no other explanation, but my captain still holds it against me, and at the very time I most needed to be here, he has picked me out for detached duty--to go to the wood camp in the Sagamore to-morrow."

And at the instant Priscilla's crisp, even tones were heard at the rear door. "Oh, Blenke? I _thought_ I knew the voice. One moment and I'll strike a light!"

And in that moment Sandy made his escape.

His mother was sitting up waiting for him when, an hour later, he came in. Tenderly, fondly, she kissed him, and for a moment he clung to her.

Then, looking in her face, he saw impending question.

"Not--not to-night, mother, darling," he hurriedly spoke. "I _do_ want to talk with you--to tell you, but not to-night. Bear with me just a day or two, and"--then again his arms enfolded her--"trust me."

Her silent kiss, her murmured blessing, was his good-night. Then she went slowly to her room, leaving him to extinguish the lights and close their little army home to await the coming of another day.

But, somewhere about twelve there was trouble down toward the fords, and Sandy, in no mood for sleep, went forth to inquire. The sentry on No. 3 was standing listening to the distant jumble of excited voices. "I don't know what it was, sir. They took some fellow up to the guard-house, and they're hunting the willows for more." Then No. 4, behind them, set up a shout for the corporal, which No. 3 echoed, and Sandy, not knowing what to expect or why he should go, trudged westward up the sentry post and found No. 4 fifty paces beyond the last quarters, the major's, and wrathful because "some fellers," he said, had sneaked in across his post. The corporal came panting on the run, and Ray scouted on along the bluff, saw nothing, found n.o.body, turned to his right at the west gate, glanced upward where the night light burned dimly in the patient's room, at the closed blinds and shades of the room he knew to be hers, and all was hushed and still within the sleeping garrison as a second time he walked slowly homeward along the row, unseen of anybody, probably, from the moment he left the corporal and No. 4, who had some words over the sentry's report, and parted in ill humor. "Don't you yell for me again until it's business, d'ye hear?" was the corporal's last injunction.

Less than fifteen minutes later No. 4 was startled by a sudden sound--a woman's half-stifled scream, followed by commotion at Major Dwight's.

CHAPTER XX

A MOTHER'S DREAD

Little Jim came over somewhat earlier than usual in the morning. He had returned to his own room adjoining his father's as soon as the physicians deemed it wise to permit, and the permission was given earlier than others might have deemed wise because the doctors, both senior and junior, agreed that Dwight's recovery would be r.e.t.a.r.ded if the boy were not close at hand, with his fond smile and caressing touch, eager to answer the faintest call. There was something more than pathetic in the way the somber deep-set eyes of the weak and broken man, so infinitely humbled in his own sight, now followed Jimmy's every movement about the room, and as soon as Dwight was strong enough to leave his bed for a moment at a time he would be up again and again during the night hours to gaze into Jimmy's sleeping face, to softly touch his hand or forehead. Stratton, of the hospital force, detailed for duty with the major, told later how the big tears would gather in the major's eyes as he bent over the unconscious sleeper; how, many a time he would find the major kneeling by the bedside, his lips moving in prayer. Marion's eyes welled over when this was told her, though it could hardly have been news. She and all who knew him in the old days must have known how, with clearing faculties, the strong and resolute man would suffer in the consciousness of the cruel wrong he had done his boy, must have realized the depth of his contrition, and probably guessed with fair accuracy the intensity of his grieving and of his thoughts of her--the wife he had so utterly loved, so sadly lost--Margaret, the devoted mother of his only son.

And realizing this, there had come a vital question to the mind of Marion Ray. What was to be now the father's att.i.tude toward this girl-wife--she who had been set in Margaret's place, never for a moment to fill it? All Minneconjou was asking itself what would be her status, this beautiful young creature, when reason fully resumed its sway and Dwight was once more able to a.s.sume the reins of domestic authority?

Thus far all that was known was that estrangement existed. She, herself, had sobbingly told her story to eager if not always sympathetic souls.

"He turns from me almost in loathing--he for whom I would gladly die!"

was her melodramatic utterance to one of her hearers, and it was quite enough to start the story that there would certainly be a separation just so soon as Dwight could effect it. Meantime, Inez had ever her faithful Felicie, her phaeton, her flowers from town, her lovely gowns and fluffy wraps, her long hours abed after sun-up, her late hours and suppers, concerning which kitchen cabinets of officers' row had superabundant information, and a certain firm in Silver Hill a swift-growing account, on the face of which the item, "Case Pommery Sec, Pints," appeared with a frequency suggestive of supper parties of several people instead of only one or two. The domestics at the Dwights'

were a disloyal lot, if Felicie's views were accepted, but as members of the establishment they resented it that the "frog-eating Feelissy"

should dare to give them orders. "Madame much objected to their late hours." "It was Madame's wish they should be in their rooms by eleven o'clock, and that even when there was a dance they should be home by twelve." Their rooms were under the low mansard, on what might be called the third floor, and a back staircase led from the kitchen to the upper regions; therefore, there was no need of their entering the dining-room late at night. Still, they saw no reason why a bolt should have been placed on the door. They said improper things at the advent of that obstruction during Foster's brief visit, and, after his unlamented departure, the spare bedroom on the lower floor, a.s.signed to that distinguished officer, had been most ostentatiously aired. Foster's consumption of cigarettes was something abnormal, two receivers being sometimes left in the dining-room over night, both well burdened with ashes and discolored ends--the only tips, by the way, the parting guest, apparently, had time to leave.

No, those servitors had rebelled at heart against both mistress and maid, but the master's dictum had for a time enforced obedience. Now, however, they were in almost open revolt. "It was her that drove him crazy or he'd never have beaten Master Jimmy!" was the comprehensive verdict. Yet housewives who heard their tales and reported them to their lords met sometimes with rebuff. "Growl because they're sent to bed at eleven o'clock, do they? They'd growl the harder if ordered to sit up till then," was one way the unresponsive husband had of settling the story. But wives, who are wiser in the ways of the domestic world, felt sure there was something coming to explain it all, and something came--though, so far from explaining, it seemed to make matters all the more thrillingly inexplicable.

Jimmy, as has been said, came earlier. Daddy had been up quite a while during the night and the doctor had come over before sick call. Mamma wasn't quite well, and Doctor Wallen had directed that daddy be undisturbed and left to sleep, if possible, during the morning. Mamma, of course, never came to breakfast at all now. She had her chocolate in her room, prepared by Felicie, and seldom appeared until long after Jimmy was out of the house. Indeed, he seldom now met mamma at all, this in spite of the fact that, since the major's seizure, mamma had declined all invitations to dine or sup elsewhere, and such invitations had ceased coming, when now with entire propriety she might accept, if with entire propriety invitations could be extended. Minneconjou society was nearly unanimous in the view that, so long as her husband saw no impropriety in the lady's conduct, she must be bidden. Now that he only saw her in the presence of the doctor or the nurse, and she had for two weeks declined to attend, there was warrant for the omission of her name from social functions. Jimmy lunched either at Aunt Marion's, with some of his friends, or had a chosen chum to lunch with him at home. Anything Master Jim desired the kitchen cabinet accorded without demur. He dined for the present with Aunt Marion, or "had his rations," as he said, when daddy was served at seven.

Mamma, attended by Felicie, dined later, in her accustomed state.

Mamma's appet.i.te was very delicate and had to be stimulated, he said with unconscious truth, and this morning, this particular morning, he had had to wait for his breakfast. There was some kind of a squabble between Felicie and the folks in the kitchen. He couldn't understand it.

They didn't like her having beaux around late at night--swore they'd seen a fellow prowling about there two or three times, and only just missed nabbing him at the foot of the back stairs last night, and Felicie was white with rage. She said b.u.t.ts, the groom, was a _cocaine_ (though _he_ never kept any, and Felicie did) and she called the cook _coshon_, and scolded both for having disturbed daddy. Daddy got as far as the back stairs with his revolver, they said, before the nurse could get him back, and they swore it wasn't their doing, but hers--her scream that woke him, and even the sentry heard it out on No. 4 and yelled for the corporal, and they nearly caught somebody that hid in the woodshed, and "wasn't it funny, I never heard a thing!" and then Jimmy stopped short, for Priscilla had stepped to Aunt Marion's side at the little desk, and Aunt Marion was very pale. Priscilla had thrown him one warning glance, as though to say "Hush." But Aunt Marion asked a question.

"What time did this happen, Jimmy?"

"Why, after twelve, the nurse told the doctor. But, _wasn't_ it funny that I didn't hear a thing of it?"

"Hear what, Jimmy?" said a voice, and Sandy, an hour late for breakfast, stood at the open door.

"Go fetch some water, quick!" said Priscilla, and Jim went like a shot, for Sandy Ray stood just one moment, pallid and uncomprehending, then, with a cry, sprang to his mother's side, for her eyes had closed, her head was drooping on Priscilla's arm. "Don't touch her, Sandy! Let me----It's--it'll be over in a minute! She has had one or two little turns like this!" And then Jim came running with a br.i.m.m.i.n.g gla.s.s. Mrs.

Ray sipped slowly, lifted her head, put forth a feeble, wavering hand toward Sandy and faintly smiled. "How--foolish!" she muttered. "You shall have your coffee in a moment, Sandy," but Priscilla, with determined face, stood her ground and retained her hold. "Don't let her rise yet," said she warningly, her eyes on his face, "and--don't ask questions of anybody. Wait!"

For reasons of his own, Dr. Wallen, after hearing from the attendant of the stifled scream downstairs at 12:25, gave instructions to speak of it to n.o.body but the post surgeon when he came. He did not see, he did not ask to see, Madame. He did not wish to see Felicie, but that ubiquitous young person was on the landing and the verge of tears. Madame's rest also had been cruelly disturbed by this disturbance the most disreputable made by these _miserables_, the _domestiques_ of _Monsieur le Commandant_. Madame not until after dawn had been able to repose herself, and as for Felicie, "me who you speak," nothing but the pathetic condition of Madame could persuade her to remain another day in a such establishment, wherein she, the experienced, the most-recommended, the companion of high n.o.bility, the all-devoted, had been subject to insolence the most frightful----at which point the rear door to the landing opened, and in came cook, all bristling for combat, and the wordy battle would have reopened then and there but for Wallen's stern, "Silence, both of you! Pull each other's hair to your heart's content in the cellar, but not one word here." Then hied him homeward.

When the senior surgeon came over later, the patient was sleeping, and, after hearing that Wallen had been there, he left without interrogating the nurse. All seemed going well, so Waring had nothing of especial consequence to tell the colonel when dropping in at the office later.

Even the officer of the day, in response to the question, "Anything special to report, sir?" failed to make the faintest mention of the excitement reported by No. 4 as occurring soon after twelve. But it was no fault of the officer of the day. He had other and, presumably, far more important matters to mention first, and by the time he had told that two sergeants, three corporals and a dozen men had been run in by the patrols, many of them battered, most of them drunk, and all of them out of quarters, out of the post and in the thick of a row over at Skid's; that one of the guard had been slashed with a knife in the hands of a half-breed; that the patrol had been pelted with bottles, gla.s.ses and bar-room bric-a-brac; that Lieutenant Stowe had been felled by a missile that flattened the bridge of his nose, and that the prison room was filled to the limit, the colonel would hear no more. He ordered his horse and a mounted orderly, strode to the guard-house to personally look over the prisoners, then set forth to town in search of the sheriff.

So the old officer of the day and the old guard were relieved and went about their business, and while the colonel was closeted with civilian officials in town a new story started the rounds at Minneconjou--a story that only slowly found its way to the officers' club or quarters, for, if the commanding officer didn't care to hear it, Captain Rollis, the old officer of the day, cared not to refer to it, but there was one set of quarters besides that of Major Dwight's in which some portion of the story, at least, had been antic.i.p.ated.

Unable to sleep, filled with anxiety about her firstborn, Marion Ray after midnight had left her room and stolen over to his, hoping vainly that he might have made his way thither. But the bed was undisturbed, the room was empty. Then she thought perhaps he might have fallen asleep in an easy-chair in the parlor; but the parlor, too, was empty, the lights turned low. The front door was closed for the night and bolted, so she went to the kitchen and found the back door ajar. Somewhere out on sentry post there was for a moment a murmur of voices, then silence fell again, except for distant sounds at the ford--sounds to which they were becoming accustomed, though still unreconciled.

For a while she waited irresolute, vaguely distressed, then, finally, returned to the upper floor and once again entered Sandy's room and gazed wistfully about her. All was darkness, but the faint flutter at the west window told her the light curtain was blowing outward, so she went thither, drew it in and fastened it, then stepped to the other opening to the south and looked out over the dark valley of the Minneconjou, the sharp ridge that spanned the far horizon, and the brilliant, spangled sky above. And while she gazed, she listened, hoping every minute to hear the sound of his coming, even though it was no longer the light, quick, springy step that before his wound was so like the step she so well remembered--his father's, in the old days of the --th. She was just turning away disappointed when far up at the west she heard the shrill cry, "Corporal of the guard, No. 4!" heard the prompt echo of No. 3, the more distant calls of 2 and 1, and, even before these last, had heard the swift footfalls of the summoned guardian taking the short cut across the parade. Two--three minutes she waited, listening for the explanation. Vaguely, dimly, she could make out the form of No.

3 standing at the edge of the sloping bluff, listening, apparently, like herself, for explanation of the call. None came. Then the sentry stepped swiftly along his post in the direction of the sound, as though something further had caught his eye or ear. Then he was lost to view, and still she waited. Then she heard a voice that was probably the sentry's, low and indistinct, yet like the challenge and the "Advance for recognition". Then, a moment later, a hurried footfall, almost at a run--a halting, uneven footfall, as though one leg was not doing its share, and that then surely meant Sandy, and Sandy would know all that had pa.s.sed and would tell her. Yes, there he came, so vague, so shadowy, now that, had she not heard the sound, she would not have looked for the shadow. She saw the dark form dive quickly through the gate, then pause.

Instead of coming further, Sandy had stopped and, leaning at the gate-post, was peering up along the fence line outside. How unlike Sandy that seemed! Why should her son seek shelter and then turn and look back from a safe covert along the path he came? Something urged her to softly call his name, but, with a moment's thought, she decided against that.

She would go down, meet him, welcome him, see if there were not something he needed, see him to his room, kiss him again good-night; and so she took her candle to the lower floor, left it on the dining-room table, and finally reached the rear door, even as her son came slowly up the steps. At that instant began at the guard-house the call of half-past twelve.

CHAPTER XXI

LOVE'S LAST APPEAL

Going, as usual, next day to read an hour or so to the invalid major, still under injunctions not to tax his eyes, Miss Sanford became conscious of an undercurrent of something akin to sensation, something approximating unusual excitement. Both doctors had earlier been there, and Wallen came again. The hospital attendant seemed abnormally anxious and officious. Felicie, infelicitously named, if it was her name, fluttered upstairs and down, in and out of my lady's chamber, effusively greeting the neighbors who somewhat significantly began coming in with anxious inquiry, tender of sympathy, etc. "Couldn't help noticing the doctor had been over three times, so fearing the major might have had a turn for the worse," etc., etc., but it wasn't the man so much as his wife of whom they hoped for tidings. But Felicie could fence, and would not favor even the adroit with the desired information. Madame was still reposing herself. Madame would a.s.suredly promenade at horse or in vehicle later. Madame adored the fresh, free air, and though Madame was desolate that, alas, her physicians, these medicines, adjured her that it was the most important she should at this time live hours in the air and sunshine, and she was forbidden the bliss of sharing her husband's confinement and alleviating his ennui, it was for his sake more than her own and for the sake of their cherished hope that she meekly yield to their mandates; and was it not a circ.u.mstance the most felicitous that the charming Mademoiselle should be so ever-ready to read to Monsieur the Commandant?

With all its graceful, polished pleasantries at the expense of the unmarried sister of thirty and upwards, the social world that professes to regard her matrimonial prospects as past praying for, and herself as oddly unattractive, is quick to take alarm when, apparently accepting their unflattering view, she likewise accepts duties denied, as a rule, to those who are attractive. The very girls who giggled behind "Aunt Priscilla's" back and pitied her undesired lot were promptly and properly aggrieved that she should prove to be so forward, so unmaidenly. Because the right man does not happen to come into a woman's life until so late, or because the wrong one happened in and won her fresh young heart all too early, it results that many a better, wiser, lovelier woman lives unmated to-day than many a woman married in her teens. Lucky is the man the Indian summer of whose life is blessed by the companionship of such. Minneconjou laughed at Priscilla so long as she read to the man in hospital or the bed-ridden dames in the married quarters; but it shied violently at her spending an hour or more each day in reading to Dwight, even though the attendant was never away, and Mrs. Ray, with her needlework, was often present. Was Minneconjou already consigning the present inc.u.mbent to outer darkness and thinking of prescribing another mate for Oswald Dwight?

Not only did Priscilla note the incessant flittings about the house, but presently she saw that Dwight's attention was wandering. From the adjoining room the m.u.f.fled sound of voices, in petulant appeal or expostulation, was at times distinctly audible. Felicie wished Madame to do something, apparently, which Madame was determined not to do.

Felicie came once or twice with Madame's devoted love to ask if there was anything Monsieur desired or lacked, and to flash guarded malevolence at Priscilla. Felicie came again to say Madame was recalcitrant. She feared Monsieur had not rested well _cette nuit_, and she wished well to postpone her promenade, but the doctor he had prescribed and Monsieur he had desired that Madame neglect no opportunity to take the air, and would not Monsieur again conjure Madame? Madame was deaf to these the protestations of her most devoted.

Dwight rose slowly from his reclining chair and, excusing himself to the patient reader, was gone but a moment or two, and Madame was ravishingly gowned and most becomingly hatted and veiled when, just for a moment, as the day's session was closing and the fair reader about departing, Madame rustled in to archly upbraid Monsieur for his cruelty in ordering her to take her drive when it was impossible for him to be at her side.

"Ah, but next week--next week!"--this, doubtless, for the benefit of Priscilla--"we shall see!"

The phaeton was at the door and Priscilla walked silently, thoughtfully, homeward. Aunt Marion was at her desk, writing pages to the soldier-husband and father in the distant Philippines. The sweet face was looking grave and careworn. There were traces of tears, there were dark lines, about the soft blue eyes, as Priscilla bent and tenderly kissed her. "Do come down and let me make you a cup of tea," she pleaded. "You've been writing--and I reading--long. I'd like some, too.

Is--is Sandy home?"

"Riding," said Aunt Marion briefly, and Priscilla knew.

Ordinarily, half a dozen women would come drifting in to Mrs. Ray's during the summer afternoon. To-day there were none. They heard voices on the walk, voices that seemed to hush as the gate was neared, and only to resume in low tone after it was pa.s.sed. Priscilla could not account for the unusual depression that had seemed to possess Aunt Marion even when struggling against it herself. At breakfast time Aunt Marion had been unusually silent, unusually watchful of Sandy, who, before he would touch his fruit or sip his coffee, had gone forth to the bench in rear of quarters, searching, he said, for some memoranda he might have dropped out there at night. He had hunted all through the pockets of his khaki rig, that he happened to be wearing at that time, and to no purpose. He must have whipped it out with his handkerchief, he said--"just that little flat memorandum book" they had often seen him have, with a few loose pages--no earthly use to anybody but him, no great consequence, and yet, after breakfast, he was searching again, and had Hogan searching, and again he returned and hunted all through his room, and investigated cook and housemaid, and again went forth.

Priscilla found herself unable to cast it from her mind or to cause her aunt to forget it. Sandy had been gone an hour when she returned, and had said not to wait dinner; he might ride late and long and far.

"But not toward the reservation," he a.s.sured his mother, seeing the trouble in her face. "Though I'd more than like to ride over there with the troop and round up those blackguard reds that turned me back."

"Those blackguard reds" were forbidden by their agent to set foot north of the Minneconjou, where the ranchers and settlers and miners were frequent. But still the mother was anxious, filled with dread she could not speak, and even as she now sat, absently toying with her teaspoon, the maid came in with a note. "A soldier friend of Blenke" had just brought it for Miss Sanford.