A WELCOME PERIL
"For such light duty as he may be able to perform," read the order that
had brought Sandy Ray to Minneconjou. First it was the Canteen, and
under the young officer's zealous management that fiercely assailed and
finally abolished institution had been a credit to the post and a
comfort to the men. It was not the duty Ray best loved, by any means,
but, being debarred by his wound from active exercise, compelled as yet
to ride slowly and with caution, he had thankfully accepted and
thoroughly performed it. Then had come his serious trouble, and then,
when, had he known the stories in circulation, he should have remained
to face them, he was ordered away, leaving, like Sir Peter Teazle, his
character behind him.
He was ordered to a difficult, probably dangerous and possibly perilous
duty, and, knowing this, he could not for an instant delay or demur. It
wasn't in the blood of the Rays to shirk. Far better might it have been
for Sandy had someone, either friend or foe, suggested that his being
selected, when he belonged to neither regiment represented in the
garrison, was in itself intimation that the stories at his expense were
believed, and if that were true he should be sent to Coventry--not to
command. There were young fellows in both the cavalry and infantry at
Minneconjou who would eagerly have welcomed the detail, with its chance
of swelling an efficiency record. Under any other circumstances there
might have been protest, there would have been growling. Now there were
only silence and significant looks. Even at the Club (Minneconjou had
set its seal against the time-honored, but misleading, appellation
"Mess"), where her name could not be mentioned, even in a whisper, the
order was accepted without comment. There was a woman in the case!
Ordinarily, under circumstances demanding the detail of a guard for such
purposes, post commanders would send a company under a captain, or half
a company under a subaltern; but Stone hated to lose a unit from his
regimental line. He had sent to the wood camp a sergeant with a dozen
picked men--one or two from each of his infantry companies. Now he sent
a lieutenant and thirty of the rank and file, selected at random, to the
aid of the agent. Of this thirty a sergeant, two corporals and twelve
men were taken from the squadron, for it might be necessary to send out
mounted men to make arrests, said the agent, and the agency police were
sullen over recent happenings. Sandy was notified by a call from the
post adjutant about 11:30, just as he was softly locking up for the
night. He listened in silence, made no comment, asked no questions,
completed his few preparations, bade Priscilla keep it all from his
mother until after he was gone, for rest and sleep were most essential,
and at dawn, with dark-rimmed eyes and solemn face, he stole to the
half-open doorway, beyond which the night lamp dimly glowed; listened;
entered one moment and softly kissed the dear hand that lay so wearily
upon the coverlet; looked fondly at the gentle, careworn face, and then,
with firm, set lips, turned stealthily away. Priscilla was up and had
hot coffee ready for him below stairs, and possibly admonition, but this
she spared him. Oh, if Priscilla had but known what Aunt Marion had seen
at the rear gate two nights before, what might she not have said to
both! for Priscilla, too, had had her vigil, had both seen and heard and
knew more than Aunt Marion even thought she knew.
"It is barely ten miles," said Sandy. "Couriers will be riding to and
fro. Then there's the telephone by way of town, unless the wires are
cut. Let me hear of mother night and morning, Pris. Now, I've got to
go."
She stood at the window of his room an hour later, watching the little
command as it wound away among the dips and waves of the southward
prairie, until finally lost to sight. This was a new phase to the
situation. Priscilla had never pictured the modern redman save as she
had heard him described at church sociables, peace society meetings and
the occasional addresses of inspired "Friends of the Indian," who came
soliciting the sympathies--and subscriptions--of the congregation. The
few specimens that had met her gaze about town, the station and the
fords were, she felt sure, and justly sure, but frowsy representatives
of a magnificent race. It was only when the agent, himself a godly man,
had come and told his recent troubles, after evening service, that
Priscilla began to realize how, despite his innate nobility of character
and exalted ideals and eloquence, the average ward of the nation was not
built on the lofty plane of Logan, Osceola and Chief Joseph. He was
quite capable of extravagant demands of his own and of raising the devil
when he didn't get what he wanted.
There were other eyes, and anxious eyes, along the bluffs and the
southward windows of officers' row. There were women and children, even
at that early hour, clustered at the little mound beyond the west gate,
whence the last peep could be had at the "byes" as they breasted and
crossed Two-Mile Ridge. There were garrison lads on their ponies, little
Jim among them, who rode forth with the detachment as far as the
railway, and were now racing back. There were even watchers in the upper
windows at Skid's, for the word had gone from lip to lip that the
Indians were in a fury and meant business this time. But there was
darkness, there was silence, there were only drawn blinds and lowered
shades and apparent indifference at Major Dwight's. Possibly Jimmy was
the only one who had heard. Possibly Inez did not know; mayhap she did
not care.
The boy's face was hot and flushed that afternoon, and he lay down a
while, an unusual thing with him, but he had been up very early and out
very long and riding in the breeze. All this might tend to make him
drowsy. He had come as usual to tell his father all about Mr. Ray's
march and the boy escort. A prime favorite and something of a hero was
Sandy Ray among the boys about the post, and Jimmy did not know just why
daddy seemed so uninterested. Perhaps he, too, was tired. After
breakfast Jim had gone to see Aunt Marion, and returned disappointed,
and, after an inning or two of ball, which he played but languidly, had
come home for a snooze, and found daddy talking gravely with gentlemen
from town who had been to see him before, and had queer-looking papers
for him to sign, not a bit like the innumerable rolls, returns and
company things he had to attend to when captain of a troop. Jim awakened
only with difficulty and only when called. He had promised to lunch with
Harold Winn, and went, slowly and heavily, but came back soon with a hot
headache, and was again sleeping when the phaeton drove round for mamma
and Felicie, and he did not know that this time mamma came not to see
daddy before starting. He did not know that Miss Sanford came not to
read. He did not know just what to make of things when he found daddy
bending over him at sunset, with anxiety in his face, and young Dr.
Wallen was helping undress and get him regularly to bed.
Mamma and Felicie had come home before the usual time, and Jim never
knew that, or what happened later, until very long after. But something,
it seems, had occurred during the drive to greatly agitate mamma, and
that evening her condition demanded the ministrations of both the
physician and her maid. That night something further occurred that led
to much more agitation and weeping and upbraiding and reproaches and
accusations and all manner of things his father evidently wished him not
to hear, for he firmly closed the door between their rooms. The doctor
came a third time, and in the morning, burning with fever and caring
little whither he went, Jimmy was only vaguely conscious that he was
being gently borne down the stairway and into the open air, and thought
he was flying until again stowed away between sheets that seemed so
fresh and cool, and once he thought daddy was standing over him, dressed
again in his uniform, and he was sure Aunt Marion had bent to kiss him,
and then that every now and then Miss 'Cilla placed a slim, cool hand
upon his forehead and removed some icy bandage that seemed almost to
sizzle when it touched his skin. From time to time something was fed him
from a tiny spoon, and all the time he was getting hotter and duller,
and the lightest cover was insupportable, and he wished to toss it
off--toss everything off--toss himself off the little white bed; and
then, mercifully, Jim knew nothing at all but dreams for many a day
until he and Minneconjou came once more slowly to their senses, for
Minneconjou had been every bit as flighty, as far out of its head, as
Jimmy Dwight, and it had not typhoid to excuse it, either.
The day following Jimmy's seizure, Major Dwight appeared in public again
for the first time since his strange attack. He had ever been of spare
habit, but now he was gaunt as a greyhound, and his uniform hung
flabbily about his wasted form. He looked two shades grayer and ten
years older. His eyes were dull and deep-set. His face was ashen. He was
not fit to be up and about, said the doctors, but could not be kept at
home. Mrs. Dwight was in semi-hysterical condition, requiring frequent
sedatives and unlimited Felicie. There had been--yes, in answer to
direct question, the physicians had to own--there had been a scene
between the aging husband and the youthful wife and, though the details
were fairly well known to these gentlemen, they were almost as fairly
kept inviolate. But for the voluble, the invaluable Felicie, Minneconjou
might have been kept guessing for ten days longer. Dwight spent his
waking hours mostly at the Rays', wistfully watching the doctor and
pleading to be admitted to the bedside of the burning little patient, a
thing they could not permit, for Dwight was still too weak to exercise
the needed self-control. It seemed as though he had forgotten the
existence of Inez, his wife, the existence of Foster, the existence of
Sandy Ray and everybody and anybody beyond Jimmy and those who were
ministering to him. Mrs. Ray, once again moving, though languidly, about
her household duties (for Priscilla was utterly engrossed with the boy)
had made the major as comfortable as he would permit in the little
library below stairs, where he had an easy chair in which he could
recline, and books, desk, writing material, but no one to read to him;
and, as it turned out, he would do nothing but move restlessly about,
listen for every sound from the upper floor where Jim lay in Sandy's
bed, and waylay the doctors or anybody who might have tidings. Once or
twice, there or at home, he had to see the colonel, the adjutant or his
own second in command, Captain Hurst, but the lawyers came no more. All
proceedings were called off for the time being. Everything in his mind
hinged on the fate of Jimmy, and, one thing worth the noting, Madame and
the phaeton went no more abroad.
But if he had apparently forgotten, Felicie had not, the incidents of
that stormy meeting, the episode that led to it and the consequences to
be expected. Felicie felt that the public should be enlightened and
public opinion properly aroused as to the major's domestic misrule. It
was high time all Minneconjou was made to know this monster and "the
hideous accusations he make against this angel, and this angel's the
most devoted myself that to you speak." From the torrent of her tirade,
occasionally, drops of information seemed to accord with the rumors
dribbling about the garrison. Minneconjou knew that the well-named and
impenetrable post commander was in possession of facts he could impart
to nobody; that he had been questioning and cross-questioning corporal
and men, the latter recent occupants of sentry posts Nos. 3 and 4; that
these gentry had been ordered by him to hold no converse with anybody;
that he had again called up two of the three men incarcerated at the
time of the assault upon Captain Foster, and it was now definitely known
that these two had both served under Foster in the --th Cavalry,
although both now protested they always considered him a model officer
and a perfect gentleman. To offset this was the statement of Sergeant
Hess, of the Sixty-first, who said he had once served at the same post
with them, though not in the cavalry, and knew they bore bad characters
and would bear watching. Then he was sent for, and then it transpired
that No. 3 of the suspected trio had gone with the guard to the agency,
and he, said Hess, had been the worst of the lot. His name to-day was
Skelton, but in those days they knew him as Scully. Had it not been that
a dozen other men were out the night of that assault, this might have
clinched the case against them. It was enough, at least, to keep them
under surveillance.
But other stories, readily confirmed by Felicie, were to the effect that
Dwight had accused his wife of deliberate falsehood in denying that she
had met Mr. Ray at Naples; of deliberate intent to make him believe
Jimmy a liar when adhering to his story that Mr. Ray had come and spoken
to her (a dream! a vision! declared Felicie); of deliberately accusing
him of rudeness, insolence, affront to Captain Foster and herself in
refusing to deny he had seen them together in the parlor during church
time ("a mere incident of the most innocent," said Felicie, "of which
this infant terrible would have made a mountain"). Moreover, the monster
had "accused Madame of all manner of misdoings with this most amiable
the Captain Fawstair," and Felicie's humid eyes went heavenward at the
retrospect; "and of lying to him, her husband, about, _ah, ciel_, that
man!" And then to think that he should demand of Madame in her condition
that she confess the truth about that midnight affair when her scream
aroused the household! It was she, Felicie, who screamed. Madame could
not sleep. She needed a composing draught. She, Felicie, had gone down
to prepare it, had unbolted the back door, and was passing to and fro
between the kitchen and the refrigerator in the addition without, and
she could not find the cork-screw, and could not open the--Apollinaris,
and Madame had become impatient, nervous, and had herself wandered down;
and just as Felicie was returning they encountered at the doorway and,
to her shame be it said, she screamed, so was she startled, "and Madame
uttered too a cry, because I cry, but it was nothing, nothing!"
Nevertheless, Minneconjou was hearing of a slender form seen skulking
along the back fence, hurrying away from Dwight's, and of items picked
up at dawn near Dwight's back steps, and of a notebook sent to
Lieutenant Ray, who had himself been out searching very early and very
diligently. Then, something or other, picked up early that morning, had
been sent to the colonel, for it came with his mail; and the adjutant
and the orderly heard his exclamation, saw the consternation in his
face, and the orderly told of it--told Kathleen at the doctor's; then
had to tell other girls or take the consequences. Then there were these
drives up the valley and the meetings at the cottonwoods. People who
called to ask after the presumably lonely mistress of the house began
asking after something Felicie had hoped no one had noticed.
For in upbraiding Inez, his wife, Major Dwight not once had mentioned
her meetings near Minneconjou with Lieutenant Ray, who, as all this was
going on at the post, stood facing a condition that called for the
exercise of all his nerve and pluck and common sense. The Indian
leaders, three days after his coming, had mustered their force and
demanded the instant withdrawal of himself and his men, leaving all
horses and arms and certain of their charges behind them.