"You don't _know_?" exclaimed Curbit, puzzled and beginning to bristle.
"I don't _know_," repeated Lanier, positive and beginning to rejoice.
"Suppose the colonel tells me to explain that," began Curbit, but Doctor
Schuchardt set his foot down summarily.
"Here," said he, "this thing's got to stop;" and he came to the door in
his shirt sleeves, leaning half way out, with one hand behind him.
"Lanier's in a highly nervous and excited state. He has had a fall--and
I'm trying to get him to bed and asleep. He doesn't know--whom--he has
seen since he got home in arrest, and you can say so for me."
"All right Shoe," was the philosophical answer. "It's none o' my
funeral, and personally I don't give a cuss if they _never_ find him,
but there are just s-teen reasons why the Old Man wants to see that
young man Rawdon forthwith, and as many for believing he's skipped."
"Then skip after him. You can track anything but a ghost in this
new-fallen snow."
Curbit lowered his voice. "That's exactly the trouble, doctor. Go to the
back of the quarters and see for yourself. His trail starts--and
ends--_here_."
In all its history Fort Cushing had never known such a day of
bewilderment as that which followed. Guard mounting was held as usual at
eight A.M., and Colonel Button, awaiting in his office the coming of the
old and the new officers-of-the-day, directed his adjutant to drop his
own work at their entrance and give attention to what took place. Half a
dozen other officers, with little or no business to transact at that
hour, made it their business to be present, drawn thither from sheer
sympathy, as some declared, and downright curiosity, as owned by others.
The office building was large and roomy; the colonel's desk was close to
the door; beyond it were tables spread with maps, magazines, and
papers; a big stove stood in the middle, and a dozen chairs were
scattered about, for it was here the officers met one evening each week
in the one "book-schooling" to which they were then subjected--a
recitation in regulations or "Tactics." Across the hall was a smaller
office--the adjutant's--and beyond that the room where sat the
sergeant-major and his clerks. The windows, snow-battered and
frost-bitten, gave abundant light from the skies, but none on the
surroundings--the view being limited to scratch-hole surveys. There was
nothing to distract attention from what might be going on within, and
all eyes were on the two burly captains who entered at 8.30, fur-capped,
fur-gloved, in huge overcoats and arctics. The wind had begun, even
earlier than usual, to whine and stir as it swept down from the bleak
northwest, and the mercury had dropped some ten degrees since the
previous evening.
"Blizzard coming," said Scott, as he glanced at the sullen skies, and
Scott knew the Rockies as he did the Paymaster's Manual.
"I report as old officer-of-the-day, sir," said Curbit, with brief
salute, tendering the guard report book.
The colonel went straight to business, as he glanced over the list of
prisoners.
"No sign of Trooper Rawdon?"
"No, sir. The patrol sent to search in town got back at reveille."
"His horse and kit all right?"
"All right, sir. Nothing missing that he was supposed to have."
"Police notified to watch all trains--and stages?"
"Yes, sir, and Sergeant Stowell, who commanded the paymaster's escort,
remains in town with a couple of men to help."
There was impressive silence in the office. The colonel sat with
troubled brow, looking grimly over the roster of the guard, the written
"remarks" of the officer-of-the-day, and the hours of his inspections of
sentries, etc. Barker, the adjutant, had dropped into a chair, a few
feet back of the fur-capped officers, and, though listening as bidden,
was gloomily contemplating the frost-covered panes of the nearest north
window.
Eight men had gone with Sergeant Stowell as escort to the paymaster
when, nearly four weeks earlier, he had set forth on his trip. Then the
little iron safe was full of money. Seven men had come back with him,
when, as the safe was well nigh empty, the paymaster said he hardly
needed an escort. Of the eight who started, four were "casuals" who
belonged to companies stationed at Fort Frayne, well up in the Indian
country, and there they remained when the duty was over. Of the seven
who came with Stowell, three belonged at Fort Frayne, a corporal and two
men of Captain Raymond's troop, and they came fortified with the orders
of their post commander, a copy of which was now in Barker's hands.
"What I don't understand," said the colonel, whirling his chair to the
right about and addressing the paymaster, "is how or why those men
should be down here."
"It _seems_ simple," answered Scott, placidly, he being entirely
independent of the post commander. "From Frayne I had to go to the
cantonments up along the Big Horn, and we doubled the size of the escort
accordingly. When we got back there these three were permitted to come
all the way, whether to buy Christmas things for the Frayne folk, or for
affairs of their own, I didn't inquire."
"To whom did you assign them for rations and quarters?" demanded the
colonel, of Barker.
"Captain Snaffle, sir--'C' Troop."
"Are they there?--the others, at least?"
"Corporal Watts and Trooper Ames are there, sir. Trooper Rawdon, as you
know, is not. He has not been seen about the quarters since some time
last evening. Moreover, the few personal belongings he had are gone."
Again a pause. Then presently: "You arrested Kelly, I see, the man who
was on Number Five."
"Yes, sir. Both Doctor Schuchardt and the steward said his sickness was
due to drink. The sergeant and corporal-of-the-guard are willing to
swear he was perfectly sober when they stationed him. The men say he
hadn't touched a drop of liquor for a month. He must have drunk after he
was posted as sentry, for he vomited whiskey at the hospital. I believe
he was doped."
"That he could get whiskey anywhere along back of the officers'
quarters," said the colonel, reflectively as well as reflecting, "is not
improbable. That it should have been doped, judging from the way one or
two have misbehaved, is not impossible. Captain Snaffle's cook, it
seems, was indulging some of her friends with a surreptitious supper, at
his expense. That, very possibly, is how Kelley came to grief. The
others seem to have hidden their tracks thus far." Then, as though with
sudden resolution, he turned abruptly again.
"The usual orders, for the present, captain," said he, to the new
incumbent. "And you are relieved, Captain Curbit"--to the old. "But I
shall need to see you later, so do not leave the post."
"The man that leaves the post this day," said Major Scott, with a squint
through the upper and unincumbered panes of the nearest window, "may
need a seven days' leave."
"And that, colonel," said a quiet voice at the commander's elbow, "is
what I applied for earlier. Pardon me, sir, but I need to know your
decision, for I should now be going to town."
It was Captain Sumter who spoke, and the colonel flushed promptly at
sound of his voice.
"I had intended sending for you, Sumter," said he, "but these rather
engrossing matters had to be taken up first. I--have your application,"
he continued, fumbling among the papers on his desk. "It is an awkward
time--and these are awkward circumstances. It will leave your troop
without an officer."
"Mr. Lanier will be here, colonel."
"Here--but in close arrest," frowned the colonel, "and you haven't had a
first lieutenant since I have been in command."
"My misfortune, sir, but hardly my fault," answered Captain Sumter
tersely yet respectfully. "General Sheridan selects his aides-de-camp
where he will, and last month you thought it a compliment to the
regiment and to my troop."
"You feel that--you _ought_ to go?" asked the colonel, dropping the
subject like a hot brick, and resuming the previous question.
"Our guest, Miss Arnold, is in no condition to travel alone," said
Captain Sumter gravely. "My wife decides to accompany her, at least to
Chicago, and I desire to go with my wife."
The colonel bit his lip, and bowed. "I see," said he. "Miss Arnold was
very much shaken by what happened--after she got home?"
"Rather by what happened _before_ she got home," was the calm yet
suggestive reply, and it stung the commander to the quick.
"Captain Sumter," said he, flushing angrily, for no one of his officers
held he in higher esteem, "your attitude is that of opposition, if not
of rebuke, to the official acts of the post commander."
"Then let me disclaim at once the faintest disrespect, Colonel Button,
but--as Mr. Lanier's troop commander and personal friend, I beg leave to
say that so far as I know, his offense is one which his comrades have
committed time and again, without rebuke."
"Which simply goes to show, sir," responded the colonel, with glittering
eyes, "that you do not know the twentieth part of his offense."
For a moment the silence in the office was painful. Men looked at each
other without speaking. Sumter stood before his commander, turning paler
with the flitting seconds. At last he spoke:
"If that be true, Colonel Button, of course I cannot think of going. I
withdraw my application;" and, turning slowly, left the office.
Between him and the adjutant flashed one quick glance. There was
something to come yet. The officers-of-the-day had gone--Curbit to shed
furs and sabre at his quarters and say "Thank God!" Snaffle, his junior
in rank but senior in years, a veteran of the old dragoons, to plod
wearily back towards the guard-house for a conference with Lieutenant
Crane, commander-of-the-guard.
In the office of the sergeant-major the clerks were busily at work
consolidating the morning reports of the ten companies--six of cavalry,
four of infantry--stationed at the post. A note on that of Captain
Snaffle had already caught the eye of the sergeant-major, who had
bustled in to impart the tidings to his immediate superior, the
adjutant, and was disappointed to find them known already.
Instead of carrying three enlisted men present as "casually at post,"
the "return" of Troop "C" had but two. Trooper Rawdon, whose horse,
horse equipments, and field kit were safely stored in the troop-stables
since noon the previous day, was himself accounted for nowhere. In view
of the fact that he had not been seen, and could not be found, there was
nothing remarkable about that. With the morning report book, however,
there was handed in a copy of an order duly submitted by Corporal Watts
to Snaffle's first sergeant, and by him to his captain, which read as
follows:
FORT FRAYNE, Wyoming,
December 11, 1876.
S. O. }
} (Extract)
No. 81. }
* * * * *
3. On arriving with his detachment at Fort Cushing, and in
compliance with the telegraphic instructions from Department
Headquarters, Trooper G. P. Rawdon, Troop "L," --th Cavalry, is
granted thirty days' furlough, at the expiration of which he will
report to the commanding officer of Fort Cushing for transportation
to his proper station.
By order of Lieutenant-Colonel Kent,
DOUGLAS JERROLD,
Second Lieut. --th Inf.,
Post Adjutant.