IX

Few men slept the rest of the night for talking over the stirring scenes

of that spectacular fire. Indeed, there had been a strenuous fight to

keep it from spreading, and the Graysons' quarters next door were badly

scorched, and the Graysons woefully scared, before the little bachelor

hall had burned itself out. Big Jim Ennis had lost pretty much

everything he owned except what he had on. Lanier was not much better

off. As to the origin of the fire, Bob merely said that he had turned

the lights low in the sitting-room, and, obedient to "Shoe's" orders,

had gone up to his roost, too wrathful and amazed over what had occurred

even to think of sleep--to think, in fact, of anything but the colonel's

words. So absorbed was he, as he slowly undressed, he never noted the

sounds from below until his room of a sudden seemed filled with smoke,

and, throwing open the door, he was amazed to find the hallway ablaze,

the stairs impassable. Running to his dormer window, he yelled fire at

the top of his voice. Sentry Number Five heard and came running down

along the back fence; saw the peril, let drive a shot and gave the yell

that roused every one at the hospital--poor Rafferty, half crazed, half

dazed, and by no means half dressed, coming leaping along among the

first.

And there at his back window, choking with smoke and tossing out

clothing and other belongings, stood Mr. Lanier. Some men went searching

for ladders up the line of back yards, the post hook and ladder truck

being, of course, on the far side of the garrison. There being no

extension and sheds to this little box, as to the larger quarters up the

line, other men began shouting, and Lieutenant Grayson imploring Mr.

Lanier to jump, for already the flames had burst through the windows

below. Then came the episode the regiment laughed over, swore over,

talked over, many a long year thereafter. To Grayson's appeal Bob's only

answer was a calm and deliberate:

"Give my compliments to the colonel, will you, and tell him that, my

quarters being all ablaze, I'd like an extension of arrest?"

Then Sumter and Stannard came in, tumultuous, and _ordered_ him down,

and Blake and Curbit, and the rest of the card party, came tearing after

them, and berated him for an absurdity, and implored him not to be an

ass. And then a bright tongue of flame licked in through the transom

behind him, and the door panels burst from the heat, and all the room at

his back suddenly blazed with fire, and then went up the cry from that

agonized girl, at sound of which Lanier started and strove to climb to

the little window-sill, with a lurid sheet lapping down about his head,

and then a brace of young Irishmen, Cassidy foremost, came scrambling up

a human pyramid, smoking and singeing below them. They reached the

blazing eaves and burst through the fringe of flame, dragging Bob forth

and on to the edge, and then tottered all together into that blessed

mound of snow beneath, fast melting in the glare of that fiery furnace.

Then came the commander, and the swift running soldiers, and all the

antiquated fire apparatus, and most of the families. Soon the hooks were

locked in the blazing framework, and speedily the little bachelor den

was torn into hissing and smoking fragments. Meantime Lanier and

Cassidy, Blake, Horton, and nearly a dozen daring fellows who had risked

their skins to save their lieutenant, had been led over to hospital to

be cooled off and lotioned and bandaged and variously put to bed, and

when at last not a spark could be found in the black, unsightly ruins,

and even they had been buried under bushels of snow, the colonel and his

men-at-arms went back to quarters, and many of the officers to the

store, to talk it all over, especially what Bobby had said to Button.

And thus were we brought to the morning of Thursday, the sixth since the

eventful night when Miriam Arnold's shriek had alarmed the

garrison--Miriam, whose voice had now been heard a second time, upraised

in frantic dread and appeal, but this time for the young soldier who, on

the previous Friday night, forgetful of his arrest, had rushed forth at

her cry, but this night had to be dragged--Miriam who now lay sick from

maidenly shame that in one wild appeal to save her lover she had so

betrayed herself.

With Thursday noon came resumption of telegraphic communication, and the

long-stalled railway trains from east and west. With Thursday afternoon

came "wires" from Arnold, the father, begging to know had his daughter

started, and back went the electric message that she neither had nor

could, nor would for a week--"full details by post." With Thursday

evening came stacks of belated letters, "with whole bales of

newspapers," said the stage driver, to follow, and with Thursday

midnight, long after every one had gone to bed, there came a tapping at

Major Stannard's storm door, and presently a fumbling at the bell knob,

a clanging of the bell.

"What now?" thought the sleepy major, as he scuttled down-stairs in

slippers and dressing-gown. "Who's there?" he growled, as he unbolted

the door. That fire down the line had made people nervous. There was no

saying how it started.

"It is Mayhew, sir," said a solemn voice. "I've come not hoping, only

praying, I may find my daughter here."

"Good God!" said Stannard. "Come in," and led forthwith his aged and

trembling comrade within doors, seated him by the still glowing stove

in the front room, and struck a light. In less than a minute Mrs.

Stannard, too, had joined them, her kind blue eyes filled with tender

pity and sorrow. She, at least, was not entirely unprepared. Poor

motherless Dora had no lack of friendly counsel and fond, womanly

sympathy when once she could be brought to lay her burden there. If only

she had earlier sought that wise and winsome monitor! But Mrs. Stannard

had not been at Frayne in the early summer, not until the major was

assigned to station at Cushing had the good wife joined him, and

meanwhile there had been no hand to guide, only a fond and passionate

young heart. And now, with his gray hairs bowed in sorrow to the dust,

poor Mayhew had come to tell his piteous tale. Ever since young Rawdon

had gone with the paymaster she had been fitful and nervous. Ever since

their coming to Cushing, four weeks agone, she had been watching,

waiting, listening, often weeping, and when letters came for her, with

the postmark of Fetterman or Laramie, Red Cloud or the cantonment in the

Hills, he could not but note her feverish eagerness and her instant

escape to her own room to read her treasure alone. Oh, yes, he knew they

must be from Rawdon. He had liked the lad, knew there was good stuff in

him, and he could not bear that fellow Fitzroy, who was a military loan

shark, a man who fattened on the needs or weaknesses of his comrades. He

hated to think of his bonny girl's losing her heart to Fitzroy. He owned

he rather welcomed Rawdon's advances and rejoiced that she, too, seemed

to prefer him.

But--God! He had never looked for--this! Oh, where had she gone?--and

why? He had found her at home and in tears after the fire. All morning

long she had been in an agony of nervousness. Then that afternoon, some

time, somehow, she got a message or letter, and then, kissing him and

saying she would be better in bed, had gone to her room, but not to

sleep. At eleven o'clock old Chloe's sobbing aroused him. He found it

all deserted. Dora had disappeared, leaving not one word to comfort him.

They lost no time, those men of the field and the frontier. Stannard was

dressed and out in twenty minutes; had summoned Ennis, Field, and others

among the young officers; had routed out half a troop and could have had

the entire garrison, for few were the soldiers who would not search all

night or work all day for good old Mayhew and his pretty daughter.

Perhaps that was one reason why, until this night, so many maids and

mothers among the sergeants' families envied and slandered her. Mayhew

had been far from wise, and Dora, indeed, had none to guide. Kindly and

cordially treated as he and she had been by the officers and their

wives--being, in fact, superior socially to the Snaffle household, if

not to certain others--there was yet this bar to hold them back: they

dined and danced not with the "commissioned" element of the post whereat

Mayhew was stationed. They were of finer clay than the people of the

rank and file, and so, with the families of the forage and wagon-master,

the chief packer and old Ordnance Sergeant Shell, they made up a little

middle class of their own, when Dora's heart had gone out, ungrudgingly,

to handsome, clever, educated George Rawdon, whom all men could see had

been reared among gentlefolk, and who, as further fascination, was

supplied from some unknown source with money which he spent with lavish

hand.

The moon was in the fourth quarter now, yet still bright enough to aid

them, and up and down the creek bank went the searchers, probing every

pool, searching every shallow. It was odd--or was it odd?--that for half

an hour no man, no matter what he thought, went down and banged at the

door of "C" Troop's stable--where in cozy quarters and solemn state,

guarded by the sentries on either flank, slept that surly magnate among

the non-commissioned officers--Fitzroy, the stable sergeant of Snaffle's

troop. Whatever had befallen poor Dora Mayhew, it was not to join

Cockney Fitzroy she had fled.

Had she fled to join anybody? was the question that racked so many a

heart, for, with the possible exception of gentle Mrs. Stannard, the

girl had made no confidant. It was stanch old Chloe who would have it

that her pet and pride from childhood, her solemn charge since the poor

mother's death eight years before, had never left her father's roof to

do harm to herself and break their hearts. If morning came without her,

she surely had been lured away, and, if "Marss Rawdon" had really gone,

who was there who, through love or fear or threat or artifice of any

kind, _could_ lure her?

It was this, full fifteen minutes after Lieutenant Field and two of his

men had trotted off to town, that started old Stannard and big Jim Ennis

down the valley from the veterinarian's, through "Suds-town," where

girls and women were huddling and whispering at the news; through the

hay and wood-yards, where the sentry challenged sharply, so often had he

halted searching parties in the last ten minutes; past the little shack

where dwelt the farriers and blacksmiths, many of them alight, for the

story had gone sweeping; and so at last they came to the long cavalry

stables, standing gable ends to the north, like so many companies in

close column, and at the sixth of these, farthest from the bluff whereon

stood the barracks and quarters, they stopped and banged at the door. No

answer--even when the sentry came to their aid and hammered with the

butt of his carbine. They went round and rattled at the window of the

sergeant's room. Still no response, and at their beck the sentry yelled

for the corporal-of-the-guard, who had followed down, expectant.

"I'll have him out," said he, and ran round to the south end, and

presently came back, panting but triumphant. He had roused the two

stable orderlies. They would open up in a minute. They did, with much

blinking of eyes and some demur, but stood abashed when the burly major

strode in, big Jim Ennis at his heels. The latter hesitated not one

second. His weight went in with the battering ram of that muscular leg

and massive foot, and the sergeant's door flew open before them. The

room was empty. Fitzroy and Fitzroy's furs were gone. Nor was that all.

Snatching a stable lantern from the hand of one of the shaking grooms,

Ennis swung it high aloft. Two empty stalls stood close at hand.

"I thought so," said he, then grabbed the nearest orderly by the coat

collar. "Who took Lieutenant Foster's sleigh and team," demanded he,

"and how long ago?"

"Sergeant Fitzroy, sir," came the answer, with a doleful whine, "just

before the third relief, at half-past eleven."

"No time to see the colonel now!" said Ennis. "Major Stannard, I've got

to gallop into town, but a dozen men, if need be, should trail that

sleigh."

"Go it, boy," was the instant answer, "and I'm behind you."

X

On the principle that disaster ever demands its victim, the sentry of

the second relief--the immediate predecessor of the soldier now on post

at the north line of the stables--was stirred up at once and ordered to

explain. Even as Stannard was hastening the movements of the men

detailed to mount and trail the Foster team, even as Ennis was galloping

town-ward on a mission of his own, Captain Langley, of the Infantry,

officer-of-the-day, began his stern examination of the luckless

guardian.

Orders are orders. Even a stable sergeant could not take or send an

animal out at night (except the building stood in danger of destruction

by flood, fire, or tornado) save on written order of a commissioned

officer and in presence of the corporal-of-the-guard, and Stoner, the

sentry of the second relief, admitted he knew these were the orders, but

"the fellers" had never supposed they applied to Sergeant Fitzroy, who

did pretty much as he pleased. In fact, Fitzroy hitched up and drove

away without so much as a word to him. He, the sentry, was too little

surprised to think of ordering "Halt." Even as Langley drew from him the

admission, the word came up that the squad had started hot foot on the

trail. It led straight away to town.

And the stable orderlies had sworn that Fitzroy started alone.

Therefore, unless Dora Mayhew had circled the fort and joined him on the

bleak eastward prairie, it was most unlikely she had gone with him, and,

up to one o'clock, there was none to hint with whom, or how, except

afoot, she could have gone. Then, however, came revelation. The sentry

stationed at the northwest face of the post admitted having seen "a rig

from town" making wide circuit clear around behind the fort on the

westward "bench," which was swept almost clean of snow. It had kept well

out beyond hailing distance, stood a moment or two up at the edge of the

bluff, then whirled about and went the way it came. What hour was this?

Just before they called off eleven o'clock. Why had he not mentioned or

reported it? Well, he thought it might have been some of the officers.

"They sometimes came out late and went in home the back way," whereat,

in some confusion, Captain Langley dropped that phase of the

investigation.

By two o'clock that rig also had been trailed back to town, where it was

lost in the tangle of wheel tracks. There Ennis and Field and several

troopers, with one or two interested citizens, were in quest of tidings.

There they were joined by Mayhew himself, who had one more hope. Dora

had a friend, a few years older than herself, with whom she had been

intimate at Fort Riley. They went daily to school together when

children, and wept when parted. Now her friend was married to a

conductor of the Union Pacific Railway, and living in town. It might be

that Dora had gone to her.

They found the house, and hammered at the door and lower windows, and

succeeded only in waking a Chinese servant who said, "All gone; b'long

Omaha," and refused further information. They went to the three stables

in town, and all had "rigs" out, some of them two or three. None, to the

proprietor's knowledge, had been to the fort. Most of them had gone to a

dance at Arena, a cattle town six miles east, and it was high time they

were returning, for now it was after three. "What's all the row about

anyhow?" demanded the night watchman of one of these establishments.

"There was that cockney sergeant fellow here along about midnight,

asking questions and raising hell. The town marshal had a rumpus with

him and went to bed mad." The half-dozen hangers-on about the railway

station, and the roisterers at the one, open-all-night saloon were

growing inquisitive, if not impudent. The station-master had gone home,

but the lone operator to whom, one after another, Field, Ennis, and

Mayhew had appealed, declared that no young lady had gone on Number Six,

for the reason that Number Six hadn't gone and wouldn't go till 'long

toward daylight. She broke down somewhere about seven o'clock at

Medicine Bow.

But Ennis and Mayhew came at him a second time, with a second question:

Could he tell them anything of Mr. and Mrs. Osborn, Osborn being a

conductor and Mrs. Osborn Dora's friend of whom previous mention is

made? Had they gone to Omaha? No, for Mr. Osborn was round here early in

the evening, and had to be here at six o'clock A.M. to meet and take

Number Five over the Mountain Division. Then John Chinaman had lied,

said poor Mayhew, grieving sore and quite ready to break down, but Ennis

was spurred to new energy.

"Keep your heart, old man," said he. "The more I think of this, the more

I'm sure there's light ahead, and I'm going after it. Go to the hotel,

lie down, and leave the rest to me."

And still Jim Ennis felt by no means confident he could be in time. He

knew the Mayhews only slightly. He had never before been stationed at

regimental headquarters, had seen and known Dora only since their coming

to Fort Cushing, and therefore had not learned to share Bob's honest

admiration for her. She might be all Bob thought her, a loving child and

a true-hearted girl in spite of her infatuation for this presentable

young trooper whose antecedents nobody knew. Ennis had often marked him

during the campaign and noted his regard for Bob, and felt kindly

disposed toward him until mid September, when two troops were sent in

to Frayne, with the pack train and orders to load up with rations and

escort it back. Rawdon was missing from the column when it camped the

first night out, on the return, and only caught them by a daring night

ride through the Sioux country when they were two days' march beyond.

His captain, Raymond, had sternly rebuked him and promised him further

punishment when they reached the regiment, but Lanier had heard of it

and interceded, thereby making Rawdon still more his friend. But now the

heart of "Dad" Ennis was hot against him, for fear that what Barker said

might all be true: that Rawdon had wrecked an old man's heart and home,

and ruined an old man's beloved daughter.

With just two troopers at his back, toward four in the morning, big Jim

went spurring on through the dim moonlight, town and station far behind,

following a meandering sleigh and wagon track across the wide, dreary

upland, riding, as a rule, parallel with the railway, while such sleighs

as tried the journey had evidently been making many a detour. Snow there

was in abundance in the coulées and ravines, snow in sheets in the lee

of every little ridge or hummock, but elsewhere the icy sod was swept

hard and clean, and the sharp hoofs rang as though they struck macadam.

Three miles out two "rigs" were passed, westward bound, filled with town

folk who had been to Arena for the dance. Had they seen or heard aught

of Mr. and Mrs. Osborn? he asked. No, they knew them well by sight, and

would be sure to note them had they come to the dance. Five miles out a

stage was encountered, loaded with exuberant revellers who had remained

after the dance for a spree, and were now consumed with wrath because

certain officers of the law from their own town, too, had hustled them

out.

"A hull sleighful of 'em--three or four anyhow--came over there with

that cockney sergeant you fellers keep at the fort, lookin' for

deserters. You after deserters? Well, here's--hic--hopin' you don't get

'em."

It was all Jim Ennis wanted to know. "Come on, men," he cried, and

spurred ahead, his wondering troopers following.

"Now, what the mischief is that man Fitzroy's game?" thought Ennis, as

he pushed on through the bitter cold of the December morning. It had not

been difficult to learn that the sergeant, after much search and inquiry

in town, had started for Arena, taking with him, as it happened, two of

the Rocky Mountain police, who had business there and were tired of

waiting for the train. Ennis reasoned it was after Dora that Fitzroy had

gone; that in his jealous misery he had kept watch upon her, had

followed to town on hearing of her flight, had followed further, and

this it was that gave Ennis the hope that she was accompanied by such

worthy people as the Osborns. If that were so, it could mean but one

thing. It was to join Rawdon, perhaps to be joined to Rawdon. Osborn had

sent two messages by wire and received two early in the evening; Ennis

had learned this through the operator, though the contents were

withheld. Rawdon, probably, dared not come to Cushing City. There he

might still be arrested on sight. Yes. Ennis had it now. Dora Mayhew had

fled to Arena to meet and marry George Rawdon; Fitzroy had followed fast

in hopes of blocking it.

And just as the twinkling switch-lights of the little prairie station

hove in sight ahead, there came a sound that startled him--the whistle

of a railway engine not a mile behind--Number Six at last, and coming

full tilt--the very train, perhaps, that they, the young couple, hoped

and meant to take, and might have taken on their eastward way had not

Fitzroy, keen-eyed, quick-witted, and vengeful, been there in time to

bar the move.

And then in the soldier soul of big Jim Ennis was born a strange,

sudden, and somewhat unprofessional spirit of opposition. Starting out

in the hope of finding and restoring to her father's roof the sorrowing

fugitive, Jim Ennis veered right round to the purpose of succoring a

maiden in distress. If marriage was Rawdon's motive in bidding her join

him, then Rawdon was honest after all, and who was he or who was Fitzroy

to stand in the way and stop it? No, by all the Arts of Peace and the

Articles of War, Rawdon was right and d---- be the man that sought to

check him.

Five minutes later, with the big engine and train coming hissing and

grinding to a stop at the platform, Ennis sprang from his panting horse,

tossed the reins to one trooper, and, followed by the other, shouldered

his way through a little knot of staring townsfolk and up to a group at

the edge of the platform. A trim-built young fellow in civilian dress

was struggling in the grasp of two detectives; a terrified girl was

clinging to his arm, tears streaming down her face; a clerical-looking,

elderly stranger was expostulating; a man in the cap and dress of a

railway conductor was vehemently arguing with a stocky sergeant of

cavalry, who seemed master of the situation, and greatly enjoying his

own importance. A pale-faced young woman, whom the conductor of Number

Six addressed as Mrs. Osborn, was imploring his aid, when, to the amaze

of the sergeant, this big subaltern in boots and spurs bulged in between

him and Conductor Osborn and demanded to know the nature of the trouble.

"I've run down this man, at last, sir," gulped Fitzroy, flustered, but

making valiant effort at control, "as you see, sir, only in the nick of

time."

"Oh, Mr. Ennis," cried Dora, throwing herself upon him and clasping his

arm, "Rawdon has done no wrong. We are married. Here are our friends to

prove it. _Why_ should they arrest him?"

"Colonel's orders, lieutenant. Arrest him wherever found," said Fitz

stoutly, "and I've a sl--stage here to take him back."

"On charges of your own invention, Sergeant Fitzroy," said Ennis icily,

"no one of which you'll ever prove. Have you any warrant for this

man?"--this to the detectives.

"None, sir. The sergeant said he was a deserter, running off with the

doctor's daughter."

"He's no deserter. He's on furlough by order of General Crook,

travelling, I take it, with his own wife, and unless you want to burn

your fingers to the bone, let go."

"Then lieutenant," burst in Fitzroy, "he's a prisoner by order of

Colonel Button----"

"Then as senior officer on the spot I'll take charge of him; also,

Sergeant Fitzroy, of you, and the sleigh you feloniously made way with.

Stand aside, sir. Now, gentlemen, how about this train?"

"Ordered right on, lieutenant, to meet Number Five at Beaver Switch."

"Then it's a case of all aboard for those bound eastward. We'll hear the

rest when you return from furlough, Rawdon"--for now the young man was

trying to speak instead of seeking to speed away. "I did my best to be

in time for the ceremony, Mrs. Rawdon," continued Ennis, gallant and

impressive, as he swung her suddenly aboard, "but with my usual luck I

lost the chance to kiss the bride."

For answer she quickly turned, flung her arms about his neck, and her

warm lips swept his cheek. "One for you, Mr. Ennis," she cried, and then

again, "and this--for Mr. Lanier!"