GARRISON TALK.
It was a picturesque group that assembled every pleasant morning on the
veranda of the colonel's quarters. There had been a time in the not very
distant past of the regiment when the ladies gathered almost anywhere
else in preference, but that was when Colonel Pelham had retained the
command, and when his wife sought to rule the garrison after methods of
her own devising. However successful may be such feminine usurpation for
a time, it is at best but a temporary power, for women are of all things
revolutionary. The instances where some ambitious matron has sought to
assume the control of the little military bailiwick known as "the
garrison" are numerous indeed, but the fingers of one hand are too many
to keep tally of the cases of prolonged and peaceful reign. Mrs.
Pelham's queendom had been limited to a very brief fortnight,--so 'twas
said in the regiment,--despite the fact that the more prominent members
of the social circle of the --th had been quite ready to do her every
homage on her first arrival,--provided the prime ministry were not given
to some rival sister. But Mrs. Pelham's administration had been fraught
with errors and disasters enough to wreck a constitutional monarchy,
and, as a result, affairs were in a highly socialistic, if not
nihilistic condition for some months after the return of the regiment
from its exile in Arizona. Only a few of the officers had taken their
families thither with them, for the journey in those days was full of
vast discomfort and expense, and life there was an isolation; but those
ladies who had shared the heat and burden of the Arizona days with their
lords were not unnaturally given to regarding themselves as entitled to
more consideration as regimental authorities than those of their
sisterhood who had remained in comfort in the East. Then, too, there was
a little band of heroines who had made the march "cross country" with
the --th, and held themselves (and were held by the men) as having a
higher place on the regimental unwritten records than those who were
sent home by way of the Pacific, San Francisco, and the one railway that
then belted the continent. Of these heroines Mrs. Pelham was not, and
when she rejoined at Fort Hays, got her house in order and proceeded,
though with inward misgiving, to summon her subjects about her, she
found that even the faint rally on which she had counted was denied her.
The ladies who knew her at Camp Sandy had thrown off the yoke, and those
who were joining for the first time had been unmistakably cautioned by
the determined Amazons of the homeward march. Courtesy, civility, and a
certain degree of cordiality when in their social gatherings, the ladies
were willing to extend to the colonel's wife, but the declaration of
independence had been signed and sealed,--they would have no more of her
dominion.
To a woman of her character garrison life was no longer tolerable to
Mrs. Pelham; the colonel, too, was getting tired of it, was aging
rapidly and no longer able to take his morning gallops. Then, too, he
was utterly lonely; his one daughter, the light of his old eyes, had
married the man of her choice during the previous year; his sons were
scattered in their own avocations, and the complaints and peevishness of
his wife were poor companions for his fireside. The officers welcomed
him to their club-room, and gladly strove to interest him in billiards
or whist, to the exclusion of the Gleason clique and concomitant poker,
which was never played in the colonel's presence; but even this solace
was denied him by his wife. She was just as lonely at home, poor lady,
and she had to have some one to listen to her long accumulation of
feminine trials and grievances, otherwise the overcharged bosom would
burst. We claim it an attribute of manhood that "to suffer and be
strong" is an every-day affair; but the best of men feel infinite relief
in having some trusted friend who will listen in patience to the
oft-told story of their struggle. To suffer, be strong, and be silent
is a task for the stoutest of our sex, but woman triumphs over nature
itself in accomplishing the triple feat, and undergoes a torture that
outrivals martyrdom. Suffer Mrs. Pelham could and did, if her voluble
lamentations could be credited; strong she deemed herself beyond all
question, in not having succumbed to the privations and asperities of
Western life, but silent? ah, no! Poor old Pelham's life had become a
perennial curtain-lecture, so Lieutenant Blake expressed it, and when
January came, and with it an opportunity to accept a pleasant detail in
the East, the colonel lost no time in taking his departure. He left the
--th with a sorrowful heart, for officers and men were strongly attached
to the old soldier who had for years past shared every exile with them,
but they could not bear his domineering wife, and many a fellow who
hadn't told an appreciable lie for six months gulped unconscionably when
it came to saying good-by to Mrs. Pelham. How could an honest man say he
regretted her going? Stout old Bucketts, the quartermaster, looked her
straight in the eye and wished her a pleasant journey and a long and
happy visit East, whereat several ladies gasped audibly, yet told it
over and over afterwards with infinite delight. The majority of the
officers contented themselves with saying that the garrison would not be
the same place without the colonel and herself, which was gospel truth
despite its ambiguity, but Gleason came in from a hunt purposely to say
farewell, and was most effusive in his regrets at her ladyship's
departure, and as for the ladies of the regiment. Ah, well! Why should
they be any different, any more frank in garrison than out of it? There
was not one of their number who did not inwardly rejoice at Mrs.
Pelham's going, but they clouded their gentle faces in decorous
mourning; they grouped about her on the piazza when the hour for parting
came, looking infinitely pathetic and picturesque, and the soft voices
were touching in their subdued sorrow; there were even eyes that
glistened with unshed tears, and both Mrs. Raymond and Mrs. Turner
begged that she would write to them, and heaven only knows what all. Who
that saw it could doubt the forgiving nature of the gentler sex? Who
dare asperse the sweet sincerity of feminine friendship?
But Lady Pelham had gone, and gone for good they hoped; the
lieutenant-colonel had arrived and assumed command, and Major and Mrs.
Stannard made their first appearance at regimental headquarters. A new
era had dawned on the --th; the staff sent in their resignations, and
were promptly and pleasantly notified by the new commander that he hoped
they would not deprive him of services that had been so valuable to his
predecessor; whereat they resumed duty with lighter hearts. It was all
well enough where Bucketts was concerned; he had been quartermaster for
years and no one expected anything else, but there were those in the
regiment who hoped there might be a change in the adjutancy. The office
was held by one of the senior lieutenants, to be sure, and one who
possessed many qualifications which were conceded, but his appointment
had been something of an accident.
He, too, had come into the --th by transfer in '71 for the avowed
purpose of seeking service on the Western frontier with the cavalry. As
it was the artillery which he abandoned for that purpose, the --th
admitted that here was a fellow who might be worth having, but, to the
scandal of the entire regiment, no sooner was the order issued which
doomed them to a five years' exile in Arizona--then overrun with hostile
Apaches--than the newly transferred gentleman accepted a detail as
aide-de-camp on the staff of a general officer, and the --th went across
to the Pacific and presently were lost to recollection in the then
inaccessible wilds of that marvellous Territory. Here they spent four
long years of hard scouting, hard fighting, and no little suffering,
while the aide in question was presumably enjoying himself in unlimited
ball and opera in a gay Southern capital. Suddenly he turned up in their
midst just in time to take part in the closing campaign which left the
Apaches for several years a disarmed and subjugated race; he happened to
get command of a well-seasoned and thoroughly experienced "troop," and
through no particular personal merit, but rather by the faculty he had
of seeking the advice of the veteran sergeants in the company, he had
won two or three lively little fights with wandering bands of hostiles,
and had finally been quite enviably wounded. It was all a piece of his
confounded luck, said some of the --th not unnaturally. Many a gallant
fellow had been killed and buried, many another wounded and not
especially mentioned, and all of them had done months of hard work where
Billings had put in only so many days, but here he came in at the
eleventh hour, and they, who had borne the heat and burden of the
campaign and received every man his penny, couldn't help a few
good-natured slings at the fact that Billings's penny was just as big
and round as theirs. The department commander had been close at hand
every time that fortunate youth came in from a scout, and even Ray, who
was incessantly seeking the roughest and most dangerous service, could
not repress a wistful expression of his views when he heard of the final
scrimmage far up towards Chevelon's Fork. "Here we fellows have been
bucking against this game for nigh onto four years now, and if ever we
raked in a pile it's all been ante'd up since, and now Billings comes in
fresh--never draws but he gets a full hand--and he scoops the deck. He
has too much luck for a white man." The remark was one that, said by Ray
himself in his whimsical and downright manner, was destitute of any
hidden meaning, and Billings, who had not seen Ray for years, would
never have misunderstood it, but when he first heard it six months
afterwards, and while Ray and himself had yet to meet, it was told
semi-confidentially, told as Ray never said it, told in fact--by
Gleason; and Billings, who was of a nervous, sensitive disposition, as
outspoken in a way as Ray was in his, was hurt more than a little. He
had known Ray a dozen years before when both were wearing the gray as
cadets at the Point, but they were in different classes and by no means
intimate. Each, however, had cordially liked the other, and Billings
would have been slow to believe the statement as told him for a single
instant except for two things,--one was that Gleason was a new
acquaintance of whom up to that time he knew nothing really
discreditable; the other was that just before the regiment came East
from Arizona the adjutancy became vacant, Lieutenant Truscott, who had
long held the position, was detailed for duty at West Point and speedily
promoted to his captaincy; Billings was brought in wounded and sent off
by sea to San Francisco as soon as he could travel, and so heard little
of the particulars of some strange mystery that was going on at
regimental headquarters, and when, some months later, he rejoined the
regiment in Kansas, it was with much mental perturbation that he
received from "Old Catnip" the offer of the still vacant adjutancy.
Of course, he had heard by that time just why Truscott had resigned and
refused to re-accept the position; he also knew that the colonel had
said that he could give it to no officer who had not served with them in
the rough days in Arizona; and, moreover, that he had once declared that
offering the adjutancy to a second lieutenant was equivalent to saying
that no first lieutenant was capable of performing the duties. But he
did not know that soon after Truscott's resignation the colonel had
tendered the adjutancy to Ray, and that impolitic youth had promptly
declined. He knew, as did the whole regiment, that for Truscott Ray had
an enthusiastic admiration and regard, and for that matter, Billings
himself had reason to look upon the ex-adjutant as a friend worth
having; but he did not suspect, as some at old Camp Sandy more than
suspected, that Ray had been offered his place. The colonel, in his
surprise and mortification, would speak of it to no one. Ray, in his
blunt honesty, conceived it to be his duty to regard the offer as
confidential, since he _had_ declined, and so, snubbed any one who
strove to extract information. Most of the senior lieutenants were on
detached service when they came in from Arizona. Everybody thought
Stryker would get the detail as soon as he returned from abroad, whither
he had gone on leave after making, as mountain scout leader, the best
four years' record in the regiment; but Stryker came just as Billings
did, and to Billings, not Stryker, was the adjutancy tendered. What made
the regiment indignant was, that so far from being in the least put out
about it, Stryker placidly remarked that Billings was the very man for
the place. "He isn't entitled to it," said the --th; "in ten years'
service he hasn't spent ten months with us." But Stryker did not see fit
to tell them what he knew and the colonel knew,--that he had been
tendered and had accepted the position of aide-de-camp to his old
Arizona chief, and was daily awaiting orders to join; and Ray was off
scouting with his troop when Billings reached headquarters, and had to
face, as he supposed, an opposition. Stannard was the only man who
really knew very much about him as a cavalry officer, and Stannard's
opinion was what brought it all about. They had served for some months
at the same post, and both the major and his clear-sighted wife had
taken a fancy to the young officer, whose first appearance in "citified
garb and a _pince-nez_" gave little promise of future usefulness in the
field. Pelham and Stannard knew that it _had_ to be Billings or a second
lieutenant, but Billings had at first no such intimation. Possibly his
strong sense of self-esteem might have stood in the way of acceptance
had he supposed that he was merely a last resort. Stannard really hoped
he would be the appointee, but all he would say to the colonel when
asked for his opinion was, "I have had less to find fault with in him
than any officer who ever served in my troop; but then he was only with
me six months or so. _I_ like him," which was tantamount to saying
others probably wouldn't. But Stannard and Billings were firm friends,
as anybody could see, and the colonel was quick to note that when
Stannard had given Billings anything to do, he bothered himself no
further about the matter, instead of going along and supervising as was
his wont with most of the others. "If he's good enough for Stannard,
he'll do for me," was the colonel's comment, and when Billings sought to
decline the appointment offered, hinting, with well-meant but awkward
delicacy, that perhaps it ought to go to some man of more established
reputation and record in the regiment, the colonel cut him short with,
"Here, Mr. Billings, I must have some one at once; old Bucketts has been
doing office-work as both quartermaster and adjutant until he is getting
used up, and young Dana is only good for parade and guard-mounting. I'll
detail you as acting adjutant, and if you like it, at the end of a week
we'll make the appointment permanent. Consult your friends meantime, if
you choose." And so it happened that when Stannard said, "Take it," and
Stryker told him quietly that there were reasons why he himself would
have had to decline, Billings shook his head a few minutes in thinking
over what he had heard of Mrs. Pelham, and wished he might see Ray and
make him understand that he thought the place should go to him, but
Stannard said, emphatically, that Ray was too harum-scarum for
office-work, good as he was in the field. And then came a brief letter
from Truscott, cordial and straight to the point as ever. It wound up
by saying, "The colonel attributes your hesitation to the fact that you
think it ought to go to some man who has served longer with the
regiment. We respect that, and appreciate it; but you are offered this
with the best backing in the regiment,--Stannard's,--and with that you
can afford to laugh at anything the growlers may say."
The next morning the order was issued in due form. That afternoon Mr.
Ray, returning dusty and unshorn from a two weeks' scout up the Saline,
was informed of the fact as he stood at the stables unstrapping from the
back of his sorrel the carcass of a fat antelope, gave a low whistle,
remarked, "Well, I'm damned!" and, as bad luck would have it, postponed
rushing in to congratulate Billings until dinner, when, to his genuine
disappointment, the latter did not appear. He was dining at the
colonel's to meet some officers from Leavenworth, and when the new
adjutant went to his rooms late that night he had not seen Ray at all,
but there was that man Gleason smoking a cigar, sipping a toddy, and
evidently primed for a chat. Already Billings had begun to look upon him
with disfavor, but could find no reason to avoid him entirely; he did
not welcome the unwanted guest; he could not chill him. Gleason had his
chat, and, when Ray stepped forward with sunny smile and glistening
white teeth and cordial, outstretched hand the next morning, Billings
looked him in the eye, took his hand, but there was no warmth in the
welcome, and Ray felt rebuffed. "I heard Ned Billings had developed into
something of a snob," said he afterwards, "but he's changed more, for a
frank-hearted fellow that he was ten years ago, than any man I know."
And so it happened that two men whose lives were closely interwoven from
that time on, who had much in common, who, "had they but known," could
never have drifted apart, began the next stage with an unknown, unseen,
yet undeniable influence thrusting them asunder. And it was of these two
men that the picturesque group on the colonel's piazza happened to be
speaking this very May morning as the major and Mr. Ray, dismounting at
the south gate, strolled lazily up the lane. It was the habit of the
former when not on military duty to thrust his hands deep down into his
trousers pockets, and allow his ample and aldermanic paunch to repose
its weight upon his sabre-belt. As the belt was worn only at the hours
of drill or parade, it followed that there were lapses of time wherein
the paunch knew no such military trammel, and a side elevation of the
battalion commander warranted the simile put in circulation by
Lieutenant Blake: "The major looked as though he had swallowed a drum."
Ray, on the contrary, was slimly, even elegantly built, a trifle taller
than his bulky superior, and though indolent in his general movements,
excitement or action transformed him in an instant. Then in every motion
he was quick as a cat. It was his wont to wear his forage-cap far down
over his forehead and canted very much over the right eye, while,
contrary to the fashion of that day, his dark hair fell below the visor
in a sweeping and decided "bang" almost to his eyebrows, which were
thick, dark brown, and low-arched. A semi-defiant backward toss of the
head was the result as much perhaps of the method of wearing his cap as
of any pronounced mental characteristic. When Stannard was talking
eagerly of any subject his hands went deeper into his pockets, his head
thrust forward, and his eyes fairly popped, as though slight additional
pressure would project them into space like many-tinted grape-shot. If
he were standing still, he tilted on his toes and dropped his head to
one side as he expounded, until the ear wellnigh reposed upon the
shoulder-strap. Ray, on the other hand, threw his head farther back and,
unless he was angry, showed his white teeth to the molars.
As they came along the walk from the main gate and passed one by one the
snug little brown cottages known as the officers' quarters, the ladies
grouped on the colonel's piazza began their very natural comment,--there
were no other men in sight on that side of the garrison.
"Last year you never saw Major Stannard without Mr. Billings; now you
never see him with him, and he is just as chummy with Mr. Ray," remarked
our old friend Mrs. Turner, who was languidly swinging in the hammock,
her eyes commanding a view of the sidewalk, and the sidewalk commanding
a view of her very presentable feet encased in a new pair of French
heeled slippers, and stockings whose delicate mauve tint matched the
ribbons of her airy dress.
"Well, Mr. Billings is adjutant and cooped up in the office all day,"
was the reply of Mrs. Raymond, who could readily find reason for taking
exception to the remarks or theories of her next-door neighbor and
social rival.
There were five ladies in the group, all under thirty, two of them under
twenty, only one unmarried, none of them avowedly interested in either
of the two officers slowly approaching. No one of them, however,
neglected a sweeping glance at her draperies or some slight readjustment
of pose or petticoat. Possibly the formality would have been equally
observed had they all been over fifty.
"I never could understand why Mr. Billings was made adjutant," remarked
the one spinster, her eyes dreamily resting on the lithe form of Mr.
Ray. "I don't mean, of course, that he doesn't do very well, but--there
were so many others who would have--at least who deserved it so much
more."
"Well, you must remember this," responded Mrs. Turner, "there wasn't
anybody else when it was given to him, and there was no real reason why
the colonel should remove him when he took command. Mr. Stryker was
going as aide-de-camp; Mr. Gleason--well, anybody knows he wouldn't do;
Mr. Crane and Mr. Wilkins were neither of them fit for it; Mr. Ray
wouldn't have it, and Mr. Blake and Mr. Freeman hadn't joined. It was
really Billings or nobody, except, of course, the second lieutenants.
Dear me! how I wish one of them could have been appointed!" And Mrs.
Turner sighed pathetically. The younger officers were her especial
henchmen, and each in turn paid his devotion a year or more at the
shrine. If any one of them had been put in power, how much easier
'twould have been to get the band every evening! and then the hops
wouldn't have to close at midnight either! and Mrs. Turner was devoted
to dancing.
"But papa says Mr. Billings is right about not letting the band play
after midnight," broke in the young lady, whose years had been spent in
many a garrison, and whose papa--the post surgeon--had pronounced views
on matters of military and medical discipline. "Papa says the officers
have no right to make the band play until late at night unless they pay
them extra. They have to be up at reveille, and it's a shame to make
them work all day and at night too!"
"The doctor is by no means alone in that idea," began a third speaker in
a quiet voice, and both Mrs. Turner and Mrs. Raymond, who had
impulsively burst into speech at the same instant, checked their nimble
tongues, bridled, sweetly said, "I beg your pardon, Mrs. Stannard," and
inclined attentive ears to a lady who at the moment had stepped from the
open door-way to the piazza. It was evident that she was a late arrival,
in whose presence the others felt bound to observe the deferential
manners which further intimacy would possibly extinguish. "Indeed," she
went on, "only this morning at breakfast Colonel Foster was saying that
the bandsmen were getting their full share of work, and that Mr.
Billings was quite right in the stand he made in the matter."
"Ah, Mrs. Stannard, I don't wonder Mr. Billings is devoted to you!" said
Mrs. Raymond. "You are always ready to defend him."
"He was in our troop, you know, and I feel that he belongs to us to a
certain extent," said Mrs. Stannard, smiling brightly, and nodding
pleasant greetings to the two officers who were passing at the moment,
still intent in their earnest talk. The major merely glanced at the
piazza and pulled off his cap, as though he wished its fair occupants
were beyond saluting distance. Ray bowed with laughing grace, and sung
out cheerily,--
"Don't expect the major home just yet, Mrs. Stannard; he's giving me
fits, and I'm in for a lecture."
The ladies were silent a moment, until the pair had passed on out of
earshoot. Then Mrs. Turner took up the cudgels again.
"And yet, Mrs. Stannard, it wasn't so when Mr. Truscott was adjutant. We
could have the band night after night if we wanted to, and surely you
won't say that Mr. Truscott wasn't the very paragon of an adjutant."
"No, indeed," was the reply. "We all know how unequalled Mr. Truscott
was; but then, were not the conditions very different, Mrs. Turner? For
instance, in Arizona the band was not mounted, the men had no stable
duty, and it was so hot in the daytime that they really had no duty to
perform but to play after dark when it was cool. Now, here they have
their horses, they have two parades each day; they practice every
morning, and play on the parade every afternoon; that, with morning and
evening stable duty, keeps them very busy, and don't you think Mr.
Billings is right?"
Now, all this was well understood by both Mrs. Turner and Mrs. Turner's
friends, and as put by Mrs. Stannard, the case was clearly in favor of
the bandsmen and the adjutant. Down in the depths of her consciousness
Mrs. Turner was well aware of the fact. She had gone over the fight with
her liege lord, the captain, more than once since the spring weather had
set in and the services of the band were in requisition several hours
each day. She knew perfectly well that there was no parallel in the
conditions existing in Arizona in Mr. Truscott's time and those of the
day in Kansas with Billings. Still, she wanted to contrast the men and
their methods, and, as is not unusual, pronounced the abstract statement
that "it wasn't so with Mr. Truscott. _Then_ we could have the band
night after night." She was only stating a fact, was her mental
justification, but that she was doing an injustice she would probably
have not admitted for an instant.
Mrs. Stannard, however, had seen through the argument, and in her
courteous way had shattered its effect. This put Mrs. Turner on her
mettle, and she half rose from the hammock.
"Don't for a moment think I mean to criticise Mr. Billings, Mrs.
Stannard; I really like him, _very_ much; only it's so poky not to have
the band now. The evenings are so lovely for dancing, and with so many
young officers here, it seems such a pity to waste so much time. They
are out drilling or shooting, or something, all day long, and who knows
but what they'll all be ordered off somewhere the next minute? Then we
can have the band all day and nobody to dance with. It's always the
way."
"Well, I like Mr. Billings, too," said Mrs. Raymond, eager to say
something pleasant of Mrs. Stannard's friend; "and Captain Raymond says
he is a very soldierly officer,--very military, I mean,--and knows his
duties so well, only we can't help contrasting him with Mr. Truscott.
Mr. Truscott was so dignified and calm and deliberate, while Mr.
Billings is a regular bunch of springs. They _say_ he's very quick and
irascible; real peppery, you know; but I suppose that is because they
bother him a good deal."
"Mr. Billings has a very nervous temperament I know," replied Mrs.
Stannard, "but we never thought him ill-tempered at Fort Gaines, and
certainly Captain Truscott thinks all the world of him. They correspond
constantly, and only last evening he showed me a letter just received
from the captain."
"Did he?" said Mrs. Turner, with sudden interest. "What did he say about
Grace?"
"About Mrs. Truscott?" said Mrs. Stannard, smilingly. "He said a good
deal about her. She was so bright and well and so pleased with West
Point, and they had such lovely quarters, looking right out on the plain
where they could see everything that was going on, and Miss Sanford was
visiting them----"
"What Miss Sanford?" asked Mrs. Turner, with that feminine impetuosity
which is born of an incredulity as to any one's being able to convey
information in one's own time and way.
"Miss Marion Sanford. She was a classmate of Mrs. Truscott's in their
school-days, and belongs to a wealthy New Jersey family, Mr. Billings
says."
"Oh, _I_ know!" said Mrs. Raymond. "She's that handsome girl in the
album that Grace had at Sandy, don't you know? with the Worth dress and
the something or other the matter with her forehead,--a burn or a
birth-mark,--wears her hair so low over it. Don't you know? Grace told
us she had such a sad history,--her mother died when she was sixteen and
her father married again, and she has her mother's fortune and had gone
abroad. She was travelling with the Zabriskies and was presented at
court last year, and the Prince of Wales said something or other about
her. Don't you know? we read it in the New York something as we were
coming out on the Kansas Pacific last fall. My! Just think of her at
West Point! What a catch!" And Mrs. Raymond paused, breathless with
admiration, not with effort. Talking fatigued her far less than silence.
"Yes, Mrs. Raymond, that is the very one, I believe," continued Mrs.
Stannard in her pleasant tones, as soon as the lady came to a full stop.
"Mr. Billings says that he has heard that her father married a very
unpleasant woman the last time, and that 'twas said he would be----"
"What! Mr. Billings said that? Oh, Mrs. Stannard, how rejoiced I am to
hear it! Captain Turner tried to make me believe that he was another
Truscott in his horror of gossip. Now, won't I crow over him when he
comes in to dinner?"
"Not crow, dear,--cackle," suggested Mrs. Raymond, mildly; "it's the
other sex that does the crowing."
"Very possibly I have betrayed a trust," laughed Mrs. Stannard, coming
to the rescue in the interests of harmony. "It was my mistake in
referring to it. _Do_ tell me about Mrs. Truscott; you know I never met
her."
"What is there to tell except that she _is_ Mrs. Truscott," half
laughed, half pouted Mrs. Turner, who never quite forgave the fact that
her queendom, real or imaginary, had been invaded by that very lady a
year before, to the temporary loss of her throne. As Grace Pelham, Mrs.
Truscott had won all hearts at Sandy. "She is undeniably pretty and
lady-like; but what else can any one say of her? Stylish? no. Now, Mrs.
Raymond, you need not try and say _you_ think her stylish, because only
last year at Prescott you wouldn't admit it. And as to her winning Mr.
Truscott as she did, it is simply incomprehensible. What men see in some
women is beyond _me_. She is neither deep, nor intellectual, nor
particularly well read that _I_ ever saw or heard of, and how she's a
match for him, as people say, I can't see. He's just head over heels in
love with her,--at least he was,--and she was simply wrapped up in
him,--at least she is. You ought to have seen the letter she wrote Mrs.
Page a few months ago; all about her happiness and Jack,--just as if
there never had been another man in the world worth looking at. She'd
have been just as rapturous over Mr. Glenham if she'd married him as she
promised to do, I haven't a doubt, or Ray. _He_ was ready to bow down
and worship her at one time; and she encouraged him not a little before
we left Sandy, too."
"Don't you believe _that_," interposed Mrs. Raymond. "They were warm
friends, I know, but Ray was never her lover."
"You always will contradict me, Nellie," protested Mrs. Turner; "but if
you could not see what every one else saw you were simply blind. I
wonder she doesn't sometimes regret not marrying Glenham, though. They
say he has gone abroad and has more money than he can ever spend."
"More than he ever could if he's as close as he was in Arizona,"
interposed Mrs. Raymond.
"But did you not know that Captain Truscott's ventures were coming out
wonderfully well?" asked Mrs. Stannard, eager to give a pleasanter tone
to the talk. "I heard not only that was true, but that an uncle had
left him a good deal of money. One thing is certain, they have fitted up
their quarters beautifully at the Point, and are living there in a good
deal of style."
"Here come the officers in from drill," exclaimed Mrs. Turner, as a
group of bronzed and soldierly-looking men came suddenly around the
corner of the adjutant's office and strolled towards them. "Ask Captain
Merrill, he will know. _Captain Merrill_," she called, raising her
voice. "Do come here a moment." And obediently he came, doffing his cap
and accepting the seat tendered him beside her by Mrs. Raymond.
"You were at the Point last month. Is it true that Captain Truscott has
a good deal of money now?"
"Can't prove it by me, madame," said Merrill, sententiously. "Ask Blake.
He's our Jenkins. How is it, Blake?"
"Don't call me pet names, dearie. 'When _my_ tongue blabs then let mine
eyes not see,'" declaimed Mr. Blake, sauntering up to the group and
swinging a long, lean leg over the railing. "What do you want to know?"
"Is Mr.--Captain Truscott rich?"
"If my individual experiences are indicative, I should say he was
boundless in wealth and prodigality."
"Why?"
"He lent me a hundred dollars when I was East on leave, and I know he
never expects to see it again."
"I declare, Mr. Blake, you are as bad as Mr. Ray!"
"They are scoundrels and substractors that say so of me. Mrs. Turner,
you--you make me blush. Ray, come hither and bear me consolation. Friend
of my youth, Merrill calls me Jenkins; Mrs. Turner calls me bad as you;
and you--called me with a pair of kings when mine was a bobtail. The
world is hollow, Ray."
"_Mr._ Blake! Will you stop your everlasting nonsense and tell us about
Truscott? When were you there?"
"Mrs. Turner, you aggrieve me, but I was there in April."
"And _are_ they so delightfully situated?"
"Yea, verily,--blissfully."
"Was Miss Sanford there?"
"She came, alas! the very eve I hied me hence. I saw her but a moment;
'twas----"
"You saw her? Tell us what she's like. Is she pretty? is she
sweet-mannered as they say?"
"Sweet? She's sweet, aye, _dix-huit_; at least she was a year agone.
Pretty? Ah me!" And Blake sighed profoundly, and straddled the rail a
picture of dejection. His auditors groaned in chorus, the customary
recognition of one of Blake's puns, but gathered about him in manifest
interest. With all his rattling nonsense he was a regimental pet.
"But where is she from? What connection of the New Jersey Sanford?"
"The Autocrat of the Preakness Stable, mean you? Marry, I know not. She
is a Sanford and has a Sanford's wealth, but 'twas not for me. She
adores a horse and worships a horseman. This I gathered from our too
brief converse. I strove to win her ear with poesie, but she bade me
cease. Her soul is not attuned to melody,--she'd none of mine. She
preferred my Lady Truscott and buttered muffins."
"What did Truscott say about Crook's fight with Crazy Horse?" asked
Ray, who looked blank enough at Blake's jargon, and wanted facts.
"I don't think Jack liked the looks of things," said Blake, relapsing
into sudden gravity. "He told me that he thought it more than likely
we'd all be in the field again in less than a month."
"We?" said Merrill. "It isn't a matter that affects Truscott one way or
another. He has his four years' detail at the Point. What difference
does it make to him whether we're ordered up to reinforce Crook?"
"Just this difference, my bully rook: that Truscott would catch us
before we got to Laramie--unless we went by rail."
"Why, Blake, you're addled!" replied the captain, in that
uncomplimentary directness which sometimes manifests itself among old
comrades of the frontier, even in the presence of the gentler sex. "Why,
Mr. Blake, you don't suppose he is going to give up his young wife, his
lovely home, his pleasant duties, to join for a mere Indian campaign, do
you?" asked more than one present, and a general murmur of dissent went
round. "What do _you_ say, major?" said one voice, in direct appeal to
the senior officer of the group.
"It depends on what you consider a 'mere Indian campaign,'" was the cool
response.
"But as to Truscott's going, what do you think, Ray?"
"I don't think anything about it. I _know_."