An odd despatch was that which went by the single wire of the military
telegraph line to Fort Fetterman late that night. It was known that a
small escort would leave that point early in the morning, going
through with a staff-officer _en route_ to join the field column now
busily engaging the hostile Indians along the northern foot-hills of
the Big Horn range. Major Miller asked the commanding officer at
Fetterman to hold back a brace of horsemen to await the arrival of a
courier just leaving Laramie, and bearing an important and
confidential letter to the general commanding the department, who was
with his troops in the field. It was over eighty miles by the river
road; the night was dark and the skies overcast. There might be
Indians along the route; there certainly were no soldiers, for, with
the exception of eight or ten men, all of Captain Terry's troop were
with him scouting on the north side of the Platte and over near the
Sioux reservations. All the same, a single trooper, armed only with
the revolver and unburdened by the usual blankets and field
kit,--riding almost as light as a racer,--was to make the run and
reach Fetterman the next afternoon.
This was the result of the interview with Lieutenant McLean, a
conference at which were present Major and Mrs. Miller, Dr. Bayard, and
the adjutant. Why Mrs. Miller, the wife of the commanding officer,
should have been present in any capacity, it is not the province of the
narrator to defend. She had been assiduously nursing and caring for the
young officer in his weak and wounded condition. She had him where he
could not escape her shrewd and relentless questionings. She was
enabled to tell him much that Hatton had told her and a few things she
certainly thought he had and therefore said he had. She was further
enabled to tell him of the letters from Robinson and all they
portended; of Mr. Holmes's loss and what she had seen in the mirror; of
her own meeting with Miss Forrest in the darkness of the doctor's hall;
of the registered letters sent away when everybody knew Mrs. Forrest
hadn't a penny except the captain's pay, and that she had openly and
repeatedly announced that her sister-in-law had now come to be a
burden, too, having quarrelled with her relatives in the East. And so,
little by little, she had drawn from McLean the story of Hatton's
farewell words and the discovery of the card in the handkerchief. Then,
fortified with this intelligence, and firmly convinced that she could
not be mistaken in the guilt of her Majesty of Bedlam, Mrs. Miller
reopened the subject and prodded the major into immediate action. She
meant well. She intended no public exposure, no unnecessary disgrace.
She merely wanted that Captain Forrest should come at once, compel his
much-afflicted sister (for, of course, kleptomania was the sole
explanation) to make restitution, and then remove her to some safe
retreat in the distant East. Miller decided to see McLean at once,
taking his adjutant to jot down the statements made, and Dr. Bayard
because of his rank in the service and his professional connection with
the officer in question. Mrs. Miller decided to be present because of
McLean's great reluctance to tell what he knew and because she
conceived it her duty to prompt him; and this was the quartet that
swooped down upon the poor fellow in his defenceless condition late
that sunshiny afternoon. No wonder his recovery was delayed!
The most stunned and bewildered man of the party while the painful
interview was in progress was Dr. Bayard. He had gone in the confident
expectation that McLean was to be confronted with the evidences of his
guilt, and offered the chance of immediate resignation. His patient was
sufficiently removed from the danger-line to enable him to sustain the
shock, and he had not interposed. It was too late, therefore, to put an
end to matters on that plea when to his horror-stricken ears was
revealed the evidence against the woman who had so enthralled and
piqued him. Miller led him away in a semi-dazed condition after the
close of the conference, and then at last the doctor's vehement
emotions found tongue.
"And all this time you have been suspecting that poor young fellow!"
said the major, with a touch of reproach in his voice.
There was silence an instant. The doctor stopped short and leaned
against the fence in front of the adjutant's quarters, his face
purpling with wrath and indignation, his lips twitching, his hands
clinched. Miller looked at him in amaze, and then came the outburst:
"Suspect him! By heaven, sir! What it was before is nothing to what I
feel now! That in his depravity he should have stolen was bad enough;
but that now, to cover his tracks, he should accuse and defame a
defenceless woman is infamy! Look at his story, and tell me could
anything be more pitiful and mendacious? Her handkerchief was found in
his bureau the night of the robbery. Where is the handkerchief now? He
burned it! He found a note on a card from her hidden in the
handkerchief she had given Hatton to replace in the drawer. Where is
the card? He burned it! He 'purposely destroyed all evidence against
her.' A sham Quixote! Who found her handkerchief in his bureau? Who saw
the burning? Who put the handkerchief in the drawer? Who told him of
her confession? Who heard her beg that you should be delayed in your
investigation? Who, in fact, is corroborating witness to everything and
anything he alleges, but the man he believes, and I believe, you can
never reach again. Hatton is failing rapidly."
"How could he have heard that?" asked Miller, with mingled wrath and
stupefaction in his face,--wrath at the doctor's contemptuous disregard
of all other opinions, and stupefaction at the suddenly presented view
of the case.
"The attendant, sir, was down at the telegraph office when the news
came in, and he had to tell McLean; the latter insisted on being told
the truth. Weeks fears blood-poisoning, and if that has set in nothing
can save him. Then where will be your evidence against this most foully
wronged lady?"
"Hush!" exclaimed Miller, quickly, with a warning, sidelong glance
toward Bedlam. "Come with me!" And, following his commander's look, the
doctor saw, standing close together, leaning on the southern balustrade
and gazing down upon them in evident interest and equally evident
surprise, Fanny Forrest and Mr. Roswell Holmes. Silently he turned and
accompanied the major until he reached his own gateway, and then
stopped.
"I presume there is nothing further I can do just now, and, with your
permission, sir, I will leave you. I want to think this all over."
"Do so, doctor. And, when you are ready, come and see me. Let me only
say this to you: You have hardly known McLean at all. We have known him
nearly five years, and he has ever been in our eyes the soul of honor
and truth."
"The soul of honor and truth, sir, would not be writing love-letters
and destroying the peace of mind of a young and innocent girl when all
he has to offer her is a millstone of debt and a tarnished name." And
with this parting-shot the doctor majestically turned away.
"So that's where the shoe pinches!" thought Miller, as he entered his
quarters, where presently he was joined by his excited wife.
"He isn't half as prostrated as you thought he'd be," she instantly
exclaimed, as she entered the room. "Of course it wouldn't be Mac if he
were not greatly distressed, but I have promised him that not a word
shall leak out until Captain Forrest gets here, and that then he is to
see him himself. Isn't it dreadful about Mr. Hatton? Can nothing be
done?"
"I am to see Bayard again by and by. This affair has completely
unstrung him, for he is evidently deeply smitten; I never dreamed it
had gone so far. Now that letter must be written to the general, and I
am going to the office. You must not know a thing about it, or about
this affair. Of course you will be besieged with questions." And so the
major sallied forth.
Darkness was settling down. The sunset-gun had been fired just as they
left McLean's. By this time the doctor should be entertaining his guest
at dinner, and Miller wondered how even "Chesterfield" would rally to
the occasion and preserve his suavity and courtliness after the shock
of the last hour. But Miller had no idea that it was the last of three
shocks that had assailed him in quick succession and with increasing
severity that very day, and never dreamed of the gulf of distress in
which poor Bayard was plunged. He had gone at once to his library and
thrown himself in the easy-chair in an attitude of profound dejection,
barely paying attention when Chloe entered to say that Miss Nellie
begged to be excused from coming down to dinner, as she felt too ill.
Then Robert entered to ask should he serve dinner or wait until Mr.
Holmes came in. "Wait!" said Bayard, bluntly. But five minutes passed;
the dinner would be overdone; so Robert slipped out in search of the
truant, and Miller saw him going over to Bedlam. But the upper gallery
was empty; Mr. Holmes and Miss Forrest had disappeared; the adjutant
came striding up from the guard-house, and together the two officers
turned away.
"Orderly," said the major, to the attendant soldier following at his
heels, "find Sergeant Freeman, who is in charge of the cavalry
detachment, and tell him I want him at once. Then go and get your
supper."
Meantime, realizing that the dinner-hour was at hand, and knowing the
punctilious ideas of his host, Mr. Holmes had somewhat abruptly bidden
adieu to the young lady with whom he had been in such interesting
conversation. "I must see you again about Hatton if possible, and just
as soon as I have found out what this means. If all the four were
together at McLean's room the mischief is probably done, but I'll see
him at once unless it be forbidden." He was turning away without more
words, when something in her deep, dark eyes seemed to detain him. He
held forth his hand.
"Miss Forrest, I cannot tell you how I appreciate the honor you have
done me in this confidence. It may be the means of my making more than
one man happy. One word, where is Celestine now?"
"She should be in the dining-room, setting the table for tea. Good-by,
then, till tattoo. See him if you can."
"Indeed I will," he answered, and bowing over the slender,
richly-jewelled hand she so frankly placed in his, he slowly released
it, and turned away.
"In the dining-room, is she?" muttered Holmes to himself, as he ran
lightly through the hall and down the stairs. "If that was not Miss
Celestine I saw this moment scurrying in from the direction of the
wood-piles out yonder, I'm vastly mistaken, and she was talking with a
soldier there. I saw the glint of the sunset on the brasses of his
forage-cap. I thought they all had to be at retreat roll-call, but this
fellow missed it."
Turning at the foot of the stairs, he strode to the rear door, and
looked out through the side-light upon the unpicturesqueness of the
yards, the coal- and wood-sheds, the rough, unpainted board fences; the
dismantled gate, propped in most inebriate style against its
bark-covered post, and clinging thereto with but a single hinge. At
this half-closed aperture suddenly appeared the mulatto girl, stopped,
turned, gave a quick glance at the various back windows of Bedlam,
waved her hand to a dim, soldierly form just discernible in the
twilight striding toward the northern end of the garrison, then she
came scurrying to the door, and burst in, panting.
"Ah, Celestine! That you?" asked Holmes, pleasantly. "I thought to find
you in the dining-room, and stopped to ask for a glass of water."
At sight of him the girl had almost recoiled, but his cheery voice
reassured her.
"Laws, Mr. Holmes! I done thought 'twas a ghost," she laughed, but
turned quickly from him as she spoke and hurried into the dining-room,
filling a goblet with a trembling hand. He drank the water leisurely;
thanked her, and strolled with his accustomed deliberation through the
hall and out across the piazza, never appearing to notice her
breathlessness or agitation. Once outside the steps, however, his
deliberation was cast aside, and with rapid, nervous strides he
hastened up the walk,--out past the old ordnance storehouse and the
lighted windows of the trader's establishment, turned sharply to the
west, and, sure enough, coming toward him was a brisk, dapper,
slim-built little soldier in his snugly-fitting undress uniform. Holmes
stopped short, whipped out his cigar-case and wind-matches, thrust a
Partaga between his teeth, struck a light as the soldier passed him and
the broad glare from the north window fell full upon the dapper shape
and well-carried head. There was the natty forage-cap with the gleaming
cross-sabres; there was the dark face, there the heavy brows, the
glittering black eyes, the moustache and imperial, the close-curling
hair, of the very man he had seen peeping into the parlor windows back
of Mrs. Griffin's little post-office the night of his talk with
Corporal Zook.
Ten minutes later and he was tapping at McLean's door. It was opened by
the hospital attendant,--slowly and only a few inches.
"Can I see the lieutenant?" he asked.
"I am very sorry," whispered the man, mindful of the visitor's
prodigality in the past and hopeful of future favors. "I have strict
orders to admit nobody to-night until the doctor sees him again. The
lieutenant isn't so well, sir, and Dr. Bayard had to administer
sedatives before he left. I think he is sleeping just now, though he
may only be trying to."
Holmes paused, reluctant and a little irresolute.
"Is there nothing I can do or say, sir, if he wakes?" asked the
attendant.
"Can you give him a letter and say nothing about it to anybody?"
"Certainly I can,--if it's one that won't harm him."
"It will do him good, unless I'm mistaken; and he ought to have it
to-night: he'll sleep better for it. I'll give it to you at
tattoo.--Ah, Robert! I might have known you'd be in search of me and
that I was delaying dinner. Say I'll be there instantly."
Meantime, Sergeant Freeman had reported to Major Miller as directed,
and was standing attention, cap in hand, at that officer's desk, while
the adjutant was scratching away across the room, his pen racing over
the paper as he copied the despatch his commander had slowly and
thoughtfully dictated.
"You say that Parsons is the best man to send, sergeant?"
"I don't say that, sir, exactly; but he's the lightest man in the troop
and has the fastest horse now in the post. He could make it quicker
than anybody else, but----"
"But what? Doesn't he want to go? Is he afraid?" asked the major,
impatiently.