FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91  
92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   >>   >|  
ome gray mustache and distinguished bearing, and that air of conscious success and possession which some men know so well how to assume even when their chances are slimmer than my lady's hand. The sisterly breach was healed before that beautiful month was over. Frost dined at the Garrison's four times a week and drove Miss Nita behind his handsome bays every day or two. In November he asked a question. In December there was an announcement that called forth a score of congratulations around headquarters, and in January the wedding cards went all over the Union--some to West Point--but to Latrobe, who had been looking ill and anxious for six weeks, said his classmates, and falling off fearfully in his studies, said his professors, only a brief note inclosing his letters and begging for hers. At reveille next morning there was no captain to receive the report of roll call from the first sergeant of Company "B." "Where's Latrobe?" sleepily asked the officer of the day of the cadet first lieutenant. "I don' know," was the answer, and to the amaze of Latrobe's roommate, who had gone to bed and to sleep right after taps the night before, they found evidence that "Pat" had left the post. He had not even made down his bedding. His cadet uniforms were all there, but a suit of civilian clothes, usually in a snug package up the chimney, that had been used several times "running it" to the hotel after taps in August, was now, like its owner, missing. After three days' waiting and fruitless search, the superintendent wired Latrobe's uncle and best friend, old General Drayton, and that was the last seen or heard of "Pat." In the spring and ahead of time his class was graduated without him, for the war with Spain was on. In the spring an irate and long-tried father was upbraiding another only son for persistent failures at college. "Gov Prime will get the sack, not the sheepskin," prophesied his fellows. And then somehow, somewhere the father heard it was a married woman with whom his boy was so deeply in love, and there were bitter, bitter words on both sides--so bitter that when at last he flung himself out of his father's study Gov Prime went straight to Mildred's room, silently kissed her and walked out of the house. This was in April. The next heard of him he had enlisted for the war and was gone to San Francisco with his regiment with the prospect of service in the Philippines ahead of him, but that was full four months after his
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91  
92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Latrobe

 

father

 

bitter

 
spring
 
chimney
 

package

 
uniforms
 

clothes

 

civilian

 

waiting


fruitless
 

search

 

graduated

 

superintendent

 

running

 
missing
 

General

 

friend

 

August

 
Drayton

persistent

 
Mildred
 

silently

 

kissed

 

straight

 

walked

 

service

 
prospect
 

Philippines

 

months


regiment

 

Francisco

 

enlisted

 

deeply

 

bedding

 

failures

 

college

 

upbraiding

 

married

 

sheepskin


prophesied

 

fellows

 

officer

 

handsome

 

Garrison

 

November

 
question
 

headquarters

 

January

 

wedding