we pity the swells of the light battery who have to
stay! How wistful those fellows look, and how eagerly they throng about
the barracks, yearning to go, and, since that is denied, praying to be
of use in some way! Small wonder is it that all the bustle and
excitement penetrates the portals of Mr. Jerrold's darkened quarters,
and the shutters are thrown open and his bandaged head comes forth.

"What is it, Harris?" he demands of a light-batteryman who is hurrying
past.

"Orders for Colorado, sir. The regiment goes by special train. Major
Thornton's command's been massacred, and there's a big fight ahead."

"My God! Here!--stop one moment. Run over to Company B and see if you
can find my servant, or Merrick, or somebody. If not, you come back
quick. I want to send a note to Captain Armitage."

"I can take it, sir. We're not going. The band and the battery have to
stay."

And Jerrold, with trembling hand and feverish haste, seats himself at
the same desk whence on that fatal morning he sent the note that wrought
such disaster; and as he rises and hands his missive forth, throwing
wide open the shutters as he does so, his bedroom doors fly open, and a
whirling gust of the morning wind sweeps through from rear to front, and
half a score of bills and billets, letters and scraps of paper, go
ballooning out upon the parade.

"By heaven!" he mutters, "that's how it happened, is it? _Look_ at them
go!" for going they were, in spiral eddies or fluttering skips, up the
grassy "quad," and over among the rose-bushes of Alice Renwick's garden.
Over on the other side of the narrow, old-fashioned frontier fort the
men were bustling about, and their exultant, eager voices rang out on
the morning air. All was life and animation, and even in Jerrold's
selfish soul there rose responsive echo to the soldierly spirit that
seemed to pervade the whole command. It was their first summons to
active field-duty with prospective battle since he had joined, and, with
all his shortcomings as a "duty" officer in garrison and his many
frailties of character, Jerrold was not the man to lurk in the rear when
there was danger ahead. It dawned on him with sudden and crushing force
that now it lay in the power of his enemies to do him vital
injury,--that he could be held here at the post like a suspected felon,
a mark for every finger, a target for every tongue, while every other
officer of his regiment was hurrying with his men to take his knightly