achel, compressing as much haughtiness as possible
into the answer.

"Of course not. Girls at your age are not at all likely to know anything
that is useful, and least of all how to nurse a sick man. I hardly
know which is the worst, a young one who don't know anything, or a
middle-aged one who thinks she knows it all, and continually interferes
with the management of a case. I believe though, I'd rather have had
the middle-aged one to start with. She'd be more likely to tend to
her business, and not have her head turned by the attentions of the
good-looking young officers who swarm around her. Mind, I'll not allow
any flirting here."

Rachel's face crimsoned. "You forget yourself," she said, cuttingly; "or
perhaps you have nothing to forget. At least, man an effort to remember
that I'm a lady."

The bristly eyebrows straightened down to a level line over the small
blue eyes, and unpleasant furrows drew themselves around the corners of
his mouth. "YOU forget," he said, "that if you enter upon these duties
you are in the military service and subject to your superior officers.
You forget the necessity of the most rigid discipline, and that it is my
duty to explain and enforce this."

"I certainly expect to obey orders," said Rachel, a little overawed.

"You may rightly expect to," he answered with a slight sneer; "because
it will be a matter of necessity--you will have to. We must have instant
and unquestioning obedience to orders here, as well as everywhere
else in the Army, or it would be like a rope of sand--of no strength
whatever--no strength, whatever."

"I know it," answered Rachel, depressed even more by the apparition of
martial law than she had been by the heat.

"And what I have been telling you is only the beginning," continued the
Surgeon, noting the effect of his words, and exulting in their humbling
power. "The cornerstone of everything military is obedience--prompt,
unfailing obedience, by everybody, soldier or officer, to his superiors.
Without it----"

"Major Moxon," said an officer, entering and saluting, "the General
presents his compliments, and desires to know why his repeated orders in
regard to the furloughing of men have been so persistently disregarded."

"Because," said the Surgeon, getting purplish-red about the cheeks
and nose, "because the matter's one which I consider outside of his
province--beyond his control, sir. I am Chief of the Medical Department,
as you are perhaps aware,