t and
wore Elinor's picture, and it was right out there among them that
Halbert was found. Horse thieves had run off his best horses--the
same gang of murderers that, they say, planned to trap you and that
you outwitted. Oh! Marshall, was ever a girl so proud of her
brother!--and they shot Hal and he was found and taken care of by
some Indian people, tame ones, and one was a girl, Lizette, who had
fallen in love with him four years ago. Wasn't it romantic? And
she's gone again, but Hal is safe here, although Mrs. Folsom is
more than half-crazy, and now old Mr. Folsom is worried to death,
and says we must start back for home to-morrow. It's seventy-five
miles and we don't want to go at all--only I'm so eager to see you,
and I heard--at least Mr. Loomis told me you'd be back any day, and
he has your troop till you come, and he's so fond of you--Oh,
here's Pappoose to say this must go at once."

The colonel sat watching the young fellow as he read. "Bad news, Dean?"
he queried.

"Every kind of news, sir. It's all a whirl. The devil seems to have
broken loose in Wyoming. Let me skim through Loomis' note.

"DEAR DEAN: In case the letter sent yesterday passes you
on the way, I add a line to say that if ever I said a mean thing
about Loring when we were in the corps, I take it back. I thought
him a prig when we wore the gray. He rather 'held us under' anyhow,
being a class ahead, you know, but the way he has panned out here
and wiped up Wyoming with the only men I ever knew that tried to
wrong you is simply wonderful. He's nabbed three of the Birdsall
gang and is away now after Burleigh. The news from Folsom's ranch
is more reassuring. Hal was shot by horsethieves who were running
off stock, and was found and taken care of by friendly Indians, but
Mrs. Hal had an awful scare and sent for the old man, who went, of
course--both young ladies going with him. They were miles away
before we knew it at the fort. I tried to pursuade old Pecksniff
that he ought to let me go with twenty troopers to guard the ranch
and scout the Laramie, and he threatened to put me in arrest. Of
all the double-dashed, pig-headed old idiots he's the worst. I
don't want people at the ranch to be scared, but if the Sioux only
would make some demonstration this way that would give me a chance.