d you get here? Of
course I remember you."

"Yes, but how did you get here yourself--you were not on my boat?"

"I was ordered up the day after you left Jefferson Barracks," he said,
"and took the _Asia_. We got into St. Joe the same day with the _River
Belle_, and heard about your accident down river. I suppose you came out
on the old Cut-off trail."

"Yes; and of course you took the main trail west from Leavenworth."

He nodded. "Orders to take this detachment out to Laramie," he said,
"and meet Colonel Meriwether there."

"He'll not be back?" I exclaimed in consternation. "I was hoping to meet
him coming east."

"No," said Belknap, "you'll have to go on with us if you wish to see
him. I'm afraid the Sioux are bad on beyond. Horrible thing your man
tells me about up there," he motioned toward the ruined station. "I'm
taking his advice and going into camp here, for I imagine it isn't a
nice thing for a woman to see."

He turned toward the ambulance, and I glanced that way. There stood near
it a tall, angular figure, head enshrouded in an enormous sunbonnet; a
personality which it seemed to me I recognized.

"Why, that's my friend, Mandy McGovern," said I. "I met her on the boat.
Came out from Leavenworth with you, I suppose?"

"That isn't the one," said Belknap. "No, I don't fancy that sister
McGovern would cut up much worse than the rest of us over that matter up
there; but the other one--"

At that moment, descending at the rear of the ambulance, I saw the other
one.

CHAPTER XV

HER INFINITE VARIETY

It was a young woman who left the step of the ambulance and stood for a
moment shading her eyes with her hand and looking out over the
shimmering expanse of the broad river. All at once the entire landscape
was changed. It was not the desert, but civilization which swept about
us. A transfiguration had been wrought by one figure, fair to look upon.

I could see that this was no newcomer in the world of the out-of-doors,
however. She was turned out in what one might have called workmanlike
fashion, although neat and wholly feminine. Her skirt was short, of good
gray cloth, and she wore a rather mannish coat over a blue woolen shirt
or blouse. Her hands were covered with long gauntlets, and her hat was a
soft gray felt, tied under the chin with a leather string, while a soft
gray veil was knotted carelessly about her neck as kerchief. Her face
for the time was turned from us, but I could see that