gate, safe and sound."

CHAPTER XI.

The sunshine of an exquisite April morning was shimmering over the
Louisiana lowlands as Battery "X" was "hitching in," and Mrs. Cram's
pretty pony-phaeton came flashing through the garrison gate and reined
up in front of the guns. A proud and happy woman was Mrs. Cram, and
daintily she gathered the spotless, cream-colored reins and slanted her
long English driving-whip at the exact angle prescribed by the vogue of
the day. By her side, reclining luxuriously on his pillows, was Sam
Waring, now senior first lieutenant of the battery, taking his first
airing since his strange illness. Pallid and thin though he was, that
young gentleman was evidently capable of appreciating to the fullest
extent the devoted attentions of which he had been the object ever since
his return. Stanch friend and fervent champion of her husband's most
distinguished officer at any time, Mrs. Cram had thrown herself into his
cause with a zeal that challenged the admiration even of the men whom
she mercilessly snubbed because they had accepted the general verdict
that Lascelles had died by Waring's hand. Had they met in the duello as
practised in the South in those days, sword to sword, or armed with
pistol at twelve paces, she would have shuddered, but maintained that as
a soldier and gentleman Waring could not have refused his opponent's
challenge, inexcusable though such challenge might have been. But that
he could have stooped to vulgar, unregulated fracas, without seconds or
the formality of the cartel, first with fists and those women's weapons,
nails, then knives or stilettoes, as though he was some low dago or
Sicilian,--why, that was simply and utterly incredible. None the less
she was relieved and rejoiced, as were all Waring's friends, when the
full purport of poor Doyle's dying confession was noised abroad. Even
those who were sceptical were now silenced. For four days her comfort
and relief had been inexpressible; and then came the hour when, with woe
and trouble in his face, her husband returned to her from Waring's
bedside with the incomprehensible tidings that he had utterly repudiated
Doyle's confession,--had, indeed, said that which could probably only
serve to renew the suspicion of his own guilt, or else justify the
theory that he was demented.

Though Cram and the doctor warned Waring not to talk, talk he would, to
Pierce, to Ferry, to Ananias; and though these three were pledged b