a cheer of welcome, and many men ran to meet the worn
arrivals, to take their horses to feed and water so that the masters
might be fed at once, and the major's first thought had been to welcome
his subordinate and fill him with comfort before requiring of him
detailed account of the day's doings. "I hardly expected you so soon,"
he said; "but here's coffee all ready, baker's bread fresh in town
yesterday,--think of it!--and bacon and flapjacks. Your men must be
pretty tired."

"They're about used up," said Devers; "but of course when we got your
instructions to come on we came."

"Oh, I didn't mean you to come on if you were in camp for the night. Our
men would rather eat than sleep and we thought yours would; but
here--swallow this," said he, hospitably. "This is no time for business.
I haven't tasted anything so good as that coffee in years."

"Thanks," said Devers, pulling gratefully at the steaming tin. "That
_is_ good. I'm glad, for my part, you told us to come along," he went
on, reverting again to the subject of the major's note. "We shouldn't
have done anything of the kind, of course, otherwise,--especially with
Davies still out."

"_What!_ Isn't Davies with you?" asked Warren, with sudden anxiety and
suspicion. "Why, I thought----"

"Well, we couldn't wait for him, you know, in face of your directions,"
said the captain, his eyes glancing quickly, almost furtively, from one
to another of the bearded faces about him, for Truman, Hastings,
Calvert, and all the officers of the little command had gathered. "Of
course, I sent couriers right out to guide him----"

"Why--what I meant was for you to bring him along," said the major,
gravely, yet not unkindly. "I felt sure, of course, you were within
communicating distance at least, even if he hadn't come in. What did
that smoke turn out to be when you got a closer look at it?"

"We--didn't get any closer look," answered Devers, in apparent surprise.
"You ordered me to bury my dead and then go on. We had just buried them
when your next orders reached us,--to join you at once. These, of
course, superseded the others."

There was profound silence. The major stood by the camp-fire, his hands
clasped behind his back, looking full in the face of the troop
commander, all the old sayings that he had ever heard with regard to
Devers crowding upon him now. When promoted to the regiment only just in
time to join it on this hard campaign, and when assigned to the comman