er he had alienated or betrayed
every commander under whom he had served. One after another he had lost
the respect of every officer with whom he associated, and now he
realized that if the regiment could but settle down somewhere for a few
months, there would speedily follow a crystallization of the sentiment
against him,--a deposit of all this floating mass of testimony now
apparently held in solution, and the true inwardness of the tragedy of
Antelope Springs, the falsity of his insinuations against Davies, the
trickery of his methods, one and all be brought to light. Already,
through Haney, he heard of the sensation created among the men by his
defence of Howard, and of the depth of feeling among the old hands
against this airy upstart recruit, not a year in service, who frequently
boasted that he had more influence with "Cap." than all the rest of
them put together. Haney himself could not cipher out the secret of
Howard's importance, and was plainly and palpably jealous. Ever since
early in the campaign, when young Brannan was pointed out to Devers as
Miss Loomis's patient and as a trooper who wanted to get out of "A"
troop and into "C,"--ever since the colonel and the major began
interfering with Devers because of his open rebuke of Mr. Davies, it was
noticed that Howard, a mere raw recruit, could get the captain's private
ear at almost any time, and those were days when a soldier was not
supposed to address his company commander on any point until he had
first obtained the sanction of the first sergeant. Every man in the
troop knew that soon after their arrival at Scott, Howard began to get
letters from the East, and some of these contained money orders, which
he had cashed in Braska. Some men in the troop, notably that babbling
drunkard Paine, declared that in a little strong box he had brought with
him Howard had some letters tied up in ribbon that he watched with
jealous care. "New hands" who came out in the same batch of recruits
said that at St. Louis Arsenal, whither they were shipped on enlistment,
Brannan, Howard, and Paine had at first been very intimate, but that
some coldness had sprung up and Brannan kept aloof from them. They were
wild and full of "gall," Brannan was sad and sober. Howard used to write
lots of letters then to some girl, Paine said, and go off and post them
in obscure letter-boxes outside the gates when he could get leave, but
he had quit writing long since, Haney knew, for he watched