and a capacity for further devilment was certain. Haney had
still more to tell. The captain had sent for him and told him of the
adjutant's being in conference with the chaplain and Mr. Davies, and he
felt sure it was about the Antelope Springs matter. He was sure they had
his map, the one on which Archer based his report, and that this would
some day be brought up in evidence against him. It was locked for the
night in the second drawer of the adjutant's desk, said he, and Haney
understood. The drawer was chiselled that night and the map and papers
taken, but not until the robbery was known all over the post did the
captain see the map and see that it wasn't his original at all, but
simply a copy. Except for information obtained in the memoranda, they
had robbed the desk to no purpose.

Howard was gone before this, but there was Brannan's writing-case in
Haney's possession, why not throw further suspicion upon him? and so
there were the papers hidden in the hopes of further damning him should
he ever appear as a witness against them. For all this and much more the
poor dying sinner craved forgiveness, and, hearing promptly of the
confession, through Finucane, who had fled with horse, equipments, and
everything, Howard, in hiding and in want at Butte, wired to his
captain, hoping to extract more money, for Devers had been a thrifty,
and was regarded a wealthy, man.

And then when this confession had been made known to the wounded
sufferer the chaplain spoke. "You see the case that is building up
against you, Powlett, and just as soon as you are able to sit or stand
the court will meet for your trial. You have assault with intent to
kill, at Bluff Siding if not at Urbana, highway robbery, theft,
desertion, conspiracy, and kindred crimes to answer for; would it not be
infinitely better that you should confess fully and at once? Even the
men whom you have so bitterly wronged join in no clamor against--they
would even spare--you."

But Powlett was a villain game, and answered only with a sneer. It was
that packet of Mira's letters handed to Davies with his father's watch
that supplemented Brannan's story and told him all. Mira could not live
without adorers, could not resist the longing to flaunt her victims in
the faces of other girls, and Powlett was a conquest indeed until his
rascality at the institute became known. Then he had to flee, but such
was his infatuation that he returned in hopes of seeing her. She did
me