r all these years, something had
happened: they were actually corresponding.

She learned more within the fortnight that followed. One exquisite May
evening just as the sunset gun had fired and all the bordering walks and
piazzas were thronged with gayly-dressed groups, women and children
mainly, watching the scene on the parade, there was some stir among the
clerks and orderlies and a gentle movement over on the porch of the
colonel commanding. The long line of officers dispersed as usual at
dismissal of parade, and Cranston came strolling over homeward chatting
with his friend and next-door neighbor, Captain Blake, of the --th.
Blake's lovely wife was even then on Cranston's veranda, for she and
Miss Loomis seemed to have taken a fancy to each other from the moment
of their meeting. Margaret, as usual, met her hero at the steps, just as
a young officer came excitedly and hurriedly down the brick walk from
the colonel's. It was Blake who heard him calling some tidings to other
households and who hailed him as he neared them and was bustling by.

"What's the row, Tommy?"

"Big fight in Arizona," was the startling answer. "Captain Hastings and
Parson Davies killed."

And Nannie Blake saw in amaze the light go out of her companion's eyes
and every vestige of color from her face. Her arms were about her in an
instant, and none too soon. Oh, the blessing of those clinging,
clustering vines! No one else saw how they had to fairly carry her
within doors, but Agatha's secret was revealed.

There was little exaggeration in the first story of that savage battle
in the canon. Many a gallant fellow lay stripped and bloated when the
relief party reached the scene a few days later, but Davies, though
pierced through and through, still lived, and was moved and borne away
weeks later to bracing mountain air, and found many a reason for wanting
to live for many a year. Two men had gone to him fast as trains could
speed, Cranston and our old friend the chaplain. It was the former who
within the week that followed that engagement announced another. It was
the latter who within the fortnight joined her hand in his, white,
feeble as it was, and poured out his very heart and soul in the fervent
prayer for blessing on this man and this woman now at last made one.

* * * * *

That seems a long time ago. The regiment is famous now for its troop
commanders,--stalwart fellows in the prime of life who have br