pproached along the walk.

Blake had gone to town early in the morning after giving that letter to
Ray. Hogan was in the guard-house a prisoner. Ray was penned to the
limits of his house in arrest. He could only see and hear the suffering
of his pet and not relieve him. Late in the day he called to a soldier
going by and offered him a dollar to go to the horse and tie him to a
post ten yards nearer where there was a little shade. The soldier untied
and was leading him away while Dandy tripped gratefully after, when the
quartermaster's Hibernian accents were heard thundering an order to
"come back wid dthat harrse." The soldier saluted and said Mr. Ray had
asked him just to move him into the shade, and the officer damned the
man for not knowing better. Then Ray came to the door and asked the
soldier to take Dandy a bucket of water, and as the man carried it and
the horse pawed and whinnied at the welcome sight, the quartermaster
appeared on his piazza, and shouted in wrath to the soldier not to
interfere again or he'd "have him in the lock-up." And poor Dandy, like
an equine Tantalus, was robbed of the needed fluid. Ray could bear no
more. He kept one foot inside the door-way as his arrest demanded, but
leaning far out, with blazing eyes and clinching fist he hurled his
challenge at the quartermaster in a voice that rang along the row like
the "to arms" of the trumpets.

"You cowardly brute! I'll horsewhip you before the whole garrison the
moment I'm free!" The surgeon heard it and came hurrying to him. Mrs.
Turner heard it and feared poor Mr. Ray must have been taking too much.
The colonel heard it far up the row and incorporated it in the
additional charge and specifications he was drawing up against Mr. Ray;
but the ladies "up the row" were busy dressing to come down according to
promise and see him, and they did not hear. Ah, no! Nine out of ten of
those who read this may say it was all improbable, impossible, or, if
true, that there was nothing but drink to explain poor Ray's frantic
outburst; but ask any cavalryman who deserves the name, and we will rest
the defence with him.

The ladies came as Mrs. Stannard had promised, and with anxious face
the doctor met them at the gate. Mr. Ray was in no condition to see any
one.

That night Mrs. Stannard returned with the doctor to his bedside. Ray
was delirious, in a raging fever.

CHAPTER XXII.

A SHOT AT MIDNIGHT.

While, as has been said, no further new