ed, he was
equally hemmed in. A moment of fury took the place of fear, wherein he
cursed and raved against a government, calling itself paternal, that
would play fast and loose with its people's lives; but at last he fell
into a dull brooding, tinged with physical and mental nausea.

He was aroused by a voice, and looked up to behold the Colonel's head
and shoulders above the picket fence. The old gentleman's face was grave
and his well-known Stetson had been pulled lower to his eyes.

"I thought I'd find you," he was saying. "Walk down to my office with
me."

Since the sixth of April, now almost two months passed, the Colonel had
referred to the table in Mr. Strong's editorial sanctum as his office;
not alone because it pleased him so to do, but equally because his
friend would tolerate no other arrangement. Never having possessed an
office of any kind, he felt that it added dignity to his declining
years; and there, each morning, he would re-check the names on his
recruiting ledger, besides writing suggestions--some very good
suggestions--to the War Department. If the young Martian clerks, working
like bees in that august building at Sixteenth and Pennsylvania Avenue,
grew into the habit of unopening fat envelopes postmarked "Hillsdale"
until the very last moment, they learned to do so after a manner of
self-protection--but had the Colonel suspected this he would have gone
forthwith and flourished his cane, not only over their heads, but over
the heads of their heads, even unto the Mr. Secretary of War himself.

"I'm unhappy about you, Jeb," he said, as they fell into stride.

Jeb, having reached a state of mind wherein he expected at any moment to
be called a coward, felt his body stiffen as if to receive a blow. He
had become ashamed even to inquire for news of Marian, during these last
few days, as the contrast of their characters was a thing he preferred
keeping in the background. He now looked stolidly at the pavement, and
asked:

"What about?"--but the words were huskily inarticulate and he repeated
them, this time in a louder voice: "What about?"

"Oh, everything," the old gentleman answered. "Your splendid loyalty to
the company that won't be formed has robbed you of a place in other
branches of the service which by this time would have meant much to you,
and I'm afraid now it's too late to recover the lost ground." He failed
to notice that his young friend drew a breath of relief, or that he
stepped o