amazing energy,
working hard at her violin lessons and delighting Neroda by her
progress, reading and studying until Mrs. Fortescue took the books away
from her, going to all the dances, doing everything that her young
companions did, and many things which they did not. She became the
chaplain's right hand for work among the soldiers' children, and from
daybreak until she went to bed at night Anita was ever employed at
something and throwing into that something wonderful force and
perseverance. One thing became immediately noticeable to Colonel and
Mrs. Fortescue; this was that Anita never spoke Broussard's name from
the hour he left Fort Blizzard.

"It is only a girl's fancy; she will get over it," said Mrs. Fortescue
to the Colonel.

"She would if she were like most girls, but I tell you, Betty, this
child of ours, this devoted, obedient little thing, has more mind, more
introspection, than any young creature I ever knew. There is the
making of a dozen tragedies in her."

"It is you who are too introspective and too tragic about her,"
answered Mrs. Fortescue, and the Colonel, recognizing the germ of truth
in his wife's words, remained silent for a moment. Then he said:

"It's the sky and the snow and this altitude, and being shut in from
all the world that make everything so tense. On these far-off,
ice-bound plains, life is abnormally vivid. We are all keyed up too
high here."

Mrs. Fortescue, seeing Anita reading often, and getting many books from
the post library, glanced at the literature that crowded the table in
Anita's sunny bed room. They were of two sorts--books of passionate
poetry and books about the Philippines, their geography, their history,
the story of the natives, "the silent, sullen peoples, half savage and
half child," tales of the creeping, crawling, stinging things that make
life hideous in the jungles, all these was Anita studying. Mrs.
Fortescue said nothing of this to the Colonel, but recalled that
Broussard was in the Philippines, and Anita's soul was there, although
her body was at Fort Blizzard. In a book of her own, Anita had written
her name, in the firm, clear hand that belonged to thirty rather than
to seventeen, and these words:

"This I, who walk and talk and sleep and eat here, is not I. It is but
my body; my soul is with the Beloved."

Mrs. Fortescue said nothing of this to the Colonel, but the trend of
Anita's reading was unexpectedly revealed at one of the state