p.

"I have, sir."

"Then it is the General's order, sir," said the chief-of-staff, "that
you go at once to your quarters in close arrest."

CHAPTER XVII.

There was the mischief to pay in and about department headquarters for
something like twenty-four hours. Colonel Strain, as chief-of-staff, had
a sleepless night of it. Mr. Loring, reticent as ever, had gone straight
to his rooms, which were far from the office and not very far from the
convent of the good gray sisters. He had no thought of insubordination
in wiring as he did to Washington. He considered it was his paramount
duty to make every effort in his power to sail by the first steamer.
Letters of instruction that had reached him informed him that a new post
was to be built along the Big Horn range in Wyoming, and that the moment
he arrived a board of officers, of which he would serve as junior, would
be sent out to select the site. There was urgent need of his services,
therefore, and no time to be lost. He felt that this sudden and summary
arrest was a wrong to him personally and professionally, but the lessons
of obedience and discipline taught in the four long years at West Point
were fresh in his mind, and whatever should be the result of his
detention the responsibility now lay with the department commander.
Arrived at his quarters, Loring calmly wrote a dispatch to the assistant
in the office of the Chief of Engineers at Washington, saying so many
words: "Placed in close arrest because of previous telegrams. Cannot
sail to-morrow." This and a note to the Lady Superior at the convent
saying he would be unable to come to say good-by to Pancha, and would
probably be detained, he sent by his servant, bidding the man go first
to the telegraph office and then to stop at headquarters for certain
books, and then to deliver the note at the convent on his homeward way.
Dennis was a retired dragoon who had found such employment with the
officers on duty in San Francisco for several years past, and was
endowed with the Irishman's almost pathetic sense of fealty to his
"commander," as he insisted on speaking of his employer. Master was a
word he could not tolerate because of its implication of servitude. But
even while rebelling at the term, he yielded to the fact a degree of
devotion to Loring's interests far exceeding that usually accorded by
the body servant of tradition, and this calm, deliberate, methodical,
silent young soldier was, in spite of hims