ty to Adolphe,
agreeing to bear its whole cost if the nephew would manage to include in
it Anna and Hilary. And Irby had duly reported complete success and
drawn on him, but the old soldier still told his doubts to the
newspaper.

"Adolphe has habits," he meditated, "but success is not one of them."

Up and down a perpendicular procession on the page he every now and then
mentally returned the salute of the one little musketeer of the same
height as the steamboat's chimneys, whether the Attention he challenged
was that of the Continentals, the Louisiana Grays, Orleans Cadets,
Crescent Blues or some other body of blithe invincibles. Yet his thought
was still of Anna. When Adolphe, last year, had courted her, and the
hopeful uncle had tried non-intervention, she had declined him--"and oh,
how wisely!" For then back to his native city came Kincaid after years
away at a Northern military school and one year across the ocean, and
the moment the uncle saw him he was glad Adolphe had failed. But now if
she was going to find Hilary as light-headed and cloying as Adolphe was
thick-headed and sour, or if she must see Hilary go soft on the slim
Mobile girl--whom Adolphe was already so torpidly enamored
of--"H-m-m-m!"

Two young men who had tied their horses behind the hotel crossed the
white court toward the garden. They also were in civil dress, yet wore
an air that goes only with military training. The taller was Hilary
Kincaid, the other his old-time, Northern-born-and-bred school chum,
Fred Greenleaf. Kincaid, coming home, had found him in New Orleans, on
duty at Jackson Barracks, and for some weeks they had enjoyed cronying.
Now they had been a day or two apart and had chanced to meet again at
this spot. Kincaid, it seems, had been looking at a point hard by with a
view to its fortification. Their manner was frankly masterful though
they spoke in guarded tones.

"No," said Kincaid, "you come with me to this drill. Nobody'll take
offence."

"Nor will you ever teach your cousin to handle a battery," replied
Greenleaf, with a sedate smile.

"Well, he knows things we'll never learn. Come with me, Fred, else I
can't see you till theatre's out--if I go there with her--and you say--"

"Yes, I want you to go with her," murmured Greenleaf, so solemnly that
Kincaid laughed outright.

"But, after the show, of course," said the laugher, "you and I'll ride,
eh?" and then warily, "You've taken your initials off all your stuff?...