hundred and ninety-six pounds—and I'm the lightest man in the regiment. Missis McGillicuddy has been a good wife, sir—I ain't sayin' a word about that, sir."

"I should think not," replied Colonel Fortescue, to whom the Sergeant's married life was known intimately for nineteen years, "Mrs. McGillicuddy keeps all the soldiers' wives satisfied and is a boon to the regiment."

"That's so, sir," the Sergeant agreed, "and the chaplain, he compliments her on the way she marches them eight children and me to the chapel every Sunday, rain or shine, me havin' the right of the line, Missis McGillicuddy herself bein' the rear guard, the line properly dressed, no stragglers, everything done soldier-like. But Missis McGillicuddy don't follow me around like a poodle dog, as the palmist, and the mind reader, and the dream book said she would. She's hell-bent—excuse me sir—on havin' her own way all the time."

Just then a vision flitted past the door. It was Anita, dressed for dinner, in a filmy gown of pale blue and white, the colors of the Blessed Damozel. A light came into Colonel Fortescue's eyes as they rested on this darling of his heart. The Sergeant had a pretty daughter, Anna Maria by name, who was just Anita's age and of whom the Sergeant was extravagantly fond. The two fathers, the Colonel and the Sergeant, exchanged intelligent glances. Often, in their twenty years of daily association, they talked together about things of which they never spoke to any other man.

"Anna Maria is a fine girl," said the Colonel.

"Yes, sir," answered the Sergeant, "if she'd just get over the fancy she has for Briggs, the artillery corporal. That man is bound to be killed by a wheel runnin' over him. You know, sir, if there is anything on earth that skeers me stiff it is a horse hitched to any kind of a vehicle. I don't mind ridin' 'em because then the horse's heels is behind me. But in a vehicle the horse's heels is in front of me, and it makes me nervous. I have told Anna Mariar that she shan't so much as look at Briggs unless he exchanges into the cavalry, so the horse's heels will be behind him, and not in front of him."

The entrance bell rang, and Kettle went to the front door. Colonel Fortescue could neither hear nor see the visitor, but the step and the sound of a military cloak thrown on a chair indicated the arrival of a junior lieutenant. Colonel Fortescue looked annoyed. The junior officer running after Anita bothered him even more than Briggs, the artillery corporal, bothered Sergeant McGillicuddy. Anita was but a child—only seventeen; the Colonel had proclaimed this when he brought Anita to the post. Colonel Fortescue did all that a father and a Colonel could do to keep the junior lieutenants away from Anita, but no method has yet been found to keep junior officers away from pretty girls.

There were still twenty minutes before dinner, and the scoundrel, as Colonel Fortescue classified all the juniors who, like himself, adored Anita, seemed determined to stay until the musical gong sounded, and later, if he were asked. This particular scoundrel, Broussard, was the one to whom the Colonel most objected of all the slim, good-looking scoundrels who wore shoulder straps, for Broussard had too much money to spend, and spent it wildly, so the Colonel thought; he, himself, had something handsome besides his pay, but he had also a sensible father who held him down. Broussard had too many motors, too many horses, too many dogs, too many clothes, too many fighting chickens, and, above all, was too intimate with a certain soldier, a gentleman-ranker who was disapproved, both of officer and man. A gentleman-ranker is a man serving in the rank who might be an officer. This one, Lawrence by name, was a bad lot altogether. The Colonel could add quite a respectable number of demerits to Broussard's credit. And to make matters worse, Broussard was a dashing fellow, the best rider in his troop, and had a way with him that made Anita's eyes soften and her tea-rose cheeks brighten when he came within her presence.

Meanwhile, Broussard was walking up the long and handsome drawing-room toward the little glass room at the end, which had been fitted up for Anita's birds, her doves and her canaries.

Anita, leaning backward in the cushioned window seat, held to her breast a fluttering white dove. She did not see Broussard until he was quite in the little room, and had closed the glass door after him. As Anita gave Broussard her hand, a great wave of delicate color flooded her face. This quickened the beating of Broussard's heart—Anita did not blush like that for everybody. She had a gentle aloofness generally toward men which was a baffling mystery to her mother.

Broussard, being frankly in love with Anita, lost all his importance and presumption in her sweet presence, and was as gentle and modest as the white dove that Anita still held to her breast. As he longed to sit near her and ask her poignant questions, Broussard sat a long way off and talked common-places, chiefly about birds, of which he showed a surprising knowledge, gleaned that afternoon from the encyclopaedia, in anticipation of his visit. Also, Broussard had, very artfully, secured a traitor in the enemy's camp because it was well understood at Fort Blizzard that Colonel Fortescue was the enemy of every subaltern at the post who dared to raise his sacrilegious eyes to the Colonel's daughter.

This traitor was Kettle, into whose hand Broussard never failed to place a quarter whenever they met, and at the same time to wink gravely. Kettle knew the meaning both of the quarter and the wink.

Across the hall Kettle was arranging the dinner table, it being Mrs. McGillicuddy's duty to put the After-Clap to bed. The dining-room door was ajar, and Kettle kept an eye open to Broussard's advantage.

Presently, Mrs. Fortescue came down-stairs, dressed for dinner in a gown of a jocund yellow, which Colonel Fortescue liked. As she passed the open door of the handsome dining-room, Kettle beckoned to her mysteriously. Mrs. Fortescue walked into the room and Kettle closed the door after her.

"Miss Betty," whispered Kettle earnestly, "doan' you go into that there apiary," by which Kettle meant the aviary. "Miss Anita is in there with Mr. Broussard, an' he got on his courtin' breeches, an' they's jest as quiet as a couple of sleepin' babies."

[Illustration: "Miss Anita is in there with Mr. Broussard, an' he got
on his courtin' breeches, an' they's jest as quiet as a couple of
sleepin' babies."]

A look of annoyance came to Mrs. Fortescue's expressive eyes. The Colonel had imbued her with disapproval of the man of too many motors and horses and dogs and clothes and fighting chickens.

Mrs. Fortescue waved Kettle away and marched into the hall, where she met Colonel Fortescue coming out of his office.

"It's Broussard," she whispered to the Colonel.

Together they entered the long drawing-room. Broussard and Anita were leaning forward; Anita's face was still deeply flushed. Her beloved white dove fluttered, unnoticed, about her white-shod feet. When the glass door opened and Colonel and Mrs. Fortescue entered the little glass room, both Anita and Broussard started violently—a sign of captive love.

Mrs. Fortescue was gracious, merely because she could not help it, and the Colonel treated Broussard with the elaborate courtesy which a Colonel shows to a subaltern and which makes the subaltern look and feel the size of the head of a pin. Naturally, Broussard hastened his leave-taking and received no invitation to remain, except from Anita's eyes, shy and long-lashed.

When the Colonel and Mrs. Fortescue and Anita were sitting at the