Armstrong
gravely. "One was the order she wrote in excellent imitation of her
husband's hand and signature, authorizing the changing of guard
arrangements on the wharf the evening Stewart sailed. The other was a
note in pencil, also purporting to come from him, directing old
Keeny--you remember the General's Irish orderly--to search for a packet
of letters that had come by mail, and must be in the general's tent,
either about his desk or overcoat, and to bring them at once to room
number so and so at the Palace. Of course neither the General nor
Garrison was there when he arrived with them; but she was, and with all
her fascinations. She got the Irishman half drunk and told him a piteous
story and made him swear he'd never tell the General or anybody. If
questioned he could plead he had gone out, and--"got a little full with
the boys." She gave him money--a big bit, too; and he got more than full.
"The very vehemence of his denials made me suspect him," said Armstrong;
"but he was firm when examined." The General never required him to remain
at the tent at night. He could go to town any evening he wished; and to
cover his appearing at the Palace where the General long had a room, and
where he was well known, he could say he was only in to have a word with
one of the housemaids, and to give Mrs. Garrison a handkerchief one of
the ladies must have dropped. But one thing she failed in--getting the
letter back. Keeny had left it at camp in the pocket of his old blouse,
and when he sobered up and all the questions were asked he hung onto it
in case the truth came out, in order that he might save himself from
punishment. But it broke him--he got to drinking oftener, and the General
had to send him to his regiment; and then when we heard of Canker's
charge against you I saw the way to wring the truth out of him. He
worshiped your father, as did every Irish dragoon that ever rode under
him, and I told him you were to be brought to trial for the crime. Then
he broke down and gave the truth--and her penciled order--to me."

In the silence that followed the soldier of forty and the lad of only
twenty-one sat looking gravely into each other's face. It was Armstrong
who spoke again:

"Gray, it was manly in you to tell me your story and your trouble. I
could help you here; but--who can help you when you have to tell it--next
time?"

"Next time?--father, do you mean?" queried Gray, a puzzled look in his
blue eyes. "I hadn't thought