on reaching
the opposite bank and was watching his little column through the
ford,--three stanch troops, each about sixty strong, reinforced by half
a dozen of Ray's men left behind in the forward rush at dawn, but
scorning disqualification of any kind now that danger menaced their
beloved captain and their comrades of the sorrel troop. In all the
regiment no man was loved by the rank and file as was Billy Ray.
Brilliant soldiers, gifted officers, sterling men were many of his
comrades, but ever since he first joined the ----th on the heels of the
civil war, more than any one of its commissioned list, Ray had been
identified with every stirring scout and campaign, fight or incident in
the regimental history. Truscott, Blake, Hunter and Gregg among the
junior captains had all had their tours of detached duty--instructing at
West Point, recruiting in the big Eastern cities, serving as
aide-de-camp to some general officer, but of Ray it could be said he had
hardly been east of the Missouri from the day he joined until his
wedding day, and only rarely and briefly since that time. More than any
officer had he been prominent in scout after scout--Arizona, Mexico,
Texas, the Indian Territory, Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, Wyoming, the
Dakotas, Montana, even parts of Idaho and Utah he knew as he used to
know the roads and runways of the blue grass region of his native state.
From the British line to the Gulfs of Mexico and California he had
studied the West. The regiment was his home, his intense pride, and its
men had been his comrades and brothers. The veterans trusted and swore
by, the younger troopers looked up to and well nigh worshipped him, and
now, as the story that the Sioux had probably surrounded the sorrel
troop went like wild fire through the garrison, even the sick in
hospital begged to be allowed to go, and one poor lad, frantic through
fever and enforced confinement, broke from the hold of the half-hearted
attendant; tore over to "K" Troop barracks, demanding his "kit" of
Sergeant Schreiber, and, finding the quarters deserted, the men all gone
to stables, dared to burst into that magnate's own room in search of his
arms and clothing, and thereby roused a heavily sleeping soldier, who
damned him savagely until, through wild raving, he gathered that some
grave danger menaced Captain Ray. Even his befuddled senses could
fathom that! And while guards and nurses bore the patient, shrieking and
struggling, back to hospi