they knew why. Letters came, black-bordered, with Esther's
superscription, sometimes, but only for Mrs. Blake or Mrs. Ray. There
was never one for Field. And so a second summer came and went and a
second September was ushered in, and in the flood of the full moonlight
there was again music and dancing at Fort Frayne, but not for Field, not
for Esther Dade. They were all talking of Nanette, Daughter of the
Dakotas, and Esther, Daughter of the Regiment, as they called her in her
father's Corps, and the mail came late from Laramie, and letters were
handed round as tattoo sounded, and Mrs. Blake, eagerly scanning a
black-bordered page, was seen suddenly to run in doors, her eyes
brimming over with tears.

Later that night Hogan tapped at Field's front door and asked would the
lieutenant step over to Mrs. Ray's a minute, and he went.

"Read that," said Mrs. Ray, pointing to a paragraph on the third page of
the black-bordered missive that had been too much for Mrs. Blake. And he
read:

"Through it all Esther has been my sweetest comfort, but now I must
lose her, too. Our means are so straitened that she has _made_ me
see the necessity. Hard as it is, I must yield to her for the help
that it may bring. She has been studying a year and is to join the
staff of trained nurses at St. Luke's the first of October."

For a moment there was silence in the little army parlor. Field's hands
were trembling, his face was filled with trouble. She knew he would
speak his heart to her at last, and speak he did:--

"All these months that she has been studying I've been begging and
pleading, Mrs. Ray. _You_ know what I went for last winter,--all to no
purpose. I'm going again now, if I have to stay a patient at St. Luke's
to coax her out of it."

But not until Christmas came the welcome "wire:"

Patient discharged. Nurse finally accepts new engagement.

FINIS

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Daughter of the Sioux, by Charles King

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