Messenger bent her head lower over her bridle.

"Why do you ask? Did you know her?"

"Yes."

"Well?"

The captain lifted his grave eyes, but the Messenger was not looking at
him.

"I knew her--in a way--better than I ever knew any woman, and I saw her
only three times in all my life. That is your answer--and my excuse for
asking. Does she still live at Sandy River?"

"No."

"Do you know where she has gone?"

"She is somewhere in the South."

"Is she--married?" he asked under his breath.

The Special Messenger looked up at him, smiling in the darkness.

"No," she said. "I heard that she lost her--heart--to a bandmaster of
some cavalry regiment who was killed in action at Sandy River--three
years ago."

The captain straightened in his saddle as though he had been shot; in
the dim light his lean face turned darkly scarlet.

"I see her occasionally," continued the Messenger faintly; "have you any
message--perhaps----"

The captain turned slowly toward her. "Do you know where she is?"

"I expect that she will be within riding distance of me--very soon."

"Is your mission a secret one?"

"Yes."

"And you may see her--before very long?"

"Yes."

"Then tell her," said the captain, "that the bandmaster of the Fourth
Missouri--" He strove to continue; his voice died in his throat.

"Yes--yes--say it," whispered the Special Messenger. "I will tell her;
she will understand--truly she will--whatever you say."

"Tell her--that the bandmaster has--has never forgotten----"

"Yes--yes----"

"Never forgotten her!"

"Yes--oh, yes!"

"That he--he----"

"Yes! Oh, please--please say it--don't be afraid to say--what you wish!"

The captain's voice was not under perfect control.

"Say that he--thinks of her.... Say that--that he--he thought of her
when he was falling--there, in the charge at Sandy River----"

"But he once told her that himself!" she cried. "Has he no more to tell
her?"

And Captain Stanley, aghast, fairly leaped in his stirrups.

"Who are you?" he gasped. "What do _you_ know of----"

His voice was smothered in the sudden out-crash of rifles, through which
startled trumpets sounded, followed by the running explosions of cavalry
carbines.

"Attention! Draw sabres!" rang out a far voice in the increasing uproar.

The night air thrilled with the rushing swish of steel drawn swiftly
across steel.

"Forward!" and "Forward! Forward!" echoed the officers, one after
another.

"Steady