ardhouse, the sentry on Number
One started the call of eleven o'clock. Number Two, at the storehouse,
took it up in his turn and trolled off his "All's well," and then it
was Number Three's turn, out just under the edge of the bench, and
Three muffled his voice and strove to turn it into a lullaby as he
began, and, as the first words of the soldier watch cry came
floating in through the partly open window, Mrs. Archer's hand
stole forth and clasped that of Mrs. Stannard's, for the mother
had begun to stir. Then, finger on lips, in tremulous excitement,
those loving-hearted friends bent forward, and the watchers, five,
listened and gazed, the women quivering with sympathy and emotion,
for Mrs. Bennett's dark head was slowly lifting from the pillow,
and then, all on a sudden went up a piercing cry--in a very agony of
joy--incredulous, intolerable--"_Danny!_ DANNY! Oh, my God! Don't say
I'm dreaming! And JIMMY!"

And then, with lusty yowl, the younger of the startled cherubs entered
his protest against this summary awakening, and the words of ecstatic
thanksgiving were for the moment drowned in the chorus of infant
lamentation. Even the rapture of restoration to mother arms was dimmed
by consideration of present discomfort.

But within were glad-hearted friends, weeping joyfully with her.
Without were sturdy soldiers, shaking hands and slapping backs and
shoulders in clumsy delight, and somebody was moved to say he'd bet the
Old Man wouldn't care if it _was_ after taps, "and--Craney's was still
open."

And so by dozens they went trooping down, for, though cash was scant
and the paymaster overdue, the rules were suspended and Craney bade
"Barkeep" credit all comers who drank to Harris; and Case, the
bookkeeper, with white and twitching face, waylaid such men as came
from the escort with odd, insistent questioning. If 'Tonio was really
leader in the rescue, had nothing been seen of 'Patchie Sanchez? Was
Sanchez heard of--nowhere?--until, with his fifth free drink to the
health of everybody concerned, Corporal Dooley turned on Case with
"What the hell's it to you, anyhow, whether 'Tonio led or Sanchez's
dead?" and Craney, listening and watching, turned to Watts and asked
had Case begun again? If so, they couldn't too speedily check him.
"Come up here, if you're a man," insisted Dooley, "and have wan on me
to big little Harris and 'Tonio--'Tonio, bedad, even if he _did_ do up
Loot'nent Willett!"

Whereat, even in the noi