the mark of the comb in
her hair, where it had become damp at the temples during her ablution.
She looked about her swiftly as she stood a moment in the door, very
trim and handsome in her close-fitting black dress, with a virginal
touch of white collar and a coral pin.

Agnes was bending over a bed of coals, which she was raking down to the
front of the stove for the toast--a trick taught the ladies of the camp
by Sergeant Schaefer--and did not seem to hear her.

"Dr. Slavens hasn't come back?" Mrs. Mann whispered, coming over softly
to Agnes' side.

Agnes shook her head, turning her face a moment from the coals.

"I heard you get up," said Mrs. Mann, "and I hurried to join you. I know
just how you feel!"

With that the romantic little lady put an arm around Agnes' neck and
gave her a hurried kiss, for Horace was in the door. A tear which sprang
suddenly leaped down Agnes' face and hissed upon the coals before the
girl could take her handkerchief from her sweater-pocket and stop its
wilful dash. Under the pretext of shielding her face from the glow she
dried those which might have followed it into the fire, and turned to
Horace with a nod and smile.

What was there, she asked herself, to be sitting there crying over, like
a rough-knuckled housewife whose man has stayed out all night in his
cups? If he wanted to stay away that way, let him stay! And then she
recalled his hand fumbling at the inner pocket of his coat, and the
picture post-card which he had handed her at the riverside.

Still, it wasn't a matter to cry about--not yet at least. She would
permit no more disloyal thoughts. There was some grave trouble at the
bottom of Dr. Slavens' absence, and she declared to herself that she
would turn Comanche over, like a stone in the meadow of which the
philosopher wrote, and bare all its creeping secrets to the healthy sun,
but that she would find him and clear away the unjust suspicions which
she knew were growing ranker in that little colony hour by hour.

They all gathered to bid Sergeant Schaefer good-bye, for he was to
rejoin them no more. June pressed upon him a paper-bag of fudge, which
she had prepared the day before as a surprise against this event. The
sergeant stowed it away in the side pocket of his coat, blushing a great
deal when he accepted it.

There was a little sadness in their hearts at seeing the soldier go, for
it foretold the dissolution of the pleasant party. And the gloom of Dr.
Slaven