hed,--the pilferer had been interrupted too soon. Some
letters and notes that were lying in the lower pigeon-holes had
evidently been objects of scrutiny, but were still there--so far as he
had time to count. He had left a jolly little gathering at the
Millers', and he was eager to return; he had left them only at Mrs.
Miller's urgent request that he should bring over his "scrap-book," in
which he had a miscellaneous assortment of photographs of army friends
and army scenes, of autographs, doggerel rhymes, and newspaper
clippings, such as "Spelling Tests" and "Feats in Pronunciation," and a
quantity of others containing varied and useful information. It was a
great standby and resource of his, and had helped to while away many an
evening on the frontier. Now, Mrs. Miller had been telling Nellie
Bayard about it, and was eager that she should see it. The major, too,
and several ladies present, all united in the request and enjoined upon
him to hurry back. As "Bedlam" lay but a hundred yards away, there was
no reason why he should not have returned in five minutes, but it was
fifteen when he reappeared, and was, as became the only young man in
the room, the immediate centre of combined question and invective.

"What could have kept you so long?" "Where on earth have you been?"
"Were it anybody but Mr. McLean, I would say he had gone down to the
club-room for a drink," etc. Nellie Bayard alone was silent. The
question that occurred to her was finally asked by Mrs. Miller,--

"Why, Mr. McLean, how white you look! Have you seen a ghost?"

"No," he answered, laughing nervously. "I've seen nothing. It is dark
as Erebus outside, and I ran into something I couldn't see at
all,--something too tangible for a ghost."

"Who was it or what was it?"

"That's what I'm dying to know. I was out in the very middle of the
parade, and this something was scurrying over toward Gordon's quarters
as I was coming here. We ran slap into each other. I sang out, 'Halloo!
Beg pardon,' and began hunting for the book that was knocked out from
under my arm, and this figure just whizzed right on,--never answered at
all."

"Odd!" said the major. "Some one of the men, do you think? been over
paying a visit to a sweetheart in some kitchen of the opposite
quarters?"

"Well, no," answered McLean, coloring and hesitating. "It might have
been some sweetheart going over to visit the east side and taking a
short cut across the parade. It wasn't a man."