s the matter. What have you lost? What's been
taken?"

"Nothing--nothing of any consequence. Come on. Let us hurry after the
major, or we'll miss the fun. Mrs. Miller, permit me," and he offered
his arm to the major's wife, who stood nearest the door.

"No, but I insist on knowing what is missing, Holmes. It is my right to
know," called the doctor, as he struggled into his army overcoat.

"Nothing but a cigar-case and an old pocket-book. I've mislaid them
somewhere and there's no time to look. Come on."

"Mr. Holmes," said Mrs. Miller in a low tone, "I have abundant reason
for asking and--no! Tell me. Where was that pocket-book and how much
money was there in it?"

"In my overcoat-pocket, at sunset. Probably one hundred dollars or so.
I never carry much in that way. You will not speak of it, Mrs. Miller?"

"To my husband I must, and this very night. You do not dream what
trouble we are in, with a thief in our very midst."

"Some of the servants, I suppose," he said, carelessly.

But to his surprise she only bowed her head and was silent a moment,
then muttered rather than spoke the words,--

"God knows. I only hope so!"

V.

"What a trump that young fellow McLean seems to be, doctor," said Mr.
Holmes, reflectively, late that night as the two men were smoking a
final cigar together.

"Oh, he's not a bad lot by any means," was the reply. "Good deal of a
boy, you know. Has no experience of life. Doesn't know anything, in
fact, except what professional knowledge he picked up at the Point. You
can't expect anything else of an infantry subaltern whose army life has
been spent out in this God-forsaken country."

"Why do you always run down this country, doctor? It's a glorious
country, a magnificent country. I declare I hate the clatter and racket
and rush of Chicago more and more every time I go back to it."

"That's all very well. You are unmarried, and can come and go as you
please. If you were a man of family and compelled as I am to bring up a
daughter in these barbaric wilds, or even to live here at all,--a man
of my tastes and antecedents,--you'd curse the fates that landed you in
the army. Still, I would not mind it so much if it were not for Nellie.
It is galling to me to think of her having to spend so much of her fair
young life in these garrison associations. Who is there here, except
possibly Miss Forrest, who, by birth, education, and social position,
is fit to be an intimate or friend? W