hat
they took to be an Indian signal-fire up Tonto Creek. It soon smouldered
away,--but I always make it a point to show respect to these old
soldiers."

"You show d--d little respect for their reports all the same," said
Blake, suddenly shooting up on a pair of legs that looked like stilts.
"An Indian signal-fire is a matter of a heap of consequence in my
opinion;" and he wrathfully stalked away.

For some reason Gleason saw fit to take no notice of this piece of
insubordination. Placidly he resumed his chat,--

"Now, you gentlemen seem skeptical about Potts. Do any of you know his
history?"

"Well, I know he's about the oldest soldier in the regiment; that he
served in the First Dragoons when they were in Arizona twenty years ago,
and that he gets drunk as a boiled owl every pay-day," was an immediate
answer.

"Very good as far as it goes," replied Gleason, with a superior smile;
"but I'll just tell you a chapter in his life he never speaks of and I
never dreamed of until the last time I was in San Francisco. There I met
old General Starr at the 'Occidental,' and almost the first thing he did
was to inquire for Potts, and then he told me about him. He was one of
the finest sergeants in Starr's troop in '53,--a dashing, handsome
fellow,--and while in at Fort Leavenworth he had fallen in love with,
won, and married as pretty a young girl as ever came into the regiment.
She came out to New Mexico with the detachment with which he served, and
was the belle of all the '_bailes_' given either by the 'greasers' or
the enlisted men. He was proud of her as he could be, and old Starr
swore that the few ladies of the regiment who were with them at old Fort
Fillmore or Stanton were really jealous of her. Even some of the young
officers got to saying sweet things to her, and Potts came to the
captain about it, and he had it stopped; but the girl's head was turned.
There was a handsome young fellow in the sutler's store who kept making
her presents on the sly, and when at last Potts found it out he nearly
hammered the life out of him. Then came that campaign against the
Jicarilla Apaches, and Potts had to go with his troop and leave her at
the cantonment, where, to be sure, there were ladies and plenty of
people to look after her; and in the fight at Cieneguilla poor Potts was
badly wounded, and it was some months before they got back; and meantime
the sutler fellow had got in his work, and when the command finally came
in w