nd
dangerously, and half a dozen men with lanterns were hunting about the
bloody sands where the faithful fellow had dropped, looking for a
weapon or a clew, and probably trampling out all possibility of
finding either. Major Plume, through Mr. Doty, his adjutant, had felt
it necessary to remind Captain Wren that an officer in close arrest
had no right to be away from his quarters. Late in the evening, it
seems, Dr. Graham had represented to the post commander that the
captain was in so nervous and overwrought a condition, and so
distressed, that as a physician he recommended his patient be allowed
the limits of the space adjoining his quarters in which to walk off
his superabundant excitement. Graham had long been the friend of
Captain Wren and was his friend as well as physician now, even though
deploring his astounding outbreak, but Graham had other things to
demand his attention as night wore on, and there was no one to speak
for Wren when the young adjutant, a subaltern of infantry, with
unnecessary significance of tone and manner, suggested the captain's
immediate return to his proper quarters. Wren bowed his head and went
in stunned and stubborn silence. It had never occurred to him for a
moment, when he heard that half-stifled, agonized cry for help, that
there could be the faintest criticism of his rushing to the sentry's
aid. Still less had it occurred to him that other significance, and
damning significance, might attach to his presence on the spot, but,
being first to reach the fallen man, he was found kneeling over him
within thirty seconds of the alarm. Not another living creature was in
sight when the first witnesses came running to the spot. Both Truman
and Todd could swear to that.

In the morning, therefore, the orderly came with the customary
compliments to say to Captain Wren that the post commander desired to
see him at the office.

It was then nearly nine o'clock. Wren had had a sleepless night and
was in consultation with Dr. Graham when the summons came. "Ask that
Captain Sanders be sent for at once," said the surgeon, as he pressed
his comrade patient's hand. "The major has his adjutant and clerk and
possibly some other officers. You should have at least one friend."

"I understand," briefly answered Wren, as he stepped to the hallway to
get his sun hat. "I wish it might be you." The orderly was already
speeding back to the office at the south end of the brown rectangle of
adobe and painted