nd the ladies as
enthusiastically as they could, for one's charitable impulses ooze all
too rapidly when the object looms suddenly as a rival. Sanders begged
presently to try with Mrs. Davies, while Mrs. Flight tried again with
Willett, and presently all were trying and gradually mastering the new
step, and when it was time to separate for dinner it was solemnly agreed
that they would tell no one of their practice, but that very night at
the hop they would simply paralyze the entire assemblage by dancing the
latest waltz step.

"Now, Mrs. Davies," said Willett, "you've just _got_ to go, if only just
once to show them how," and Darling and Sanders joined eagerly in the
plea. There was not actual unanimity as to the propriety and necessity
of the project, however. Mrs. Flight was doubtful, but did not openly
oppose, and Mrs. Darling said, of course dear Mrs. Davies must know that
it would certainly cause remark. But all through tea it cropped out
again and again, and after tea Willett and Sanders came back from the
mess dinner and renewed their supplications. It was, at least, decided
that Almira could not be left to mope alone, and as her lady friends had
to go to the hop, why, she might as well go and peep in and hear the
music at any rate. There were good friends, true friends of her own and
her husband, who would have been glad indeed to spend the evening with
her, either at her fireside or their own, whose cards and condolences
she found on her little hall table when, escorted to the door by Mr.
Willett, she went home at half-past eight, just to make some slight
change in her toilet, which, as it stood, was too funereal for so
festive an occasion.

And so that night, while Davies and his men were huddling about the
little camp-fires in the snow at Dismal River and a wintry blast was
whistling through the bare, brown limbs of the cottonwoods, there were
sounds of revelry at the big frontier post, spirited music, merry
laughter, the rhythmic beat of martial feet in the measures of the
dance, the rustle of silk, and the pit-a-pat of dainty slippers. Only
two or three households were unrepresented. It was the first hop Mrs.
Stone had missed. It was something that the chaplain and his wife did
not care for. It was a nuisance to Leonard, who loved his books and his
home. It bored more than one old warrior, who went, however, on account
of his wife and daughters, but Captain and Mrs. Devers were on hand, as
befitted the o