with despatches. He felt that things must be brought to a
crisis speedily. He knew that, properly handled, he had the means of
clouding Ray's name with something worse than suspicion. He had already
sneeringly replied to the officers who had spoken admiringly of Ray's
daring, by saying that Ray was, doubtless, trying to make a record to
block matters that were working against him here. Some of his auditors
had gone off disgusted. One had plainly said he was sick of
insinuations. Now, however, they were all gone, and he had the field
practically to himself. The half-dozen officers left at the post would
be little apt to interfere with him. Only, he must manage Mrs. Stannard.
Gleason took a fortifying glass or two, ordered up his horse, and, late
as it was, rode in to Cheyenne. There he dropped in at the
telegraph-office,--he could have sent it from the adjutant's office just
as well,--and, after some deliberation, wrote this despatch:

"WILLARD RALLSTON, ESQ., Omaha.

"Why no letter? When you coming? Act now. Ferguson gone.

"G."

Being in town he dropped in at one or two places of popular resort, and
had more or less conversation with the hangers-on at the open bars. He
drank more freely than usual, too, and while by no means off his
balance, mentally or physically, when at midnight he turned his horse's
head homewards, he was rather more capable of any deed of meanness than
would ordinarily have been deemed expedient. His quarters reached, he
stood for a moment gazing along the dark and silent row. Suddenly, soft
and sweet on the clear night air he heard the notes of a guitar, then a
tenor voice, well trained, rich and melodious. He well knew there was no
officer in the garrison who could sing like that. Who was it? Where was
it?

Slipping through the back-yard and keeping close under the high board
fence, Mr. Gleason tiptoed up the row until behind Truscott's. A
convenient knot-hole enabled him to peer through, and his eye lit on the
dim figure of a man enveloped in cavalry overcoat standing beneath the
rear window. This, then, was the troubadour.

A moment or two previous, Miss Sanford, wearied after a long day of
anxiety and care, was roused from a broken sleep by a soft, sweet tenor
voice beneath her window, and the tinkling accompaniment of a guitar.
Each word came floating through the silent night,--

"Rings Stille herscht--es schweigt der Wald,
Vollendet ist des Tages