Preakness Stable, mean you? Marry, I know not. She
is a Sanford and has a Sanford's wealth, but 'twas not for me. She
adores a horse and worships a horseman. This I gathered from our too
brief converse. I strove to win her ear with poesie, but she bade me
cease. Her soul is not attuned to melody,--she'd none of mine. She
preferred my Lady Truscott and buttered muffins."

"What did Truscott say about Crook's fight with Crazy Horse?" asked
Ray, who looked blank enough at Blake's jargon, and wanted facts.

"I don't think Jack liked the looks of things," said Blake, relapsing
into sudden gravity. "He told me that he thought it more than likely
we'd all be in the field again in less than a month."

"We?" said Merrill. "It isn't a matter that affects Truscott one way or
another. He has his four years' detail at the Point. What difference
does it make to him whether we're ordered up to reinforce Crook?"

"Just this difference, my bully rook: that Truscott would catch us
before we got to Laramie--unless we went by rail."

"Why, Blake, you're addled!" replied the captain, in that
uncomplimentary directness which sometimes manifests itself among old
comrades of the frontier, even in the presence of the gentler sex. "Why,
Mr. Blake, you don't suppose he is going to give up his young wife, his
lovely home, his pleasant duties, to join for a mere Indian campaign, do
you?" asked more than one present, and a general murmur of dissent went
round. "What do _you_ say, major?" said one voice, in direct appeal to
the senior officer of the group.

"It depends on what you consider a 'mere Indian campaign,'" was the cool
response.

"But as to Truscott's going, what do you think, Ray?"

"I don't think anything about it. I _know_."

CHAPTER III.

HEROINES.

"What is so rare as a day in June?" sings the poet, and where can a day
in June be more beautiful than at this Highland Gate of the peerless
Hudson? It is June of the Centennial year, and all the land is ablaze
with patriotic fervor. From North, from South, from East and West, the
products of a nation's ingenuity or a nation's toil have been garnered
in one vast exhibition at the Quaker City; and thither flock the
thousands of our people. It is June of a presidential nomination, and
the eyes of statesmen and politicians are fixed on Cincinnati. It is the
celebration of the first century of a nation's life that engrosses the
thoughts of millions of hearts, and between tha