lid woman before her was a painful mystery to Anita.
Jealousy is a plant that springs from nothing, and grows like Jonah's
gourd in the minds of women.

Anita was too innocent, too rashly confident in the honor of all the
other women in the world to think any wrong of the woman before her.
But it was enough that Mrs. Lawrence knew Broussard well, and was in
communication with him--a strange thing between an officer and the wife
of a private soldier, even if the soldier be of a station unusual in
the ranks. Ever in Anita's heart smouldered the joy of the words
Broussard had spoken to her under thousands of eyes on that memorable
night of the music ride, and the sharp pain that came from Broussard's
saying no more.

In a few minutes the jacket was done, and Anita rose. It required all
her generosity as well as justice to say to Mrs. Lawrence:

"If I can do anything for you, please let me know."

"I thank you," replied Mrs. Lawrence. "You have already done much for
me and for Ronald."

Then Anita went out into the dusk, and in her soul was rebellion.
Youth was made for joy and she was robbed of her share. Anita was
scarcely eighteen and deep-hearted.

In Mrs. Fortescue's room, Anita found Mrs. McGillicuddy, engaged in one
of the comfortable chats that always took place between the Colonel's
lady and the Sergeant's wife at the After-Clap's bed-time. As Sergeant
McGillicuddy kept the Colonel informed of the happenings at the fort,
so Mrs. McGillicuddy, who had great qualifications, and would have made
a good scout, kept Mrs. Fortescue informed of all the news at the fort,
from Major Harlow, the second in command, down to the smallest drummer
boy in the regiment. Mrs. Fortescue being nothing if not feminine, she
and Mrs. McGillicuddy were "sisters under their skins."

Anita's face was so grave that Mrs. Fortescue said to her tenderly--one
is very tender with an only daughter:

"Is anything troubling you, dear?"

"Nothing at all," replied Anita, "I went to see Mrs. Lawrence, as the
chaplain asked me, and finished a little jacket she was knitting for
her boy. She doesn't seem very strong."

"And I dessay," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, who had held Anita in her arms
when the girl was but a day old, "you saw all that cut glass and the
rugs, as Mr. Broussard give to Lawrence. Them rugs! They're fit for a
general's house. It seems to me it oughter be against the regulations
for privates to have such rugs when serge