then lighted with a little smile of deference and recognition; but
permanently lighted with the brightest and quickest hazel eyes that I
ever saw. Something about the face pleased me on the instant. I
believe it was the frankness.

"I have to apologize for my rudeness, in calling a gentleman away from
you, Miss Randolph, in a very unceremonious manner, a little while
ago."

"Oh, I know," I said. "I saw what you did with him."

"Did I do anything with him?"

"Only called him to his duty, I suppose."

"Precisely. He was very excusable for forgetting it; but it might have
been inconvenient."

"Do you think it is ever excusable to forget duty?" I asked; and I was
rewarded with a swift flash of fun in the hazel eyes, that came and
went like forked lightning.

"It is not easily pardoned here," he answered.

"People don't make allowances?"

"Not officers," he said, with a smile. "Soldiers lose the character of
men, when on duty; they are only reckoned machines."

"You do not mean that exactly, I suppose."

"Indeed I do!" he said, with another slighter coruscation.
"Intelligent machines, of course, and with no more latitude of action.
You would not like that life?"

"I should think you would not."

"Ah, but we hope to rise to the management of the machines, some day."

I thought I saw in his face that he did. I remarked that I thought the
management of machines could not be very pleasant.

"Why not?"

"It is degrading to the machines--and so, I should think, it would not
be very elevating to those that make them machines."

"That is exactly the use they propose them to serve, though," he said,
looking amused; "the elevation of themselves."

"I know," I said, thinking that the end was ignoble too.

"You do not approve it?" he said.

I felt those brilliant eyes dancing all over me and, I fancied, over
my thoughts too. I felt a little shy of going on to explain myself to
one whom I knew so little. He turned the conversation, by asking me if
I had seen all the lions yet.

I said I supposed not.

"Have you been up to the old fort?"

"I want to go there," I said; "but somebody told me to-day, there was
nothing worth going for."

"Has his report taken away your desire to make the trial?"

"No, for I do not believe he is right."

"Might I offer myself as a guide? I can be disengaged this afternoon;
and I know all the ways to the fort. It would give me great pleasure."

I felt it would give me great