, the company, the
government, his comrades, even his benefactors, and then thoughtfully
demanded drink. There was no longer a stern corporal to forbid, for
Connelly, suffering and almost sightless, had been led into a rear
coach. But there was no longer money with which to buy, for Foster's
last visible cent had gone up in smoke and flame, and, scorched and
smarting in a dozen places, wrapped in a blanket in lieu of clothes, the
dark-eyed young soldier sat, still trembling from excitement, by the
roadside.

It was three hours before the wreck could be cleared, another car
procured, and the recruits bundled into it. Then, as dawn was spreading
over the firmament, the train pushed on, and the last thing Gerard
Stuyvesant was conscious of before, exhausted, he dropped off to
troubled sleep, was that a soft, slender hand was renewing the cool
bandage over his burning eyes, and that he heard a passenger say "That
little brunette--that little Miss Ray--was worth the hull carload of
women put together. She just went in and nursed and bandaged the burned
men like as though they'd been her own brothers."

Certainly the young lady had been of particular service in the case of
Connelly and one of the seriously injured recruits. She had done
something for every man whose burns deserved attention, with a single
exception.

Recruit Foster had declared himself in need of no aid, and with his face
to the wall lay well out of sight.

CHAPTER III.

At one of the desert stations in the Humboldt Valley a physician boarded
the train under telegraphic orders from the company and went some
distance up the road.

He had brought lint and bandages and soothing lotions, but in several
cases said no change was advisable, that with handkerchiefs contributed
by the passengers and bandages made from surplus shirts, little Miss Ray
had extemporized well and had skilfully treated her bewildered patients.
Questioned and complimented both, Miss Ray blushingly admitted that she
had studied "First Aid to the Wounded" and had had some instructions in
the post hospitals of more than one big frontier fort. Passengers had
ransacked bags and trunks and presented spare clothing to the few
recruits whom the garments would fit. But most of the men were shoeless
and blanketed when morning dawned, and all were thankful when served
with coffee and a light breakfast, though many even then were too much
excited and some in too much pain to eat.

Mell