Within a week, as we know, the telegram had reached the —th announcing Truscott's move, and that very afternoon Mrs. Stannard, seated on the piazza of her new quarters and gazing southward across the bare parade to the dun-colored barracks on the other side and the snow-capped peaks of Colorado seemingly just beyond, was startled by a sudden sensation in the group of officers in front of Colonel Whaling's. Another telegram. Presently her husband left the group and came quickly to her, hands in his pockets as usual, and with his customary expression of unastonishable nonchalance. Still, she saw he had disturbing news, and she rose anxiously to meet him, her sweet blue eyes clouded with the dread she strove to repress.
"What is it, Luce?" she asked.
The major unpursed his lips and abandoned the attempted whistle.
"Been a fight—way up on the Rosebud," he briefly said, as he dropped into a chair, still maintaining his apparent indifference of manner.
"Yes; but—what was it? Who is hurt this time?"
"H——, of the Third; shot through the face; can't live, they say. Reckon that isn't the worst of it, either. Crook found the Indians far too many for him and he had to fall back to his camps."
"Oh, Luce! Then it will be a hard campaign. What news for the —th?"
"Nothing as yet. We march, of course, at daybreak, and I suppose the rest of the regiment will be hurried up from Kansas. What must be looked after at once is the great mass of Indians at the Red Cloud and Spotted Tail reservations on White River. They will get this news within the next twenty-four hours, and it will so embolden them that the entire gang will probably take the war-path. There is where we will be sent, I fancy. Orders will reach us at Laramie. They say Sheridan himself is on his way to the reservations to look into matters. Mrs. Turner been here?" he suddenly asked, with a quick glance from under his shaggy eyebrows.
"Mrs. Turner? Not since morning. Why?"
"There was a sort of snarl down at the store this morning, Some mention of it was made while we were talking there at Whaling's, and I was anxious to get the particulars. Wilkins was saying something about Ray that worries me. Have you heard nothing?"