And so it was with hardened and resentful heart that the major sought her on the morrow. The general and the commands afield would soon be coming home. Such Indians as they had not "rounded up" and captured were scattered far and wide. The campaign was over. Now for the disposition of the prisoners. It was to tell Mrs. Hayand Nanette, especially Nanette, why the sentries were re-established about their home and that, though he would not place the trader's niece within a garrison cell, he should hold her prisoner beneath the trader's roof to await the action of superior authority on the grievous charges lodged at her door. She was able to be up, said Miss McGrath,—not only up but down—down in the breakfast room, looking blither and more like herself than she had been since she was brought home.
"Say that Major Flint desires to see her and Mrs. Hay," said Flint, with majesty of mien, as, followed by two of his officers, he was shown into the trader's parlor.
And presently they came—Mrs. Hay pale and sorrowing; Miss Flower, pale, perhaps, but triumphantly defiant. The one sat and covered her face with her hands as she listened to the major's few words, cold, stern and accusing. The other looked squarely at him, with fearless, glittering eyes:—
"You may order what you like so far as I'm concerned," was the utterly reckless answer of the girl. "I don't care what you do now that I know he is safe—free—and that you will never lay hands on him again."
"That's where you are in error, Miss Flower," was the major's calm, cold-blooded, yet rejoiceful reply. It was for this, indeed, that he had come. "Ralph Moreau was run down by my men soon after midnight, and he's now behind the bars."
December and bitter cold. The river frozen stiff. The prairie sheeted in unbroken snow. Great log fires roaring in every open fireplace. Great throngs of soldiery about the red hot barrack stoves, for all the columns were again in winter columns, and Flint's two companies had "got the route" for home. They were to march on the morrow, escorting as far as Laramie the intractables of Stabber's band, some few of the Indians to go in irons, among them Ralph Moreau, or Eagle Wing, now a notorious character.
The general was there at Frayne, with old "Black Bill," erstwhile chief inspector of the department, once a subaltern in days long gone by when Laramie was "Ultima Thule" of the plains forts. The general had heard Flint's halting explanation of his laxity in Moreau's case, saying almost as little in reply as his old friend Grant when "interviewed" by those of whom he disapproved. "Black Bill" it was who waxed explosive when once he opened on the major, and showed that amazed New Englander something of the contents of Moreau's Indian kit, including the now famous hunting pouch, all found with Stabber's village. A precious scoundrel, as it turned out, was this same Moreau, with more sins to answer for than many a convicted jail bird, and with not one follower left to do him reverence except, perhaps, that lonely girl, self secluded at the Hays. Hay himself, though weak, was beginning to sit up. Dade, Blake and Ray were all once more housed in garrison. Truscott and Billings, with their hardy troopers, had taken temporary station at the post, until the general had decided upon the disposition of the array of surrendered Indians, nearly three hundred in number, now confined under strong guard in the quartermaster's corral at the flats, with six "head devils," including Eagle Wing, in the garrison prison.
All the officers, with two exceptions, were again for duty at Frayne. Webb, laid by the heels at Beecher, his feet severely frozen, and Beverly Field, who, recalled from a brief and solemn visit to a far southern home, had reached the post at nightfall of the 10th. There had hardly been allowed him time to uplift a single prayer, to receive a word of consolation from the lips of friends and kindred who loved the honored father, borne to his last resting place. "Come as soon as possible," read the message wired him by Ray, and, though the campaign was over, it was evident that something was amiss, and, with all his sorrow fresh upon him, the lad, sore in body and soul, had hastened to obey.
And it was Ray who received and welcomed him and took him straightway to his own cosy quarters, that Mrs. Ray, and then the Blakes, might add their sympathetic and cordial greeting,—ere it came to telling why it was that these, his friends despite that trouble that could not be talked of, were now so earnest in their sympathy,—before telling him that his good name had become involved, that there were allegations concerning him which the chief had ordered "pigeon-holed" until he should come to face them. A pity it is that Bill Hay could not have been there, too, but his fever had left him far too weak to leave his room. Only Ray and Blake were present and it was an interview not soon, if ever, to be forgotten.
"I'm no hand at breaking things gently, Field," said Ray, when finally the three were closeted together in the captain's den. "It used to worry Webb that you were seen so often riding with Miss—Miss Flower up to Stabber's village, and, in the light of what has since happened, you will admit that he had reasons. Hear me through," he continued, as Field, sitting bolt upright in the easy chair, essayed to speak. "Neither Captain Blake nor I believe one word to your dishonor in the matter, but it looks as though you had been made a tool of, and you are by no means the first man. It was to see this fellow, Moreau—Eagle Wing—whom you recognized at the Elk,—she was there so frequently—was it not?"
Into Field's pale face there had come a look of infinite distress. For a moment he hesitated, and little beads began to start out on his forehead.
"Captain Ray," he finally said, "they tell me—I heard it from the driver on the way up from Rock Springs—that Miss Flower is virtually a prisoner, that she had been in league with the Sioux, and yet, until I can see her—can secure my release from a promise, I have to answer you as I answered you before—I cannot say."
Blake started impatiently and heaved up from his lounging chair, his long legs taking him in three strides to the frost-covered window at the front. Ray sadly shook his dark, curly head.
"Youareto see her, Field. The general—bless him for a trump!—wouldn't listen to a word against you in your absence; but that girl has involved everybody—you, her aunt, who has been devotion itself to her, her uncle, who was almost her slave. She deliberately betrayed him into the hands of the Sioux. In fact this red robber and villain, Moreau, is the only creature she hasn't tried to 'work,' and he abandoned her after she had lied, sneaked and stolen for him."
"Captain Ray!" The cry came from pallid lips, and the young soldier started to his feet, appalled at such accusation.
"Every word of it is true," said Ray. "She joined him after his wounds. She shared his escape from the village at our approach. She was with him when Blake nabbed them at Bear Cliff. She was going with him from here. What manner of girl was that, Field, for you to be mixed up with?"
"He is her half brother!" protested Field, with kindling eyes. "She told me—everything—told me of their childhood together, and—"
"Told you a pack of infernal lies!" burst in Blake, no longer able to contain himself. "Made you a cat's paw; led you even to taking her by night to see him when she learned the band were to jump for the mountains—used you, by God, as he usedher, and, like the Indian she is, she'd turn and stab you now, if you stood in her way or his. Why, Field, that brute's her lover, and she's his—"
"It's a lie! You shall not say it, sir!" cried Field, beside himself with wrath and amaze, as he stood quivering from head to foot, still weak from wounds, fever and distress of mind. But Ray sprang to his side. "Hush, Blake! Hush, Field! Don't speak. What is it, Hogan?" And sharply he turned him to the door, never dreaming what had caused the interruption.
"The general, sir, to see the captain!"
And there, in the hallway, throwing off his heavy overcoat and "arctics," there, with that ever faithful aide in close attendance, was the chief they loved; dropped in, all unsuspecting, just to say good-bye. "I knocked twice," began Hogan, but Ray brushed him aside, for, catching sight of the captain's face, the general was already at the door. Another moment and he had discovered Field, and with both hands extended, all kindliness and sympathy, he stepped at once across the room to greet him.
"I was so very sorry to hear the news," said he. "I knew your father well in the old days. How's your wound? What brought you back so soon?"
And then there was one instant of awkward silence and then—Ray spoke.
"That was my doing, general. I believed it best that he should be here to meet you and—every allegation at his expense. Mr. Field, I feel sure, does not begin to know them yet, especially as to the money."
"It was all recovered," said the general. "It was found almost intact—so was much of that that they took from Hay. Even if it hadn't been, Hay assumed all responsibility for the loss."
With new bewilderment in his face, the young officer, still white and trembling, was gazing, half stupefied, from one to the other.
"What money?" he demanded. "I never heard—"
"Wait," said the general, with significant glance at Ray, who was about to speak. "I am to see them—Mrs. Hay and her niece—at nine o'clock. It is near that now. Webb cannot be with us, but I shall want you, Blake. Say nothing until then. Sit down, Mr. Field, and tell me about that leg. Can you walk from here to Hay's, I wonder?"
Then the ladies, Mrs. Ray and her charming next door neighbor, appeared, and the general adjourned the conference forthwith, and went with them to the parlor.
"Say nothing more," Ray found time to whisper. "You'll understand it all in twenty minutes."
And at nine o'clock the little party was on its way through the sharp and wintry night, the general and Captain Blake, side by side, ahead, the aide-de-camp and Mr. Field close following. Dr. Waller, who had been sent for, met them near the office. The sentries at the guard-house were being changed as the five tramped by along the snapping and protesting board walk, and a sturdy little chap, in fur cap and gauntlets, and huge buffalo overcoat, caught sight of them and, facing outward, slapped his carbine down to the carry—the night signal of soldier recognition of superior rank as practised at the time.
"Tables are turned with a vengeance," said the general, with his quiet smile. "That's little Kennedy, isn't it? I seem to see him everywhere when we're campaigning. Moreau was going to eat his heart out next time they met, I believe."
"So he said," grinned Blake, "before Winsor's bullet fetched him. Pity it hadn't killed instead of crippling him."
"He's a bad lot," sighed the general. "Wing won't fly away from Kennedy, I fancy."
"Not if there's a shot left in his belt," said Blake. "And Ray is officer-of-the-day. There'll be no napping on guard this night."
At the barred aperture that served for window on the southward front, a dark face peered forth in malignant hate as the speakers strode by. But it shrank back, when the sentry once more tossed his carbine to the shoulder, and briskly trudged beneath the bars. Six Indians shared that prison room, four of their number destined to exile in the distant East,—to years, perhaps, within the casemates of a seaboard fort—the last place on earth for a son of the warlike Sioux.
"They know their fate, I understand," said Blake, as the general moved on again.
"Oh, yes. Their agent and others have been here with Indian Bureau orders, permitting them to see and talk with the prisoners. Their shackles are to be riveted on to-night. Nearly time now, isn't it?"
"At tattoo, sir. The whole guard forms then, and the four are to be moved into the main room for the purpose. I am glad this is the last of it."
"Yes, we'll start them with Flint at dawn in the morning. He'll be more than glad to get away, too. He hasn't been over lucky here, either."
A strange domestic—(the McGrath having been given warning and removed to Sudsville) showed them into the trader's roomy parlor, the largest and most pretentious at the post. Hay had lavished money on his home and loved it and the woman who had so adorned it. She came in almost instantly to greet them, looking piteously into the kindly, bearded face of the general, and civilly, yet absently, welcoming the others. She did not seem to realize that Field, who stood in silence by the side of Captain Blake, had been away. She had no thought, apparently, for anyone but the chief himself,—he who held the destinies of her dear ones in the hollow of his hand. His first question was for Fawn Eyes, the little Ogalalla maiden whose history he seemed to know. "She is well and trying to be content with me," was the reply. "She has been helping poor Nanette. She does not seem to understand or realize what is coming to him. Have they—ironed him—yet?"
"Hush! She's coming"—She was there"Hush! She's coming"—She was there.
"I believe not," said the general. "But it has to be done to-night. They start so early in the morning."
"And you won't let her see him, general. No good can come from it. She declares she will go to him in the morning, if you prohibit it to-night," and the richly jewelled hands of the unhappy woman were clasped almost in supplication.
"By morning he will be beyond her reach. The escort starts at six."
"And—these gentlemen here—" She looked nervously, appealingly about her. "Must they—all know?"
"These and the inspector general. He will be here in a moment. But, indeed, Mrs. Hay, itisall known, practically," said the general, with sympathy and sorrow in his tone.
"Not all—not all, general! Even I don't know all—She herself has said so. Hush! She's coming."
She was there! They had listened for swish of skirts or fall of slender feet upon the stairway, but there had not been a sound. They saw the reason as she halted at the entrance, lifting with one little hand the costly Navajo blanket that hung as a portière. In harmony with the glossy folds of richly dyed wool, she was habited in Indian garb from head to foot. In two black, lustrous braids, twisted with feather and quill and ribbon, her wealth of hair hung over her shoulders down the front of her slender form. A robe of dark blue stuff, rich with broidery of colored bead and bright-hued plumage, hung, close clinging, and her feet were shod in soft moccasins, also deftly worked with bead and quill. But it was her face that chained the gaze of all, and that drew from the pallid lips of Lieutenant Field a gasp of mingled consternation and amaze. Without a vestige of color; with black circles under her glittering eyes; with lines of suffering around the rigid mouth and with that strange pinched look about the nostrils that tells of anguish, bodily and mental, Nanette stood at the doorway, looking straight at the chief. She had no eyes for lesser lights. All her thought, apparently, was for him,—for him whose power it was, in spite of vehement opposition, to deal as he saw fit with the prisoner in his hands. Appeal on part of Friends Societies, Peace and Indian Associations had failed. The President had referred the matter in its entirety to the general commanding in the field, and the general had decided. One moment she studied his face, then came slowly forward. No hand extended. No sign of salutation,—greeting,—much less of homage. Ignoring all others present, she addressed herself solely to him.
"Is it true you have ordered him in irons and to Fort Rochambeau?" she demanded.
"It is."
"Simply because he took part with his people when your soldiers made war on them?" she asked, her pale lips quivering.
"You well know how much else there was," answered the general, simply. "And I have told you he deserves no pity—of yours."
"Oh, you say he came back here a spy!" she broke forth, impetuously. "It is not so! He never came near the post,—nearer than Stabber's village, and there he had a right to be. You say 'twas he who led them to the warpath,—that he planned the robbery here and took the money. He never knew they were going, till they were gone. He never stole a penny. That money was loaned him honestly—and for a purpose—and with the hope and expectation of rich profit thereby."
"By you, do you mean?" asked the general, calmly, as before.
"By me? No! What money had I? He asked it and it was given him—by Lieutenant Field."
A gasp that was almost a cry following instantly on this insolent assertion—a sound of stir and start among the officers at whom she had not as yet so much as glanced, now caused the girl to turn one swift, contemptuous look their way, and in that momentary flash her eyes encountered those of the man she had thus accused. Field stood like one turned suddenly to stone, gazing at her with wild, incredulous eyes. One instant she seemed to sway, as though the sight had staggered her, but the rally was as instantaneous. Before the general could interpose a word, she plunged on again:—
"He, at least, had a heart and conscience. He knew how wrongfully Moreau had been accused,—that money was actually needed to establish his claim. It would all have been repaid if your soldiers had not forced this wicked war, and—" and now in her vehemence her eyes were flashing, her hand uplifted, when, all on a sudden, the portière was raised the second time, and there at the doorway stood the former inspector general, "Black Bill." At sight of him the mad flow of words met sudden stop. Down, slowly down, came the clinched, uplifted hand. Her eyes, glaring as were Field's a moment agone, were fixed in awful fascination on the grizzled face. Then actually she recoiled as the veteran officer stepped quietly forward into the room.
"And what?" said he, with placid interest. "I haven't heard you rave in many a moon, Nanette. You are your mother over again—without your mother's excuse for fury."
But a wondrous silence had fallen on the group. The girl had turned rigid. For an instant not a move was made, and, in the hush of all but throbbing hearts, the sound of the trumpets pealing forth the last notes of tattoo came softly through the outer night.
Then sudden, close at hand, yet muffled by double door and windows, came other sounds—sounds of rush and scurry,—excited voices,—cries of halt! halt!—the ring of a carbine,—a yell of warning—another shot, and Blake and the aide-de-camp sprang through the hallway to the storm door without. Mrs. Hay, shuddering with dread, ran to the door of her husband's chamber beyond the dining room. She was gone but a moment. When she returned the little Ogalalla maid, trembling and wild-eyed, had come running down from aloft. The general had followed into the lighted hallway,—they were all crowding there by this time,—and the voice of Captain Ray, with just a tremor of excitement about it, was heard at the storm door on the porch, in explanation to the chief.
"Moreau, sir! Broke guard and stabbed Kennedy. The second shot dropped him. He wants Fawn Eyes, his sister."
A scream of agony rang through the hall, shrill and piercing. Then the wild cry followed:
"You shall not hold me! Let me go to him, I say—I am his wife!"
That was a gruesome night at Frayne. Just at tattoo the door leading to the little cell room had been thrown open, and the sergeant of the guard bade the prisoners come forth,—all warriors of the Ogalalla band and foremost of their number was Eagle Wing, the battle leader. Recaptured by Crabb and his men after a desperate flight and fight for liberty, he had apparently been planning ever since a second essay even more desperate. In sullen silence he had passed his days, showing no sign of recognition of any face among his guards until the morning Kennedy appeared—all malice forgotten now that his would-be slayer was a helpless prisoner, and therefore did the Irishman greet him jovially. "That man would knife you if he had half a chance," said the sergeant. "Watch out for him!"
"You bet I'll watch out," said Kennedy, never dreaming that, despite all search and vigilance, Moreau had managed to obtain and hide a knife.
In silence they had shuffled forth into the corridor. The heavy portal swung behind them, confining the other two. Another door opened into the guardroom proper, where stood the big, red hot stove and where waited two blacksmiths with the irons. Once in the guard room every window was barred, and members of the guard, three deep, blocked in eager curiosity the doorway leading to the outer air. In the corridor on one side stood three infantry soldiers, with fixed bayonets. On the other, facing them, three others of the guard. Between them shuffled the Sioux, "Wing" leading. One glance at the waiting blacksmiths was enough. With the spring of a tiger, he hurled himself, head foremost and bending low, straight at the open doorway, and split his way through the astonished guards like center rush at foot ball, scattering them right and left; then darted round the corner of the guard-house, agile as a cat.
And there was Kennedy confronting him! One furious lunge he made with gleaming knife, then shot like an arrow, straight for the southward bluff. It was bad judgment. He trusted to speed, to dim starlight, to bad aim, perhaps; but the little Irishman dropped on one knee and the first bullet tore through the muscles of a stalwart arm; the second, better aimed, pierced the vitals. Then they were on him, men by the dozen, in another instant, as he staggered and fell there, impotent and writhing.
They bore him to the cell again,—the hospital was too far,—and Waller and his aides came speedily to do all that surgery could accomplish, but he cursed them back. He raved at Ray, who entered, leading poor, sobbing little Fawn Eyes, and demanded to be left alone with her. Waller went out to minister to Kennedy, bleeding fast, and the others looked to Ray for orders when the door was once more opened and Blake entered with Nanette.
"By the general's order," said he, in brief explanation, and in an instant she was on her knees beside the dying Sioux. There and thus they left them. Waller said there was nothing to be done. The junior surgeon, Tracy,—he whom she had so fascinated only those few weeks before,—bent and whispered: "Call me if you need. I shall remain within hearing." But there came no call. At taps the door was once more softly opened and Tracy peered within. Fawn Eyes, rocking to and fro, was sobbing in an abandonment of grief. Nanette, face downward, lay prone upon a stilled and lifeless heart.
Flint and his escort duly went their way, and spread their story as they camped at Laramie and "the Chug." The general tarried another week at Frayne. There was still very much to keep him there; so, not until he and "Black Bill" came down did we at other stations learn the facts. The general, as usual, had little to say. The colonel talked for both.
A woful time, it seems, they had had with poor Nanette when at last it became necessary to take her away from her dead brave. She raged and raved at even her pleading aunt. Defiant of them all, from the general down, and reckless of law or fact, she vowed it was all a conspiracy to murder Moreau in cold blood. They gave him the knife, she declared, although it later developed that she had tossed it through the open window. They had given him the chance to escape—the sight of Kennedy, "who had striven to kill him twice before," and then of the blacksmiths, with their degrading shackles—all just to tempt him to make a dash for freedom;—just as they had lured and murdered Crazy Horse—Crazy Horse, his brave kinsman—not ten years before,—then had placed a dead shot on the path to life and liberty—a man who killed him in cold blood, as deliberately planned. These were her accusations, and that story took strong hold in certain circles in the far East, where "love of truth" inspired its widespread publication, but not its contradiction when the facts became known. The same conditions obtain to-day in dealing with affairs across the sea.
Nanette said many other things before her final breakdown; and Hay and his sorrowing wife found their load of care far heaviest, for the strain of Indian blood, now known to all, had steeled the soul of the girl against the people at Fort Frayne, men and women both—against none so vehemently as those who would have shown her sympathy—none so malignantly as those who had suffered for her sake.
This was especially true of Field. In the mad hope of "getting justice," as she termed it, for the dead, she had demanded speech of the general, and, in presence of "Black Bill" and the surgeon, he had given her a hearing. It proved fatal to her cause, for in her fury at what she termed "the triumph of his foes," she lost all sense of right or reason, and declared that it was Field who had warned Stabber's band and sent them fleeing to unite with Lame Wolf,—Field who took the trader's horses and rode by night with Kennedy to warn them it was Webb's intention to surround the village at dawn and make prisoners of the men. It was Field, she said, who furnished the money Moreau needed to establish his claim to a gold mine in the Black Hills, the ownership of which would make them rich and repay Field a dozen times over. It was Field who sought to protect her kindred among the Sioux in hopes, she said it boldly, of winning her. But the general had heard enough. The door was opened and Ray and Blake were ushered in. The former briefly told of the finding of her note in Field's room the night the adjutant was so mysteriously missing. The note itself was held forth by the inspector general and she was asked if she cared to have it opened and read aloud. Her answer was that Field was a coward, a dastard to betray a woman who had trusted him.
"Oh, he didn't," said Blake, drily. "'Twas just the other way. He couldn't be induced to open his head, so his friends took a hand. You got word of the outbreak through your Indian followers. You wrote to Field and sent the note by Pete, bidding him join you at that godless hour, telling him that you would provide the horses and that you must ride to Stabber's camp to see Moreau for the last time, as he was going at once to the Black Hills. You made Field believe he was your half brother, instead of what he was. You brought Moreau back to the post and took something, I can't say what, down to him from Mr. Hay's,—he waiting for you on the flats below the trader's corral. You should have worn your moccasins, as well as a divided skirt, that night instead of French-heeledbottines. The rest—others can tell."
The others were Kennedy and the recaptured, half recalcitrant Pete; the latter turned state's evidence. Kennedy told how he had wandered down into the flats after "the few dhrinks" that made him think scornful of Sioux; of his encounter with Eagle Wing, his rescue by Field and a girl who spoke Sioux like a native. He thought it was little Fawn Eyes when he heard her speak, and until he heard this lady; then he understood. He had been pledged to secrecy by the lieutenant, and never meant to tell a soul, but when he heard the lie the lady told about the lieutenant, it ended any promise.
Then Pete, an abject, whining wretch, was ushered in, and his story, when dragged out by the roots, was worst of all. Poor Mrs. Hay! She had to hear it, for they sent for her; somebody had to restrain Nanette. Pete said he had known Nanette long time, ever since baby. So had Crapaud. Yes, and they had known Eagle Wing, Moreau, always—knew his father and mother. Knew Nanette's father and mother. But Black Bill interposed. No need to go into these particulars, as substantiating Mrs. Hay and himself, said he. "The lady knows perfectly well that I know all about her girlhood," so Pete returned to modern history. Eagle Wing, it seems, came riding often in from Stabber's camp to see Nanette by night, and "he was in heap trouble, always heap trouble, always want money," and one night she told Pete he must come with her, must never tell of it. She had money, she said, her own, in the trader's safe, but the door was too heavy, she couldn't open it, even though she had the key. She had opened the store by the back door, then came to him to help her with the rest. He pulled the safe door open, he said, and then she hunted and found two big letters, and took them to the house, and next night she opened the store again, and he pulled open the safe, and she put back the letters and sent him to Mr. Field's back door with note, and then over to saddle Harney and Dan, and "bring 'em out back way from stable." Then later she told him Captain Blake had Eagle Wing's buckskin pouch and letters, and they must get them or somebody would hang Eagle Wing, and she kept them going, "all time going," meeting messengers from the Sioux camps, or carrying letters. She fixed everything for the Sioux to come and capture Hay and the wagon;—fixed everything, even to nearly murdering the sentry on Number Six. Pete and Spotted Horse, a young brave of Stabber's band, had compassed that attempted rescue. She would have had them kill the sentry, if need be, and the reason they didn't get Wing away was that she couldn't wait until the sentries had called off. They might even then have succeeded, only her pony broke away, and she clung to Eagle Wing's until he—he had to hit her to make her let go.
The wild girl, in a fury declared it false from end to end. The poor woman, weeping by her side, bowed her head and declared it doubtless true.
Her story,—Mrs. Hay's,—was saddest of all. Her own father died when she was very, very young. He was a French Canadian trader and traveller who had left them fairly well to do. Next to her Indian mother, Mrs. Hay had loved no soul on earth as she had her pretty baby sister. The girls grew up together. The younger, petted and spoiled, fell in love with a handsome, reckless young French half breed, Jean La Fleur; against all warnings, became his wife, and was soon bullied, beaten and deserted. She lived but a little while, leaving to her more prosperous and level-headed sister, now wedded to Mr. Hay, their baby daughter, also named Nanette, and by her the worthy couple had done their very best. Perhaps it would have been wiser had they sent the child away from all association with the Sioux, but she had lived eight years on the Laramie in daily contact with them, sharing the Indian sports and games, loving their free life, and rebelling furiously when finally taken East. "She" was the real reason why her aunt spent so many months of each succeeding year away from her husband and the frontier. One of the girl's playmates was a magnificent young savage, a son of Crow Killer, the famous chief. The father was killed the day of Crazy Horse's fierce assault on the starving force of General Crook at Slim Buttes in '76, and good, kind missionary people speedily saw promise in the lad, put him at school and strove to educate him. The rest they knew. Sometimes at eastern schools, sometimes with Buffalo Bill, but generally out of money and into mischief, Eagle Wing went from one year to another, and Nanette, foolishly permitted to meet him again in the East, had become infatuated. All that art and education, wealth, travel and luxury combined could do, was done to wean her from her passionate adoration of this superb young savage. There is no fiercer, more intense, devotion than that the Sioux girl gives the warrior who wins her love. She becomes his abject slave. She will labor, lie, steal, sin, suffer, die,gladlydie for him, if only she believes herself loved in turn, and this did Nanette more than believe, and believing, slaved and studied between his irregular appearances that she might wheedle more money from her aunt to lavish on her brave. When discovered meeting him in secret and by night, she was locked in her third story room and thought secure, until the day revealed her gone by way of the lightning rod. They had to resort to more stringent measures, but time and again she met him, undetected until too late, and when at last her education was declared complete, she had amazed her aunt by expressing willingness to go to Frayne, when the good woman thought the objectionable kinsman abroad with Buffalo Bill. Until too late, Mrs. Hay knew nothing of his having been discharged and of his preceding them to the West. Then Nanette begged her for more money, because he was in dreadful trouble;—had stabbed a police officer at Omaha, whose people, so Moreau said, agreed not to prosecute him if one thousand dollars could be paid at once. Hay's patience had been exhausted. He had firmly refused to contribute another cent to settle Moreau's scrapes, even though he was a distant kinsman of his wife, and they both were fond of his little sister Fawn Eyes. It had never occurred to Mrs. Hay that Nan could steal from or plot against her benefactors, but that was before she dreamed that Nanette had become the Indian's wife. After that, anything might happen. "If she could dothatfor love of Moreau," said she, "there was nothing she could not do."
And it would seem there was little short of deliberate murder she had not done for her Sioux lover, who had rewarded her utter self-sacrifice by a savage blow with a revolver butt. "Poor Nanette!" sobbed Mrs. Hay, and "Poor Nanette!" said all Fort Frayne, their distrust of her buried and forgotten as she lay, refusing herself to everyone; starving herself in dull, desperate misery in her lonely room. Even grim old "Black Bill," whom she had recognized at once,—Bill, who had been the first to confirm Blake's suspicions as to her identity,—had pity and compassion for her. "It's the way of the blood," said Blake. "She is
"'Bred out of that bloody strainThat haunted us in our familiar paths.'"
"'Bred out of that bloody strainThat haunted us in our familiar paths.'"
"She could do no different," said the general, "having fixed her love on him. It's the strain of the Sioux.Wecall her conduct criminal:—they call it sublime."
And one night, while decision in Nanette's case was still pending, and, still self-secluded, she hid within the trader's home, refusing speech with anyone but little Fawn Eyes, a sleighing party set out from Frayne for a spin by moonlight along the frozen Platte. Wagon bodies had been set on runners, and piled with hay. The young people from officers' row, with the proper allowance of matrons and elders, were stowed therein, and tucked in robes and furs, Esther Dade among them, gentle and responsive as ever, yet still very silent. Field, in his deep mourning, went nowhere. He seemed humiliated beyond words by his connection with this most painful affair. Even the general failed to cheer and reassure him. He blamed himself for everything and shrank even from his friends. They saw the dim glow of the student lamp in his quarters, as they jingled cheerily away. They were coming homeward, toward ten o'clock. The moon was shining brilliantly along the bold heights of the southern bank, and, insensibly, chat and laughter gradually ceased as they came again in sight of the twinkling lights of Frayne, and glanced aloft at a new-made scaffolding, standing black against the sky at the crest of Fetterman Bluff. "Eagle Wing roosts high," said a thoughtless youngster. "The general let them have their way to the last. What's that?" he added, with sudden stop.
The sleigh had as suddenly been reined in. The driver, an Irish trooper, crossed himself, for, on the hush of the breathless winter night, there rose and fell—shrill, quavering, now high, now low, in mournful minor, a weird, desolate, despairing chant, the voice of a heart-broken woman, and one and all they knew at once it was Nanette, after the manner of her mother's people, alone on the lofty height, alone in the wintry wilderness, sobbing out her grief song to the sleeping winds, mourning to the last her lost, her passionately loved brave.
Then, all on a sudden, it ceased. A black form started from under the scaffolding to the edge of the bluff. Then again, weird, wild, uncanny, a barbaric, almost savage strain burst from the lips of the girl. "Mother of Heavin!" cried the driver. "Can no one shtop that awful keen. It's her death song she's singin'!"
Two young officers sprang from the sleigh, but at the instant another cry arose. Another form, this one of horse and rider, appeared at the crest, silhouetted with the girl's against the stars. They saw the rider leap from saddle, almost within arms' length of the singer; saw her quickly turn, as though, for the first time, aware of an intruder. Then the wailing song went out in sudden scream of mingled wrath, hatred and despair, and, like the Sioux that she was at heart, the girl made one mad rush to reach the point of bluff where was a sheer descent of over eighty feet. A shriek of dread went up from the crowded sleigh; a cry of rejoicing, as the intruder sprang and clasped her, preventing her reaching the precipice. But almost instantly followed a moan of anguish, for slipping at the crest, together, firmly linked, they came rolling, sliding, shooting down the steep incline of the frozen bluff, and brought up with stunning force among the ice blocks, logs and driftwood at the base.
They bore them swiftly homeward,—Field senseless and sorely shaken,—Nanette's fierce spirit slowly drifting away from the bruised and broken tenement held there, so pityingly, in the arms of Esther Dade. Before the Christmas fires were lighted in the snowbound, frontier fort, they had laid all that was mortal of the brave, deluded girl in the little cemetery of Fort Frayne, her solemn story closed, on earth, forever.
Nearly two years later, with the old regiment still serving along the storied Platte, they were talking of her one moonlit evening at the flagstaff. The band, by this time a fixture at Frayne, had been playing delightfully, and some of the girls and young gallants had been waltzing on the Rays' veranda. A few new faces were there. Two faces, well known, were missing,—those of Esther Dade and Beverly Field. The latter had never been the same man since the tragic events that followed so closely on the heels of the Lame Wolf campaign. Wounds had slowly healed. Injuries, physical, were well nigh forgotten; but, mentally, he had been long a sufferer. For months after the death of Nanette, even when sufficiently restored to be on duty, he held shrinkingly aloof from post society. Even Webb, Blake and Ray were powerless to pull him out of his despond. He seemed to feel,—indeed he said so, that his brief entanglement with that strange, fascinating girl had clouded his soldier name for all time. To these stanch friends and advisers he frankly told the whole story, and they, in turn, had told it to the general, to the colonel commanding the regiment and to those whose opinions they most valued; but Field could speak of it to none others. Frankly he admitted that from the moment he met the girl he fell under the influence of a powerful fascination. Within twenty-four hours of his return from the Laramie trip they were riding together, and during that ride she asked to be taken to Stabber's village, and there had talked long with that magnificent young Sioux. Later, Field surprised her in tears, and then she told him a pitiful tale. Eagle Wing had been educated, she said, by her aunt and uncle,—was indeed their nephew and her own cousin. He had been wild and had given them much trouble, and her aunt was in bitter distress over his waywardness. It was to plead with him that she, Nanette, had gone. "Moreau" had been taught mining and mineralogy, it seems, and declared that he had "located" a most promising mine in the Black Hills. He could buy off every claim if he had a thousand dollars, and the mine might be worth millions. Hay pooh-poohed the story. Mrs. Hay could not persuade him. Then "Moreau" became threatening. He would join the hostiles, he swore, if his aunt would not help him. Indeed, and here Field's young face burned with shame, Nanette told him that she understood that he, Field, was an only son who might inherit wealth in days to come, and could draw upon his father now for any reasonable sum; and, within the week of his meeting her, he was on the point of offering everything she needed, but that he disbelieved the Indian's story. Then, one night, there came a note begging him to meet her at once. She had a dreadful message, she said, from "Moreau." The fellow had frequently been prowling about the trader's during the dark hours, and now she was afraid of him, yet must see him, and see him at once, even if she had to ride to Stabber's camp. Field's eyes were blinded and he went. Hay's horses were ready beyond the corral, and she rode astride on one of Hay's own saddles. They found "Moreau" awaiting them at the ford, and there was a scene Field could not understand, for they spoke in the Sioux language. That night it was that, all in tears at the Indian's obduracy, she owned that he was her own brother, not merely a cousin, and together they had all gone back toward Frayne. "Moreau" was to wait on the flats until she could return to the house. She had been striving to get him to make certain promises, she said, contingent on her giving him something from her own means. Field said he remonstrated with her to the utmost, but she told him no woman with Sioux blood in her veins ever deserted a brother—or lover. And so she had returned with a packet, presumably of money, and there they found the Indian clinched with Kennedy. Kennedy was rescued in the nick of time, and pledged to silence. The Indian rode away triumphant. Nanette climbed back to her window, exhausted, apparently, by her exertions, and Field started for his quarters, only to find the entire garrison astir. The rest they knew.
Asked how she came to know of the money in the trader's safe, he said no secret had been made of it by either Hay or him. She had asked him laughingly about his quarrel with Wilkins, and seemed deeply interested in all the details of subaltern life. Either Hay or he, fortunately, could have made good the missing sum, even had most of it not been found amongst Stabber's plunder. Field had never seen her again until the night the general took him to confront her at the Hays', and, all too late, had realized how completely she had lured and used him. In pride, honor, self-respect, he had been sorely wounded, and, even when assured that the general attached no blame to him, and that his name was no longer involved, he would have resigned his commission and quit the service had it not been for these soldiers three, Webb, Blake and Ray. They made him see that, all the more because his father's death had left him independent—sole master of quite a valuable property—he must stick to the sword and live down the possible stain.
And stay he did, refusing even a chance to go abroad the following spring, and devoting himself assiduously to his duties, although he shrank from society. They made him sometimes spend a quiet evening at Ray's or Blake's, where twice Miss Dade was found. But that young lady was quick to see that her hostess had been scheming, as loving women will. And then, when he went hoping to see her, yet half afraid, she came no more. They could not coax her. The early spring had taken him forth on long campaign. The ensuing fall had taken her to the far distant East, for gallant old Dade was breaking down. The doctors sent him on prolonged sick leave. Then was Fort Frayne indeed a desolate post to Beverly Field, and when midwinter came, and with it the news that Dade had but little while to live, he took counsel with Ray, and a month's leave, not much of which was spent in the South. The old regiment was represented at the sad and solemn little ceremony when the devoted husband, father and fellow soldier was laid at rest.
Nor was Field a happier man when he rejoined from leave, and they all thought they knew why. Letters came, black-bordered, with Esther's superscription, sometimes, but only for Mrs. Blake or Mrs. Ray. There was never one for Field. And so a second summer came and went and a second September was ushered in, and in the flood of the full moonlight there was again music and dancing at Fort Frayne, but not for Field, not for Esther Dade. They were all talking of Nanette, Daughter of the Dakotas, and Esther, Daughter of the Regiment, as they called her in her father's Corps, and the mail came late from Laramie, and letters were handed round as tattoo sounded, and Mrs. Blake, eagerly scanning a black-bordered page, was seen suddenly to run in doors, her eyes brimming over with tears.
Later that night Hogan tapped at Field's front door and asked would the lieutenant step over to Mrs. Ray's a minute, and he went.
"Read that," said Mrs. Ray, pointing to a paragraph on the third page of the black-bordered missive that had been too much for Mrs. Blake. And he read:
"Through it all Esther has been my sweetest comfort, but now I must lose her, too. Our means are so straitened that she hasmademe see the necessity. Hard as it is, I must yield to her for the help that it may bring. She has been studying a year and is to join the staff of trained nurses at St. Luke's the first of October."
"Through it all Esther has been my sweetest comfort, but now I must lose her, too. Our means are so straitened that she hasmademe see the necessity. Hard as it is, I must yield to her for the help that it may bring. She has been studying a year and is to join the staff of trained nurses at St. Luke's the first of October."
For a moment there was silence in the little army parlor. Field's hands were trembling, his face was filled with trouble. She knew he would speak his heart to her at last, and speak he did:—
"All these months that she has been studying I've been begging and pleading, Mrs. Ray.Youknow what I went for last winter,—all to no purpose. I'm going again now, if I have to stay a patient at St. Luke's to coax her out of it."
But not until Christmas came the welcome "wire:"