Whether it was military caution or the feminine discretion of the colonel's wife,--to the quiet amusement of the other officers,--a trooper was added to the riding party by the order of the colonel, and thereafter it consisted of three.One night, however, the riders did not appear at dinner, and there was considerable uneasiness mingled with some gossip throughout the garrison.It was already midnight before they arrived, and then with horses blown and trembling with exhaustion, and the whole party bearing every sign of fatigue and disturbance.The colonel said a few sharp, decisive words to the subaltern, who, pale and reticent, plucked at his little moustache, but took the whole blame upon himself.HE and Mrs.Lascelles had, he said, outridden the trooper and got lost; it was late when Cassidy (the trooper) found them, but it was no fault of HIS, and they had to ride at the top of their speed to cover the ground between them and the fort.It was noticed that Mrs.Lascelles scarcely spoke to Forsyth, and turned abruptly away from the colonel's interrogations and went to her room.
Peter, absorbed in his report, scarcely noticed the incident, nor the singular restraint that seemed to fall upon the little military household for a day or two afterwards.He had accepted the lieutenant's story without comment or question; he knew his own sister too well to believe that she had lent herself to a flirtation with Forsyth; indeed, he had rather pitied the young officer when he remembered Lascelles' experience in his early courtship.But he was somewhat astonished one afternoon to find the trooper Cassidy alone in his office.
"Oi thought Oi'd make bould to have a word wid ye, sorr," he said, recovering from a stiff salute with his fingers nipping the cord of his trousers."It's not for meeself, sorr, although the ould man was harrd on me, nor for the leddy, your sister, but for the sake of the leftenant, sorr, who the ould man was harrdest on of all.
Oi was of the parrty that rode with your sister.""Yes, yes, I remember, I heard the story," said Peter."She and Mr.Forsyth got lost.""Axin' your pardin, sorr, she didn't.Mr.Forsyth loid.Loid like an officer and a jintleman--as he is, God bless him--to save a leddy, more betoken your sister, sorr.They never got lost, sorr.
We was all three together from the toime we shtarted till we got back, and it's the love av God that we ever got back at all.And it's breaking me hearrt, sorr, to see HIM goin' round with the black looks of everybody upon him, and he a-twirlin' his moustache and purtending not to mind.""What do you mean?" said Peter, uneasily.
"Oi mane to be tellin' you what happened, sorr," said Cassidy stoutly."When we shtarted out Oi fell three files to the rear, as became me, so as not to be in the way o' their colloguing, but sorra a bit o' stragglin' was there, and Oi kept them afore me all the toime.When we got to Post Oak Bottom the leddy p'ints her whip off to the roight, and sez she: 'It's a fine bit of turf there, Misther Forsyth,' invitin' like, and with that she gallops away to the right.The leftenant follys her, and Oi closed up the rear.So we rides away innoshent like amongst the trees, me thinkin' only it wor a mighty queer place for manoovrin', until we seed, just beyond us in the hollow, the smoke of an Injin camp and a lot of women and childer.And Mrs.Lascelles gets off and goes to discoursin' and blarneying wid 'em: and Oi sees Mr.Forsyth glancin' round and lookin' oneasy.Then he goes up and sez something to your sister, and she won't give him a hearin'.And then he tells her she must mount and be off.And she turns upon him, bedad, like a tayger, and bids him be off himself.Then he comes to me and sez he, 'Oi don't like the look o' this, Cassidy,'
sez he; 'the woods behind is full of braves,' sez he.'Thrue for you, leftenant,' sez Oi, 'it's into a trap that the leddy hez led us, God save her!' 'Whisht,' he sez, 'take my horse, it's the strongest.Go beside her, and when Oi say the word lift her up into the saddle before ye, and gallop like blazes.Oi'll bring up the rear and the other horse.' Wid that we changed horses and cantered up to where she was standing, and he gives the word when she isn't lookin', and Oi grabs her up--she sthrugglin' like mad but not utterin' a cry--and Oi lights out for the trail agin.And sure enough the braves made as if they would folly, but the leftenant throws the reins of her horse over the horn of his saddle, and whips out his revolver and houlds 'em back till I've got well away to the trail again.And then they let fly their arrows, and begorra the next thing a BULLET whizzes by him.And then he knows they have arrms wid 'em and are 'hostiles,' and he rowls the nearest one over, wheelin' and fightin' and coverin' our retreat till we gets to the road agin.And they daren't folly us out of cover.Then the lady gets more sinsible, and the leftenant pershuades her to mount her horse agin.But before we comes to the fort, he sez to me: 'Cassidy,' sez he, 'not a word o' this on account of the leddy.' And I was mum, sorr, while he was shootin'
off his mouth about him bein' lost and all that, and him bein'
bully-ragged by the kernel, and me knowin' that but for him your sister wouldn't be between these walls here, and Oi wouldn't be talkin' to ye.And shure, sorr, ye might be tellin's the kernel as how the leddy was took by the hysterics, and was that loony that she didn't know whatever she was sayin', and so get the leftenant in favor again.""I will speak with the colonel to-night," said Peter gloomily.
"Lord save yer honor," returned the trooper gratefully, "and if ye could be sayin' that the LEDDY tould you,--it would only be the merest taste of a loi ye'd be tellin',--and you'd save me from breakin' me word to the leftenant.""I shall of course speak to my sister first," returned Peter, with a guilty consciousness that he had accepted the trooper's story mainly from his previous knowledge of his sister's character.