The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1895-04-14
FORT FRAYNE
- NONEI---E5y Capt. Charles King.
AUTHOR or @rHE DEsERrrR,r WARTIME woorSc Ere
Copyrighted, 1898, by +. Tenny.on Nee,y.

IN Indian battle. A famous fellow. with
all ms modesty and good sense. was
Jack Ormsby in the armory of the
Seventh all the year that followed his
homecoming from the Sioux campaign,
and again and again did his comrades
make him tell the story of his sensations
ana experiences when he followed Far
rar into the heart of that fire-spitting
village, through that veil of softly fall
ing snow. How red it grew in many a
place. What scenes of carnage were
mere not after the noble Colonel fell.
Jack brain used to turn sick at thought
OF II sometimes. but still there was the
exultat1on of the rescue of those hapleSs
captives, those poor women, being
dragged away to a fate to which torture
at the stake were mercy. There was
the triumph of the overwhelming defeat
and punishment of that great village
OF hostileS even when it was reinforced,
as it soon was. by the return of many
OF the warriors who had been watching
and hindering the pursuit of the
Eleventh. Leale had taken command,
cool, yet raging over the murder of his
beloved chief, and while even then seek
ing to carry out Farrar's injunctions to
project the women and children, had
dealt vengefully with the warriors who
had rallied to the attack. Ormsby was
through IL all and bore himself like a
man and a sergeant. even of the
seventh, and swore that his Creedmoor
training had been more than enough to
help him empty at least two saddles.
Ii he had ''only had his old Remington"
said he. instead of a cavalry, carbine,"
XIII Eagle himself would have bit the
dust, for twice he drew bead upon that
savage chief when the snow clouds lifted
late in the afternoon and let the battle
field be seem Great work had the little
battalion done that day, but all the
same were they glad to see the coming
column of the Eleventh just before the
red, red sun went down.
Once, just once. after they had been
home perhaps month, Ellis made him
tell her something of that stirring, fatal
day, but soon-she shut her ears and fled
Ormsby came again. He began coming
often-so often that that became one
reason why it was deemed best that
Ellis should return to school. Mr.. Orms-
by was very fine fellow, and all that,
said Mrs. Farrar's many relatives, but,
really, Ellis is still too young, and she
might do better. and SO poor Jack, who
was learning to do nothing less than
worship that exquisite face, SO pathetic
above the deep mourning of her attire,
became dismal in his turn and found no
comfort in anything outside of the
armory or Wall street.
The next summer the Farrars spent
at West Point. 1t was Wills first class
camp, and Will was cadet captain of the
color company, and capital young Off
Ger despite a boyish face and manner,
and then Jack Ormsby, who never be-
fore had taken much stock in West
Point" the battalion looked SO small
beside the Seventh and the band was
such miserable little affair after Cappa
and his superb array-Jack not only con-
cluded that he must go up there every
few days to pick UP points on guard
and sentry duty and things of that kind,
but Jack decided that Kitty his precious
sister, might as well go. too, and spend
a fortnight, and she did, under the wing
of a matron from Gotham with daugh-
ters of her own, and Kitty Ormsby, only
sixteen, and as full of vivacity, grace,
sprightliness and winning ways as girl
could be, pretty as peach and brim-
ming over with fun, coquetry and sweet
ness combined, played havoc in the
corps of cadets, and, could anything
have been more fortunate? the victim
most helplessly, hopelessly, utterly gone
was cadet Captain Will Farrar. To the
CONSERVATION of the widowed mother she
saw her handsome soldier boy led day
after day more deeply into the meshes,
led like slave or like the piggy in the
nursery rhyme with the ring in the end
of his nose, by this bewitching, i'm
perious. fascinating little creature, and
there was absolutely no help for it.
Anywhere else almost she could have
whisked her boy under her wing and
borne him awav beyond range, but not
at West Point. She had to learn the
lessons so many mothers learn with such
bewilderment, often with such ill grace,
that the boy was no longer hers to do
with as she would, but Uncle Sans,
and Uncle Sam unfeelingly said stick to
your camp duty, with it's drills and
parades, roll calls practical engineering,
forthcoming and spooning in stolen half
hours, no matter what the consequence.
Mrs Farrar couldn't carry VIII away
and couldn't order Kitty. About all she
saw of her boy was drilling with the
battalion at distance or dancing with
Miss Ormsby close at hand, and, on the
principle that misery loves company.she
soon was comforted by a fellow-sufferer,
for just in proportion as the mother
heart was troubled by the sight of her
boys infatuation for this pretty child,
so was Jack Ormsby made miserable by
seeing the attentions lavished by officers
and cadets alike on Ellis Farrar.
And yet the little blind god was doing
Jack far better work than ever he dared
to dream. The mother longed for Will
and no one else could quite take his
place. The lover longed for Ellis, and
what earthly chance has cit lover
at West Point, even though he be
swell and sergeant in the Seventh. 1t
resulted that in the hours when the
mother and Jack had to sit and look on
they were brought constantly together,
and then in. these hours of companion
ship Mrs. Farrar began to see more and
more how manful. honest self-reliant
was the gallant fellow who had fought
by her husbands side. Little by little
she learned to lean upon him. appeal to
him, defer to him, and to see in him,
after all, a man in whom she could per-
haps confide even so precious a trust
as her daughters heart and that sum-
mer at West Point won the mother
even if it did not win the lady of his
love-
That winter the boys came down to
New York, half a. dozen of Wills class
mates, for Christmas leave. and such
day and night of adulation as they re-
ceived. At last did Mrs. Farrar quit her
seclusion to give a little dinner in their
honor, and consent to attend, as a
looker-on. the dance that night at Sher-
RVS, where Ellis gave Orrnsby one
blessed waltz and Kitty gave VIII the
mitten. Oh, darts, and flames, and
furies what turmoil there was over
that Christmas dance. Will mad to go
back with his classmates in time to re-
port at a certain hour but he told his
mother in tragic tone that all was over
between him and Miss Ormsby forever
forever-and SO, perhaps, it might have
been had Kitty so minded. She had
flirted outrageously with Charley Bates.
a fellow VIII Farrar simply couldn't
bear, and. though neither would admit
that a girl had anything to do with it,
there was the usual cadet challenge
and as spirited midwinter mill as
n Fo,. a,oJ-c