The Redwood gazette., 1896-12-03

mails strayed from their little herds.
But there came az. ent; to all this
when, resisting an unjust demand, the
Sioux being fired upon, retaliated. From
the day of the Grattan massacre beyond
old Laramie there had been no real
peace with the lords of the northwest.
They are quiet only when subdued by
force They have broken the crust OF
their environment time and again and
burst forth in the seething flame of a
volcano that is ever bubbling and boil
ing beneath the feet of the frontiersman
to this day.
And so Frayne was maintained as
military post for years, first as stock
ade, then as a subdepot of supplies, gar
risoned by four companies of infantry
and four of cavalry, the former to hold
the fort, the latter to scour the neigh
boring country. Then, as time wore on
and other posts were built farther up in
the Big HorS, Frayne's garrison dwin-
died, but there stood upon its command
ing bluff the low rows of wooden bar
racks, the parallel rows of double sets
of broad piazzaed quarters where dwelt
the officers, the long, low, log riveted
walls of the corrals and cavalry stables
on the fat below. Here, oddly enough,
the Twelfth had spent a lively year or
two before it went to Arizona. Here it
learned the Sioux country and the Sioux
so we'll that when, a few years back,
the ghost dance craze swept over the
l:lyo hn p1aC
the old regiment was hurried from Its
sunshiny stations in the south and mus
tered once again, four troops at least,
within the very walls that long before
had echoed to its trumpets. Here we
found them in the midst of the Christ
mas preparations that were turned so
suddenly into summons to the field, and
here again, three years later still, head
quarters and six troops now. the proud
old regiment is still at Frayne, and
Fenton, ''vice Farrar, killed in action
with hostile Indians" holds the COM
mand.
A good soldier is Fenton, brave fell
low, a trifle rough at times, like the
simple plains bred dragon he is, but
gentleman, with a gentle heart in his
breast for all the stern exterior. Wom-
en- said of him that all he needed to
make him perfect was polish, and all he
needed to give him polish was wife,
for at 81 the grizzled colonel was a
bachelor. But Fenton had had his ro-
nance in early youth. He had loved
with all his big heart, SO said tradition,
New York belle and beauty whom he
knew in his cadet days, and who, SO
rumor said, preferred another, whom
she married before the war, and many
garrison belle had since set her cap
for Fenton and found him faithful to
his early love. But, though the ladies
often speculated as to the identity of
the woman who had held the colonel's
heart in bondage all these years and
blocked the way for all successors, no
one of their number had ever heard her
name or ever knew the truth. One Off
Ger there was in the Twelfth who, like
Fenton himself, was confirmed bach
elor and who was said to be possessed
of the whole story, but there was no use
asking Malcolm Leale to tell anybody's
secrets, and when Fenton came to
Frayne, promoted to the command SO
recently held by man they all loved
and honored, it was patent to everybody
that he felt sorely, as though he were
an usurper. Fenton was many long
miles away with another battalion Of
the Twelfth the day of the tragic battle
on the Mini Pusa, and it was long
months thereafter before he appeared at
regimental headquarters, and then he
brought with him as his housekeeper his
maiden sister Lucretia, and in Lucre-
tia Fenton-the dreamiest, dowdiest,
kindliest, quaintest middle aged pratt
tier that ever lived, moved and had her
being in the army-the ladies of the
Twelfth found so much to make merry
over that they well nigh forgot and for
gave the unf1attering Indifference to
feminine destinations of her brother,
the colonel.
When Fenton came, the Farrars,
widowed mother and devoted daughter,
had been gone some weeks. The shock
of her husbands death had we'll nigh
shaken Mrs. Farrar's reason, and for
months her condition was indeed de.
plorable. The next summer the Farrars
spent at West Point. It was Willis first
class camp, and Will was cadet captain
of the color company, and capital
young officer despite boyish face and
manner, and then Jack Ormsby, who
never before had "taken much stock in
West Point''-the battalion looked so
small beside the Seventh, and the band
was such a miserable little affair after
Cappa and his superb array-Jack not
only concluded 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 we'll go,
too, and spend a fortnight, and she did,
under the wing Of a matron from Goth
am with daughters Of her own, and Kit
ty Ormsby, only 16 and as full of vivac-
ity, grace, sprightliness and winning
ways as girl could be, pretty as peach
and brimming over with fun, coquetry
and sweetness combined, played havoc