Willmar tribune., 1900-11-14
CHAPTER II.-CoNT1NuED.
Copyright. 1897. by r. Tennyson Neely.1

Copyright. 1897. byF Tennysoa Ne.ly.l z=
CHAPTER II.-CoNr1NuED. ~
All the long summer of the year after
his graduation, from mid-Aprif until
November, he never once slept beneath
q wooden roof, and more often than
not the sky was his only canopy. That
summer, too, Jessie spent, at home,
Pappoose with her most of the time,
and one year more would finish them
at the reliable old Ohio school. BY
that time Folsom's handsome new
home would be in readiness to receive
his daughter at Gate City. By that
time, too, Marshall might hope to have
leave and come in to Illinois to well
come his sister and gladden. his moth
er's eyes. But until then, the boy had
said to himself, he'd stick to the field,
and the troop that had the toughest
work to do was the one that suited him,
and so it had happened that by the
second spring of his service in the regi-
ment no subaltern was held in higher
esteem by senior officers or regarded
with more envy by the lazy ones among
the juniors than the young graduate,
for those, too, were days in which grad
yates were few and far between, except
in higher grades. Twice had he ridden
in the dead of winter the devious trail
through the Medicine Bow range to
Frayne. Once already had he been
sent the long march to and from the
Big Horn, and when certain officers
were ordered to the mountains early in
the spring to locate the site of the new
post at Warrior Gap, Brooks troop, as
has been said, went along as escort and
Brooks caught mountain fever in the
hills, or some such ailment, and made
the home trip in the ambulance, leav-
ing the active command of ''C'' troop
to his subaltern.
With the selection of the site Dean
had nothing to do. Silently he looked
on as the quartermaster, the engineer
and a staff officer from Omaha paced
off certain lines, took shots with their
instruments at neighboring waters of
the fork. Two companies of infantry,
sent down from further posts along the
northern slopes of the range, had
stacked their arms and pitched their
"dog tents" and vigilant vedettes and
sentries peered over every command
ing height and ridge to secure the in
vaders against surprise. Invaders they
certainly were from the Indian point
of view, for this was Indian Story
Land, the most priced, the most beauti-
full, the most prolific in fish and game
in all the continent. Never had the red
man clung with such tenacity to any
section of his hunting grounds as did
the northern Sioux to this, the north
and northeast watershed of the Big
Horn range. Old Indian fighters
among the men shook their heads
when the quartermaster selected a
level bench as the site on which to be-
gin the stockade that was to inclose
the officers quarters and the barrac cks,
storehouse and magazine, and omin-
ously they glanced at one another and
then at the pine-skirted ridge that rose,
sharp and sudden, against the sky, not
400 yards away, dominating the site en-
tirely.
II shouldn't like the job of clearing
away the gang of Indians that might
seize that RIDGE" said Dean, when later
asked by the engineer what he thought
of it, and Dean had twice by that time
been called upon to help ''hustle" In
dians out of threatening positions,
and knew whereof he spoke.
II shouldn't worry over things
you're never likely to have to do," said
the quartermaster, with sarcastic en-
phasis, and he was man who never
yet had had to face a foeman in the
field, and Dean said nothing more, but
felt right well he had no friend in
Maj. Burleigh.
They left the infantry there to guard
the site and protect the gang of wood
choppers set to work at once, then
turned their faces homeward. They
had spent four days and nights at the
Gap, and the more the youngster saw
of the rotund quartermaster, the less
he cared to cultivate him. A portly,
heavily built man was he, some 40
years of age, a widower, whose chill
uEcu were dG GuclI uOCucI 3 OAu uO1ac
in the far east, business man with
a keen eye for opportunities and in
vestments, a fellow who was reputed
to have stock in dozen mines and
kindred enterprises, a knowing hand
who drove fast horses and owned quite
a stable, a sharp hand who played q
thriving game of poker and had no
. compunctions as to winning. Officers
at Emory were fighting shy Of him.
He played too big game for their
small pay and pockets, and the men
with whom he took his pleasure were
big contractors or well-known Sports
and gamblers, who in those days
throngedo the frontier towns and most
men did them homage. But on this
trip Burleigh had no big gamblers
along and missed his evening game,
and. once arrived at camp along the
Fork, he had .'roped in" some Of the
infantry officers, but Brooks and the
engineer declined to play, and so had
Dean from the very start. ."@ +
All true cavalrymen ought to be
able to take a hand at poker. !. sneered
-Burleigh, at esfrst nights camp, for
here was q pigeon really worth the
plucking, thought he. Deans Life in
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