Waterbury Democrat., 1901-04-15


 ! staff. There was a maze of brick and wooden buildings in front of the guard-house, and a perfect tangle of dense shrubbery only 50 yards away to the west. 1t was into this that most of the fugitives diyed and were instantly lost to sight, while others had doubled behind the guard-house and rushed into an alley-way that passed in rear of the club and row of officers quarters.
 Some of them apparently had taken refuge in the cellars or wood and coal sheds until thick darkness came down, and others had actually dared to enter the quarters of Lieut.. Ray, for the back door was found wide open, the sideboard, wherein had been kept some choice old Kentucky whisky produced only on special oc-' casions, had been forced, and the half-emptied denijohn and some glasses stood on the table in pool of sloppy water.
 But what was worse, the 1ieuten- ants desk in the front room, secure ly locked when he went to town, Ado DCCA JUL ORCI W1CA O. SA4ASOA, and MT. Ray had declined to say how much he had lost. Indeed, he did not fully know
 s'Too busy to come in," was the message he had sent his mother the morning after the discovery, and yet all that morning he remained about his quarters after one brief inter- view with the perturbed and ekasper- ated post commander, ransacking desks. drawers and trunks in the vain hope that he might find in them some of the missing property, for lit tie by little the realization was forced up several hundreds-all through his own neglect and through disregard of his fathers earnest counsel.
 Only three days before the lieuten- ant commanding his troop had been sent to Oregon and Washington on duty connected with the mastering of volunteers. Their captain was a field officer of one of the regiments of his native state, and, in hurriedly leaving, Lieut.. Creswell had turned over to his young subordinate not only the troop fund, amounting to over $40O, but the money belonging to the post athletic association, and marked envelopes containing the pay of certain soldiers on temporary de- tached service-in all between 5000 and $1,O00.
 Whenever you have care of pub- lie money-evenotemp orarily-put it at once into the nearest United States depository" said his father. Even office safes in garrison are not safe," he had further said. Clerks, somehow, learn the combination and are tempted sometimes beyond their strength. Lose no time, therefore, in getting your funds into the bank"
 And that was what he meant to do in this case, only, as the absent troopers were expected to return in two days, what was the use of break ing up those sealed envelopes and de- posting the whole thing only to have to draw it out in driblets again as the men came to him for it? 4 There stood his own desk, beauti- full and costly thing-his mothers gift-with it's strong locks and intri- cate system of pigeon-holes and se- cret drawers. He would "chance it'' one night, he said, and give his trust ed servant ,ordacs to stand guard over the premises, and so the little bag of gold went into one closed com partment, the envelopes and wads of treasury notes into the hidden drawer, and the key into his watch pocket.
 His servant was a young man whose father had been with Col. Ray for a quarter of a century, faithful Irishman by the name of Hogan. He was honest to the core and had but one serious failure--he would drink.
 And now Saturday morning, while the guns of Alcatraz were booming in salute across the bay and all the garrison was out along the shore or on the seaward heights, waving fare we'll to the Vinton fotilla, and his mother and Maidie had gone out with the department commander to bid them godspeed, poor Sandy sat in his quarters.
 Hogan, overwhelmed by the magni- 1 tude of his masters misfortunes, and | realizing that it was due in no small | degree to his own neglect, was now | self-exiled from the ieutenant's roof, l and seeking such consolation as he could find at the Harp of Erin out side the walls, miserable and con trite man-contrite, that is to say, as manifested in the manner of his country, for Hogan was bottle deep in his distress.
 Although vouched for as perfectly | sober from the Hibernian point of view, he we'll knew that he had taken E so much that fatal Thursday even- ing as to be fearful of meeting his master, and so had kept out of the way until full time for him to be gone to dinner. Then, working his way homeward in the darkness of the night, he had marveled much at finding the back door open, rejoiced 1t sight of the demijohn and dis order in the little dining-room, argu-5 ng therefrom that the lieutenant aad had some jovial callers and therefore hadn't missed him.
 Hogan drank, in his masters price, ess old Blue Grass Bourbon, to the health of the party, and then, stum- ,ling into the bedroom and lighting he lamp, came upon a sight that . I