From the Ranks Part 16

"I ask in his name. I am authorized by him, for he is not well enough to meet the ordeal."

"You say so, and I don't mean to dispute your word, Captain Armitage, but I have a right to demand some proof. How am I to know he authorized you?"

"He himself gave me this letter, in your handwriting," said Armitage; and, opening the long envelope, he held forth the missive over which the poor old colonel had gone nearly wild. "He found it the morning they left,--in her garden."

If Jerrold's face had been gray before, it was simply ghastly now. He recoiled from the sight after one fruitless effort to grasp the letter, then rallied with unlooked-for spirit:

"By heaven, Armitage, suppose I _did_ write that letter? What does it prove but what I say,--that somebody has been prying and spying into my affairs? How came the colonel by it, if not by fraud or treachery?"

"He picked it up in the garden, I tell you,--among the rose-bushes, where she--where Miss Renwick had been but a few moments before, and where it might appear that she had dropped it."

"_She!_ That letter! What had she to do with it? What right had she to read it?"

Armitage stepped impulsively forward. A glad, glorious light was bursting upon his soul. He could almost have seized Jerrold's hand and thanked him; but proofs--proofs were what he needed. It was not his mind that was to be convinced, it was "society" that must be satisfied of her utter innocence, that it might be enabled to say, "Well, I never for a moment believed a word of it." Link by link the chain of circ.u.mstantial evidence must be destroyed, and this was only one.

"You mean that that letter was not intended for Miss Renwick?" he asked, with eagerness he strove hard to repress.

"It was never meant for anybody," said Jerrold, the color coming back to his face and courage to his eyes. "That letter was never sent by me to any woman. It's my writing, of course, I can't deny that; but I never even meant it to go. If it left that desk it must have been stolen. I've been hunting high and low for it. I knew that such a thing lying around loose would be the cause of mischief. G.o.d! is _that_ what all this fuss is about?" And he looked warily, yet with infinite anxiety, into his captain's eyes.

"There is far more to it, as you well know, sir," was the stern answer.

"For whom was this written, if not for her? It won't do to _half_ clear her name."

"Answer me this, Captain Armitage. Do you mean that that letter has compromised Miss Renwick?--that it is she whose name has been involved, and that it was of her that Chester meant to speak?"

"Certainly it was,--and I too."

There was an instant's silence; then Jerrold began to laugh nervously:

"Oh, well, I fancy it isn't the first time the revered and respected captain has got away off the track. All the same I do not mean to overlook his language to me; and I may say right now, Captain Armitage, that yours, too, calls for explanation."

"You shall have it in short order, Mr. Jerrold, and the sooner you understand the situation the better. So far as I am concerned, Miss Renwick needed no defender; but, thanks to your mysterious and unwarranted absence from quarters two very unlucky nights, and to other circ.u.mstances I have no need to name, and to your _penchant_ for letter-writing of a most suggestive character, it _is_ Miss Renwick whose name has been brought into question here at this post, and most prominently so. In plain words, Mr. Jerrold, you who brought this trouble upon her by your own misconduct must clear her, no matter at whose expense, or--"

"Or what?"

"I make no threats. I prefer that you should make the proper explanations from a proper sense of what is due."

"And suppose I say that no man is called upon to explain a situation which has been distorted and misrepresented by the evil imagination of his fellows?"

"Then I may have to wring the truth out of you,--and _will_; but, for her sake, I want as little publicity as possible. After this display on your part, I am not bound to show you any consideration whatever.

Understand this, however: the array of evidence that you were feloniously inside Colonel Maynard's quarters that night and at his cottage window last night is of such a character that a court would convict you unless your _alibi_ was conclusive. Leave the service you certainly shall, unless this whole thing is cleared up."

"I never was anywhere near Colonel Maynard's either last night or the other night I was absent."

"You will have to prove it. Mere denials won't help you in the face of such evidence as we have that you were there the first time."

"What evidence?"

"The photograph that was stolen from Mrs. Maynard between two and four o'clock that morning was seen in your drawer by Major Sloat at reveille.

You were fool enough to show it to him."

"Captain Armitage, I shall be quite able to show, when the proper time comes, that the photograph I showed Major Sloat was _not_ stolen: it was given me."

"That is beyond belief, Mr. Jerrold. Once and for all, understand this case. You have compromised her good name by the very mystery of your actions. You have it in your power to clear her by proving where you were, since you were not near her,--by showing how you got that photograph,--by explaining how you came to write so strange a letter.

Now I say to you, will you do it, instantly, or must we wring it from you?"

A sneering smile was the only answer for a moment; then,--

"I shall take great pleasure in confounding my enemies should the matter be brought before a court,--I'm sure if the colonel can stand that sort of thing I can,--but as for defending myself or anybody else from utterly unjust and proofless suspicions, it's quite another thing."

"Good G.o.d, Jerrold! do you realize what a position you are taking? Do you--"

"Oh, not at all, captain," was the airy reply, "not at all. It is not a position I have taken: it is one into which you misguided conspirators have forced me. I certainly am not required to compromise anybody else in order to relieve a suspicion which you, not I, have created. How do you know that there may not be some other woman whose name I propose to guard? You have been really very flattering in your theories so far."

Armitage could bear no more. The airy conceit and insolence of the man overcame all self-restraint and resolution. With one bound he was at his throat, his strong white hands grasping him in a sudden, vice-like grip, then hurling him with stunning, thundering force to the floor. Down, headlong, went the tall lieutenant, his sword clattering by his side, his slim brown hands clutching wildly at anything that might bear him up, and dragging with him in his catastrophe a rack of hunting-pouches, antlers, and one heavy double-barrelled shot-gun. All came tumbling down about the struggling form, and Armitage, glaring down at him with clinching fists and rasping teeth, had only time to utter one deep-drawn malediction when he noted that the struggles ceased and Jerrold lay quite still. Then the blood began to ooze from a jagged cut near the temple, and it was evident that the hammer of the gun had struck him.

Another moment, and the door opened, and with anxious face Chester strode into the room. "You haven't killed him, Armitage? Is it as bad as that?"

"Pick him up, and we'll get him on the bed. He's only stunned. I didn't even hit him. Those things tumbled afterwards," said Armitage, as between them they raised the dead weight of the slender Adonis in their arms and bore him to the bedroom. Here they bathed the wound with cold water and removed the uniform coat, and presently the lieutenant began to revive and look about him.

"Who struck me?" he faintly asked.

"Your shot-gun fell on your head, but I threw you down, Jerrold. I'm sorry I touched you, but you're lucky it was no worse. This thing is going to raise a big b.u.mp here. Shall I send the doctor?"

"No. I'll come round presently. We'll see about this thing afterwards."

"Is there any friend you want to see? Shall I send word to anybody?"

asked Chester.

"No. Don't let anybody come. Tell my striker to bring my breakfast; but I want nothing to-night but to be let alone."

"At least you will let me help you undress and get to bed?" said Chester.

"No. I wish you'd go,--both of you. I want quiet,--peace,--and there's none of it with either of you."

And so they left him. Later Captain Chester had gone to the quarters, and, after much parleying from without, had gained admission. Jerrold's head was bound in a bandage wet with arnica and water. He had been solacing himself with a pipe and a whiskey toddy, and was in a not unnaturally ugly mood.

"You may consider yourself excused from duty until your face is well again, by which time this matter will be decided. I admonish you to remain here and not leave the post until it is."

"You can prefer charges and see what you'll make of it," was the vehement reply. "Devil a bit will I help you out of the thing, after this night's work."

XIV.

Tuesday, and the day of the long-projected german had come; and if ever a lot of garrison-people were wis.h.i.+ng themselves well out of a flurry it was the social circle at Sibley. Invitations had been sent to all the prominent people in town who had shown any interest in the garrison since the regiment's arrival; beautiful favors had been procured; an elaborate supper had been prepared,--the ladies contributing their efforts to the salads and other solids, the officers wisely confining their donations to the wines. It was rumored that new and original figures were to be danced, and much had been said about this feature in town, and much speculation had been indulged in; but the Beaubien residence had been closed until the previous day, Nina was away with her mother and beyond reach of question, and Mr. Jerrold had not shown his face in town since her departure. Nor was he accessible when visitors inquired at the fort. They had never known such mysterious army people in their lives. What on earth could induce them to be so close-mouthed about a mere german? one might suppose they had something worth concealing; and presently it became noised abroad that there was genuine cause for perplexity, and possibly worse.

To begin with, every one at Sibley now knew something of the night adventure at the colonel's, and, as no one could give the true statement of the case, the stories in circulation were gorgeous embellishments of the actual facts. It would be useless, even if advisable, to attempt to reproduce these wild theories, but never was army garrison so tumultuously stirred by the whirlwind of rumor. It was no longer denied for an instant that the absence of the colonel and his household was the direct result of that night's discoveries; and when, to Mrs. Hoyt's inexpressible relief, there came a prettily-worded note from Alice on Monday evening informing her that neither the colonel nor her mother felt well enough to return to Sibley for the german, and that she herself preferred not to leave her mother at a time when she needed her care, Mrs. Hoyt and her intimates, with whom she instantly conferred, decided that there could be no doubt whatever that the colonel knew of the affair, had forbidden their return, and was only waiting for further evidence to decide what was to be done with his erring step-daughter.