"Come, come! You go too far!"

"Not at all. That's your own construction. I merely say that I am not
concerned about that man's disappearance. I think he'll be looked after,
as a valuable witness should be."

"Well," the colonel grumbled uneasily, "I don't like mysteries myself, and
I don't like family quarrels nor skeletons at the feasts of old friends.
But I suppose there must be a drop in every cup. What were your altitude
cases, Doctor?"

"The same old ones; poor Addison, you know. All those stories they tell an
Easterner. As I pointed out to Mrs. Bogardus, in every case there was some
predisposing cause. Addison had been too long in the mountains, and he was
frightfully overworked; short of company officers. He came to me about an
insect he said had got into his ear; buzzed, and bothered him day and
night. The story got to the men's quarters. They joked about the colonel's
'bug.' I knew it was no joke. I condemned him for duty, but the Sioux were
out. They thought at Washington no one but Addison could handle an Indian
campaign. He was on the ground, too. So they sent him up higher where it
was dry, with a thousand men in his hands. I knew he'd be a madman or a
dead man in a month! There were a good many of the dead! By Jove! The boys
who took his orders and loved the old fellow and knew he was sending them
to their death! Well for him that he'll never know."

"The 'altitude of heartbreak,'" sighed Mrs. Creve. The phrase was her own,
for many a reason deeply known unto herself, but she gave it the effect of
a quotation before the men.

"Then you think there is no 'altitude' in ours?"