not getting on at all with your military training. Now let me give you
some useful information. In two seconds the bugle will call the first
sergeant--of each company--to the adjutant's office, and there he'll get
the mail for his men. The orderly trumpeter will bring it to the houses on
the line, and the colonel's orderly--beautiful creature! There he goes!
How I wish we could take him home with us and have him in our front hall.
Fancy the feelings of the maids! And the rage on the noble brow of
Parkins--awful Parkins. I should like to give his pride a bump."

Mother and daughter were pacing the colonel's veranda, behind a partial
screen of rose vines--October vines fast shedding their leaves. Every
breeze shook a handful down, which the women's skirts swept with them as
they walked. Mrs. Bogardus turned and clasped Christine's arm above the
elbow; through the thin sleeve she could feel its cool roundness. It was a
soft, small, unmuscular arm, that had never borne its own burdens, to say
nothing of a share in the burdens of others.

"Get your jacket," said the mother. "There is a chill in the air."

"There is no chill in me," laughed Christine. "You know, mamsie, you
aren't a girl. I should simply die in those awful things that you wear.
Did you ever know such a hot house as the colonel keeps!"

"The rooms are small, and the colonel is--impulsive," Mrs. Bogardus added
with a smile.

"There is something very like him about his fire-making. I should know by
the way he puts on wood that he never would have "--Mrs. Bogardus checked
herself.