Uncle Will had taken her, at her request, to see the objectionable institution, and she had peered curiously about the cozy interior. At sight of their much honored squadron leader, the few troopers at the tables, busy with checkers, dominoes or billiards, had sprung to attention, facing him and the grave-eyed lady by his side, and there stood in soldierly respect. Ray smilingly acknowledged their homage, bade them go on with their games; he merely wished his niece from the East "to see how we manage to live in the West." Then he showed her the bookshelves and the reading room with its illustrated weeklies and magazines, the well-furnished writing tables whereat certain young soldiers were working at their letters home; the refreshment counter, with its appetizing little stack of sandwiches and polished urn of steaming coffee, and all this Priscilla saw without sign of surrender. What she looked for she did not find – symptoms of the inevitable intoxication and debauchery to be expected wherever liquor was sold or used. Some of the men had half-emptied beer glasses at their elbow. Two German non-commissioned officers were sipping appreciatively the wine of their native Rhineland as they chatted in quiet comfort over their little table at the window. A veteran sergeant stepped forward and begged the honor of tendering the colonel and the lady a glass of their wine, and again every man was on his feet as Ray drank to their health, and Priscilla thanked their entertainers and said she would be glad of a little coffee – she never used wine. She was silent as she came away – all was so orderly, so cheery; the men seemed so content with their surroundings, so pleased that "the colonel" (never did they forget his volunteer title) should come to see them. She owned that – yes – they looked very – decent now, but – but, it was only the first step; it was what it all led to, said she, that made it so dangerous, so dreadful! Indeed, the mere fact that all was so well ordered made it, presumably, to Priscilla's mind, all the more alluring and terrible. It was the devil's way always, she had been taught – imperceptible, inviting, insidious. Priscilla prayed long that night and pondered. She had almost decided on a campaign of conquest and overthrow, when the new commander came, and in Colonel Stone she found an obstacle quite as firm as Uncle Will – and far less tolerant.

Meantime, however, Priscilla had organized her "Soldiers' Advancement Association"; had started in a vacant set of quarters a rival to the Canteen, where even better coffee and sandwiches could be had and much more improving conversation, but no beer, and Priscilla was presently in the seventh heaven; so many soldiers came she had to send for more seats and more supplies. Every evening after dinner, putting behind her the unworthy, if worldly, impulse to go and join in the music or the dance, Priscilla met her martial friends and pupils, learned their soldier names, something of their history and much of their needs. The chaplain at first was quite assiduous in his attendance, but the chaplain, she speedily decided, was slow, prosy, unconvincing. He did not seem to stir them as they should be stirred, and when one night the kindly old gentleman failed to come, and his goodwife sent word she feared her husband had caught a heavy cold, Priscilla took the Word, as the French would say; read the chapter of her choice; expounded vehemently after the manner of her favorite exhorters, and came home radiant. No less than six of the men had come to her to thank her for her soul-stirring words, and to say that if they had had such teaching as that in their past they would never have brought sorrow to a mother's heart, as some of them feared they had. Uncle Will's eyebrows went up significantly when Priscilla named her converts, and once or twice, as he sat writing to Blake that night in his little den, sounds as of irrepressible chuckling came from that sanctum, and Marion slipped in to say a word of caution. Priscilla, however, at last had found her opportunity and could not be laughed out of it. The chaplain was warned, he said, that exposure to the wintry night air was hazardous, and he was reluctantly compelled to withdraw, and Priscilla, by no means reluctantly, to part with him. She was in desperate earnest and in the full tide of apparent success, with all Minneconjou watching with absorbed if mischievous interest. Priscilla's mourners' bench, it must be owned, was graced by the presence of one or two veteran troopers, the mention of whose names was enough to start the risibilities of that godless array, "the Mess." There was Shaughnessy, who had served six enlistments and never kept the chevrons six months at a time. There was Kelly, the "champeen thrumpether," who could blow "Taps" that would bring tears to your eyes one day and maledictions on his head the next. There was Costigan, who had been "bobtailed" out of two of the best regiments of infantry of the service, and only "taken on" in Ray's old troop by special permission, because of his undeniable valor in Indian campaign and the fact that when he let whisky alone there was not a neater, nattier soldier, Horse, Foot or Dragoon, to be found in the field. Priscilla had indeed gathered in some of the reprobates, and sought to reach more. She begged that, in accordance with their plaintive request, the inmates of the guard-house, immortal "Company Q," might be allowed the benefit and privileges of the Association. Had not He said He came not to call the just but the sinners to repentance? and, as Uncle Will whimsically remarked, "If what Priscilla wants are sinners – she's got 'em."

And this was the state of things when Stone arrived; took command, reinforced the garrison with eight stout companies and band of the Sixty-first, and the guard-house with a score of military malefactors who, hearing of Miss Sanford's Soldiers' Advancement Association, begged leave to partake of its blessings, including the coffee and sandwiches. Then Stone suddenly "tumbled to the scheme," as Billy, Junior, a fierce skeptic from the start, described it. Then Stone himself attended a meeting, to the obvious embarrassment of the congregation, though Priscilla beamed upon him in the sudden belief that here indeed was a heart worth the moving. What Stone saw was quite enough to convince him of the utter absurdity of permitting the further attendance of, at least, the guard-house contingent, but he would not wound Priscilla or, without abundant reason, disturb the edifice builded under Ray's administration. The Association might even have lived and thrived another week on Priscilla's ministrations – and at Ray's expense – for daily coffee and sandwiches for all comers, forty odd, at least, was proving costly. It was "Company Q" itself that broke it up. The privilege and the darkness combined enabled certain of its unhallowed spirits to smuggle whisky into the prison room, and, thus stimulated, a gifted ex-professional of the "dramatic line" set up a wonderfully if wickedly witty burlesque of the evening's lecture, to the irrepressible, and presently uproarious, mirth of his fellow-jailbirds. It was just what Stone was expecting, and so far from ordering it stopped, he sent for Ray and bade him listen. Then the post and the squadron commander shook hands in silence. "You see for yourself," said Stone. "I, too, have been expecting it," said Ray. Then the guard was sent in. The impious revel was suddenly and summarily squelched. Then Ray gently told Priscilla the sinners could come no more, but mercifully would not tell her much, at least, that he had heard. So the Soldiers' Advancement Association retrograded in numbers to less than half, and then, as others not at the moment under guard took alarm, to less than a dozen. But Priscilla wrapped herself up in the nine that were left, and, as all barrack room was now needed, for these they fitted up a little apartment in the basement of the major's quarters, and then came Sandy Ray, as has been said, and spring was turning to summer, and Priscilla's band of stalwarts had been reduced to six, and of these six the apple of her spiritual eye was Blenke.

One of the recruits, regimental and bibli-classical, was Blenke, but already a marked man. Small of stature, lithe, slender and sinewy, with dainty little hands and feet, with pallid face and regular features and great big, mournful brown eyes that looked pleadingly into those of his superiors, Blenke wore the uniform of a private with the ease and grace and care of a dandy subaltern. Blenke's gloves and shoes could not be furnished by the quartermaster's department; they did not deal in such small sizes; but Blenke brought with him all he could need of such items for months to come. Blenke was a silent fellow in barracks. Blenke never whistled or sang. Blenke rarely spoke and never smiled. It was not that Blenke's face was set in gloom, but an air of gentle melancholy hung ever about him. He made no intimates, sought no confidences and gave none among the men. Whatever he was put to do he did surprisingly well. Corporal Donovan, detailed to drill him when he, with the rest of the little party, arrived, informed the first sergeant that "that young feller knew more settin'-up drill than any non-com at the post." So it proved also with the manual of arms. Blenke was an expert. When put into a squad for aiming and position drill, Blenke had nothing to learn, and his shooting and gallery practice was on a par with the best. They sent him out to the rifle range west of the post and there he "qualified" at known distance and excelled at the silhouettes, and still he declared he had never before "taken a blanket." He learned his drill and shooting with the militia, he said; gave "clerk" as his occupation and wrote a beautiful hand, though his spelling at times might be criticised. Blenke had a watch, card-case, shirts, shoes and underwear that told of better days. Blenke, apparently, had no vices. He neither drank, smoked, chewed, gambled nor, unless closely pressed as to his past, was he believed to lie. Blenke looked about him a bit before going either to church or town. Then Blenke began appearing regularly at chapel service, and then, modestly, sought permission to enter Miss Sanford's Soldiers' Advancement Association, where speedily he attracted the especial notice of that devoted and devotional young woman. Then Blenke offered his services as writer, copyist, etc., and Priscilla, being much occupied, gladly installed him at a desk whereat he spent much time when not elsewhere on duty, and all the while, neat, handy, silent, unobtrusive, yet seeing everything with those deep, mournful, watchful eyes, Blenke found means to make himself more and more useful, and presently to communicate the fact that though his present lot was humble there had been "advantages" in the past, there were ambitions for the future. To begin with, he wished to transfer into the cavalry. He knew little, he said, of the relative merits of those arms before enlisting. He had seen much since, he said, to convince him that for a young man of spirit the cavalry offered opportunities not to be looked for in the infantry. This, he judged, would not displease the squadron commander, whose influence through Miss Sanford he earnestly sought, and so it resulted that Blenke, little by little, was far more frequently to be found about the major's quarters than his own.

Ray did not like it. Neither did Blenke's captain, yet neither wished to throw cold water on Priscilla's efforts, and really nothing could be less obtrusive or more precise and soldierly than Blenke. He never presumed to speak except in answer to questions. He was scrupulous in dress, bearing, conduct and military courtesy. His salute was precision itself. His captain really wished to make him a corporal, but a veteran first sergeant respectfully protested. "The men wouldn't stand for it, sir, and him not two months in the company." Sandy Ray, who came home in mood to carp at anything, liked it least of all that he should be forever encountering Blenke about the lower floor or around the walks and quarters. But Priscilla was forever talking of Blenke's helpfulness, his piety, high character, and his modest hopes. Blenke was beginning to talk with her about studying for a commission. Blenke was beginning to be disliked among the men because he ignored them so.

Then one day came the expected. Lieutenant-Colonel Ray, – th Cavalry, was ordered to proceed at once to San Francisco, and thence by transport to Manila. Then came tidings of deaths in the Islands, and retirements at home, and, six months sooner than he had hoped for such a thing, Oswald Dwight saw the gold leaves of a major dangling before his mental vision, and the night before Colonel Ray was to bid his loved ones good-by and take train for the coast, and he and Marion, arm in arm, were coming home from some parting calls, they saw Blenke standing at their gate, a telegraphic message in his hand; Priscilla and Billy, Junior, following, closed upon the elders as Ray tore open the envelope. Blenke, having delivered it, stood scrupulously at attention just beyond the gate, gazing with his mournful eyes straight out at the flagstaff in the middle of the parade. Ray read, turned a bit pale, and glanced hurriedly about him as though in search of someone. Sandy was not in sight. He was busy with the affairs of the Canteen.

"What is it, Will?" asked Marion anxiously, her gloved hand trembling a bit upon his arm.

"Of all things – queer," said Ray. "Dwight gets my squadron, and —she's coming with him."

Then unaccountably Private Blenke's forage-cap, always worn well forward, tilted off and fell at his feet.