A further requisition was made upon the bartender, and the company indulged anew.  Searle, although a little pale and nervous, was all life and gaiety.  His coming was a fresh brand on the convivial flame, and the party, too much exhilarated to be content with pushing one vice to excess, sallied forth in search of whatever other the great city might afford.  They had not to look far.  Folly is at no fault in the metropolis for food of whatever quality to feed upon; and they were soon accommodated with excitement to their hearts content at a fashionable gambling saloon on Broadway.  The colonel played with recklessness and daring that, if he carries it to the battle-field, will wreathe his brow with laurels; but like many a rash soldier before him, he did not win.  On the contrary, his eagles took flight with a rapidity suggestive of the old adage that “gold hath wings,” and when, long after midnight, he stood upon the deserted street alone with Philip Searle and his reflections, he was a sadder and a soberer man.

“Searle, I’m a ruined man.”

“You’ll fight all the better for it,” replied Philip, knocking the ashes from his segar.  “Come, you’ll never mend the matter by taking cold here in the night air; where do you put up?  I’ll see you home.”

“D—­n you, you take it easy,” said the colonel, bitterly.  Philip could afford to take it easy, for he had most of the colonel’s money in his pocket.  In fact, the unhappy votary of Mars was more thoroughly ruined than his companion was aware of, for when fortune was hitting him hardest, he had not hesitated to bring into action a reserve of government funds which had been intrusted to his charge for specific purposes.

“Searle,” said the colonel, after they had walked along silently for a few minutes, “I was telling you this evening about that vacant captaincy.”

“Yes, you were telling me I shouldn’t have it,” replied Philip, with an accent of injured friendship.

“Well, I fancied it out of my power to do anything about it.  But”—­

“Well, but?”—­

“I think I might get it for you, for—­for”——­

“A consideration?” suggested Philip, interrogatively.

“Well, to be plain with you, let me have five hundred, and you’ve won all of that to-night, and I’ll get you the captaincy.”

“We’ll talk about it to-morrow morning,” replied Philip.

And in the morning the bargain was concluded; Philip, with the promise that all should be satisfactorily arranged, started the same day for Washington, to await the commission so honorably disposed of by the gallant colonel.

CHAPTER XVIII.