Sinclair handed him the despatches.  “You are the only man on the train to whom I have shown them,” said he.

Foster read them slowly, his eyes lighting up as he did so.  “Looks as if it was true,” said he.  “Let me see!  Fort ——.  Yes, that’s the —­th infantry.  Two of their boys were killed at Sidney last summer by some of the same gang, and the regiment’s sworn vengeance.  Major, if this story’s on the square, that crowd’s goose is cooked, and don’t you forget it!  I say, you must give me a hand in.”

“Foster,” said Sinclair, “I am going to put responsibility on your shoulders.  I have no doubt that, if we be attacked, the soldiers will dispose of the gang; but I must take all possible precautions for the safety of the passengers.  We must not alarm them.  They can be made to think that the troops are going on a scout, and only a certain number of resolute men need be told of what we expect.  Can you, late this afternoon, go through the cars, and pick them out?  I will then put you in charge of the passenger cars, and you can post your men on the platforms to act in case of need.  My place will be ahead.”

“Major, you can depend on me,” was Foster’s reply.  “I’ll go through the train and have my eye on some boys of the right sort, and that’s got their shooting-irons with them.”

Through the hours of that day on rolled the train, still over the crisp buffalo grass, across the well-worn buffalo trails, past the prairie-dog villages.  The passengers chatted, dozed, played cards, read, all unconscious, with the exception of three, of the coming conflict between the good and the evil forces bearing on their fate; of the fell preparations making for their disaster; of the grim preparations making to avert such disaster; of all of which the little wires alongside of them had been talking back and forth.  Watkins had telegraphed that he still saw no reason to doubt the good faith of his warning, and Sinclair had reported his receipt of authority and his acceptance thereof.  Meanwhile, also, there had been set in motion a measure of that power to which appeal is so reluctantly made in time of peace.  At Fort ------, a lonely post on the plains, the orders had that morning been issued for twenty men under Lieutenant Halsey to parade at 4 p.  M., with overcoats, two days’ rations, and ball cartridges; also for Assistant Surgeon Kesler to report for duty with the party.  Orders as to destination were communicated direct to the lieutenant from the post commander, and on the minute the little column moved, taking the road to the station.  The regiment from which it came had been in active service among the Indians on the frontier for a long time, and the officers and men were tried and seasoned fighters.  Lieutenant Halsey had been well known at the West Point balls as the “leader of the german.”  From the last of these balls he had gone straight to the field, and three years had given him an enviable reputation