Another thing that added to the flame of speculation and curiosity was this.  Two of the ladies, returning from a moonlit stroll on the terrace just after tattoo, came through the narrow passage-way on the west side of the colonel’s quarters, and there, at the foot of the little flight of steps leading up to the parade, they came suddenly upon Captain Chester, who was evidently only moderately pleased to see them and nervously anxious to expedite their onward movement.  With the perversity of both sexes, however, they stopped to chat and inquire what he was doing there, and in the midst of it all a faint light gleamed on the opposite wall and the reflection of the curtains in Alice Renwick’s window was distinctly visible.  Then a sturdy masculine shadow appeared, and there was a rustling above, and then, with exasperating, mysterious, and epigrammatic terseness, a deep voice propounded the utterly senseless question,—­

“How’s that?”

To which, in great embarrassment, Chester replied,—­

“Hold on a minute.  I’m talking with some interested spectators.”

Whereat the shadow of the big man shot out of sight, and the ladies found that it was useless to remain,—­there would be no further developments so long as they did; and so they came away, with many a lingering backward look.  “But the idea of asking such a fool question as ‘How’s that?’ Why couldn’t the man say what he meant?” It was gathered, however, that Armitage and Chester had been making some experiments that bore in some measure on the mystery.  And all this time Mr. Jerrold was in his quarters, only a stone’s-throw away.  How interested he must have been!

But, while the garrison was relieved at knowing that Alice Renwick would not be on hand for the german and it was being fondly hoped she might never return to the post, there was still another grievous embarrassment.  How about Mr. Jerrold?

He had been asked to lead when the german was first projected, and had accepted.  That was fully two weeks before; and now—­no one knew just what ought to be done.  It was known that Nina Beaubien had returned on the previous day from a brief visit to the upper lakes, and that she had a costume of ravishing beauty in which to carry desolation to the hearts of the garrison belles in leading that german with Mr. Jerrold.  Old Madame Beaubien had been reluctant, said her city friends, to return at all.  She heartily disapproved of Mr. Jerrold, and was bitterly set against Nina’s growing infatuation for him.  But Nina was headstrong and determined:  moreover, she was far more than a match for her mother’s vigilance, and it was known at Sibley that two or three times the girl had been out at the fort with the Suttons and other friends when the old lady believed her in quarters totally different.  Cub Sutton had confided to Captain Wilton that Madame Beaubien was in total ignorance of the fact that there was to be a party at the doctor’s