“Miss Arnold,” said Henry, “permit me to introduce our quartermaster, Lieutenant Duncan—­and Mr. Duncan,” continued the boy, “it gives me pleasure to present to you Miss Brenda Arnold.”

The quality, modulation, and refinement of the voice in which the girl assured me of her pleasure in meeting me, confirmed my first impression.

“But how did you make the acquaintance of Corporal Henry Burton, Miss Arnold?” I asked.

“I was riding back from the fort, sir, where I had been to mail some letters, and my pony, Gypsy, lost a shoe and came near falling.  The stumble caused me to drop a package, and Mr. Burton chanced to come up and restore it to me, and he also picked up Gypsy’s shoe.  He accompanied me to camp, and since we arrived has been giving me the history of Vic, Sancho, and Chiquita.”

“And that, of course, included something of the history of their devoted attendants?”

“Yes, I have learned something of the gallant deeds of Corporals Frank and Henry Burton and Lieutenant Duncan at Los Valles Grandes and on the march here.  When I meet Corporal Frank I shall know you all.”

“He will present himself to-morrow, no doubt,” I observed.  “But about that pony’s shoe; do you want it reset?”

“Yes, but who can do it?”

“At our next camp, to-morrow, our soldier-blacksmith shall set it.”

“But I do not belong to government, sir.”

“But part of this government belongs to you,” replied Henry.  “I’ll lead Gypsy to the forge for you, and Private Sattler shall shoe her as he does Chiquita, and polish the shoes, too.”

The Arnold family history, gathered incidentally on the march, and at a period later in my story, was briefly this:  Brenda was the only daughter of Mr. Arnold’s only brother, and had been reared in a large inland city of New York.  Her father and mother had recently perished in a yachting accident, and the young girl had been sent to her paternal uncle in Colorado.  There were relatives on the mother’s side, but they were scattered, two brothers being in Europe at the time of the accident.  Brenda had reached her Western uncle just as he was starting on one of his periodical moves—­this time to Arizona.

The different social status of the families of the two brothers was unusual, but not impossible in our country.  One of the brothers was ambitious, of steady habits, and possessed of a receptive mind; the other was idle, impatient of restraint, with a disinclination to protracted effort of any kind.

The distance to the first camp beyond Fort Wingate where we were sure to find water was twenty-two miles; and it being impossible for us to leave the post before three o’clock in the afternoon, we determined to make a dry camp five and a half miles out.

When Frank and Henry learned that the start was not to be an early one they rode out to the Arnold camp with the information, and the former was duly presented to Miss Brenda.  Gypsy was brought into the fort and shod, and returned to her mistress in season for the march.