"Yes – marked. I hadn't thought of that. Before we were married, Ralph was jealous of everybody who spoke to me – man, woman, or brute. I couldn't even pet the cat or talk to the dog."
"Matrimonial traits," observed the Captain's wife, sagely, "are the result of pre-nuptial tendencies. If you look carefully into the subject before you're married, you can see about what you're coming to."
"I guess that's right. I needn't have expected marriage to cure Ralph of jealousy, but, like you, I supposed it was love."
"My dear," said Mrs. Franklin, with feeling, "many a woman mistakes the flaws in a man's character for the ravages of the tender passion – before marriage."
"Well, I never!" said a soft voice behind them. "Kitty and Mamie talking scandal!"
Both women jumped.
"How did you get in?" demanded Mrs. Howard.
"Came in," replied Ronald, laconically.
"Don't you know enough to rap?" asked Mrs. Franklin, angrily. Like others who have been christened "Mary," she was irritated beyond measure at that meaningless perversion of her name.
"Did rap," answered George, selecting the most comfortable chair, "but nobody heard me, so I let myself in."
"How dare you call me 'Kitty'?" exclaimed Mrs. Howard.
"Soldiers aren't afraid of anything except the War Department."
"How long have you been here?" they asked simultaneously.
"Don't all speak at once. I've been here a long, long time – so long, in fact, that I'm hungry." He looked past them as he spoke and gazed pensively out of the window.
Mrs. Franklin's cheeks were blazing and her eyes snapped. "You're the very worst man I ever met," she said.
The Ensign sighed heavily. "And yet I've never been accused of mulishness," he remarked, rolling his eyes toward the ceiling, "nor of jealousy," he added. His mouth was twitching, and the women exchanged glances.
"I admit an enormous appetite," he continued. "Wonder if it's the ravages of the tender passion?"
Mrs. Howard brought in a plate of cookies and set it ostentatiously within his reach. "Lovely woman!" apostrophised George. "She feeds me! Radiant vision, will you be mine?"
There was a dead silence.
"Queer, isn't it," observed the guest, between mouthfuls, and apparently to himself, "that women should look so pretty when they're mad?"
"Your wife will be pretty all the time, then," said Mrs. Franklin.
"I trust so. She'll have to have a good start at it, or she won't get me, and with the additional stimulus which living with me will give her, she'll be nearly as lovely as the wives of the other officers at Fort Dearborn. I could give her no higher praise. These cookies are all gone."
"I know it," replied Mrs. Howard. "I gave you all I had left."
"If I might presume," said Ronald, "I'd like the prescription they were made by, to give to my wife, when I get one. I suppose it's more in the making than in the prescription, and though I'll undoubtedly like 'em, my native love of truth will oblige me to tell her that they don't come up to those Kitty – pardon me, Mrs. Howard – used to make for me. I always think of you by your first name," he went on. "I know it's wrong, but I can't help it. You're so good to me. Isn't there one more cooky?"
"No, there isn't."
"Your mother makes surpassing doughnuts. Did she ever teach you how?"
"Oh, yes," responded Mrs. Howard, coolly; "but I don't make them very often. I haven't made any for months."
"I have the plan of 'em all written down, in case you should forget how. I'm saving it for my wife. Can I go and look in the pantry?"
"No, you cannot."
"Why don't you get married, George?" asked Mrs. Franklin, by way of a diversion.
"I've never been asked."
"Didn't you ever ask anybody?"
"Oh, Lord, yes! I've asked every girl I've ever met. Say, do you know that I've got so now that I can propose off-hand, as easily as other fellows can after they've written it out and learned it? If there was a girl here at the Fort who suited me, I'd ask everybody to my wedding inside of two weeks."
"Charming diffidence," murmured Katherine.
"Modest soul," commented Mrs. Franklin. "What kind of a girl would suit you?"
"I like the domestic variety. The faithful kind, you know. One who wouldn't gad all the time. Good cook, and that sort of thing."
"Some Indian girl" – began the Captain's wife.
"I know," interrupted George, pointedly; "that runs in some families, but it never has in ours. Wouldn't mind an Indian aunt, maybe, after I got used to her; but a mother-in-law – Lord!"
Mrs. Franklin was angry for an instant, then she laughed. It was impossible for any one to harbour resentment against Ronald.
"I don't think I could ever love an ordinary girl," that intrepid youth resumed, with a dare-devil light in his eyes. "She'd have to be very superior. Lots of girls get married without any clear idea of what it means. For instance, while I was working day and night, trying to earn board and clothes for a woman, I wouldn't like to have her trot over to her friend's house to discuss my faults. If that's marriage, I won't enlist."
"You haven't any faults," put in the Captain's wife, sweetly. "There would be nothing to discuss."
"True, Mamie, I had forgotten that. Thank you for reminding me of my perfection. But you know what I mean. As soon as I got out of sight of the house, she'd gallop over to her friend's, and her friend would say: 'Good-morning, Mrs. Ronald, you don't look fit this morning. What has that mean thing done to you now?'"
Throwing himself thoroughly into the part, the Ensign got up and proceeded to give an elaborate monologue, in falsetto, punctuated with mincing steps and frequent rearrangement of an imaginary coiffure. Mrs. Howard clasped her hands at her waist and the tears rolled down Mrs. Franklin's cheeks.
"And then she'd say," Ronald went on, "'Just suppose you had to live with a mulish, jealous man who wouldn't give you more than nine dresses and eleven bonnets and four pairs of shoes. Yes, that's just what the horrid thing has done. And this morning, when I asked for money to get a few clothes, so I could look more respectable, he gave me some, but I caught him keeping back fifty-two cents. Now, what do you think of that? Do you suppose he's going to take a lot of men out and get 'em all drunk?'"
The entrance of Captain Franklin put an end to the inspired portrayal of wifely devotion. As Katherine had said, he did not look stubborn. On the contrary, he seemed to be the mildest sort of a man, for he was quiet and unobtrusive in manner. His skin was very white, and the contrast of his jet-black hair and mustache made him look pale.
"Did you tell them the news?" he asked Ronald.
"'Pon my word, Captain, I haven't had time. They've been chattering so ever since I came in that I'm nearly deaf with it. You tell 'em."
"I don't know as you'd call it news," said the Captain; "but we can't afford to ignore any incident out here. A Kickapoo runner has come in from the Illinois River, and he says the pack-trains are about to start from there and from the Kankakee, and that they will be here soon."
"It's an early Spring," remarked Mrs. Franklin.
"I'm glad," said Katherine; "I love to be outdoors, and the Winters in this lonesome little Fort are almost unbearable."
"What?" asked Ronald, "with me here?"
"Drill to-morrow," said the Captain, turning to his subordinate. The Ensign saluted gravely, but made no reply.
The Captain lingered a few moments, listening while the others talked. "Are you going home, Mary?" he asked.
"Yes, after a while. I'll go now if you want me to."
"No; never mind. I've got some things to see to."
"Now