He experienced no fear, no premonition of coming disaster, yet the reawakened plainsman in him kept him sufficiently wary and cautious.  The faint note of discontent apparent in Brant’s concluding words—­doubtless merely an echo of that ambitious officer’s dislike at being put on guard over the pack-train at such a moment—­awoke no response in his mind.  He possessed a soldier’s proud confidence in his regiment—­the supposition that the old fighting Seventh could be defeated was impossible; the Indians did not ride those uplands who could do the deed!  Then there came to him a nameless dread, that instinctive shrinking which a proud, sensitive man must ever feel at having to face his old companions with the shadow of a crime between.  In his memory he saw once more a low-ceiled room, having a table extending down the centre, with grave-faced men, dressed in the full uniform of the service, looking at him amid a silence like unto death; and at the head sat a man with long fair hair and mustache, his proud eyes never to be forgotten.  Now, after silent years, he was going to look into those accusing eyes again.  He pressed his hand against his forehead, his body trembled; then he braced himself for the interview, and the shuddering coward in him shrank back.

He had become wearied of the endless vista of desert, rock, and plain.  Yet now it strangely appealed to him in its beauty.  About him were those uneven, rolling hills, like a vast storm-lashed sea, the brown crests devoid of life, yet with depressions between sufficient to conceal multitudes.  Once he looked down through a wide cleft in the face of the bluff, and could perceive the head of the slowly advancing pack-train far below.  Away to the left something was moving, a dim, shapeless dash of color.  It might be Benteen, but of Reno’s columns he could perceive nothing, nor anything of Custer’s excepting that broad track across the prairies marked by his horses’ hoofs.  This track Hampton followed, pressing his fresh mount to increased speed, confident that no Indian spies would be loitering so closely in the rear of that body of cavalry, and becoming fearful lest the attack should occur before he could arrive.

He dipped over a sharp ridge and came suddenly upon the rear-guard.  They were a little squad of dusty, brown-faced troopers, who instantly wheeled into line at sound of approaching hoofs, the barrels of their lowered carbines glistening in the sun.  With a swing of the hand, and a hoarse shout of “Despatches!” he was beyond them, bending low over his saddle pommel, his eyes on the dust cloud of the moving column.  The extended line of horsemen, riding in column of fours, came to a sudden halt, and he raced swiftly on.  A little squad of officers, several of their number dismounted, were out in front, standing grouped just below the summit of a slight elevation, apparently looking off into the valley through some cleft In the bluff beyond.  Standing among these, Hampton