The Advance of Custer

The Sergeant swung down from the saddle and forced both ponies back below the crest of the hill, his swift glance sweeping back over their trail. Then he gazed again searchingly into the valley below.

"What is it?" she questioned.

"A moving column of horsemen, soldiers from their formation, for Indians never march in column of fours. They are too far away for me to be certain yet. What troops can be away out here?"

"Wasn't there to be a winter campaign against Black Kettle?" she questioned. "It was the rumor at Dodge. Perhaps--"

"Why, yes, that must be it," he interrupted eagerly. "Custer and the Seventh. What luck! And I'll be in it with the boys after all."

"Shall we not ride to meet them?"

"Soon, yes; only we need to be certain first."

"Are you not?" and she rose in her stirrups. "I am sure they are cavalrymen. Now you can see clearly as they climb the hill."

"There is no doubt," he admitted, "a single troop ahead of the main body; the others will be beyond the bend in the stream."

He stepped back, where he could look directly into her face.

"They are soldiers all right, but that was not what I wanted to be so certain about. When we ride down there, Molly girl, we shall be swallowed up into the old life once more, the old army life."

"Yes."

"Perhaps you do not realize how different it will all be from out here alone together."