"
"And Belknap was content to do this?" I mused. "He would do this after
Ellen told him that she loved me--"
"Stop!" thundered Colonel Meriwether. "I have told you all that is
necessary. I will add that he said to me, like the gentleman he is, that
in case my daughter asked it, _he_ would marry her and leave her at
once, until she of her own free will asked him to return. There is
abundant opportunity for swift changes in the Army. What seems to you
absurd will work out in perfectly practical fashion."
"Yes," said I, "in fashion perfectly practical for the ruin of her life.
You may leave mine out of the question."
"I do, sir," was his icy reply. "She told you to your face, and in my
hearing, that you had deceived her, that you must go."
"Yes," I said, dully, "I did deceive her, and there is no punishment on
earth great enough to give me for that--except to have no word from
her!"
"You are to go at once. I put it beyond you to understand Belknap's
conduct in this matter."
"He is a gentleman," I said, "and fit to love her. I think none of us
needs praise or blame for that."
He choked up. "She's my girl," he said. "Yes, all my boys in the Army
love her--there isn't one of them that wouldn't be proud to marry her on
any terms she would lay down.
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