Lingering farewells there certainly were. Many a young soldier and many a lass "paired off" in little nooks and corners among the stacks of bales and boxes, but at the table nearest the staging all seemed gay good humor. A merry little woman with straw-colored hair and pert, tip-tilted nose and much vivacity and complexion, had apparently taken the lead in the warfare of chaff and fun. Evidently she was no stranger to most of the officers. Almost as evidently, to a very close observer who stood a few paces away, she was no intimate of the group of women who with good right regarded that table as their especial and personal charge. Her Red Cross badge was very new; her garb and gloves were just as fresh and spotless. _She_ had not been ladling out milk and cream, or buttering sandwiches, or pinning souvenirs on dusty blue blouses ever since early morning. Other faces there showed through all their smiles and sweetness the traces of long days of unaccustomed work and short nights of troubled sleep. Marvelous were Mrs. Frank Garrison's recuperative powers, thought they who saw her brought home in the Primes' stylish carriage, weak and helpless and shaken after her adventure of the previous day. She had not been at the Presidio a week, and yet she pervaded it. She had never thought of such a thing as the Red Cross until she found it the center of the social firmament after her arrival at San Francisco, and here she was, the last comer, the foremost ("most forward" I _think_ some one described it) in their circle at one of the most prominent tables, absorbing much of the attention, most of the glory, and none of the fatigue that should have been equally shared by all. "_Adios_!" she gayly cried as the "assembly" rang out, loud and clear, and waving their hands and raising their caps, the officers hastened to join their commands. "_Adios_, till we meet in Manila." "Do you _really_ think of going to the Philippines, Mrs. Garrison?" queried a much older-looking, yet younger woman. "Why, _we_ were told the General said that none of his staff would be allowed to take their wives." "Yet there are others!" laughed Mrs. Garrison, waving a dainty handkerchief toward the troops now breaking into column of twos and slowly climbing the stage. "Who would _want_ to go with that blessed old undertaker? Good-by--_bon voyage_, Geordie," she cried, blowing a kiss to the lieutenant at the head of the second troop, a youth who blushed and looked confused at the attention thereby centered upon him, and who would fain have shaken his fist, rather than waved the one unoccupied hand in perfunctory reply. "When _I_ go I'll choose a ship with a band and broad decks, not any such cramped old canal boat as the Portland." "Oh! I thought perhaps your husband--" began the lady dubiously, but with a significant glance at the silent faces about her.