"Did I? Well, you shall see them, although they are not as good as I shall do next year. One has to learn to handle new material. Your Western atmosphere is so different from that of Giverney, in which we all paint in Paris; then, the feeling of the landscape is so different; everything is so firm and crisp in line--but I am going to get it! 'There is the mystery of light as well as of the dark,' Meunnot used to say to us, and if I can get that clear shimmer, and the vibration of the vivid color of the savage in the midst of it--" She broke off as if in contemplation of the problem, rapt with question how to solve it. "There speaks the artist in you, and it is fine. But I'd like you to see the humanitarian side of life, too," he replied. "There is none," she instantly replied, with a curious blending of defiance and amusement. "I belong to the world of Light and Might--" "And I to the world of Right--what about that?" "Light and Might make right." "Your team is wrongly harnessed--Light and Right are co-workers. Might fears both Light and Right." Mrs. Wilcox, who had been listening, fairly clapped her hands. "I'm glad to have you refute her arguments, Captain. She is absolutely heartless in her theories--in practice she's a nice girl." Elsie laughed. "What amuses me is that a soldier, the embodiment of Might, should dare to talk of Right." Curtis grew grave. "If I did not think that my profession at bottom guarded the rights of both white men and red, I'd resign instantly. Our army is only an impartial instrument for preserving justice." "That isn't the old-world notion," put in Lawson from across the table. "It is _our_ notion," stoutly replied Curtis. "Our little army to-day stands towards the whole nation as a police force relates itself to a city--a power that interferes only to prevent aggression of one interest on the rights of another." Brisbane's big, flat voice took up the theme. "That's a very pretty theory, but you'll find plenty to claim that the army is an instrument of oppression." "I'll admit it is sometimes wrongly used," Curtis replied. "We who are in the field can't help that, however. We are under orders. Of course," he added, modestly, "I am only a young soldier. I have seen but ten years of service, and I have taken part in but one campaign--a war I considered unavoidable at that time." "You would hold, then, that an officer of the army has a right to convictions?" queried Brisbane, in the tone of the lawyer. "Most certainly. A man does not cease to think upon entering the army." "That's dangerous doctrine." "It's the American idea. What people would suffer by having its army intelligent?" Lawson coughed significantly. "Bring forth the black-swathed axe--treason has upreared her head." It was plain that Brisbane was lying in wait for him. Curtis whispered to Elsie: "Rescue me! Your father is planning to quiz me, and I must not talk before I report to the department."