Mrs. Meadows possibly overestimated the post commandant's interest in these matters, but she had gratefully remembered his civility to her husband when he went to make fatherly inquiries. The colonel was a father himself, and had seemed to appreciate their anxiety about Callie's choice. It was just as well that Meta should know that none of the constituted authorities were on the side of her lover's defection. Meta said nothing to all this. It did not touch her, only as it bore on the one question, Was Henniker going to leave her behind him? "How long is it since you have seen him, that he hasn't told you this news himself?" asked the mother. "Last night; but perhaps he did not know." Henniker had known, as Mrs. Meadows supposed, but having to shift for himself in the matter of transportation for the wife he had never acknowledged, and seeing no way of providing for her without considerable inconvenience to himself, he had put off the pain of breaking to her the parting that must come. In their later consultations Meta had mentioned her "pony money," as she called it, and Henniker had privately welcomed the existence of such a fund. It lightened the pressure of his own responsibility in the future, in case--but he did not formulate his doubts. There are more uncertainties than anything else, except hard work, in the life of an enlisted man. Father Meadows purposely would not speak of Meta's resources. He felt that Henniker had not earned his confidence in this or any other respect where his girls were concerned. Till Meta should come of age,--she was barely sixteen,--or until it could be known what sort of a husband she had got in Henniker, her bit of money was safest in her guardian's hands. So the orders came, and the transfer of troops was made; and now it was the trumpeter of C troop that sounded the calls, and Henniker's bold messages at guard-mounting and his tender good-night at taps called no more across the plain. The summer lilies were all dead on the hills, and the common was white with snow. But something in Meta's heart said,-- "'Weep no more! Oh, weep no more! Young buds sleep in the root's white core.'" And she dried her eyes. The mother was very gentle with her; and Callie, hard-eyed, saying nothing, watched her, and did her little cruel kindnesses that cut to the quick of her soreness and her pride.