Felipa had taken charge of the two, being the only woman in the place not already provided with children of her own, and had roused herself to an amount of capability her husband had never suspected her of. She belonged to the tribe of unoccupied women, as a rule, not that she was indolent so much as that she appeared to have no sense of time nor of the value of it. Landor, who had always one absorbing interest or another to expend his whole energy upon, even if it were nothing larger than running the troop kitchen, thought her quite aimless, though he never addressed that or any other reproach to her. He was contented at the advent of the hapless orphans for one thing, that they superseded the Ellton baby, which he secretly detested with a kind of unreasonable jealousy. It was the first scene of the closing act of the tragic comedy of the Geronimo campaign. That wily old devil, weary temporarily of the bloodshed he had continued with more or less regularity for many years, had[Pg 297] sent word to the officers that he would meet them without their commands, in the Ca?on de los Embudos, across the border line, to discuss the terms of surrender. The officers had forthwith come, Crook yet hopeful that something might be accomplished by honesty and plain dealing; the others, for the most part, doubting. He found Billings, all unconscious of the impending storm, dealing out wrath on those who were hauled before him. "I hardly think there's any danger," said Conductor Madden. "Things 've been very quiet this side of the Tennessee River ever since last October, when Crook, Wilder and Minty belted the life out of old Joe Wheeler down there at Farmington and Rodgersville. Our cavalry gave theirs an awful mauling, and them that were lucky enough to escape acrost the river have seemed purty well satisfied to stay on that side. A hell's mint of 'em were drowned trying to get acrost the river. Our cavalry's been patrolling the country ever since, but hasn't seen anything of consequence. Still, it is possible that some gang has managed to sneak acrost a blind-ford somewhere, and in hopes to catch a train. Guerrillas are always where you find 'em." "Them that we shot?" said Shorty carelessly, feeling around for his tobacco to refill his pipe. "Nothin'. I guess we've done enough for 'em already." The whip-poor-wills began to fill the evening air with their mournful calls, which accentuated and intensified the weird loneliness of the scene, where but a little while before there had been no thought but of deadly hatred and bitter strife. Robert bit off the end of his pencil, which his father,[Pg 160] who was looking the other way, luckily did not see. The boy crouched over the fire, trying to hide his trembling, and longing yet not daring to ask a hundred questions. He was glad and at the same time sorry when Reuben having explained to him the right and the wrong way of sowing beans, and enlarged on the wickedness of Radicals in general and Gladstone in particular, returned to Bardon's loss. "Hullo," said Pete. Something in his brother's pitiable condition seemed to have touched him. HoME欧美色操下身女图
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