THE OLD REGIMENT By the time Hampton swung up the _coulee_, he had dismissed from his attention everything but the business that had brought him there.

No lingering thought of Naida, or of the miserable Murphy, was permitted to interfere with the serious work before him.

To be once again with the old Seventh was itself inspiration; to ride with them into battle was the chief desire of his heart.

It was a dream of years, which he had never supposed possible of fulfilment, and he rode rapidly forward, his lips smiling, the sunshine of noonday lighting up his face.
He experienced no fear, no premonition of coming disaster, yet the reawakened plainsman in him kept him sufficiently wary and cautious.
The faint note of discontent apparent in Brant's concluding words--doubtless merely an echo of that ambitious officer's dislike at being put on guard over the pack-train at such a moment--awoke no response in his mind.

He possessed a soldier's proud confidence in his regiment--the supposition that the old fighting Seventh could be defeated was impossible; the Indians did not ride those uplands who could do the deed! Then there came to him a nameless dread, that instinctive shrinking which a proud, sensitive man must ever feel at having to face his old companions with the shadow of a crime between.
In his memory he saw once more a low-ceiled room, having a table extending down the centre, with grave-faced men, dressed in the full uniform of the service, looking at him amid a silence like unto death; and at the head sat a man with long fair hair and mustache, his proud eyes never to be forgotten.