CHAPTER VIII.--THE DASHING DRAGOON.
Colonel Dick Ivey was a bachelor and a man of vast wealth.
He had been an only son, and the idol of his boyhood life had been hissister, two years his junior.
Their parents had been wealthy, and they dated their ancestry back formany generations, and the father of the young Richard had been anxiousto have his son become a soldier, and so got for him a cadetship at WestPoint.
A handsome, dashing youth, generous to a fault, Dick Ivey had won thehearts of professors and comrades alike, and none of the latter hadenvied him the first honours of his class when he had graduated, whilethe instructors had said they were well won and deserved.
There were four persons present at the graduating exercises that Dickwas most desirous of pleasing, and these were his parents, his sister,and her best friend, the young cadet's lady-love.
But, in spite of his honours won, the fickle young lady-love had flirtedwith the honoured cadet, refused his proffered love, and becameinfatuated, as it were, with a brother cadet of her old lover.
It cut Dick Ivey to the heart, but he nursed his sorrow in silence,uttered no complaint, and went to the border with his regiment, to soonwin distinction as a daring officer.
The fickle maiden meanwhile married the successful rival, and two yearsafter died, it was said, of a broken heart.
The news came to Dick Ivey that his sister was to marry, and when heheard whom it was that was to be her husband, he obtained a furlough andstarted for his home to warn her against the man who had broken theheart of his old lady-love.
But, wounded on the way, in a fight with Indians, he was laid up forweeks, and arrived too late, for his sister had married the man whom henow hated with all his soul.
Soon after the Mexican war broke out, and as the American army crossedthe Rio Grande, Dick Ivey met his old rival, and learned of his sister'sdeath.
Soon after a letter came to him, written by his sister, and given tosome faithful servant to mail.
It told of her sorrows, her sufferings, the cruelties of the man she hadloved, and that she too was dying of a broken heart.
At once did Dick Ivey seek the man who had wrecked the lives of two whomhe had so dearly loved, and what he said was terse, to the point, and indeadly earnest. It was:
"You know my cause of quarrel with you, sir, and that now is no time tosettle it, for we belong to our country.
"But, the day this war ends, if you and I are alive, you shall meet meon the field of honour, and but one of us shall ever leave it alive."
And all through the war did Dick Ivey win fame, and he became a hero inthe eyes of his gallant comrades.
At last the war ended, the City of Mexico was in the hands of GeneralScott, and the Daring Dragoons, commanded by Colonel Ivey, were orderedhome.
Instantly, he sought his rival, and reminded him of his words at thebreaking out of hostilities, and the two met in personal combat upon theduelling field.
It was a duel with swords, and each man meant that it should be to thedeath, that no mercy should be shown, and it could end in but oneway--the death of one, or both.
It was fought through to the bitter end, and Dick Ivey left his hatedenemy dead upon the field.
Resigning his commission, he returned to his home in the State ofMississippi, and yet he remained there but a short while, for the spiritof unrest was upon him, and the papers teeming with stories of hiscareer, he sailed for foreign lands and remained abroad for years.
Again, he returned to America and settled in an elegant bachelor-homeupon a fashionable avenue in New York city, a man of noble impulses, yetone upon whose life a shadow had fallen, and who carried in his heart askeleton of bitter memories.
Such was the man who had found Will Raymond's lost gold-piece, and hiscareer, from a cadet at West Point, to his living a luxurious bachelorlife in New York, Mrs. Raymond read to her children that Thanksgivingnight after he had left; for the distinguished soldier had begged aninvitation to eat his Thanksgiving turkey that day in the humble home ofthe woman he had so strangely met, and who, by some strange accident,had pasted in her scrap-book his picture, as a young soldier, and thescraps of his life history as she had then read them, never dreamingthat she would meet the hero with the dark, handsome face, dressed inhis gorgeous Dragoon uniform.
To her children then, that Thanksgiving night, after he had departed,Mrs. Raymond read the history of the Dashing Dragoon, and he became toWill and Pearl a hero also in their eyes, and warm was the welcome thathe received when he came the next day to tell Mrs. Raymond that he hadadopted all of them as _protegees_, and meant to take them to a pleasanthome and send the children to school.
This promise he kept, for he would not be said nay, and Mrs. Raymond,grown almost happy-faced with the change, moved to a pleasant littlehome in the upper part of the city, and Will and Pearl daily attendedthe most fashionable schools in the metropolis.
Months thus passed away, Colonel Ivey taking his Sunday dinner with themother and her children at first, and then calling oftener and oftener,until one night he called Will and Pearl to him and told them that hehad asked their mother to become his wife, and that she had said thatshe would.
It made them happy, for they were glad to see joy in the face of theirdearly loved mother, and soon after Mrs. Ruby Raymond became Mrs.Richard Ivey.
It was a quiet wedding in the cosey home, and then into the grandmansion of Colonel Ivey the mother and her children moved, and sunshineseemed to brighten all their pathway through life; but alas! who can seeinto the future, who can tell how far beyond the sunshine lie theshadows that must fall upon our lives, shutting out all brightness,encircling them with gloom as black as the grave, and far more cruel.