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 From the careless, wilful, pretty Peggy Moore of eight years before, she had grown into a sweet, serious girl of twenty-two. The sorrow of the past four years and the strain of the long waiting had chastened and refined her. It was a rare, sweet soul that looked out at the trooper through her smiling face.

"Did Palo'mine get wounded any?" she inquired at last when she had admired all his fine points.

"Oh yes," said Halsey, "He got his scratches with the rest of us. Here old Pal, hold down your head," he said to the horse, touching him lightly on his nose. Palo'mine held down his head as he did when he said grace. The trooper straightened out one of his expressive ears and showed a small hole in it.

"That was made by a minie ball at Look-off Mountain," he said simply.

"Oh," cried Peggy, "I'm glad it was no lower down."

Next Halsey opened up the thoroughbred's mane and showed that one layer of