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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Littlest Rebel, by Edward Peple
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Littlest Rebel
+
+Author: Edward Peple
+
+Release Date: March 19, 2005 [EBook #15414]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LITTLEST REBEL ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Suzanne Lybarger, Josephine Paolucci and the
+PG Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+The
+
+LITTLEST REBEL
+
+By
+
+EDWARD PEPLE
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP: _Publishers_
+
+NEW YORK
+
+Copyright, 1914 By the ESTATE OF EDWARD H. PEPLE
+
+ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM
+WITHOUT PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM THE PUBLISHER.
+
+_Printed in the United States of America_
+
+
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+
+The play, from which this book is written, was in no sense of the word
+intended as a war drama; for war is merely its background, and always in
+the center stands a lonely little child.
+
+War is its theme but not its purpose. War breeds hatred, horror,
+pestilence and famine, yet from its tears and ashes eventually must rise
+the clean white spirit of HUMANITY.
+
+The enmity between North and South is dead; it sleeps with the fathers
+and the sons, the brothers and the lovers, who died in a cause which
+each believed was just.
+
+Therefore this story deals, not with the right or wrong of a lost
+confederacy, but with the mercy and generosity, the chivalry and
+humanity which lived in the hearts of the Blue and Gray, a noble
+contrast to the grim brutality of war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The author is indebted to Mr. E.S. Moffat, who has novelized the play
+directly from its text, with the exception of that portion which
+appeared as a short story under the same title several years ago,
+treating of Virgie in the overseer's cabin, and the endorsing of her
+pass by Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison.
+
+EDWARD PEPLE.
+
+
+
+
+THE LITTLEST REBEL
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+Young Mrs. Herbert Cary picked up her work basket and slowly crossed the
+grass to a shady bench underneath the trees. She must go on with her
+task of planning a dress for Virgie. But the prospect of making her
+daughter something wearable out of the odds and ends of nothing was not
+a happy one. In fact, she was still poking through her basket and
+frowning thoughtfully when a childish voice came to her ears.
+
+"Yes, Virgie! Here I am. Out under the trees."
+
+Immediately came a sound of tumultuous feet and Miss Virginia Houston
+Cary burst upon the scene. She was a tot of seven with sun touched hair
+and great dark eyes whose witchery made her a piquant little fairy. In
+spite of her mother's despair over her clothes Virgie was dressed, or
+at least had been dressed at breakfast time, in a clean white frock, low
+shoes and white stockings, although all now showed signs of strenuous
+usage. Clutched to her breast as she ran up to her mother's side was
+"Susan Jemima," her one beloved possession and her doll. Behind Virgie
+came Sally Ann, her playmate, a slim, barefooted mulatto girl whose
+faded, gingham dress hung partly in tatters, halfway between her knees
+and ankles. In one of Sally Ann's hands, carried like a sword, was a
+pointed stick; in the other, a long piece of blue wood-moss from which
+dangled a bit of string.
+
+"Oh, Mother," cried the small daughter of the Carys, as she came up
+flushed and excited, "what do you reckon Sally Ann and me have been
+playing out in the woods!"
+
+"What, dear!" and Mrs. Cary's gentle hand went up to lift the hair back
+from her daughter's dampened forehead.
+
+"_Blue Beard_!" cried Virgie, with rounded eyes.
+
+"Blue Beard!" echoed her mother in astonishment at this childish freak
+of amusement.
+
+"Not really--on this hot day."
+
+"Um, hum," nodded Virgie emphatically. "You know he--he--he was the
+terriblest old man that--that ever was. An' he had so many wifses
+that--"
+
+"Say 'wives,' my darling. _Wives_."
+
+Sally Ann laughed and Virgie frowned.
+
+"Well, I _thought_ it was that, but Sally Ann's older'n me and she said
+'wifses.'"
+
+"Huh," grunted Sally Ann. "Don' make no differ'nce what you call 'em,
+des so he had 'em. Gor'n tell her."
+
+"Well, you know, Mother, Blue Beard had such a bad habit of killin' his
+wives that--that some of the ladies got so they--they almost didn't like
+to marry him!"
+
+"Gracious, what a state of affairs," cried Mrs. Cary, in well feigned
+amazement at the timidity of the various Mrs. Blue Beards. "And then--"
+
+"Well, the last time he got married to--to another one--her name was
+Mrs. Fatima. An'--an' I've been playin' _her_."
+
+"And who played Blue Beard?"
+
+"Sally Ann--an' she's just fine. Come here, Sally Ann, an' let's show
+her. Kneel down."
+
+Clutching the piece of moss from Sally Ann, Virgie ran behind the girl
+and put her chubby arms around her neck. "This is his blue beard,
+Mother. Hold still, Sally Ann--_My lord_, I mean--till I get it tied in
+the right place."
+
+"Be keerful, Miss Virgie," advised the colored girl. "You's a-ticklin'
+my nose. I'se gwine to sneeze ef yo' don't, and jes blow my beard all
+away."
+
+"Oh, don't be such a baby," remonstrated the earnest Miss Virginia, with
+a correcting slap. "S'pose you were a man an' had to wear one all the
+time. Now! Stand up! Look, Mother!"
+
+"I'm afraid of him already. He's so ferocious."
+
+"Isn't he? Oh, won't _you_ play with us, Mother? I'll--I'll let you be
+Mrs. Fatima." And then, as her mother's face showed signs of doubt as to
+her histrionic ability, "If you were _my_ little girl, I'd do it in a
+minute."
+
+"All right, dear, of course I will; but I've just remembered a bit of
+lace in your grandmother's trunk in the attic. I believe it will be
+exactly enough for the neck and sleeves of your new dress." She smiled
+courageously as she folded a piece of old silk she was remaking. "You
+and--" she cast a glance at Sally Ann--"your respected brother-in-law
+can wait a few moments, can't you? You might rehearse a little more.
+With all this important audience of solemn oaks you wouldn't want to
+make the slightest slip in your parts."
+
+"That's so," agreed Virgie, raising her hands and clasping her tiny
+fingers thoughtfully. "And I'll tell you what--we'll mark off the castle
+walls around the bench where the window's going to be. We ought to have
+a stage. Come on Sal--I mean Blue Beard, pick up some sticks quick."
+
+Mrs. Cary started, but turned back an instant: "By the way, have either
+of you seen Uncle Billy. I' must find him, too, and plan something for
+our lunch."
+
+"I seen 'im early dis mawnin'," piped Blue Beard, "makin' for de woods.
+I reckon he be back pres'n'y."
+
+"Very well," answered Virgie's mother, a shadow creeping into her face
+as she went on toward the house. Could Uncle Billy possibly be leaving!
+The most trusted negro of all! No--_never_! She would almost as soon
+doubt the cause itself!
+
+Three long years ago war had seemed a thrilling, daring necessity.
+Caught in the dreadful net of circumstance she had vowed proudly in her
+own heart never to be less brave than the bravest. In her ears still
+rang the echo of that first ...
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+_Tara-tara!_
+
+From far away a faint fanfare of trumpets, borne on brazen wings from
+the distant clamor of the city's streets.
+
+_Tara-tara!_
+
+"What's that--a bugle?"
+
+_R-r-r-r-rum-dum!_
+
+"And that--a drum?"
+
+_Tramp--tramp--tramp_--the rolling thunder of ten thousand feet.
+
+_War has been declared!_
+
+From North to South, the marching lines fill the land--a sea of men
+whose flashing bayonets glisten and glitter in the morning light. With
+steady step and even rank, with thrill of brass lunged band and
+screaming fife the regiments sweep by--in front, the officers on their
+dancing steeds--behind them, line after line of youthful faces, chins
+in, chests out, the light of victory already shining in their eyes.
+
+In just this way the Nation's sons went forth to fight in those first
+brave days of '61. Just so they marched out, defiant, from South and
+North alike, each side eager for the cause he thought was right, with
+bright pennons snapping in the breeze and bugles blowing gayly and never
+a thought in any man's mind but that _his_ side would win and his own
+life be spared.
+
+And every woman, too, waving cheerful farewell to valiant lines of
+marching gray or sturdy ranks of blue, had hoped the same for _her_
+side.
+
+But in war there is always a reckoning to pay. Always one contender
+driven to the wall, his cities turned to ashes, his lands laid waste.
+Always one depleted side which takes one last desperate stand in the
+sight of blackened homes and outraged fields and fights on through ever
+darkening days until the inevitable end is come.
+
+And the end of the Confederacy was now almost in sight. Three years of
+fighting and the Seceding States had been cut in twain, their armies
+widely separated by the Union hosts. Advancing and retreating but always
+fighting, month after month, year after year the men in gray had come at
+last to the bitterest period of it all--when the weakened South was
+slowly breaking under the weight of her brother foes--when the two
+greatest of the armies battled on Virginia soil--battled and passed to
+their final muster roll.
+
+Of little need to tell of the privations which the pivotal state of the
+Confederacy went through. If it were true that Virginia had been simply
+one vast arsenal where every inhabitant had unfailingly done his part in
+making war, it was also true that she had furnished many of its greatest
+battlefields--and at what a frightful cost.
+
+Everywhere were the cruel signs of destruction and want--in scanty
+larder, patched, refurbished clothing, servantless homes--in dismantled
+outhouses, broken fences and neglected, brier-choked fields. Even the
+staples of life were fast diminishing for every man who could shoulder
+a gun had gone to fight with Lee, and few animals were left and fewer
+slaves.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Yet, for all the dismal outlook, Winter had passed without actual
+disaster to the Confederate arms and now that Spring had come the
+plantation home of the Herbert Carys, twenty miles below Richmond, had
+never had a fairer setting. White-pillared and stately the old Colonial
+mansion stood on one of the low, emerald hills which roll back lazily
+from the peaceful James. It was true that the flower beds had been
+trampled down to ruin by alien horse and heel, but the scent of the
+honeysuckle clinging to those shining pillars only seemed the sweeter
+for the loss, and whatever else the forager might take, he could not rob
+them of their gracious vista of hills and shimmering river.
+
+Across the broad driveway and up the steps of the veranda passed Mrs.
+Cary, fairer than had been the flowers, a true daughter of the oldtime
+South, gentle and quiet eyed, her light summer dress of the cheapest
+material, yet deftly fashioned by her own fingers from slightly opened
+neck, where an old brooch lay against her soft throat, down to the
+dainty spotless flounces lying above her petticoat of crinoline.
+
+Though her lips and eyes refused to betray it even when there was no one
+to see, it was with a very heavy heart that she mounted the stairs to
+the attic, thinking, contriving, clutching desperately at her fading
+hopes.
+
+For good reason the plantation was very silent on this warm spring
+morning. Where only a year before dozens of soft eyed Jerseys had ranged
+through the pastures and wood lots there was now no sound of tinkling
+bells--one after another the fine, blooded stock had been requisitioned
+by a sad faced quartermaster of the Army of Northern Virginia. And one
+by one the fat porkers who had muzzled greedily among the ears from the
+Cary bins and who ought to have gone into the smoke house had departed,
+squealing, to furnish bone and sinew with which to repel the invader.
+Saddest of all, the chicken coops down by the deserted negro quarters
+were quite as empty as the once teeming cabins themselves. Poverty, grim
+and relentless, had caught the Carys in its iron hand and behind
+Poverty stood its far more frightening shadow--Starvation.
+
+But in these gloomy thoughts she was not entirely alone. All that
+troubled her and more, though perhaps in a different way, passed hourly
+through the old gray kinky head of Uncle Billy who happened at this very
+moment to be emerging stealthily from the woods below the house. Slowly
+and deliberately he made his way toward the front till he reached a
+bench where he sat down under a tree to ruminate over the situation and
+inspect the feathered prize which he had lately acquired by certain,
+devious means known only to Uncle Billy. Wiping his forehead with his
+ragged sleeve and holding the bird up by its tied feet he regarded it
+with the eye of an expert, and the fatigue of one who has been sorely
+put to it in order to accomplish his purpose.
+
+"It 'pears to me," said Uncle Billy, "dat des' when you needs 'em the
+mostest the chickens goes to roosting higher 'n' higher. Rooster--I
+wonder who you b'longs to. Um-_um_!" he murmured as he thoughtfully
+sounded the rooster's well developed chest through the feathers. "From
+de feelin' of you, my son, I 'spec' you was raise' by one er de ol'es'
+fam'lies what is!"
+
+But Uncle Billy knew the fortunes of the Cary family far too well to
+mourn over the probable toughness of his booty, and as he rose up from
+the seat and meandered toward the kitchen, his old, wrinkled face broke
+into a broad smile of satisfaction over the surprise he had in store.
+"Well--after I done parbile you, I reckon Miss Hallie be mighty glad to
+see you. Yas, _seh_!"
+
+But as Uncle Billy walked slowly along beside the hedge which shielded
+the house on one side he heard a sound which made him halt. A young
+negro, coming from the rear, had dodged behind the hedge and was trying
+to keep out of his sight.
+
+"Hi, dar! You, Jeems Henry!" shouted Uncle Billy, instantly suspicious
+of such maneuvers. "Come heh! Hear _me_! Come heh!"
+
+At this sudden command a young mulatto, hesitating, came through a break
+in the hedge and stood looking at him, sullen and silent. In his hands
+he carried a small bundle done up in a colored handkerchief and on this
+guilty piece of baggage Uncle Billy's eye immediately fastened with an
+angry frown.
+
+"Whar you gwine?" demanded Uncle Billy, with an accusing finger
+trembling at the bundle.
+
+The younger man made no reply.
+
+"Hear _me_?" the elder demanded again in rising tones of severity.
+"Ain't you got no tongue in yo' haid? Whar you gwine?"
+
+Shifting from one foot to the other the younger man finally broke away
+from Uncle Billy's eye and tried to pass him by.
+
+"Den _I'll_ tell you whar you gwine," shouted Uncle Billy, furious at
+last. "You's runnin' 'way to de Yankees, dat's whar you gwine."
+
+At this too truthful thrust Jeems Henry saw that further deceit would be
+futile and he faced Uncle Billy with sullen resentment.
+
+"An' s'posin' I _is_--wat den?"
+
+"Den you's a thief," retorted Uncle Billy with dismayingly quick wit.
+"Dat's what you is--a _thief_."
+
+"I _ain'_ no thief," Jeems Henry refuted stubbornly, "_I_ ain' stole
+nothin'."
+
+"You is too," and Uncle Billy's forefinger began to shake in the
+other's face. "You's stealin' a _nigger_!"
+
+"What dat?" and Jeems Henry's eyes opened wide with amazement. "What you
+talkin' 'bout?"
+
+"Talkin' 'bout _you_," replied Uncle Billy, sharper than ever. "Dey say
+a nigger's wuth a thousan' dollars. 'Cose _you_ ain't wuth dat much," he
+said with utter disgust. "I put you down at a dollar and a quarter. But
+dat ain't de p'int," and he steadily advanced on the other till their
+faces were only a few inches apart. "It's dis. _You_, Jeems Henry,
+belongs to Mars' Herbert Cary an' Miss Hallie; an' when you runs 'way
+you's stealin'. _You's stealin yo'sef!_"
+
+"H'm!" sniffed Jeems Henry, now that the nature and extent of his crime
+were fully understood. "Ef I ain' wuth but a dollar an' a quarter, I
+suttenly ain' stealin' _much_!"
+
+At this smart reply Uncle Billy's disgust overcame him completely and he
+tossed the rooster on the ground and clutched Jeems Henry by the arm.
+
+"You mighty right, you ain't!" he shouted. "An' ef I was fo' years
+younger I'd take it outer yo' hide with a carriage whip. Hol' on dar,"
+as Jeems Henry eluded his grasp and began to move away. "Which way you
+gwine? You hear me? Now den!"
+
+"I gwine up de river," replied Jeems Henry, badgered at last into
+revealing his plan. Then, after a cautious look around,--"to
+Chickahominy Swamp," he added in lower tones.
+
+Uncle Billy cocked his ears. Here was news indeed.
+
+"Chickahominy, huh! So de Yankees is up dar, is dey? An' what you think
+you gwine to do when you git to 'em?"
+
+"Wuck 'roun de camp," replied Jeems Henry with some vagueness.
+
+"Doin' what?" was the relentless query.
+
+"Blackin' de gent'men's boots--an'--an' gittin' paid fer it," Jeems
+Henry stammered in reply. "It's better'n being a slave, Unc' Billy," he
+added as he saw the sneer of contempt on the faithful old man's face.
+"An' ef you wan' sech a crazy ol' fool, you'd come along wid me, too."
+
+At this combination of temptation and insult Uncle Billy's eyes narrowed
+with contempt and loathing. "Me?" he said, and a rigid arm pointed back
+at the house which had been for years his source of shelter and comfort.
+"Me leave Miss Hallie _now_? Right when she ain't got _nothin_'? Look
+heah, nigger; dog-gone yo' skin, I got a great min' for to mash yo'
+mouf. Yas, I _is_ a slave. I b'longs to Mars Cary--an' I b'longed to his
+pa befo' him. Dey feed me and gimme de bes' dey got. Dey take care of me
+when I'm sick--an' dey take care of me when I'm well--an' _I_ gwine to
+stay right here. But you? You jes' go on wid de Yankees, an' black der
+boots. Dey'll free you," and Uncle Billy's voice rose in prophetic
+tones--"an you'll _keep on_ blackin' boots! Go 'long now, you low-down,
+dollar-an'-a-quarter nigger!" as Jeems Henry backed away. "Go long wid
+yo' _Yankee_ marsters--and git yo' freedom an' a blackin' brush."
+
+So engrossed were both the actors in this drama that they failed to
+hear the sound of footsteps on the veranda, and it was so that the
+mistress of the manor found the would-be runaway and the old slave,
+glaring into each other's eyes and insulting one another volubly.
+
+Mrs. Cary, with her workbasket on her arm, paused at the top of the
+steps and regarded the angry pair with well-bred surprise.
+
+"Why, Uncle Billy," she queried, "what is going on here? What _is_ the
+matter?"
+
+"It's Jeems Henry; dat's what's de matter," said Uncle Billy, in defense
+of his agitation. "He's runnin' 'way to de Yankees."
+
+Mrs. Cary stopped short for a moment and then came slowly down the
+steps.
+
+"Oh, James," she said, unbelievingly. "Is this really true?"
+
+Jeems Henry hung his head and dug at the gravel with his toe.
+
+"I'm sorry," said Mrs. Cary, and the word held a world of painful
+thought--of self-accusation, of hopeless regret, of sorrow for one who
+could be so foolishly misguided. "I'm sorry not only for ourselves but
+for _you_. You know, I promised Mammy before she died that I would look
+after you--always."
+
+Still Jeems Henry made no answer and old Uncle Billy saw fit to make a
+disclosure.
+
+"He's gwine up to Chickahominy." Then to Jeems Henry he added something
+in low tones which made the young negro's eyes roll wildly with fear.
+"Dey tells me dat der's _hants_ and _ghoses_ over dar. I hopes dey'll
+git you."
+
+"Stop that!" commanded Mrs. Cary. "You know very well, Uncle Billy,
+there are no such things as ghosts."
+
+"Nor'm I don't, Miss Hallie," responded Uncle Billy, sticking
+tenaciously to his point, because he could plainly see Jeems Henry
+wavering. "'Twas jes las' night I hear one--moanin' 'roun' de smoke
+house. An' ef I ain't mighty fur wrong, she was smellin' arfter Jeems
+Henry."
+
+At this wild fabrication, the reason for which she nevertheless
+appreciated, Mrs. Cary had hard work to hold back a smile, although she
+promptly reassured the terrified Jeems Henry.
+
+"There now--there--that will do. Nothing of that kind will trouble you,
+James; you may take my word for it. If you are quite determined to go I
+shall not try to keep you. But what have you in that bundle?"
+
+"Hi! Hi! Dat's de way to talk!" interrupted Uncle Billy, excitedly
+foreseeing means to prevent Jeems Henry's departure. "What you got in
+yo' bundle?"
+
+Jeems Henry lifted his anguished eyes and gazed truthfully at his
+mistress.
+
+"I ain't got nothin'--what don't b'long to me, Miss Hallie."
+
+"I don't mean that," Mrs. Cary responded kindly. "But you have a long
+tramp before you. Have you anything to eat?"
+
+"Nor'm, I ain't," and Jeems Henry seemed disturbed.
+
+"Then you'd better come around to the kitchen. We'll see what we can
+find."
+
+At this unheard-of generosity, Uncle Billy's eyes opened widely and he
+exploded in remonstrance.
+
+"Now, hol' on dar, Miss Hallie! Hol' on. You ain' got none too much fo'
+yo'se'f, d'out stuffin' dis yere six-bit rat hole wid waffles an'
+milasses."
+
+"_William!_" commanded his mistress.
+
+"Yas'm," was the meek response, and Uncle Billy subsided into silence.
+
+With a sigh, Mrs. Cary turned away toward the house. "Well, James, are
+you coming?"
+
+But Jeems Henry, completely abashed before this miracle of kindness
+which he did not deserve, decided that it was time for him to be a man.
+
+"Thank you, Miss Hallie," he gulped, "but f'um now on I reckon I gwine
+take keer of myse'f."
+
+Mrs. Cary, pausing on the bottom step, raised her eyes heavenward in a
+short prayer that children such as these might somehow be protected from
+themselves.
+
+"Well, James," she said, when she saw there was nothing more to be done.
+"I hope you'll be happy and contented. If you are not--come back to us.
+Perhaps, when the war is over, you'll find things a little
+more--comfortable. Good-by, James," and she held out her hand.
+
+But this last touch of gentleness was too much for the young mulatto.
+Although he made an obedient step forward, his feelings overcame him and
+with an audible snuffle and his hand over his eyes he retreated--then
+turned his back and plunged through the hedge.
+
+Mrs. Cary sank down on the step and looked as if she, too, would like to
+cry.
+
+Manfully, Uncle Billy came to her rescue. "Now don't you care, Miss
+Hallie. He wan' no 'count for plowin' no how."
+
+"Oh, it isn't that, Uncle Billy," Mrs. Cary replied with a low cry of
+regret. "It isn't the actual loss of help, tho' we need it, goodness
+knows. But it makes me sad to see them leaving, one by one. They are
+such children and so helpless--without a master hand."
+
+"Yas'm," agreed Uncle Billy readily. "An' de marster's han' ought to
+have a hick'ry stick in it fer _dat_ nigger. Yas, bless Gawd. But you
+got _me_, Miss Hallie," he announced proudly. "_I_ ain't runned away to
+de blue-bellies yet."
+
+"No, you dear old thing," Mrs. Cary cried with laughing relief, and her
+hand rested on his shoulder in a gentle caress. "I'd as soon think of
+the skies falling. It is just such faithful friends as you who help me
+to fight the best."
+
+"Um?" said Uncle Billy promptly, not quite understanding.
+
+"I mean a woman's battles, Uncle Billy--the _waiting_ battles--that we
+fight alone." Mrs. Gary rose to her feet and turned sadly away.
+
+"Yas'm," agreed Uncle Billy. "I dunno what yo' talkin' 'bout but I spec'
+you's right. Yas'm."
+
+"Dear Uncle Billy," repeated Mrs. Gary, while her eyes filled with
+tears. "The most truthful--the most _honest_--"
+
+Mrs. Cary stopped and looked sharply at something lying on the ground
+beside the steps. Then she turned and swept the old man with an accusing
+glance which made him quail.
+
+"_William!_" she said, in awful tones.
+
+"Yas'm," replied Uncle Billy, feverishly.
+
+"What's _that_?"
+
+Uncle Billy immediately became the very picture of innocence and
+ignorance. He looked everywhere but at the helpless rooster.
+
+"What's what?" he asked. "Aw, dat? Why--why, dat ain' nothin' 'tall,
+Miss Hallie. Dat's--dat's des a _rooster_. Yas'm."
+
+Mrs. Cary came down from the steps and looked carefully at the
+unfamiliar bird. No fear that she would not recognize it if it were
+hers. "Whose is he?" she asked.
+
+"You--you mean who he b'longs to?" queried Uncle Billy, fencing for time
+in which to prepare a quasi-truthful reply. "He--he don' b'long to
+_nobody_. He's his _own_ rooster."
+
+"William!" commanded Mrs. Cary, severely. "Look at me. _Where_ did you
+get him?"
+
+Here was a situation which Uncle Billy knew must be handled promptly,
+and he picked up the rooster and made an attempt to escape. "Down on de
+low grouns--dis mornin'. Dat's right," he said, as he saw dawning
+unbelief in his mistress' face. "Now you have to skuse me, Miss Hallie.
+I got my wuck to do."
+
+"One moment, William," interposed Mrs. Cary, completely unconvinced.
+"You are sure he was on the low grounds?"
+
+"Cose I is!" asseverated Uncle Billy, meanwhile backing farther away.
+
+"What was he doing there?"
+
+Uncle Billy stammered.
+
+"He--he--he, he was trespassin', dat's what he was doin'--des natcherly
+trespassin'."
+
+At this marvel of testimony, Mrs. Cary's lips relaxed in a smile and she
+warned him with an upraised finger.
+
+"Be careful, Uncle Billy! Be careful."
+
+"Yas, _mar'm_" chuckled the old man. "I _had_ to be. I never would a-got
+him! Oh, I's tellin' de trufe, Miss Hallie. Dis' here ol' sinner tooken
+flewed off a boat what was comin' up de river. Yas'm. And he sure was
+old enough to know better."
+
+"And you _saw_ him fly off the boat?"
+
+"Oh, yas'm. I seed him. I seed him," and Uncle Billy floundered for a
+moment, caught in his own trap. "Dat is, not wid my own eyes. But I see
+him settin' in de woods, lookin' dat lonesome and losted like, I felt
+real sorry for him. Yas'm," and to prove his deep sympathy for the
+unfortunate bird he stroked its breast lovingly.
+
+Mrs. Cary turned away to hide her laughter. "How did you catch him?"
+
+"How?" repeated Uncle Billy, while his ancient mind worked with unusual
+rapidity. "I got down on all fo's in the thick weeds, an' cluk like a
+hen. An' den ol' Mr. Rooster, he came 'long over to see ef I done laid
+an aig--an' I des reach right out an' take him home to de Lawd."
+
+"Oh, Uncle Billy," his mistress laughed. "I'm afraid you're
+incorrigible. It's a dreadful thing to doubt one's very dinner. Isn't
+it?"
+
+"Yas'm. An' I was des 'bout to say ef you an' Miss Virgie kin worry down
+de white meat, maybe den dis here bird 'll kinder git eben wid me when I
+tackle his drum sticks. Yas'm," and with a final chuckle of joy over his
+success the old man hobbled quickly away in the direction of the
+kitchen.
+
+Mrs. Cary, still smiling, went back to play Mrs. Fatima to a dusky
+moss-covered Blue Beard.
+
+"Oh goody, goody, here is Mrs. Fatima again!" and Virgie's dancing feet
+seemed hardly to touch the ground. "We've just finished building the
+castle. Look!" She pointed proudly to a square of twigs and leaves
+around the garden seat. "Come on, Sally Ann. We can play it now and use
+Mamma's keys."
+
+"Wait dar! Whar'd I put my s'wode?" And Sally Ann snatched up her
+dangerous weapon and thrust it into a rope around her waist. "Now I'se
+ready fo' killin' folks."
+
+"But we have to begin where Blue Beard goes away on a journey," Virgie
+cried. "Susan Jemima, you sit there on the bench and clap your hands.
+Get up, Mamma. Go ahead, Sally Ann!"
+
+"'Ooman," said Sally Ann, strutting up to her mistress and frowning
+terribly. "I'se gwine away fer a night an' a day. Dese yere is de keys
+to de castle."
+
+"Yes, sir," was the meek response.
+
+Sally Ann Blue Beard pointed to an imaginary door halfway between them
+and where Virgie sat on the steps, wriggling with delight. "You kin look
+in ev'ry room in de house--castle, I means--'cept in des dat one.
+Orn'estan me? _Des dat one!_ But ef yo' looks in _dar_,--Gawd he'p you.
+I gwine cut yo' haid off," and the fearful sword whizzed threateningly
+through the air. "Fyarwell--fyarwell."
+
+"Farewell, my lord," said Mrs. Cary, and then in a whisper, as Blue
+Beard stalked away to hide behind a tree. "What _do_ we do now?
+_Quick_!"
+
+"Now I come in," cried Virgie. "I'm 'Sister Anne' that looks for the
+horseman in the cloud of dust." And jumping up, the child managed to
+change the tones of her voice in a surprising manner.
+
+"Good morning, fair sister. Blue Beard has gone away, and now we can
+look in his secret room."
+
+"No, Sister Anne, No! I dare not," and Mrs. Fatima shrank back full of
+fear from the imaginary door. "Urge me no more. I am afraid."
+
+"But, Mother," cried Virgie, with a little squeal of disappointment.
+"You _have_ to. It's part of the play," and she led her up to the
+invisible door.
+
+"Now look in--and when you look--drop the keys--an' we'll both scream."
+
+Slowly the door seemed to open and, after an instant's terrified
+silence, both actresses screamed with complete success. Whereupon Mrs.
+Fatima dropped to her knees and Sister Anne hugged her tight.
+
+"It's blood. It's the blood of his seven wives. O-o-o-e-e-e!"
+
+A great roar sounded in their ears.
+
+"Mercy! What's that?" cried the terrified Mrs. Fatima.
+
+"It's Blue Beard. He's coming back," whereupon Virgie immediately left
+Mrs. Fatima to face her fate alone.
+
+Having spent a night and a day behind the tree, Blue Beard now rushed
+upon the castle and roared for his wife.
+
+"Greeting, my lord," said the trembling Mrs. Fatima with a low curtsey
+"I hope you have enjoyed your journey."
+
+"'Ooman," demanded Blue Beard severely. "What make you look so pale?"
+
+"I know not, sweet sir. Am I, then, so pale?"
+
+"You is! What you be'n up to sence I be'n away? Ha! What I tole you?
+Look at de blood on dat key! False 'ooman, you done deceib' me. Down on
+yo' marrow bones an' prepyar to die!"
+
+"Spare me, my lord. Spare me! I am so--"
+
+It was just about this time that old Uncle Billy, with a bridle in one
+hand and a carriage whip in the other came slowly upon the scene. At the
+sight of Sally Ann apparently about to assault his mistress the bridle
+dropped from his hand and with a tight clutch on the carriage whip he
+covered the intervening space at an amazing speed.
+
+"Hi, dar! You li'l woolly haided imp! You tech Miss Hallie wid dat ar
+stick an' I bus' you wide open!"
+
+"Oh, stop, Uncle Billy!" cried Virgie in dismay. "We're only having a
+play!"
+
+"Maybe you is; but I lay ef I wrop my carriage whip roun' her laig, des
+oncet, she'll hop all de way to de river."
+
+At this dismal prospect, which seemed much truer than the play, Sally
+Ann began to whimper loudly. "Miss Hallie, ef he stay here, I ain't
+gwine to play."
+
+"Whar you git dem whiskers at?" demanded Uncle Billy.
+
+"Shut up!" cried Virgie.
+
+"I'm shuttin'," said Uncle Billy, retreating.
+
+Thus reassured Sally Ann continued:
+
+"I gwine down stairs to git my dinner When I come back, I sho' gwine
+kill you. Fyar you well," and Blue Beard, making a wide circle around
+the carriage whip, took himself off the scene.
+
+"Now, Mother," Virgie announced, "I have to watch at the castle window,"
+and she jumped up on the bench.
+
+"Sister Anne; Sister Anne, do you see anybody coming?"
+
+"No one, Fatima--nothing but a cloud of dust made by the wind."
+
+"Look again, Sister Anne. Do you see anybody coming?"
+
+"Oh, Fatima, Fatima. It's growing bigger."
+
+"Dar now," interposed Uncle Billy. "She's seem' som'pin."
+
+"Sister Anne! Sister Anne. And what do; you see?"
+
+"Dust! Dust! I see a horseman in a cloud of dust. Look! Look! He's
+coming this way." By this time Virgie's acting had taken on so close a
+resemblance to the real thing that both Mrs. Gary and Uncle Billy rose
+to their feet in wonder.
+
+"He's jumped the _fence_," cried Virgie. "He's cutting across our
+fields! He sees me! He's waving his hat to me!" With the last words the
+child suddenly jumped down from the bench and ran through the opening in
+the hedge, leaving her mother gazing after her in sudden consternation.
+
+"Name we Gawd! Miss Hallie," gasped Uncle Billy. "You reckon she done
+brought somebody, sho' 'nuff? Hi! Hi! _I_ hear sum'-pin. It's a horse.
+Lan' er Glory! Hits, _him_!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+Round the corner of the hedge at a swift trot came a man in the uniform
+of an officer in the Confederate Army,--and Virgie was in his arms.
+
+Mrs. Cary gave him one look and threw out her arms.
+
+"Herbert!"
+
+The man on horseback let Virgie slide down and then dismounted like a
+flash, coming to her across the little space of lawn with his whole soul
+in his eyes. With his dear wife caught in his arms he could do nothing
+but kiss her and hold her as if he would never again let her go.
+
+"Hallie," he breathed, "but it's good to see you again. It's _good_."
+And so they stood for a long moment, husband and wife united after
+months of separation, after dangers and terrors and privations which had
+seemed as if they never would end.
+
+Sally Ann was one of the first to interrupt, edging up at the earliest
+opportunity with her beard in her hand. "How you does, Mars' Cary? How
+you fine yo'sef, seh?"
+
+"Why, hullo, Sally Ann!" said Cary, and put out his hand. "What on earth
+is this thing?"
+
+Virgie ran to his side and caught his hand in hers. "We were playing
+'Blue Beard,' Daddy,--an' you came just like the brother."
+
+"So you've been Blue Beard, have you, Sally Ann?--then I must have the
+pleasure of cutting you into ribbons." Herbert Cary's shining saber
+flashed half out of its scabbard and then, laughing, he slapped it back
+with a clank.
+
+"Sally Ann," he announced, "I'm going to turn you into Sister Anne for a
+while. You run up to Miss Hallie's room and sit by the window where you
+can watch the road and woods. If you see anything--soldiers, I mean--"
+
+"Oh, Herbert!" cried his wife in anguish.
+
+"S-s-sh!" he whispered. "Go along, Sally Ann. If you see anyone at all
+report to me at once. Understand? Off with you!"
+
+Uncle Billy now came forward in an effort to make his master's clothes
+more presentable.
+
+"Heh, Mars' Cary, lemme brush you off, seh. You's fyar kivered."
+
+"Look out, you old rascal," Cary laughed, as his wife backed away
+coughing before the cloud of fine white dust that rose under Uncle
+Billy's vigorous hands. "You're choking your mistress to death. Never
+mind the dust. I'll get it back in ten minutes."
+
+Mrs. Cary clasped her hands together at her breast with a look of
+entreaty.
+
+"Herbert! Must you go so soon?"
+
+Her husband looked back at her with eyes dark with regret.
+
+"Yes," he said briefly. "I'm on my way to Richmond. How many horses are
+there in the stable?"
+
+"Two--only two," was the broken response, as his wife sank down
+disconsolate on a bench. "Belle and Lightfoot--we sold the others--I
+_had_ to do it."
+
+"Yes, I know, little woman. It couldn't be helped. Here, Billy! Take my
+horse and get Belle out of the stable. Lead them down to the swamp and
+hide them in the cedars. Then saddle Lightfoot--bring him here and give
+him some water and a measure of corn. Look sharp, Billy! Lively!"
+
+In the face of danger to his master Uncle Billy's response was instant.
+"Yes, seh. Right away, seh," and he took Cary's lathered animal and made
+off for the stables at top speed.
+
+Mrs. Cary looked up at her husband with a great fear written on her
+face.
+
+"Why, Herbert dear. You--you don't mean to say that the Yankees are in
+the neighborhood?"
+
+Immediately Cary was on the bench beside her with his arm around her,
+while Virgie climbed up on the other side.
+
+"Now, come," he murmured, "be a brave little woman and don't be alarmed.
+It may be nothing after all. Only--there are several foraging
+parties--small ones, a few miles down the river. I've been dodging them
+all morning. If they come at all they won't trouble either you or
+Virgie."
+
+"But _I'm_ not afraid of them, Daddy-man," cried the small daughter,
+and she doubled up her fist ferociously. "Look at _that_."
+
+"Aha! There's a brave little Rebel," her father cried as he swept her up
+in a hearty hug. "_You're_ not afraid of them,--nor you either, God
+bless you," and his lips rested for a moment on his wife's soft cheek.
+"Only, you are apt to be a little too haughty. If they search the house
+for arms or stragglers, make no resistance. It's best."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know," his wife cried out, "but you, dear, _you_! Why are
+you here? Why aren't you with your company?"
+
+Cary looked away for a moment across the fields and down the slope
+towards the shimmering river. They were very beautiful--he wondered why
+he had not fully realized all that wife and child and home meant to him
+when he volunteered recently for a certain hazardous duty. He knew, too,
+how quickly his dear wife would know the full extent of the peril with
+which he felt himself surrounded. And so his reply was short and
+seemingly gruff, as many another man's has been under too heavy
+circumstances.
+
+"Scouting duty. I've been on it for the past two months."
+
+Mrs. Cary's hand went to her heart.
+
+"A _scout_, Herbert! But, darling, why? It's so dangerous--so
+horrible--so--"
+
+He put up his hand, with a forced smile, to check her, and broke in
+gayly.
+
+"Ah, but think of the fun in it. It's like playing hide-and-go-seek with
+Virgie."
+
+But his wife was not to be put off so lightly and she put her impelling
+hands on his arm.
+
+Gary changed his tone. His voice deepened.
+
+"They need me, dear," he said earnestly. "What does danger to one man
+mean when Dixie calls us all? And I'm doing work--good work. I've
+already given one battle to General Lee and now I have information that
+will give him another and a bigger one. Two nights ago I came through
+the Union lines. I ..."
+
+Mrs. Cary rose unsteadily to her feet.
+
+"Through the Yankee lines! Oh, Herbert. _Not as a spy!_"
+
+"A spy? Of course not. I hid in the woods all day, then climbed a tall
+pine tree and got the lay of their camp--the number of their guns--the
+disposition of forces and their lines of attack. Yesterday I had the
+wires at Drury's Bluff and started trouble. I'm on my way now to join my
+command, but I had a good excuse for coming home to hold you in in my
+arms again, if only for a moment. You see, poor old Roger got a wound in
+his flank--from a stray bullet."
+
+"A _stray_ bullet," asked Mrs. Gary, doubtfully.
+
+"Yes," he smiled, for he had escaped it, "a stray bullet meant for
+_me_."
+
+"But, Daddy," Virgie interrupted, "while you were up in the tree--"
+
+A wild whoop broke off Virgie's question. Sally Ann was rushing down the
+steps, her eyes rolling up with excitement.
+
+"Mars' Cary! Mars' Cary! Somebody comin' long de road!"
+
+"Who? How many?" Cary demanded, springing up and running towards the
+gate that opened on the wagon road over the hills.
+
+"Des' one," responded Sally Ann with naive truthfulness. "Ol' Dr.
+Simmons. He drivin' by de gate in de buggy."
+
+Mrs. Cary threw up her hands with a muffled cry of relief and laughter.
+"Oh, Sally! Sally!" she exclaimed, "you'll be the death of me."
+
+"But Lor! Miss Hallie," said Sally plaintively, "he _tole_ me fer to
+tell him."
+
+Cary, returning, waved Sally Ann back to her post. "That's right," he
+laughed. "You're a good sentry, Sally Ann. Go back and watch again.
+_Scoot_!"
+
+"Herbert," and his wife stood before him. "Come into the house and let
+me give you something to eat."
+
+For answer Cary gently imprisoned her face in his hands. "Honey, I
+can't," he said, his eyes grown sad again. "Just fix me up
+something--anything you can find. I'll munch it in the saddle."
+
+For a moment their lips clung and then she stepped back with a broken
+sigh. "I'll do the best I can, but oh! how I wish it all were over and
+that we had you home again."
+
+A spasm crossed the man's face. "It soon _will_ be over, sweetheart. It
+soon _will_ be."
+
+His wife flung him a startled look. "You mean--Oh, Herbert! Isn't there
+a single hope--even the tiniest ray?"
+
+Cary took her hands in his, looked into her eyes and his answer breathed
+the still unconquered spirit of the South. "There is always hope--as
+long as we have a man." Mrs. Cary went into the house, slowly, wearily,
+and Cary turned to Virgie.
+
+"Well, little lady," her father said, resting his hand on Virgie's
+shining head. "Have you been taking good care of mother--and seeing that
+Uncle Billy does his plowing right?"
+
+"Yes, sir," came the prompt response. "Susan Jemima an' me have been
+lookin' after everything--but we had to eat up General Butler!"
+
+"General Butler," cried her father, astounded.
+
+"Yes, Daddy--our lastest calf. We named him that 'cause one day when I
+was feedin' him with milk he nearly swallowed my silver spoon."
+
+"Ha-ha," laughed the amused soldier, and swept her up in his arms. "If
+we could only get rid of all their generals as easy as that we'd promise
+not to eat again for a week. Everything else all right?"
+
+"No, sir," said Virgie, dolefully. "All the niggers has runned away--all
+'cept Uncle Billy and Sally Ann. Jeems Henry runned away this morning."
+
+"The deuce he did! The young scamp!"
+
+"He's gone to join the Yankees," Virgie continued.
+
+"What's that?" and Cary sprang up to pace to and fro. "I wonder which
+way he went?"
+
+"I don' know," whimpered Virgie forlornly. "I only wish I was a soldier
+with a big, sharp sword like yours--'cause when the blue boys came I'd
+_stick_ 'em in the stomach."
+
+Mrs. Cary was coming down the steps now with a small package of food and
+in the roadway Uncle Billy stood feeding and watering his master's
+horse. In this bitterest of moments, when his own family had to be the
+ones to hurry him along his way, there had come another and greater
+danger--peril to those he loved.
+
+"Tell me, dear," he said with his hand warm on his wife's soft shoulder.
+"Is it true that Jeems Henry ran away this morning?"
+
+"Yes," she nodded. "I knew the poor boy meant to leave us sooner or
+later, so I made no effort to detain him."
+
+"You did right," was the answer. "But which way did he go?"
+
+"Up the river. To a Union camp on the Chickahominy."
+
+"Chickahominy!" exclaimed Cary sharply, and bit his lips. "So that's the
+lay of the land, eh! I'm mighty glad you told me this. But still--"
+Cary's voice faded away under the weight of a sudden despair. What was
+the use of fighting forever against such fearful odds? What could they
+ever gain--save a little more honor--and at what dreadful cost?
+
+"What makes you look so worried, Herbert?" his wife murmured, her nerves
+on edge again.
+
+"Yes, it's true," the man said with a groan. "They're gradually closing
+in on us--surrounding Richmond."
+
+"_Surrounding us?_" Mrs. Cary whispered, hardly believing her ears.
+
+"Yes, it's true--all too true," the man burst out bitterly. "We can
+fight against thousands--and against tens of thousands but, darling, we
+can't fight half the world."
+
+He sank down on the bench, one elbow on his crossed knee, the other arm
+hanging listlessly by his side. His face grew lined and haggard. All the
+spirit, the indomitable courage of a moment ago had fled before the
+revelation that, try as they might, they could never conquer in this
+terribly unequal fight. Then he threw out his hand and began to speak,
+half to her and half to the unseen armies of his fellows.
+
+"Our armies are exhausted. Dwindling day by day. We are drawing from the
+cradle and the grave. Old men--who can scarcely bear the weight of a
+musket on their shoulders: and boys--mere children--who are sacrificed
+under the blood-stained wheels. The best! The flower of our land! We
+are dumping them all into a big, red hopper. Feed! Feed! Always more
+feed for this greedy machine of war!"
+
+Silently wife and daughter came to the man in his despair, as if to ward
+off some dark shape which hovered over him with brushing wings. Their
+arms went around him together.
+
+"There, there, dear," he heard a soft voice whisper, "don't grow
+despondent. _Think!_ Even though you've fought a losing fight it has
+been a glorious one--and God will not forget the Stars and Bars!
+Remember,--you still have us--who love you to the end--and fight your
+battles--on our knees."
+
+Slowly the man looked up.
+
+"Forgive me, honey," he murmured remorsefully. "You are right--and
+bravest, after all. It is you--you women, who save us in the darkest
+hours. You--our wives--our mothers--who wage a silent battle in the
+lonely, broken homes. You give us love and pity--tenderness and tears--a
+flag of pride that turns defeat to victory. The women of the South," he
+cried, and Herbert Cary doffed his hat before his wife, "the crutch on
+which the staggering hope of Dixie leans!"
+
+There came, then, the sound of hurrying footsteps. Once more Sally Ann
+rushed from the house but this time genuine danger was written plainly
+in her face.
+
+"Mars' Cary! Mars' Cary! Dey's comin' dis time--sho' 'nuff!"
+
+"How many?" Cary cried, springing for the roadway and his horse.
+
+"Dey's comin' thu' de woods--an' Lawd Gawd, de yearth is fyar blue wid'
+'em."
+
+"Billy!" commanded Cary. "Take Lightfoot as fast as you can down to the
+edge of the woods. Don't worry, Hallie, they'll never catch me once I'm
+in the saddle."
+
+He stooped and kissed her, then caught up Virgie for a last hug, burying
+his worn face in her curls. "Good-by, little one. Take good care of
+Mother. Good-by!"
+
+With one last grasp his wife caught his hand. "Herbert! which way do you
+go?"
+
+"Across the river--to the Chesterfield side."
+
+"But the Yankees came that way, too!"
+
+"I'll circle around them. If they've left a guard at the crossing I'll
+swim the river higher up." He slapped his holster with his open hand.
+"Listen for three shots. If they come in quick succession--then I've
+crossed--I'm safe. If I only had a few men I'd stay, but alone, I
+can't--you know I can't. Good-by! God bless you." And in another moment
+he was in the saddle--had waved his hand--was gone.
+
+Straining their eyes after him, as if they would somehow pierce the dark
+woods which hid his flight, mother and daughter stood as if turned to
+stone. Only Virgie, after a moment, waved her hand and sent her soft,
+childish prayer winging after him to save him from all harm. "Good-by,
+Daddy-man, good-by!"
+
+Sally Ann, however, having seen the approaching danger with her own
+eyes, began to wring her hands and cry hysterically. "Aw, Miss Hallie, I
+so skeered! I so skeered!"
+
+"Sally," cried Mrs. Cary, as the sound of hoofbeats thudding through the
+woods came unmistakably to her ears, "take Virgie with you instantly
+and run down through the grove to the old ice house. Hide there under
+the pine tags. Understand?"
+
+But the negro girl, ashen with terror, seemed incapable of flight.
+
+"I skeered to go, Miss Hallie," she whimpered. "I wan' stay here wid
+you! Ou-ou!"
+
+"But you can't, I tell you," her mistress answered, as the certainty of
+the girl's helplessness before a questioner flashed through her mind.
+"You'd tell everything."
+
+"Oh, come on, you big baby," Virgie urged, pulling at Sally Arm's
+sleeve. "_I'll_ take care of you." Then her eye fell on Susan Jemima
+lying neglected on the bench and she gave a faint scream at her
+heartlessness. "Goodness gracious, Mother," she cried, as, still holding
+on to Sally Ann, she ran and caught up her beloved doll. "I nearly
+forgot my child!"
+
+With the clank of sabers and the sound of gruff commands already in her
+ears, Mrs. Cary turned peremptorily to Uncle Billy.
+
+"Remember, William! If the Yankees ask for my husband _you haven't seen
+him!_"
+
+"Nor'm, dat's right," was the prompt answer. "I dunno you eben got one.
+But you go in de house, Miss Hallie. Dat's de bes' way,--yas'm."
+
+"Perhaps it _is_ best," his mistress answered. "The longer we can detain
+them the better for Captain Cary. You'd better come in yourself."
+
+"Yas'm," replied the faithful old man, although such action was farthest
+from his thoughts. "In des' a minnit. I'll be dar in des' a minnit."
+
+But once his mistress had closed the door behind her Uncle Billy's plan
+of operations changed. Hurrying down the steps he plunged his arm under
+the porch and drew forth--a rusty ax. With his weapon over his shoulder
+he hastened up on the veranda and stood with his back against the door.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+The thudding feet came nearer. A bugle call--a rattling of accouterments
+and then, from the other side of the hedge, came a half dozen troopers
+in blue, led by a Sergeant with a red face and bloodshot eyes.
+
+"This way, boys!" the Sergeant shouted, and at the sound of a harsh,
+never-forgotten voice Uncle Billy's grasp on his ax grew tighter. "_I_
+know the place--I've been here before. _We'll_ get the liquor and silver
+while the Colonel is stealing the horses, eh?" Then his eyes fell on
+Uncle Billy and he greeted him with a yell of recognition. "Hello, you
+black old ape! Come down and show us where you buried the silver and the
+whisky. Oh, you won't? Then I'll come up and get you," and he lurched
+forward.
+
+"Look here, white man," Uncle Billy shouted, lifting the rusty ax high
+in the air, "you stay whar you is. Ef you come up dem steps I'll split
+yo' ugly haid! I know you, Jim Dudley," he cried. "Mars' Cary done give
+you _one_ horse whippin', an' ef you hang aroun' here you'll get anudder
+one!"
+
+Furious at the recollection of his shame of a few years back when he had
+been overseer on this same plantation, the Sergeant rushed up the steps
+and knocked the ax aside with his gun barrel. "Yes, he did whip me, burn
+him, and now I'll do the same for you." Seizing Uncle Billy by the
+throat he pushed him against the house.
+
+Instantly the door swung open. Mrs. Cary, her head held high, her
+beautiful dark eyes blazing with wrath, stood on the threshold.
+
+"Stop it!" she commanded in tones that brooked no disobedience even from
+a drunkard. "Let my servant go--instantly!"
+
+Astounded at this sudden apparition the man shrank back for a moment,
+but almost as quickly regained his bluster.
+
+"Ah-hah, the beautiful Mrs. Cary, eh! I'm glad to see you looking so
+well--and handsome."
+
+The words might as well have been spoken to the wind for all the notice
+that the woman paid them. With only a gesture of mingled contempt and
+loathing she stepped to the railing and called to the grinning troopers
+below. "Who is in command here?"
+
+To her horror only Dudley answered.
+
+"_I_ am," he said, triumphantly. He thrust a menacing face close to hers
+and ordered her curtly. "And I'd just as soon have _you_ get me a drink
+as the nigger. Come on, fine lady."
+
+Intent on insulting this woman whose husband had once cut his back with
+a whip the man caught her by the arm and roughly tried to pull her to
+him. But before he could accomplish his purpose retribution fell on him
+with a heavy hand.
+
+Through a gap in the hedge an officer at the head of a dozen troopers
+appeared. One look at the scene on the veranda and Lieutenant-Colonel
+Morrison, with a smothered cry, dashed up the steps.
+
+"You beastly coward," and catching the drunkard by the collar he twisted
+him around and hurled him thudding and bumping down the steps. "Dudley,
+I ought to have you shot." He swept his arm out and gave voice to a
+ringing command. "Report to Lieutenant Harris--at once--_under arrest!_
+Corporal! Take his gun." He paused a moment as a brother of the man now
+under arrest stepped forward with a sullen face and obeyed orders.
+Running his glance over the line of faces, now suddenly vacant of
+expression, he whipped them mercilessly with his eye. "You men, too,
+will hear from me. Go to the stable and wait. Another piece of work like
+this and I'll have your coats cut off with a belt buckle! Clear out!"
+
+Then he turned to the beautiful woman in white who stood only a few feet
+away, no longer timid but in entire possession of her faculties before
+what, she knew, might prove a greater danger than a drunkard.
+
+"Madam," said the Union officer as he doffed his hat, "I couldn't
+apologize for this, no matter how hard I tried; but, believe me, I
+regret it--deeply."
+
+In answer she slowly raised her heavy lidded eyes and gave him her
+first thrust--smoothly and deftly.
+
+"No apology is demanded," she murmured in soft tones. "I was merely
+unfamiliar with the Union's method of attack."
+
+"Attack!" he repeated, astounded, and stepped back.
+
+"What else?" she asked, simply. "My home is over-run; my servant
+assaulted--by a drunken ruffian."
+
+"The man will be punished," was the stern reply, "to the limit of my
+authority."
+
+"He _should_ be. We know him," the Southern woman said bitterly. "Before
+the war he was our overseer. He was cruel to the negroes and my husband
+gave him a taste of his own discipline--with a riding whip!"
+
+"Ah, I see," Morrison nodded. "But it is not always in an officer's
+power to control each individual in the service--especially at such a
+time. Yet I assure you on the part of the Union--and mine--that there
+was no intention of attack."
+
+Mrs. Cary had chosen this moment in which to draw her visitor off the
+veranda and when she had successfully brought him to the foot of the
+steps she looked up in smiling sarcasm with another thrust.
+
+"Oh! Then since your visit would seem a _social_ one--how may I serve
+you, sir?"
+
+Morrison laughed lightly. This pretty cat could scratch.
+
+"I'm afraid, dear madam, you are wrong again. My detachment is on
+foraging duty. It is not a pleasant task--but our army is in need of
+horses and supplies, and by the rules of war, I must take what I can
+find."
+
+"Even by force?" came the quiet inquiry.
+
+"Yes, even force," he answered, reddening. "With its proper limitations.
+I rob you, it is true, but by virtue of necessity. In return I can only
+offer, as I would to every other woman of the South, all courtesy and
+protection at my command," and Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison, for the
+second time, took off his hat.
+
+The Southern woman swept him a curtsey filled with graceful mockery.
+
+"I thank you. There is consolation--and even flattery--in being
+plundered by a gentleman." She made a short gesture which took in
+house, plantation and all the Cary possessions. "I regret sincerely that
+we have nothing left; yet I beg you--help yourself."
+
+Colonel Morrison bit his lip, half in vexation and half in amusement.
+"At least you make my undertaking a difficult one, although I must
+admit, I hardly blame you." And then, with a quick, searching look, "Are
+there any rebels hidden in your house?"
+
+"No," she answered.
+
+"No wounded officers--or refugees of any kind?"
+
+"None."
+
+"You give me your word for this--your oath?"
+
+The Southern woman's head went up and her eyes flashed. "I do," she said
+contemptuously and moved away.
+
+"Thank you," was the grave reply, and he turned to dismiss his men. Then
+a thought struck him and he detained her with a gesture.
+
+"Pardon me, but if it _was_ true--if a brother or a father--was
+concealed in there--wouldn't your answer be the same?"
+
+The answer that came proudly back did not amaze him. "I would try to
+protect them--yes! Even with a _perjury_!"
+
+"Ah!" he said sharply. "Then, don't you you see, you tie the hands of
+courtesy and _force_ me to--to this invasion of your home. _Corporal!_
+Make a search of the house for hidden arms or stragglers and report to
+me. If any rebels are found--bring them out. Wait," he ordered, as the
+Corporal promptly started forward, "nothing else, _whatever_, must be
+taken or molested."
+
+"One moment," commanded Mrs. Cary in her turn and beckoned to Uncle
+Billy who had been standing by in silence. "William! conduct these
+soldiers through my house--and show them every courtesy. If the
+Colonel's orders are not obeyed, report to me."
+
+"Yas'm," grinned Uncle Billy, with an opera bouffe salute. "Ev'ry
+molestashun I'se gwine report."
+
+Morrison laughed outright. "I'm sorry you still have doubts of my
+honorable intentions. May--may my soldiers go in now? Thank you."
+
+He walked away a few steps, then turned and looked at her where she sat
+on the bench demurely sewing. It occurred to him that she was _too_
+demure. Besides, he had discovered something.
+
+"Er--it is true that I found your stable empty," he said, while his eyes
+probed hers, "but, curiously enough, it seems to have been recently
+occupied."
+
+"Yes?" was the non-committal reply.
+
+"Yes," he echoed, with a touch of iron in his voice. "And you can insure
+our leaving you more quickly if you will tell me where these horses have
+been hidden."
+
+Mrs. Cary did not raise her eyes.
+
+"Granted that we _had_ them," she said, "I'm afraid I must trouble you
+to look for them. Otherwise there would be no sense in trying to protect
+my property."
+
+"Right again," he acknowledged, but did not swerve from what he had to
+do. "Orderly," he commanded, "report to Lieutenant Harris at the stables
+and have him hunt the woods and swamp for hidden horses. Hurry! We must
+leave in half an hour."
+
+As Morrison spoke his eye fell on the roadway and he started
+perceptibly. When he turned back to the woman on the bench it was with a
+sterner light in his eye.
+
+"I also notice that a horse has recently been fed and watered in your
+carriage road. _Whose was he?_"
+
+Again that smooth, soft voice with its languid evasions. "We have
+several neighbors, Colonel. They visit us at infrequent times."
+
+"Undoubtedly," he conceded. "But do you usually feed their horses?"
+
+She smiled faintly. "What little hospitality is ours extends to both man
+and beast."
+
+"I can well believe it," he replied, for he saw to cross-examine this
+quick witted woman would be forever useless. "And in happier times I
+could wish it might extend--to me.
+
+"Oh, I mean no offense," he interrupted as Mrs. Cary rose haughtily. "I
+only want you to believe that I'm sorry for this intrusion."
+
+She raised her eyebrows faintly and sat down again. "And was that the
+reason why you asked about my neighbor's horse?"
+
+"No," he said quickly, and as suddenly caught and held her eye. "There's
+a Rebel scout who has been giving us trouble--a handsome fellow riding a
+bay horse. I thought, perhaps, he might have passed this way."
+
+If he had thought he would detect anything in her face he was once more
+mistaken.
+
+"It is more than possible," Mrs. Cary remarked with a touch of
+weariness. "The road out there is a public one."
+
+"And where does it lead to, may I ask?"
+
+"That depends upon which way you are traveling--and which fork you
+take."
+
+"Possibly. But suppose you were riding north. Wouldn't the right fork
+lead to Richmond--and the left swing around toward the river crossing?"
+
+"As to that I must refer you to a more competent authority," she
+answered with a hint of some disclosure in her tones.
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Mr. Jefferson Davis," she replied and almost laughed outright as he
+turned away to hide his vexation. This was an easy game for her to
+play--and every moment she gained added to Herbert's safety. But if only
+she could hear those three shots from across the river.
+
+"Well, Harris?" said Morrison as his Lieutenant strode up.
+
+"I have to report, sir, that we've gotten what little hay and corn there
+was in the stables and are waiting for your orders."
+
+"Very well," and Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison's incisive words rang
+mercilessly in the listening woman's ears. "Pick out the best shots you
+have among your men and send them at the gallop down this road to the
+river crossing. String them along the bank, dismount them and have them
+watch as they've never watched before. You understand? Now _hurry_!"
+
+If ever a woman hated a man, or rather the crushing force he typified,
+then Herbert Cary's wife hated this clear headed, efficient Northerner,
+who was now discovering how he had been delayed and thwarted. Yet she
+had plenty of spirit left, for as Corporal Dudley and his file of
+troopers emerged from the house she stood up and caught Uncle Billy's
+eye.
+
+"Well, Corporal?" asked Morrison.
+
+"Well, William?" asked Mrs. Cary.
+
+"It's all right, Miss Hallie," Uncle Billy grinned. "Dey ain't took
+nothin'--not a single thing."
+
+"Thank you, William," said Mrs. Cary, having triumphed again. "And thank
+_you_, gentlemen." With a bow to Morrison she went superbly back to her
+seat under the trees. But as she went it took all her strength of will
+to keep from crying. Down the carriage road a squad of cavalry was
+galloping furiously towards the river. And still she had not heard the
+three shots.
+
+"Now, then, Corporal, you found what?"
+
+"Nothing, sir. We hunted from cellar to roof. No arms and no rebels."
+
+"H'm," he mused. "Anything else?"
+
+"Three bedrooms, sir. All in use."
+
+"Three?" Colonel Morrison exclaimed. "Very well. That's all. I'll join
+you in a moment." Then he turned to Mrs. Cary, his face stern with
+resolve.
+
+"Madam," he said crisply, "you are not alone on this plantation with
+only this old negro. We are wasting time. I'm after a Rebel scout and _I
+want him_. Which way did he go?"
+
+"I'm sorry, sir," she said, quite ready to play her game again. "But our
+Rebel scouts usually neglect to mention their precise intentions."
+
+"Perhaps. If this one went at all. Is he still here?"
+
+"I should imagine--_not_."
+
+"Then he did go this way--to the river crossing?"
+
+Once more he caught and held her eyes and thought he would read the
+truth in spite of anything she might say.
+
+But while he looked he saw her strained face suddenly relax--saw the
+anxiety flee from her eyes--saw heart and soul take on new life. From
+far away across the river had come some faint popping sounds, regularly
+spaced--_three shots_.
+
+"Ah!" he said, in wonder. "What is that?"
+
+"It _sounds_," laughed Herbert Cary's wife, "like firing. But I think it
+is a friend of mine saluting me--from the safe side of the river. Good
+evening, Colonel," and she swept by him. She could go find Virgie now.
+
+Just then came the sound of a horse, galloping. Up the road came a
+trooper, white with dust, his animal flecked with foam.
+
+"For Colonel Morrison. Urgent," he rasped from a dry throat, as he
+thudded across the lawn and dismounted. "From headquarters," and he
+thrust out a dispatch, "I'm ordered to return with your detachment."
+
+Snatching the dispatch from the man's hand Morrison ran his eye over
+it--then started visibly.
+
+"Orderly! Report to Harris double-quick. Recall the men. Sound
+boots-and-saddles. Then bring my horse--_at once!_ Any details?" he
+asked peremptorily of the courier.
+
+"Big battle to-morrow," the man answered. "Two gunboats are reported
+coming up the river and a wing of the Rebel army is advancing from
+Petersburg. Every available detachment is ordered in. You are to reach
+camp before morning."
+
+"All right. We'll be there." Then, as the bugle sounded, "Ride with us,"
+he said, and strode over to where Mrs. Cary stood, arrested by the news.
+
+"Madam, I must make you a rather hurried farewell--and a last apology.
+If ever we meet again, I hope the conditions may be happier--for you."
+
+"I thank you, Colonel," the proud Southern woman said sincerely, with a
+curtsy. "Some day the 'rebel scout' may thank you also for me and mine."
+And with a smile that augured friendship when that brighter day should
+come she passed out of his sight among the trees.
+
+For a moment he watched her, proud at least that this proud woman was of
+his own race, then saw that the old negro, her only protector, still
+guarded the house.
+
+"Here, old man," he commanded, "go along with your mistress and take
+care of her. I'll be the last to leave and see that nothing happens to
+the house."
+
+"Yas, seh. Thank'e, seh," said old Uncle Billy, coming down. "If all of
+'em was only lek you, seh--"
+
+Uncle Billy suddenly turned and looked up at the house, his mouth open
+in consternation. With a cry of anguish he pointed to an upper window.
+
+"Look what dey done done," he shrieked. "Aw, Gawd a'mighty! Look what
+dey done done!"
+
+A cloud of smoke was rolling from the windows, shot through with yellow
+jets of flame. There was the sound of clumsy boots on the stairs and the
+door was thrown open. Dudley, escaped from arrest, ran out with a
+flaming pine torch in his hand.
+
+"Halt!" cried Morrison, with raging anger. "Dudley! HALT!"
+
+But Dudley knew that there would be little use in halting and so ran on
+until a big revolver barked behind him and he pitched heavily forward on
+his face. Morrison looked down on the prostrate form and his lips moved
+sadly, pityingly:
+
+"And I promised her--protection!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+Of all the memories of war, after the dear dead are buried, there is one
+that serves to bring the struggle back in all the intensity of its
+horrors--to stand both as a monument to those who bled and suffered and
+as a lonely sentinel mourning for the peace and plenty of the past--a
+blackened chimney.
+
+Of all the houses, cabins, barns and cribs which had made up the home of
+the Carys a few short months ago nothing remained to-day but ashes and
+black ruin. Only one building had been left unburned and this, before
+the war, had been the cabin of an overseer. It had but two rooms, and a
+shallow attic, which was gained by means of an iron ladder reaching to a
+closely fitting scuttle in the ceiling. The larger room was furnished
+meagerly with a rough deal table, several common chairs, and a
+double-doored cupboard against the wall. In the deep, wide fire-place
+glowed a heap of raked-up embers, on which, suspended from an iron
+crane, a kettle simmered, sadly, as if in grief for her long-lost
+brother pots and pans. The plaster on the walls had broken away in
+patches, especially above the door, where the sunlight streamed through
+the gaping wound from a cannon shot. The door and window shutters were
+of heavy oak, swinging inward and fastening with bars; yet now they were
+open, and through them could be seen a dreary stretch of river bottom,
+withering beneath the rays of a July sun.
+
+Beyond a distant fringe of trees the muddy James went murmuring down its
+muddy banks, where the blue cranes waited solemnly for the ebbing tide;
+where the crows cawed hoarsely in their busy, reeling flight, and the
+buzzards swung high above the marshes. Yet even in this waste of
+listless desolation came the echoed boom of heavy guns far down the
+river, where the "Rebs" and "Yanks" were pounding one another lazily.
+
+From the woods which skirted the carriage road a man appeared--a thin,
+worn man, in a uniform of stained and tattered gray--a man who peered
+from right to left, as a hunted rabbit might, then darted across the
+road and plunged into the briery underbrush. Noiselessly he made his way
+to the now deserted cabin, creeping, crawling till he reached a point
+below an open window, then slowly raised himself and looked within.
+
+"Virgie!" he whispered cautiously. "Virgie!"
+
+No answer came. For a moment the man leaned dizzily against the
+windowsill, his eyes fast closed with a nameless dread, till he caught
+his grip again and entered the open door.
+
+"Virgie!" he called, in a louder tone, moving swiftly but unsteadily
+toward the adjoining room. He flung its door open sharply, almost
+angrily; yet the name on his lips was tender, trembling, as he called:
+"Virgie! Virgie!"
+
+In the loneliness of dread, he once more leaned for support against the
+wall, wondering, listening to the pounding of his heart, to the murmur
+of the muddy James, and the fall of a flake of plaster loosened by the
+dull reverberation of a distant gun; then suddenly his eye was caught
+by the kettle simmering on the fire, and he sighed in swift relief.
+
+He wiped his brow with a ragged sleeve and went to where a water-bucket
+stood behind the door, knelt beside it, drinking deeply, gratefully, yet
+listening the while for unwonted sounds and watching the bend of the
+carriage road. His thirst appeased, he hunted vainly through the table
+drawer for balls and powder for the empty pistol at his hip; then,
+instinctively alert to some rustling sound outside, he crouched toward
+the adjoining room, slipped in, and softly closed the door.
+
+From the sunlit world beyond the cabin walls rose the murmur of a
+childish song and Virgie came pattering in.
+
+She had not changed greatly in stature in the past few months, but there
+was a very noticeable decrease in the girth of her little arms and body,
+and her big dark eyes seemed the larger for the whiteness of her face.
+On her head she wore an old calico bonnet several sizes too large and
+the gingham dress which scarcely reached to her bare, brown knees would
+not have done, a few months ago, for even Sally Ann. In one hand Virgie
+carried a small tin bucket filled with berries; in the other she
+clutched a doll lovingly against her breast.
+
+Not the old Susan Jemima, but a new Susan Jemima on whom an equal
+affection was being lavished even though she was strangely and
+wonderfully made. To the intimate view of the unimaginative, Susan
+Jemima was formed from the limb of a cedar tree, the forking branches
+being her arms and legs, her costume consisting of a piece of rag tied
+at the waist with a bit of string.
+
+On a chair at the table Virgie set her doll, then laughed at the
+hopelessness of its breakfasting with any degree of comfort, or of ease.
+
+"Why, Lord a-mercy, child, your chin don't come up to the table."
+
+On the chair she placed a wooden box, perching the doll on top and
+taking a seat herself just opposite. She emptied the blackberries into a
+mutilated plate, brought from the cupboard a handful of toasted acorns,
+on which she poured boiling water, then set the concoction aside to
+steep.
+
+"Now, Miss Susan Jemima," said Virgie, addressing her vis-a-vis with the
+hospitable courtesy due to so great a lady, "we are goin' to have some
+breakfas'." She paused, in a shade of doubt, then smiled a faint
+apology: "It isn't very _much_ of a breakfas', darlin', but we'll make
+believe it's waffles an' chicken an'--an' hot rolls an' batter-bread
+an'--an' everything." She rose to her little bare feet, holding her wisp
+of a skirt aside, and made a sweeping bow. "Allow me, Miss Jemima, to
+make you a mos' delicious cup of coffee."
+
+And, while the little hostess prepared the meal, a man looked out from
+the partly open door behind her, with big dark eyes, which were like her
+own, yet blurred by a mist of pity and of love.
+
+"Susan," said the hostess presently, "it's ready now, and we'll say
+grace; so don't you talk an' annoy your mother."
+
+The tiny brown head was bowed. The tiny brown hands, with their
+berry-stained fingers, were placed on the table's edge; but Miss Susan
+Jemima sat bolt upright, though listening, it seemed, to the words of
+reverence falling from a mother-baby's lips:
+
+"Lord, make us thankful for the blackberries an' the aco'n coffee
+an'--an' all our blessin's; but please, sir, sen' us somethin' that
+tastes jus' a little better--if you don't mind. Amen!"
+
+And the man, who leaned against the door and watched, had also bowed his
+head. A pain was in his throat--and in his heart--a pain that gripped
+him, till two great tears rolled down his war-worn cheek and were lost
+in his straggling beard.
+
+"Virgie!" he whispered hoarsely. "Virgie!"
+
+She started at the sound and looked about her, wondering; then, as the
+name was called again, she slid from her chair and ran forward with a
+joyous cry:
+
+"Why, Daddy! Is it you? Is--"
+
+She stopped, for the man had placed a finger on his lip and was pointing
+to the door.
+
+"Take a look down the road," he ordered, in a guarded voice; and, when
+she had reached a point commanding the danger zone, he asked, "See
+anybody?--soldiers?" She shook her head. "Hear anything?"
+
+She stood for a moment listening, then ran to him, and sprang into his
+waiting arms.
+
+"It's all right, Daddy! It's all right now!"
+
+He raised her, strained her to his breast, his cheek against her own.
+
+"My little girl!" he murmured between his kisses. "My little rebel!" And
+as she snuggled in his arms, her berry-stained fingers clasped tightly
+about his neck, he asked her wistfully, "Did you miss me?--_awful_
+much?"
+
+"Yes," she nodded, looking into his eyes. "Yes--in the night time--when
+the wind was talkin'; but, after while, when--Why, Daddy!" He had
+staggered as he set her down, sinking into a chair and closing his eyes
+as he leaned on the table's edge. "You are hurt!" she cried. "I--I can
+see the blood!"
+
+The wounded Southerner braced himself.
+
+"No, dear, no," he strove to reassure her. "It isn't anything; only a
+little scratch--from a Yank--that tried to get me. But he didn't,
+though," the soldier added with a smile. "I'm just--tired."
+
+The child regarded him in wondering awe, speaking in a half-breathed
+whisper:
+
+"Did he--did he _shoot_ at you?"
+
+Her father nodded, with his hand on her tumbled hair.
+
+"Yes, honey, I'm afraid he did; but I'm so used to it now I don't mind
+it any more. Get me a drink of water, will you?" As Virgie obeyed in
+silence, returning with the dripping gourd, the man went on: "I tried to
+get here yesterday; but I couldn't. They chased me when I came
+before--and now they're watching." He paused to sip at his draught of
+water, glancing toward the carriage road. "Big fight down the river.
+Listen! Can you hear the guns?"
+
+"Yes, plain," she answered, tilting her tiny head. "An' las' night, when
+I went to bed, I could hear 'em--oh! ever so loud: Boom! Boom!
+Boom-boom! So I knelt up an' asked the Lord not to let any of 'em hit
+you."
+
+Two arms, in their tattered gray, slipped round the child. He kissed
+her, in that strange, fierce passion of a man who has lost his mate,
+and his grief-torn love is magnified in the mite who reflects her image
+and her memory.
+
+"Did you, honey?" he asked, with a trembling lip. "Well, I reckon that
+saved your daddy, for not one shell touched him--no, not one!" He kissed
+her again, and laughed. "And I tell you, Virgie, they were coming as
+thick as bees."
+
+Once more he sipped at the grateful, cooling draught of water, when the
+child asked suddenly:
+
+"How is Gen'ral Lee?"
+
+Down came the gourd upon the table. The Southerner was on his feet, with
+a stiffened back; and his dusty slouch hat was in his hand.
+
+"He's well; God bless him! Well!"
+
+The tone was deep and tender, proud, but as reverent as the baby's
+prayer for her father's immunity from harm; yet the man who spoke sank
+back into his seat, closing his eyes and repeating slowly, sadly:
+
+"He's well; God bless him! But he's tired, darling--mighty tired."
+
+"Daddy," the soldier's daughter asked, "will you tell him
+somethin'--from me?"
+
+"Yes, dear. What?"
+
+"Tell him," said the child, with a thoughtful glance at Miss Susan
+Jemima across the table, "tell him, if he ever marches along this way,
+I'll come over to his tent and rub his head, like I do yours--if he'll
+let me--till he goes to sleep." She clasped her fingers and looked into
+her father's eyes, hopefully, appealingly. "Do you think he would,
+if--if I washed my hands--real clean?"
+
+The Southerner bit his lip and tried to smile.
+
+"Yes, honey, I know he would! And think! He sent a message--to _you_."
+
+"Did he?" she asked, wide-eyed, flushed with happiness. "What did he
+say, Daddy? What?"
+
+"He said," her father answered, taking her hands in his: "'She's a brave
+little soldier, to stay there all alone. Dixie and I are proud of her!'"
+
+"Oh, Daddy, did he? Did he?"
+
+"Yes, dear, yes," the soldier nodded; "his very words. And look!" From
+his boot leg he took a folded paper and spread it on his knee. "He
+wrote you a pass--to Richmond. Can you read it?"
+
+Virgie leaned against her father's shoulder, studying the paper long and
+earnestly; then, presently looked up, with a note of grave but courteous
+hesitation in her tone:
+
+"Well--he--well, the Gen'ral writes a awful bad hand, Daddy."
+
+Her father laughed in genuine delight, vowing in his heart to tell his
+general and friend of this crushing criticism, if ever the fates of war
+permitted them to meet again.
+
+"Dead right!" he agreed, with hearty promptness. "But come, I'll read it
+for you. Now then. Listen:
+
+    "HEADQUARTERS OF THE ARMY OF NORTHERN VA.
+
+    "_Pass Virginia Cary and escort through all Confederate lines and
+    give safe-conduct wherever possible._
+
+    "R.E. LEE, _General_."
+
+There was silence for a moment, then Virgie looked up, with tears in her
+eyes and voice.
+
+"An' he did that--for little _me_? Oh, Daddy, I love him so much, it--it
+makes me want to cry."
+
+She hid her face on the coat of gray, and sobbed; while her father
+stroked her hair and answered soothingly, but in a tone of mourning
+reverie:
+
+"So do we all, darling; big grown men, who have suffered, and are losing
+all they love. They are ragged--and wounded--hungry--and, oh, so tired!
+But, when they think of _him_, they draw up their belts another hole,
+and say, '_For General Lee!_' And then they can fight and fight and
+fight--till their hearts stop beating--and the god of battles writes
+them a bloody pass!"
+
+Again he had risen to his feet. He was speaking proudly, in the reckless
+passion of the yet unconquered Southerner, only half-conscious of the
+tot who watched him, wondering. So she came to him quickly, taking his
+hand in both her own, and striving to bring him comfort from the
+fountain of her little mother-heart.
+
+"Don't you worry, Daddy-man. We'll--we'll whip 'em yet."
+
+"No, dear--no," he sighed, as he dropped into his seat. "We won't. It's
+hard enough on men; but harder still on children such as you." He
+turned to her gravely, earnestly: "Virgie, I had hoped to get you
+through to Richmond--to-day. But I can't. The Yankees have cut us off.
+They are up the river and down the river--and all around us, I've been
+nearly the whole night getting here; creeping through the woods--like an
+old Molly-cotton-tail--with the blue boys everywhere, waiting to get me
+if I showed my head."
+
+"But they didn't, did they?" said Virgie, laughing at his reference to
+the wise old rabbit and feeling for the pockets of his shabby coat, "Did
+you--did you bring me anything?"
+
+At her question the man cried out as if in pain, then reached for her in
+a wave of yearning tenderness.
+
+"Listen, dear; I--I had a little bundle for you--of--of things to eat."
+He took her by the arms, and looked into her quaint, wise face, "And I
+was so glad I had it, darling, for you are thinner than you were." He
+paused to bite his lip, and continued haltingly, "There was bread in
+that bundle--and meat--real meat--and sugar--and tea."
+
+Virgie released herself and clapped her hands.
+
+"Oh, Daddy, where is it?" she asked him happily, once more reaching for
+the pocket. "'Cause I'm _so_ hungry for somethin' good."
+
+"Don't! Don't!" he cried, as he drew his coat away, roughly, fiercely,
+in the pain of unselfish suffering. "For Daddy's sake, don't!"
+
+"Why, what is it, Daddy," she asked, in her shrillness of a child's
+alarm, her eyes on the widening stain of red above his waist. "Is--is it
+hurtin' you again? What is it, Daddy-man?"
+
+"Your bundle," he answered, in the flat, dull tone of utter
+hopelessness. "I lost it, Virgie. I lost it."
+
+"Oh," she said, with a quaver of disappointment, which she vainly strove
+to hide. "How did you do it?"
+
+For a moment the man leaned limply against a chair-back, hiding his eyes
+with one trembling hand; then he spoke in shamed apology:
+
+"I--I couldn't help it, darling; because, you see, I hadn't any powder
+left; and I was coming through the woods--just as I told you--when the
+Yanks got sight of me." He smiled down at her bravely, striving to add a
+dash of comedy to his tragic plight. "And I tell you, Virgie, your old
+dad had to run like a turkey--wishing to the Lord he had wings, too."
+
+Virgie did not smile in turn, and her father dropped back into his
+former tone, his pale lips setting in a straight, hard line.
+
+"And then--the blue boy I was telling you about--when he shot at me, I
+must have stumbled, because, when I scrambled up, I--I couldn't see just
+right; so I ran and ran, thinking of you, darling, and wanting to get to
+you before--well, before it was breakfast time. I had your bundle in my
+pocket; but when I fell--why, Virgie, don't you see?--I--I couldn't go
+back and find it." He paused to choke, then spoke between his teeth, in
+fury at a strength which had failed to breast a barrier of fate: "But I
+_would_ have gone back, if I'd had any powder left. I _would_ have! I
+would!"
+
+A pitiful apology it was, from a man to a little child; a story told
+only in its hundredth part, for why should he give its untold horrors to
+a baby's ears? How could she understand that man-hunt in the early dawn?
+The fugitive--with an empty pistol on his hip--wading swamps and
+plunging through the tangled underbrush; alert and listening, darting
+from tree to tree where the woods were thin; crouching behind some
+fallen log to catch his laboring breath, then rising again to creep
+along his way. He did not tell of the racking pain in his weary legs,
+nor the protest of his pounding heart--the strain--the agony--the puffs
+of smoke that floated above the pines, and the ping of bullets whining
+through the trees. He did not tell of the ball that slid along his ribs,
+leaving a fiery, aching memory behind, as the man crashed down a clay
+bank, to lie for an instant in a crumpled heap, to rise and stumble
+on--not toward the haven of his own Confederate lines, but forward, to
+where a baby waited--through a dancing mist of red.
+
+And so the soldier made his poor apology, turning his head away to
+avoid a dreaded look in Virgie's big, reproachful eyes; then he added
+one more lashwelt to his shame:
+
+"And now your poor old daddy is no more use to you. I come to my little
+girl with empty hands--with an empty gun--and an empty heart!"
+
+He said it bitterly, in the self-accusing sorrow of his soul; and his
+courage, which had borne him through a hell of suffering, now broke; but
+only when a helper of the helpless failed. He laid his outflung arms
+across the table. He bowed his beaten head upon them and sobbed aloud,
+with sobs that shook him to his heels.
+
+It was then that Virgie came to him again, a little daughter of the
+South, who, like a hundred thousand of her sisters, brought comfort in
+the blackest hours.
+
+One tiny, weak arm was slipped about his neck. One tiny brown hand, with
+its berry-stained fingers, was run through his tangled hair, softly,
+tenderly, even as she longed to soothe the weary head of General Lee.
+
+"Don't cry, Daddy-man," she murmured in his ear; "it's all right. _I_
+can eat the blackberries. They--they don't taste so _awful_ good when
+you have 'em _all_ the time; but _I_ don't mind." She paused to kiss
+him, then tried once more to buoy his hope and hers. "We'll have jus'
+heaps of things when we get to Richmon'--jus' heaps--an' then--"
+
+She stopped abruptly, lifting her head and listening, in the manner of a
+sheep dog scenting danger from afar. Her father looked up sharply and
+gripped her hands.
+
+"Virgie! You hear--_what_?"
+
+"Horses! Oh, a lot of 'em! On the big road!"
+
+It was true, for down the breeze came the faintly echoed thud of many
+hoofs and the clinking jingle of sabers against the riders' thighs.
+Virgie turned back from the open door.
+
+"Why--why, they've turned into _our_ road!" Her breath came fast, as she
+sank her voice to a faint, awed whisper, "Daddy--do you reckon
+it's--_Yankees_?"
+
+"Yes," said her father, who had risen to his feet. "Morrison's cavalry!
+They won't hurt _you_; but I'll have to get to the woods again! Good-by,
+honey! Good-by!"
+
+He kissed her hurriedly and started for the door, but shrank into the
+shadow at sight of a blue-clothed watcher sharply outlined on the crest
+of a distant rise. Escape was cut off, and the hunted soldier turned to
+Virgie in his need.
+
+"Shut the door--quick!" She obeyed in silence. "Lock it!" She turned the
+rusty key, and waited. "Now the windows! Hurry, but do it quietly."
+
+She closed the clumsy shutters and set the heavy bars into their slots;
+then the man came forward, knelt down before her and took her hands.
+
+"Listen, Virginia," he whispered earnestly; "don't you remember how your
+dear, dear mother--and I, too, darling--always told you never to tell a
+lie?"
+
+"An' I haven't, Daddy-man," she protested, wondering. "'Deed, an' 'deed,
+I haven't. Why--"
+
+"Yes, yes, I know," he interrupted hurriedly; "but now--_you must_!" As
+the child stepped backward and tried to draw away, he clasped her hands
+more tightly still. "But listen, dear; it's to save _me_! Don't you
+understand?--and it's _right_! When those men come, they mustn't find
+me. Say I _was_ here, but I've gone. If they ask which way, tell them I
+went down past the spring--through the blackberry patch. Do you
+understand?--and can you remember?" She nodded gravely, and the
+Southerner folded her tightly in his arms. "Be a brave little rebel,
+honey--_for me_!"
+
+He released her and began to mount the ladder leading to the scuttle in
+the ceiling; but halfway up he paused, as Virgie checked him with a
+solemn question:
+
+"Daddy--would Gen'ral Lee want me to tell that lie?"
+
+"Yes, dear," he answered slowly, thoughtfully; "this once! And, if ever
+you see him, ask him, and he'll tell you so himself. God help you,
+darling; it's for General Lee--and _you_!"
+
+The littlest rebel sighed, as though a weight had been lifted from her
+mind, and she cocked her head at the sound of louder hoof-beats on the
+carriage road.
+
+"All right, Daddy-man. I'll tell--a _whopper_!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+The man crawled up through the scuttle hole and disappeared; then drew
+the ladder after him and closed the trap, while Virgie tiptoed to the
+table and slipped into a seat.
+
+The cabin was now in semi-darkness, except for a shaft of sunlight
+entering through the jagged wound from the cannon-shot above the door;
+and it fell on the quaint, brown head of little Miss Virginia Cary, and
+the placid form of Susan Jemima, perching opposite, in serene contempt
+of the coming of a conquering host.
+
+The jingling clank of sabers grew louder to the listeners' ears, through
+the rumble of pounding hoofs; a bugle's note came winnowing across the
+fields, and Virgie leaned forward with a confidential whisper to her
+doll:
+
+"Susan Jemima, I wouldn't tell anybody else--no, not for anything--but I
+cert'n'y am awful scared!"
+
+There came a scurrying rush, a command to halt, and a rustling,
+scraping noise of dismounting men; a pause, and the sharp, loud rap of a
+saber hilt against the door. Virgie breathed hard, but made no answer.
+
+"Open up!" called a voice outside, but the little rebel closed her lips
+and sat staring at Susan Jemima across the table. A silence followed,
+short, yet filled with dread; then came a low-toned order and the crash
+of carbine butts on the stout oak door. For a time it resisted
+hopefully, then slowly its top sagged in, with a groaning, grating
+protest from its rusty hinges; it swayed, collapsed in a cloud of
+dust--and the enemy swept over it.
+
+They came with a rush; in the lead an officer, a naked saber in his
+fist, followed by a squad of grim-faced troopers, each with his carbine
+cocked and ready for discharge. Yet, as suddenly as they had come, they
+halted now at the sight of a little lady, seated at table, eating
+berries, as calmly as though the dogs of war had never even growled.
+
+A wondering silence followed, till broken by a piping voice, in grave
+but courteous reproof:
+
+"I--I don't think you are very polite."
+
+The officer in command was forced to smile.
+
+"I'm sorry, my dear," he apologized; "but am afraid, this time, I can't
+quite help it." He glanced at the door of the adjoining room and turned
+to his waiting men, though speaking in an undertone: "He's in there, I
+guess. Don't fire if you can help it--on account of the baby. Now then!
+Steady, boys! Advance!"
+
+He led the way, six troopers following, while the rest remained behind
+to guard the cabin's open door. Virgie slowly turned her head, with eyes
+that watched the officer's every move; then presently she called:
+
+"Hey, there! That's _my_ room--an' don't you-all bother any of my
+things, either!"
+
+This one command, at least, was implicitly obeyed, for in a moment the
+disappointed squad returned. The carbine butts were grounded; the
+troopers stood at orderly attention, while their officer stepped toward
+the table.
+
+"What's your name, little monkey?"
+
+Virgie raised her eyes in swift reproach.
+
+"I don't like to be called a monkey. It--it isn't respectful."
+
+The Union soldier laughed.
+
+"O-ho! I see." He touched his hat and made her a sweeping bow. "A
+thousand pardons, Mademoiselle." He shot his sword into its scabbard,
+and laughed again. "Might I inquire as to what you are called by
+your--er--justly respectful relatives and friends?"
+
+"Virgie," she answered simply.
+
+"Ah," he approved, "and a very pretty name! Virgie what?"
+
+"My whole name is Miss Virginia Houston Gary."
+
+The soldier started, glanced at his troopers, then back to the child
+again:
+
+"Is Herbert Cary your father?"
+
+He waited for her answer, and got it, straight from a baby's shoulder:
+
+"_Mister_ Herbert Cary is--yes, sir."
+
+The enemy smiled and made her another bow.
+
+"I stand corrected. Where is your father now?"
+
+Virgie hesitated.
+
+"I--I don't know."
+
+The voice of her inquisitor took on a sterner tone:
+
+"Is he here?--hiding somewhere? Tell me!"
+
+Her little heart was pounding, horribly, and the hot blood came into her
+cheeks; but she looked him squarely in the face, and lied--for General
+Lee:
+
+"No, sir. Daddy _was_ here--but he's gone away."
+
+The enemy was looking at her, intently, and his handsome, piercing eyes,
+grew most uncomfortable. She hung for an instant between success and
+sobbing failure, till a bubble from Mother Eve rose up in her youthful
+blood and burst into a spray of perfect feminine deceit. She did not try
+to add to her simple statement, but began to eat her berries, calmly, as
+though the subject were completely closed.
+
+"Which way did he go?" the officer demanded, and she pointed with her
+spoon.
+
+"Down by the spring--through the blackberry patch."
+
+The soldier was half-convinced. He stood for a moment, looking at the
+floor, then asked her sharply, suddenly:
+
+"If your father had gone, then why did you lock that door?"
+
+She faltered, but only for an instant.
+
+"'Cause I thought you might be--_niggers_."
+
+The man before her clenched his hands, as he thought of that new-born,
+hideous danger menacing the South.
+
+"I see," he answered gently; "_yes_, I see." He turned away, but, even
+as he turned, his eye was caught by the double-doored cupboard against
+the wall. "What do you keep in there?" he asked; and the child smiled
+faintly, a trifle sadly, in reply:
+
+"We _used_ to keep things to eat--when we had any."
+
+He noted her mild evasion, and pushed the point.
+
+"What is in it now?"
+
+"Tin pans."
+
+"Anything else?"
+
+"Er--yes, sir."
+
+He caught his breath and stepped a little nearer, bending till his face
+was close to hers.
+
+"What?"
+
+"Colonel Mosby," declared the mite, with a most emphatic nod; "an' you
+better look out, too!"
+
+The officer laughed as he turned to his grinning squad.
+
+"Bright little youngster! Still, I think we'll have a look." He dropped
+his air of amusement, growing stern again. "Now, men! Ready!"
+
+They swung into line and faced the cupboard, the muzzles of their
+carbines trained upon it, while their leader advanced, swung open the
+doors, and quickly stepped aside.
+
+On the bottom shelf, as Virgie had declared, were a few disconsolate tin
+pans; yet tacked to the door was a picture print of Mosby--that dreaded
+guerrilla whose very name was a bugaboo in the Union lines.
+
+The littlest rebel flung back her head and laughed.
+
+"My, but you looked funny!" she cried to the somewhat disconcerted
+officer, pointing at him with her spoon. "If a mouse had jumped out, I
+reckon it would have scared you mos' to death."
+
+The officer's cheeks flushed red, in spite of his every effort at
+control; nor was he assisted by the knowledge that his men were
+tittering behind his back. He turned upon them sharply.
+
+"That will do," he said, and gave a brusque command: "Corporal, deploy
+your men and make a thorough search outside. Examine the ground around
+the spring--and report!"
+
+"Yes, sir," returned Corporal Dudley saluting and dropping his hand
+across his mouth to choke off an exclamation of anger. Then he snarled
+at his men, to ease the pain of thwarted vengeance: "_'Tention! Right
+face! Forward! March!_"
+
+The squad trooped out across the broken door, leaving their commanding
+officer alone with his rebel prisoner.
+
+"Now, Virgie," he asked, in a kindly tone, though holding her eyes with
+his, "do you mean to tell me--cross your heart--that you are here, just
+by yourself?"
+
+"Er--no, sir." As he opened his lips to speak, she pointed to her doll.
+"Me an' Susan Jemima."
+
+"Well, that's a fact," he laughed. "Hanged if I'm not losing all my
+social polish." He gallantly removed his hat, bowed gravely to the cedar
+stick, and shook its hand. "Charmed to make your acquaintance, Miss
+Susan, believe me. My own name is Morrison--Lieutenant-Colonel
+Morrison--at your service." He turned to the little mother with a smile
+that showed a row of white and even teeth. "And now," he said, "since we
+are all informally introduced, suppose we have a quiet, comfortable
+chat." He paused, but she made no answer. "Well? Aren't you going to ask
+me to have some breakfast?"
+
+Virgie cast a troubled gaze into the plate before her.
+
+"Er--no, sir."
+
+"What? Why not?"
+
+She faltered, and answered slowly:
+
+"'Cause--'cause you're one of the damn Yankees."
+
+"Oh! oh! oh!" exclaimed the soldier, shocked to hear a baby's lips
+profaned. "Little girls shouldn't use such words. Why, Virgie!"
+
+She raised her eyes, clear, fearless, filled with vindicating innocence.
+
+"Well, it's your _name_, isn't it? _Everybody_ calls you that."
+
+"Um--yes," he admitted, striving to check the twitching of his lips; "I
+suppose they do--south of Washington. But don't you know we are just
+like other people?" She shook her head. "Oh, yes, we are. Why, _I_ have
+a little girl at home--not any bigger than you."
+
+"Have you?" asked Virgie, her budding racial prejudice at war with
+youthful curiosity. "What's her name?"
+
+"Gertrude," he answered softly, tenderly. "Gertrude Morrison. Would you
+like to see her picture?"
+
+"Yes," said the little rebel, and stepped across the gulf which had lain
+between her and her enemy. "You can sit down if you want to. Jus' put
+Susan Jemima on the table."
+
+"Thank you," returned her visitor, obeying instructions, seating himself
+and loosening the upper buttons of his coat. On his neck, suspended by
+a chain, was a silver locket containing the miniature of a plump and
+pretty child. It had lain there since the war began, through many a
+bivouac, many a weary march, and even in the charge he could feel it
+tapping against his breast; so now, as he held it out to Virgie, the
+father's hand was trembling.
+
+"There she is. My Gertrude--my little Gertrude."
+
+Virgie leaned forward eagerly.
+
+"Oh!" she said, in unaffected admiration, "She's _mighty_ pretty.
+She's--" The child stopped suddenly, and raised her eyes. "An' she's
+fat, too. I reckon Gertrude gets lots to eat, doesn't she?"
+
+"Why, yes," agreed the father, thinking of his comfortable Northern
+home; "of course. Don't you?"
+
+Virgie weighed the question thoughtfully before she spoke.
+
+"Sometimes--when Daddy gets through the lines and brings it to me."
+
+The soldier started violently, wrenched back from the selfish dream of
+happiness that rose as he looked at the picture of his child.
+
+"What! Is _that_ why your father comes?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"I didn't know! I thought he came--"
+
+He rose to his feet and turned away, his thoughts atumble, a pang of
+parental pity gnawing at his heart; then he wheeled and faced her,
+asking, with a break in his husky voice:
+
+"And at other times--what do you eat, then?"
+
+She made a quaint, depreciating gesture toward the appointments of her
+breakfast table.
+
+"Blackberries--an'--an' coffee made out of aco'ns."
+
+Again the troubled conqueror turned away.
+
+"Oh, it's a shame!" he muttered between his teeth. "A wicked shame!"
+
+He stood for a moment, silently, till Virgie spoke and jarred him with
+another confidence.
+
+"My cousin Norris told me that the Yankees have bread every day; an'
+tea--an' milk--an' everything. _An' butter!_"
+
+This last-named article of common diet was mentioned with an air of
+reverential awe; and, somehow, it hurt the well-fed Union officer far
+more than had she made some direct accusation against the invading
+armies of the North.
+
+"Don't, Virgie--please," he murmured softly. "There are some things we
+just can't bear to listen to--even in times of war." He sighed and
+dropped into his former seat, striving gently to change the subject.
+"You have lived here--always?"
+
+"Oh, no," she assured him, with a lift of her small, patrician brows.
+"_This_ is the overseer's house. _Our_ house used to be up on the hill,
+in the grove."
+
+"_Used_ to be--?"
+
+"Yes, sir. But--but the Yankees burnt it up."
+
+Morrison's fist came down on the table with a crash. He remembered now
+his raid of some months before upon this same plantation, so unfamiliar
+in its present neglected state. Again he looked into the fearless eyes
+of a Southern gentlewoman who mocked him while her lover husband swam
+the river and escaped. Again he saw the mansion wrapped in flame and
+smoke--the work of a drunken fiend in his own command. Yes, he
+remembered now; too well; then he turned to the child and spoke:
+
+"Tell me about it. Won't you?"
+
+She nodded, wriggled from her chair, and stood beside the table.
+
+"Oh, it was a long time ago--a month, maybe--an' they came after our
+horses. Mamma an' me were all by ourselves--'ceptin' Uncle Billy and
+Sally Ann. An' we were dreadful scared--an' we hid in the ice house."
+
+She paused. Her listener had leaned his elbow on the table, his hand
+across his eyes.
+
+"Yes, dear. Go on."
+
+The child had been standing opposite, with Susan Jemima and the
+acorn-coffee pot between them; but gradually she began to edge a little
+nearer, till presently she stood beside him, fingering a shiny button on
+his coat.
+
+"An' the blue boys ate up everything we had--an' took our corn. An' when
+they went away from our house, they--a man set it on fire. But another
+man got real mad with him, an'--an' shot him. _I_ know, 'cause Uncle
+Billy put him in the ground." She paused, then sank her voice to a
+whisper of mysterious dread, "An'--_an' I saw him!_"
+
+"Don't think about it, Virgie," begged Morrison, slipping his arm about
+the mite, and trying not to put his own beloved ones in the little
+rebel's place. "What happened then?"
+
+"We came to live here," said Virgie; "but Mamma got sick. Oh, she got
+terrible sick--an' one night Daddy came through, and put her in the
+ground, too. But _he_ says she's jus' asleep."
+
+The soldier started. Mrs. Cary dead? This poor tot motherless? He drew
+the baby closer to him, stroking her hair, as her sleeping mother might
+have done, and waited for the rest.
+
+"An' las' Friday, Sally Ann went away--I don't know where--an'--"
+
+"What?" asked Morrison. "She left you here--all by yourself?"
+
+"Yes, sir," said the child, with a careless laugh. "But _I_ don't mind.
+Sally Ann was a triflin' nigger, anyhow. You see--"
+
+"Wait a minute," he interrupted, "what became of the old colored man
+who--"
+
+"Uncle Billy? Yes, sir. We sent him up to Richmond--to get some things,
+but he can't come back--the Yankees won't let him."
+
+"Won't they?"
+
+"No, sir. An' Daddy's been tryin' to get me up to Richmon', where my
+Aunt Margaret lives at, but he can't--'cause the Yankees are up the
+river an' down the river, an'--an' everywhere--an' he can't." She
+paused, as Morrison turned to her from his restless pacing up and down.
+"My, but you've got fine clo'es! Daddy's clo'es are all rags--with--with
+holes in 'em."
+
+He could not answer. There was nothing for him to say, and Virgie
+scorched him with another question:
+
+"What did you come after Daddy for?"
+
+"Oh, not because I _wanted_ to, little girl," he burst out harshly. "But
+you wouldn't understand." He had turned away, and was gazing through the
+open door, listening to the muttered wrath of the big black guns far
+down the river. "It's war! One of the hateful, pitiful things of war! I
+came because I had my orders."
+
+"From your Gen'ral?"
+
+He lowered his chin, regarding her in mild astonishment.
+
+"Yes--my General."
+
+"An' do you love _him_--like _I_ love Gen'ral Lee?"
+
+"Yes, dear," he answered earnestly; "of course."
+
+He wondered again to see her turn away in sober thought, tracing lines
+on the dusty floor with one small brown toe; for the child was wrestling
+with a problem. If a soldier had orders from his general, as she herself
+might put it, "he was _bound_ to come"; but still it was hard to
+reconcile such duty with the capture of her father. Therefore, she
+raised her tiny chin and resorted to tactics of a purely personal
+nature:
+
+"An' didn't you know, if you hurt my daddy, I'd tell Uncle Fitz Lee on
+you?"
+
+"No," the Yankee smiled. "Is he your uncle?"
+
+The littlest rebel regarded him with a look of positive pity for his
+ignorance.
+
+"He's _everybody's_ uncle," she stated warmly. "An' if I was to tell
+him, he'd come right after you an'--an' lick the _stuffins_ out of
+you."
+
+The soldier laughed.
+
+"My dear," he confided, with a dancing twinkle in hip eye, "to tell you
+the honest truth, your Uncle Fitz has done it already--_several_ times."
+
+"Has he?" she cried, in rapturous delight. "Oh, _has_ he?"
+
+"He has," the enemy repeated, with vigor and conviction. "But suppose we
+shift our conversation to matters a shade more pleasant. Take you, for
+instance. You see--" He stopped abruptly, turning his head and listening
+with keen intentness. "What's that?" he asked.
+
+"_I_ didn't hear anything," said Virgie, breathing very fast; but she
+too had heard it--a sound above them, a scraping sound, as of someone
+lying flat along the rafters and shifting his position and, while she
+spoke, a telltale bit of plaster fell, and broke as it struck the floor.
+
+Morrison looked up, starting as he saw the outlines of the closely
+fitting scuttle, for the loft was so low and shallow that he had not
+suspected its presence from an outside view; but now he was certain of
+the fugitive's hiding-place. Virgie watched him, trembling, growing hot
+in the pit of her little stomach; yet, when he faced her, she looked him
+squarely in the eye, fighting one last battle for her daddy--as hopeless
+as the tottering cause of the Stars and Bars.
+
+"You--you don't think he can fly, do you?"
+
+"No, little Rebel," the soldier answered gently, sadly; "but there are
+other ways." He glanced at the table, measuring its height with the
+pitch of the ceiling, then turned to her again: "Is your father in that
+loft?" She made no answer, but began to back away. "Tell me the truth.
+Look at me!" Still no answer, and he took a step toward her, speaking
+sternly: "Do you hear me? _Look_ at me!"
+
+She tried; but her courage was oozing fast. She had done her best, but
+now it was more than the mite could stand; so she bit her lip to stop
+its quivering, and turned her head away. For a moment the man stood,
+silent, wondering if it was possible that the child had been coached in
+a string of lies to trade upon his tenderness of heart; then he spoke,
+in a voice of mingled pity and reproach:
+
+"And so you told me a story. And all the rest--is a story, too. Oh,
+Virgie! Virgie!"
+
+"I didn't!" she cried, the big tears breaking, out at last. "I didn't
+tell you stories'. Only jus' a _little_ one--for Daddy--an' Gen'ral
+Lee."
+
+She was sobbing now, and the man looked down upon her in genuine
+compassion, his own eyes swimming at her childish grief, his soldier
+heart athrob and aching at the duty he must perform.
+
+"I'm sorry, dear," he sighed, removing her doll and dragging the table
+across the floor to a point directly beneath the scuttle in the ceiling.
+
+"What are you goin' to do?" she asked in terror, following as he moved.
+"Oh, what are you goin' to do?"
+
+He did not reply. He could not; but when he placed a chair upon the
+table and prepared to mount, then Virgie understood.
+
+"You shan't! You shan't!" she cried out shrilly. "He's my daddy--and you
+shan't."
+
+She pulled at the table, and when he would have put her aside, as gently
+as he could, she attacked him fiercely, in a childish storm of passion,
+sobbing, striking at him with her puny fists. The soldier bowed his head
+and moved away.
+
+"Oh, I can't! I can't!" he breathed, in conscience-stricken pain. "There
+_must_ be some other way; and still--"
+
+He stood irresolute, gazing through the open door, watching his men as
+they hunted for a fellow man; listening to the sounds that floated
+across the stricken fields--the calls of his troopers; the locusts in
+the sun-parched woods chanting their shrill, harsh litany of drought;
+but more insistent still came the muffled boom of the big black guns far
+down the muddy James. They called to him, these guns, in the
+hoarse-tongued majesty of war, bidding him forget himself, his love, his
+pity--all else, but the grim command to a marching host--a host that
+must reach its goal, though it marched on a road of human hearts.
+
+The soldier set his teeth and turned to the little rebel, deciding on
+his course of action; best for her, best for the man who lay in the
+loft above, though now it must seem a brutal cruelty to both.
+
+"Well, Virgie," he said, "since you haven't told me what I want to know,
+I'll have to take you--and give you to the Yankees."
+
+He stepped toward her swiftly and caught her by the wrist. She screamed
+in terror, fighting to break his hold, while the trap above them opened,
+and the head and shoulders of the Southerner appeared, his pistol held
+in his outstretched hand.
+
+"Drop it, you hound!" he ordered fiercely. "Drop it!"
+
+The Northerner released his captive, but stood unmoved as he looked into
+the pistol's muzzle and the blazing eyes of the cornered scout.
+
+"I'm sorry," he said, in quiet dignity. "I'm very sorry; but I had to
+bring you out." He paused, then spoke again: "And you needn't bother
+about your gun. If you'd had any ammunition, our fire would have been
+returned, back yonder in the woods. The game's up, Cary. Come down!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+The head and shoulders disappeared. A short pause followed, then the
+ladder came slowly down, and the Southerner descended, while Virgie
+crouched, a sobbing little heap, beside her doll. But when he reached
+the bottom rung, she rose to her feet and ran to meet him, weeping
+bitterly.
+
+"Oh, Daddy, Daddy, I didn't do it right! I didn't do it right!"
+
+She buried her head in his tattered coat, while he slipped an arm about
+her and tried to soothe a sorrow too great for such a tiny heart to
+bear.
+
+"But you did do it right," he told her. "It was my fault. Mine! My leg
+got cramped, and I had to move." He stooped and kissed her. "It was _my_
+fault, honey; but you?--you did it _splendidly_!" He patted her
+tear-stained cheek, then turned to his captor, with a grim, hard smile
+of resignation to his fate.
+
+"Well, Colonel, you've had a long chase of it; but you've gotten my
+brush at last."
+
+The Union soldier faced him, speaking earnestly:
+
+"Captain Cary, you're a brave man--and one of the best scouts in the
+Confederate army. I regret this happening--more than I can say." The
+Southerner shrugged his shoulders. His Northern captor asked: "Are you
+carrying dispatches?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Any other papers?--of any kind?" No answer came, and he added sternly:
+"It is quite useless to refuse. Give them to me."
+
+He held out his hand, but his captive only looked him in the eyes; and
+the answer, though spoken in an undertone, held a world of quiet
+meaning:
+
+"You can take it--_afterwards_."
+
+The Federal officer bit his lip; and yet he could not, would not, be
+denied. His request became demand, backed by authority and the right of
+might, till Virgie broke in, in a piping voice of indignation:
+
+"You can't have it! It's mine! My pass to Richmon'--from Gen'ral Lee."
+
+Morrison turned slowly from the little rebel to the man.
+
+"Is this true?" he asked.
+
+The Southerner flushed, and for reply produced the rumpled paper from
+his boot leg, and handed it over without a word. The Northerner read it
+carefully.
+
+    "_Pass Virginia Cary and escort through all Confederate lines and
+    give safe-conduct wherever possible._
+
+    "R.E. LEE, _General_."
+
+The reader crushed the paper in his fist, while his hand sank slowly to
+his side, then he raised his head and asked, in a voice which was
+strangely out of keeping with a Lieutenant-Colonel of the Union Cavalry:
+
+"And who was to be her escort? You?"
+
+The captive nodded, smiling his sad, grim smile; and the captor
+swallowed hard as he moved to the cabin door and stood listening to the
+muttered rumble of the river guns.
+
+"I'm sorry, Cary," he whispered brokenly; "more sorry than you can
+understand."
+
+For a long time no one spoke, then the Southerner went to Virgie,
+dropping his hand in tenderness on her tumbled hair.
+
+"Just go into your room, honey; I want to talk to Colonel Morrison." She
+looked up at him doubtfully; but he added, with a reassuring smile:
+"It's all right, darling. I'll call you in just a minute."
+
+Still Virgie seemed to hesitate. She shifted her doubting eyes toward
+the Union officer, turned, and obeyed in silence, closing the door of
+the adjoining room behind her. Then the two men faced each other,
+without the hampering presence of the child, each conscious of the
+coming tragedy that both, till now, had striven manfully to hide. The
+one moved forward toward a seat, staggering as he walked, and catching
+himself on the table's edge, while the other's hand went out to lend him
+aid; but the Southerner waved him off.
+
+"Thank you," he said, as he sank into a chair. "I don't _want_
+help--from _you_!"
+
+"Why not?" asked Morrison.
+
+"Because," said Cary, in sullen anger, "I don't ask quarter, nor aid,
+from a man who frightens children."
+
+The Northerner's chin went up; and when he replied his voice was
+trembling; not in passion, but with a deeper, finer something which had
+gripped his admiration for the courage of a child:
+
+"And I wouldn't hurt a hair of her splendid little head!" He paused,
+then spoke again, more calmly: "You thought me a beast to frighten her;
+but don't you know it was the only thing to do? Otherwise my men might
+have had to shoot you--before her eyes." Cary made no answer, though now
+he understood; and Morrison went on: "It isn't easy for me to track a
+fellow creature down; to take him when he's wounded, practically
+unarmed, and turn him over to a firing squad. But it's war, my
+friend--one of the merciless realities of war--and you ought to know the
+meaning of its name."
+
+"Yes, I know," returned the Southerner, with all the pent-up bitterness
+of a hopeless struggle and defeat; "it has taken three years to teach
+me--_and I know_! Look at me!" he cried, as he stood up in his rags and
+spread his arms. "Look at my country, swept as bare as a stubble field!
+You've whipped us, maybe, with your millions of money and your endless
+men, and now you are warring with the women and the children!" He turned
+his back and spoke in the deep intensity of scorn: "A fine thing,
+Colonel! And may you get your ... reward!"
+
+The Northerner set his lips in a thin, cold line; but curbed his wrath
+and answered the accusation quietly:
+
+"There are two sides to the question, Cary; _but there must be one
+flag_!"
+
+"Then fly your flag in justice!" the Southerner retorted hotly, wheeling
+on his enemy, with blazing eyes and with hands that shook in the stress
+of passion. "A while ago you called me a brave man and a good scout;
+and, because I'm both, your people have set a price on me. Five hundred
+dollars--alive or dead!" He laughed; a hoarse, harsh travesty of mirth,
+and added, with a lip that curled in withering contempt: "Alive or dead!
+A gentleman and a scout!--for just half the price of one good, sound
+nigger! By Heaven, it makes me proud!"
+
+Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison looked across the table at his prisoner, and
+answered gravely, yet with a touch of sternness in his military tone:
+
+"You are more than a scout, Cary. You've carried dispatches, and
+intercepted ours; for both of which, if taken, you would have been a
+prisoner of war, no more. But you've entered our lines--not in a uniform
+of gray, _but blue_--and you've cost us the loss of two important
+battles."
+
+"And had you done the same," returned the Southerner, "for you it would
+have meant promotion. I've served my cause as best I could; in the
+saddle or the rifle pit; in the woods, or creeping through your lines.
+If I've cost you a battle, my life is a puny price to pay, and I'd pay
+it without a sigh." He paused and sank into his seat. "For myself, I
+don't care much. I'm worn out, anyway; and I only wanted to get my
+little girl to Richmond." At the thought of Virgie his anger returned to
+him, and he once more staggered to his feet.
+
+"But you," he accused, "you've beaten a baby by the force of arms!
+You've run me to earth--and you've blocked her chance! It's Virgie you
+are fighting now--not me--yes, just as if you rode her down with a troop
+of horse! A fine thing, Colonel! For you, a brevet! For me, a firing
+squad! Well, call in your men and get it over!" Again he smiled; a grim,
+slow smile of bitterness and scorn. "Bravo, Colonel Morrison! Bravo! You
+add one other glory to your conquering sword--and, besides, you'll
+receive five hundred dollars in reward!"
+
+The Northerner turned upon him fiercely, goaded at last to the
+breaking-point in a struggle as black and awful as the struggle of his
+brother-foe.
+
+"Stop it, man!" he cried. "I order you to stop! It's duty!--not a
+miserable reward!" His cheeks were flaming; his muscles quivered, and
+his fists were clenched. "Do you actually suppose," he asked, "that I'm
+proud of this? Do you think I'm wringing blood out of your heart and
+mine--for money?"
+
+They faced each other, two crouching, snarling animals, the raw,
+primeval passions of their hearts released, each seeing through a mist
+of red; a mist that had risen up to roll across a mighty land and plunge
+its noblest sons into a bloody ruck of war.
+
+They faced each other, silently; then slowly the features of the
+Southerner relaxed. His bitterness was laid aside. He spoke, in the
+soft, slow accent of his people--an accent so impossible to a trick of
+print or pen.
+
+"I'm glad you feel that way; and maybe, after all, you're doing what you
+think is right. Yes--and I know it's hard." He stopped, then stepped a
+little nearer, timidly, as Virgie might have done. "Colonel," he said,
+scarce audibly, "I ask you just one thing; not for myself, but for
+her--for Virgie. Get the poor little tad through your lines, will
+you?--and--and don't let her know--about _me_."
+
+His captor did not answer him in words, because of the pain that took
+him by the throat; but his hand went out, till it reached another hand
+that gripped it gratefully.
+
+"Thank you, Morrison," said the prisoner simply. "If it wasn't war
+times--"
+
+He choked, and said no more; yet silence proved more eloquent than human
+speech. They were men--brave men--and both were grateful; the one,
+because an enemy would keep his unspoken word; the other, because a
+doomed man understood.
+
+Cary opened the door of his daughter's room and called to her. She came
+in quickly, a question in her big brown eyes.
+
+"Daddy," she said, "you talked a mighty long time. It was a heap more
+than jus' a minute."
+
+"Was it?" he asked, and forced a smile. "Well, you see, we had a lot to
+say." He seated himself and, drawing her between his knees, took both
+her hands. "Now listen, honey; I'm going away with this gentleman,
+and--" He stopped as she looked up doubtfully; then added a dash of
+gayety to his tender tone: "Oh, but he _invited_ me. And think! He's
+coming back for _you_--to-day--to send you up to Richmond. Now, isn't
+that just fine?"
+
+Virgie looked slowly from her father to the Union soldier, who stood
+with downcast eyes, his back to them.
+
+"Daddy," she whispered, "he's a right good Yankee--isn't he?"
+
+"Yes, dear," her father murmured sadly, and in yearning love for the
+baby he must leave behind; "yes--he's mighty good!"
+
+He knelt and folded her in his arms, kissing her, over and over, while
+his hand went fluttering about her soft brown throat; then he wrenched
+himself away, but stood for a lingering instant more, his hands
+outstretched, atremble for a last and lingering touch, his heart a
+racing protest at the parting he must speak.
+
+"Cary!"
+
+It was Morrison who spoke, in mercy for the man; and once more Cary
+understood. He turned to cross the broken door; to face a firing squad
+in the hot, brown woods; to cross the gulf which stretched beyond the
+rumble of the guns and the snarling lip of war. But even as he turned, a
+baby's voice called out, in cheerful parting, which he himself had
+failed to speak:
+
+"Good-by, Daddy-man. I'll see you up in Richmon'."
+
+The eyes of the two men met and held, in the hardest moment of it all;
+for well they knew this hopeful prophecy could never be fulfilled.
+Morrison sighed and moved toward the door; but, from its threshold, he
+could see his troopers returning at a trot across the fields.
+
+"Wait," he said to Cary; "I'd rather my men shouldn't know I've talked
+with you." He pointed to the scuttle in the ceiling. "Would you mind if
+I asked you to go back again? Hurry! They are coming."
+
+The captured scout saluted, crossed to the ladder, and began to mount.
+At the top he paused to smile and blow a kiss to Virgie, then
+disappeared, drew up the ladder after him, and closed the trap.
+
+The captor stood in silence, waiting for his men; yet, while he stood,
+the little rebel pattered to his side, slipping her hand in his
+confidingly.
+
+"Mr. Yankee," she asked, and looked up into his face, "are you goin' to
+let Daddy come to Richmon', too?"
+
+Morrison withdrew his hand from hers--withdrew it sharply--flung himself
+into a seat beside the table, and began to scribble on the back of
+Virgie's rumpled pass; while the child stood watching, trusting, with
+the simple trust of her little mother-heart.
+
+In a moment or two, the troopers came hurrying in, with Corporal Dudley
+in the lead. He stood at attention, saluted his superior, and made his
+report of failure in the search.
+
+"Nothing sir. No tracks around the spring, and no traces of the fellow
+anywhere; but--" He stopped. His keen eyes marked the changed position
+of the table and followed upward. He saw the outlines of the scuttle
+above his head, and smiled. "But I'm glad to see that you've had better
+luck yourself."
+
+"Yes, Corporal," said Morrison, with a sharp return of his military
+tone, "I think I've found the fox's hole at last." He rose and gave his
+orders briskly. "Push that table forward!--there!--below the trap! Two
+of you get on it!" He turned to the Corporal, while he himself climbed
+up and stood beside his men. "Light that candle and pass it up to me!"
+The orders were obeyed. "Now, boys, boost me!--and we'll have him out."
+
+They raised him, till he pushed the trap aside and thrust his head and
+shoulders through the opening. From below they could see him as he waved
+the lighted candle to and fro, and presently they heard his voice, that
+sounded deep and muffled in the shallow loft:
+
+"All right, boys! You can let me down."
+
+He slid to the table and sprang lightly to the floor, facing his
+troopers with a smile, half-humorous, half in seeming disappointment, as
+he glanced at Virgie.
+
+"I'm afraid the little rebel's right again. _He isn't there!_"
+
+"Oh!" cried Virgie, then clapped her hands across her mouth, while the
+troopers slowly looked from her into the level eyes of their commanding
+officer. He stood before them, straight and tall, a soldier, every inch
+of him; and they knew that Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison was lying like a
+gentleman. They knew that their chief was staking the name and title of
+an honorable soldier against the higher, grander title of "a man."
+
+Only Corporal Dudley stood disconcerted at the startling statement, but
+as there was no help for it he could only strangle an oath and give the
+order to pass out.
+
+"_'Tention! Right face! Forward! March!_"
+
+They mounted and rode a rod or two away, awaiting orders; while Morrison
+stood silently and watched them go. He, too--like Virgie--had wrestled
+with a problem, and it stirred him to the depths. As a trooper must
+obey, so also must an officer obey a higher will; yes, even as a slave
+in iron manacles. The master of war had made his laws; and a servant
+broke them, knowingly. A captured scout was a prisoner, no more; a spy
+must hang, or fall before the volley of a firing squad. No matter for
+his bravery; no matter for the faithful service to his cause, the man
+must die! The glory was for another; for one who waved a flag on the
+spine of a bloody trench; a trench which his brothers stormed--and gave
+the blood. No matter that a spy had made this triumph possible. He had
+worn a uniform which was not his own--and the dog must die!
+
+So ruled the god of warfare; still, did war prescribe disgrace and death
+for all? If Cary had crept through the Union lines, to reach the side of
+a helpless little one--_yes, even in a coat of blue_--would the Great
+Tribunal count his deed accursed? Should fearless human love reap no
+reward beyond the crashing epitaph of a firing squad, and the powder
+smoke that drifted with the passing of a soul?
+
+"No! No!" breathed Morrison. "In God's name, give the man his chance!"
+
+He straightened his back and smiled. He took from the table a rumpled
+paper and turned to the littlest factor in the great Rebellion.
+
+"Here, Virgie! Here's your pass to Richmond--for you and your
+escort--through the Federal lines."
+
+She came to him slowly, wondering; her tiny body quivering with
+suppressed excitement, her voice a whispering caress:
+
+"Do you mean for--for Daddy, too?"
+
+"Yes, you little rebel!" he answered, choking as he laughed; "but I'm
+terribly afraid you'll have to pay me--with a kiss."
+
+She sprang into his waiting arms, and kissed him as he raised her up;
+but when he would have set her down, her little brown hands, with their
+berry-stained fingers, clung tightly about his neck.
+
+"Wait! Wait!" she cried. "Here's another one--for Gertrude! Tell her
+it's from Virgie! An' tell her I sent it, 'cause her daddy is jus' the
+best damn Yankee that ever was!"
+
+The trap above had opened, and the head and shoulders of the Southerner
+appeared; while Morrison looked up and spoke in parting:
+
+"It's all right, Cary. I only ask a soldier's pledge that you take your
+little girl to Richmond--nothing more. In passing through our lines,
+whatever you see or hear--_forget_!"
+
+A sacred trust it was, of man to man, one brother to another; and
+Morrison knew that Herbert Cary would pass through the very center of
+the Federal lines, as a _father_, not a spy.
+
+The Southerner tried to speak his gratitude, but the words refused to
+come; so he stretched one trembling hand toward his enemy of war, and
+eased his heart in a sobbing, broken call:
+
+"_Morrison! Some day it will all--be over!_"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the cabin's doorway stood Virgie and her father, hand in hand. They
+watched a lonely swallow as it dipped across the desolate, unfurrowed
+field. They listened to the distant beat of many hoofs on the river road
+and the far, faint clink of sabers on the riders' thighs; and when the
+sounds were lost to the listeners at last, the notes of a bugle came
+whispering back to them, floating, dipping, even as the swallow dipped
+across the unfurrowed fields.
+
+But still the two stood lingering in the doorway, hand in hand. The
+muddy James took up his murmuring song again; the locusts chanted in the
+hot, brown woods to the basso growl of the big, black guns far down the
+river.
+
+A sad, sad song it was; yet on its echoes seemed to ride a haunting,
+hopeful memory of the rebel's broken call, "Some day it will all be
+over!"
+
+And so the guns growled on, slow, sullen, thundering forth the
+battle-call of a still unconquered enmity; but only that peace might
+walk "some day" in the path of the shrieking shells.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+It was afternoon and over on the eastern side of the James where the old
+Turnpike leads up over the rolling hills to Richmond the sun was pouring
+down a flood of heat. The 'pike was ankle deep with dust and the fine,
+white powder, churned into floury softness by artillery and the myriad
+iron heels of war, had settled down on roadside bush and tree and vine
+till all the sweet green of summer hung its head under the hot weight
+and longed for a cooling shower which would wash it clean.
+
+In fairer times the Pike had been an active thoroughfare for the
+plantations and hundreds of smaller truck farms which fed the capitol,
+but of late months nearly all this traffic had disappeared. For the days
+of the Confederacy were drawing slowly but none the less surely to a
+close.
+
+Inside the breastworks and far flung fortifications which encompassed
+Richmond the flower of the rebel arms, the Army of Northern Virginia,
+lay like a rat caught in a trap. On three sides, north, east and south
+the Army of the Potomac under Grant beleaguered the city while the
+tireless Sheridan, with that lately developed arm of the Federals, the
+cavalry, raided right and left and struck hard blows at the crumbling
+cause where they were least expected. Yet in this same dark hour there
+had been a ray of light. Once the Confederacy had come within
+hairbreadth of overwhelming success, for Early's hard riding troopers
+had made a dash for Washington but a few weeks before and, with the
+prize almost in their grasp, had only been turned back by a great force
+which the grim, watchful Grant suddenly threw in between their guns and
+the gleaming dome of the nation's capitol.
+
+But even this small success was not for long for when Early, crossing
+over into the luscious valley of the Shenandoah, began to scourge it
+with his hosts and threaten a raid into Pennsylvania, Sheridan broke
+loose from the restriction of telegraph wires and followed him to the
+death and finally broke the back of the great raid with his mad gallop
+from Winchester.
+
+Meanwhile around Richmond, Lee and Grant, a circle within a circle, were
+constantly feeling each other out, shifting their troops from point to
+point in attack and defense,--for all the world like two fighting dogs
+hunting for an opening in the fence. And all the time the grim, quiet
+man in blue kept contracting his lines around the wonderful tactician in
+gray until the whole world came to know that unless Lee could break
+through the gap to the southwest the end of the war was plainly in
+sight.
+
+And so it happened that on this hot July day the only sign of life on
+the 'pike was a small cloud of dust which drifted lazily in the wake of
+two people who passed along the road on foot.
+
+One of the two was a tired, gaunt man in a ragged uniform of gray who
+stared up the long, hot road ahead of him with eyes in which there was,
+in spite of every discouragement the light of a certain firm resolve.
+
+The other of the two was a child with bare, brown legs and tattered
+gingham dress who limped painfully along beside the man, her sunny hair
+in a tangle half across her pinched and weary little face.
+
+At a faint sigh of exhaustion from the child the man looked down,
+gathered her up in his arms and perched her on his shoulder. Then he
+plodded on again, a prey to weariness and hunger. The turning point in
+Herbert Cary's life had come. Thanks to a generous enemy; Virgie and he
+were now reasonably sure of food if once they could reach the
+Confederate lines but as for himself, with the woman he had loved asleep
+forever beneath the pines, the future could only be an unending, barren
+stretch of gray.
+
+Then, almost as quickly, recollection of his duty towards her whom he
+carried in his arms came to him and he raged at himself for his moment
+of selfish discouragement. Spurred on by the necessity of gaining a
+point of safety for his child he began to calculate the distance yet to
+be covered and their chances of gaining friendly lines before
+encountering scouting parties of Federals. Behind him, a few miles south
+on the other bank of the James at Light House Point Sheridan was in camp
+with two brigades and Cary knew this fast riding, hard striking
+cavalryman too well not to suspect that the country, even in front of
+him, was alive with Union men. There was the pass which Morrison had
+given him, of course, but the worth of a pass in war time often depends
+more on him who receives it than on the signature.
+
+But all those things, even food, would have to wait for a while because
+he was consumed with thirst and must find water before he went another
+mile forward.
+
+A tired sigh from Virgie caught his ear and he stopped by a stone wall
+and let her get down from his shoulder. The child stood up on the broad,
+flat stones and then gave a little cry of pain. She raised one foot up
+and nursed it against her dusty, brown leg, meanwhile clutching her doll
+closer to her neck.
+
+"It's all right, honey; be a brave little girl," her father said
+consolingly. "There's a spring along here somewhere and we can look
+after that poor little foot. Ah, there it is," he cried, as he caught
+sight of a big rock behind a stone wall with a seepage of water under it
+among some trees at one side. "Just sit still a minute--till I rest--and
+then we'll have a look." He leaned back against the wall and closed his
+eyes to shut out the dizziness with which exhaustion and hunger filled
+his aching head.
+
+The child watched him anxiously for a moment and then put a soft little
+hand on his shoulder:
+
+"Are you _so_ tired, Daddy-man?"
+
+"Yes, dear," he answered with a faint smile as he opened his eyes. "I
+had to catch my breath, but I'm really all right. Now then, we'll call
+in the hospital corps."
+
+Virgie slipped down and sat on the top of the wall with her foot in her
+hand, rocking to and fro, but bravely saying nothing until her father's
+eye caught the look of pain on her pinched face.
+
+"Does it hurt you much, dear?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, sir. It--it hurts like the mischief," answered Virgie in a small
+voice. "It keeps jumping up and down."
+
+"Little woman, that's too bad," he said with a consoling pat on the head
+which seemed to take most of the pain away. "But after we bathe it and
+tie it up it will feel better."
+
+Kneeling beside the spring he took off his campaign hat of felt and
+dipped it full of clear, cold water.
+
+"Wow!" cried Virgie suddenly in the interval and she slapped her leg
+with a resounding whack. "There are 'skeeters roun' this place. One of
+'em bit me--an old _he_ one. Jiminy!"
+
+"Did he?" asked her father, smiling as he came back with the hat. "Well,
+honey, there are much worse things in this world than those little
+fellows and if you don't complain any more than that you're going to be
+a very happy lady when you grow up."
+
+"Like Mamma?" asked the little tot, with a thoughtful face.
+
+"Just like Mamma," the man repeated. "The loveliest--the bravest--and
+the _best_." He wavered a little on his feet and the hat threatened to
+slip through his fingers, but his daughter's great, dark eyes were
+steady on his and, curiously enough, he seemed to draw strength to pull
+himself together.
+
+"And now, let's see. We'll have to get the grime off first. Just dip the
+little wounded soldier in."
+
+"What! My foot in your hat!" protested Virgie with a little scream. "Oh,
+you poor daddy!"
+
+"Why, that's all right, honey," he laughed, pleased at her daintiness.
+"That hat's an old veteran. He don't mind anything. So--souse her in.
+
+"There--easy now--_easy_" as she threatened to capsize this curious
+basin. "Big toe first.
+
+"Yes, I know it's cold," he laughed as the water stung the broken skin
+and made her twitch involuntarily, "but bathing will do it good. I just
+know it feels better already--doesn't it?"
+
+"Yes, sir," answered Virgie meekly, "only--it jumps up and down harder
+than ever. But of course I know it must be getting better."
+
+"Good! What did I tell you? Now let Daddy look."
+
+He lifted her foot up tenderly and examined it with care. "My, my!" he
+murmured. "You poor little soldier. If I hadn't looked around that time
+I expect you'd been willing to walk all the way to Richmond on a foot
+that would make a whole regiment straggle. Just see where you've cut
+it--right under the second little piggie. We'll have to tie it right up
+and keep the bothersome old dust from getting in. By morning you'll
+hardly feel it."
+
+With a soldier's readiness he opened his coat and began to tear a strip
+from his shirt from which to make a bandage. But his small daughter
+interrupted him with a vigorous protest.
+
+"Wait!" she cried, with a face full of alarm at the willful destruction
+of his garment. "Don't do that. Here! You can take it off my petticoat."
+
+"_That_ petticoat," her father laughed, with the first real mirth she
+had heard for many weeks. "That poor little petticoat wouldn't make an
+arm bandage for Susan Jemima. Now--up with your hoofie and let's play
+I'm a surgeon and you're a brave soldier who has fought in every battle
+since we first made the Yanks skedaddle at Bull Run."
+
+With the painful foot securely bandaged the little girl gave herself up
+to thought, emerging from her study at last to ask what was an
+all-important question.
+
+"Daddy--"
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"Do you reckon, by the time the war is over, we could call Susan Jemima
+a vet'ran?"
+
+"I should say we could," the father agreed heartily, without the symptom
+of a smile. "Hasn't she grown bald in the service? And hasn't she almost
+lost an arm--or is it a leg I see dangling so terribly? I'll tell you
+what we'll do! We'll give her an honorable discharge--and decorate her.
+How's that?"
+
+"Oh, fine!" she cried, clapping her hands with delight at the fantasy.
+"And we'll get that Yankee man to write her a pass just like mine. Do
+you hear that, Cap'n Susan," she crooned to the doll, unconscious of the
+convulsion of silent amusement beside her. "When we get to Richmon'--if
+we ever _do_ get there--I'm going to make you a uniform!"
+
+Then she turned to her father with a little sigh, for the miles seemed
+very long.
+
+"How far _is_ it to Richmon', Daddy-man?" she said.
+
+"Just about twelve miles," her father answered. "But they're real old
+country miles, I'm sorry to say."
+
+"Can we get to it to-night?"
+
+The simple little question made the man's heart ache. What wouldn't he
+give for an hour of Roger once more--or Belle--or Lightfoot!
+Anything--even one of the old plantation mules would do if he could only
+perch her up on its back and take her into Richmond like a lady and not
+like the daughter of poor white trash, tramping, poverty stricken, along
+a dusty road.
+
+"No, dear, not to-night," he sighed. "We've come a long way and we're
+both tired. So when it gets dark we'll curl up somewhere in the nice,
+sweet woods and take a snooze, just like camping out. And then--in the
+morning, when the old sun comes sneaking up through the trees, we'll
+fool him! We won't wait till he can make it hot, but we'll get right up
+with the birds and the squirrels and we'll just run right along. And by
+twelve o'clock we'll be in Richmond--where they have good things to eat.
+So there you are--all mapped out. Only now we'll have a belt supper."
+
+"A belt supper?" queried the child curiously, though her face brightened
+at the thought of _any_ kind of supper, made out of belts or any other
+thing.
+
+"Um-hum," asseverated her father gravely. "See--this is the way it's
+done."
+
+He cupped his hands and took a draught from the spring, pretending to
+chew it as it went down. "You take a big drink of nice cold water; then
+draw up your belt as tight as you can--and say your prayers."
+
+To his surprise his small daughter only sniffed scornfully.
+
+"Oh, shucks, Daddy! I know a better way than that. Susan an' me used to
+do it all the time while you were away."
+
+"What did you do?" he asked curiously, for he had forgotten that more
+than half the childish play world is the world of "make believe.'"
+
+"Why, we--we just '_let on_,'" she answered, with simple naivete. "Sit
+down an' I'll show you how."
+
+He sat down obediently, but not before he had picked up an old tin can
+from nearby and set it carefully between them.
+
+"This rock is our table--the moss is the table cloth. Oh, it isn't
+green," she cried as he looked down in serious doubt. "You must _help_
+me make believe. Now--doesn't it look nice and white?"
+
+"It does, indeed. I can see nothing but snowy linen of the finest
+texture," he responded instantly.
+
+"That's better," complimented his hostess. And then with a grand air--
+
+"I'm so glad you dropped in, sir--an' just at supper time. Pass your
+plate an' allow me to help you to some batter bread."
+
+"Batter bread! Ah, just what I was hoping for," her guest replied,
+thankfully extending his plate for the imaginary feast.
+
+"Thank you. Delicious. The very best I've tasted for a year. Did you
+make it yourself?"
+
+"Oh, dear, no--the cook."
+
+"Ah, of course! Pray pardon me, I might have known."
+
+The little hostess inclined her head. "Take plenty of butter. 'Cause
+batter bread isn't good 'thout butter."
+
+"Thank you--what lovely golden butter. And--goodness gracious! What is
+this I see before me? Can this really be a sausage?"
+
+"Yes, sir," laughed Virgie with delight. "And there's the ham. I smoked
+it myself over hick'ry wood. Please help yourself."
+
+She pretended to arrange a cup and saucer in front of her and held
+daintily in her fingers a pair of imaginary sugar tongs.
+
+"Coffee? How many lumps? And _do_ you take cream?"
+
+"Five, please--and a little cream. There--just right."
+
+She passed the cup gracefully and added a little moue of concern for the
+efficiency of her menage.
+
+"I'm afraid you won't find it very hot," said this surprising young
+hostess. "That butler of mine is growing absolutely _wuthless_."
+
+"Then perhaps we can have something better," her guest responded
+readily, and he picked up the battered old tin can. "Permit me, Miss
+Cary, to offer you a glass of fine old blackberry wine which I carefully
+brought with me to your beautiful home. It has been in my family wine
+cellars since 1838.
+
+"Well--" he cried, as Virgie suddenly sat back with a look of painful
+recollection on her face.
+
+"Oh, Daddy," she murmured pathetically, "_don't_ let's call it
+_blackberry_ wine."
+
+"Forgive me, darling," her father said tenderly, and he took the small
+face between his hands and kissed her. "There, now--it's all right. It's
+_all right_."
+
+To create a diversion he looked behind him with a frown and spoke with
+great severity to an imaginary waiter.
+
+"Here, _Jo_! How dare you bring such terribly reminiscent stuff to our
+table. Go get the port.
+
+"We'll surely have to discharge that butler," he said. "He's too
+shiftless. And now, fair lady, will you honor me by joining the humblest
+of your admirers in a sip of port."
+
+"With pleasure," answered his hostess, and lifted the can of water in
+both hands. "Your health, sir. May your shadow never grow littler."
+
+Half way through her drink Virgie stopped and slowly put the can down.
+She looked at her father, who already had his finger at his lips. Voices
+had come to them from down the road--the sounds of a party of men
+talking and laughing as they marched along.
+
+Cary's face took on again the grim lines which had been wiped away
+momentarily by their little bit of play. He was trying to make himself
+believe that the approaching party might be friends, although he knew
+only too well that such a possibility was full of doubt. There were too
+many scouting parties of Federals ready to pounce on Rebel patrols in
+these perilous days to allow any but large forces of men to venture far
+from Richmond, and when his own men sallied forth they did not go with
+laughter but with tightly drawn, silent lips.
+
+"S-s-s-h," he whispered, and held up his finger again, as she seemed
+ready to burst into questioning.
+
+Immediately she snuggled close to him and whispered hotly in his ear,
+"Who are they, Daddy?"
+
+"I don't know, honey," he whispered back. "But I'm afraid they're Yanks.
+Keep quiet till they pass." And quickly deserting the stone under the
+trees where they had had their "belt supper" he drew her with him behind
+the large ledge of rock from under which the spring flowed out. Looking
+behind them he saw that with good luck they could reach the shelter of
+the woods and get up over the hill without being seen. But just now they
+could not stir from their hiding place unless--unless the men were
+Confederates. This faint hope, however, soon flickered out when he saw
+the color of their uniforms.
+
+Up the road came four dismounted men with a corporal in command. They
+were taking it easy as they walked along, their caps thrust back, their
+coats open and their Sharps' carbines carried in the variety of ways
+that a soldier adopts to ease his shoulder of the burden that grows
+heavier with every mile.
+
+"Here's the place, boys," the Corporal called out as his eye fell on the
+spring. "We can get some decent water, now. That James River water's too
+yellow for any white man to put inside of him."
+
+At the sound of a voice which he had heard that same morning while he
+hid in the attic of the overseer's cabin Cary's hold on his daughter's
+hand tightened warningly.
+
+"Come along, Virgie," he whispered. "We'll get out of the way."
+
+"But, Daddy," she protested in low tones, "we've got our pass."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know," he answered, with a twinge of regret that the rest
+of the world could not trust so faithfully to human kindness. "But
+that's for emergency. Come along, honey--quick!"
+
+Silently as a shadow the two stole out of the shelter of the ledge of
+rock, and by dint of keeping it between them and the troopers, managed
+to cover most of the open space between the spring and the protecting
+trees without being seen. Meanwhile, they heard the Corporal giving his
+commands.
+
+"You, Collins, take sentry duty out there in the road for a while. As
+soon as we make the coffee we'll bring you out a cup. Now--over the wall
+with you, men."
+
+Leaving one man behind to pace slowly up and down the dusty road the
+four sprang over the wall and advanced towards the spring. It was well
+the sight of the cool water held their eyes for if they had only looked
+up they might have seen Virgie wresting her hand out of her father's
+grasp and standing suddenly petrified with the thought that she had left
+behind her one beloved possession.
+
+"Here's the spring, Smith--under the rock. Fill up the canteens. Here,
+Harry, help me get fire wood."
+
+With a soldier's readiness when it comes to making camp one of the
+troopers promptly collected the canteens and knelt down by the spring,
+carefully submerging one at a time so as to get the sweet, cold water in
+all its purity. Another opened the knapsacks and took out a can of
+coffee, biscuits and some scraps of meat--not much with which to make a
+meal but still so much more than many a Rebel soldier had that day as to
+take on the proportions of a feast. Meanwhile, Corporal Dudley had drawn
+his saber and was engaged in leisurely lopping off the dead branches of
+a fallen tree.
+
+"This strikes me a lot better than the camp," he remarked as he tossed
+his firewood into a heap. "A man and his friends can have a quiet drink
+here, without treating a whole battalion."
+
+His eye fell on the ground near the spring as he spoke and he paused.
+Then, with a grin on his face, he jabbed his saber into something which
+lay there and held it transfixed on the point.
+
+"Say, boys--look at this," and he shook poor Susan Jemima till her arms
+and legs wiggled spasmodically and her dress seemed on the point of
+complete disintegration.
+
+Perhaps, if Corporal Dudley had not laughed derisively Virgie might have
+stayed hidden in the protection of the trees, but this outrageous
+insult combined with the terrible sight of poor Susan Jemima impaled on
+a Yankee sword was too much for her bursting heart. With blazing eyes
+she broke away from her father and dashed back to the group at the
+spring.
+
+"Here, you! You stop that," she cried angrily at the astonished
+troopers, who caught up their carbines at the sound of feet. "_How dare
+you!_"
+
+There was a moment of surprise and then the four broke out in guffaws of
+laughter.
+
+"Well, hang me if it isn't the little girl we saw this morning," shouted
+Dudley, without, however, stopping the torture of the defenseless Susan
+Jemima. "Where did _you_ drop from?"
+
+"Ne'm min' where I dropped from," commanded the wrathful Virgie with her
+dark eyes like twin stars of hate. "You're the meanest old thing I ever
+saw. _Give me back my baby!_"
+
+Back in the trees a little way a man was watching with a heavy heart. He
+knew only too well what was to come. No matter what the final outcome
+might be when he showed his safe-guard to his own army's lines there
+would be a delay and searching questions and more of the old insults
+which always made his blood boil--which always made the increasing
+burden of despair still harder to bear. But there was no use in putting
+off the trial--Virgie had slipped away in spite of every whispered
+remonstrance and now that she was there in the center of that group of
+guffawing Yankees, there, too, was the only place for him. And so, he
+stepped out swiftly and faced the enemy.
+
+"Hah!" shouted Dudley, looking up at the sound of branches crackling
+underfoot. "A Johnnie Reb, eh--walking right into camp! That's right,
+Harry, keep him covered."
+
+He looked Cary over from head to foot with a sneer at his tattered
+uniform.
+
+"Well, sir," he asked, "who are you?"
+
+"A Confederate officer," was the quiet reply, "acting as escort for this
+child. We are on our way to Richmond."
+
+Cary's hand went into the breast of his coat and he drew out a folded
+paper.
+
+"Here is my authority for entering your lines--a pass signed by
+Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison."
+
+At the sound of the name Corporal Dudley started and quickly took the
+paper. But before he opened it he gave Cary a keen look which, to the
+Confederate officer, did not bode well for the prospect of immediate
+release. It seemed as if the man's sharp wits had suddenly seized on
+something which he could profitably turn to his own account.
+
+With his back turned on Cary and Virgie the Corporal unfolded the pass
+and studied it carefully, while the troopers gathered behind him and
+tried to read its contents over his shoulder.
+
+"Pwhat does it say?" asked the young Irishman, Harry O'Connell, who had
+covered Cary with his carbine. "'Tis a precious bit of paper, bedad--if
+it passes him through _me_."
+
+"It says: 'Pass Virginia Cary and escort through all Federal lines, and
+assist them as far as possible in reaching Richmond,'" read the
+Corporal.
+
+Deep in thought he turned the paper over and studied the name on the
+back. At the sight of the signature there his mouth fell open and he
+uttered a shout of surprise. His eyes brightened and he stepped back
+from the group and threw up his head with a look of triumph on his dark
+face. He struck the paper a slap with the back of his hand.
+
+"Morrison on _one_ side--and 'Old Bob' on the _other_" he exclaimed.
+"What luck! What a _find_."
+
+"How so--a find?"
+
+The man who had had to put his own brother under arrest a few short
+weeks before and then had seen him shot through the heart by this same
+officer whose name was on the pass looked at the questioner with an ugly
+glitter in his eyes. He was beginning to taste already the sweets of
+revenge. For blood ties bind, no matter how badly they are stretched,
+and long ago Corporal Dudley had sworn to wipe out his grudge.
+
+"Why, man, can't you see?" he whispered excitedly. "This Johnnie Reb is
+the man that was hiding in the cabin loft this morning. Morrison lied
+when he said he wasn't there--you remember, he was the only one who
+looked--he lied and as soon as he got us out of the way he let him come
+down and he gave him _this_. Could any man ask for better proof that we
+had the spy right in our hands and then our commanding officer
+deliberately let him go?"
+
+At the sound of the man's excited whispering Cary's fears as to the
+value of Virgie's pass grew too strong to warrant this agony of watching
+and waiting, and he stepped forward with a sharp question:
+
+"Well, Corporal, isn't the pass satisfactory?"
+
+"Oh, perfectly--perfectly," Dudley answered with baleful readiness, but
+made no move to return it.
+
+Cary put out his hand. "Then I would like to have it again, if you
+please."
+
+By way of answer Corporal Dudley carefully found an inside pocket and
+buttoned the pass up in his coat. "Oh, no, you don't," he said, with an
+evil grin. "I've got a better use for that little piece of paper."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that you're my prisoner, Mister Johnnie Reb," was the brutal
+answer.
+
+"For what?" asked Cary, while his heart grew sick inside him and his
+lips twitched. Richmond--and food for Virgie were growing farther away
+every moment.
+
+"Because you're a Rebel _spy_, that's why," came the biting answer.
+
+"Oh--none of that," as Cary's fists doubled up and he made a forward
+step at the Corporal. "I guess you know what's good for you, with three
+guns at your back. If Colonel Morrison wouldn't take you as a spy, _I
+will!_"
+
+"Here, boys," he said in brusque command to his men, "we'll have to cut
+the supper and take this man to camp. There'll be a sunrise hanging
+to-morrow or I miss my guess. Come on, now. Bring him along."
+
+"Wait a minute, Corporal," O'Connell said. "Sure I've something to say
+to ye," and he led him aside where the others could not bear.
+
+All unconscious of the fatal predicament into which Susan Jemima and
+she had got them Virgie looked up at her father from where she stood in
+the shelter of his arm.
+
+"Daddy," she questioned, in a small, puzzled voice, "what are they going
+to do?"
+
+"S-s-s-h," her father commanded as he patted her head comfortingly.
+"Everything will be all right, honey, I'm sure." But he had caught
+enough of the Corporal's altercation with Trooper O'Connell to make him
+see that things were very far from being what he wanted Virgie to
+suppose.
+
+"Ye'd better be careful now," O'Connell said to Dudley. "Ye know well
+that if the pass is all right ye'll be getting yerself into a peck o'
+trouble."
+
+"It isn't _me_ that'll get in trouble," Dudley answered, with grim
+triumph. "It's someone else."
+
+"Faith, then, _who_?" was the query.
+
+"_Morrison_," snapped Dudley, with an ominous click of his teeth.
+
+"The Colonel? Why?"
+
+"_Because he helped this spy escape!_ that's why. He killed my brother,
+shot him. Shot him down like a dog. But now I'm even with him."
+
+He shook the pass under the trooper's nose and crowed with satisfaction.
+
+"I've been waiting for a chance like this," he chortled, "and now I'm
+going to make him sweat--sweat blood."
+
+"Don't be a fool, Corporal," the trooper counseled. "What'll ye be after
+doin'?"
+
+"_Report him, at headquarters_--for helping a spy escape! If I have the
+man and _this_," and he slapped the paper, "it'll mean his sword and
+shoulder straps--if not a bullet! Come on!"
+
+He turned away, to scramble over the wall, but Trooper O'Connell caught
+his arm.
+
+"Hold on! Ye may get in trouble."
+
+In answer Dudley broke away and doggedly kept on towards the stone wall
+and the road. "Keep off," he snarled. "_I'm_ running this."
+
+"I know ye are," the trooper replied, "but wait," and he pointed to the
+rear. "Don't forgit that the Colonel's out yonder reconnoiterin'. If he
+happened to overtake ye on the road--"
+
+Struck with the sudden thought Dudley paused. "Well, that's so," he
+growled as he saw how easily he could be held for disobeying orders and
+how quickly all his plans for vengeance could be smashed. He stood still
+for a moment gnawing his lip, then suddenly struck his doubled fist into
+the palm of the other hand.
+
+"Then you stay here to guard the prisoner," he said. "I'll cut through
+the woods--make my report--come back with the horses--and my authority."
+
+"Here, Smith! You and Judson come along with me. Never mind the grub.
+We'll get that later."
+
+Turning to O'Connell, "If you hear anyone coming, take those two into
+the woods. Collins! You'll have to stay on sentry duty till I get back.
+If any troops pass here, get out of sight at once and give Harry
+warning. Now, boys--come along with me--we'll take it on the trot," and
+climbing quickly over the wall the man who held two lives in the hollow
+of his hand ran down the road with the two troopers, finally cutting
+over into the woods and disappearing from view.
+
+Gary and Virgie stood still by the spring. Out in the road the sentry
+paced back and forth. Behind them Trooper O'Connell stood on guard, his
+carbine in his arms across his breast.
+
+Virgie pulled gently at her father's hand.
+
+"Daddy," she whispered, "are they--are they goin' to carry us off to the
+Yankee camp?"
+
+"I'm afraid so, darling, but I don't know," he answered sadly. "We'll
+just have to wait. Wait," he repeated, as he sat down on a rock and drew
+her close to him. Without being seen either by Virgie or O'Connell he
+picked up a jagged stone the size of his fist and hid it under his knee
+against the rock. It would be a poor weapon at best, but Cary had grown
+desperate and if the trooper once turned his back and gave him
+opportunity poor Harry O'Connell would wake up with a very bad headache
+and Virgie would be in Richmond.
+
+But Virgie's eyes were on neither the hidden stone nor her father's
+watchful, relentless face. All that Virgie could see was a knapsack open
+on the ground and food--real food displayed round about with a
+prodigality which made her mouth water and her eyes as big as saucers.
+
+"Daddy," she murmured, clutching at his sleeve, "while we are waitin' do
+you reckon we could take just a _little_ bit of that?"
+
+"No, dear--not now," her father answered, with a touch of impatience. It
+would be too much, even in those bitter times, to accept a man's food
+and then break his head for it.
+
+"Well," said Virgie, completely mystified at the restraint, "I don't see
+why they shouldn't be polite to us. We were just as polite as could be
+when the Yankees took our corn."
+
+Just then the young Irishman with the carbine turned around and caught
+the wan look on Virgie's face and the hunger appeal in her big dark
+eyes. At once a broad smile broke over his freckled countenance and he
+gestured hospitably with his gun.
+
+"Have somethin' to eat, little wan."
+
+Cary's knee loosened. The jagged stone fell to the ground.
+
+"Thank you, old fellow," he cried, springing to his feet. "I can't show
+my gratitude to you in any substantial way at present--but God bless
+you, just the same." He dropped down on the rock again and hid his face
+in his hands. Another moment and the kindhearted trooper might have been
+lying face downwards in the muddy ground around the spring. It had been
+only touch-and-go, but the man's warm Irish heart had saved him.
+
+"Oh, that's all right, sir," O'Connell answered freely. "Sure an' _I'd_
+like to see ye get through, though I ain't the Gineral. At least, not
+yet," he grinned.
+
+"There ye are, little girl," he went on, pushing the knapsack over
+towards Virgie with the muzzle of his carbine. "Jist help yerself--an'
+give yer dad some, too."
+
+With a little cry of delight Virgie swooped down on the knapsack and
+explored its interior with eager hands.
+
+"I'm much obliged, Mr. Yankee. We cert'ny do need it--bad." She tossed
+the tangled hair back from her eyes and looked thankfully up at this
+curious person who had so much food that he could really give part of it
+away. "Please, Mr. Yankee--won't you tell me your name?"
+
+"Harry O'Connell, at your service, miss."
+
+"Thank you," she bowed. "I'm very glad to meet you." Then her searching
+hands found something wonderful in the knapsack and she sprang up and
+ran with her prizes to her father.
+
+"Look, Daddy--_two biscuits!_ Take one. It's--it's _real_!"
+
+Cary's eyes grew moist.
+
+"Thank you, darling. Thank you." Just now the lump in his throat would
+not have allowed him to eat soup, let alone a rather hard biscuit, but
+he looked up with a laugh and waved a genial salute to the trooper, who
+as genially responded.
+
+Virgie, however, had become quite single minded since she had discovered
+food, and with a happy sigh she raised the biscuit to her lips. Just
+then the sentry in the road flung up his hand with a shout.
+
+"Look out, O'Connell! They're coming," and he clambered quickly over the
+wall and dropped behind it, his gun in readiness.
+
+"What is it?" demanded the other trooper.
+
+"Detachment of cavalry. A small one."
+
+"But whose is it, man. Can ye not see?"
+
+Collins, holding his hand behind him in a gesture which commanded them
+to stay where they were, raised his head cautiously over the wall.
+
+"Morrison's," he answered, after a quick look, and he dropped down again
+out of sight.
+
+At the sound of hoof beats and the name she remembered so well Virgie,
+with her biscuit all untasted, sprang up from the ground as if she would
+run out on the road. But her father caught her, for O'Connell had turned
+to them with a serious face.
+
+"I'm sorry, sir, but I'll have to trouble ye to get under cover in the
+woods. No argymint, sir," he said decisively, as he saw some show of
+resistance on Cary's part. "I'm under orders."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know," Cary cried, impatiently, "but I want to speak to
+Colonel Morrison. I _must_ speak to him. Give me a moment, man. You
+won't ever regret it."
+
+"Come now--none o' that," commanded the trooper, pushing him back with
+the carbine across his breast. "Don't make me use force, sir. Ye'll have
+to go--so go quietly. And mind--no shenanigan!"
+
+Cary stood his ground for a moment, meeting the trooper eye to eye--then
+turned with hanging head and walked a few steps back into the woods.
+
+"Come, Virgie," he said, "I guess we won't get to see Colonel Morrison
+after all."
+
+But Virgie, being a woman, had her own ideas about what she would or
+would not do. At the same moment that the trooper was forcing her father
+step by step back into the woods, Virgie was running madly towards the
+stone wall and before either of the soldiers could stop her she had
+clambered up on its broad top and was calling out to a man who clattered
+by at the head of a troop of cavalry.
+
+"Colonel Morrison! Colonel Morrison!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+"Halt!"
+
+At the sound of that piping, childish treble calling his name in so
+unexpected a place the officer at the head of the troop threw up his
+gauntleted hand and brought the detachment to a standstill in a cloud of
+dust.
+
+"Hello, there," he said, turning curiously around in his saddle. "Who is
+it wants me?"
+
+"It's _me_, Virgie!" the child cried, leaping up and down on the wall,
+all forgetful of her sore foot. "Come help Daddy and me--come quick!"
+
+"Well--what on earth--"
+
+Morrison threw out a command to his men and, wheeling his horse, spurred
+vigorously up to the wall where he dismounted and came up to take a
+closer view of the tangle haired little person dancing on one foot.
+
+"Why--bless my soul if it isn't Virgie!" His arms opened to take her in
+when, suddenly, his eye fell on O'Connell, standing at attention on the
+other side of the wall.
+
+"O'Connell," he said, sternly, "what is the meaning of this? Why aren't
+you with your detachment?"
+
+"It isn't _his_ fault," Virgie interposed in stout defense of the nice
+Yankee who carried biscuits in his knapsack. "He's under orders."
+
+The glib use of the military term made a smile flicker across Morrison's
+face, but his eyes did not leave the troubled trooper.
+
+"_Whose_ orders?" he demanded.
+
+"Corporal Dudley, sir," was the stammering answer.
+
+At this moment Cary stepped forward and the two officers exchanged nods
+of recognition.
+
+"Let me explain," the Confederate said. "Virgie and I were making for
+Richmond as rapidly as we could. Here, by this spring, we were put under
+arrest by a corporal and four troopers. Naturally, I presented your
+pass, but the corporal refused to honor it. He then left me under guard
+and hurried off to headquarters with the pass in his possession."
+
+At this unwelcome news Morrison's head jerked back as if he had been
+struck and his lips tightened. Without the addition of another word to
+Cary's story he saw all the dire consequences to himself of what had
+been an act of the commonest humanity. Yes, in other times it would have
+been what any right thinking human being would have done for another in
+distress, but, unhappily, this was war time and the best of motives were
+only too often mis-read. In his mind's eye he saw the vindictive Dudley,
+eager for a revenge which he could not encompass any other way, laying
+the proof of this act before his superiors with an abundance of
+collateral evidence which, he knew, would condemn him before any
+military tribunal in the world. It mattered not what kindly impulses had
+guided his hand when he wrote the safeguard on the other side of the
+paper on which Robert E. Lee had previously placed his name, for it is
+not the custom of courts martial to weigh the milk of human kindness
+against the blood and iron of war. The good and the safety of the
+greater number demand the sacrifice of every man who would imperil the
+cause by ill considered generosity. Morrison could see that very
+presently he would have to answer certain stern questions.
+
+Yet, there was a chance still that Dudley might be headed off and this
+whole miserable business stopped before revenge could set the inexorable
+wheels in motion and he whirled round on O'Connell with a sharp
+question:
+
+"Which way did Dudley go?"
+
+"Down the pike, then over the hill by the wood road, sor--makin' for
+headquarters," the young Irishman answered, only too glad of a chance to
+help his officer out of what, he saw, was a frightful situation.
+
+"How long ago?" came back the instant query.
+
+"Five minutes, sor. Ye cud catch him wid a horse."
+
+"Ah," exclaimed Morrison, and he threw up his hand to his men.
+"Lieutenant Harris," he shouted. "Take a squad and ride to camp by the
+wood road. Overtake Corporal Dudley or intercept him at headquarters.
+Don't fail! Get him and bring him here!"
+
+Lieutenant Harris's hand went up to his hat in ready salute and he
+bellowed out his orders.
+
+"Jennings! Hewlett! Brown! Hammond! Burt! 'Bout face. Forward!" Almost
+before the words were out of his mouth Harris and his men were riding
+madly down the road in a chase, which the Lieutenant suspected, meant
+something more to his colonel, than merely the recovery of a
+safe-conduct for a Confederate officer and a little girl.
+
+Morrison turned to Trooper O'Connell and jerked his thumb towards the
+road.
+
+"Report at my quarters this evening--at nine," he said curtly. And the
+young Irishman, thankful to be well out of the mess, quickly clambered
+over the wall and disappeared though not without a soft voiced farewell
+from Virgie.
+
+"Good-by, Mr. Knapsack Man," called the child. "Thank you for the
+biscuits."
+
+Then Cary came forward and gripped the other's hand.
+
+"Colonel," he said earnestly, with full appreciation of what was passing
+through Morrison's mind, "I hope no trouble will come of this. If I had
+only known the vindictiveness of this man--"
+
+He was interrupted by a genially objecting hand and a laugh which
+Morrison was somehow able to make lighthearted.
+
+"Oh, that will be all right. Harris will get him--never fear."
+
+"And so," he said, addressing Miss Virginia, "that bad man took your
+pass?"
+
+"Yes, sir. He did," Virgie answered, and caught his hand in hers. "He
+ran right away with it--mean old thing."
+
+"Well, then--we'll have to write you out another one. A nice, clean,
+white one this time. Come on, little sweetheart. We'll do it together,"
+and he took out a note book and pencil.
+
+"I say, Morrison," Cary murmured, glancing apprehensively at the
+troopers idling in the road and very plainly interested in what the
+small group were doing, "do you really think you'd better--on your own
+account?"
+
+Again Morrison's hand was raised in polite objection. He had taken a
+sporting chance when he wrote the pass which had been stolen but because
+he had probably lost was no reason why he shouldn't play the game out
+bravely to the end. So he only smiled at Virgie, who came and sat beside
+him, and began to write the few short sentences of his second
+safe-conduct. But while he wrote he was talking in low tones which the
+troopers in the road could not hear.
+
+"There's a line of your pickets about three miles up the road, Cary,"
+said he. "If I loaned you a horse, do you think Virgie could ride behind
+you?"
+
+"_Me?_" pouted Virgie. "Why, Daddy says that when I was bornded, I came
+ridin' in on a stork."
+
+Morrison burst out laughing and dropped his hand down on the small paw
+resting on his knee.
+
+"Then, by St. George and the Dragon we'll send you home to Jefferson
+Davis on a snorting Pegasus!"
+
+Again Cary spoke to him in warning tones, which at the same time
+thanked him unendingly for the kindly thought.
+
+"You needn't trouble about the mount. Why, man," he said huskily,
+"you're in trouble enough, as it is! And if our lines are as close as
+you say they are--"
+
+Once more the Union officer checked him.
+
+"It isn't any trouble. Only--you'll have to be careful of your approach,
+even to your own lines. Those gray devils in the rifle pits up there
+have formed the habit of shooting _first_ and asking questions
+_afterwards_. There you are," and he tore the leaf from his note book
+and handed it up with a faint smile.
+
+The Southerner took it with a reluctant hand.
+
+"I--I wish I could thank you--Morrison," he said in tones that shook
+with feeling, "but you see I--I--"
+
+"Then please don't try. Because if you do I'll--I'll have to hold Virgie
+as a prisoner of war.
+
+"Well, young one," he said to the small Miss Cary with a laugh, "did you
+really get something to eat?"
+
+"Yes, sir. That is--we _almost_ did."
+
+"_Almost?_" he echoed.
+
+"Yes, sir," came the plaintive answer. "Eve'y time we start to
+eat--somethin' _always_ happens!"
+
+"Well, well, that _is_ hard luck," he said with a gentle squeeze of her
+frail body. "But I'll bet you it won't happen this time; not if a whole
+regiment tries to stop it."
+
+"Come on," he suggested as he sprang to his feet and began picking up
+dry twigs. "You can start in and munch on those heavenly biscuits while
+this terrible Yankee builds the fire." Cary made a move as if to help;
+but Morrison checked him.
+
+"Oh, no, Cary, just you keep on sitting still. This is no work for you.
+You're tired out.
+
+"Here, Virgie, I know you want to get me some water from the spring.
+Please pick out the cleanest pieces of water you can and put them
+carefully in the coffee pot. All right. There you are. _'Tention!_
+Carr-ee coffee pot! Right wheel! _March!_"
+
+With a carefree laugh he turned away to light the little heap of twigs
+he had placed between two flat stones. "It's mighty considerate of my
+boys to leave us all these things. We'll call it the raid of Black Gum
+Spring.
+
+"And here comes the little lady with the coffee pot filled just right.
+Now watch me pour in the good old coffee--_real_ coffee, Virgie
+dear--not made from aco'ns." He settled the pot on the fire and sat back
+with a grin. "Oh, oh! Don't watch it," he cried, in well feigned alarm
+as Virgie, unwilling to believe the sight, stooped over to feast her
+eyes on the rich brown powder sinking into the black gulf of the pot.
+"If you do that it will never, _never_ boil!"
+
+"All right," the child agreed pathetically, and she sank wearily down
+against her father's knee. "I'll just pray for it to hurry up."
+
+The two men exchanged quiet smiles and Cary murmured something in his
+daughter's ear.
+
+"Oh, no, I won't," she answered, and then looked up at Morrison with a
+roguish light in her dark eyes. "He's only afraid I'll pray so terribly
+hard that the old coffee pot will boil over an' put out the fire."
+
+Morrison, chuckling, now began to drag something out of a rear pocket.
+Presently, he uncorked it and held it up--a _flask_!
+
+"Here, Cary," he said, holding out a cup. "Join me, won't you? Of
+course, you understand--in case a snake should bite us."
+
+"Colonel Morrison," responded the Southerner, "you are certainly a man
+of ideas."
+
+He waited for his foe to fill his own cup, then raised his in a toast:
+
+"I drink to the health, sir, of you and yours. Here's hoping that some
+day I may take _you_ prisoner!"
+
+At the quizzical look of surprise in the other's face Cary's voice
+almost broke.
+
+"I mean, sir, it's the only way I could ever hope to show you how much I
+appreciate--"
+
+He stopped and covered his face with his hands, not a little to his
+daughter's alarm.
+
+"Come, come, old chap," the Northerner said bluffly, tapping him on the
+shoulder. "Brace up. It's the fortunes of war, you know. One side or the
+other is bound to win. Perhaps--who knows--it may be _your_ turn
+to-morrow. Well, sir--here goes. May it soon be over--in the way that's
+best and wisest for us all.
+
+"Now, Virgie," he went on, when the toast had been drunk, "while I wash
+these cups suppose you go on another voyage of discovery through the
+magic knapsack for some sugar for the coffee."
+
+He watched her fling herself impetuously on the knapsack. "If you find
+any Yankee spoons--put them under arrest. They haven't any pass like
+yours."
+
+Then he turned to Cary: "Have any trouble on the road as you came
+along?"
+
+The other man shook his head.
+
+"None to speak of. We were stopped several times of course, but each
+time your pass let us through without delay--until we met Dudley. And
+now I'm worried, Colonel," he said frankly, while his eyes tried to tell
+the other all that he feared without putting it in words, "worried on
+your account. It's easy to see that the man has a grudge against you--"
+
+"Yes, I'm afraid he has," was the thoughtful reply. "But really, Cary,
+you mustn't try to carry any more burdens than your own, just now. I
+know what you mean and what, I daresay, you'd be only too willing to do,
+but I can't permit it."
+
+They were interrupted by the spectacle of Virgie standing before them
+with anxiously furrowed brow, a paper bag in one hand and three spoons
+clutched in the other.
+
+"But Colonel Morrison," she was saying in tragic tones, "there isn't a
+drop of milk."
+
+"Milk!" he cried in mock despair. "Well, dash my buttons if I didn't
+forget to order a cow."
+
+"Oh, _I_ know what to do," cried the child. Dropping her supplies and
+utensils she ran to the wall and climbed up.
+
+"Hey, there, _you_" commanded the small general with an imperious
+gesture to the assembled troopers. "One of you men ride right over to
+camp and bring us back some milk--an' butter."
+
+At this abrupt demand of so small a rebel on the commissary of the
+United States a roar of laughter went up from the troopers, though some
+of them had the grace to salute and so relieve the child of
+embarrassment.
+
+"Virgie! Virgie!" called her father, scandalized.
+
+"It's all right, Cary," Morrison laughed. "She's only starting in at
+giving orders a little earlier than most women.
+
+"Never you mind, Miss Brigadier," he comforted. "We'll have all those
+luxuries next time, or when I come to see you in Richmond after the war
+is over. Just now we'll do the best we can. Come along."
+
+Virgie got down from the wall and pattered up to the fire.
+
+"Is it ready yet?" she asked with the perfect directness of seven years.
+
+"In a minute now. Ah-hah! There she goes."
+
+He took the pot from the fire and set it down on a rock where,
+presently, he brought a cupful of cold water to pour in.
+
+"Is that to settle it?" she asked of her father.
+
+"Yes, child--and I wish all our questions were as easily cleared up.
+And now--to the attack."
+
+"Right-o. Virgie--pass the beautiful, hand painted china and let's fill
+up. This one for your daddy--you can put the sugar in. Only don't burn
+those precious fingers."
+
+Virgie carried the steaming cup to her father and put it in his hands
+with shining eyes.
+
+"This is better than our old belt supper, Daddy, isn't it?" she said,
+with a flirt of her tangled curls. "Anyway--it _smells_ nicer."
+
+She was back at the sugar bag at once, digging out spoonfuls for
+Morrison's coffee.
+
+"Thank you, Miss Cary, I am indeed obliged to you. Now do sit down and
+_eat_. No, not another word till you've eaten two whole biscuits!"
+
+For several ecstatic moments the child munched her biscuits. It had been
+a long time since she had eaten anything so delicious, although if those
+same biscuits had appeared on the Cary table a month ago they would have
+probably been scorned. But eager as her appetite was it did not stop the
+active workings of her mind and she presently was struck by an idea
+which tried to force itself out through a mouthful of biscuit--with the
+usual amusing results.
+
+"_Virginia!_" admonished her father.
+
+Morrison laughed out like a boy and slapped his knee.
+
+"Suppose we swallow--and try again."
+
+Virgie, thus adjured, concentrated her mind on the task--gulped,
+blinked, swallowed with pathetically straining eyes, and then smiled
+triumphantly.
+
+"Excuse me, Daddy. I guess I wasn't very polite."
+
+"Apology accepted. What were you going to say?"
+
+The child looked up with a sweetly serious look in her eyes that the two
+men recognized as the forerunner of true womanly thought for others.
+
+"I was only goin' to ask the Colonel if he didn't think his men out
+there would like some of these _heavingly_ things to eat?" she said
+plaintively. "It must be terrible--jus' to look on!"
+
+"Well, bless your little heart," the Northerner cried. "But don't you
+worry about the boys. They'll have theirs when they get back to camp. Go
+on and eat, Virgie. Stuff in another biscuit. And, look! By Jupiter.
+_Butter!_"
+
+Evidently Trooper O'Connell during the past twenty-four hours had
+foraged or blarneyed most successfully for out of the knapsack which he
+had left behind Morrison suddenly produced a small earthenware jam jar
+in which was something now indubitably liquid in form but none the less
+sweet, yellow, appetizing butter. Pouring a little on a biscuit he held
+it out to her, speculating on what she would say.
+
+The tot took it hungrily and raised it to her lips, her eyes shining and
+her face glowing with anticipation. Then she paused and, with a little
+cry of vexation over her selfishness, held out the biscuit to her
+father.
+
+"Here, Daddy," she said. "You take this--because you tried to bring me
+somethin' good to eat yesterday."
+
+The father threw a look at Morrison and caught Virgie to him in a swift
+embrace.
+
+"No, dear," he said. "Eat your nice buttered biscuit and thank the good
+Lord for it. Your father will get more fun out of seeing you eat that
+little bit than he would out of owning a whole cellar of big stone
+crocks jam full. Do you know--I think when we get up to Richmond you'll
+have to write a letter to the Colonel--a nice long letter, thanking him
+for all he's done. Won't you?"
+
+There was a pause for a moment as the child looked over at Morrison,
+revolving the thought in her mind.
+
+The Union officer had passed into a sudden reverie, the hand holding his
+coffee cup hanging listlessly over his knee. He was thinking of another
+little girl, and one as dear to him as this man's child was to her
+father. He was wondering if the fortunes of war would ever let him see
+her face again or hear her voice--or feel her chubby arms around his
+neck. She was very, very far away--well cared for, it was true, but he
+knew only too well that it would need but one malignant leaden missile
+to make her future life as full of hardships as those which the little
+tot beside him was passing through to-day. So much, at least, for the
+ordinary chances of war--he was beginning to wonder how much had been
+added to these perils by the matter of the pass and whether his
+superiors would see the situation as it had appeared to his eyes.
+
+Into this sad reverie Virgie's soft voice entered with a gentleness
+which roused but did not startle him. When she spoke, it seemed as if
+some subtle thought-current between their minds had put the subject of
+his dreams into the child's mind.
+
+"Do you reckon," the child said, curiously, "that Gertrude is havin'
+_her_ supper now?"
+
+The Union officer looked up with eyes that mutely blessed her.
+
+"Yes, dear, I was thinking of her--and her mother."
+
+Again he was silent for a space, and when he spoke, his voice was
+dreamy, tender, as he seemed to look with unseeing eyes far into the
+Northland where dwelt the people of his heart.
+
+"Do you know, Cary, this war for us, the men, may be a hell, but what is
+it for those we leave at home? The women! Who wait--and watch--and too
+often watch in vain. _We_ have the excitement of it--the rush--the
+battles--and we think that ours is the harder part when, in reality, we
+make our loved ones' lives a deeper, blacker hell than our own. Theirs
+to watch and listen with the love hunger in their hearts, month in,
+month out and often without a word! Theirs to starve on the crusts of
+hope! Waiting--always waiting! Hunting the papers for the thing they
+dread to find; a name among the missing. A name among the dead! Good
+Heaven! When I think of it sometimes--" Morrison dropped his head
+between his clenched fists and groaned.
+
+"Yes, yes, old fellow, I know," the other man answered, for in truth he
+_did_ know, "but I want you to remember that for you the crusts of hope
+will some day be the bread of life--and love."
+
+Slowly the Northerner's face came up out of his hands and he seemed to
+take heart again. After all, he had led a charmed life so far--perhaps
+the God of Battles had written his name among those who would some day
+go back to live the life for which the Almighty made them. God grant
+then that he might have for his friend this man who, in the time of his
+own greater grief, was unselfish enough to console him. Ah! If God would
+only grant that from this day on there would be no more of this hideous
+fighting. Morrison's eyes met the other's and he put out his hand.
+
+Suddenly there came the sound of a shot. Another and another--then a
+volley, which almost at once became a continuous rattle of musketry.
+
+The Northerner sprang to his feet. "Look! there go your pickets."
+
+Struck dumb by this sudden return to the actualities of life the two men
+stood motionless, listening for every sound which might tell them what
+it meant. For a little while they had dreamed the dream of peace only to
+have it rudely shattered.
+
+But Virgie had not followed them in their dreams, for she was an
+extremely practical young lady. Having seen food, real food, vanish
+away before her very eyes several times already she was quite prepared
+to see it happen again.
+
+"There!" she said, in tones in which prophecy and resignation were oddly
+mingled. "Didn't I jus' _know_ somethin' was goin' to happen!"
+
+By this time Morrison had run to the stone wall and sprung to its top.
+Out in the road the troopers had mounted without waiting for command and
+with one accord had faced towards the firing.
+
+"Can you see anything?" Cary called.
+
+"Not yet," said Morrison. "I guess we came too close to your nest--and
+the hornets are coming out."
+
+"Turner!" he commanded, and a trooper's hand went up, "ride up to the
+fork of the road. Learn what you can and report."
+
+As the cavalryman struck his heels into his horse's sides and dashed up
+the road Cary put the wishes of both men into words.
+
+"It's too near sundown for a battle. It will only be a skirmish."
+
+"Ye-e-e-s, possibly," the Northerner assented, and he looked
+thoughtfully at Virgie, "but still--"
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"I can't send you forward now--in the face of that fire. And, for that
+matter, I can't send you to the rear. In five minutes this road will be
+glutted with cavalry and guns."
+
+"Never mind, Morrison," the Southerner returned. "I couldn't go
+now--anyway."
+
+"Why?"
+
+Cary opened out his hands in a simple gesture. "Because, in case of
+trouble for you at headquarters, I'm _still_ your prisoner." With his
+eyes brave and steady on the others he took the newly written pass from
+his breast--and tore it in pieces. "When you want me," he said, "you'll
+find me--_here_."
+
+If there had been time for argument Morrison would have hotly protested
+against such self-sacrifice, but events were crowding upon them too
+fast. From down the road came the sound of furious galloping. Almost at
+once Lieutenant Harris, riding hard at the head of a troop of cavalry,
+swept round the curve and drew his horse upon his haunches.
+
+"Colonel Morrison!" he shouted. "You are ordered--"
+
+"One moment, Lieutenant," interrupted Morrison in tones so even that
+Cary marveled at his composure, "_Did you get Corporal Dudley?_"
+
+Cary's ears ached for the answer. He knew just as well as the questioner
+the danger which might now be disclosed or be forever forgotten and his
+heart went out to the other in this moment of hideous suspense.
+
+There was an instant of hesitation and then came the answer.
+
+"_No, sir!_ We tried hard but couldn't make it."
+
+Morrison's face did not change but his hands tightened until the nails
+dug deep into his palms. He had played--and lost.
+
+"Go on with your report," he said.
+
+Harris pulled in his fretting horse and delivered his significant news.
+
+"The Rebels are advancing in force. I was sent back to you with orders
+to join Major Foster at the fork and hold the road at any cost. Two
+light field pieces are coming to your support. Our main batteries are
+back there--in the woods."
+
+"Right," said Morrison, "we go at once." Turning back to Virgie he
+caught her up in his arms and kissed her. "Good-by, little sweetheart.
+Hide under the rocks and keep close."
+
+"Good-by, Morrison," Gary said, as they struck hands. "I can't wish you
+luck--but our hearts are with you as a man."
+
+"Thanks, old fellow," said the enemy, as he sprang over the wall "It
+helps--God knows."
+
+He caught at his horse's mane and threw himself into the saddle without
+touching the stirrup, while his voice roared out his command.
+
+"Ready, men! Forward!"
+
+"Good-by," shrilled Virgie in her childish treble. "Good-by, Colonel!
+Don't get hurt."
+
+"Daddy!" she cried, as they crouched down in their hiding place behind
+the wall. "Is there going to be a--a _battle_?"
+
+"Only a little one. But you won't be afraid."
+
+A rattle of approaching wheels came from down the road, the shock of
+steel tires striking viciously against the stones, the cries and oaths
+of the drivers urging the horses forward.
+
+"Look!" cried Cary, springing to his feet in spite of the danger in
+which his gray uniform placed him. "Here come the field pieces. In a
+minute now the dogs will begin to bark."
+
+With a roar of wheels and a clash of harness and accouterments the guns
+rushed by while the child stared and stared, her big eyes almost
+starting out of her face.
+
+"The dogs!" she said in wonder. "There wasn't a single dog there!"
+
+"Another kind of dog," her father said with a meaning look. "And their
+teeth are _very_ long. Ah! There they go! Over yonder on the hill--in
+the edge of the woods. The Yankee dogs are barking. Now listen for the
+answer."
+
+Together they listened, father and daughter, with straining
+ears--listened for the defiant reply of those men who, being Americans,
+were never beaten until hunger and superior numbers forced them to the
+wall.
+
+"Boom!" A great, ear-filling sound crashed over the hills and rolled,
+echoing, through the woods.
+
+"That's us! That's us!" the man cried out exultantly, while he caught
+the child closer in his arms. "Hear our people talking, honey? Hear 'em
+talk!"
+
+But overhead something was coming through the air and the child shrank
+down in terror--something that whined and screamed as it sped on its
+dreadful way and seemed like a demon out of hell searching for his prey.
+
+"Lord a' mercy, Daddy!" the child cried out. "What's _that_?"
+
+He patted her head consolingly. "Nothing at all but a shell. They sound
+much worse than they really are. Don't be afraid. Nothing will hurt
+you."
+
+From the forks of the road the sound of volley firing grew stronger and,
+as if in response, the road to the Union rear now turned into a stream
+of living blue, with cavalry madly galloping and sweating infantry
+hurrying forward as fast as their legs could carry them.
+
+"Look, Virgie, look!" her father cried, holding her head a little way
+above the wall. "See those bayonets shining back there across the road.
+A whole regiment of infantry. And they're going up against our _men
+across an open field!_ By Jiminy, but those Yanks will get a mustard
+bath. Ah-hah!" he chortled, as a roar of musketry broke out. "I told you
+so! Our boys are after them. Good work! Good work!"
+
+But again a shell passed over them and again the world was filled with
+that awful whining, shrieking sound.
+
+"Daddy," the child cried, with quivering lips, but still dry eyed. "I
+don't _like_ those things. I don't _like_'em."
+
+"There, there, darling," he comforted as they shrank closer under the
+protection of the wall. "Keep down under my arm and they won't bother
+you."
+
+As he spoke a twig with a fresh yellow break in it fell from a tree and
+struck his upturned face. He winced at the thought that the bullet
+might have flown a few feet lower. And meanwhile the sound of the firing
+came steadily closer.
+
+"By Jove!" he murmured to himself, "it's a bigger rumpus than I
+thought."
+
+This indeed was true. What had at first promised to be only a skirmish
+between the outposts of the two entrenched armies, now developed into a
+general engagement covering a space of half a mile along the line. A
+reconnoitering force of Federal cavalry had ridden too close to the
+rifle pits of the Confederates, and, as Morrison himself expressed it,
+"the hornets came out and began to sting."
+
+Major Foster, commanding a larger force of cavalry, rode out in support
+of his reconnoitering party, and found himself opposed, not by a
+straggling line of Rebel pickets, but by a moving wall of tattered gray,
+the units of which advanced on a low-bent run, crouching behind some
+bush or stone, to fire, reload and advance again.
+
+An aide raced back to the Union lines to ask for help in support of
+Foster's slender force of cavalry; and thus the order came to Morrison
+to join the detachment and hold the enemy until reinforcements could be
+formed and pushed to the firing line.
+
+The delay, however, was well nigh fatal for Morrison and Major Foster,
+and from the point where Cary and little Virgie watched, the case of the
+Union horsemen seemed an evil one. True, that infantry and guns were
+soon advancing to their aid on a "double-quick"; yet all the advantage
+seemed to lie with the ragged, sharp-shooting Southerners.
+
+The crackle of musketry increased; the dust rolled up and intermingled
+with the wreathes of drifting smoke, and through it came the vicious
+whine of leaden messengers of death.
+
+Then, borne on the wind, came a sound that he would know till his dying
+day--_the rebel yell_. An exultant scream,--a cry of unending hate,
+defiance, _victory_!
+
+He sprang to his feet. Off came the battered old campaign hat and
+unmindful that he stood there hidden in the woods and that his voice
+could carry only a few yards against the roar of battle, he swung it
+over his head: and shouted out his encouragement.
+
+"Look! We're whipping 'em. Virgie, do you hear? We're getting them on
+the run. Come on, boys! Come on!"
+
+He felt her clutch on his sleeve. With wide eyes grown darker than ever
+with excitement, she asked her piteous question.
+
+"Daddy! _Will they kill the Colonel?_"
+
+For a moment he could not answer. Then, with a groan he gave back his
+answer: "I _hope_ not, darling. I hope not!"
+
+Down the road a riderless horse was coming, head up and stirrups flying.
+As it galloped past Cary scrutinized it closely and was glad he did not
+recognize it. In its wake came soldiers, infantry and dismounted
+cavalry, firing, retreating, loading and firing again, but always
+retreating.
+
+"Here come the stragglers," he cried. "We're whipping 'em! Close,
+darling, _close_. Lie down against the wall."
+
+He crouched above her, shielding her as best he could with his body.
+Then, suddenly, a man in blue leaped on the wall not ten feet away. He
+had meant to seize the wall as a breastwork and fight from behind it,
+but before he dropped down he would fire one last shot. His gun came up
+to his shoulder--he aimed at some unseen foe and fired. But from
+somewhere, out of the crash of sound and the rolling powder smoke, a
+singing missile came and found its mark. The man in blue bent over
+suddenly, wavered, then toppled down inside the wall, his gun ringing on
+the stones as he fell.
+
+"Daddy!" the child whispered, with ashen face, "it's the biscuit man.
+It's HARRY!"
+
+Her father's hand went out instinctively to cover her eyes. "Don't look,
+dear! Don't look!"
+
+The road was choked now. Cavalry and infantry, all in a mad rush for the
+rear, were tearing by while the two field pieces which but a moment ago
+had gone into action with such a deadly whirl came limping back with
+slashed traces and splintered wheels. With fascinated eyes the Rebel
+officer watched from behind his wall, while everything, even his child,
+was forgotten in the lust for victory. And so he did not hear the faint
+voice behind him that cried out in an agony of thirst and pain.
+
+"Water! Water! Help! Someone--give water!"
+
+Virgie, with dilated eyes and heaving breast, crouched low as long as
+she could and then gave up everything to the pitiful appeal ringing in
+her ears. Quick as a flash, she sped away on bare feet over rocks and
+sharp, pointed branches of fallen trees to the spring, where she caught
+up a cup and filled it to the brim. Another swift rush and she reached
+the fallen man in blue and had the cup at his lips, while her arm went
+under his head to lift it.
+
+"Virgie!" her father cried, frantic at the sight. With a great leap he
+was at her side, forcing her down to the ground and covering her with
+his body.
+
+The trooper's head sank back and his eyes began to dull.
+
+"May God bless ye, little one," he murmured. "Heaven--_Mary_--_!_" His
+lips gave out one long, shuddering sigh. His body grew slack and his
+chin fell. Trooper Harry O'Connell had fought his last fight--had
+passed to his final review.
+
+One look at the boyish face so suddenly gone gray and bloodless and Gary
+caught Virgie up in his arms. "Come dear, you can't help him any more,"
+and with a crouching run they were back once more in the shelter of the
+wall.
+
+And now the shriek of the shells and the whine of the bullets came
+shriller than before. All around them the twigs were dropping, while the
+acrid powder smoke rolled in through the trees and burnt their eyes and
+throats. Again came men in blue retreating and among them an officer on
+horseback, wheeling his animal madly around among them and shouting
+encouragement as he tried to face them to the front. "Keep at it, men,"
+Morrison was crying, half mad with rage. "One decent stand and we can
+hold them. Give it to them hard. Stand, I tell you. _Stand!_"
+
+All around him, however, men were falling and those who were left began
+to waver. "Steady, men! Don't flinch," came the shout again. "Ah-hah,
+you _would_, would you? _Coward!_"
+
+Morrison's sword held flatwise, thudded down on the back of a man who
+had flung away his gun. "Get back in the fight, you dog! Get back!"
+
+He whipped out his revolver and pointed it till the gun had been
+snatched up, then fired all its chambers at the oncoming hordes in gray.
+
+"One more stand," he yelled. "One more--"
+
+Beside him the color sergeant gave a moan and bent in the middle like a
+hinge. Another slackening of his body and the stricken bearer of the
+flag plunged from his saddle, the colors trailing in the dust.
+
+Morrison spurred his mount toward the fallen man, bending to grasp the
+colors from the tight gripped hand; but even as he bent, his horse went
+down. He leaped to save himself, then turned once more, snatched at the
+flag of his routed regiment and waved it above his head.
+
+"_Stand, boys, and give it to 'em!_"
+
+A shout went up--not from the men he sought to rally to his flag, but
+from those who would win it at a cost of blood, for his troopers were
+running on a backward road, and Morrison fought alone. The "gray devils"
+were all around him now, and he backed against the wall, fighting till
+his sword was sent spinning from his fist by the blow of a musket butt;
+then, grasping the color-pole in both his hands, he parried bayonet
+thrusts and saber strokes, panting, breathing in hot, labored gasps, and
+cursing his enemies from a hoarse, parched throat.
+
+A hideous, unequal fight it was, and soon Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison
+must fall as his colors fell and be trampled in the dust; yet now
+through an eddying drift of smoke came another ragged Southerner, a
+grim, gaunt man whose voice was as hoarse as Morrison's, who had grasped
+a saber from the blood stained rocks and waved it above his head.
+
+"Back, boys! Don't kill that man!"
+
+Among them he plunged till he reached the side of Morrison, then turned
+and faced the brothers of his country and his State. With a downward
+stroke he arrested a saber thrusts and then struck upward at a rifle's
+mouth as it spit its deadly flame.
+
+"Don't kill him! Do you hear?" he cried, as he beat at the bayonet
+points. "I'm Cary! Herbert Cary!--_on the staff of General Lee!_"
+
+For an instant the attacking Southerners stood aghast at the sight of
+this raging man in gray who defended a Yankee officer; and yet he had
+made no saber stroke to wound or kill; instead, his weapon had come
+between their own and the life of a well-nigh helpless foe. For a moment
+more they paused and looked with wondering eyes, and in that moment
+their victory was changed to rout.
+
+A bugle blared. A thundering rush of hoof beats sounded on the road, and
+the Union reenforcements swept around the curve. Six abreast they came,
+a regiment of strong, straight riders, hungry for battle, hot to
+retrieve the losing fortune of the day. The road was too narrow for a
+concentrated rush, so they streamed into the fields on either side,
+re-formed, and swept like an avalanche of blue upon their prey. The guns
+in the woods now thundered forth afresh, their echoes rolling out
+across the hills, and the attacking Rebels turned and fled, like leaves
+before a storm.
+
+On one side of the road, Morrison and Cary shrank down beside the wall
+to let the Union riders pass; on the other, all that was left of the
+Rebel force ran helter-skelter for a screen of protecting trees. But
+before the last one disappeared he threw up his gun and fired,
+haphazard, in the direction whence he had come.
+
+As if in reply came the sound of a saber falling from a man's hand and
+striking on a stone. Under his very eyes and just as he was putting out
+his hand to grip the others Morrison saw Herbert Cary sinking slowly to
+the ground.
+
+And then, through the yellow dust clouds and the powder smoke and all
+the horrid reek of war, a child came running with outstretched arms and
+piteous voice--a frightened child, weeping for the father who had thrown
+himself headlong into peril to save another's life and who, perhaps, had
+lost his own.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+The headquarters of the Army of the Potomac on the morning of August 4,
+1864, were at City Point near where the Appomattox meets the James. Here
+the grim, silent man in whose hands lay the destinies of the United
+States sent out the telegrams which kept the Federal forces gnawing at
+the cage in which Lee had shut himself and meanwhile held to his
+strategic position south of Richmond. To his left and west lay
+Petersburg still unconquered, but Petersburg could wait, for Early's
+gray clad troopers were scourging the Shenandoah and the menace must be
+removed. To this end Grant had sent a telegram to Washington three days
+before expressing in unmistakable terms what he wished General Sheridan
+and his cavalry to accomplish. They were to go over into the Shenandoah
+and, putting themselves _south_ of the enemy, follow him to the death.
+To which telegram the tall, lank, furrow-faced man in the White House
+whose kindly heart was bursting with the strain replied in
+characteristic fashion and told him that his purpose was exactly right.
+And then, with a gleam of humor, warned him against influences in
+Washington which would prevent its carrying out unless he forced it.
+
+This message had come but a few minutes before and it had been received
+with silent satisfaction for Grant knew now that Abraham Lincoln and he
+were in perfect accord as to the means for swiftly bringing on the end.
+But the plans must be well laid and to that end he must leave City Point
+within a few hours and go north. And so he was standing at a window of
+his headquarters this morning with his eyes resting unseeingly on the
+camp, while his cool, quiet mind steadily forged out his schemes.
+
+Unlike the headquarters of "play" armies where all is noise and
+confusion and bloodied orderlies throw themselves off of plunging horses
+and gasp out their reports, the room in which General Grant did his work
+was strangely quiet.
+
+It was a large, square room with high ceiling and wall paper which had
+defied all the arts of Europe to render interesting in design. Furniture
+was neither plentiful nor comfortable--a slippery, black horse-hair
+sofa, a few horse-hair chairs and, at one side of the room, a table and
+a desk, littered with papers, maps and files. At the table Grant's
+adjutant, Forbes, sat writing. Facing him was the door opening out into
+the hallway of the house where two sentries stood on guard. In the
+silence which pervaded the room and in the quiet application to the work
+in hand there was a perfect reflection of the mind of him who stood
+impassive at the window with his back turned, a faint blue cloud of
+cigar smoke rising above his head.
+
+A quick step sounded in the corridor--the step of one who bears a
+message. An orderly appeared in the doorway, spoke to the two sentries
+and was passed in with a salute to Forbes.
+
+"For General Grant," he said, holding out a folded note of white paper.
+"Personal from Lieutenant Harris, sir."
+
+At the sound of his name the General turned slowly and accepted the
+note which the orderly presented. He took it without haste and yet
+without any perceptible loss of time or motion and, as always, without
+unnecessary words. Scanning it, he shifted his cigar to one corner of
+his mouth where its smoke would not rise into his eyes, thought for an
+instant, then nodded shortly.
+
+"I'll see him. At once."
+
+Dismissed, the orderly saluted and passed quickly out. The General, with
+his chin in his collar and his cigar held between his fingers at nearly
+the same level, moved back to the window and stood there silently as
+before. He knew what Lieutenant Harris would wish to speak to him about.
+A few weeks before a Lieutenant-Colonel of cavalry had been
+court-martialed on the charge of allowing the escape of a spy. The court
+had found him guilty and its findings had been submitted to the higher
+authorities and endorsed by them. A copy of these reports now lay on his
+desk. All this his Adjutant, Forbes, knew as well as the General
+himself, but if Forbes had thought it worth while to speculate on the
+extent of his commander's interest he might have guessed for years
+without ever drawing one logical conclusion from all the hints that that
+impassive face and figure gave him.
+
+Again a ringing step in the corridor and this time Lieutenant Harris
+came into the room, his hand going up in salute. But his General was
+still looking out of the window, his eyes on a dead level. There was a
+silence and then--without turning around--
+
+"Well, Lieutenant, what is it?"
+
+"A short conference, General, if you'll grant it. The case of
+Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison." It was hard work to talk to one who kept
+his back turned and Harris was embarrassed.
+
+The smoke from the General's cigar still curled lazily upwards.
+
+"Reprieve?" came the monosyllabic question.
+
+Harris caught himself together and put all his feelings.
+
+"No, General. A _pardon_!"
+
+At once Grant wheeled and stood gazing at him keenly.
+
+"_Pardon?_" he said, and he advanced with deliberation to the desk where
+he stood with his eyes steady on Harris' face. "Lieutenant! Do you want
+me to think you are out of your mind?"
+
+Before Harris could reply Grant stopped him with a gesture and picked up
+a batch of papers which lay on the desk.
+
+"The man has been given every chance. He has been court-martialed--and
+found guilty."
+
+He dropped the papers in the case back on the desk. "And you--his
+counsel--having failed to prove him otherwise now come to _me_--for
+pardon."
+
+He snapped his fingers. "Lieutenant, you are wasting time." And he
+turned away, pausing for a moment to turn over a sheaf here and there on
+his desk and meditate their contents. The incident of Lieutenant-Colonel
+Morrison has been disposed of and, in another moment would be forgotten.
+It was now or never for Harris and he answered quickly.
+
+"I hope not, sir. Neither yours nor mine." And then, as the General
+looked up with some surprise at this retort. "You have read the
+findings of the court?"
+
+"Yes," was the grim reply. "And approve the sentence. To-morrow he will
+be shot."
+
+"Yes, sir," acknowledged Harris. "Unless _you_ intervene."
+
+At this curiously insistent plea for clemency the short, stocky bearded
+man who, to so few, had the bearing of a great general, faced Lieutenant
+Harris and gave him a look which made the young officer's bravery falter
+for a long moment.
+
+"_I?_" said the General, with a searching note in his voice which seemed
+to probe coldly and with deadly accuracy among the strenuous emotions in
+the young man's mind. "Harris--you are an officer of promise. Don't cut
+that promise short." With a flick of his ashes to one side he turned
+away. The cigar went back into the corner of his sardonic mouth.
+
+Harris strode forward an impulsive step and threw out his hands.
+
+"It is worth the risk. When a man is condemned to die--"
+
+The General wheeled with more impatience than the Adjutant, Forbes, had
+seen him exhibit through many vexatious, worrying months. His voice took
+on a rasping note. He tapped the papers on the desk with grim
+significance.
+
+"Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison has failed in his military duty. He
+released a Rebel spy--proved himself a traitor to his cause."
+
+"A traitor, General?" protested the young officer. "Do you call a man a
+traitor who fought as Morrison did a week ago? Who stood his ground till
+his whole command was shot to pieces! And then stood alone--defending
+his colors in the face of hell let loose!"
+
+The appeal was impassioned, its sincerity and humanity undoubted. Yet it
+seemingly only served to make the grim rules of war more unyielding than
+ever.
+
+Choosing his words with more than ordinary care, and speaking them in
+firm, even tones, the General made his reply.
+
+"No act of bravery can atone for a soldier's lapse from duty." He sat
+down at his desk and began to write.
+
+Under ordinary circumstances Lieutenant Harris might have accepted
+defeat for there seemed no use in trying to break down that iron will or
+touch the heart of this relentless soldier. But this was something more
+than an ordinary case and Harris was more than simply Morrison's
+counsel--he was his friend. The two had fought together through three
+hard campaigns; they had shared food and water and shelter, had slept
+together for warmth on sodden fields, had exchanged such confidences as
+two officers from the same town in the North but of unequal rank may
+exchange under the pressure of war-time emotions. If there was one man
+living who knew Morrison's heart and appreciated his motives to the
+uttermost it was his lieutenant and the young officer was prepared to
+lose his commission, aye, even face prison for insubordination if
+continued opposition to the Commander-in-Chief would result in a
+re-hearing. And so he caught himself together for the second time and
+returned to the charge.
+
+"I do not offer his courage as a plea for pardon," he said, and turned
+to his general with half a smile, "but still I find in Shakespeare--and
+in Blackstone--the suggestion of tempering justice with mercy."
+
+Grant tossed aside his pencil, repeating the last word slowly, bitterly:
+
+"_Mercy!_"
+
+He rose from his seat and stood beside his table, speaking with a low
+but almost fierce intensity:
+
+"They call me a war machine! I am! And you--and all the rest--are parts
+of it! A lever! A screw! A valve! A wheel! A machine half human--yes! A
+thing of muscle and bone and blood--but without a heart! A merciless
+_machine_, whose wheels must turn and turn till we grind out this
+rebellion to the dust of peace!"
+
+He paused impressively, and in the hard, cold words which followed, all
+hope for Morrison seemed to fade and die.
+
+"If a wheel once fails to do its work--discard it!--for another and a
+better one! _We want no wheels that slip their cogs!_"
+
+The General ceased and turned to his littered table; but Harris was not
+yet beaten.
+
+"No, General," he answered bravely, "but there happens to be a flaw ...
+in your machine's control." The General looked up, frowning sharply; but
+Harris still went on: "In a military court we have condemned a man to
+die--_and the facts have not been proved!_"
+
+Amazed more at the young officer's obstinate temerity than his words the
+General stared at him.
+
+"How so?" he asked, with irony.
+
+Harris opened out his hands with a simple gesture that seemed to leave
+his logic to the judgment of any impartial observer.
+
+"In times of peace, my profession is that of the Law. I know my
+ground--and," in rising tones of sincerity, "I challenge you to shake it
+in any civil court in Christendom."
+
+"Strong words, young man," came the stern reply. "For your sake, I hope
+they are warranted. What is your point? Get at it!"
+
+Harris drew a short breath of relief. He had cleverly switched the
+appeal from grounds on which he stood no chance whatever to those where
+he did not fear any intellect in a fair fight.
+
+"The evidence," he said calmly, "was purely circumstantial. In the first
+place, it is alleged that my client captured a Rebel spy, one Herbert
+Cary, who was hiding in the loft of a cabin."
+
+The General's caustic tones interrupted. "To which fact," he said,
+"there were only _ten_ witnesses."
+
+"Yes, General," was the faintly smiling agreement. "Ten! But not one of
+them actually _saw_ the man! They _believe_ he was there, but they
+cannot swear to it."
+
+Grant made a motion as of putting away something of no consequence.
+"Immaterial--in view of the other facts. Well--what else?"
+
+"Next, it is claimed that Morrison released this spy and allowed him to
+enter the Union lines--without regard to consequences."
+
+The General gave a short exclamation of impatience, and struck the
+papers on his desk with the flat of his hand.
+
+"And that is _proved_," he said, sharply. "Proved by several officers
+who stopped your spy at points along the road."
+
+He singled out a soiled piece of paper from the sheaf before him and
+held it up, a piece of paper which bore writing on both sides.
+
+"When taken, _this pass_ was found on his person. Not circumstantial
+evidence, but _fact_. Signed on one side by R.E. Lee and, on the other,
+by Colonel Morrison." He laughed shortly over the futility of argument
+under such circumstances. "Do you presume to contest this, _too_?"
+
+To his amazement the young officer facing him bowed easily and smiled in
+turn.
+
+"I _do_. Emphatically. _No pass_ was given Herbert Cary either by
+Colonel Morrison _or_ General Lee."
+
+"_What?_" cried the General angrily.
+
+Harris only pointed.
+
+"Read it, sir--if you please." He watched till Grant's eyes started to
+scan the pass again, and then repeated the words which he knew so well.
+
+"Pass _Virginia Cary_ and escort through Federal--and Confederate
+lines."
+
+"'Virginia Cary,' General, is a non-combatant and a child. 'Escort' may
+mean a single person--or it may mean a whole troop of cavalry."
+
+To his infinite relief and joy his Commanding General looked up at him
+thoughtfully, then slowly rose from his desk and took a turn about the
+room, followed by a faint blue trail of cigar smoke. He paused.
+
+"And what does _Cary_ say?" he asked.
+
+Again Harris smiled the quiet smile of the lawyer who has been
+confronted with such questions before and knows well how to answer them.
+
+"He, too, is on trial for his life. His evidence, naturally, was not
+admitted."
+
+"Ah! Then what says _Morrison_?"
+
+"Nothing, sir," was the young lieutenant's calm reply. "The burden of
+proof lies with the prosecution--not with the defendant."
+
+"And this is your contention--your _legal_ flaw in my machine?" the
+General asked sharply.
+
+"It is."
+
+"Very good, sir--very good. In that case we'll call in these silent
+partners and dig into this case until we reach rock bottom!"
+
+"Forbes," he ordered. "Send for the prisoner, Mr. Morrison--and the
+Rebel, Herbert Cary. I want both of them here--at once!"
+
+In the pause which followed the Adjutant's exit Harris interposed an
+objection.
+
+"Your method, General, is hardly just to the interests of my client."
+
+Grant turned on him with something mere than impatience. He was growing
+angry.
+
+"Lieutenant Harris! Are you asking me to pardon a guilty man? It's the
+truth I want--not legal technicalities. Next you'll be asking me not to
+hang this Rebel spy because he has--a baby!"
+
+He went back to his accustomed place at the window and stood looking out
+again, his hands clasped loosely behind his back, the eternal cigar
+smoke rising above his head. Then, to the young lieutenant's amazement,
+he asked a question in tones of ordinary conversation.
+
+"Harris," he said. "Who was the man who preferred these charges to start
+with?"
+
+"Corporal Dudley," was the eager answer.
+
+"And there, General, is another point and a vital one that was not
+brought out. In reporting his Colonel, Dudley was actuated not by a
+spirit of military duty, but personal revenge."
+
+"Revenge? Why?"
+
+"Because Morrison shot and killed Dudley's brother--a Sergeant in his
+command."
+
+The General came back from his window.
+
+"Again--why?"
+
+"For insubordination--incendiarism--attempted desertion," came the swift
+reply.
+
+The General's eyebrows raised a fraction of an inch. He seated himself
+at his desk and unrolled a map.
+
+"Any witnesses of the Sergeant's death?" he asked evenly as he proceeded
+to study his map.
+
+"Unfortunately, only one," Harris replied. "An old negro--now in our
+camp--answering to the name of William Lewis."
+
+"Lewis--Lewis," said Grant thoughtfully. He referred for a moment to a
+file of papers and then looked up. "Is that the old codger who's been
+worrying my entire staff for permission to go through our lines to his
+home?"
+
+"Yes, General," said Harris, with a smile, for Unc' Billy's persistency
+and his troubles were known to everyone he met.
+
+"Good! It's about time we got even him," the General remarked
+sardonically. "Have him in! See to it, Forbes." And again he bent over
+his map.
+
+Forbes, passing out again, paused as Harris gestured.
+
+"You'll find him somewhere near the guard house," the Lieutenant said
+with a flicker of a, smile. "The old man has been regularly camping out
+there since he learned that his master was inside."
+
+A minute passed and then, from a short distance away, came the sound of
+a squad of soldiers marching. In single file, with the two prisoners in
+line, the squad came into the hallway and stopped at the doorway.
+
+"_Halt! Left face! Order arms! Prisoners file out!_" The two prisoners
+stepped forward and entered the room.
+
+Thanks to expert surgical work since he entered Union lines, Herbert
+Cary's wounds had healed quickly while plenty of good food had done the
+rest. His eyes may not have been bright with hope but at least they
+were clear with health and his straight back and squared shoulders
+showed that the man's fighting spirit had not left him even under the
+adverse decision of a court-martial.
+
+Of the two, Morrison seemed the graver and quieter. With his sword taken
+from him and his shoulder straps ripped off the man who had been a
+Lieutenant-Colonel in the Army of the Potomac only the day before stood
+looking at his general without the slightest hope for clemency. Yet,
+with all the sad, quiet look of resignation in his eyes, behind them
+glowed a wonderful light--the light of self-sacrifice. For he had chosen
+to put on the tender glove of humanity and grip hands with the mailed
+gauntlet of war, and though he had been crushed yet even in this bitter
+hour they could not take from him the knowledge that the Commander in
+Chief of all spiritual armies would stand forever on his side. They
+could take his sword and shoulder straps but they could not rob him of
+that divine consolation.
+
+And so the two stood with their eyes steady on the General--the
+Confederate, hard and defiant--the Union officer with a strange, sad
+glow on his face.
+
+But the General paid them no attention. He was still studying the map
+laid out before him on his desk, the cigar in the corner of his mouth
+drawing one side of his face into harsh, deep lines. As a matter of
+fact, Ulysses Simpson Grant was very far removed from harshness--he was
+simply and solely efficiency personified. When nothing was to be said
+General Grant said nothing. To do otherwise was waste.
+
+Presently he looked up and saw that while Forbes had given the two
+prisoners chairs directly in front of his desk one of the important
+factors in the business in hand had not been produced.
+
+"Well, Forbes, well? Where is the negro?" He asked crisply. "Bring him
+in! Bring him in!"
+
+"In a moment, General," responded the Adjutant, hastening to the doorway
+as the tread of feet sounded again in the hallway. Dismissing the two
+privates who had arrived with Uncle Billy between them he led the old
+man down to the desk and left him there, bowing and scraping a little
+and holding his hat in front of him in both hands.
+
+"Wan' see _me_, suh?" ventured Uncle Billy, intruding delicately on the
+General's calculations. "Here I is!"
+
+General Grant looked up quickly and ran his eye over the old man.
+
+"Your name!"
+
+"Er--William Lewis, seh. Yas, seh."
+
+"To whom do you belong?"
+
+Although Uncle Billy's back was not particularly straight this sudden
+question introduced a stiffening into it which made it more upright than
+it had been in years.
+
+"I b'longs to Cap'n Hubbert Cary, seh--of de Confed'it Army. Das who I
+b'longs to. Yas, seh."
+
+The General sat back a little in his chair and studied Uncle Billy. He
+saw that after all the old negro was simply a natural slave--that he
+probably had no other thought in his grayed head than that of faithful
+service to his owner. But he would try him and see how far the old man
+would go.
+
+"I understand," he said, "that freedom has been offered you--and you
+refused it. Is this true?"
+
+"Yas, seh."
+
+"_Why?_" asked the General quietly.
+
+Uncle Billy stammered.
+
+"Well--er--well, 'skuse me, Mars' Gen'l, but--but down whar _I_ lives at
+de--de white gent'men understands a nigger better'n what you-all does.
+Yas, seh."
+
+General Grant may have smiled internally, but the only symptom of
+amusement was the dry note in his voice.
+
+"I see. But there has been some difference of opinion on the point."
+
+He paused and then pointed past Uncle Billy directly at Morrison. "Do
+you know that man?"
+
+"Me?" said Uncle Billy. He turned and saw Morrison and instantly his
+face lighted up. It made no difference to the old negro that Morrison's
+uniform was mutilated--he could only see the familiar features of one
+who had treated his dead mistress with perfect respect under trying
+circumstances.
+
+"Aw, yas, seh," he broke out, with a broad grin. "How you does, Cun'l. I
+clar to--"
+
+Uncle Billy stopped. His eyes had gone beyond Morrison to the man
+sitting beside him and at the sight of that loved figure the old man
+began to tremble. His voice lowered to a whisper and he began to totter
+forward.
+
+"Mars' Cary!" he said, as if he were looking on one risen from the dead.
+He came a little nearer, with his hand stretched out as if to touch him
+testingly--then suddenly dropped down on his knees before Gary who had
+risen from his chair. "Bless Gawd, I done fin' you," he sobbed, his face
+buried in his toaster's coat. "I done fin' you at last."
+
+The General frowned.
+
+"Forbes," he ordered. "Put a stop to that. Bring him back!"
+
+But Uncle Billy paid not a bit of attention as the Adjutant sprang up.
+All his thought was for his master and his own explanation.
+
+"Dey wouldn' lemme git thru, seh!" he cried, pleading absolution from
+what had seemed an inexcusable breach of trust. "Dey wouldn' gimme no
+pass an' I'se des been stuck! Aw, Gawd, Mars' Cary--an' I axed 'em ev'y
+day!"
+
+"There now, Billy--don't," Cary said with a gesture of pity and unending
+gratitude.
+
+Uncle Billy rose slowly to his feet.
+
+"Yas, seh. Yas, seh," he answered obediently. "'Skuse me, Mars' Gen'l. I
+couldn' he'p it, seh. I--I couldn' he'p it. Dey wouldn' eben lemme see
+him in de guard house--"
+
+"That will do," interrupted the General firmly. "Listen to me. When did
+you see Mr. Morrison--last?"
+
+"Him?" said Uncle Billy, looking around at the Union officer.
+"'Twas--'twas in de spring, seh. Yas, seh. De time de Yankees bu'nt us
+out."
+
+"How's that?" asked the General, not understanding.
+
+Lieutenant Harris came forward a step.
+
+"The act of incendiarism I spoke of, General--on the part of Sergeant
+Dudley."
+
+The General looked up and nodded.
+
+"I see," he said, and Harris, knowing that due weight would be given the
+fact let go a faint sigh of relief and stepped back.
+
+The cigar came out of the General's mouth. "Tell me about it," he said
+to Uncle Billy.
+
+The old negro drew himself up and shifted his weight onto his other
+foot.
+
+"Well, seh, 'twas dis way. One mornin' de blue-bellies--'skuse me, seh,
+de cav'lry gent'men. One mornin' de cav'lry gent'men come ridin' up,
+lookin' fer horses an' fodder an'--an' Mars' Cary--an' anything else
+what was layin' roun'. Yas, seh. An' des' befo' dis here gent'man come,"
+with a bow at Morrison, "a low-lived white man took'n grab me by de
+th'oat--an' choke me, seh. Den he 'sult Miss Hallie--"
+
+"Miss Hallie?" queried the General.
+
+"My mis'tiss, seh," answered Uncle Billy. "My mis'tiss, seh," he said
+again and his hand went up to his eyes.
+
+"The wife of Captain Cary," Harris said in a low tone and the General
+nodded.
+
+"Den--bless Gawd--de Cun'l come! He pick him down offn de front
+po'ch--and put him under 'rest. Yas, seh. An' Miss Hallie, she sho' was
+hoppin', Gen'l. She--"
+
+"Never mind that," sighed the man whose creed was Patience. "Go on with
+the story."
+
+"Yas, seh. Thank'e, seh. 'Twas des lek I tell you, seh. An' arfter while
+orders come to de cav'lry gent'men fer to light out fr'm dar in a hurry.
+An' whilst dey was gettin' ready, seh, an' me an' de Cun'l was waitin'
+roun' fer to proteck de property, de fire bus' right out de winders!
+
+"Dat's right, Mars' Gen'l," Uncle Billy hurried to state, as the
+General's eyebrows went up in surprise. "Dat's right. Den de front do'
+flewed open, an' here come dat po' white trash rapscallion--wid de pine
+knot in his han'. Yas, _seh_. He--"
+
+"One moment!" snapped the General. "Was he running _towards_ his troop
+or _away_ from it?"
+
+"_Way_ fr'm it, seh," replied the old negro, with unmistakable
+truthfulness, "t'odes de ice house whar Miss Hallie an' de chillun was
+at. Yas, seh."
+
+"And Mr. Morrison tried to stop him?"
+
+"Ha!" cried Uncle Billy, with a chuckle. "He mo'n tried, seh. He _done_
+it!"
+
+The General nodded, his lips tight shut.
+
+"So I understand. But what did he do--or say?"
+
+At this question Uncle Billy suddenly developed dramatic abilities that
+his master had never dreamed of.
+
+"He say--" and Uncle Billy's arm shot out as he pointed something deadly
+at an invisible foe--"he say, '_Halt! Dudley! Halt! Bang!_'"
+
+Uncle Billy's hat dropped down on the floor with a whack. "Dat's all,
+seh. Dat po' white trash--he drop lek a stuck pig, seh!"
+
+The General's eyes were on his desk and for a moment there was a pause.
+Finally, he lifted his head and looked at Morrison, who rose in salute.
+
+"Mr. Morrison. You did well. Your Sergeant failed in his military
+duty--and deserved the punishment. I commend your action."
+
+Harris, listening with all his might, thought the words more favorable
+than the tone in which they were spoken and his face brightened. Then he
+heard the General speaking more sternly.
+
+"The Federal powers of administrative justice now occupy precisely the
+same position with regard to your own default."
+
+Harris' face darkened. After the first just encomium--what was this that
+was coming?
+
+Relentless and inflexible the voice went on.
+
+"The rules of war, as applied to a non-commissioned officer, must also
+govern his superiors. As Sergeant Dudley deserved his bullet you merit
+_yours_."
+
+His eyes dropped from Morrison's face and he looked up at Harris.
+
+"A bad witness for your client, Lieutenant," he said grimly, as he
+nodded his head towards Uncle Billy. "You ought to study law! Take him
+away," and he picked up a fresh cigar from a box in front of him and
+tossed the old one out of the window.
+
+Uncle Billy, with a puzzled look on his face, slowly yielded to the
+touch of the two soldiers who stepped into the room at a gesture from
+Forbes. He seemed to realize that his testimony had not been of much
+avail though just why was indeed a mystery. One thing, however, was
+quite clear.
+
+"'Skuse me, Mars' Gen'l. I--I don't need dat ar pass home now. An' I
+much obliged to you fer _not_ givin' it to me. Yas, seh. Thank'e, seh."
+At the doorway he bowed with careful politeness to each occupant of the
+fatal room. "Good mornin', Mars' Cary. Good mornin', gent'men. _Good_
+mornin'."
+
+With the disappearance of bewildered Uncle Billy the General swung
+around on the officer who no longer wore his shoulder straps.
+
+"Mr. Morrison," he said, in his distinct, even tones. "Your friend and
+counsel, Lieutenant Harris, has applied to me for your pardon!"
+
+"_Pardon?_" cried Morrison, springing to his feet with an exclamation of
+amazement.
+
+"Exactly," was the crisp response. "It comes from him--not from you. But
+still, as an interested party, have you anything to say in your own
+behalf?"
+
+The Union officer stared at his general for a moment without replying.
+Yes, there were many things that might be said--all of them honest
+arguments in his own behalf, all of them weighted with Right and
+Humanity but none of them worth putting into words in the face of this
+deadly machine of war, this grim, austere, unyielding tribunal. He
+wavered for a moment on his feet as a terrible wave of despair surged
+over him, then made a faint gesture of negation.
+
+"I have nothing to say, sir."
+
+"Captain Cary!" ordered the General and, as Cary rose unsteadily to his
+feet, "No. Keep your seat, sir; you are wounded. Is it true--as I learn
+from this report--that during a skirmish a week ago you helped defend
+the Union colors against your own people?"
+
+Cary shot up from his chair with a fiery rush of anger.
+
+"_I? No, sir!_ I defended the _man_--not the soldier, or his flag!"
+
+"Ah!" ejaculated the General, leaning back in his chair and blowing out
+a cloud of smoke in surprise. "You draw a rather fine distinction,
+Captain. You saved the colors--_but you failed to save the man!_ You had
+better have let him die--as an honorable soldier."
+
+There was silence for a moment, and the General asked: "Is it true that
+you were actuated by a debt of gratitude?"
+
+"Yes," answered the Southerner, throwing back his head. "And a greater
+debt than I can ever hope to pay. His mercy to--my little girl."
+
+Without relaxing for a moment his grip on the points of the case, no
+matter what human elements might be drawn into it, the General instantly
+rose and shot out an accusing forefinger at the Confederate.
+
+"And the pass he gave--_to you!_"
+
+Their eyes clashed but the Southerner lowered his own not a whit and
+backed them, furthermore, with honest anger.
+
+"_To her!_" he answered, and drove the reply home with clenched jaws.
+
+The General relaxed--and smiled.
+
+"Another fine distinction," he said, resuming his seat. He knocked the
+ashes from his cigar and presently looked up with another one of those
+terribly vital questions which came so simply from his lips. "Did you
+ever penetrate the Federal lines by means of a uniform--of blue?"
+
+The Confederate drew back as he felt the assault on his rights as a
+soldier.
+
+"As to that, General Grant, there is--"
+
+"Answer me!" came the sharp command. "'Yes' or 'No'!"
+
+"One moment, General," interrupted Harris, with a lawyer's quick
+objection. "If--"
+
+"No interference, Harris," came the curt order. "Answer me, Captain.
+'Yes' or 'No'!"
+
+The Southerner's face flushed and he threw back his head with the superb
+defiance that General Grant knew so well--which was his one eternal
+stumbling block, and due to continue for another full year of blood.
+
+"Under the rulings of court-martial law," the Confederate Captain said
+in ringing tones, "I deny even _your_ right to the question."
+
+To the surprise of everyone the General merely nodded.
+
+"That is all, sir. Thank you," he said, and Cary, with a look of
+surprise, slowly resumed his seat.
+
+"Mr. Morrison!"
+
+The Union officer rose and saluted.
+
+"As a military servant of the United States Government you were ordered
+to pursue this man and take him--dead or alive. In this you failed."
+
+Morrison inclined his head gravely but shot a look of respectful
+objection at his superior.
+
+"In part--I failed."
+
+Instantly the accusing forefinger was leveled at him across the desk and
+the point made with terrible directness.
+
+"_And knowing he was a spy!_"
+
+Morrison shook his head.
+
+"Not to my personal knowledge, sir. I hunted him many times; but never
+while he wore a Federal uniform."
+
+"And when you captured him?"
+
+In reply, Morrison simply indicated Cary's tattered coat of gray.
+
+"Ah! Then you _did_ capture him?"
+
+"Yes," came the quiet answer.
+
+"And he _was_ the escort mentioned in your pass."
+
+"Yes," Morrison answered slowly.
+
+"H'm," said the General. He rose and turned to Harris.
+
+"I am afraid, my dear Harris, that in spite of fine spun distinctions
+and your legal technicalities, the findings of our court were not far
+wrong."
+
+Dropping his handful of papers on the desk he caught Morrison's eye and
+rasped out his analysis of the case.
+
+"Captain Cary practically admits his guilt! _You_ were aware of it! And
+yet you send him through the very center of our lines! A _pass_! Carte
+blanche to learn the disposition of our forces--our weakness and our
+strength--and to make his report in Richmond. He was an enemy--with a
+price on his head! And you trusted him! _A spy!_"
+
+As the General had been speaking the first few words of his contemptuous
+summing up Morrison saw where they would lead and his manhood instantly
+leaped up in reply.
+
+"I trusted, not the spy, but _Herbert Cary_," he said with honest
+courage. Then, as the General turned his back on him with a contemptuous
+snap of his fingers--
+
+"General! I have offered no defense. If the justice of court-martial law
+prescribes a firing squad--I find no fault. I failed. I pay."
+
+With a gesture which indicated Gary the disgraced officer of the Army of
+the Potomac shot out his one and only defense of his action--at an
+unyielding back.
+
+"I took this man--hunted--wounded--fighting to reach the side of a
+hungry child. I captured him and, by the rules of war, I was about to
+have him shot. Then he asked me to get his little girl safely to
+Richmond, and not to let her know--about him."
+
+"And she believed in _me_. _Trusted_ me--even as I trusted Herbert Cary
+to pierce the very center of your lines--as a father--not a spy!"
+
+From behind the unyielding back came a statement of fact, firm and
+pitiless.
+
+"And it cost you your sword--your life."
+
+Morrison centered his eyes on the back of the General's head and sent
+his answer home with all the power of his voice and spirit.
+
+"_And I have no regret_" he said. "In the duty of a military servant--I
+have failed. But my prisoner still lives! I could _not_ accept the
+confidence of his child--the trust of innocence--a baby's kiss--with the
+blood of her father on my hands!" He dropped his hands and half turned
+away.
+
+The General turned, a little at a time--first his head and then his
+shoulders.
+
+"A very pretty sentiment," he remarked dryly. "But you seem to forget
+that we are not making love but _war_."
+
+With a supreme burst of anger at his helplessness before the brute
+forces which would presently send him forth to the firing squad,
+Morrison wheeled on his commanding general and flared forth with his
+last reply.
+
+"Yes, _war_! And the hellish laws that govern it. But there is another
+law--_Humanity_! Through a trooper in my command the home of an enemy
+was turned to ashes--his loved ones flung out to starve. When a helpless
+tot had lost its mother and a father would protect it, then _war_
+demands that I smash a baby's one last hope--in the name of the Stars
+and Stripes. And then--to march back home, to a happy, triumphant
+North--and meet _my_ baby--with the memory of a butcher in my heart--_By
+Heaven, sir! I'd rather hang!_"
+
+For a moment General and Colonel regarded each other fixedly and then
+the General turned away to pace the floor. Presently he came to his
+decision and walked slowly back to his desk.
+
+"Lieutenant Harris," he said in tones whose significance could not be
+misunderstood, "I was right. You have wasted your time--and mine."
+
+Then he sighed wearily and made a last gesture to Forbes.
+
+"_The guard_" he said.
+
+It was all over.
+
+And then, to the ears of the two prisoners who stood looking at one
+another with sad eyes, came a sound which made both men start and look
+again with apprehension written on their faces--the shrill scream of a
+child who is being kept from something she has set her heart upon.
+Another moment and there was a rush of tiny feet in the hall, whereupon
+the two sentries crossed their rifles across the doorway. But what
+might have proved a serious obstruction for a man was only an absurdity
+to a child's quick wit and Virgie, with a little duck of her sunny head,
+dodged quickly under the muskets and charged, flushed and panting, on
+the General's desk.
+
+"You shan't shoot Colonel Morrison," cried this astonishing new comer in
+tones of shrill command as she stamped her little foot: "I won't let
+you! You shan't! You shan't!"
+
+A moment of displeased surprise on the part of the General. Then--
+
+"Take the child out of here," he ordered.
+
+"I won't _go_!" answered Virgie, tossing her curls back and standing her
+ground with' angry eyes.
+
+"Orderly!" called the General.
+
+With a whirl Virgie dashed away from the desk, eluded the orderly and
+threw herself into her father's arms.
+
+"Oh, Daddy, Daddy! You won't let him shoot the Colonel. Daddy, you
+won't! You won't!" She burst into a passionate flood of tears.
+
+Cary lifted his hand to the General in a plea for a moment's respite
+from force.
+
+"General--please. She'll go."
+
+He turned to the sobbing child and shook her gently. "Virgie! Virgie!
+Listen, honey! _Remember General Lee!_" The bowed head rose from her
+father's shoulder; the little shoulders stiffened, and eye to eye she
+looked into the face of Cary as his pleading voice went on: "_He_
+wouldn't want you to cry like this. He said--'She's a brave little
+soldier to stay there all alone. Dixie and I are _proud_ of her.'"
+
+The Littlest Rebel's chin went up, and she bravely choked back her sobs.
+If this was what her General wanted, this her General would have, though
+childhood's sobs are hard to check when a little heart is aching for the
+pain of those she loves.
+
+"Go now, darling," her father pleaded. "Go."
+
+She kissed him, and turned in silent, slow obedience, casting a scowl at
+the grim and silent General Grant, then moved toward the guarded door.
+
+"Wait!" said a quiet voice.
+
+"Harris! They say that fools and children speak the truth." He paused
+and then said gently: "Come here, little girl. Come here and talk to
+me."
+
+Somewhat in fear now that the kind voice robbed her of her anger the
+little pale faced child choked down her sobs and came slowly forward to
+the desk. But, as she stood there, her courage returned and, marvel of
+marvels, her tiny hand went up in imitation of a salute.
+
+Grant dropped his chin in his hand so that their heads were nearly on a
+level across his desk and looked at her with gentle kindness in his
+eyes.
+
+"The Littlest Rebel, eh?" he said in low tones. "How old are you?"
+
+"S-s-s-even. Goin' on eight," responded Virgie, gulping down a sob and
+nervously fingering her tattered dress.
+
+"Ah, yes," he nodded. "And do you know the uniform of a Union
+officer--when you see it?"
+
+Virgie's small mouth dropped open at the absurdity of the question and
+she almost laughed.
+
+"A Yankee?" she queried with scorn. "Well, I reckon I _ought_ to--by
+_this_ time."
+
+"Very good," the brown bearded man nodded, and gently blew smoke at the
+ceiling. "Now, tell me. When you lived at home--and afterwards in your
+cabin--did your father come to see you often?"
+
+Virgie's sunny head nodded in emphatic asseveration. "Yes, sir. Often."
+
+"_How_ often?" asked the bearded man.
+
+Virgie's fingers twisted themselves deep in her dress.
+
+"I--I don't know, sir. But heaps of times."
+
+"Good again," and the questioner actually smiled. "When your father
+came, did he ever wear clothes that--that were not his own?"
+
+Virgie turned a side-long look on her father but, as he could not help,
+her puzzled eyes went back to the General.
+
+"Well--well, lots of our men don't have hardly _any_ clo's," she said
+pathetically.
+
+Another smile broke the sternness of the General's face.
+
+"That isn't what I mean," he explained gently. "Did he ever wear a coat
+of blue--a _Yankee_ uniform?"
+
+"_General_!" broke in Harris.
+
+"Lieutenant!" Grant frowned. He turned back to Virgie and coaxed her a
+little.
+
+"Well? Tell me!"
+
+With one bare big toe twisted under her foot and fingers interlocked in
+agony the child turned a look of pure anguish on her silent, grave faced
+father. This was torture--and she could not escape.
+
+"Oh, Daddy, Daddy!" she burst forth with a wail of tragedy in her voice.
+"_What must I tell him_?"
+
+The father's lips, which had been closed against the pain that racked
+him, softened with the perfect trust which went into his gentle command.
+
+"The _truth_, Virgie. Whatever the General asks."
+
+The General's observant eyes rested on the proud Southerner for an
+instant, noted that his face was quite without anxiety, then went back
+to the little child.
+
+"Well, did he?" he asked.
+
+"Y-y-y-es, sir," answered Virgie with a gulp.
+
+The General nodded and his face grew grave again.
+
+"I wonder if you even know what it means. A _spy_!"
+
+"Yes, sir," said the Littlest Rebel, and dropped her eyes.
+
+"Hm. And do you remember how many times he came that way?"
+
+"Yes, sir," came the instant answer, and she threw up her head.
+"_Once_."
+
+"_Once?_" echoed the General, surprised. "Are you sure?"
+
+"Yes, sir," she answered. She drew herself up proudly, forgetting the
+poor, tattered dress, and her clear eyes rested fearlessly on two others
+that read through them down into the pure whiteness of her soul.
+
+"_Think!_" said the quiet voice again, while the perspiration started
+out on the forehead of more than one listener. "And remember what your
+father said just now. When was it?"
+
+Again the fearless eyes of the child, the Littlest Rebel of them all,
+rose to the gaze of the man whose iron heel was crushing them into the
+ground and she made her answer--as crystal clear and truthful as if she
+stood before the Throne on the last great day.
+
+"When--when Daddy came through the woods an'--an' put my mamma in the
+ground."
+
+There was a silence. No one moved. Outside in the trees and bushes the
+song the summer insects were singing suddenly burst upon, their ears and
+the myriad noises of the camp, hitherto unnoticed, became a veritable
+clamor, so complete was the stillness in the room. Everyone except,
+perhaps, the child herself realized the vital importance of her answer
+and now that it had been given the crisis had passed. The Littlest Rebel
+had put an end to questioning. An audible sigh went up from everyone
+except the man behind the desk.
+
+This one turned his head slowly towards the Confederate prisoner.
+
+"Captain Cary, is this true?"
+
+"Yes, General," came the straightforward answer. "I went to your nearest
+post with a flag of truce and asked permission to go to my dead wife. I
+was refused. I went _without_ permission."
+
+General Grant rose to his feet. Centering the other's eyes with his own
+he spoke to him as one officer speaks to another when he expects the
+truth and nothing but the truth.
+
+"And you give me your word, as a soldier and a gentleman, that
+once--once _only_--you wore a Federal uniform and that because of the
+burial of your wife?"
+
+"I do," answered Herbert Cary, a rebel to the last. "And that was the
+only cause in heaven or hell that could have _induced_ me to wear it!"
+
+For a moment the Commander of the Army of the Potomac surveyed the still
+defiant prisoner, then turned his back and walked to the window where he
+tossed away a much chewed cigar, meantime thinking out his last
+analysis.
+
+Here was a man who had been hunted tirelessly month after month as a
+rebel spy. It was true that he was a spy and true that he had worn a
+uniform of blue. Yet the fact had been established--by the spotless
+honesty of a little child--that he had worn the uniform only so that he
+might reach his home and bury his dead. And--went on the cool, quiet
+mind--since the man was _not_ a spy how could a Union officer be
+executed for assisting a _spy_ to escape?
+
+Coming back to his desk again the General picked out another smoke, felt
+of it thoughtfully, sniffed at it, then raised his quiet eyes.
+
+"Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison," he said in clear, incisive tones, "_go
+back to your command!_"
+
+Five words. Five short, plain words, yet they made all the difference
+between a firing squad and a chance at life again. There was a
+silence--then a gasp from Morrison's dry throat. At the sound of his
+title--at the sound of that blessed order which, by right of supreme
+power, instantly restored him to his rank, the Union officer leaped to
+his feet with a cry of joy. But it was not even for those around him in
+that little room to know the wonderful vista of happiness which opened
+up again before the eyes which only a moment ago had been doomed to
+close in the sleep of a disgraceful death.
+
+The General's hand went up in a gesture which checked his gratitude.
+
+"The _next_ time you are forced to decide between military duty and
+humanity--think twice!"
+
+He turned to his desk and took up a small piece of paper, crumpled and
+torn.
+
+"Captain Cary," he said, "I sincerely regret that I cannot honor the
+pass as given you by Colonel Morrison," and he turned the paper over,
+"but I do honor the pass of your General--R.E. Lee."
+
+He folded the paper and held it out to Cary who came forward as if in a
+dream. Then the General turned his back again and began to rummage on
+his desk. The incident was closed.
+
+But there was a rush of bare, childish feet sand before he could escape
+Virgie's brown little arms were round him and her dimpled chin was
+pressed against his waist.
+
+The General made no effort to release himself but looked down on her
+with a softer light in his face than any of his men had seen there in
+many months.
+
+"And as for you, young lady, the next time you pervert my officers and
+upset the discipline of the Federal Army--well, I don't know _what_ I'll
+do with you."
+
+He looked down into her face and read there a wistful feminine appeal
+for outward and visible reconciliation.
+
+"Oh, well," he said with mock resignation, "I suppose I've got to do
+it," and he stooped and kissed her. Then he took up his campaign hat and
+walked towards the door.
+
+Behind him the child in her tattered dress and bare brown legs stood
+still and threw out her arms to him in a last soft-voiced good-by.
+
+"Thank you, Gen'ral," called the Littlest Rebel, with the light of
+heaven in her eyes. "Thank you for Daddy and Colonel Morrison and _me_.
+You're another mighty good damn Yankee!"
+
+And then, with a cry of surpassing joy and love, she rushed back to
+where the two men waited for her on their knees.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+In the shade of a fringe of trees that edged the river bank a troop of
+cavalry was drawn up in one long, thin line. Knee to knee, the silent,
+blue-coated riders sat, waiting, waiting--not for a charge upon the
+enemy, or orders for a foray through an already harried land. They
+waited for a leader--a man who had led them through the heat and cold,
+through peaceful valleys and the bloody ruck of battle; a man whom they
+loved and trusted, fearing him only when they shirked a duty or
+disobeyed the iron laws of war.
+
+This man had been taken from them, himself a servant who had disobeyed
+these laws, his sword dishonored, his shoulder straps ripped off before
+their eyes. And now the troopers waited--and for what? An order had come
+which put them on review, a long thin line of horsemen waiting on the
+river bank, while the sun beat down on the parched red fields, and the
+waters of the muddy James lazed by as they murmured their sad, low song.
+
+The troopers were silent--waiting. A horse stamped idly in the dust, and
+a saber rattled against a booted leg. A whisper ran down the line. The
+eyes of the men turned slowly at the sight of a single rider who
+advanced from the distant Union camp. He did not take the dusty road
+which swept in a wide, half-circle to where the waiting troopers sat in
+line, but jumped a low worm-fence and came straight across the fields.
+
+An officer he was, erect in his saddle, chin up and shoulders squared.
+On his shoulders his straps had been replaced, and his saber rattled
+against his thigh to the rise and fall of his horse's stride.
+
+Straight on he came till he checked his mount before the center of the
+waiting line, and the troopers knew that Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison had
+once more come into his own.
+
+Their sabers rasped from out the scabbards and rose in a joyous, swift
+salute, while Morrison's once dishonored sword acknowledged it.
+
+"_'Tention_ ..._company!_"
+
+The long line stiffened and waited for their officer to speak; yet the
+voice was not the voice of an officer in command, but that of a comrade
+and a friend.
+
+"Thank you, boys! It's good to be back again." He swallowed something in
+his throat and struggled manfully to speak in even tones. "I must ask
+you to be quiet--and not to--"
+
+He stopped. Again his troop had disobeyed him--disobeyed him to a man. A
+shout went up, deep, joyous and uncontrolled, its echoes pulsing out
+across the hot, red fields till it reached the distant camp; and Grant
+looked up from a war map's crisscross lines, grunted, and lit a fresh
+cigar.
+
+And Lieutenant-Colonel Morrison sat his horse before his cheering line
+of men, silent, happy, while two tears rolled, unheeded, down his
+cheek--a soldier and a man!
+
+His tenderness to a little child had torn him from his saddle and doomed
+him to disgrace and death; and then, one line from her baby lips had
+mounted him again and set him before his troopers on parade.
+
+"_It was when ... Daddy came through the woods ... and put my mamma ...
+in the ground_."
+
+Two lives she had held--in her little hands--and had saved them both
+with a dozen words of simple, unfaltering truth.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On the dusty pike which led to Virginia's capital another rider plodded
+through the heat and haze. His coat, once gray, now hung in mud-stained
+tatters about his form, but beneath his battered campaign hat his thin,
+pale features were smoothed by a smile of happiness.
+
+Behind his saddle, one hand gripped tightly in a rent in the soiled gray
+coat, sat still another Rebel--the smallest of them all--her tiny legs
+stretched out almost straight on the horse's wide, fat back.
+
+"Daddy--how far is it to Richmon' now?"
+
+The rider turned his head and pointed north.
+
+"It's close now, honey. See that line of hills? That's Richmond. A mile
+or two and we'll be at home."
+
+Again they plodded on, past fields of shriveled corn whose stalks stood
+silently in parched and wilted lines--lines that were like the ranks of
+the doomed Confederacy--its stalks erect, yet sapped of the juice of
+life. Where orchards once had flourished their rotted branches now hid
+mouths of rifle pits, and low, red clay entrenchments stretched across
+the fields.
+
+"Daddy," broke out a piping voice, "don't you think we'd better make
+this Yankee horse get up a little? 'Cause--'cause somethin' _else_ might
+happen before we get there."
+
+"It's all right, Virgie," her father answered, with a pat on her small,
+brown knee. "These lines are ours, and I reckon we are safe at last."
+
+They were. Two Rebels on a Yankee horse soon made their triumphant entry
+into Richmond. They passed through Rockets, by the half-deserted wharves
+on the river bank where a crippled gunboat lay, then clattered over the
+cobble stones up Main Street till they reached the Square. On the State
+House the Stars and Bars still floated; but the travelers did not
+pause. Northward they turned, then westward again, till they stopped at
+last before a silent, stately mansion, the headquarters of their
+General--General Lee.
+
+Before the open door two sentries stood, but as Cary and his charge
+dismounted an orderly came down the steps and out of the iron gate. A
+word or two from Cary and the orderly disappeared into the house,
+returning soon with word that the visitors would be received--at once.
+
+Up the stone steps went Virgie, holding tightly to her father's hand,
+for now, as she neared her General, her little heart was pounding, and
+her breath came eagerly and fast.
+
+On the threshold of a dim and shaded room they paused and looked. He sat
+there, at a table strewn with war maps and reports--a tall gray man in a
+coat of gray--the soldier and the gentleman.
+
+As father and child came in he rose to meet them, looking at the two
+with eyes that seemed to hold the sadness and the tenderness of all the
+world.
+
+He knew their story; in fact, he had bent his every effort to the
+saving of Cary's life. He had sent a courier to the camp of General
+Grant below the city, asking a stay of sentence till the facts in the
+case were cleared; and only a half hour before his courier had returned
+with news of the prisoner's release.
+
+And now, as he advanced and gave a courtly welcome to his trusted scout,
+the hand of the Littlest Rebel once more went up in salute to a superior
+officer.
+
+"Gen'ral," she said, as she stole a glance at her father's smiling face,
+"I've brought him back--with--with the pass you gave me, sir."
+
+And the General stooped--six feet of him--till his lips were on a level
+with Virgie's lips; then folded her closely into his great gray arms.
+
+
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+PEACE
+
+
+  Hushed is the rolling drum. The bugle's note
+    Breathes but an echo of its martial blast;
+  The proud old flags, in mourning silence, float
+    Above the heroes of a buried past.
+  Frail ivy vines 'round rusting cannon creep;
+    The tattered pennants droop against the wall;
+  The war-worn warriors are sunk in sleep,
+    Beyond a summons of the trumpet's call.
+
+  Do ye still dream, ye voiceless, slumbering ones,
+    Of glories gained through struggles fierce and long,
+  Lulled by the muffled boom of ghostly guns
+    That weave the music of a battle-song?
+  In fitful flight do misty visions reel,
+    While restless chargers toss their bridle-reins?
+  When down the lines gleam points of polished steel,
+    And phantom columns flood the sun-lit plains?
+
+  A breathless hush! A shout that mounts on high
+    Till every hoary hill from sleep awakes!
+  Swift as the unleashed lightning cleaves the sky,
+    The tumbling, tempest-rush of battle breaks!
+  The smoke-wreathed cannon launch their hell-winged shells!
+    The rattling crash of musketry's sharp sound
+  Sinks in the deafening din of hoarse, wild yells
+    And squadrons charging o'er the trampled ground!
+
+  Down, down they rush! The cursing riders reel
+    'Neath tearing shot and savage bayonet-thrust;
+  A plunging charger stamps with iron heel
+    His dying master in the battle's dust.
+  The shrill-tongued notes of victory awake!
+    The black guns thunder back the shout amain!
+  In crimson-crested waves the columns break,
+    Like shattered foam, across the shell-swept plain.
+
+  A still form lies upon the death-crowned hill,
+    With sightless eyes, gray lips that may not speak.
+  His dead hand holds his shot-torn banner still--
+    Its proud folds pressed against his bloodstained cheek.
+
+  O slumbering heroes, cease to dream of war!
+    Let hatreds die behind the tread of years.
+  Forget the past, like some long-vanished scar
+    Whose smart is healed in drops of falling tears.
+  Keep, keep your glory; but forget the strife!
+    Roll up your battle-flags so stained and torn!
+  Teach, teach our hearts, that still dream on in life,
+    To let the dead past sleep with those we mourn!
+
+  From pitying Heaven a pitying angel came.
+    Smiling, she bade the tongues of conflict cease.
+  Her wide wings fanned away the smoke and flame,
+    Hushed the red battle's roar. God called her Peace.
+  From land and sea she swept mad passion's glow;
+    Yet left a laurel for the hero's fame.
+  She whispered hope to hearts in grief bowed low,
+    And taught our lips, in love, to shape her name.
+
+  She sheathed the dripping sword; her soft hands pres't
+    Grim foes apart, who scowled in anger deep.
+  She laid two grand old standards down to rest,
+    And on her breast rocked weary War to sleep.
+  Peace spreads her pinions wide from South to North;
+    Dead enmity within the grave is laid.
+  The church towers ring their holy anthems forth,
+    To hush the thunders of the cannonade.
+
+  EDWARD PEPLE.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Littlest Rebel, by Edward Peple
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