A DAINTIER bouquet than usual was placed on Lane's table next morning, and the piece of chicken sent to his breakfast was broiled to the nicest turn of brown. The old colored cook was friendly to the "Linkum ossifer," and soon discovered that "Missy S'wanee" was not averse to a little extra painstaking.
After the surgeon had made his morning rounds the young girl visited the men also. She found them doing well, and left them doing better; for, in rallying the wounded, good cheer and hopefulness can scarcely be over-estimated.
As she was returning the surgeon met her, and said, "Captain Lane is already better for your first visit and impatient for another."
"Then he's both patient and impatient. A very contradictory and improper condition to remain in. I can read to him at once, after I have seen if mamma wishes anything."
"Please do; and with your permission I'll take a little walk, forI, too, am restless from inaction."
"I don't think it's nice for you to read alone with that officer," said Roberta.
"I see no impropriety at all," cried Suwanee. "Yours and mamma's rooms are but a few yards away, and you can listen to all we say if you wish. If your colonel was sick and wounded at the North wouldn't you like some woman to cheer him up?"
"No, not if she were as pretty as you are," replied Roberta, laughing.
"Nonsense," said Suwanee, flushing. "For all I know this captain is married and at the head of a large family.
"But I'm going to find out," she assured herself. "I shall investigate this new species of genus homo who imagines me to be a saint. He wasn't long in proving that Northern men were not what I supposed. Now I shall give him the harder task of proving me to be an angel;" and she walked demurely in, leaving the door open for any espionage that her mother and sister might deem proper.
Lane's face lighted up the moment he saw her, and he said: "You have robbed this day of its weariness already. I've had agreeable anticipations thus far, and I'm sure you will again leave pleasant memories."
"Then you are better?"
"Yes; thanks to you."
"You are given to compliments, as our Southern men are."
"I should be glad to equal them at anything in your estimation. But come, such honest enemies as we are should be as sincere as friends. I have meant every word I have said to you. You are harboring me, an entire stranger, who presented my credentials at first very rudely. Now you can ask me any questions you choose. You have proved yourself to be such a genuine lady that I should be glad to have you think that I am a gentleman by birth and breeding."
"Oh, I was convinced of that before you put your sabre in its scabbard on the evening of your most unwelcome arrival, when you spoiled our supper-party. You have since been confirming first impressions. I must admit, however, that I scarcely 'reverence' you yet, nor have I detected anything specially 'angelic.'"
"Your failure in these respects will be the least of my troubles.I do not take back what I have said, however."
"Wait; perhaps you will. You are very slightly acquainted with me, sir."
"You are much less so with me, and can't imagine what an obstinate fellow I am."
"Oh, if I have to contend with obstinacy rather than judgment—"
"Please let us have no contentions whatever. I have often found that your Southern men out-matched me, and not for the world would I have a dispute with a woman of your mettle. I give you my parole to do all that you wish, as far as it is within my power, while I am helpless on your hands."
"And when I have helped to make you well you will go and fight against the South again?"
"Yes, Miss Barkdale," gravely, "and so would your officers against the North."
"Oh, I know it. I sha'n't put any poison in your coffee."
"Nor will you ever put poison in any man's life. The most delightful thing about you, Miss Barkdale," he continued, laughing, "is that you are so genuinely good and don't know it."
"Whatever happens," she said, almost irritably, "you must be cured of that impression. I won't be considered 'good' when I'm not. Little you know about me, indeed! Good heavens, Captain Lane! what kind of women have you been accustomed to meet in the North? Would they put strychnine in a wounded Southerner's food, and give him heavy bread, more fatal than bullets, and read novels while dying men were at their very doors?"
"Heaven help them! I fear there are many women the world over who virtually do just those things."
"They are not in the South," she replied, hotly.
"They are evidently not in this house," he replied, smiling. "You ask what kind of women I am accustomed to meet. I will show you the shadow of one of my friends;" and he took from under his pillow a photograph of Marian.
"Oh, isn't she lovely!" exclaimed the girl.
"Yes, she is as beautiful as you are; she is as brave as you are, and I've seen you cheering on your friends when even in the excitement of the fight my heart was filled with dread lest you or your mother or sister might be shot. She is just as ardent for the North as you are for the South, and her influence has had much place in the motives of many who are now in the Union army. If wounded Confederates were about her door you could only equal—you could not surpass—her in womanly kindness and sympathy. The same would be true of my mother and sisters, and millions of others. I know what you think of us at the North, but you will have to revise your opinions some day."
Her face was flushed, a frown was upon her brow, a doubtful smile upon her lips, and her whole manner betokened her intense interest. "You evidently are seeking to revise them," she said, with a short laugh, "much as you charged our cavalry the other evening. I think you are a dangerous man to the South, Captain Lane, and I don't know whether I should let you get well or not."
He reached out his hand and took hers, as he said, laughingly: "I should trust you just the same, even though Jeff Davis and the whole Confederate Congress ordered you to make away with me."
"Don't you call our President 'Jeff,'" she snapped, but did not withdraw her hand.
"I beg your pardon. That was just as rude in me as if you had calledMr. Lincoln 'Abe.'"
She now burst out laughing. "Heaven knows we do it often enough," she said.
"I was aware of that."
"This won't do at all," she resumed. "Your hand is growing a little feverish, and if my visits do not make you better I shall not come. I think we have defined our differences sufficiently. You must not 'reverence' me any more. I couldn't stand that at all. I will concede at once that you are a gentleman, and that this lovely girl is my equal; and when our soldiers have whipped your armies, and we are free, I shall be magnanimous, and invite you to bring this girl here to visit us on your wedding trip. What is her name?"
"Marian Vosburgh. But I fear she will never take a wedding trip with me. If she did I would accept your invitation gratefully after we had convinced the South that one flag must protect us all."
"We won't talk any more about that. Why won't Miss Vosburgh take a wedding trip with you?"
"For the best of reasons,—she doesn't love me well enough."
"Stupid! Perhaps she loves some one else?"
"No, I don't think so. She is as true a friend as a woman can be to a man, but there it ends."
"With her."
"Certainly, with her only. She knows that I would do all that a man can to win her."
"You are frank."
"Why should I not be with one I trust so absolutely? You think us Northmen cold, underhanded. I do not intend virtually to take my life back from your hands, and at the same time to keep that life aloof from you as if you had nothing to do with it. If I survive the war, whichever way it turns, I shall always cherish your memory as one of my ideals, and shall feel honored indeed if I can retain your friendship. To make and keep such friends is to enrich one's life. Should I see Miss Vosburgh again I shall tell her about you, just as I have told you about her."
"You were born on the wrong side of the line, Captain Lane. You are a Southerner at heart."
"Oh, nonsense! Wait till you visit us at the North. You will find people to your mind on both sides of the line. When my mother and sisters have learned how you have treated me and my men they will welcome you with open arms."
She looked at him earnestly a moment, and then said: "You make me feel as if the North and South did not understand each other." Then she added, sadly: "The war is not over. Alas! how much may happen before it is. My gray-haired father and gallant brothers are marching with Lee, and while I pray for them night and morning, and often through the day, I fear—I FEAR inexpressibly,—all the more, now that I have seen Northern soldiers fight. God only knows what is in store for us all. Do not think that because I seem light-hearted I am not conscious of living on the eve of a tragedy all the time. Tears and laughter are near together in my nature. I can't help it; I was so made."
"Heaven keep you and yours in safety," said Lane, earnestly; and she saw that his eyes were moist with feeling.
"This won't answer," she again declared, hastily. "We must have no more such exciting talks. Shall I read to you a little while, or go at once?"
"Read to me, by all means, if I am not selfishly keeping you too long. Your talk has done me good rather than harm, for you are so vital yourself that you seem to give me a part of your life and strength. I believe I should have died under the old dull monotony."
"I usually read the Bible to your men," she said, half humorously, half questioningly.
"Read it to me. I like to think we have the same faith. That book is the pledge that all differences will pass away from the sincere."
He looked at her wonderingly as she read, in her sweet, girlish voice, the sacred words familiar since his childhood; and when she rose and said, "This must do for to-day," his face was eloquent with his gratitude. He again reached out his hand, and said, gently, "Miss Suwanee, Heaven keep you and yours from all harm."
"Don't talk to me that way," she said, brusquely. "After all, we are enemies, you know."
"If you can so bless your enemies, what must be the experience of your friends, one of whom I intend to be?"
"Roberta must read to you, in order to teach you that the South cannot be taken by storm."
"I should welcome Miss Roberta cordially. We also shall be good friends some day."
"We must get you well and pack you off North, or there's no telling what may happen," she said, with a little tragic gesture. "Good-by."
This was the beginning of many talks, though no other was of so personal a nature. They felt that they understood each other, that there was no concealment to create distrust. She artlessly and unconsciously revealed to him her life and its inspirations, and soon proved that her mind was as active as her hands. She discovered that Lane had mines of information at command, and she plied him with questions about the North, Europe, and such parts of the East as he had visited. Her father's library was well stored with standard works, and she made him describe the scenes suggested by her favorite poets. Life was acquiring for her a zest which it had never possessed before, and one day she said to him, abruptly, "How you have broadened my horizon!"
He also improved visibly in her vivacious society, and at last was able to come down to his meals and sit on the piazza. Mrs. Barkdale's and Roberta's reserve thawed before his genial courtesy, and all the more readily since a letter had been received from Colonel Barkdale containing thanks to Lane for the consideration that had been shown to his family, and assuring his wife that the Barkdale mansion must not fail in hospitality either to loyal friends or to worthy foes.
Roberta was won over more completely than she had believed to be possible. Her proud, high spirit was pleased with the fact that, while Lane abated not one jot of his well-defined loyalty to the North and its aims, he also treated her with respect and evident admiration in her fearless assertion of her views. She also recognized his admirable tact in preventing their talk from verging towards a too-earnest discussion of their differences. Suwanee was delighted as she saw him disarm her relatives, and was the life of their social hours. She never wearied in delicately chaffing and bewildering the good-natured but rather matter-of-fact Surgeon McAllister, and it often cost Lane much effort to keep from exploding in laughter as he saw the perplexed and worried expression of his friend. But before the meal was over she would always reassure her slow-witted guest by some unexpected burst of sunshine, and he afterwards would remark, in confidence: "I say, Lane, that little 'Missy S'wanee' out-generals a fellow every time. She attacks rear, flank, and front, all at once, and then she takes your sword in such a winsome way that you are rather glad to surrender."
"Take care, McAllister,—take care, or you may surrender more than your sword."
"I think you are in the greater danger."
"Oh, no, I'm forearmed, and Miss Suwanee and I understand each other."
But he did not understand her, nor did she comprehend herself. Her conversation seemed as open, and often as bright as her Southern sunshine, and his mind was cheered and delighted with it. He did not disguise his frank, cordial regard for her, even before her mother and sister, but it was ever blended with such a sincere respect that she was touched and surprised by it, and they were reassured. She had told them of the place possessed by Marian in his thoughts, and this fact, with his manner, promised immunity from all tendencies towards sentiment. Indeed, that Suwanee should bestow anything more upon the Northern officer than kindness, a certain chivalric hospitality, and some admiration, was among the impossibilities in their minds.
This, at the time, seemed equally true to the young girl herself. Not in the least was she on her guard. Her keen enjoyment of his society awakened no suspicions, for she enjoyed everything keenly. His persistence in treating her, in spite of all her nonsense and frolicsomeness, as if she were worthy of the deepest respect and honor which manhood can pay to womanhood, ever remained a bewildering truth, and touched the deepest chords in her nature. Sometimes when they sat in the light of the young moon on the veranda she revealed thoughts which surprised him, and herself even more. It appeared to her as if a new and deeper life were awakening in her heart, full of vague beauty and mystery. She almost believed that she was becoming good, as he imagined. Why otherwise should she be so strangely happy and spiritually exalted? He was developing in her a new self-respect. She now knew that he was familiar with standards of comparison at the North of which she need not be ashamed. Even her mother and sister had remarked, in effect, "It is evident that Captain Lane has been accustomed to the best society." His esteem was not the gaping admiration of a boor to whom she had been a revelation.
"No," she said, "he is a revelation to me. I thought my little prejudices were the boundaries of the world. He, who has seen the world, walks right over my prejudices as if they were nothing, and makes me feel that I am his friend and equal, because he fancies I possess a true, noble womanhood; and now I mean to possess it. He has made his ideal of me seem worthy and beautiful, and it shall be my life effort to attain it. He doesn't think me a barbarian because I am a rebel and believe in slavery. He has said that his mother and sisters would receive me with open arms. It seems to me that I have grown years older and wiser during the last few weeks."
She did not know that her vivid, tropical nature was responding to the influence which is mightiest even in colder climes.
THE month of June was drawing to a close. Captain Lane, his surgeon, and a little company of wounded men, equally with the Confederates, were only apparently forgotten. They were all watched, and their progress towards health was noted. Any attempt at escape would have been checked at once. The majority of the Federal soldiers could now walk about slowly, and were gaining rapidly. Although they were not aware of the fact, the Confederate wounded, who had progressed equally far in convalescence, were their guards, and the residents of the neighborhood were allies in watchfulness. The Southerners were only awaiting the time, near at hand, when they could proceed to Richmond with their prisoners. This purpose indicated no deep hostility on the part of the rebels. Companionship in suffering had banished this feeling. A sergeant among their number had become their natural leader, and he was in communication with guerilla officers and other more regular authorities. They had deemed it best to let events take their course for a time. Lee's northward advance absorbed general attention, although little as yet was known about it on that remote plantation. The Union men were being healed and fed at no cost to the Confederates, and could be taken away at the time when their removal could be accomplished with the least trouble.
Lane himself was the chief cause of delay. He was doing well, but his wound was of a peculiar nature, and any great exertion or exposure might yet cause fatal results. This fact had become known to the rebel sergeant, and since the captain was the principal prize, and they were all very comfortable, he had advised delay. It had been thought best not to inform the family as to the state of affairs, lest it should in some way become known to Lane and the surgeon, and lead to attempted escape. The Barkdales, moreover, were high-strung people, and might entertain some chivalric ideas about turning over their guests to captivity.
"They might have a ridiculous woman's notion about the matter," said one of these secret advisers.
Lane and McAllister, however, were becoming exceedingly solicitous concerning the future. The former did not base much hope on Suwanee's evident expectation that when he was well enough he would go to his friends as a matter of course. He knew that he and his men were in the enemy's hands, and that they would naturally be regarded as captives. He had a horror of going to a Southern prison and of enduring weeks and perhaps months of useless inactivity. He and McAllister began to hold whispered consultations. His mind revolted at the thought of leaving his men, and of departing stealthily from the family that had been so kind. And yet if they were all taken to Richmond he would be separated from the men, and could do nothing for them. Matter-of-fact McAllister had no doubts or scruples.
"Of course we should escape at once if your wound justified the attempt."
On the 29th of June Lane and the surgeon walked some little distance from the house, and became satisfied that they were under the surveillance of the rebel sergeant and his men. This fact so troubled Lane that Suwanee noticed his abstraction and asked him in the evening what was worrying him. The moonlight fell full on her lovely, sympathetic face.
"Miss Suwanee," he said, gravely, "I've been your guest about a month. Are you not tired of me yet?"
"That's a roundabout way of saying you are tired of us."
"I beg your pardon: it is not. But, in all sincerity, I should be getting back to duty, were it possible."
"Your wound is not sufficiently healed," she said, earnestly, wondering at the chill of fear that his words had caused. "The surgeon says it is not."
"Don't you know?" he whispered.
"Know what?" she almost gasped.
"That I'm a prisoner."
She sprung to her feet and was about to utter some passionate exclamation; but he said, hastily, "Oh, hush, or I'm lost. I believe that eyes are upon me all the time."
"Heigho!" she exclaimed, walking to the edge of the veranda, "I wish I knew what General Lee was doing. We are expecting to hear of another great battle every day;" and she swept the vicinity with a seemingly careless glance, detecting a dark outline behind some shrubbery not far away. Instantly she sprung down the steps and confronted the rebel sergeant.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, indignantly.
"My duty," was the stolid reply.
"Find duty elsewhere then," she said, haughtily.
The man slunk away, and she returned to Lane, who remarked, significantly, "Now you understand me."
It was evident that she was deeply excited, and immediately she began to speak in a voice that trembled with anger and other emotions. "This is terrible. I had not thought—indeed it cannot be. My father would not permit it. The laws of war would apply, I suppose, to your enlisted men, but that you and Surgeon McAllister, who have been our guests and have sat at our table, should be taken from our hospitality into captivity is monstrous. In permitting it, I seem to share in a mean, dishonorable thing."
"How characteristic your words and actions are!" said Lane, gently. "It would be easy to calculate your orbit. I fear you cannot help yourself. You forget, too, that I was the means of sending to prison even your Major Denham."
"Major Denham is nothing—" she began, impetuously, then hesitated, and he saw the rich color mantling her face even in the moonlight. After a second or two she added: "Our officers were captured in fair fight. That is very different from taking a wounded man and a guest."
"Not a guest in the ordinary sense of the word. You see I can be fair to your people, unspeakably as I dread captivity. It will not be so hard for McAllister, for surgeons are not treated like ordinary prisoners. His remaining, however, was a brave, unselfish act;" and Lane spoke in tones of deep regret.
"It must not be," she said, sternly.
"Miss Suwanee,"—and his voice was scarcely audible,—"do you think we can be overheard?"
"No," she replied, in like tones. "Roberta and mamma are incapable of listening."
"I was not thinking of them. I must speak quickly. I don't wish to involve you, but the surgeon and I must try to escape, for I would almost rather die than be taken prisoner. Deep as is my longing for liberty I could not leave you without a word, and my trust in the chivalric feeling that you have just evinced is so deep as to convince me that I can speak to you safely. I shall not tell you anything to compromise you. You have only to be blind and deaf if you see or hear anything."
Her tears were now falling fast, but she did not move, lest observant eyes should detect her emotion.
"Heaven bless your good, kind heart!" he continued, in a low, earnest tone. "Whether I live or die, I wish you to know that your memory will ever be sacred to me, like that of my mother and one other. Be assured that the life you have done so much to save is always at your command. Whenever I can serve you or yours you can count on all that I am or can do. Suwanee, I shall be a better man for having known you. You don't half appreciate yourself, and every succeeding day has only proved how true my first impressions were."
She did not answer, and he felt that it would be dangerous to prolong the interview. They entered the house together. As they went up the stairs she pressed her handkerchief to her eyes, he wondering at her silence and emotion. At the landing in the dusky hall-way he raised her hand to his lips.
There was not a trace of gallantry in the act, and she knew it. It was only the crowning token of that recognition at which she had wondered from the first. She realized that it was only the homage of a knightly man and the final expression of his gratitude; but it overwhelmed her, and she longed to escape with the terrible revelation which had come to her at last. She could not repress a low sob, and, giving his hand a quick, strong pressure, she fled to her room.
"Can it be possible?" he thought. "Oh! if I have wounded that heart, however unintentionally, I shall never forgive myself."
"Lane," whispered McAllister, when the former entered his room, "there are guards about the house."
"I'm not surprised," was the despondent reply. "We are prisoners."
"Does the family know it?"
He told him how Suwanee had detected the espionage of the rebel sergeant.
"Wouldn't she help us?"
"I shall not ask her to. I shall not compromise her with her people."
"No, by thunder! I'd rather spend my life in prison than harm her.What shall we do?"
"We must put our light out soon, and take turns in watching for the slightest opportunity. You lie down first. I do not feel sleepy."
After making some slight preparations the doctor slept, and it was well on towards morning before Lane's crowding thoughts permitted him to seek repose. He then wakened McAllister and said, "There has been a stealthy relief of guards thus far, and I've seen no chance whatever."
The doctor was equally satisfied that any attempt to escape would be fruitless.
Suwanee's vigil that night was bitter and terrible, indeed. Her proud, passionate nature writhed under the truth that she had given her heart, unsought, to a Northern officer,—to one who had from the first made it clear that his love had been bestowed on another. She felt that she could not blame him. His frankness had been almost equal to that of her own brothers, and he had satisfied her that they could scarcely be more loyal to her than he would be. She could detect no flaw in his bearing towards her. He had not disguised his admiration, his abundant enjoyment of her society, but all expression of his regard had been tinged with respect and gratitude rather than gallantry. He perhaps had thought that her knowledge of his attitude towards Miss Vosburgh was an ample safeguard, if any were needed. Alas! it had been the chief cause of her fatal blindness. She had not dreamed of danger for him or herself in their companionship. Nothing was clearer than that he expected and wished no such result. It was well for Lane that this was true, for she would have been a dangerous girl to trifle with.
But she recognized the truth. Before, love had been to her a thing of poetry, romance, and dreams. Now it was a terrible reality. Her heart craved with intense longing what she felt it could never possess.
At last, wearied and exhausted by her deep emotion, she sighed: "Perhaps it is better as it is. Even if he had been a lover, the bloody chasm of war would have separated us, but it seems cruel that God should permit such an overwhelming misfortune to come upon an unsuspecting, inexperienced girl. Why was I so made that I could, unconsciously, give my very soul to this stranger? yet he is not a stranger. Events have made me better acquainted with him than with any other man. I know that he has kept no secrets from me. There was nothing to conceal. All has been simple, straightforward, and honorable. It is to the man himself, in his crystal integrity, that my heart has bowed, and then—that was his chief power—he made me feel that I was not unworthy. He taught me to respect my own nature, and to aspire to all that was good and true.
"After all, perhaps I am condemning myself too harshly,—perhaps the truth that my heart acknowledged such a man as master is proof that his estimate of me is not wholly wrong. Were there not some kinship of spirit between us, this could not be; but the secret must remain between me and God."
Lane, tormented by the fear suggested by Suwanee's manner on the previous evening, dreaded to meet her again, but at first he was reassured. Never had she been more brilliant and frolicsome than at the breakfast-table that morning. Never had poor McAllister been more at his wits' end to know how to reply to her bewildering sallies of good-natured badinage. Every vulnerable point of Northern character received her delicate satire. Lane himself did not escape her light shafts. He made no defence, but smiled or laughed at every palpable hit. The girl's pallor troubled him, and something in her eyes that suggested suffering. There came a time when he could scarcely think of that day without tears, believing that no soldier on either side ever displayed more heroism than did the wounded girl.
He and the surgeon walked out again, and saw that they were watched. He found that his men had become aware of the truth and had submitted to the inevitable. They were far from the Union lines, and not strong enough to attempt an escape through a hostile country. Lane virtually gave up, and began to feel that the best course would be to submit quietly and look forward to a speedy exchange. He longed for a few more hours with Suwanee, but imagined that she avoided him. There was no abatement of her cordiality, but she appeared preoccupied.
After dinner a Confederate officer called and asked for Miss Roberta, who, after the interview, returned to her mother's room with a troubled expression. Suwanee was there, calmly plying her needle. She knew what the call meant.
"I suppose it's all right, and that we can't help ourselves," Roberta began, "but it annoys me nevertheless. Lieutenant Macklin, who has just left, has said that our own men and the Union soldiers are now well enough to be taken to Richmond, and that he will start with them to-morrow morning. Of course I have no regrets respecting the enlisted men, and am glad they are going, for they are proving a heavy burden to us; but my feelings revolt at the thought that Captain Lane and the surgeon should be taken to prison from our home."
"I don't wonder," said Suwanee, indignantly; "but then what's the use? we can't help ourselves. I suppose it is the law of war."
"Well, I'm glad you are so sensible about it. I feared you would feel a hundred-fold worse than I, you and the captain have become such good friends. Indeed, I have even imagined that he was in danger of becoming something more. I caught him looking at you at dinner as if you were a saint 'whom infidels might adore.' His homage to our flirtatious little Suwanee has been a rich joke from the first. I suppose, however, there may have been a vein of calculation in it all, for I don't think any Yankee—"
"Hush," said Suwanee, hotly; "Captain Lane is still our guest, and he is above calculation. I shall not permit him to be insulted because he has over-estimated me."
"Why, Suwanee, I did not mean to insult him. You have transfixed him with a dozen shafts of satire to-day, and as for poor Surgeon McAllister—"
"That was to their faces," interrupted Suwanee, hastily.
"Suwanee is right," said Mrs. Barkdale, smiling. "Captain Lane has had the sense to see that my little girl is good-hearted in spite of her nonsense."
The girl's lip was quivering but she concealed the fact by savagely biting off her thread, and then was impassive again.
"I sincerely regret with you both," resumed their mother, "that these two gentlemen must go from our home to prison, especially so since receiving a letter from Captain Lane, couched in terms of the strongest respect and courtesy, and enclosing a hundred dollars in Northern money as a slight compensation—so he phrased it—for what had been done for his men. Of course he meant to include himself and the surgeon, but had too much delicacy to mention the fact. He also stated that he would have sent more, but that it was nearly all they had."
"You did not keep the money!" exclaimed the two girls in the same breath.
"I do not intend to keep it," said the lady, quietly, "and shall hand it back to him with suitable acknowledgments. I only mention the fact to convince Roberta that Captain Lane is not the typical Yankee, and we have much reason to be thankful that men of a different stamp were not quartered upon us. And yet," continued the matron, with a deep sigh, "you little know how sorely we need the money. Your father's and brothers' pay is losing its purchasing power. The people about here all profess to be very hot for the South, but when you come to buy anything from them what they call 'Linkum money' goes ten times as far. We have never known anything but profusion, but now we are on the verge of poverty."
"Oh, well," said Suwanee, recklessly, "starving isn't the worst thing that could happen."
"Alas! my child, you can't realize what poverty means. Your heart is as free from care as the birds around us, and, like them, you think you will be provided for."
The girl sprung up with a ringing laugh, and kissed her mother as she exclaimed, "I'll cut off my hair, put on one of brother Bob's old suits, and enlist;" and then she left the room.
At supper there was a constraint on all except Suwanee. Mrs. Barkdale and Roberta felt themselves to be in an embarrassing position. The men at the table, who had been guests so long, would be marched away as prisoners from their door in the morning. The usages of war could not satisfy their womanly and chivalric natures, or make them forget the courtesy and respect which, in spite of prejudices, had won so much good-will. Lane scarcely sought to disguise his perplexity and distress. Honest Surgeon McAllister, who knew that they all had been an awful burden, was as troubled as some men are pleased when they get much for nothing. Suwanee appeared in a somewhat new role. She was the personification of dignity and courtesy. She acted as if she knew all and was aware that their guests did. Therefore levity would be in bad taste, and their only resource was the good breeding which ignores the disagreeable and the inevitable. Her mother looked on her with pride, and wondered at so fine an exibition of tact. She did not know that the poor girl had a new teacher, and that she was like an inexorable general who, in a desperate fight, summons all his reserve and puts forth every effort of mind and body.
Lane had not found a chance to say one word to Suwanee in private during the day, but after supper she went to the piano and began to play some Southern airs with variations of her own improvising. He immediately joined her and said, "We shall not attempt to escape; we are too closely watched."
She did not reply.
"Miss Suwanee," he began again, and distress and sorrow were in his tones, "I hardly know how to speak to you of what troubles me more than the thought of captivity. How can I manage with such proud, chivalric women as you and your mother and sister? But I am not blind, nor can I ignore the prosaic conditions of our lot. I respect your pride; but have a little mercy on mine,—nay, let me call it bare self-respect. We have caused you the loss of your laborers, your fields are bare, and you have emptied your larder in feeding my men, yet your mother will not take even partial compensation. You can't realize how troubled I am."
"You, like ourselves, must submit to the fortunes of war," she replied, with a sudden gleam of her old mirthfulness.
"A bodily wound would be a trifle compared with this," he resumed, earnestly. "O Miss Suwanee, have I won no rights as a friend? rather, let me ask, will you not generously give me some rights?"
"Yes, Captain Lane," she said, gently, "I regard you as a friend, and I honor you as a true man. Though the war should go on forever I should not change in these respects unless you keep harping on this financial question."
"Friends frankly accept gifts from friends; let it be a giftthen, by the aid of which you can keep your mother from privation.Suwanee, Suwanee, why do you refuse to take this dross from me whenI would give my heart's blood to shield you from harm?"
"You are talking wildly, Captain Lane," she said, with a laugh."Your heart belongs to Miss Vosburgh, and therefore all its blood."
"She would be the first to demand and expect that I should risk all and give all for one to whom I owe so much and who is so deserving."
"I require of her no such sacrifice," Suwanee replied, coldly, "nor of you either, Captain Lane. Unforeseen circumstances have thrown us together for a time. We have exchanged all that is possible between those so divided,—esteem and friendship. If my father thinks it best he will obtain compensation from our government. Perhaps, in happier times, we may meet again," she added, her tone and manner becoming gentle once more; "and then I hope you will find me a little more like what you have thought me to be."
"God grant that we may meet again. There, I can't trust myself to speak to you any more. Your unaffected blending of humility and pride with rare, unconscious nobility touches my very soul. Our leave-taking in the morning must be formal. Good-by, Suwanee Barkdale. As sure as there is a God of justice your life will be filled full with happiness."
Instead of taking his proffered hand, she trembled, turned to the piano, and said hastily between the notes she played: "Control yourself and listen. We may be observed. You and the surgeon be ready to open your door and follow me at any time to-night. Hang your sword where it may be seen through the open window. I have contrived a chance—a bare chance—of your escape. Bow and retire."
He did so. She bent her head in a courtly manner towards him, and then went on with her playing of Southern airs.
A moment later the rebel sergeant disappeared from some shrubbery a little beyond the parlor window, and chuckled, "The Yankee captain has found out that he can't make either an ally or a sweetheart out of a Southern girl; but I suspicioned her a little last night."
At two o'clock that night there was an almost imperceptible tap at Lane's door. He opened it noiselessly, and saw Suwanee with her finger on her lips.
"Carry your shoes in your hands," she said, and then led the way down the stairs to the parlor window. Again she whispered: "The guard here is bribed,—bribed by kindness. He says I saved his life when he was wounded. Steal through the shrubbery to the creek-road; continue down that, and you'll find a guide. Not a word. Good-by."
She gave her hand to the surgeon, whose honest eyes were moist with feeling, and then he dropped lightly to the ground.
"Suwanee," began Lane.
"Hush! Go."
Again he raised her hand to his lips, again heard that same low, involuntary sob that had smote his heart the preceding night; and then followed the surgeon. The guard stood out in the garden with his back towards them, as, like shadows, they glided away.
On the creek-road the old colored man who worked in the garden joined them, and led the way rapidly to the creek, where under some bushes a skiff with oars was moored. Lane slipped twenty dollars into the old man's hand, and then he and his companion pushed out into the sluggish current, and the surgeon took the oars and pulled quietly through the shadows of the overhanging foliage. The continued quiet proved that their escape had not been discovered. Food had been placed in the boat. The stream led towards the Potomac. With the dawn they concealed themselves, and slept during the day, travelling all the following night. The next day they were so fortunate as to fall in with a Union scouting party, and so eventually reached Washington; but the effort in riding produced serious symptoms in Lane's wound, and he was again doomed to quiet weeks of convalescence, as has already been intimated to the reader.
When Mrs. Barkdale and Roberta came down the next morning they found Suwanee in the breakfast room, fuming with apparent irritability.
"Here is that Lieutenant Macklin again," she said, "and he is very impatient, saying that his orders are imperative, and that he is needed on some special duty. His orders are to convey the prisoners to the nearest railroad station, and then report for some active service. From all I can gather it is feared that the Yankees propose an attack on Richmond, now that General Lee is away."
"It's strange that Captain Lane and the surgeon don't come down," Roberta remarked. "I truly wish, however, that we had not to meet them again."
"Well, since it must be, the sooner the ordeal is over the better," said Suwanee, with increasing irritation. "Captain Lane has sense enough to know that we are not responsible for his being taken away."
"Hildy," said Mrs. Barkdale, "go up and tell the gentlemen that breakfast is ready."
In a few moments the old woman returned in a fluster and said, "I knock on de doah, and dey ain't no answer."
"What!" exclaimed Suwanee, in the accents of surprise; then, sharply, "go and knock louder, and wake them up," adding, "it's very strange."
Hildy came back with a scared look, and said, "I knock and knock; den I open de doah, and der' ain't no one dere."
"They must be out in the grounds for a walk," exclaimed Roberta."Haven't you seen them this morning?"
"I ain't seen nuffin' nor heard nuffin'," protested the old woman.
"Girls, this is serious," said Mrs. Barkdale, rising; and she summoned Lieutenant Macklin, who belonged to a class not received socially by the family.
"We have but this moment discovered," said the lady, "that Captain Lane and Surgeon McAllister are not in their room. Therefore we suppose they are walking in the grounds. Will you please inform them that breakfast is waiting?"
"Pardon me, madam, they cannot be outside, or I should have been informed."
"Then you must search for them, sir. The house, grounds, and buildings are open to you."
The fact of the prisoners' escape soon became evident, and there were haste, confusion, and running to and fro to no purpose. Suwanee imitated Roberta so closely that she was not suspected. Lieutenant Macklin and the rebel sergeant at last returned, giving evidence of strong vexation.
"We don't understand this," began the lieutenant.
"Neither do we," interrupted Mrs. Barkdale, so haughtily that they were abashed, although they directed keen glances towards Suwanee, who met their scrutiny unflinchingly.
The Barkdales were not people to be offended with impunity, and the lieutenant knew it. He added, apologetically: "You know I must do my duty, madam. I fear some of your servants are implicated, or that guards have been tampered with."
"You are at liberty to examine any one you please."
They might as well have examined a carved, wrinkled effigy as old Cuffy, Lane's midnight guide. "I don' know nuffin' 'tall 'bout it," he declared. "My ole woman kin tell yo' dat I went to bed when she did and got up when she did."
The guard, bought with kindness, was as dense in his ignorance as any of the others. At last Macklin declared that he would have to put citizens on the hunt, for his orders admitted of no delay.
The Union prisoners, together with the Confederates, when formed in line, gave a ringing cheer for "Missy S'wanee and the ladies," and then the old mansion was left in more than its former isolation, and, as the younger girl felt, desolation.
She attended to her duties as usual, and then went to her piano. The words spoken the previous evening would ever make the place dear to her. While she was there old Hildy crept in, with her feeble step, and whispered, "I foun' dis un'er Cap'n Lane's piller."
It was but a scrap of paper, unaddressed; but Suwanee understood its significance. It contained these words: "I can never repay you, but to discover some coin which a nature like yours can accept has become one of my supreme ambitions. If I live, we shall meet again."
Those words formed a glimmering hope which grew fainter and fainter in the dark years which followed.
She did not have to mask her trouble very long, for another sorrow came like an avalanche. Close to the Union lines, on Cemetery Ridge, lay a white-haired colonel and his two tall sons. They were among the heroes in Pickett's final charge, on the 3d of July. "Missy S'wanee" laughed no more, even in self-defence.