After this Virginia went to the Judge's bedside every day, in the morning, when Clarence took his sleep. She read his newspapers to him when he was well enough. She read the detested Missouri Democrat, which I think was the greatest trial Virginia ever had to put up with. To have her beloved South abused, to have her heroes ridiculed, was more than she could bear. Once, when the Judge was perceptibly better, she flung the paper out of the window, and left the room. He called her back penitently.
"My dear," he said, smiling admiration, "forgive an old bear. A selfish old bear, Jinny; my only excuse is my love for the Union. When you are not here, I lie in agony, lest she has suffered some mortal blow unknown to me, Jinny. And if God sees fit to spare our great country, the day will come when you will go down on your knees and thank Him for the inheritance which He saved for your children. You are a good woman, my dear, and a strong one. I have hoped that you will see the right. That you will marry a great citizen, one unwavering in his service and devotion to our Republic." The Judge's voice trembled with earnestness as he spoke. And the gray eyes under the shaggy brows were alight with the sacred fire of his life's purpose. Undaunted as her spirit was, she could not answer him then.
Once, only once, he said to her: "Virginia, I loved your father better than any man I ever knew. Please God I may see him again before I die."
He never spoke of the piano. But sometimes at twilight his eyes would rest on the black cloth that hid it.
Virginia herself never touched that cloth to her it seemed the shroud upon a life of happiness that was dead and gone.
Virginia had not been with Judge Whipple during the critical week afterStephen was brought home. But Anne had told her that his anxiety was apitiful thing to see, and that it had left him perceptibly weaker.Certain it was that he was failing fast. So fast that on some daysVirginia, watching him, would send Ned or Shadrach in hot haste for Dr.Polk.
At noon Anne would relieve Virginia,—Anne or her mother,—and frequently Mr. Brinsmade would come likewise. For it is those who have the most to do who find the most time for charitable deeds. As the hour for their coming drew near, the Judge would be seeking the clock, and scarce did Anne's figure appear in the doorway before the question had arisen to his lips—"And how is my young Captain to-day?"
That is what he called him,—"My young Captain." Virginia's choice of her cousin, and her devotion to him, while seemingly natural enough, had drawn many a sigh from Anne. She thought it strange that Virginia herself had never once asked her about Stephen's condition and she spoke of this one day to the Judge with as much warmth as she was capable of.
"Jinny's heart is like steel where a Yankee is concerned. If her best friend were a Yankee—"
Judge Whipple checked her, smiling.
"She has been very good to one Yankee I know of," he said. "And as forMrs. Brice, I believe she worships her."
"But when I said that Stephen was much better to-day, she swept out of the room as if she did not care whether he lived or died."
"Well, Anne," the Judge had answered, "you women are a puzzle to me. I guess you don't understand yourselves," he added.
That was a strange month in the life of Clarence Colfax,—the last of his recovery, while he was waiting for the news of his exchange. Bellegarde was never more beautiful, for Mrs. Colfax had no whim of letting the place run down because a great war was in progress. Though devoted to the South, she did not consecrate her fortune to it. Clarence gave as much as he could.
Whole afternoons Virginia and he would sit in the shaded arbor seat; or at the cool of the day descend to the bench on the lower tier of the summer garden, to steep, as it were, in the blended perfumes of the roses and the mignonettes and the pinks. He was soberer than of old. Often through the night he pondered on the change in her. She, too, was grave. But he was troubled to analyze her gravity, her dignity. Was this merely strength of character, the natural result of the trials through which she had passed, the habit acquired of being the Helper and comforter instead of the helped and comforted? Long years afterward the brightly colored portrait of her remained in his eye,—the simple linen gown of pink or white, the brown hair shining in the sunlight, the graceful poise of the head. And the background of flowers—flowers everywhere, far from the field of war.
Sometimes, when she brought his breakfast on a tray in the morning, there was laughter in her eyes. In the days gone by they had been all laughter.
They were engaged. She was to be his wife. He said it over to himself many, many times in the day. He would sit for a space, feasting his eyes upon her until she lifted her look to his, and the rich color flooded her face. He was not a lover to sit quietly by, was Clarence. And yet, as the winged days flew on, that is what he did, It was not that she did not respond to his advances, he did not make them. Nor could he have told why. Was it the chivalry inherited from a long life of Colfaxes who were gentlemen? Not wholly. Something of awe had crept into his feeling for her.
As the month wore on, and the time drew near for him to go back to the war, a state that was not quite estrangement, and yet something very like it, set in. Poor Clarence. Doubts bothered him, and he dared not give them voice. By night he would plan his speeches,—impassioned, imploring. To see her in her marvellous severity was to strike him dumb. Horrible thought! Whether she loved him, whether she did not love him, she would not give him up. Through the long years of their lives together, he would never know. He was not a weak man now, was Clarence Colfax. He was merely a man possessed of a devil, enchained by the power of self-repression come upon her whom he loved.
And day by day that power seemed to grow more intense,—invulnerable. Among her friends and in the little household it had raised Virginia to heights which she herself did not seem to realize. She was become the mistress of Bellegarde. Mrs. Colfax was under its sway, and doubly miserable because Clarence would listen to her tirades no more.
"When are you to be married?" she had ventured to ask him once. Nor had she taken pains to hide the sarcasm in her voice.
His answer, bringing with it her remembrance of her husband at certain times when it was not safe to question him, had silenced her. Addison Colfax had not been a quiet man. When he was quiet he was dangerous.
"Whenever Virginia is ready, mother," he had replied. Whenever Virginia was ready! He knew in his heart that if he were to ask her permission to send for Dr, Posthelwaite to-morrow that she would say yes. Tomorrow came,—and with it a great envelope, an official, answer to Clarence's report that he was fit for duty once more. He had been exchanged. He was to proceed to Cairo, there to await the arrival of the transport Indianapolis, which was to carry five hundred officers and men from Sandusky Prison, who were going back to fight once more for the Confederacy. O that they might have seen the North, all those brave men who made that sacrifice. That they might have realized the numbers and the resources and the wealth arrayed against them!
It was a cool day for September, a perfect day, an auspicious day, and yet it went the way of the others before it. This was the very fulness of the year, the earth giving out the sweetness of her maturity, the corn in martial ranks, with golden plumes nodding. The forest still in its glory of green. They walked in silence the familiar paths, and Alfred, clipping the late roses for the supper table, shook his white head as they passed him. The sun, who had begun to hurry on his southward journey, went to bed at six. The few clothes Clarence was to take with him had been packed by Virginia in his bag, and the two were standing in the twilight on the steps of the house, when Ned came around the corner. He called his young mistress by name, but she did not hear him. He called again.
"Miss Jinny!"
She started as from a sleep, and paused.
"Yes, Mr. Johnson," said she, and smiled. He wore that air of mystery so dear to darkeys.
"Gemmen to see you, Miss Jinny."
"A gentleman!" she said in surprise. "Where?"
The negro pointed to the lilac shrubbery.
"Thar!"
"What's all this nonsense, Ned?" said Clarence, sharply: "If a man is there, bring him here at once."
"Reckon he won't come, Marse Clarence." said Ned, "He fearful skeered ob de light ob day. He got suthin very pertickler fo' Miss Jinny."
"Do you know him?" Clarence demanded.
"No sah—yessah—leastwise I'be seed 'um. Name's Robimson."
The word was hardly out of his mouth before Virginia had leaped down the four feet from the porch to the flower-bed and was running across the lawn toward the shrubbery. Parting the bushes after her, Clarence found his cousin confronting a large man, whom he recognized as the carrier who brought messages from the South.
"What's the matter, Jinny?" he demanded.
"Pa has got through the lines," she said breathlessly. "He—he came up to see me. Where is he, Robinson?"
"He went to Judge Whipple's rooms, ma'am. They say the Judge is dying. I reckoned you knew it, Miss Jinny," Robinson added contritely.
"Clarence," she said, "I must go at once."
"I will go with you," he said; "you cannot go alone." In a twinkling Ned and Sambo had the swift pair of horses harnessed, and the light carriage was flying over the soft clay road toward the city. As they passed Mr. Brinsmade's place, the moon hung like a great round lantern under the spreading trees about the house. Clarence caught a glimpse of his cousin's face in the light. She was leaning forward, her gaze fixed intently on the stone posts which stood like monuments between the bushes at the entrance. Then she drew back again into the dark corner of the barouche. She was startled by a sharp challenge, and the carriage stopped. Looking out, she saw the provost's guard like black card figures on the road, and Ned fumbling for his pass.
On they drove into the city streets until the dark bulk of the Court House loomed in front of them, and Ned drew rein at the little stairway which led to the Judge's rooms. Virginia, leaping out of the carriage, flew up the steps and into the outer office, and landed in the Colonel's arms.
"Jinny!"
"Oh, Pa!" she cried. "Why do you risk your life in this way? If theYankees catch you—"
"They won't catch me, honey," he answered, kissing her. Then he held her out at arm's length and gazed earnestly into her face. Trembling, she searched his own. "Pa, how old you look!"
"I'm not precisely young, my dear," he said, smiling. His hair was nearly white, and his face scared. But he was a fine erect figure of a man, despite the shabby clothes he wore, and the mud-bespattered boots.
"Pa," she whispered, "it was foolhardy to come here. Why did you come toSt. Louis at all?"
"I came to see you, Jinny, I reckon. And when I got home to-night and heard Silas was dying, I just couldn't resist. He's the oldest friend I've got in St. Louis, honey and now—now—"
"Pa, you've been in battle?"
"Yes," he said.
"And you weren't hurt; I thank God for that," she whispered. After a while: "Is Uncle Silas dying?"
"Yes, Jinny; Dr. Polk is in there now, and says that he can't last through the night. Silas has been asking for you, honey, over and over. He says you were very good to him,—that you and Mrs. Brice gave up everything to nurse him."
"She did," Virginia faltered. "She was here night and day until her son came home. She is a noble woman—"
"Her son?" repeated the Colonel. "Stephen Brice? Silas has done nothing the last half-hour but call his name. He says he must see the boy before he dies. Polk says he is not strong enough to come."
"Oh, no, he is not strong enough," cried Virginia. The Colonel looked down at her queerly. "Where is Clarence?" he asked.
She had not thought of Clarence. She turned hurriedly, glanced around the room, and then peered down the dark stairway.
"Why, he came in with me. I wonder why he did not follow me up?"
"Virginia."
"Yes, Pa."
"Virginia, are you happy?"
"Why, yes, Pa."
"Are you going to marry Clarence?" he asked.
"I have promised," she said simply.
Then after a long pause, seeing her father said nothing, she added, "Perhaps he was waiting for you to see me alone. I will go down to see if he is in the carriage."
The Colonel started with her, but she pulled him back in alarm.
"You will be seen, Pa," she cried. "How can you be so reckless?"
He stayed at the top of the passage, holding open the door that she might have light. When she reached the sidewalk, there was Ned standing beside the horses, and the carriage empty.
"Ned!"
"Yass'm, Miss Jinny."
"Where's Mr. Clarence?"
"He done gone, Miss Tinny."
"Gone?"
"Yass'm. Fust I seed was a man plump out'n Willums's, Miss Jinny. He was a-gwine shufflin' up de street when Marse Clarence put out after him, pos' has'e. Den he run."
She stood for a moment on the pavement in thought, and paused on the stairs again, wondering whether it were best to tell her father. Perhaps Clarence had seen—she caught her breath at the thought and pushed open the door.
"Oh, Pa, do you think you are safe here?" she cried. "Why, yes, honey, I reckon so," he answered. "Where's Clarence?"
"Ned says he ran after a man who was hiding in an entrance. Pa, I am afraid they are watching the place."
"I don't think so, Jinny. I came here with Polk, in his buggy, after dark."
Virginia, listening, heard footsteps on the stairs, and seized her father's sleeve.
"Think of the risk you are running, Pa," she whispered. She would have dragged him to the closet. But it was too late. The door opened, and Mr. Brinsmade entered, and with him a lady veiled.
At sight of Mr. Carvel Mr. Brinsmade started back in surprise. How long he stared at his old friend Virginia could not say. It seemed to her an eternity. But Mrs. Brice has often told since how straight the Colonel stood, his fine head thrown back, as he returned the glance. Then Mr. Brinsmade came forward, with his hand outstretched.
"Comyn," said he, his voice breaking a little, "I have known you these many years as a man of unstained honor. You are safe with me. I ask no questions. God will judge whether I have done my duty."
Mr. Carvel took his friend's hand. "Thank you, Calvin," he said. "I give you my word of honor as a gentleman that I came into this city for no other reason than to see my daughter. And hearing that my old friend was dying, I could not resist the temptation, sir—"
Mr. Brinsmade finished for him. And his voice shook.
"To come to his bedside. How many men do you think would risk their lives so, Mrs. Brice?"
"Not many, indeed, Mr. Brinsmade," she answered. "Thank God he will now die happy. I know it has been much on his mind."
The Colonel bowed over her hand.
"And in his name, madam,—in the name of my oldest and best friend,—I thank you for what you have done for him. I trust that you will allow me to add that I have learned from my daughter to respect and admire you. I hope that your son is doing well."
"He is, thank you, Colonel Carvel. If he but knew that the Judge were dying, I could not have kept him at home. Dr. Polk says that he must not leave the house, or undergo any excitement."
Just then the door of the inner room opened, and Dr. Polk came out. He bowed gravely to Mrs. Brice and Mr. Brinsmade, and he patted Virginia.
"The Judge is still asleep," he said gently. "And—he may not wake up in this world."
Silently, sadly, they went together into that little room where so much of Judge Whipple's life had been spent. How little it was! And how completely they filled it,—these five people and the big Rothfield covered with the black cloth. Virginia pressed her father's arm as they leaned against it, and brushed her eyes. The Doctor turned the wick of the night-lamp.
What was that upon the sleeper's face from which they drew back? A smile? Yes, and a light. The divine light which is shed upon those who have lived for others, who have denied themselves the lusts of the flesh, For a long space, perhaps an hour, they stayed, silent save for a low word now and again from the Doctor as he felt the Judge's heart. Tableaux from the past floated before Virginia's eyes. Of the old days, of the happy days in Locust Street, of the Judge quarrelling with her father, and she and Captain Lige smiling nearby. And she remembered how sometimes when the controversy was finished the Judge would rub his nose and say:
"It's my turn now, Lige."
Whereupon the Captain would open the piano, and she would play the hymn that he liked best. It was "Lead, Kindly Light."
What was it in Silas Whipple's nature that courted the pain of memories? What pleasure could it have been all through his illness to look upon this silent and cruel reminder of days gone by forever? She had heard that Stephen Brice had been with the Judge when he had bid it in. She wondered that he had allowed it, for they said that he was the only one who had ever been known to break the Judge's will. Virginia's eyes rested on Margaret Brice, who was seated at the head of the bed, smoothing the pillows The strength of Stephen's features were in hers, but not the ruggedness. Her features were large, indeed, yet stanch and softened. The widow, as if feeling Virginia's look upon her, glanced up from the Judge's face and smiled at her. The girl colored with pleasure, and again at the thought which she had had of the likeness between mother and son.
Still the Judge slept on, while they watched. And at length the thought of Clarence crossed Virginia's mind.
Why had he not returned? Perhaps he was in the office without. Whispering to her father, she stole out on tiptoe. The office was empty. Descending to the street, she was unable to gain any news of Clarence from Ned, who was becoming alarmed likewise.
Perplexed and troubled, she climbed the stairs again. No sound came from the Judge's room Perhaps Clarence would be back at any moment. Perhaps her father was in danger. She sat down to think,—her elbows on the desk in front of her, her chin in her hand, her eyes at the level of a line of books which stood on end.—Chitty's Pleadings, Blackstone, Greenleaf on Evidence. Absently; as a person whose mind is in trouble, she reached out and took one of them down and opened it. Across the flyleaf, in a high and bold hand, was written the name, Stephen Atterbury Brice.
It was his desk! She was sitting in his chair!
She dropped the book, and, rising abruptly, crossed quickly to the other side of the room. Then she turned, hesitatingly, and went back. This was his desk—his chair, in which he had worked so faithfully for the man who lay dying beyond the door. For him whom they all loved—whose last hours they were were to soothe. Wars and schisms may part our bodies, but stronger ties unite our souls. Through Silas Whipple, through his mother, Virginia knew that she was woven of one piece with Stephen Brice. In a thousand ways she was reminded, lest she drive it from her belief. She might marry another, and that would not matter.
She sank again into his chair, and gave herself over to the thoughts crowding in her heart. How the threads of his life ran next to hers, and crossed and recrossed them. The slave auction, her dance with him, the Fair, the meeting at Mr. Brinsmade's gate,—she knew them all. Her love and admiration for his mother. Her dreams of him—for she did dream of him. And now he had saved Clarence's life that she might marry her cousin. Was it true that she would marry Clarence? That seemed to her only a dream. It had never seemed real. Again she glanced at the signature in the book, as if fascinated by the very strength of it. She turned over a few pages of the book, "Supposing the defendant's counsel essays to prove by means of—" that was his writing again, a marginal, note. There were marginal notes on every page—even the last was covered with them, And then at the end, "First reading, February, 1858. Second reading, July, 1858. Bought with some of money obtained by first article for M. D." That capacity for work, incomparable gift, was what she had always coveted the most. Again she rested her elbows on the desk and her chin on her hands, and sighed unconsciously.
She had not heard the step on the stair. She had not seen the door open. She did not know that any one wage in the room until she heard his voice, and then she thought that she was dreaming.
"Miss Carvel!"
"Yes?" Her head did not move. He took a step toward her.
"Miss Carvel!"
Slowly she raised her face to his, unbelief and wonder in her eyes, —unbelief and wonder and fright. No; it could not be he. But when she met the quality of his look, the grave tenderness of it, she trembled, and our rendered her own to the page where his handwriting quivered and became a blur.
He never knew the effort it cost her to rise and confront him. She herself had not measured or fathomed the power which his very person exhaled. It seemed to have come upon him suddenly. He needed not to have spoken for her to have felt that. What it was she could not tell. She knew alone that it was nigh irresistible, and she grasped the back of the chair as though material support might sustain her.
"Is he—dead?"
She was breathing hard.
"No," she said. "Not—not yet, They are waiting for the end."
"And you?" he asked in grave surprise, glancing at the door of theJudge's room.
Then she remembered Clarence.
"I am waiting for my cousin," she said.
Even as she spoke she was with this man again at the Brinsmade gate. Those had been her very words! Intuition told her that he, too, was thinking of that time. Now he had found her at his desk, and, as if that were not humiliation enough, with one of his books taken down and laid open at his signature. Suffused, she groped for words to carry her on.
"I am waiting for Clarence, Mr. Brice. He was here, and is gone somewhere."
He did not seem to take account of the speech. And his silence—goad to indiscretion—pressed her to add:— "You saved him, Mr. Brice. I—we all —thank you so much. And that is not all I want to say. It is a poor enough acknowledgment of what you did,—for we have not always treated you well." Her voice faltered almost to faintness, as he raised his hand in pained protest. But she continued: "I shall regard it as a debt I can never repay. It is not likely that in my life to come I can ever help you, but I shall pray for that opportunity."
He interrupted her.
"I did nothing, Miss Carvel, nothing that the most unfeeling man in our army would not do. Nothing that I would not have done for the merest stranger."
"You saved him for me," she said.
O fateful words that spoke of themselves! She turned away from him for very shame, and yet she heard him saying:— "Yes, I saved him for you."
His voice was in the very note of the sadness which has the strength to suffer, to put aside the thought of self. A note to which her soul responded with anguish when she turned to him with the natural cry of woman.
"Oh, you ought not to have come here to-night. Why did you come? TheDoctor forbade it. The consequences may kill you."
"It does not matter much," he answered. "The Judge was dying."
"How did you know?"
"I guessed it,—because my mother had left me."
"Oh, you ought not to have come!" she said again.
"The Judge has been my benefactor," he answered quietly. I could walk, and it was my duty to come."
"You did not walk!" she gasped.
He smiled, "I had no carriage," he said.
With the instinct of her sex she seized the chair and placed it under him. "You must sit down at once," she cried.
"But I am not tired," he replied.
"Oh, you must sit down, you must, Captain Brice." He started at the title, which came so prettily from her lips, "Won't you please!" she said pleadingly.
He sat down. And, as the sun peeps out of a troubled sky, she smiled.
"It is your chair," she said.
He glanced at the book, and the bit of sky was crimson. But still he said nothing.
"It is your book," she stammered. "I did not know that it was yours whenI took it down. I—I was looking at it while I was waiting for Clarence."
"It is dry reading," he remarked, which was not what he wished to say.
"And yet—"
"Yes?"
"And yet you have read it twice." The confession had slipped to her lips.
She was sitting on the edge of his desk, looking down at him. Still he did not look at her. All the will that was left him averted his head. And the seal of honor was upon his speech. And he wondered if man were ever more tempted.
Then the evil spread its wings, and soared away into the night. And the moment was past. Peace seemed to come upon them both, quieting the tumult in their hearts, and giving them back their reason. Respect like wise came to the girl,—respect that was akin to awe. It was he who spoke first.
"My mother has me how faithfully you nursed the Judge, Miss Carvel. It was a very noble thing to do."
"Not noble at all," she replied hastily, "your mother did the most of it,And he is an old friend of my father—"
"It was none the less noble," said Stephen, warmly, "And he quarrelled with Colonel Carvel."
"My father quarrelled with him," she corrected. "It was well that I should make some atonement. And yet mine was no atonement, I love Judge Whipple. It was a—a privilege to see your mother every day—oh, how he would talk of you! I think he loves you better than any one on this earth."
"Tell me about him," said Stephen, gently.
Virginia told him, and into the narrative she threw the whole of her pent-up self. How patient the Judge had been, and the joy he had derived from Stephen's letters. "You were very good to write to him so often," she said. It seemed like a dream to Stephen, like one of the many dreams of her, the mystery of which was of the inner life beyond our ken. He could not recall a time when she had not been rebellious, antagonistic. And now—as he listened to her voice, with its exquisite low tones and modulations, as he sat there in this sacred intimacy, perchance to be the last in his life, he became dazed. His eyes, softened, with supreme eloquence cried out that she, was his, forever and forever. The magnetic force which God uses to tie the worlds together was pulling him to her. And yet the Puritan resisted.
Then the door swung open, and Clarence Colfax, out of breath, ran into the room. He stopped short when he saw them, his hand fell to his sides, and his words died on his lips. Virginia did not stir.
It was Stephen who rose to meet him, and with her eyes the girl followed his motions. The broad and loosely built frame of the Northerner, his shoulders slightly stooping, contrasted with Clarence's slighter figure, erect, compact, springy. The Southerner's eye, for that moment, was flint struck with the spark from the steel. Stephen's face, thinned by illness, was grave. The eyes kindly, yet penetrating. For an instant they stood thus regarding each other, neither offering a hand. It was Stephen who spoke first, and if there was a trace of emotion in his voice, one who was listening intently failed to mark it.
"I am glad to see that you have recovered, Colonel Colfax," he said.
"I should indeed be without gratitude if I did not thank Captain Brice for my life," answered Clarence. Virginia flushed. She had detected the undue accent on her cousin's last words, and she glanced apprehensively at Stephen. His forceful reply surprised them both.
"Miss Carvel has already thanked me sufficiently, sir," he said. "I am happy to have been able to have done you a good turn, and at the same time to have served her so well. It was she who saved your life. It is to her your thanks are chiefly due. I believe that I am not going too far, Colonel Colfax," he added, "when I congratulate you both."
Before her cousin could recover, Virginia slid down from the desk and had come between them. How her eyes shone and her lip trembled as she gazed at him, Stephen has never forgotten. What a woman she was as she took her cousin's arm and made him a curtsey.
"What you have done may seem a light thing to you, Captain Brice," she said. "That is apt to be the way with those who have big hearts. You have put upon Colonel Colfax, and upon me, a life's obligation."
When she began to speak, Clarence raised his head. As he glanced, incredulous, from her to Stephen, his look gradually softened, and when she had finished, his manner had become again frank, boyish, impetuous —nay, penitent. He seized Stephen's hand.
"Forgive me, Brice," he cried. "Forgive me. I should have known better.I—I did you an injustice, and you, Virginia. I was a fool—a scoundrel."Stephen shook his head.
"No, you were neither," he said. Then upon his face came the smile of one who has the strength to renounce, all that is dearest to him—that smile of the unselfish, sweetest of all. It brought tears to Virginia. She was to see it once again, upon the features of one who bore a cross, —Abraham Lincoln. Clarence looked, and then he turned away toward the door to the stairway, as one who walks blindly, in a sorrow.
His hand was on the knob when Virginia seemed to awake. She flew after him:
"Wait!" she whispered.
Then she raised her eyes, slowly, to Stephen, who was standing motionless beside his chair.
"Captain Brice!"
"Yes," he answered.
"My father is in the Judge's room," she said.
"Your father!" he exclaimed. "I thought—"
"That he was an officer in the Confederate Army. So he is." Her head went up as she spoke.
Stephen stared at her, troubled. Suddenly her manner, changed. She took a step toward him, appealingly.
"Oh, he is not a spy," she cried. "He has given Mr Brinsmade his word that he came here for no other purpose than to see me. Then he heard that the Judge was dying—"
"He has given his word to Mr. Brinsmade?
"Yes."
"Then," said Stephen, "what Mr. Brinsmade sanctions is not for me to question."
She gave him yet another look, a fleeting one which he did not see. Then she softly opened the door and passed into the room of the dying man. Stephen followed her. As for Clarence, he stood for a space staring after them. Then he went noiselessly down the stairs into the street.
When the Judge opened his eyes for the last time in this world, they fell first upon the face of his old friend, Colonel Carvel. Twice he tried to speak his name, and twice he failed. The third time he said it faintly.
"Comyn!"
"Yes, Silas."
"Comyn, what are you doing here?
"I reckon I came to see you, Silas," answered the Colonel.
"To see me die," said the Judge, grimly.
Colonel Carvel's face twitched, and the silence in that little room seemed to throb.
"Comyn," said the Judge again, "I heard that you had gone South to fight against your country. I see you here. Can it be that you have at last returned in your allegiances to the flag for which your forefathers died?"
Poor Colonel Carvel
"I am still of the same mind, Silas," he said.
The Judge turned his face away, his thin lips moving as in prayer. But they knew that he was not praying, "Silas," said Mr. Carvel, "we were friends for twenty years. Let us be friends again, before—"
"Before I die," the Judge interrupted, "I am ready to die. Yes, I am ready. I have had a hard life, Comyn, and few friends. It was my fault. I—I did not know how to make them. Yet no man ever valued those few more than! But," he cried, the stern fire unquenched to the last, "I would that God had spared me to see this Rebellion stamped out. For it will be stamped out." To those watching, his eyes seemed fixed on a distant point, and the light of prophecy was in them. "I would that God had spared me to see this Union supreme once more. Yes, it will be supreme. A high destiny is reserved for this nation—! I think the highest of all on this earth." Amid profound silence he leaned back on the pillows from which he had risen, his breath coming fast. None dared look at the neighbor beside them.
It was Stephen's mother who spoke. "Would you not like to see a clergyman, Judge?" she asked.
The look on his face softened as he turned to her.
"No, madam," he answered; "you are clergyman enough for me. You are near enough to God—there is no one in this room who is not worthy to stand in the presence of death. Yet I wish that a clergyman were here, that he might listen to one thing I have to say. When I was a boy I worked my way down the river to New York, to see the city. I met a bishop there. He said to me, 'Sit down, my son, I want to talk to you. I know your father in Albany. You are Senator Whipple's son.' I said to him, 'No, sir, I am not Senator Whipple's son. I am no relation of his.' If the bishop had wished to talk to me after that, Mrs. Brice, he might have made my life a little easier—a little sweeter. I know that they are not all like that. But it was by just such things that I was embittered when I was a boy." He stopped, and when he spoke again, it was more slowly, more gently, than any of them had heard him speak in all his life before. "I wish that some of the blessings which I am leaving now had come to me then—when I was a boy. I might have done my little share in making the world a brighter place to live in, as all of you have done. Yes, as all of you are now doing for me. I am leaving the world with a better opinion of it than I ever held in life. God hid the sun from me when I was a little child. Margaret Brice," he said, "if I had had such a mother as you, I would have been softened then. I thank God that He sent you when He did."
The widow bowed her head, and a tear fell upon his pillow.
"I have done nothing," she murmured, "nothing."
"So shall they answer at the last whom He has chosen," said the Judge. "I was sick, and ye visited me. He has promised to remember those who do that. Hold up your head, my daughter. God has been good to you. He has given you a son whom all men may look in the face, of whom you need never be ashamed. Stephen," said the Judge, "come here."
Stephen made his way to the bedside, but because of the moisture in his eyes he saw but dimly the gaunt face. And yet he shrank back in awe at the change in it. So must all of the martyrs have looked when the fire of the faggots licked their feet. So must John Bunyan have stared through his prison bars at the sky.
"Stephen," he said, "you have been faithful in a few things. So shall you be made ruler over many things. The little I have I leave to you, and the chief of this is an untarnished name. I know that you will be true to it because I have tried your strength. Listen carefully to what I have to say, for I have thought over it long. In the days gone by our fathers worked for the good of the people, and they had no thought of gain. A time is coming when we shall need that blood and that bone in this Republic. Wealth not yet dreamed of will flow out of this land, and the waters of it will rot all save the pure, and corrupt all save the incorruptible. Half-tried men wilt go down before that flood. You and those like you will remember how your fathers governed,—strongly, sternly, justly. It was so that they governed themselves.
"Be vigilant. Serve your city, serve your state, but above all serve your country."
He paused to catch his breath, which was coming painfully now, and reached out his bony hand to seek Stephen's. "I was harsh with you at first, my son," he went on. "I wished to try you. And when I had tried you I wished your mind to open, to keep pace with the growth of this nation. I sent you to see Abraham Lincoln that you might be born again —in the West. You were born again. I saw it when you came back—I saw it in your face. O God," he cried, with sudden eloquence. "I would that his hands—Abraham Lincoln's hands—might be laid upon all who complain and cavil and criticise, and think of the little things in life: I would that his spirit might possess their spirit!"
He stopped again. They marvelled and were awed, for never in all his days had such speech broken from this man. "Good-by, Stephen," he said, when they thought he was not to speak again. "Hold the image of Abraham Lincoln in front of you. Never forget him. You—you are a man after his own heart—and—and mine."
The last word was scarcely audible. They started for ward, for his eyes were closed. But presently he stirred again, and opened them.
"Brinsmade," he said, "Brinsmade, take care of my orphan girls. SendShadrach here."
The negro came forth, shuffling and sobbing, from the doorway.
"You ain't gwine away, Marse Judge?"
"Yes, Shadrach, good-by. You have served me well, I have left you provided for."
Shadrach kissed the hand of whose secret charity he knew so much. Then the Judge withdrew it, and motioned to him to rise. He called his oldest friend by name. And Colonel Carvel came from the corner where he had been listening, with his face drawn.
"Good-by, Comyn. You were my friend when there was none other. You were true to me when the hand of every man was against me. You—you have risked your life to come to me here, May God spare it for Virginia."
At the sound of her name, the girl started. She came and bent over him.And when she kissed him on the forehead, he trembled.
"Uncle Silas!" she faltered.
Weakly he reached up and put his hands on her shoulders. He whispered in her ear. The tears came and lay wet upon her lashes as she undid the button at his throat.
There, on a piece of cotton twine, hung a little key, She took it off, but still his hands held her.
"I have saved it for you, my dear," he said. "God bless you—" why did his eyes seek Stephen's?—"and make your life happy. Virginia—will you play my hymn—once more—once more?"
They lifted the night lamp from the piano, and the medicine. It was Stephen who stripped it of the black cloth it had worn, who stood by Virginia ready to lift the lid when she had turned the lock. The girl's exaltation gave a trembling touch divine to the well-remembered chords, and those who heard were lifted, lifted far above and beyond the power of earthly spell.
"Lead, Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloomLead Thou me onThe night is dark, and I am far from home;Lead Thou me on.Keep Thou my feet! I do not ask to seeThe distant scene; one step enough for me."
A sigh shook Silas Whipple's wasted frame, and he died.
By Winston Churchill
Mr. Brinsmade and the Doctor were the first to leave the little room where Silas Whipple had lived and worked and died, Mr. Brinsmade bent upon one of those errands which claimed him at all times. He took Shadrach with him. Virginia sat on, a vague fear haunting her,—a fear for her father's safety. Where was Clarence? What had he seen? Was the place watched? These questions, at first intruding upon her sorrow, remained to torture her.
Softly she stirred from the chair where she had sat before the piano, and opened the door of the outer office. A clock in a steeple near by was striking twelve. The Colonel did not raise his head. Only Stephen saw her go; she felt his eyes following her, and as she slipped out lifted hers to meet them for a brief instant through the opening of the door. Then it closed behind her.
First of all she knew that the light in the outer office was burning dimly, and the discovery gave her a shock. Who had turned it down? Had Clarence? Was he here? Fearfully searching the room for him, her gaze was held by a figure in the recess of the window at the back of the room. A solid, bulky figure it was, and, though uncertainly outlined in the semi-darkness, she knew it. She took a step nearer, and a cry escaped her.
The man was Eliphalet Hopper. He got down from the sill with a motion at once sheepish and stealthy. Her breath caught, and instinctively she gave back toward the door, as if to open it again.
"Hold on!" he said. "I've got something I want to say to you, MissVirginia."
His tones seemed strangely natural. They were not brutal. But she shivered and paused, horrified at the thought of what she was about to do. Her father was in that room—and Stephen. She must keep them there, and get this man away. She must not show fright before him, and yet she could not trust her voice to speak just then. She must not let him know that she was afraid of him—this she kept repeating to herself. But how to act? Suddenly an idea flashed upon her.
Virginia never knew how she gathered the courage to pass him, even swiftly, and turn up the gas. He started back, blinking as the jet flared. For a moment she stood beside it, with her head high; confronting him and striving to steady herself for speech.
"Why have you come here?" she said. "Judge Whipple—died—to-night."
The dominating note in his answer was a whine, as if, in spite of himself, he were awed.
"I ain't here to see the Judge."
She was pale, and quite motionless. And she faltered now. She felt her lips moving, but knew not whether the words had come.
"What do you mean?"
He gained confidence. The look in his little eyes was the filmy look of those of an animal feasting.
"I came here to see you," he said, "—you." She was staring at him now, in horror. "And if you don't give me what I want, I cal'late to see some one else—in there," said Mr. Hopper.
He smiled, for she was swaying, her lids half closed. By a supreme effort she conquered her terror and looked at him. The look was in his eyes still, intensified now.
"How dare you speak to me after what has happened! she said. If ColonelCarvel were here, he would—kill you."
He flinched at the name and the word, involuntarily. He wiped his forehead, hot at the very thought.
"I want to know!" he exclaimed, in faint-hearted irony. Then, remembering his advantage, he stepped close to her.
"He is here," he said, intense now. "He is here, in that there room." He seized her wrists. Virginia struggled, and yet she refrained from crying out. "He never leaves this city without I choose. I can have him hung if I choose," he whispered, next to her.
"Oh!" she cried; "oh, if you choose!"
Still his body crept closer, and his face closer. And her strength was going.
"There's but one price to pay," he said hoarsely, "there's but one price to pay, and that's you—you. I cal'late you'll marry me now."
Delirious at the touch of her, he did not hear the door open. Her senses were strained for that very sound. She heard it close again, and a footstep across the room. She knew the step—she knew the voice, and her heart leaped at the sound of it in anger. An arm in a blue sleeve came between them, and Eliphalet Hopper staggered and fell across the books on the table, his hand to his face. Above him towered Stephen Brice. Towered was the impression that came to Virginia then, and so she thought of the scene ever afterward. Small bits, like points of tempered steel, glittered in Stephen's eyes, and his hands following up the mastery he had given them clutched Mr. Hopper's shoulders. Twice Stephen shook him so that his head beat upon the table.
"You—you beast!" he cried, but he kept his voice low. And then, as if he expected Hopper to reply: "Shall I kill you?"
Again he shook him violently. He felt Virginia's touch on his arm.
"Stephen!" she cried, "your wounds! Be careful! Oh, do be careful!"
She had called him Stephen. He turned slowly, and his hands fell from Mr. Hopper's cowering form as his eyes met hers. Even he could not fathom the appeal, the yearning, in their dark blue depths. And yet what he saw there made him tremble. She turned away, trembling too.
"Please sit down," she entreated. "He—he won't touch me again while you are here."
Eliphalet Hopper raised himself from the desk, and one of the big books fell with a crash to the floor. Then they saw him shrink, his eyes fixed upon some one behind them. Before the Judge's door stood Colonel Carvel, in calm, familiar posture, his feet apart, and his head bent forward as he pulled at his goatee.
"What is this man doing here, Virginia?" he asked. She did not answer him, nor did speech seem to come easily to Mr. Hopper in that instant. Perhaps the sight of Colonel Carvel had brought before him too, vividly the memory of that afternoon at Glencoe.
All at once Virginia grasped the fulness of the power in this man's hands. At a word from him her father would be shot as a spy—and Stephen Brice, perhaps, as a traitor. But if Colonel Carvel should learn that he had seized her,—here was the terrible danger of the situation. Well she knew what the Colonel would do. Would. Stephen tell him? She trusted in his coolness that he would not.
Before a word of reply came from any of the three, a noise was heard on the stairway. Some one was coming up. There followed four seconds of suspense, and then Clarence came in. She saw that his face wore a worried, dejected look. It changed instantly when he glanced about him, and an oath broke from his lips as he singled out Eliphalet Hopper standing in sullen aggressiveness, beside the table.
"So you're the spy, are you?" he said in disgust. Then he turned his back and faced his uncle. "I saw, him in Williams's entry as we drove up. He got away from me."
A thought seemed to strike him. He strode to the open window at the back of the office, and looked out, There was a roof under it.
"The sneak got in here," he said. "He knew I was waiting for him in the street. So you're the spy, are you?"
Mr. Hopper passed a heavy hand across the cheek where Stephen had struck him.
"No, I ain't the spy," he said, with a meaning glance at the Colonel.
"Then what are you doing here?" demanded Clarence, fiercely.
"I cal'late that he knows," Eliphalet replied, jerking his head toward Colonel Carvel. "Where's his Confederate uniform? What's to prevent my calling up the provost's guard below?" he continued, with a smile that was hideous on his swelling face.
It was the Colonel who answered him, very quickly and very clearly.
"Nothing whatever, Mr. Hopper," he said. "This is the way out." He pointed at the door. Stephen, who was watching him, could not tell whether it were a grim smile that creased the corners of the Colonel's mouth as he added. "You might prefer the window."
Mr. Hopper did not move, but his eyes shifted to Virginia's form. Stephen deliberately thrust himself between them that he might not see her.
"What are you waiting for?" said the Colonel, in the mild voice that should have been an ominous warning. Still Mr. Hopper did not move. It was clear that he had not reckoned upon all of this; that he had waited in the window to deal with Virginia alone. But now the very force of a desire which had gathered strength in many years made him reckless. His voice took on the oily quality in which he was wont to bargain.
"Let's be calm about this business, Colonel," he said. "We won't say anything about the past. But I ain't set on having you shot. There's a consideration that would stop me, and I cal'late you know what it is."
Then the Colonel made a motion. But before he had taken a step Virginia had crossed the room swiftly, and flung herself upon him.
"Oh, don't, Pa!" she cried. "Don't! Tell him that I will agree to it. Yes, I will. I can't have you—shot." The last word came falteringly, faintly.
"Let me go,—honey," whispered the Colonel, gently. His eyes did not leave Eliphalet. He tried to disengage himself, but her fingers were clasped about his neck in a passion of fear and love. And then, while she clung to him, her head was raised to listen. The sound of Stephen Brice's voice held her as in a spell. His words were coming coldly, deliberately, and yet so sharply that each seemed to fall like a lash.
"Mr. Hopper, if ever I hear of your repeating what you have seen or heard in this room, I will make this city and this state too hot for you to live in. I know you. I know how you hide in areas, how you talk sedition in private, how you have made money out of other men's misery. And, what is more, I can prove that you have had traitorous dealings with the Confederacy. General Sherman has been good enough to call himself a friend of mine, and if he prosecutes you for your dealings in Memphis, you will get a term in a Government prison, You ought to be hung. Colonel Carvel has shown you the door. Now go."
And Mr, Hopper went.
Of the Staff of General Sherman on the March to the Sea, and on the March from Savannah Northward.
HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI GOLDSBORO, N.C. MARCH 24, 1865
DEAR MOTHER: The South Carolina Campaign is a thing of the past. I pause as I write these words—they seem so incredible to me. We have marched the four hundred and twenty-five miles in fifty days, and the General himself has said that it is the longest and most important march ever made by an organized army in a civilized country. I know that you will not be misled by the words "civilized country." Not until the history of this campaign is written will the public realize the wide rivers and all but impassable swamps we have crossed with our baggage trains and artillery. The roads (by courtesy so called) were a sea of molasses and every mile of them has had to be corduroyed. For fear of worrying you I did not write you from Savannah how they laughed at us for starting at that season of the year. They said we would not go ten miles, and I most solemnly believe that no one but "Uncle Billy" and an army organized and equipped by him could have gone ten miles. Nothing seems to stop him. You have probably remarked in the tone of my letters ever since we left Kingston for the sea, a growing admiration for "my General."
It seems very strange that this wonderful tactician can be the same man I met that day going to the Arsenal in the streetcar, and again at Camp Jackson. I am sure that history will give him a high place among the commanders of the world. Certainly none was ever more tireless than he. He never fights a battle when it can be avoided, and his march into Columbia while threatening Charleston and Augusta was certainly a master stroke of strategy.
I think his simplicity his most remarkable trait. You should see him as he rides through the army, an erect figure, with his clothes all angular and awry, and an expanse of white sock showing above his low shoes. You can hear his name running from file to file; and some times the new regiments can't resist cheering. He generally says to the Colonel: —"Stop that noise, sir. Don't like it."
On our march to the sea, if the orders were ever given to turn northward, "the boys" would get very much depressed. One moonlight night I was walking my horse close to the General's over the pine needles, when we overheard this conversation between two soldiers:— "Say, John," said one, "I guess Uncle Billy don't know our corps is goin' north."
"I wonder if he does,'" said John. "If I could only get a sight of them white socks, I'd know it was all right."
The General rode past without a word, but I heard him telling the story to Mower the next day.
I can find little if any change in his manner since I knew him first. He is brusque, but kindly, and he has the same comradeship with officers and men—and even the negroes who flock to our army. But few dare to take advantage of it, and they never do so twice. I have been very near to him, and have tried not to worry him or ask many foolish questions. Sometimes on the march he will beckon me to close up to him, and we have a conversation something on this order:— "There's Kenesaw, Brice."
"Yes, sir."
Pointing with his arm.
"Went beyond lines there with small party. Rebel battery on summit. Had to git. Fired on. Next day I thought Rebels would leave in the night. Got up before daylight, fixed telescope on stand, and waited. Watched top of Kenesaw. No Rebel. Saw one blue man creep up, very cautious, looked around, waved his hat. Rebels gone. Thought so."
This gives you but a faint idea of the vividness of his talk. When we make a halt for any time, the general officers and their staffs flock to headquarters to listen to his stories. When anything goes wrong, his perception of it is like a lightning flash,—and he acts as quickly.
By the way, I have just found the letter he wrote me, offering this staff position. Please keep it carefully, as it is something I shall value all my life.
GAYLESVILLE, ALABAMA, October 25, 1864.
Dear Sir,—The world goes on, and wicked men sound asleep. Davis has sworn to destroy my army, and Beauregard has come to do the work,—so if you expect to share in our calamity, come down. I offer you this last chance for staff duty, and hope you have had enough in the field. I do not wish to hurry you, but you can't get aboard a ship at sea. So if you want to make the trip, come to Chattanooga and take your chances of meeting me.
Yours truly,
W. T. SHERMAN, Major General.
One night—at Cheraw, I think it was—he sent for me to talk to him. I found him lying on a bed of Spanish moss they had made for him. He asked me a great many questions about St. Louis, and praised Mr. Brinsmade, especially his management of the Sanitary Commission.
"Brice," he said, after a while, "you remember when Grant sent me to beat off Joe Johnston's army from Vicksburg. You were wounded then, by the way, in that dash Lauman made. Grant thought he ought to warn me against Johnston.
"'He's wily, Sherman,' said he. 'He's a dangerous man.'
"'Grant,' said I, 'you give me men enough and time enough to look over the ground, and I'm not afraid of the devil.'"
Nothing could sum up the man better than that. And now what a trick of fate it is that he has Johnston before him again, in what we hope will prove the last gasp of the war! He likes Johnston, by the way, and has the greatest respect for him.
I wish you could have peeped into our camp once in a while. In the rare bursts of sunshine on this march our premises have been decorated with gay red blankets, and sombre gray ones brought from the quartermasters, and white Hudson's Bay blankets (not so white now), all being between forked sticks. It is wonderful how the pitching of a few tents, and the busy crackle of a few fires, and the sound of voices—sometimes merry, sometimes sad, depending on the weather, will change the look of a lonely pine knoll. You ask me how we fare. I should be heartily ashamed if a word of complaint ever fell from my lips. But the men! Whenever I wake up at night with my feet in a puddle between the blankets, I think of the men. The corduroy roads which our horses stumble over through the mud, they make as well as march on. Our flies are carried in wagons, and our utensils and provisions. They must often bear on their backs the little dog-tents, under which, put up by their own labor, they crawl to sleep, wrapped in a blanket they have carried all day, perhaps waist deep in water. The food they eat has been in their haversacks for many a weary mile, and is cooked in the little skillet and pot which have also been a part of their burden. Then they have their musket and accoutrements, and the "forty rounds" at their backs. Patiently, cheerily tramping along, going they know not where, nor care much either, so it be not in retreat. Ready to make roads, throw up works, tear up railroads, or hew out and build wooden bridges; or, best of all, to go for the Johnnies under hot sun or heavy rain, through swamp and mire and quicksand. They marched ten miles to storm Fort McAllister. And how the cheers broke from them when the pop pop pop of the skirmish line began after we came in sight of Savannah! No man who has seen but not shared their life may talk of personal hardship.
We arrived at this pretty little town yesterday, so effecting a junction with Schofield, who got in with the 3d Corps the day before. I am writing at General Schofield's headquarters. There was a bit of a battle on Tuesday at Bentonville, and we have come hither in smoke, as usual. But this time we thank Heaven that it is not the smoke of burning homes, —only some resin the "Johnnies" set on fire before they left.
I must close. General Sherman has just sent for me.
ON BOARD DESPATCH BOAT "MARTIN."AT SEA, March 25, 1865.
DEAR MOTHER: A most curious thing has happened. But I may as well begin at the beginning. When I stopped writing last evening at the summons of the General, I was about to tell you something of the battle of Bentonville on Tuesday last. Mower charged through as bad a piece of wood and swamp as I ever saw, and got within one hundred yards of Johnston himself, who was at the bridge across Mill Creek. Of course we did not know this at the time, and learned it from prisoners.
As I have written you, I have been under fire very little since coming to the staff. When the battle opened, however, I saw that if I stayed with the General (who was then behind the reserves) I would see little or nothing; I went ahead "to get information" beyond the line of battle into the woods. I did not find these favorable to landscape views, and just as I was turning my horse back again I caught sight of a commotion some distance to my right. The Rebel skirmish line had fallen back just that instant, two of our skirmishers were grappling with a third man, who was fighting desperately. It struck me as singular that the fellow was not in gray, but had on some sort of dark clothes.
I could not reach them in the swamp on horseback, and was in the act of dismounting when the man fell, and then they set out to carry him to the rear, still farther to my right, beyond the swamp. I shouted, and one of the skirmishers came up. I asked him what the matter was.
"We've got a spy, sir," he said excitedly.
"A spy! Here?"
"Yes, Major. He was hid in the thicket yonder, lying flat on his face. He reckoned that our boys would run right over him and that he'd get into our lines that way. Tim Foley stumbled on him, and he put up as good a fight with his fists as any man I ever saw."
Just then a regiment swept past us. That night I told the General, who sent over to the headquarters of the 17th Corps to inquire. The word came back that the man's name was Addison, and he claimed to be a Union sympathizer who owned a plantation near by. He declared that he had been conscripted by the Rebels, wounded, sent back home, and was now about to be pressed in again. He had taken this method of escaping to our lines. It was a common story enough, but General Mower added in his message that he thought the story fishy. This was because the man's appearance was very striking, and he seemed the type of Confederate fighter who would do and dare anything. He had a wound, which had been a bad one, evidently got from a piece of shell. But they had been able to find nothing on him. Sherman sent back word to keep the man until he could see him in person. It was about nine o'clock last night when I reached the house the General has taken. A prisoner's guard was resting outside, and the hall was full of officers. They said that the General was awaiting me, and pointed to the closed door of a room that had been the dining room. I opened it.
Two candles were burning in pewter sticks on the bare mahogany table. There was the General sitting beside them, with his legs crossed, holding some crumpled tissue paper very near his eyes, and reading. He did not look up when I entered. I was aware of a man standing, tall and straight, just out of range of the candles' rays. He wore the easy dress of a Southern planter, with the broad felt hat. The head was flung back so that there was just a patch of light on the chin, and the lids of the eyes in the shadow were half closed.
My sensations are worth noting. For the moment I felt precisely as I had when I was hit by that bullet in Lauman's charge. I was aware of something very like pain, yet I could not place the cause of it. But this is what since has made me feel queer: you doubtless remember staying at Hollingdean, when I was a boy, and hearing the story of Lord Northwell's daredevil Royalist ancestor,—the one with the lace collar over the dull-gold velvet, and the pointed chin, and the lazy scorn in the eyes. Those eyes are painted with drooping lids. The first time I saw Clarence Colfax I thought of that picture—and now I thought of the picture first.
The General's voice startled me.
"Major Brice, do you know this gentleman?" he asked.
"Yes, General."
"Who is he?"
"His name is Colfax, sir—Colonel Colfax, I think"
"Thought so," said the General.
I have thought much of that scene since, as I am steaming northward over green seas and under cloudless skies, and it has seemed very unreal. I should almost say supernatural when I reflect how I have run across this man again and again, and always opposing him. I can recall just how he looked at the slave auction, which seem, so long ago: very handsome, very boyish, and yet with the air of one to be deferred to. It was sufficiently remarkable that I should have found him in Vicksburg. But now—to be brought face to face with him in this old dining room in Goldsboro! And he a prisoner. He had not moved. I did not know how he would act, but I went up to him and held out my hand, and said.—"How do you do, Colonel Colfax?"
I am sure that my voice was not very steady, for I cannot help liking him And then his face lighted up and he gave me his hand. And he smiled at me and again at the General, as much as to say that it was all over. He has a wonderful smile.
"We seem to run into each other, Major Brice," said he.
The pluck of the man was superb. I could see that the General, too, was moved, from the way he looked at him. And he speaks a little more abruptly at such times.
"Guess that settles it, Colonel," he said.
"I reckon it does, General," said Clarence, still smiling. The General turned from him to the table with a kind of jerk and clapped his hand on the tissue paper.
"These speak for themselves, sir," he said. "It is very plain that they would have reached the prominent citizens for whom they were intended if you had succeeded in your enterprise. You were captured out of uniform You know enough of war to appreciate the risk you ran. Any statement to make?"
"No, sir."
"Call Captain Vaughan, Brice, and ask him to conduct the prisoner back."
"May I speak to him, General?" I asked. The General nodded.