hile this frightful battle raged, lucius stood some little distance off, in an agony of apprehension for the safety of his friend. at the first clank of the meeting steel he had risen to his feet, and strained his eager eyes to see what was about to happen; but, even though he drew a little nearer, he could distinguish nothing clearly. only in the dusk a pair of tall forms dashed from right to left, or bounded from side to side, meeting, recoiling, and meeting again. but if he could not see, he could hear; and at each jarring clank of the clashing bayonets his heart leaped, and his hair rose on his head, for he could not believe that ephraim would win the fight. oh for a gun! he thought, as he ran wildly backwards and forwards, groping along the ground, in the hope that he might come upon some straggler’s discarded piece. all at once he heard shouts and the noise of rushing footsteps. from the river bank, from the woods, from the pickets behind him—from every direction—men were hastening to the scene of the conflict. then that furious cry from 200the grizzly, and the dull crash as the sergeant fell under his powerful stroke. finally silence for a little space around the combatants.
lucius did not know which had fallen: he could just see that one was down—that was all—and his fears told him that it must be grizzly. a dull, apathetic feeling stole over him. he did not try to move. he knew that in a few minutes more he must be a prisoner, and he did not care. a mournful voice seemed to chant in his ears, slow and solemn as a dirge, ‘the grizzly is dead! the grizzly is dead!’ and all concern for himself vanished in the presence of this overwhelming sorrow.
then, as he stood, the sound of the well-known voice thrilled him like an electric shock, jarring his whole frame with the one pregnant monosyllable, ‘run!’ and, without stopping to question or to reason, he turned his face and fled. fled at first madly, unthinkingly, right in the teeth of the advancing enemy. he had no knowledge of ephraim’s whereabouts—whether he was ahead of him or behind him. he was alive—that was just enough then—and on went lucius like the wind.
when two people are running at top speed in the same line, but from opposite extremes, it stands to reason that, sooner or later, they will meet. and this is exactly what happened now. they met, lucius and the leading man of the racing sentinels—met with a crash, like two charging footballers—with the result that both went down in a heap upon the ground.
lucius was the first to recover himself, and the shock seemed to clear his brain, so that he realised sharply what he was doing in thus throwing himself into the arms of his foes. he was a slow thinker as a rule—or, rather, he seldom troubled himself to think at all; but now his plans were formed upon the instant, such a stimulus is necessity.
tearing himself free from the man upon the ground, he leaped to his feet, and running a few paces, still towards the advancing crowd, wheeled round suddenly, and with a loud shout of ‘this way! over here!’ rushed back by the way he had come, only at a much slower pace.
fortunate it was for him that it was so dark. guided by his voice, the soldiers hurried after him, surrounded him, noted him running in their midst in the same direction as themselves, and—passed him by.
still lucius held on, slowing down at every stride, till the last man of the supports, puffing and blowing, shot ahead of him, and then he turned in his tracks once more, and sped like a deer towards the confederate lines.
he took a diagonal path, making by instinct for the corner of the wood, which more than once that day had been their means of salvation, and reaching it after a tearing run of nearly a mile, plunged just inside its border and flung himself face downwards to recover his wind.
all at once, as he lay, a sharp pang shot through him. the grizzly! where was he? was he, too, running for his life in the open? had he reached the wood? or, bitter thought, had he been captured after all? the bare possibility stung lucius into action, and he leaped again to his feet, glaring wildly round him in the dark.
what would they do with him if he were taken? 202would they shoot him then and there? or would they take him back to the camp, and after a mere formality of a trial, hang him like a dog? lucius strained his ears until they pained him, listening for the fatal shot. but he heard nothing. ‘oh, grizzly,’ he thought bitterly, ‘if you are taken, if you are shot, and i have run away and left you to your fate!’
he was hardly fair to himself in his sharp self-upbraiding. to run had been the grizzly’s own command, and he had obeyed implicitly. he began to take a little comfort. perhaps they had only missed one another in the dark. perhaps the grizzly was even now in safety, waiting opportunity to make a dash for the confederate lines. he would go on. then again the cruel thought, ‘what if he be a captive while i am free?’ ‘go on and save yourself, at all events,’ whispered self-preservation. ‘it is what he himself would have you do.’
‘and just because it is what he would have me do,’ answered the spirit of manliness in the boy’s breast, ‘i will not do it. i will go back and find him, if i have to march right into the federal camp.’
he was almost beside himself with pain and grief, but the one idea took possession of him, and in his brain the words repeated themselves over and over again: ‘go back and find him! go back and find him!’
‘oh, if i had but a gun!’ he sighed, ‘i would make somebody pay for this.’
his hands struck against his cartridge belt. ‘pah!’ he said in disgust, opening the pouch. ‘what is the use of you without a gun?’ then a gasp of astonishment escaped him. his fingers, idly groping in the 203pouch, had encountered a piece of folded paper—two pieces.
for a moment he could not understand it, and then the meaning flashed across him, and everything became clear. in the dark of the cave he had picked up and assumed ephraim’s belt instead of his own. the papers were general shields’s despatch to general frémont, and the written order to colonel spriggs regarding the escaped prisoners.
luce’s first feeling was one of joy that, even if the grizzly were taken, at all events nothing compromising would be found upon him. his second, a wild impulse to fling away the despatch, and rid himself of its dangerous companionship. but something restrained him in the very act, and the thought crossed him: ‘the fate of an army may depend upon that paper, and that army your own. you must carry it to general jackson.’
poor lucius! he was on the horns of a dreadful dilemma. if he were caught with that paper upon him, it would be short shrift, he knew, and few questions asked. yet if he did not deliver it, the consequences to the confederates might be fearfully disastrous. and yet again, if he did attempt to carry it through, he must turn his back upon his friend, presuming him to be a prisoner, and after the thoughts of self-preservation in which he had indulged, how could he do that without laying himself open to the charge of grasping an excuse to ensure his own safety by an attempt to reach the confederate lines?
he wrung his hands together in the extremity of his despair. which was the right thing to do? who would help him in this desperate strait?
he leaned against a tree, his head throbbing and his whole mind bewildered in the presence of the most serious problem he had ever had to face. then once again came to him one of those mysterious, silent promptings, so frequent in the last anguished quarter of an hour. and this time it was as if ephraim spoke: ‘do yer duty, luce, and never mind me.’
‘i will,’ he cried aloud, dashing the tears from his eyes. ‘i will. but i’ll come back and find you afterwards, grizzly, if i die for it!’
he braced himself up to consider the best means to carry out his dual resolve. he knew very well that, no matter how many men might have been detached to the aid of the sentry at the ditch, the federal outposts would still remain in their place, with beyond them the last line of sentinels on the side of jackson’s army. to reach his goal he must first pass this obstacle, and he realised that in the ferment raised by the present crisis, the time for further stratagem had passed, and that his only hope lay in making a rush for it.
a sense of uneasiness was everywhere, and the outposts were especially alert. not only had the rumour spread of the presence in camp and subsequent escape therefrom of a supposed rebel spy, but there was a pretty well defined feeling that the morrow would not pass without an attack on the part of jackson, though exactly how or where the blow would be delivered, no man could say. therefore the outposts kept even stricter watch than usual, ready at the first sign of the advance of the enemy to give the alarm and fall back upon the camp, where, on that night, the federal soldiers lay on their arms.
the uneasy feeling was justified by what was happening in the confederate camp. the night had descended upon another federal repulse. the veteran ewell had hurled back frémont at cross keys, and driven him from the field after a long and desperate conflict. then, when the darkness put a stop to the operations, jackson recalled the troops of ewell, and leaving a strong rearguard in front of frémont, returned to port republic. here he hastily constructed a foot-bridge, by means of wagons placed end to end, over the south fork of the shenandoah, and gave orders that at dawn his infantry were to cross and try conclusions with shields at lewiston. he then retired to snatch a few hours of well-earned repose. shields, meanwhile, had managed to get a second despatch conveyed to frémont, laying before him a plan of operations which differed little from those set forth in the lost despatch; for as ephraim had shrewdly surmised, there was but scant time to alter the disposition of an entire army; and, moreover, shields, sanguine to the last, could not bring himself to believe that, from a camp so strongly guarded, the spy had really been able to make good his escape. he was convinced that if accident did not deliver the bold rebel into his hands during the night, his capture would certainly be accomplished in the morning. that there were two people concerned in this escapade he had never fully realised, and that the despatch had passed from one hand to another, he never even dreamed.
fully alive to the dangers of the situation, lucius moved cautiously along, feeling the edge of the wood lest he should lose himself in its gloomy depths, and every moment drawing nearer to the federal outposts. a white glow on the hill-tops warned him that the moon was rising, and he prayed earnestly that the clouds which were driving across the sky would form up and shut behind them the silver light which would make the difficulties of his perilous advance so much greater.
suddenly he pulled up short. not far away he heard a sound, a suppressed cough. there it was again, its owner evidently doing his best to stifle it. lucius surmised clearly enough from whom the sound proceeded. it was one of the communicating sentries between the outposts and their reserves. he felt rather than heard that the man was walking in his direction, and with the painful thought troubling him, ‘what if i were to cough or sneeze?’ drew close behind a tree to wait till he had passed by. standing there, he heard another sound—the measured tramp of feet, as if a body of men were stealthily approaching him. the sentry heard it too, for he halted a few paces from lucius and prepared to act.
‘halt!’ he challenged in a guarded voice, at the same time bringing his rifle to the charge. ‘who comes there?’
‘patrol!’ was the reply, also given in an undertone.
‘stand, patrol! advance one and give the countersign!’
some one stepped forward to the point of the sentry’s bayonet, and answered in a tone so low as to be almost a whisper: ‘winchester!’
‘so,’ thought lucius, who caught the word, ‘the countersign has been changed. that is how grizzly 207came to be stopped at the ditch. well, it won’t do me any good, for i dare not try it on now.’
‘pass, patrol! all’s well!’ said the sentry, still keeping his rifle at the charge.
the patrol moved on, the officer in charge turning back to inquire: ‘any sign of the spy?’
‘no, sir,’ replied the sentry, and luce’s heart thrilled with joy at the word.
presently the sentry resumed his beat, and lucius slipped past and continued his heedful advance. the most difficult part of his work lay before him, for the outposts were in strength, and their advanced sentries had also to be negotiated. still he thought that, once past the outposts, he would be able to show the sentinels a clean pair of heels. but there was one thing on which he had not reckoned, and presently he came upon a sight which took his breath away. a line of light lay right across his path—the bivouac fires of the pickets.
they extended as far as he could see on either hand, and the boy’s heart sank within him as he wondered how he should pass across that line of radiant light without being discovered. however, on closer investigation, he saw to his intense relief that, though the fires were not very far apart, yet between each was a dark space, and through one of these he trusted to be able to slip. moreover, he noted that, while most of the men were lying down, some few were standing up or walking about, and so was led to hope that his upright figure, if observed at all, would not attract attention.
there was no help for it—it had to be done; so drawing a long breath he set his teeth hard, and making 208carefully for the dark path between two of the fires, advanced with firm and deliberate step.
some one spoke to him as he came on. he did not hear the question, but he was conscious of returning an answer of some sort, though a moment afterwards he could not have told what he had said.
he reached the coveted path between the two fires, and again a soldier who was reclining by one of them hailed him.
‘that yew, dick?’ asked the man. ‘why can’t yew keep still? i believe yew’re a funk.’
lucius spared a thought to bless the restless dick, and strode on.
‘dick,’ said the man again, ‘did yew hear that?—why, dick! look at him! by’——
for lucius had passed beyond the line, and casting all idea of further concealment to the winds, leaped forward like a startled hare.
in a moment all was bustle and confusion. the pickets sprang to arms, orders were shouted in rapid succession, and twenty men darted upon the track of the fugitive, while the advance sentries, hearing the commotion, stopped on their beat, eagerly waiting the explanation of the unusual disturbance, which, so far as they were concerned, seemed to come from the wrong quarter.
the very energy of the pursuit saved lucius; for sentries, pursuers, and pursued were all mixed up in one inextricable tangle in the darkness, and the noise the soldiers made in following him of itself prevented them from getting any clear idea of his whereabouts.
on he dashed. shots were fired here and there at 209random; but if any one was hit it was not lucius, and in less than five minutes he plumped into the middle of a confederate picket, under arms, and ready for an affair of outposts, if that were what the noise presaged.
‘i surrender! i surrender!’ panted lucius. ‘take me prisoner! quick!’
‘i reckon ef thet’s what ye’ve come fer, ye’ve got yer way,’ said a confederate soldier gruffly, at the same time seizing him by the arm. ‘air thar enny more er you uns on the road?’
‘no,’ gasped lucius; ‘there’s only me. take me to the general. quick! oh, do be quick!’
‘take ye to the ginrul! thet’s good! ho! ho!’ the men around broke into loud laughter; but an officer, coming up at that moment, sternly ordered silence, and raising a lantern to look at lucius, demanded who he was, and what he meant by running into them like that.
‘i want to see the general,’ repeated lucius, who just then could think of nothing else to say.
‘state your business to me,’ said the officer. ‘i will be the judge as to whether it is of sufficient importance to justify the granting of your request. are you a deserter from the enemy? do you bring news of his movements?’
‘no—yes,’ replied lucius hurriedly. ‘i mean i am not a deserter, but i bring important news,’
‘if you are not a deserter, what do you mean by wearing that uniform? explain yourself,’
‘captain,’ answered lucius earnestly, ‘believe me, i am telling the truth. i found this uniform, and put it on to disguise myself. i have a despatch from general 210shields to general frémont, and i will give it to the general, if you will take me to him.’
‘give it to me,’ urged the captain, holding out his hand. lucius hesitated. if he gave up the despatch and then asked leave to return, the captain would become suspicious of a trick, and perhaps detain him there till the rounds passed by, and so valuable time would be lost. he felt that his only resource lay in an appeal to some one in authority who would grant him the required permission, and the memory of jackson’s face at staunton on that last sunday suggested that the appeal should be made to him, and him alone. ‘he will understand me,’ thought lucius; ‘these other fellows will not.’ aloud he said: ‘captain, i’ve gone through a good deal—in fact, i’ve risked my life—to bring that despatch here, and i beseech you to let me give it to the general with my own hands. more depends upon it than you think.’
the captain considered. the earnest pleading moved him. ‘who are you?’ he asked at length.
‘i belong to staunton,’ answered lucius. ‘my fa——i have a relative in this army.’
‘who may that be?’ inquired the captain, for it was no uncommon thing for different members of a family to be fighting on opposite sides of the line.
‘i’d rather not say,’ answered lucius. ‘oh, captain, let me go. i am sure that the general will tell you you have done right if you do.’
‘corporal,’ said the captain, after another moment’s reflection, ‘take this fellow to headquarters. report the affair to the adjutant, and hear what he has to say.’
lucius thanked him gratefully, and presently started for the village between two men, the corporal leading the way.
‘hi!’ shouted the captain after him. ‘was there any sign of movement on the part of the enemy when you left?’
‘no,’ answered lucius; ‘all was quiet. it was me they were after.’
to all the numerous questions of the corporal, as they marched along, he maintained a rigid silence, and at last they reached the house where general jackson had taken up his quarters for the night.
leaving lucius in charge of the two soldiers, the corporal slipped past the sentry and rapped up the adjutant-general, who occupied a room in the same house, and who at once rose and came down-stairs on hearing what was the matter.
to him lucius repeated his story, winding up with a supplication that he might be allowed to give his message to the general himself.
‘corporal, remain on guard here.—you, fellow, follow me,’ said the adjutant.
the corporal saluted, and lucius, his heart thumping with excitement, followed his guide upstairs.
the adjutant paused at a door and knocked softly. as there was no reply, he turned the handle, and entered the room with lucius at his heels.
a candle was burning on a table by the window, and by its light lucius discerned the figure of an officer, fully dressed, even to his sword and jack-boots, lying face downwards across the bed. he stirred uneasily at the noise, turned over, and then sat up, yawning and rubbing his eyes. it was general jackson.
‘pendleton!’ he exclaimed, starting from the bed and standing erect upon the floor. ‘you! what is the matter?’
‘all is quiet, general; and i would not have ventured to disturb you; but this fellow here avers that he brings important news of the enemy, which he will communicate to no one but you. so far as i can judge, he is telling the truth, so i brought him up.’
‘what is your news?’ asked jackson quietly of lucius.
lucius glanced at the adjutant. it was possible that if he heard the story he might throw his influence into the scale against a return to the federal camp. it would be easier, he thought, to manage general jackson alone. so he answered: ‘i would rather speak to you alone, general.’
‘leave us, pendleton,’ said the general.
‘but, sir,’ protested the adjutant, ‘i—he’——he made a step forward and ran his hands all over lucius to see if by any chance he carried hidden weapons. finding none, he saluted and withdrew.
jackson smiled at his subordinate’s excess of caution, and turning to lucius, addressed him again with: ‘now then, my man, what is your news? out with it.’
lucius drew a breath of relief. the general did not recognise him, which was scarcely wonderful, for they had met but once, and then lucius had presented a very different appearance.
he made no verbal answer, but drawing the soiled and crumpled despatch from his pouch, handed it silently to the general. equally in silence jackson received the package, and withdrawing to the table, sat down to examine it. no sooner had he read the superscription than he glanced sharply round at lucius, but restraining himself, broke open the envelope and began to peruse the contents. he smiled as he read on, for the plans of shields were so exactly what he had hoped and even prognosticated they would be. he did not look up again, though, until he had finished his scrutiny of the document. then he rose, and holding the paper in one hand, laid the fore-finger of the other upon it, and fixing his keen blue eyes upon lucius as if he would read his very heart, asked sharply: ‘how did you come by this?’
lucius was prepared for the question. while the general had been busied with the despatch, he had been debating with himself how to explain his position. he was sharp enough to know that if once his identity with lucius markham were revealed, all hope of being able to rejoin ephraim would be at an end. his one chance lay in allowing the general to suppose him an ordinary citizen of the valley. he concluded, therefore, that while suppressing his name, his best and wisest course would be to furnish a plain and simple statement of facts. so he answered at once:
‘i will tell you, general. early this morning my companion and myself—both of us live in the valley—were taken prisoners by a number of federal stragglers. we were roughly handled, but escaped, and concealed ourselves in the wood between this and lewiston. there we found two dead federal soldiers, and disguised ourselves in their uniforms. presently we were seen and forced to march to the attack upon the bridge this morning. when the yankees ran away, we were obliged to run with them, and once more took refuge in a hut in the wood. while there we overheard a 216conversation of general shields with a federal scout, and determined to try and intercept the despatches he carried. we were successful, and tried to get up the river in the spy’s own boat, but as we had no oars, the current carried us down, and we only got ashore after a great deal of trouble. we were getting along all right, when we were challenged. there was a fight in which my companion got the best of the sentry, and then we broke and ran, and lost each other. i had the despatch in my pouch, and came on with it at once. i was nearly caught at the last post.’
jackson listened in silence to luce’s explanation, and when he had finished, remarked drily: ‘that sounds a very plausible story; but how am i to know that it is a true one?’
lucius flushed through the dirt which encrusted his cheeks. he was about to reply in his usual haughty and imperious style, but remembering his assumed character in time, choked back the words and said instead: ‘you have only my word for it, general, of course; but the despatch itself is a proof of what i have told you.’
‘not at all,’ was the unexpected retort; ‘for even that may not be genuine. the whole thing, including your assumption of the federal uniform, may be merely a device to impose upon my credulity and lead me into a trap.’
at this lucius was so completely taken aback that for a moment or two he had nothing to say. then, as jackson regarded him with his shrewd, dry smile, he burst out passionately: ‘general, we have risked our lives all along the line to bring you that despatch. one of us is, for all i know, a prisoner, or perhaps dead. we could have got away easily enough by simply stopping in our hiding-place if we had not tried to do you this service. if you don’t believe me, i can’t help it; but i declare upon my honour as a southerner that i have told you the truth.’
the last words came out with so proud a ring that stonewall eyed him curiously.
‘who are you?’ he demanded by way of reply.
‘i live in the valley,’ answered lucius vaguely. ‘so does my chum.—oh, sir, sir,’ he broke off wildly, ‘do believe me and let me go! they may be killing him even now.’
jackson started in astonishment, and took a step forward. ‘you don’t ask me to believe,’ he said, ‘that you contemplate returning to the federal lines to look for him?’
‘i do, i do!’ cried lucius. ‘why should i not? twice or thrice already to-day he would have given his life to save mine. how can i desert him now? it would be too base.’
the utter simplicity of the thing carried its own conviction with it. no professional trickster would delude himself into the belief that, coming from the federal lines, he would be at once allowed to return there on the strength of his own story. the genuine emotion of the young man, as he supposed him to be, went straight to jackson’s warm heart.
‘do not distress yourself, my young friend,’ he said kindly; ‘i believe you. but as regards your comrade, what do you imagine you can effect by going back?’
‘this,’ answered lucius, as the recollection of the hut in the forest came to him like an inspiration: ‘if he has not been taken, and has not been able to break through their line, i know where he will go to look for me. i will go there. i can find out that way whether he is dead or a prisoner, or alive and free.’
‘no,’ answered jackson; ‘for he might reach our lines just while you were looking for him. you could do no good, and for your own sake, if for no other reason, i cannot allow you to return. i do not suspect your honesty,’ as lucius made a passionate gesture; ‘but it would serve no useful purpose. to-morrow, if god blesses our arms as he has hitherto done, we shall sweep shields from the field, and your comrade, if he has not managed to escape, may be recovered in the struggle. at the worst he will be sent north with other prisoners, and exchanged in due course.’
‘oh, but you are forgetting that he is a civilian,’ urged lucius, ‘and that if they find out that he took the despatch, they will kill him for it.’ his voice trembled so that he could hardly enunciate the words.
‘they would serve you the same way if they got hold of you,’ answered jackson.
‘but they shall not get hold of me, general,’ said lucius. ‘i know their word, i wear their uniform, and i know the way. once i get to the wood i shall be all right. besides,’ he added cunningly, ‘as soon as i have found out what has become of him, i will return and give you fresh information about the troops—all i can collect.’
‘my scouts are out already,’ answered jackson, ‘and there is little likelihood that you would be able to accomplish more than they will with their trained powers of observation.’
‘have they brought you a despatch like that?’ asked lucius, with a certain pride in his voice.
‘a fair hit,’ returned jackson, smiling. ‘no; but i may tell you that the information i have received through them tallies exactly with the contents of the despatch, which is perhaps fortunate for you. so you see that you have but confirmed the knowledge i already possess. in saying that, i do not wish to underrate the value of the service you have performed. if you were a soldier, i should know how to reward you. as it is’——
‘general,’ broke in lucius, ‘i never thought of reward. something told me it was my duty, and i tried to do it. but if i have really been of service, give me leave to go back. that is all i ask.—oh, general, if you knew what friends we are! if you knew what he has done for me! and i stand here talking while perhaps he——oh, general, let me go! let me go!’ he sprang forwards with clasped hands, his chest heaving, his breath coming and going in quick, short gasps, while great tears, which only pride kept from falling, rose in his eyes.
‘you are a devoted friend, young man,’ said jackson, moved by his passionate appeal. ‘if i thought you could do any good——you know the country?’ he broke off.
‘oh yes, yes,’ cried lucius. ‘that part of it, at least. haven’t i been running around there all day?’
‘when you broke away from the sentry who stopped you, and took to flight, i suppose you would both be likely to take the same direction?’ queried general jackson.
‘i imagine so,’ answered lucius. ‘why?’
‘because if your friend succeeded in making our lines, he would most likely enter them at or near the point that you did. come,’ he added kindly; ‘to relieve your anxiety, we will go together and make inquiries.’
he caught up his hat, and beckoning lucius to follow him, strode out of the room.
outside, the adjutant-general was anxiously awaiting him, and jackson stopped a moment to whisper a few instructions.
‘tell them to meet me here in three-quarters of an hour,’ he concluded.—‘now, young man, come with me.’
they walked on for some distance in silence; but at last lucius said shyly: ‘i beg your pardon, general, but we could hear the firing as we lay in the woods. would you mind telling me whether you whipped frémont to-day, or yesterday, for i don’t know what the time is?’
‘by the blessing of god we were victorious,’ answered jackson devoutly.
‘hurrah!’ cried lucius. ‘we were certain you would be. it will be the same to-day, or to-morrow, or whenever it is. oh, general, when we stood among the yanks this morning and watched you on the hill when our fellows carried the bridge, we felt we wouldn’t mind being killed, so long as our side won. it was glorious!’
‘you ought to have been soldiers, you two,’ said jackson, laughing at his enthusiasm; ‘but i suppose you prefer your ploughs and harrows. farmers, aren’t you?’
‘oh, well, some one must look after the crops, i 221suppose,’ answered lucius evasively, glad of this loophole to escape the inconvenient question of identity.
‘quite so,’ admitted the general with a sigh; ‘but i fear that before long you will have to beat your ploughshares into swords, for we shall need all the stout hearts and strong arms we can muster in the trouble that is coming upon us.’
‘you shan’t have to wait long for me,’ exclaimed lucius fervently. ‘once i get home again, nothing shall keep me from joining, and so i’ll tell them.’
‘halt! who comes there?’
it was a sentry on the inner line of pickets who challenged them, and as in answer to the general’s question he reported all well, they passed beyond him and hurried towards the outposts.
here, too, all was quiet. there had been no further scare, and presently they reached the picket in charge of the captain who had forwarded lucius to headquarters. he saluted the general, and glancing in some surprise at lucius, whom he recognised, observed that he hoped he had been right in what he had done.
‘perfectly,’ returned jackson. ‘no one else has come in since this young man, i suppose?’
‘only one of our scouts, sir,’ replied the captain. ‘he is on his way to you now. he reported a scrimmage somewhere between this and lewiston. he couldn’t tell what it was about; but there was a great fuss, and some one, he presumed a prisoner, was being taken to the federal camp. he was unable to ascertain whether it was one of his brother scouts or not.’
at this doleful communication, lucius felt his heart leap, and like lightning a plan flashed through his brain. he sprang to jackson’s side, and caught his hand in both his own.
‘general,’ he cried in piercing tones, ‘that must have been my friend. i am sure of it. i will go, if i die for it. do you remember you spoke to me in staunton that sunday? i am lucius markham. if i never come back, tell my father it was i who brought in the despatch.’ and before the astonished general could move a finger to stop him, he had darted away and sprung beyond the outpost.
‘stop him! fire on him!’ shouted the captain, who was very far from comprehending the meaning of the scene.
‘order arms!’ commanded the general loudly, as some of the soldiers levelled their guns at the rapidly disappearing lucius. ‘let him go. you will never catch him now. no pursuit, captain. good-night.’ he turned away and walked quickly back to his quarters. ‘lucius markham!’ he muttered to himself as he hurried along. ‘well, somehow i thought i knew his face. the plucky little rascal! i remember he was burning to be allowed to join. what with his dirt and his bandages, he looked so much older that it is no wonder i did not recognise him. who is this friend of his, and what have they been up to between them? well, well, i can do nothing but pray that no evil may befall him, for his father’s sake. he is in the hand of god. i can do nothing—nothing.’
a solitary shot from the direction of the federal outposts. general jackson stopped and listened anxiously. then as all was still, he shook his head sadly, and turning once more upon his heel, went slowly on.
