"Kyar for Mas" Baillie? Ain"t I his n.i.g.g.a? An" ain"t he de mastah of Warlock? Kyar for him? Why, Mis" Agatha, I"se ready to lay down an" die dis heah very minute "case he"s done got hisse"f shot an" captured."
"Then you are willing to take some risks for his sake?"
"Sho" as shootin" I is. Yes, sho"er"n shootin", "case shootin" ain"t always sho". Jes" you tell me how to do anything for Mas" Baillie, an"
then bet all the money you done got, an" put your mortal soul into de bet, dat Sam"ll face de very debil hisse"f to carry out yer "structions."
"I believe you, Sam, and I"m going to trust you. You will go with me to Willoughby to-morrow. We"ll start soon in the morning and get there before night. From there I"m going to send you north to find your master. I"ll tell you how to do it. When you find him, you are to stay with him and nurse him, no matter where he is. And when he gets well enough, you must find some way of setting him free from the hospital so that he can make his way back to Virginia again."
"But, Mis" Agatha, how"s I to--"
"Never mind the details now. I"ll tell you about all that when I get my plans ready. I"ll tell you everything you must do and how to do it, so far as I can, and you must depend on your wits for the rest. You"re pretty quick, I think."
"Yes"m; anyhow I kin see through a millstone ef there"s a hole through it. But, Mis" Agatha, is you sho" "nuff gwine to tell me how to fin"
Mas" Baillie an" take kyar o" him?"
Agatha rea.s.sured him, and sent him off to sleep in order to be ready for their early start in the morning. Then she joined Stuart and asked him:
"Did you pick up any prisoners near the point where Captain Pegram fell?"
"I really don"t know. Why?"
"Why, if you did you"d know to what command they belonged, and that would help me."
"Help you? Why, what are you planning?"
"To find Captain Pegram."
"But how?"
"Through my agents,--and Sam, his body-servant."
"O, I see. Your underground railroad is to have a pa.s.senger traffic.
I"ll find out what you wish to know. And if you"d like I"ll have Sam pa.s.sed through our lines, after which he can pretend to be a runaway."
"I thought of that," Agatha answered, "but it will not do. I must send him through my friends. You see in Maryland he"ll require a slave"s pa.s.s from a master, and my friends will be his masters, one after another.
Besides, they will help me find out in what hospital Captain Pegram is.
I"ve thought it all out. I must first prepare my friends for Sam"s coming. With your permission I"ll take him with me to Willoughby to-morrow."
"You are a wonderful woman!"
That is all that Stuart said, but it sufficiently suggested the admiration he felt for her courage, her resourcefulness, and her womanly devotion. Bidding her call upon him for any a.s.sistance she might need in carrying out her plans, he dismissed her for the night, ordering her to go to sleep precisely as he might have ordered a soldier to go to his tent. But Agatha did not obey as the soldier would have done. She went to bed, indeed, but she could not sleep. Her nerves were all a-quiver as the result of the trying experiences to which she had been subjected, until now her excited brain simply would not sink into quietude. She lay hour after hour staring into the darkness, thinking, thinking, thinking. She remembered the words that suffering on her account had wrung from Baillie Pegram that morning at the bivouac, and she bitterly reproached herself for having given him no worthier answer than a command to forget what he had said. She knew now with what measure of devotion this man loved her, and she knew something else, too, as she lay there in the darkness face to face with her own soul. She knew now that she loved Baillie Pegram with all that was best in her proud and pa.s.sionate nature. That truth confronted her. It was "naked and not ashamed." Her conscience scourged her for what she regarded as her heartlessness and frivolity in putting aside his declaration of love with the false pretence that it found no response in her own soul.
"I might at least have thanked him," she thought. "I might at least have said to him "there is no longer war between me and thee." And now he lies dead perhaps, or on a bed of suffering,--a wounded prisoner in the hands of the enemy. All that I can now do is to search him out and send Sam to nurse and comfort him." Then a new thought came to her. "That is _not_ all that I can do. Shame upon me for thinking so, even for a moment. I can go to him myself, and I will, if G.o.d lets him live long enough. I"ll take Sam with me. He can be very helpful in the search, with his sharp wits and the freedom from suspicion which his black face will secure him."
The dawn was breaking now, and a score of bugles were musically sounding the reveille in the camps round about. Agatha rose quickly, and without summoning her weary maid, plunged her face into a basin of cold water half a dozen times. Then seeing in her little mirror how hollow-eyed and haggard she was, she wetted a towel and flagellated herself with it till the colour came back and her nerves lost their tremulousness.
So great a transformation did this treatment work, that Stuart complimented her upon her freshness of face when she appeared at the breakfast-table. He had meanwhile secured for her definite information as to the Federal command that had made Pegram prisoner. He had also managed in some way to secure a side-saddle for her to ride upon, and a squad of cavalrymen, under command of a sergeant, was waiting outside to be her escort on her journey.
"Thank you, General, for giving me so good a mount," she said, glancing with a practised eye at the lean but powerful animal provided for her use.
"You should have a better one, if a better were to be had. You deserve it. By the way, you need not send the horse back by the escort. He will not be needed here, for a time at least."
Agatha looked at him, and then at the animal again, this time recognising it as the one that Baillie Pegram had ridden by her side twenty-four hours before.
"He belongs to Captain Pegram, I believe," she answered.
"Yes, his second horse, and he is specially careful of him."
"I"ll see that the animal is well cared for," answered the girl, "until--"
She did not finish the sentence, and Stuart turned away, pretending not to see the tears that stood beneath her eyelids.
XX
_TWO HOME-COMINGS_
News of Agatha"s safe return to Virginia had been sent to Colonel Archer by a courier, on the morning of her arrival at Stuart"s headquarters, and the octogenarian promenaded up and down the porch all the next day, during her homeward journey.
He had greatly grieved to have his "ladybird" undertake her late perilous enterprise at all. But with him at least Agatha was accustomed to have her way, and moreover the spirit of the old soldier was strong within him still, so that he was intensely in sympathy with Agatha"s courageous purpose to render such service as a woman might to the cause that both had at heart.
But Agatha had a harder task before her now. Remembering the heart-broken tone in which he had bidden her good-bye on the former occasion, and easily imagining the suffering he must have endured during her absence, both from loneliness and from apprehension for her safety, she thought with something like terror of her new necessity of leaving him again, almost in the very hour of his joy at her return. For it was her resolute purpose to set out again within a very few days,--as soon, indeed, as she could feel confidence that her preliminary letters would reach their destination before her own arrival there.
There were other matters that troubled her, too. She must tell her Chummie the reason for her second journey, and that would be a distressing thing for her to do. She must tell him frankly--for she would never in the least trifle with truth, especially in dealing with him--that she had learned to love Baillie Pegram, and that she had in effect put it out of possibility that Baillie Pegram should ever ask for knowledge of that fact.
To a woman of her sensitively proud nature, such a confession, even to her grandfather, seemed almost shameful. She shrank from the very thought of it, and flushed crimson every time it came to her mind during that long day"s ride. Yet not for one moment did she falter in her determination to undergo the ordeal. Not for one moment did she entertain a thought of evading the painful confession, or in any way disguising the truth. So much was due to her grandfather, and never in her life had she cheated him of his dues as Chummie. It was due to herself also. To shrink from a duty because of its painfulness would be cowardice, and there was no touch or trace of that most detestable weakness in her soul.
"Anyhow," she resolved, "I"ll let him have one whole day of joy before I grieve him with the news that I must go away again. And in telling him of my first journey I"ll say as little as I can about the dangers encountered and the hardships endured; I"ll make as much of a frolic of it as I can in the telling. Surely there will be no untruthfulness in that."
That day"s journey was a long one, but the start was early, and Baillie Pegram"s horse was a willing one, as that energetic young man"s horses were apt to be, while as for the troopers of the escort, they and their horses were accustomed to follow at any pace their leader might set. It was barely three o"clock in the afternoon, therefore, when the cavalcade arrived at Willoughby, and Agatha threw herself into the old gentleman"s arms.
"Oh, Agatha!"
"Oh, Chummie!"
That at first was all that the two could say. When Colonel Archer found voice he greeted the troopers and bade them leave their horses to the care of his servants. For the men were of that cla.s.s, socially, to which Colonel Archer belonged, and there was no thought at that time in Virginia of treating a gentleman otherwise than as a gentleman, merely because he happened to be a private soldier.
"You will be my guests for the night," the host said, quite as if that settled the matter. But the sergeant had orders which he must obey,--orders which Stuart, with his unfailing foresight, had probably given, to make sure that the presence of his men at Willoughby overnight might not spoil an occasion of tender affection.
"Thank you very cordially, Colonel Archer," answered the sergeant; "but we are under orders to move on toward Loudoun County to-night. We are permitted to rest the horses for three hours only. After that we must march about a dozen miles before sleeping, so that we may complete a little scouting expedition into Loudoun to-morrow. Our orders on that point are peremptory."
"Well, Ladybird, we"ll have the gentlemen to dinner at any rate. As soon as I heard of your coming I went out with my gun, and brought back two big wild turkeys, as fat as b.u.t.ter. I thought you might come under escort, so I"ve had them put both the birds on the spit. I"ll wager you gentlemen haven"t seen a wild turkey this fall."
So he ran on with his hospitable greetings, managing in his joyous nervousness to upset two of the gla.s.ses which he had ordered a servant to bring with the decanters, for the troopers" refreshment. Agatha managed presently to get a word with him aside.
"It is three o"clock, Chummie--an hour before dinner. I"ll have time enough to boil myself a little. Think of it, Chummie, I haven"t had a hot bath for a whole week!" Then turning to her escort she excused herself until the dinner-hour.