A car full of leaf tobacco had been brought in that day, and
Berkley secured a little of it for his pipe.
Seated on the edge of the shaky veranda in the darkness, he filled
and lighted his cob pipe and, smoking tranquilly, listened to the
distant cannonade which had begun about sundown. Thousands of
fire-flies sailed low in the damp swale beyond the store-house, or,
clinging motionless to the long wet grass and vines, sparkled
palely at intervals. There was no wind. Far on the southern
horizon the muttering thunder became heavier and more distinct.
From where he sat he could now watch the passage of the great
mortar shells through the sky, looking like swiftly moving comets
cleaving unfathomable space; then, falling, faster and faster,
dropping out of the heights of night, they seemed to leave behind
them tracks of fire that lingered on the dazzled retina long after
they had disappeared. The explosion of the incendiary shells was
even more spectacular; the burning matter of the chemical charge
fell from them in showers of clear blue and golden stars, dropping
slowly toward the unseen river below.
He could distinguish the majestic thunder of the huge mortars from
the roar of the Parrotts; the irregular volleys of musketry had a
resonant clang of metal in them like thousands of iron balls
dropped on a sheet of tin.
For an hour the distant display of fireworks continued, then the
thunder rolled away, deadened to a dull rumour, and died out; and
the last lingering spark of Greek fire faded in mid-heaven. A
wavering crimson light brightened on the horizon, increasing,
deepening. But what it was that had been set on fire he could not
guess. Paigecourt lay in that direction.
He extended his booted legs, propped his back against a pillar, and
continued smoking carefully and economically to save his fragments
of Virginia leaf, deeply absorbed in retrospection.
For the first time he was now certain of the change which time,
circumstance, and environment had wrought in himself; he was
curiously conscious of the silent growth of a germ which, one day,
must become a dictatorial and arbitrary habit--the habit of right
thinking. The habit of duty, independent of circumstances, had
slowly grown with his military training; mind and body had learned
automatically to obey; mind and body now definitely recognised the
importance of obedience, were learning to desire it, had begun to
take an obscure sort of pride in it. Mind and body were already
subservient to discipline. How was it with his other self.
In the human soul there is seldom any real perplexity. Only the
body reasons; the soul knows. He knew this now. He knew, too,
that there is a greater drill-master than that which was now
disciplining his mind and body--the spiritual will--that there is a
higher sentiment than the awakened instinct of mental and physical
obedience--the occult loyalty of the spirit. And, within him,
something was now awaking out of night, slowly changing him, soul
and body.
As he sat there, tranquil, pondering, there came a shadowy figure,
moving leisurely under the lighted windows of the hospital,
directly toward him--a man swinging a lantern low above the
grass--and halted beside him in a yellow shaft of light,
"Berkley," he said pleasantly; then, to identify himself, lifted
the lantern to a level with his face.
"Dr. Benton!"
"Surely--surely. I come from Paigecourt. I left Mrs. Craig and
Stephen about five o'clock; I have just left Miss Lynden on duty.
May I sit here beside you, Phil? And, in the first place, how are
you, old fellow?"
"Perfectly well, doctor. . . . I am glad to see you. . . . It is
pleasant to see you. . . . I am well; I really am. You are, too;
I can see that. . . . I want to shake hands with you again--to
wish you happiness," he added in a low voice. "Will you accept my
warmest wishes, Dr. Benton?"
They exchanged a hard, brief grip.
"I know what you mean. Thank you, Phil. . . . I am very happy; I
mean that she shall be. Always."
Berkley said: "There are few people I really care for. She is
among the few."
"I have believed so. . . . She cares, deeply, for you. . . . She
is right." . . . He paused and glanced over his shoulder at the
crimson horizon. "What was that shelling about? The gun-boats were
firing, too."
"I haven't any idea. Something is on fire, evidently. I hope it
is not Paigecourt."
"God forbid!"
The doctor looked hard at the fiery sky, but said nothing more.
"How is Stephen?" asked the younger man earnestly.
"Better."
"Is he going to get well?"
Dr. Benton thought a moment.
"He was struck by a conoidal ball, which entered just above the
interclavicular notch of the sternum and lodged near the superior
angle of the scapula. Assistant Surgeon Jenning, U. S. V., removed
the bullet and applied simple dressings. There was a longitudinal
groove on the bullet which may have been caused by contact with the
bone, but there are no symptoms of injury to the osseous tissue. I
hope he will recover entirely. Miss Lent, his affianced, is
expected to-night. Arrangements have been made to convey him
aboard a Sanitary Commission boat this evening. The sooner he
starts North the better. His mother and Miss Lent go with him as
nurses."
Berkley drew a quiet breath of relief. "I am glad," he said
simply. "There is fever in the air here."
"There is worse, Phil. They're fine people, the Craigs. That
mother of his stood the brutal shock of the news wonderfully--not a
tear, not a tremor. She is a fine woman; she obeyed me, not
implicitly, but intelligently. I don't like that kind of obedience
as a rule; but it happened to be all right in her case. She has
voluntarily turned Paigecourt and all the barns, quarters, farms,
and out-buildings into a base hospital for the wounded of either
army. She need not have done it; there were plenty of other
places. But she offered that beautiful old place merely because it
was more comfortable and luxurious. The medical corps have already
ruined the interior of the house; the garden with its handsome box
hedges nearly two centuries old is a wreck. She has given all the
farm horses to the ambulances; all her linen to the medical
director; all cattle, sheep, swine, poultry to the hospital
authorities; all her cellared stores, wines, luxuries to the
wounded. I repeat that she is a fine specimen of American
woman--and the staunchest little rebel I ever met."
Berkley smiled, then his bronzed face grew serious in the nickering
lantern light.
"Colonel Arran is badly hurt. Did you know it?"
"I do," said the doctor quietly. "I saw him just before I came
over here to find you."
"Would you care to tell me what you think of his chances?"
"I--don't--know. He is in considerable pain. The wound continues
healthy. They give him a great deal of morphia."
"Do you--believe----"
"I can't yet form an opinion worth giving you. Dillon, the
assistant surgeon, is an old pupil of mine. He asked me to look in
to-morrow; and I shall do so."
"I'm very glad. I was going to ask you. But--there's a good deal
of professional etiquette in these hospitals----"
"It's everywhere," said the doctor, smiling. Then his pleasant,
alert face changed subtly; he lifted the lantern absently, softly
replaced it on the veranda beside him, and gazed at it. Presently
he said:
"I came here on purpose to talk to you about another matter. . . .
Shall we step inside? Or"--he glanced sharply around, lantern held
above his head--"I guess we're better off out here."
Berkley silently assented. The doctor considered the matter in
mind for a while, nursing his knees, then looking directly at
Berkley:
"Phil, you once told roe a deliberate falsehood."
Berkley's face flushed scarlet, and he stiffened in every muscle.
The doctor said: "I merely wanted you to understand that I knew it
to be a falsehood when you uttered it. I penetrated your motive in
telling it, let it go at that, and kept both eyes open--and waited."
Berkley never moved. The painful colour stained the scar on his
brow to an ugly purple.
"The consequences of which falsehood," continued the doctor,
"culminated in my asking Miss Lynden to marry me. . . . I've been
thinking--wondering--whether that lie was justifiable. And I've
given up the problem. But I respect your motive in telling it.
It's a matter for you to settle privately with yourself and your
Maker. I'm no Jesuit by nature; but--well--you've played a man's
part in the life of a young and friendless girl who has become to
me the embodiment of all I care for in woman. And I thank you for
that. I thank you for giving her the only thing she lacked--a
chance in the world. Perhaps there were other ways of doing it. I
don't know. All I know is that I thank you for giving her the
chance."
He ceased abruptly, folded Ins arms, and gazed musingly into space.
Then:
"Phil, have you ever injured a man named Eugene Hallam, Captain of
your troop in the 8th Lancers?"
Berkley looked up, startled; and the hot colour began to fade.
"What do you know about Captain Hallam?" he asked.
"Where is he?"
"Probably a prisoner. He was taken at the cavalry affair which
they now call Yellow Run."
"You saw him taken by the enemy?"
"No. I saw him--surrender--or rather, ride toward the enemy,
apparently with that design in mind."
"Why don't you say that Hallam played the coward--that he deserted
his men under fire--was even shot at by his own colonel?"
"You seem to know about it," said Berkley in a mortified
voice. . . . "No man is anxious to reflect on his own regiment.
That is why I did not mention it."
"Yes, I knew it. Your servant, the trooper Burgess, came to
Paigecourt in search of you. I heard the detestable details from
him. He was one of the detachment that got penned in; he saw the
entire performance."
"I didn't know Burgess was there," said Berkley. "Is he all right?"
"Wears his left wrist in a sling; Colles's fracture; horse fell.
He's a villainous-looking party; I wouldn't trust that fellow with
a pewter button. But he seems devoted to you."
"I've never been able to make him out," said Berkley, smiling.
The doctor thought a minute.
"I saw two interesting people at Paigecourt. One was Miss Dix, an
old friend of mine; the other chanced to be Surgeon General
Hammond. They were on a tour of inspection. I hope they liked
what they saw."
"Did they?"
"I guess not. . . . Things in the hospitals ought to go better
now. We're learning. . . . By the way, you didn't know that Ailsa
Paige had been to Paigecourt, did you?"
"When?"
"Recently. . . . She's another fine woman. She never had an
illness worse than whooping cough. I know because I've always been
her physician. Normally she's a fine, wholesome woman,
Berkley--but she told a falsehood. . . . You are not the only liar
south of Dixon's damnable Line!"
Berkley straightened up as though shot, and the doctor dropped a
heavy hand on his shoulder.
"The sort of lie you told, Phil, is the kind she told. It doesn't
concern you or me; it's between her conscience and herself; and
it's in a good safe place. . . . And now I'll sketch out for you
what she did. This--this beast, Hallam, wrote to Miss Dix at
Washington and preferred charges against Miss Lynden. . . . I'm
trying to speak calmly and coherently and without passion, damn it!
Don't interrupt me. . . . I say that Hallam sent his written
evidence to Miss Dix; and Ailsa Paige learned of it, and learned
also what the evidence was. . . . And it was a terrible thing for
her to learn, Phil--a damnable thing for a woman to learn."
He tightened his grasp on Berkley's shoulder, and his voice was not
very steady.
"To believe those charges--that evidence--meant the death of her
faith in you. . . . As for the unhappy revelation of what Miss
Lynden had been--the evidence was hopelessly conclusive. Imagine
what she thought! Any other woman would have sat aloof and let
justice brand the woman who had doubly betrayed her. I want you to
consider it; every instinct of loyalty, friendship, trust, modesty
had apparently been outraged and trampled on by the man she had
given her heart to, and by the woman she had made a friend. That
was the position in which Ailsa Paige found herself when she
learned of these charges, saw the evidence, and was informed by
Hallam that he had forwarded his complaint."
His grip almost crushed Berkley's shoulder muscles.
"And now I'll tell you what Ailsa Paige did. She went before Miss
Dix and told her that there was not one atom of truth in the
charges. She accounted for every date specified by saying that
Miss Lynden was with her at those times, that she had known her
intimately for years, known her family--that it was purely a case
of mistaken identity, which, if ever pressed, would bewilder her
friend, who was neither sufficiently experienced to understand what
such charges meant, nor strong enough to endure the horror and
shock if their nature were explained.
"She haughtily affirmed her absolute faith in you, avowed her
engagement to marry you, pointed to your splendid military record;
disdainfully exposed the motive for Hallam's action. . . . And she
_convinced_ Miss Dix, who, in turn, convinced the Surgeon General.
And, in consequence, I can now take my little girl away from here
on furlough, thank God!--and thanks to Ailsa Paige, who lied like a
martyr in her behalf. And that's what I came here to tell you."
He drew a long, shuddering breath, his hand relaxed on Berkley's
shoulder, and fell away.
"I don't know to-day what Ailsa Paige believes; but I know what she
did for the sake of a young girl. . . . If, in any way, her faith
in you has been poisoned, remember what was laid before her, proven
in black and white, apparently; remember, more than that, the
terrible and physically demoralising strain she has been under in
the line of duty. No human mind can remain healthy very long under
such circumstances; no reasoning can be normal. The small daily
vexations, the wear and tear of nerve tissue, the insufficient
sleep and nourishment, the close confinement in the hospital
atmosphere, the sights, sounds, odours, the excitement, the
anxiety--all combine to distort reason and undermine one's natural
equipoise.
"Phil, if Ailsa, in her own heart, doubts you as she now doubts
Letty, you must understand why. What she did shows her courage,
her sweetness, her nobility. What she may believe--or think she
believes--is born only of morbid nerves, overworked body, and a
crippled power of reasoning. Her furlough is on the way; I did
myself the honour to solicit it, and to interest Miss Dix in her
behalf. It is high time; the child cannot stand much more. . . .
After a good rest in the North, if she desires to return, there is
nobody to prevent her . . . unless you are wise enough to marry
her. What do you think?"
Berkley made no answer. They remained silent for a long time.
Then the doctor rose and picked up his lantern; and Berkley stood
up, too, taking the doctor's outstretched hand.
"If I were you, Phil, I'd marry her," said Benton. "Good-night.
I'll see Colonel Arran in the morning. Good-night, my boy."
"Good-night," said Berkley in a dull voice.
Midnight found him pacing the dead sod in front of the veranda,
under the stars. One by one the lights in the hospital had been
extinguished; a lantern glimmered at the guard-house; here and
there an illuminated window cast its oblong of paler light across
the grass. Southward the crimson radiance had died out; softened
echoes of distant gunshots marked the passing of the slow, dark
hours, but the fitful picket firing was now no louder than the
deadened stamp of horses in their stalls.
A faint scent of jasmine hung in the air, making it fresher, though
no breeze stirred.
He stood for a while, face upturned to the stars, then his head
fell. Sabre trailing, he moved slowly out into the open; and, at
random, wandered into the little lane that led darkly down under
green bushes to Letty's bridge.
It was fresher and cooler in the lane; starlight made the planking
of the little foot-bridge visible in the dark, but the stream ran
under it too noiselessly for him to hear the water moving over its
bed of velvet sand.
A startled whippoorwill flashed into shadowy night from the rail as
he laid his hand upon it, and, searching for the seat which Letty's
invalid had built for her, he sank down, burying his head in his
hands.
And, as he sat there, a vague shape, motionless in the starlight,
stirred, moved silently, detaching itself from the depthless wall
of shadow.
There was a light step on the grass, a faint sound from the bridge.
But he heard nothing until she sank down on the flooring at his
feet and dropped her head, face downward, on his knees.
As in a dream his hands fell from his eyes--fell on her shoulders,
lay heavily inert.
"Ailsa?"
Her feverish face quivered, hiding closer; one small hand searched
blindly for his arm, closed on his sleeve, and clung there. He
could feel her slender body tremble at intervals, under his lips,
resting on her hair, her breath grew warm with tears.
She lay there, minute after minute, her hand on his sleeve,
slipping, tightening, while her tired heart throbbed out its heavy
burden on his knees, and her tears fell under the stars.
Fatigued past all endurance, shaken, demoralised, everything in her
was giving way now. She only knew that he had come to her out of
the night's deathly desolation--that she had crept to him for
shelter, was clinging to him. Nothing else mattered in the world.
Her weary hands could touch him, hold fast to him who had been lost
and was found again; her tear-wet face rested against his; the
blessed surcease from fear was benumbing her, quieting her,
soothing, relaxing, reassuring her.
Only to rest this way--to lie for the moment unafraid--to cease
thinking, to yield every sense to heavenly lethargy--to forget--to
forget the dark world's sorrows and her own.
The high planets shed their calm light upon her hair, silvering her
slender neck and the hand holding to his sleeve, and the steel edge
of his sabre hilt, and a gilded button at his throat. And all else
lay in shadow, wrapping them close together in obscurity.
At times he thought she was asleep, and scarcely moving, bent
nearer; but always felt the nervous closing of her fingers on his
sleeve.
And at last sleep came to her, deadening every sense. Cautiously
he took her hand; the slim fingers relaxed; body and limbs were
limp, senses clouded, as he lifted her in his arms and rose.
"Don't--go," she murmured drowsily.
"No, dear."
Through the darkness, moving with infinite care, he bore her under
the stars and stepped noiselessly across the veranda, entered, and
laid her on his cot.
"Philip," she murmured.
But he whispered to her that she must sleep, that he would be near
her, close to her. And she sighed deeply, and her white lids
closed again and rested unstirring on her pallid cheeks.
So she slept till the stars faded, then, awaking, lifted her head,
bewildered, drawing her hand from his; and saw the dawn graying his
face where he sat beside her.
She sat up, rigid, on the blanket, the vivid colour staining her
from throat to brow; then memory overwhelmed her. She covered her
eyes with both arms and her head dropped forward under the beauty
of her disordered hair.
Minute succeeded minute; neither spoke nor moved. Then, slowly, in
silence, she looked up at him and met his gaze. It was her
confession of faith.
He could scarcely hear her words, so tremulously low was the voice
that uttered them.
"Dr. Benton told me everything. Take me back. The world is empty
without you. I've been through the depths of it--my heart has
searched it from the ends to the ends of it. . . . And finds no
peace where you are not--no hope--no life. All is desolation
without you. Take me back."
She stretched out her hands to him; he took them, and pressed them
against his lips; and looking across at him, she said:
"Love me--if you will--as you will. I make no terms; I ask none.
Teach me your way; your way is mine--if it leads to you; all other
paths are dark, all other ways are strange. I know, for I have
trodden them, and lost myself. Only the path you follow is lighted
for me. All else is darkness. Love me. I ask no terms."
"Ailsa, I can offer none."
"I know. You have said so. That is enough. Besides, if you love
me, nothing else matters. My life is not my own; it is yours. It
has always been yours--only I did not know how completely. Now I
have learned. . . . Why do you look at me so strangely? Are you
afraid to take me for yourself? Do you think I do not know what I
am saying? Do you not understand what the terror of these days
without you has done to me? The inclination which lacked only
courage lacks it no longer. I know what you have been, what you
are. I ask nothing more of life than you."
"Dear," he said, "do you understand that I can never marry you?"
"Yes," she said steadily. "I am not afraid."
In the silence the wooden shutter outside the window swung to with
a slam in the rising breeze which had become a wind blowing
fitfully under a wet gray sky. From above the roof there came a
sudden tearing sound, which at first he believed to be the wind.
It increased to a loud, confusing, swishing whistle, as though
hundreds of sabres were being whirled in circles overhead.
Berkley rose, looking upward at the ceiling as the noise grew in
volume like a torrent of water flowing over rocks.
Ailsa also had risen, laying one hand on his arm, listening
intently.
"What is it?" she breathed.
"It is the noise made by thousands of bullets streaming through the
air above us. It sounds like that in the rifle-pits. Listen!"
The strange, bewildering sound filled the room. And now, as the
wind shifted, the steady rattle of musketry became suddenly
audible. Another sound, sinister, ominous, broke on their ears,
the clang of the seminary bell.
"Is it an attack on this place?" she asked anxiously. "What can we
do? There are no troops here! I--I must go to my sick boys----"
Her heart stood still as a cannon thundered, followed by the
fearful sound of the shell as it came tearing toward them. As it
neared, the noise grew deafening; the air vibrated with a rushing
sound that rose to a shriek.
Ailsa's hands grasped his arm; her ears seemed bursting with the
abominable sound; pain darted through her temples, flashing into
agony as a heavy jar shook the house, followed by a dazzling light
and roar.
Boom! Boom! came the distant, sullen thunder, followed by the
unmistakable whir of a Parrott shell. Suddenly shrapnel shells
began to come over, screaming, exploding, filling the air with the
rush and clatter of bullets.
"Lie down," he said. "You can't go out in this. It will veer off
in a few moments, when they find out that they're shelling our
hospitals."
"I've got to go," she repeated; "my boys won't understand why I
don't come."
She turned and opened the door; he caught her in his arms, and she
looked up and kissed him.
"Good-bye, dear," she whispered. "You mustn't detain me----"
"You shall not go outside----"
"I've got to. Be reasonable, dear. My sick are under fire."
The bugle was sounding now; his arms fell from her waist; she
smiled at him, stepped outside, and started to run; and found him
keeping pace between her and the west.
"You should not do that!" she panted, striving to pass him, but he
kept his body in line with the incoming missiles. Suddenly he
seized her and dropped flat with her as a shell plunged downward,
exploding in a white cloud laced with flame through which the
humming fragments scattered.
As they rose to their knees in the dust they saw men
gathering--soldiers of all arms, infantry, dismounted cavalrymen,
hospital guards, limping convalescents, officers armed' with
rifles, waggon drivers, negroes.
"They're attacking our works at Cedar Springs," said an officer
wearing one hand in a sling. "This hospital is in a bad place."
Ailsa clapped both hands over her ears as a shell blew up at the
angle of an outhouse and the ground rocked violently; then, pale
but composed, she sprang inside the hospital door and ran for her
ward.
It was full of pungent smoke; a Parrott shell had passed through a
window, carrying everything away in its path, and had burst,
terrifying the sick men lying there, but not injuring anybody.
And now a flare of light and a crash outside marked the descent of
another shell. The confusion and panic among the wounded was
terrible; ward-masters, nurses, surgeons, ran hither and thither,
striving to quiet the excited patients as shell after shell rushed
yelling overhead or exploded with terrific force, raining its
whirring iron fragments over roof and chimney.
Ailsa, calm and collected in the dreadful crisis, stood at the end
of the ward, directing the unnerved stretcher bearers,
superintending the carrying out of cots to the barns, which stood
in the shelter of the rising ground along the course of the little
stream.
Letty appeared from the corridor behind her; and Ailsa smiled and
kissed her lightly on the cheek; and the blood came back to the
girl's face in a passion of gratitude which even the terror of
death could not lessen or check.
"Ailsa--darling--" she whispered; then shuddered in the violence of
an explosion that shattered the window-glass beside her,
"We're taking them to the old barns, Letty," said Ailsa, steadying
her voice. "Will you take charge here while I go to Colonel Arran?"
"They've taken him out," whispered Letty. "That ward is on fire.
Everybody is out. W-what a cruel thing for our boys! Some of them
were getting well! Can you come now?"
"As soon as they carry out young Spencer. He's the last. . . .
Look from the window! They're trying to put out the fire with
water in buckets. O--h!" as a shell struck and the flame flashed
out through a geyser of sand and smoke.
"Come," murmured Letty. "I will stay if there is anything to stay
for----"
"No, dear; we can go. Give me your hand; this smoke is horrible.
Everything is on fire, I think. . . . Hurry, Letty!"
She stumbled, half suffocated, but Letty kept her hand fast and
guided her to the outer air.
A company of cavalry, riding hard, passed in a whirlwind of dust.
After them, clanking, thudding, pounding, tore a battery, horses on
a dead run,
The west wing of the seminary was on fire; billows of sooty smoke
rolled across the roof and blew downward over the ground where the
forms of soldiers could be seen toiling to and fro with buckets.
Infantry now began to arrive, crowding the main road on the double
quick, mounted officers cantering ahead. Long lines of them were
swinging out east and west across the country, where a battery went
into action wrapped in torrents of smoke.
Bullets swarmed, singing above and around in every key, and the
distracting racket of the shrapnel shells became continuous.
Ailsa and Letty ran, stooping, into the lane where the stretchers
were being hurried across the little footbridge. As they crossed
they saw a dead artilleryman lying in the water, a crimson thread
wavering from his head to the surface. It was Arthur Wye; and
Letty knew him, and halted, trembling; but Ailsa called to her in a
frightened voice, for, confused by the smoke, they had come out in
the rear of a battery among the caissons, and the stretchers had
turned to the right, filing down into the hollow where the barns
stood on the edge of a cedar grove.
Already men were hard at work erecting hospital tents; the wounded
lay on their stretchers, bloodless faces turned to the sky, the
wind whipping their blankets and uncovering their naked, emaciated
bodies. The faces of the dead had turned black.
"Good God!" said Dr. Benton as Letty and Ailsa came up, out
of'breath, "we've got to get these sick men under shelter! Can you
two girls keep their blankets from blowing away?"
They hurried from cot to cot, from mattress to mattress, from one
heap of straw to another, from stretcher to stretcher, deftly
replacing sheet and blanket, tucking them gently under, whispering
courage, sometimes a gay jest or smiling admonition to the helpless
men, soothing, petting, reassuring.
The medical director with his corps of aides worked furiously to
get up the big tents. The smoke from the battery blew east and
south, flowing into the hollow in sulphurous streams; the uproar
from the musketry was terrific.
Ailsa, kneeling beside a stretcher to tuck in the blankets, looked
up over her shoulder suddenly at Letty.
"Where did they take Colonel Arran?"
"I don't know, dear."
Ailsa rose from her knees and looked around her through the flying
smoke; then she got wearily to her feet and began to make
inquiries. Nobody seemed to know anything about Colonel Arran.
Anxious, she threaded her way through the stretchers and the
hurrying attendants, past the men who were erecting the tents,
looking everywhere, making inquiries, until, under the trees by the
stream, she saw a heap of straw on which a man was dying.
He died as she came up--a big, pallid, red-headed zouave, whose
blanket, soaked with blood, bore dreadful witness of his end.
A Sister of Charity rose as though dazed.
"I could not stop the hemorrhage," she said in her soft, bewildered
voice.
Together they turned back toward the mass of stretchers, moving
with difficulty in the confusion. Letty, passing, glanced wanly at
the Sister, then said to Ailsa:
"Colonel Arran is in the second barn on the hay. I am afraid he is
dying."
Ailsa turned toward the barns and hurried across the trampled sod.
Through the half light within she peered about her, moving
carefully among the wounded stretched out on the fragrant hay.
Colonel Arran lay alone in the light of a window high under the
eaves.
"Oh, here you are!" she said gaily. "I hear most most splendid
things about you. I--" she stopped short, appalled at the terrible
change that was coming over his face.
"I want to see--Phil--" he whispered.
"Yes--yes, I will find him," she said soothingly; "I will go
immediately and find him."
His head was moving slowly, monotonously, from side to side.
"I want to see my boy," he murmured. "He is my son. I wish you to
know it--my only son."
He lifted his brilliant eyes to Ailsa.
Twice he strove to speak, and could not, and she watched him,
stunned.
He made the supreme effort.
"Philip!" he gasped; "our son! My little son! My little, little
boy! I want him, Ailsa, I want him near me when I die!"