OUT OF THE FOREST
The retreating brigade, the river behind it and the pursuit seemingly
lost on the farther shore, passed on in the golden sunshine of the
morning through, a country of gentle hills, green fields and scattered
forest.
It was joined three hours after sunrise by no less a person than Mr.
Sefton himself, fresh, immaculate and with no trace of discomposure on
his face. He was on horseback, and told them he had just come across the
fields from another division of the army not more than three miles away.
He gave the news in a quiet tone, without any special emphasis upon the
more important passages. The South had been compelled to give ground;
Grant had lost more than fifty thousand men, but he was coming through
the Wilderness and would not be denied. He was still fighting as if he
had just begun, and reinforcements were constantly pouring forward to
take the places of the fallen in his ranks.
Prompted by a motive which even his own analytical mind could not
define, the Secretary sought Lucia Catherwood. He admired her height,
her strength and resolved beauty--knew that she was of a type as
admirable as it was rare, and wondered once or twice why he did not love
her instead of Helen Harley. Here was a woman with a mind akin to his
own--bold, keen and penetrating. And that face and figure! He wished he
could see her in a drawing-room, dressed as she should be, and with the
lights burning softly overhead. Then she would be indeed a princess, if
there were any such beings, in the true meaning of the word, on this
earth. She would be a fit wife for a great man--the greater half of
himself.
But he did not love her; he loved Helen Harley--the Secretary confessed
it to himself with a smothered half-sigh. At times he was pleased with
this sole and recently discovered weak spot in his nature, because it
brought to him some fresh and pleasing emotions, not at all akin to any
that he had ever felt before; but again it troubled him, as a flaw in
his armour. His love for Helen Harley might interfere with his
progress--in fact, was doing so already, but he said to himself he could
not help it. Now he was moved to talk to Lucia Catherwood. Dismounting
from his horse, he took a place by her side.
She was walking near the rear of the column and there were others not
many feet away, but she was alone in the truest sense, having a feeling
of personal detachment and aloofness. These people were kind to her, and
yet there was a slight difference in their manner toward her and toward
one another--a difference almost imperceptible and perhaps not intended,
but sufficient to show her that she was not of them. Just now it gave
her such a sense of loneliness and exclusion that she almost welcomed
the smile of the Secretary when he spoke to her. As ready to recognize
the power in him as he was to note her own strong and keen mind, she
waited guardedly to hear what he had to say.
"Miss Catherwood," he said, "I was glad to assist you in your plan of
returning to Richmond, but I have wondered why you should wish to
return. If I may use a simile, Richmond is the heart of the storm, and
having escaped from such a place, it seems strange that you should go
back to it."
"There are many other women in Richmond," she replied, "and as they will
not be in any greater danger than I, should I be less brave than they?"
"But they have no other choice."
"Perhaps I have none either. Moreover, a time is coming when it is not
physical courage alone that will be needed. Look back, Mr. Sefton."
She pointed to the Wilderness behind them, where they saw the crimson
glow of flames against the blue sky, and long, trailing clouds of black
smoke. The low mutter of guns, a continuous sound since sunrise, still
came to their ears.
"The flames and the smoke," she said, "are nearer to Richmond than they
were yesterday, just as they were nearer yesterday than they were the
day before."
"It is yet a long road to Richmond."
"But it is being shortened. I shall be there at the end. The nearest and
dearest of all my relatives is in Richmond and I wish to be with her.
There are other reasons, too, but the end of which I spoke is surely
coming and you know it as well as I. Perhaps you have long known it. As
for myself, I have never doubted, despite great defeats."
"It is not given to men to have the faith of women."
"Perhaps not; but in this case it does not require faith: reason alone
is sufficient. What chance did the South ever have? The North, after all
these years, is just beginning to be aroused. Until the present you have
been fighting only her vanguard. Sometimes it seems to me that men argue
only from passion and sentiment, not from reason. If reason alone had
been applied this war would never have been begun."
"Nor any other. It is a true saying that neither men nor women are ever
guided wholly for any long period by reason. That is where
philosophers,--idealogists, Napoleon called them--make their mistake,
and it is why the science of government is so uncertain--in fact, it is
not a question of science at all, but of tact."
The Secretary was silent for awhile, but he still walked beside Miss
Catherwood, leading his horse by the bridle. Prescott presently glancing
back, beheld the two together and set his teeth. He did not like to see
Lucia with that man and he wondered what had put them side by side. He
knew that she had a pass from Mr. Sefton, and this fresh fact added to
his uneasiness. Was it possible those two had a secret in common?
The Secretary saw the frown on Prescott's face and was pleased, though
he spoke of him and his great services. "He has more than courage--he
has sense allied with it. Sometimes I think that courage is one of the
commonest of qualities, but it is not often that it is supported by
coolness, discrimination and the ability to endure. A fine young man,
Robert Prescott, and one destined to high honours. If he survive the
war, I should say that he will become the Governor of his State or rise
high in Congress."
He watched the girl closely out of the corner of his eye as he spoke,
for he was forming various plans and, as Lucia Catherwood was included
in his comprehensive schemes, he wished to see the effect upon her of
what he said, but she betrayed nothing. So far as her expression was
concerned Prescott might have been no more to her than any other chance
acquaintance. She walked on, the free, easy stride of her long limbs
carrying her over the ground swiftly. Every movement showed physical and
mental strength. Under the tight sleeve of her dress the muscle rippled
slightly, but the arm was none the less rounded and feminine. Her chin,
though the skin upon it was white and smooth like silk, was set firmly
and marked an indomitable will.
Curious thoughts again flowed through the frank mind of the Secretary.
Much of his success in life was due to his ability to recognize facts
when he saw them. If he made failures he never sought to persuade
himself that they were successes or even partial successes; thus he
always went upon the battlefield with exact knowledge of his resources.
He wondered again why he did not fall in love with Lucia Catherwood.
Here was the exact complement of himself, a woman with a mind a fit mate
to his own. He had come far already, but with her to aid him there were
no heights to which he--no, they--might not climb. And she was
beautiful--beautiful, with a grace, a stateliness and dignity beyond
compare.
Mr. Sefton glanced down the column and saw there a head upon which the
brown hair curled slightly. The eyes were turned away, but the Secretary
knew they were blue and that there was something in the face which
appealed to strong men for protection. He shook his head slowly. The
tricky little god was making sport of him, James Sefton, the
invincible, and he did not like it.
A sense of irritation against Lucia Catherwood rose in Mr. Sefton's
mind. As he could not stir her in any obvious manner by speaking of
Prescott, he felt a desire to move her in some way, to show his power
over her, to compel from her an appeal for mercy. It would be a triumph
to bring a woman at once so strong and so proud to her knees. He would
not proceed to extreme measures, and would halt at the delicate moment,
but she must be made to feel that he was master of the situation.
So he spoke again of her return to Richmond, suggesting plans for her
pleasant stay while there, mentioning acquaintances of his whom he would
like her to know, and making suggestions to which he thought she would
be compelled to return answers that would betray more or less her
position in Richmond.
She listened at first with a flush on her face, giving way soon to
paleness as her jaw hardened and her lips closed firmly. The perception
of Lucia Catherwood was not inferior to that of the Secretary, and she
took her resolve.
"Mr. Sefton," she said at length, "I am firmly convinced of one thing."
"And what is that?"
"That you know I am the alleged spy for whom you were so long looking in
Richmond."
The Secretary hesitated for an answer. Her sudden frankness surprised
him. It was so different from his own methods in dealing with others
that he had not taken it into account.
"Yes, you know it," she continued, "and it may be used against me, not
to inflict on me a punishment--that I do not dread--but to injure the
character and reputation that a woman loves--things that are to her the
breath of life. But I say that if you choose to use your power you can
do so."
The Secretary glanced at her in admiration, the old wonder concerning
himself returning to him.
"Miss Catherwood," he said, "I cannot speak in too high praise of your
courage. I have never before seen a woman show so much. Your surmise is
correct. You were the spy or alleged spy, as you prefer to say, for whom
I was looking. As for the morality of your act, I do not consider that;
it never entered into my calculations; but in going back to Richmond you
realize that you will be wholly in the power of the Confederate
Government. Whenever it wants you you will have to come, and in very
truth you will have to walk in the straight and narrow path."
"I am not afraid," she said, with a proud lifting of her head. "I will
take the risks, and if you, Mr. Sefton, for some reason unknown to me,
force me to match my wits with yours, I shall do the best I can."
The haughty uplift of her neck and the flash of her eye showed that she
thought her "best" would be no mean effort, but this attitude appealed
to the Secretary more than a humble submission ever would have done.
Here was one with whom it would be a pleasure to make a test of skill
and force. Certainly steel would be striking sparks from steel.
"I am not making any threats, Miss Catherwood," he said. "That would be
unworthy, I merely wish you to understand the situation. I am a frank
man, I trust, and, like most other men, I seek my own advancement; it
would further no interest of mine for me to denounce you at present, and
I trust that you will not at any time make it otherwise."
"That is, I am to serve you if you call upon me."
"Let us not put it so bluntly."
"I shall not do anything that I do not wish to do," she said, with the
old proud uplift of her head. "And listen! there is something which may
soon shatter all your plans, Mr. Sefton."
She pointed backward, where the purplish clouds hung over the
Wilderness, whence came the low, sullen mutter, almost as faint as the
distant beat of waves on a coast.
The Secretary smiled deprecatingly.
"After all, you are like other women, Miss Catherwood. You suppose, of
course, that I stake my whole fortune upon a single issue, but it is
not so. I wish to live on after the war, whatever its result may be, and
the tide of fortune in that forest may shift and change, but mine may
not shift and change with it."
"You are at least frank."
"The South may lose, but if she loses the world will not end on that
account. I shall still wish to play my part. Ah, here comes Captain
Prescott."
Prescott liked little this long talk between Lucia and the Secretary and
the deep interest each seemed to show in what the other said. He bore it
with patience for a time, but it seemed to him, though the thought was
not so framed in his mind, that he had a certain proprietary interest in
her because he had saved her at great risk.
The Secretary received him with a pleasant smile, made some slight
remark about duty elsewhere and dropped easily away. Prescott waited
until he was out of hearing before he said:
"Do you like that man, Miss Catherwood?"
"I do not know. Why?"
"You were in such close and long conversation that you seemed to be old
friends."
"There were reasons for what we said."
She looked at him so frankly that he was ashamed, but she, recognizing
his tone and the sharpness of it, was not displeased. On the contrary,
she felt a warm glow, and the woman in her urged her to go further. She
spoke well of the Secretary, his penetrating foresight and his knowledge
of the world and its people--men, women and children. Prescott listened
in a somewhat sulky mood, and she, regarding him with covert glances,
was roused to a singular lightness that she had not known for many days.
Then she changed, showing him her softer side, for she could be as
feminine as any other woman, not less so than Helen Harley, and she
would prove it to him. Becoming all sunshine with just enough shadow to
deepen the colours, she spoke of a time when the war should have
passed--when the glory of this world with the green of spring and the
pink of summer should return. Her moods were so many and so variable,
but all so gay, that Prescott began to share her spirits, and although
they were retreating from a lost field and the cannon still muttered
behind them, he forgot the war and remembered only this girl beside him,
who walked with such easy grace and saw so bright an outlook.
Thus the retreat continued. The able-bodied soldiers of the brigade were
drafted away, but the women and wounded men went on. Grant never ceased
his hammer strokes, and it was necessary for the Southern leaders to get
rid of all superfluous baggage. Prescott, singularly enough, found
himself in command of this little column that marched southward, taking
the place of his friend Talbot, lost in a mysterious way to the regret
of all.
Mr. Sefton left them the day after his talk with Lucia, and Prescott was
not sorry to see him go, for some of his uneasiness departed with him.
Harley, vain, fretful and complaining, gave much trouble, yielding only
to the influence of Mrs. Markham, with whom Prescott did not like to see
him, but was helpless in the matter. Helen and Lucia were the most
obedient of soldiers and gave no trouble at all. Helen, a warm partisan,
seemed to think little of the great campaign that was going on behind
her, and to concern herself more about something else. Yet she was not
unhappy--even Prescott could see it--and the bond between her and Lucia
was growing strong daily. Usually they were together, and once when Mrs.
Markham spoke slightingly of the "Northern woman," as she called Lucia,
Helen replied with a sharpness very remarkable for her--a sharpness that
contributed to the growing coldness between them, which had begun with
the power Mrs. Markham exercised over Helen's brother.
Prescott noticed these things more or less and sometimes they pained
him; but clearly they were outside his province, and in order to give
them no room in his mind he applied himself more diligently than ever to
his duties, his wound now permitting him to do almost a man's work.
They marched slowly and it gave promise of being a long journey. The
days grew very hot; the sun burned the grass, and over them hung clouds
of steamy vapour. For the sake of the badly wounded who had fever they
traveled often by night and rested by day in the shade. But that cloud
of war never left them.
The days passed and distant battles still hung on their skirts. The
mutter of the guns was seldom absent, and they yet saw, now and then, on
the horizon, flashes like heat-lightning. One morning there was a rapid
beat of hoofs, a glitter of sabers issuing from a wood, and in a moment
the little convoy was surrounded by a troop of cavalry in blue.
"Only wounded men and women," said their leader, a young colonel with a
fine, open face. "Bah, we have no time to waste with them!"
He bowed contritely, touching his hat to the ladies and saying that he
did not mean to be ungallant. Then in a moment he and his men were gone
at gallop in a cloud of dust, disappearing in a whirlwind across the
plain, leaving the little convoy to proceed at its leisure.
Prescott gazed after them, shading his eyes with his hands. "There must
be some great movement at hand," he said, "or they would have asked us
questions, at least."
The day grew close and sultry. Columns of steamy vapour moved back and
forth and enclosed them, and the sun set in a red mist. At night it
rained, but early the next morning the mutter of the cannon grew to a
rumble and then a storm. The hot day came and all the east was filled
with flashes of fire. The crash of the cannon was incessant, and in
fancy every one in that little convoy heard the tramping of brigades and
the clatter of hoofs as the horsemen rushed on the guns.
"They have met again!" said Lucia.
"Yes," replied Prescott. "It's Grant and Lee. How many great battles is
this since they met first in the Wilderness?"
Nobody could tell; they had lost count.
The tumult lasted about an hour and then died away, to be succeeded by a
stillness intense and painful. The sun shone with a white glare. No wind
stirred. The leaves and the grass drooped. The fields were deserted;
there was not a sign of life in them, either human or animal. The road
lay before them, a dusty streak.
None came to tell of the battle, and, oppressed by anxiety, Prescott
moved on. Some horsemen appeared on the hills the next morning, and as
they approached, Prescott, with indescribable joy, recognized in the
lead the figure of Talbot, whose unknown fate they had mourned. Talbot
delightedly shook hands with them all, not neglecting Lucia Catherwood.
His honest face glowed with emotion.
"I am on a scout around our army now," he said, "and I thought I should
find you near here somewhere. I wanted to tell you what had become of
me. I was captured that night we were crossing the river--some of my
blundering--but I escaped the next night. It was easy enough to do it.
There was so much fighting and so much of everything going on that I
just rose up and walked out of the Yankee camp. Nobody had time to pay
any attention to me. I got back to Lee--somehow I knew I must do it, as
he could never win the war without me--and here I am."
"There was a battle yesterday morning; we heard it," said Prescott.
Talbot's face clouded and the corners of his mouth drooped.
"We have won a great victory," he said, "but it doesn't pay us. The
Yankees lost twelve or fifteen thousand men, but we haven't gained
anything. That firing you heard was at Cold Harbour. It was a great
battle, an awful one. I hope to God I shall never see its like again. I
saw fifteen thousand men stretched out on the bloody ground in rows. I
don't believe that so many men ever before fell in so short a time. I
have heard of a whirlwind of death, but I never saw one till then.
"We had gone into intrenchments and Grant moved against us with his
whole army. They came on; you could hear 'em, the tramp of regiments
and brigades, scores of thousands, and the sun rising up and turning to
gold over their heads. Our cannon began. What a crash! It was like
twenty thunderbolts all at once. We swept that field with tons and tons
of metal. Then our rifles opened and the whistling of the bullets was
like the screaming of a wind on a plain. You could see the men of that
army shoot up into the air before such a sheet of metal, and you heard
the cracking of bones like the breaking up of ice. After awhile those
that lived had to turn back; human beings could not stand more, and we
were glad when it was all over."
Talbot stayed a little while with them. Then he and his men, like the
Northern cavalry, whirled off in a cloud of dust, and the little convoy
resumed its solemn march southward, reaching Richmond in safety.