“Can’t say when we’ll be back,” Grandma Miller had declared, and Roxy went down to the stone wall and stood there until the wagon vanished in the distance.
She looked down at the old stone bridge, remembering the day in early summer when she had quarrelled with Polly, and come running back to discover the Yankee soldier.
“That seems a long time ago,” thought Roxy, remembering all that had happened since then.
She was just turning back to the house when Polly, mounted on “Brownie,” came trotting over the bridge, and Roxy’s solemn thoughts vanished as she slipped through the opening in the wall and ran down the slope to meet her.
“Polly! Polly!” she called; “General Lee is driven back from Maryland!”
CHAPTER XVII
POLLY’S PLAN
Polly had already heard the news from Sharpsburg, and as she brought “Brownie” to a walking pace up the lane Roxy ran along beside her and the two girls rejoiced that the armies had not come on the road leading past their homes, and that the battle of the Antietam, as it was henceforth called, had not been fought in these familiar fields.
“Brownie” was left in the yard, and Polly and Roxy went to their favorite seat under the big butternut tree, and Polly was amazed to hear the story of the huge eagle that had swooped down so near to the top of the ledge.
“If it had got hold of Ivy the eagle would have carried her off!” Roxy said solemnly, and then added: “And Grandma says I am not to go to the top of the ledge again; and the squirrels will forget all about me,” and Roxy’s smile vanished, for she had grown fond of “Lee” and “Jackson” and was sorry that she could not see them again.
But Polly’s thoughts were on the errand that had brought her to the Miller farm, and for a moment she made no response to Roxy; then she said: