Again the spasm shook his lacerated frame, and twenty minutes after his fierce, relentless spirit was released from torture; the proud, ambitious, dauntless man was with his God.
Dr. Arnold closed the eyes with trembling fingers, and covered his face with his hands to hide the tears that he could not repress.
For some moments silence reigned; then Dr. Arnold said suddenly—
"Come in, and let me see your arm. Your sleeve is full of blood."
An examination discovered a painful flesh-wound—the minnie ball having glanced from the shoulder and passed out through the upper part of the arm. In removing the coat to dress the wound, the doctor exclaimed—
"Here is a bullet-hole in the breast, which must have just missed your heart! Was it a spent ball?"
A peculiar smile disclosed Russell's faultless teeth an instant, but he merely took the coat, laid it over his uninjured arm, and answered—
"Don't trouble yourself about spent balls—finish your job. I must look after my wounded."
As soon as the bandages were adjusted he walked away and took from the inside pocket of the coat a heavy square morocco case containing Irene's ambrotype. When the coat was buttoned as on that day, it rested over his heart; and during the second desperate charge of General Beauregard's lines, Russell felt a sudden thump, and, above all the roar of that scene of carnage, heard the shivering of the glass which covered the likeness. The morocco was torn and indented, but the ball was turned aside harmless, and now, as he touched the spring, the fragments of glass fell at his feet. It was evident that his towering form had rendered him a conspicuous target; some accurate marksman had aimed at his heart, and the ambrotype-case had preserved his life. With a countenance pale from physical suffering, but beaming with triumphant joy for the Nation's first great victory, he went out among the dead and dying, striving to relieve the wounded, and to find the members of his own command.
But all of intolerable torture centred not there, awful as was the scene. Throughout the length and breadth of the Confederacy telegraphic despatches told that the battle was raging; and an army of women spent that 21st upon their knees, in agonizing prayer for husbands and sons who wrestled for their birthright on the far-off field of blood.