"What would mother say," at length sobbed the boy.
Mr. Shackelford shivered as with a chill; then said brokenly: "If your mother had lived, child, my first duty would have been to her. Now it is to my country. Neither would your mother, it mattered not what she thought herself, ever have asked me to violate my own conscience."
"Father, let us both stay at home. We can do that, you thinking as you do, and I thinking as I do. We can love each other just the same. We can do good by comforting those who will be stricken; and mother will look down from heaven, and bless us. We cannot control our sympathies, but we can our actions. We can both be truly non-combatants."
"Don't, Fred, don't tempt me," gasped Mr. Shackelford. "My word is given, and a Shackelford never breaks his word. Then I cannot stand idly by, and see my kindred made slaves. I must draw my sword for the right, and the South has the right. Fred, the die is cast. I go in the Confederate army—you to Europe. So say no more."
Fred arose, his face as pale as death, but with a look so determined, so fixed that it seemed as if in a moment the boy had been transformed into a man.
"Father," he asked, "I have always been a good son, obeying you, and never intentionally grieving you, have I not?"
"You have, Fred, been a good, obedient son, God bless you!"
"Just before mother died," continued Fred, "she called me to her bedside. She told me how my great-grandfather had died on Bunker Hill, and asked me to always be true to my country. She asked me to promise never to raise my hand against the flag. I gave her the promise. You would not have me break that promise, father?"
"No, no, my son! Go to Europe, stay there until the trouble is over."