“I am wrong, my son; but it is so hard for you, my only child, to be in the army. Oh! that dreadful battle of Shiloh! The agony, the sleepless nights it has caused me! Thank God you are yet safe.”
“Yes, father, and I trust that the hand of a kind Providence will still protect me. But here is a letter from Morgan.”
The Judge adjusted his spectacles, and read the letter with much interest. “My son,” he said, after he had finished it, “it is well you were not captured with such letters on your person. It might have cost you your life. Even now I tremble for your safety. Does any one know you are in Danville?”
“Only Aunt Chloe, and she is as true as steel.”
“Yet there is danger. I know the house is under the closest surveillance. The Federal authorities know I am an ardent friend of the South, and they watch me continually. Morgan says in his letter that he hopes it will not be long before he will be in Kentucky.”
“And mark my word,” cried Calhoun, “it will not be! Before many weeks the name of Morgan will be on every tongue. He will be the scourge of the Yankee army. But, father, what of Uncle Dick and Fred?”
“Colonel Shackelford is at home minus a leg. The Federal authorities have paroled him. Fred is [pg 61]at home nursing him. Your uncle won imperishable honors on the field of Shiloh. What a pity he has such a son as Fred!”
Calhoun’s face clouded. The remembrance of his last meeting with Fred still rankled in his breast. “I never want to see him again,” he said.
The Judge sighed, “Oh, this war! this war!” he exclaimed; “how it disrupts families! You and Fred used to be the same as brothers. I thought nothing could come in between you and him. Calhoun, he is a noble boy, notwithstanding he is a traitor to his state and the South. They say he is going to resign from the army for the sake of his father. Won’t you go and see him?”
“No,” brusquely answered Calhoun, yet he felt in his heart he was wronging his cousin by his action.