"No; I hear children's voices."
They come on and pass close beside us; the children prattle away, and the father and mother talk of William somebody, who did something or other, and how Jane and her husband were going somewhere with the baby, but won't now for some unknown reason. They do not know that we stand close beside them, and that within a few yards is a troop of horse. If they did, the sentinel would halt them, and they would go no further to-night; but as it is, we are tolerably secure this side of the Holly Fork, and they are so manifestly ignorant of our whereabout, that I spare them the fright of being stopped by soldiers and kept from home all night.
"But don't let any more pass, Waldron," I say to the sentinel, "and keep a bright look out, and call me if you hear the slightest sound."
"Yes, sir." And Waldron resumes his lonely walk.
I leave him, and as I approach the guard, the sergeant is rousing the next relief.
"Walter," I say to a young trooper, who is going out on picket, "Walter, you are to go back a mile on the road we came down, and you will be posted near the wide cornfield that we passed."
"Yes, sir."
"Be careful that you give no false alarm; but if there should be anything, then fire your carbine in this direction, and come in on a gallop."
"Yes, sir."