Therefore when he suddenly became sensible that the boat was moving swiftly, strongly, in midcurrent under a full head of steam, he felt a great revulsion of emotion. Floods of sunshine suffused the guards and, shining through the glass section of the door, sent a wakening beam into his face. A glance without apprised him that while he slept the town was left far behind, the fort, the camps, the pickets, all the features of grim-visaged war, and now great forest masses pressed down to the craggy banks on either side. The moment of deliverance was near,—it was at hand,—and as he dressed in the extreme of haste, he listened expectantly for the whistle of the boat, for it was approaching a little town on the opposite side where a landing was always made. Julius hardly feared the entrance of any passenger who might recognize him, but he took his way into the saloon and asked for breakfast, in order that thus employed he might have time to reconnoitre. The boat, however, barely touched the wharf, and when he emerged and joined Mr. Burrage on the deck there was something so breezily triumphant in his manner that the observant elder man looked askance at him with a conscious lack of comprehension. He thought he was evidently mistaken if he had imagined he had gauged this youth. His breeding was far above his humble and subsidiary employment, and his manner singularly well poised and assured. There was a hint of dignity, of command, in his pose and the glance of his eye. He was perfectly courteous; he did not forget to apologize for a lapse of attention, albeit absorbed in a certain undercurrent of excitement. He did not hear what Mr. Burrage had said of the news from the front in the morning paper, and upon its repetition accepted the proffered sheet with thanks and threw himself into a chair beside his elderly fellow-passenger. He had hardly read ten words before he lifted his head with a certain alert expectancy, like the head of a listening deer. The whistle of the boat had sounded again, the hoarse, discordant howl common to river steamers, an acoustic infliction even at a distance, and truly lamentable close at hand, but it was not this that had caught his attention. The boat was turning in midstream and heading for the shore, now backing at the signal of her pilot's bells, peremptorily jangling, now going forward with a jerk, and again swinging slowly around, and at last slipping forward easily toward the wood-yard where great piles of ready-cut fuel awaited her.
An alien sound had also caught Mr. Burrage's attention.
"What is that?" he demanded of the captain of the steamboat, who held a field-glass and was looking eagerly toward the woods.
"Musketry," replied the captain, succinctly.
"There is some engagement taking place in the forest?" inquired Mr. Burrage.
"Seems so," said the captain.
"And are you—are you going to land?"
"Must have wood—that's my regular depot," returned the steamboatman.
"You had best return to Roanoke City instead," urged Mr. Burrage, aghast.
"Need wood for that!"