CHAPTER XVI
THE TUMULT IN HUMAN HEARTS
Of the many frightful nights in Richmond during the siege, that night was one of the worst. The comparative calmness of the earlier hours of repose of the quiet April evening gave way to pandemonium. The works at Petersburg, desperately held by the Confederates, were miles away from the city to the southward, but such was the tremendous nature of the cannonading that the shocking sounds seemed to be close at hand. Children cowered, women shuddered, and old men prayed as they thought of the furious onslaughts in the battle raging.
The Richmond streets were filled with people, mostly invalids, non-combatants, women, and children. A tremendous attack was being launched by the besiegers somewhere, it was evident. Urgent messengers from General Lee called every reserve out of the garrison at Richmond, and the quiet streets and country highways awoke instantly to life. Such troops as could be spared moved to the front at the double-quick. Every car of the dilapidated railroad was pressed into service. Those who could not be transported by train went on horseback or afoot. The youngest boy and the oldest man alike shouldered their muskets, and with motley clothes, but with hearts aflame, marched to the sound of the cannon. The women, the sick, the wounded and invalid men and the children waited.
Morning would tell the tale. Into the city from which they marched, men and boys would come back; an army nearly as great as had gone forth, but an army halting, maimed, helpless, wounded, suffering, shot to pieces. They had seen it too often not to be able to forecast the scene absolutely. They knew with what heroic determination their veterans, under the great Lee, were fighting back the terrific attacks of their brothers in blue, under the grimly determined Grant. They could hear his great war-hammer ringing on their anvil; a hammer of men, an anvil of men. Plan or no plan, success or no success of some Secret Service operations, some vital point was being wrestled for in a death-grapple between two armies; and all the offensive capacities of the one and all the defensive resources of the other were meeting, as they had been meeting during the long years.
In a time like that, of public peril and public need, private and personal affairs ought to be forgotten, but it was not so. Love and hate, confidence and jealousy, faithfulness and disloyalty, self-sacrifice and revenge, were still in human hearts. And these feelings would put to shame even the passions engendered in the bloody battles of the fearful warfare.
Edith Varney, for instance, had gone out of the telegraph office assured that the sacrifice she had made for her lover had resulted in the betrayal of her country; that Thorne had had not even the common gratitude to accede to her request, although she had saved his life, and, for the time being, his honour. Every cannon-shot, every crashing volley of musketry that came faintly or loudly across the hills seemed pointed straight at her heart. For all she knew, the despatch had been sent, the cunningly devised scheme had been carried out, and into some undefended gap in the lines the Federal troops were pouring. The defence would crumble and the Army would be cut in two; the city of Richmond would be taken, and the Confederacy would be lost.
And she had done it! Would she have done it if she had known? She had certainly expected to establish such a claim upon Thorne by her interposition that he could not disregard it. But if she had known positively that he would have done what she thought he did, would she have sent him to his death? She put the question to herself in agony. And she realised with flushes of shame and waves of contrition that she would not, could not have done this thing. She must have acted as she had, whatever was to come of it. Whatever he was, whatever he did, she loved that man. She need not tell him, she need tell no one, there could be no fruition to that love. She must hide it, bury it in her bosom if she could, but for weal or woe she loved him above everything else, and for all eternity.
Where was he now? Her interposition had been but for a few moments. The truth was certain to be discovered. There would be no ultimate escape possible for him. She heard shots on occasion nearer than Petersburg, in the city streets. What could they mean? Short, short would be his shrift if they caught him. Had they caught him? Certainly they must, if they had not. She realised with a thrill that she had given him an opportunity to escape and that he had refused it. The sending of that despatch had been more to him than life. Traitor, spy, Secret Service Agent—was there anything that could be said for him? At least he was faithful to his own idea of duty.
She had met Caroline Mitford waiting in the lower hall of the telegraph office, and the two, convoyed by old Martha, had come home together. Many curious glances had been thrown at them, but in these great movements that were toward, no one molested them. The younger girl had seen the agony in her friend’s face. She had timidly sought to question her, but she had received no answer or no satisfaction to her queries. Refusing Caroline’s proffered services when she reached home, Edith had gone straight to her own room and locked the door.
The affair had been irritating beyond expression to Mr. Arrelsford. It had taken him some time to establish his innocence and to get his release from General Randolph’s custody. Meanwhile, everything that he had hoped to prevent had happened. To do him justice, he really loved Edith Varney, and the thought that her actions and her words had caused his own undoing and the failure of his carefully laid plans, filled him with bitterness, which he vented in increased animosity toward Thorne.