“Splendid,” said the girl, “go on.”
“‘This is to notify you that I want you to let me join the Army right now. If you don’t, I will enlist anyway, that’s all. The seventeen call is out and I am not going to wait for the sixteen. Do you think I am a damned coward’——”
Wilfred paused and looked apprehensively at Caroline, who nodded with eyes sparkling brightly.
“That’s fine,” she said.
“I thought it sounded like a soldier.”
“It does; you ought to have heard the Third Virginia swear——”
“Oh,” said Wilfred, who did not quite relish that experience; but he went on after a little pause. “‘Tom Kittridge has gone; he was killed yesterday at Cold Harbor. Billie Fisher has gone and so has Cousin Stephen. He is not sixteen, he lied about his age, but I don’t want to do that unless you make me. I will, though, if you do. Answer this right now or not at all.’”
“I think that is the finest letter I have ever heard,” said Caroline proudly, as Wilfred stopped, laid the paper down, and stared at her.
“Do you really think so?”
“It is the best letter I——”