”How came she there? Tell me about it for Heaven’s sake, Ben.”
”Well, you know Frank Paning is buried up there in the woods by the road, and last Wednesday was a week I thought I’d go up and sorter put a pen like ’round his grave, to keep the hogs from rootin’ ‘bout on it, ‘cause I tell you the truth, John, I ain’t never felt right ‘bout killin’ him yit. I shot a sight of Yankees during the war, but I done it on account of the Confeder’cy, and I didn’t feel like it was charged ‘ginst me in the big book up yonder; but I put that bullet in Frank Paning on my own hook, because I was mad with him, and it’s looked mighty close kin to murder ever since.”
”By no means, Ben,” I interrupted; ”he had ordered you to surrender, and his friends were close at hand.”
”Well, any how,” he continued, ”I was piling up the rails ’round the grave, and kinder askin’ its pardon to myself, when I heard a carriage ‘comin’ ‘long the road. I got up and stepped back a little for ’em to pass, for I was sorter ashamed of what I was doin’. But the carriage stopped right at the grave, and a Yankee officer got out, and then handed down a lady dressed finer ‘n the top spot in a peacock’s tail. The minnit I see her face I knowed ‘twas the same young lady that come up here wonst with Mrs. Smith and you all. ‘Soon as she got on the ground she run to the grave, and fell down on her knees, and put her head on the edge of the rail pen, and cried a long time. When she got up the man fetched some white flowers outer the carriage and she put’em on the grave; then turned to the man and said:
”’Do you think you can find the place, Curnel?’
”’Without doubt, madam,’ he said.
”’I want the granite base very broad and strong, as the column will be very heavy,’ I heard her say.
”’It shall be as you desire, madam,’ he replied.
”They was about to git back in the carriage when she saw me, and come towards me with both hands stretched out.