“Where is your wound? oh, where? Help me to find it, that I may stanch the blood,” said Wing, feeling blindly about the body of his colonel.
“Well, well, here, if you will have it. Here, in my right leg,” answered Justin, in a voice that was every instant falling fainter.
Wing felt the leg of the trowsers soaked in blood; he snatched his dagger from his belt, and ripped it up, so as to get to the wound. And he took his handkerchief, and bound it around the limb just above the knee, and drew it as tight as possible, and tied it fast, and so he checked the fast flow of blood.
“Thanks, Wing. Thanks, my dear boy. I think you have helped me for the present. Now hear my last message to one I love, and then turn and fly—save yourself,” said Justin, solemnly.
“Tell me, then, your last message. What is it?” inquired Wing.
“Say to my beloved sister that I fell leading on my regiment in Wilson’s glorious charge at Cold Harbor. Say if I could have chosen the manner of my death, I would have chosen this. Bid her bestow my property on the bereaved of this war—the bereaved of both sides. For the widows and orphans and old mothers of the rebel soldiers are as much to be pitied as those of our own. Bid her, when the war is over, to open wide her heart and home for the returning prodigals. Bid her do all she can, in her limited woman’s way, to heal the wounds of the country, to reconcile enemies, and to bring back peace. And give her my love and my blessing. Will you remember to deliver all this message, Wing?”
“Oh, yes! I will! I will! But is this the only message you have to send?” sobbed Wing.
“The only one,” answered Justin.
“And is there no other—no other that you remember in this awful hour—none to whom you would wish to send a parting word?” wept Wing.
“None—there is none!” answered Justin solemnly.