“And you think I have no reason to fear for him?”
“None; the names of some of the noblest among the Union officers are pledges for his future good faith.”
Erminie heaved a sigh of infinite relief, and then said:
“But we have talked so much of him and so little of yourself, dear. How was it, precious father, that you never let me know that you were living?”
“My darling, the conditions of the commutation of my sentence from death to imprisonment were that I should hold no communication whatever with my friends across the lines. Even Eastworth, who did all that was in his power to mitigate the severity of my fate, could not aid me in evading these conditions, without a breach of trust. That was why I could not write to you.”
“But I should have supposed some one of our men in the hands of the Confederate authorities as prisoners of war, might have heard of your captivity and reported it.”
“That was not likely. I was in a solitary cell, and confined under the name in which I had been arrested. No one but Eastworth knew my real name. And at my desire he kept it a secret. You heard me say just now, my dear, that the fame of the little Lutheran Sister of Christ, who ministered to the sick and wounded, whether Loyal or Rebel, had reached me even in my distant Southern prison?”
“Yes, dear father.”
“I will tell you how that was. I once had a guard that was so very kind to me, so extremely kind to me, that I one day asked him plainly why he was so. He answered that he had been a wounded prisoner in the Douglass Hospital at Washington, and that a young Union lady had saved his life by her constant attentions to him, and by bringing him nice broths, jellies, fruits, wine, tea and coffee, such as, at that time, could not be furnished to the soldiers.”
“Yes,” said Erminie, “that must have been before the Sanitary and Christian Commissions got into operation.”