SAFE-CONDUCT OF TWO KINDS
AS Early was slowly making his way back into the valley of Virginia—fighting wherever there was a force to be fought—there came a messenger to Owen Kilgariff one night a little before midnight. He bore a slip of paper on which these words were written:—
Come to me quickly. I am mortally wounded, and it is very necessary for me to see you before I die—not for my sake, for you’d rejoice to see me in hell, but for the sake of others and for your own sake—though for yourself you don’t often care much. I’m in a farm-house hospital three miles south of Harper’s Ferry on the Martinsburg road. My messenger will guide you. The Federals have possession, of course, but the bearer of this note has a safe-conduct for you. Of course, this might be a trick, but it is not. On the word of a gambler (and you know what that means) I am playing fair this time. You are a brave enough man to risk this thing anyhow. Come!
This note bore no signature, but Owen Kilgariff knew the hand that had written it. That handwriting had sent him to jail once upon a time. He had not forgotten. He was not given to forgetting.
He summoned the messenger who had brought him the note.
“You have a safe-conduct for me, I believe?” he asked.
“Yes, Captain,” and he produced the document.
“How did you manage to pass our picket lines? Did you come under a flag of truce?”
“No. That would have taken time, and there is no time to be wasted. Major Campbell is terribly wounded. I live in these parts. I ain’t a soldier, you know. So I slipped through the lines.”