"I say let 'em go home and see their mammies," replied one of the squad; and the others nodding assent, the corporal jerked his thumb over his shoulder and told them to "git."
"It is no more than we expected of you, but we thank you all the same," said Rodney, gratefully. "I live down this way, three miles from Mooreville, and if you ever come along our road, drop in and we'll treat you right. The mouse did the lion a favor once, and who knows but that a boy who is not old enough to be conscripted, may be able to do something for one of Uncle Sam's men?"
"Good for you, Johnny. You're no reb. Any up this way?"
"None nearer than Camp Pinckney. If there are we did not see them."
With hearts full of thankfulness the boys resumed their journey, and on the afternoon of the second day following, came within sight of Rodney's home. It set his eyes to streaming, and gave such elasticity to his step that Dick could scarcely keep pace with him. As he led his friend up the wide front steps he recalled to mind the parting that had taken place there more than fifteen months before, and the confident words he had uttered about "driving the Yankees out of Missouri." He and his friends had been driven out instead, and there was no hope that Missouri would ever belong to the Confederacy.
"Alabama—here we rest," exclaimed Rodney, pushing Dick into an easy chair in the parlor, which they found to be unoccupied. "Stay there till I find somebody."
"I don't look fit," began Dick, glancing down at his dusty uniform; but just then a door opened, a lady came in, and the words "Mother!" and "Oh, my son, my son!" told Dick that "somebody" had found Rodney.
If ever a boy appreciated home and its comforts it was Rodney Gray, no longer a wild, unreasoning partisan, but sober and thoughtful beyond his years. Here we will leave him until the time comes for us to tell how Dick Graham got across the river, and take up the history of the adventures and exploits of our Union hero, Marcy Gray, whom we left in his home in North Carolina. Marcy's "Secret Enemies" and his determination to be "True to his Colors" brought him into difficulty more than once; and what those difficulties were, and how he came through them, shall be told in the third volume of this series, which will be entitled "MARCY, THE BLOCKADE-RUNNER."