"Marcy Gray, are you really a traitor? Be honest, now."
"Not much. I am true to my colors—the same colors that your grandfather and mine died under."
"But grandfather never dreamed, when he fought under that flag, that it was going to be turned into an emblem of tyranny," answered Rodney impatiently. "I'll bet you he would not fight under it now; and neither would Washington. But how will you fare when you get home? There are plenty of secessionists in your county, and they will have not the first thing to do with you."
"I don't care whether they do or not," replied Marcy, hardly realizing how much meaning there was in his cousin's last words. "Mother will have something to do with me, I reckon; and so will Jack when he returns; and if the neighbors choose to cut me because I am true to my colors, why I don't see that I can help it."
"Will you fight for the Union?"
"I hope I shall not be called upon to choose sides; but you may be sure
I shall not fight against it."
"Well, go your road, and I will go mine; but you will yet see the day when you will wish you had done differently. By the way," added Rodney carelessly; "those Taylor girls hinted that they would be pleased to see you at their house; but you don't want to air any of your disloyal sentiments in their presence, for if you do, they will be likely to tell you that you needn't come again. My paper says that is what the Richmond girls are doing, and our Barrington girls are following suit. And, Marcy, you had better haul in a little, for if you do not, you will get into trouble. The citizens are waking up, and there has been a Committee of Safety appointed to look out for all disturbers of the peace."
"I think such a committee is needed," was Marcy's quiet rejoinder. "The disturbers of the peace are secessionists without exception, and if the committee will shut up every one of that sort they can get their hands on, they will do the public a service. But as I don't care to be snubbed, I don't think I shall go out of my way to call upon those Taylor girls."
"Of course you will do as you please about that. I have simply delivered their message," said Rodney, as he passed up the steps and through the wide archway, waving his flag and making the hall ring with his shouts as he went. "Rally on the center, boys, and yell defiance to the Regicides and Roundheads. Keep your eye on the stairs, Billings, and if the kurn does not come down when he hears the racket, we are all right for to-morrow morning."
For a few minutes the greatest confusion reigned in the corridor. The secessionists yelled themselves hoarse over the Stars and Bars, and, carried away by the enthusiasm of the moment, pledged themselves to enlist with the defenders of their respective States within twenty-four hours after they reached home. Then followed a counter-demonstration for the Stars and Stripes, led by the tall student, Dixon, of Kentucky, who was backed up by nearly all the boys from the States that had not yet joined the Confederacy. The noise was deafening, but the colonel did not come out of his room to put a stop to it, and that confirmed Rodney in the belief that he was "all right for tomorrow morning." His friends were greatly encouraged, and one of them, when the evening gun was fired, jerked, rather than pulled, the old flag down from the masthead; and he would have been glad to show his contempt for it by trampling it under his feet, had it not been for the presence of the guard, who paced the top of the tower in plain view of the open door of the belfry.