Harper turned quickly to the speaker, and answered mildly, “I have learned nothing in your family, sir, of which I was ignorant before; but your son is safer from my knowledge of his visit than he would be without it.”
He bowed to the whole party, and without taking any notice of the peddler, other than by simply thanking him for his attentions, mounting his horse, and riding steadily and gracefully through the little gate, was soon lost behind the hill which sheltered the valley to the northward.
All the members of the Wharton family laid their heads on their pillows that night with a foreboding of some interruption to their ordinary quiet. Uneasiness kept the sisters from enjoying their usual repose, and they rose from their beds, on the following morning, unrefreshed and almost without having closed their eyes.
The family were already assembled around the breakfast table when the captain made his appearance, though the untasted coffee sufficiently proved that by none of his relatives was his absence disregarded.
“I think I did much better,” he cried, taking a chair between his sisters, and receiving their offered salutes, “to secure a good bed and such a plentiful breakfast, instead of trusting to the hospitality[36] of that renowned corps, the Cow-Boys.”
“If you could sleep,” said Sarah, “you were more fortunate than Frances and myself. Every murmur of the night air sounded to me like the approach of the rebel army.”
“Why,” said the captain, laughing, “I do acknowledge a little inquietude[37] myself. But how was it with you?” turning to his younger and evidently favorite sister, and tapping her cheek; “did you see banners in the clouds, and mistake Miss Peyton’s Æolian[38] harp for rebellious music?”
“Nay, Henry,” rejoined the maid, “much as I love my country, the approach of her troops just now would give me great pain.”
The brother made no reply; when Cæsar exclaimed, with a face that approached something like the hues of a white man: