Mr. Blandford had changed greatly since Joe had seen him last. His black hair, which once fell over his shoulders in glossy curls, was now gray, and the curls were shorn away. The shoulders that were once straight and stalwart were slightly stooped. Of the gay and gallant young man whom Joe Maxwell had known as Archie Blandford nothing remained unchanged except his brilliant eyes and his white teeth. Mr. Blandford had, in fact, seen hard service. He had been desperately shot in one of the battles, and had lain for months in a Richmond hospital. He was now, as he said, just beginning to feel his oats again.
“Come!” said Mr. Deometari, “we must go to my room. It is the same old room, in the same old tavern,” he remarked.
When the two men and Joe Maxwell reached the room, which was one of the series opening on the long veranda of the old tavern, Mr. Deometari carefully closed the door, although the weather was pleasant enough—it was the early fall of 1864.
“Now, then,” said he, drawing his chair in front of Joe, and placing his hands on his knees, “I heard you mention a name out yonder when you first spoke to me. What was it?”
“Pruitt,” said Joe.
“Precisely so,” said Mr. Deometari, smiling in a satisfied way. “John Pruitt. Now, what did you say about John Pruitt?”
“Late of said county, deceased,” dryly remarked Mr. Blandford, quoting from the form of a legal advertisement.
“I said I saw him last night,” said Joe, and then he went on to explain the circumstances.
“Very good! and now what did you hear me say about Pruitt?”
“You said he would be caught and not punished because he belonged to the Relief Committee.”