As he walked back to the mansion he related many of the noble qualities of his horse, how he had fought over his master long after he lay insensible upon the battle-field. There was one little matter the "brave soldier" failed to explain, and that was, how, while insensible, the master knew what the horse was doing.
"What a brave man he must be," thought the widow as she sat in her boudoir after the corporal had retired to the cellar, where he put the guns and pistols at the extreme corner of the room, least they should accidentally go off and kill him. "What a brave man he is, who has fought so many men! On him alone now depends the success of our cause. He is the Alfred the Great, the Charles the Second, who must gather an army and strike when our foe least expects it. Brave, brave man!" And the widow dreamed that night that she saw Corporal Diggs lead a vast army against the enemy, and that victory crowned his attempts. She saw the glorious South an independent nation and honors heaped upon the man she had succored. He was seated on the throne of the new kingdom and became a wise and good ruler.
Waking, the widow actually wept with joy, for she would not believe that her vision was anything else than a direct revelation, and was sure that the fate of her beloved South hung upon the sword-point of the brave man, who was then sleeping in her cellar. True, he was small of stature, and, when mounted on January, did, as Seth Williams had said, look much like a bug on a log, but then he was brave, and many of the great military men were small.
The corporal spent three or four days in concealment at the widow's, and, although his thorn scratches were entirely healed, he still kept the bandage on his head and carried his arm in a sling. He had discovered that, wounded and suffering, he elicited more sympathy from the beautiful widow. They usually walked out at twilight, and spent an hour in the spacious ground.
Upon one occasion the widow told her dreams, and asked the brave man by her side what he thought of it.
"Think of it? Hem, hem! Why, my dear Mrs. Juniper—hem, hem, hem!—why, it will be fulfilled to the very letter. Yes, my dear lady—hem, hem!"—and Diggs turned his face aside in a reflective manner, and his little eyes glowed with meaning, "it is my design to gather another army and hurl back the tide of adversity. My dear Mrs. Juniper, the world yet knows not Corporal Diggs, but it shall, it shall," and he struck the end of a stout stick which he carried in his hand into the pebble-covered earth. "Oh, if these scratches would but heal, so that I once more could take the field and lead an army on to victory; then they should know—hem, hem, hem!—they would learn that the Cæsars are not dead."
"Oh! what a loss it would have been to our beloved South if you had been slain!" said the enraptured widow.
"Fear not—hem, hem, hem—my dear madam, I shall not be slain. I have my destiny to fulfill. And now—hem, hem!—my dear madam, my dear Mrs. Juniper, my dear Julia, let me call you by that sweet name, I have something of great importance to speak of."
An ambuscade could not have startled the widow more than this brave man's manner. She elevated her eyebrows, and her large dark eyes grew round with wonder as she said:
"Why—why, Corporal Diggs, what can it be! What can you mean?"