He sat down, and Aunt Lucretia, taking my hand, led me in. "Goff," I heard him say, "that fight at Winchester when we charged into the town—you led me a little you know, and—"
I felt Eloise's hand in mine as we went down the hall. "I hate him," she said, tossing her head back toward the old man. "It's mean and sinful; but I hate him! After all these years to greet you in that way. And Braxton Bragg—you should see what a fool he is, Jack, in his captain's straps, and living hourly up to his name!"
CHAPTER IV
COLONEL GOFF
Colonel Goff followed us shortly afterwards into the hall. He had ridden over on his English hunter while Eloise and I had been on the lawn greeting our tree friends. He was immaculately groomed, in polished boots, puttees and cap, an English crop in his hands. Fifty years old, his black hair slightly streaked with gray, he was handsome, and there was a masterful air about him that even an enemy must have admired. A younger son of the Earl of Carfax, he had come to America when my grandsire was fighting with Stonewall Jackson in Virginia. He had volunteered for service, and had been placed in Jackson's corps, and on my grandsire's staff. Here his real, sterling qualities found birth and he proved to be a brilliant soldier. It was he who charged ahead of the rebel yell and led the advance that scattered Banks. It was he who led again at Cedar Creek, caught the brilliant Sheridan napping, and sent his command reeling back in a retreat which would have meant demoralization for anyone but Sheridan. His fondness for my grandsire was no less than the old man's for him, and after the war Colonel Goff, being in disgrace, it was said, with his father at home, moved to Tennessee to be near his old commander. He had bought a fine place near ours, and here he had lived the life of an English gentleman, with his hounds, his horses, and his utter disregard of all the local and established ideas of country temperance or morals. He was not a man who asked for things, he took them.
Even before I left home I had secretly rebelled at his admiration for Eloise. In all her masterful ways, her riding, her fox chasing, her hunting with the men, following Goff or the General all day on her pony, and killing quail dead-straight, in the flush of the covey, he had openly admired her. Afterwards I heard him say that she was a duchess born, and the only one he had seen in America. He had humored, petted and helped to spoil her as a child. As a girl, there never was a costly thing she wanted but he gave it to her.
In the dining-room, when supper had been announced, I noticed the flushed pleasure in Eloise's eyes at sight of him. It was half a daring look, as of the hunted defying the hunter, that I saw in her eyes, but I could not rightly decipher it, or tell whether it meant she was conquered or as yet unconquered.
My heart burned with jealousy at the sight of it. The great joy of my home-coming was gone! I knew his way, and that he would stay for supper.
"I had thought," I whispered sourly to Eloise, "that I would at least have this first evening alone with you."
Eloise laughed. "Oh, he comes when he pleases, and I—I send him home when I please."