"I see no reason to change my wish," she said. "The Confederate Government has heavier work to do now than to hunt for a spy."
But Prescott noticed during the remainder of the afternoon and throughout supper that his mother's slight attacks of agitation were recurrent. There was another change in her. She was rarely a demonstrative woman, even to her son, and though her only child, she had never spoiled him; but now she was very solicitous for him. Had he suffered from the cold? Was he to be assigned to some particularly hard duty? She insisted, too, upon giving him the best of food, and Prescott, wishing to please her, quietly acquiesced, but watched her covertly though keenly.
He knew his mother was under the influence of some unusual emotion, and he judged that this house-to-house search for a spy had touched a soft heart.
"Mother," he said, after supper, "I think I shall go out for awhile this evening."
"Do go by all means," she said. "The young like the young, and I wish you to be with your friends while you are in Richmond."
Prescott looked at her in surprise. She had never objected to his spending the evening elsewhere, but this was the first time she had urged him to go. Yes, "urged" was the word, because her tone indicated it. However, she was so good about asking no questions that he asked none in return, and went forth without comment.
His steps, as often before, led him to Winthrop's office, where he and his friends had grown into the habit of meeting and discussing the news. To-night Wood came in, too, and sat silently in a chair, whittling a pine stick with a bowie-knife and evidently in deep thought. His continued stay in Richmond excited comment, because he was a man of such restless activity. He had never before been known to remain so long in one place, though now the frozen world, making military operations impossible or impracticable, offered fair excuse.
"That man Sefton came to see me to-day," he said after a long silence. "He wanted to know just how we are going to whip the enemy. What a fool question! I don't like Sefton. I wish he was on the other side!"
A slight smile appeared on the faces of most of those present. All men knew the reason why the mountain General did not like the Secretary, but no one ventured upon a teasing remark. The great black-haired cavalryman, sitting there, trimming off pine shavings with a razor-edged bowie-knife, seemed the last man in the world to be made the subject of a jest.
Prescott left at midnight, but he did not reach home until an hour later, having done an errand in the meanwhile. In the course of the day he had marked a circumstance of great interest and importance. Frame houses when old and as lightly built as that in the little side street are likely to sag somewhere. Now, at a certain spot the front door of this house failed to meet the floor by at least an eighth of an inch, and Prescott proposed to take advantage of the difference.