“That's true. No matter what we do we'll never make any friends here in one of the Gulf states, the very core of Southern feeling. Dick, take a squad of men and enter the house. Pennington, you and Warner go with him.”
Dick sprang down instantly, chose Sergeant Whitley first and with the others entered the great portico. The front door was locked but it was easy enough to force it with a gun butt, and they went in, but not before Dick had noticed over the door in large letters the name, “Bellevue.” So this was Bellevue, one of the great cotton plantations of Mississippi. He now vaguely remembered that he had once heard his uncle, Colonel Kenton, speak of having stopped a week here. But he could not recall the name of the owner. Strong for the Union as he was Dick was glad that the family had gone before the Northern cavalry came.
The house was on a splendid scale inside also, but all the rugs and curtains were gone. As they entered the great parlor Dick saw a large piece of paper, and he flushed as he read written upon it in tall letters:
TO THE YANKEE RAIDERS:
YOU NEED NOT LOOK FOR THE SILVER.
IT HAS BEEN TAKEN TO VICKSBURG.
“Look at that!” he said indignantly to Warner. “See how they taunt us!”
But Warner laughed.
“Maybe some of our men at New Orleans have laid us open to such a stab,” he said. Then he added whimsically:
“We'll go to Vicksburg with Grant, Dick, and get that silver yet.”
“The writing's fresh,” said Sergeant Whitley, who also looked at the notification. “The paper hasn't begun to twist and curl yet. It's not been posted up there many hours.”
Colonel Winchester entered at that moment and the notice was handed to him. He, too, flushed a little when he read it, but the next instant he laughed. Dick then called his attention to the apparent fact that it had been put there recently.