CHAPTER XII
IN THE COVE
General Sheridan permitted the Winchester men to rest a long time, or rather he ordered them to do so. No regiment had distinguished itself more at Cedar Creek or in the previous battles, and it was best for it to lie by a while, and recover its physical strength—strength of the spirit it had never lost. It also gave a needed chance to the sixteen slight wounds accumulated by Dick, Pennington and Warner to heal perfectly.
"Unless something further happens," said Warner, regretfully, "I won't have a single honorable scar to take back with me and show in Vermont."
"I'll have one slight, though honorable, scar, but I won't be able to show it," said Pennington, also with regret.
"I trust that it's in front, Frank," said Dick.
"It is, all right. Don't worry about that. But what about you, Dick?"
"I had hopes of a place on my left arm just above the elbow. A bullet, traveling at the rate of a million miles a minute, broke the skin there and took a thin flake of flesh with it, but I'm so terribly healthy it's healed up without leaving a trace."
"There's no hope for us," said Warner, sighing. "We can never point to the proof of our warlike deeds. You didn't find your cousin among the prisoners?"
"No, nor was he among their fallen whom we buried. Nor any of his friends either. I'm quite sure that he escaped. My intuition tells me so."