“And my reward?”
“I shall lay at your feet all that I am and have and ever hope to be. I offer it now without condition if you will accept my hand in marriage—”
“Your commission I accept at once,” was the prompt reply. “If I succeed we shall meet on terms more nearly equal.”
Waldron sprang to his feet, seized her hand and kissed it.
Could we have seen the expression of her white face when his lips touched her flesh he would not have smiled as he led her to the waiting car.
CHAPTER XL
THE jails were crowded with our leading statesmen. The President and his Cabinet had been transferred to Fort Warren at Boston before the Capitol was destroyed.
The Honorable Plato Barker, for reasons deemed sufficient by the Governor-General, was placed in the United States penitentiary at Albany. In spite of his mania for peace, Waldron thoroughly mistrusted him. His passion for oratorical leadership he knew to be insatiate. What fool scheme he might advocate in secret could not be guessed. In vain Barker offered to take the iron-clad Imperial oath. Waldron was deaf to all entreaties even when the petition was borne to him by the officer of the army who had captured the silver-tongued leader and made him a scullion. Villard, the Commanding General, had allowed Barker to deliver Sunday lectures to his soldiers on harmless themes of Chautauqua fame. The Commander had grown to like the orator as a harmless sort of court jester. He was particularly fond of his illustrations and jokes. He declared that Barker had missed his calling—he should have been an evangelist or a clown.
Failing to release his favorite captive the General interceded to save his reason.
Barker could not endure the silence to which he had been doomed. His mind began to break under the strain. He was saved from madness by an order which permitted him to preach to the prisoners on Sunday.