A soldier saluted and handed her a piece of brown wrapping paper, neatly folded. Its corner was turned down in the old-fashioned way of a schoolboy's note to his sweetheart.
She went to the light and saw with a start it was in Ned Vaughan's handwriting. She read, with eager, sparkling eyes.
"Dearest: I've just seen in a Washington paper which our boys traded for that you are here. I must see you, and to-night. I can't wait. There will be no danger to either of us. Our pickets are on friendly terms. I've arranged everything with some good tobacco for your fellows. Follow the man who hands you this note to the river. A boat will be ready for you there with one of my men to row you across. I will be waiting for you at the old mill beside the burned pier of the railroad bridge.
"Ned."
Betty's heart gave a bound of joy, and in half an hour she was standing on the shining shore of the river before the old mill. Its great wheel was slowly turning, the water falling in broken crystals sparkling in the moonlight. Through the windows of the brick walls peered the black-mouthed guns trained across the water.
She looked about timidly for a moment while the man in grey who had rowed her over made fast his boat.
He tipped his old slouch hat:
"This way, Miss."
He led her down close, to the big wheel, crossed the stream of water which poured from its moss-covered buckets, and there, beneath an apple tree in bloom, stood a straight, soldierly figure in the full blue uniform of a Federal Captain, exactly as she had seen Ned Vaughan that night in the Old Capitol Prison.
The soldier saluted and Ned said: