The man touched his hat.
"I'll know the way from there, Madam."
The scout delivered his message into Beauregard's hands that night before eight o'clock.
At noon the next day Colonel Jordan had placed in her hands his answer:
"Yours received at eight o'clock. Let them come. We are ready. We rely upon you for precise information. Be particular as to description and destination of forces and quantity of artillery."
She had not been idle. She was able to write a message of almost equal importance to the one she had dispatched the day before. With quick nervous hand she wrote on another tiny scrap of paper:
"The Federal commander has ordered the Manassas railroad to be cut to prevent the junction of Johnston with Beauregard."
The moment the first authentic information reached President Davis of the purpose to attack Beauregard he immediately urged General Johnston to make his preparations for the juncture of their forces.
And at once the President received confirmation of his fears of his General-in-Chief. Johnston delayed and began a correspondence of voluminous objections.
July 17, on receipt of the dispatch to Beauregard announcing the plan to cut the railroad, the President was forced to send Johnston a positive order to move his army to Manassas. The order was obeyed with a hesitation which imperiled the issue of battle. And while on the march, Beauregard's pickets exchanging shots with McDowell's skirmish line, Johnston began the first of his messages of complaint and haggling to his Chief at Richmond. Jealous of Beauregard's popularity and fearful of his possible insubordination, Johnston telegraphed Davis demanding that his relative rank to Beauregard should be clearly defined before the juncture of their armies.