Morgan hid his face in his hands and a sob broke from his lips. The sound seemed to pierce Drayton like a sword thrust. His arm dropped to his side, and he turned from one to another searching their faces eagerly, but their sorrowful countenances only spoke confirmation of the news.
“In mercy, speak,” he cried with a catch in his voice. “Peggy, tell me truth! Speak to me!”
“John, John, I’m afraid ’tis true,” cried Peggy going to him with outstretched hands. “Don’t take it like this! Thee must be brave.”
But with a cry, so full of anguish, of heartbreak, that they paled as they heard it, Drayton sank to the floor.
“Boy, I loved him too,” spoke Colonel Morgan brokenly. “We were both with him on that march to Quebec. And at Saratoga in that mad charge he made. I loved him——”
He could not proceed. Bending over the prostrate lad he lifted him, and with his arm about him drew him from the room. Peggy broke into a passion of tears as Drayton’s wailing cry came back to her:
“My general! My general! My general!”
CHAPTER XXXII—ON THE ALTAR OF HIS COUNTRY
| “If you fail Honor here, Never presume to serve her any more; Bid farewell to the integrity of armes; And the honorable name of soldier Fall from you, like a shivered wreath of laurel By thunder struck from a desertlesse forehead.” —Faire Quarrell. |
For a time no sound was heard in the room but the sobs of the maiden and the broken utterances of the men. The tears of the latter were no shame to their manhood, for they were wrung from their hearts by the defection of a great soldier.