“It was mean in me to let Tom burn the letter,” he said, “but I could not bear the thought of his winning what I had lost, and so like a coward I looked on and felt a thrill of satisfaction when I saw his letter crisping on the coals. But as proof that I have repented of that selfish act, I ask you plainly, ‘Would you have replied favorably to that letter, had it been sent?’ If so, tell me truly, and without ever betraying the fact that I have written to you on the subject, I will manage to have Tom write again, and if the fates shall so decree I will try to forget that gap in the stone wall where we sat that night when I told you of my love.”
His letter found Annie sick in bed from the effects of a severe cold which kept her so long in her room that it was not till just on the eve of the battle of Fredericksburg that Jimmie received her answer, “I should say No to your brother just as I did to you.”
This was what Jimmie read, and with a feeling of relief as far as Tom was concerned, he crushed the few lines into his pocket and went on with his preparations for the contest at Fredericksburg, which seemed inevitable, with a kind of recklessness which characterized many of our soldiers. Jimmie had heretofore felt no fears of a battle. The bullet which might strike down another would not harm him, and he charged his preservation mostly to Annie’s prayers for his safety; but in this, her last brief note, she had not said so much as “God bless you,” and Jimmie’s heart beat faster as he thought of the impending danger. Jimmie seldom prayed, but if Annie had failed him he must try what he could do for himself, and when the night came down upon that vast army camping in the woods and on the hillside, it looked on one young face upturned to the wintry sky, and the moaning winds carried up to heaven the few words of prayer which Jimmie Carleton said.
Oppressed with a strange feeling of foreboding, he prayed earnestly that God would blot out all his manifold transgressions, and if he died,—grant him an entrance into heaven where Annie was sure to go. Close beside him crouched Bill, who listened with wonder to the “Corp’ral,” a feeling of terror beginning to creep into his own heart as he detected the accents of fear in his companion.
“I say, Corp’ral,” he began, when Jimmie’s devotions were ended, “be you ’fraid of somethin’s happenin’ to you when they set us to crossin’ that darned river, and if there does, shall I write to the folks and the gal you mentioned and tell ’em you prayed like a parson the night before?”
Jimmie was terribly annoyed with Bill’s impertinence, and for a man who had just been praying did not exercise as much Christian forbearance as might have been expected. A harsh “Mind your business!” was his only reply, which Bill received with a good humored, “Guess you’ll have to try agin, Corp’ral, before you get into the right frame;” and then there was silence between them, and the night crept on apace, and the early morning began to break and the wintry sky was obscured by a thick, dull haze, which hid for a time our soldiers from view, then a deadly fire of musketry from the opposite bank of the Rappahannock was opened upon them, till they fled to the shelter of the adjacent hills, where, forming into line, they again went back to the laying of the pontoon bridges, while the roar of the cannon shook the hills and told to the listeners miles away that the battle of Fredericksburg was begun.
CHAPTER XXIV.
RESULTS OF THE BATTLE.
The streets of Rockland were full of excited people when the news first reached the town of the terrible battle which had left so many slain upon the field, and desolated so many hearths both North and South. Rose Mather was nearly frantic, for Will she knew was in the battle, together with her two brothers, and it was not probable that all three would escape unharmed. Eagerly she grasped the paper to see who was killed, wounded, or missing, but neither of the three names was there, and she began to hope again, and found time to comfort poor Susan Simms, whose husband was also in the fight, and who had gone almost mad with the fear lest he should be killed.
Two days passed, and then there came a telegram from Tom, and Mrs. Carleton, who read it first, gave a low, moaning cry, while Rose, who read it next, uttered a piercing shriek, and fell sobbing into Annie’s arms.