“No, no,” Rose cried, vehemently, “not Tom; I have another brother, a younger one,—Jimmie we call him. Did you never hear of Jimmie, who ran away more than a year ago?”
“Never!” and the staunch patriot of a widow pursed up her thin lips with an expression which plainly said the Carleton family had fallen greatly in her estimation, in spite of all Tom had said of Isaac.
Rose, however, was not good at reading expressions, and taking it for granted the widow wanted to hear all about it, she told her what she knew, marvelling much at the rigid silence her auditor maintained.
“Isn’t it shameful?” she asked, when she had finished.
“Shameful? Yes. I hope he’ll be catched and hung higher than Haman. I’ll furnish rope to hang him!” was the indignant widow’s reply, and ere Rose could quite make out what ailed her, she had said good-afternoon, and banging the door behind her, was hurrying off, muttering to herself, “Somethin’ wrong in their bringin’ up. Needn’t tell me. I’d like to see my boys turnin’ traitor! The rascal!” and as by this time the widow had reached the shop where she was to stop for burning-fluid, she turned into the little store, and catching up the can with a jerk, spilt a part of its contents upon her clean gingham dress, and then hurried off again with rapid strides toward the cottage in the Hollow.
The Carletons, Tom and all, were below par in her opinion, and kept sinking lower and lower, until she reached the cottage, where she gave vent to her wrath as follows:
“A pretty how d’ye do up to Miss Martherses. Her brother Jim has jined the cowardly, sneakin’, low-lived, contemptible Rebels, and is comin’ on to take Washington! The scalliwag! If things go on at this rate, I’ll jine the army myself, and tar and feather every one on ’em! Needn’t tell me.”
Annie was no lover of gossip, and knowing that the widow was terribly excited, she made no reply except to pass her a letter bearing the Washington postmark. This had the desired effect, and utterly oblivious of Jimmie, the widow tore open Isaac’s letter, in which he spoke of Captain Carleton as being very kind to him, and very popular with the soldiers.
“I would fight for him till the very last,” Isaac wrote; “he has been so good to me, always noticing me with a bow when he comes into our regiment, as he sometimes does, and when he can, speaking to me a pleasant word. He knows I sawed his sister’s wood, for I told him so. It seemed so mean-like to be passing myself off for better than I am, and you know a soldier’s dress does improve a chap mightily, giving him kind of a dandy air. Why, even Harry Baker and Bill look like gentlemen, though Harry gets drunk awfully, and has been in the guard-house twice, But, as I was saying, Captain Carleton didn’t appear to think a bit less of me, though he struck me on the shoulder, and laughed kind of queer when I said why I told him I sawed Mrs. Mather’s wood, and the next day I saw him talking with our colonel, and heard something about sergeant, and Isaac Simms, and ‘too young to be expedient.’ Then, when I met him again, he asked me wasn’t I twenty-one, in such a way that I knew he wanted me to tell him yes; but, mother, I thought of that prayer we said together, the morning I came away, ‘Lead us not into temptation,’ and I couldn’t tell a lie, though the answer stuck in my throat and choked me so, but I out with it at last. I said, ‘No, sir, I was only eighteen last Thanksgiving,’ and then his face had the same look it wore when I told him I was a wood-sawyer. ‘And so I suppose you’ll be nineteen next Thanksgiving’ he said, adding ‘You don’t know what you lost by telling the truth so frankly, but the moral gain is much greater than the loss. You are a brave boy, Isaac Simms, and worthy of being a second George Washington.’ I do like him so much! Can’t you send him something, mother, if it’s nothing more than the nice cough-candy you used to make, or some of that poke-ointment? I notice he coughs occasionally, and I heard him say his feet were sore. I’d like to give him something, just to see his handsome white teeth when he laughed, and said ‘Thank you, my boy.’ Oh, I would almost die for Captain Carleton.”
Surely, after reading this, the widow could feel no more animosity against the Carletons, on account of Jimmie’s sin.