“Mark,” and Wilford’s voice was husky with emotion; “you’ve stumbled upon the very thing which is tormenting my life out of me. Aunt Betsy has never turned up or been heard from since that night. For aught I know she was murdered, or spirited away, and I am half distracted. I’d give a thousand dollars to know what has become of her.”
“Put down half that pile and I’ll tell you,” was Mark’s nonchalant reply, while Wilford, seizing his shoulder, and compelling him to look up, exclaimed,
“You know, then? Tell me—you do know. Where is she?”
“Safe in Silverton, I presume,” was the reply, and then Mark told his story, to which Wilford listened, half incredulous, half indignant, and a good deal relieved.
“You are a splendid fellow, Mark, though I must say you meddled, but I know you did not do it unselfishly. Perhaps with Katy not won I might do the same. Yes, on the whole, I thank you and Helen for saving me that mortification. I feel like a new man, knowing the old lady is safe at home, where I trust she will remain. And that Tom, who called here yesterday, asking to be our clerk, is the youth I saw at the opera. I thought his face was familiar. Let him come, of course. In my gratitude I feel like patronizing the entire Tubbs family.”
And so it was this flash of gratitude for a peril escaped which procured for young Tom Tubbs the situation of clerk in the office of Cameron & Ray, the application for such situation having been urged by the ambitious Mattie, who felt her dignity considerably increased when she could speak of brother Tom in company with Messrs. Cameron and Ray.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE SEVENTH REGIMENT.
Does the reader remember the pleasant spring days when the thunder of Fort Sumter’s bombardment came echoing up the Northern hills and across the Western prairies, stopping for a moment the pulses of the nation, but quickening them again with a mighty power as from Maine to California man after man arose to meet the misguided foe trailing our honored flag in the dust? Nowhere, perhaps, was the excitement so great or the feeling so strong as in New York, when the Seventh Regiment was ordered to Washington, its members never faltering or holding back, but with a nerving of the will and a putting aside of self, preparing to do their duty. Conspicuous among them was Mark Ray, who, laughing at his mother’s fears, kissed her livid cheek, and then with a pang remembered Helen—wondering how she would feel, and thinking the path to danger would be so much easier if he knew that her prayers would go with him, shielding him from harm and bringing him back again to the sunshine of her presence.
And before he went Mark must know this for certain, and he chided himself for having put it off so long. True she had been sick and confined to her room for a long while after Aunt Betsy’s memorable visit; and when she was able to go out, Lent had put a stop to her mingling in festive scenes, so that he had seen but little of her, and had never met her alone. But he would write that very day. She knew, of course, that he was going. She would say that he did well to go; and she would answer yes to the question he would ask her. Mark felt sure of that; but still the letter he wrote was eloquent with his pleadings for her love, while he confessed his own, and asked that she would give him the right to think of her as his affianced bride—to know she waited for his return, and would crown it at last with the full fruition of her priceless love.
“I meet a few of my particular friends at Mrs. Grandon’s to-night,” he added, in conclusion. “Can I hope to see you there, taking your presence as a token that I may speak and tell you in words what I have so poorly written?”