“He is to-night wherever his battery is. Somewhere on the Rapidan. He would not let—what happened—ruin his life. He went back to the army that he loved. He has done his duty there. Moreover, no friend that knew him believed him guilty. Moreover, the woman that he loves has kept the steadiest faith—not less steady than mine, who am his mother.... I will tell you this because it should be told you.”
“Yes,” he said, “it should be told me. I have loved Judith Cary. But I want her happiness now. I wrote to her last night. I couldn’t do it before.”
The clock ticked, ticked. The whip-poor-will cried. Whip-poor-will! whip-poor-will! Margaret sat very still, her elbow on the table, her hand shading her eyes.
The quiet held a moment longer in the Three Oaks’ parlour, then he broke it. “I have said all, I think, that needed to be said. It does not seem to me to be a case for words. You understand that the machinery has been set in motion, and that the weight will be lifted and laid where it belongs. I shall try when I reach the army to see Colonel Cleave. You will understand that I wish to do that, and why I wish it. Had he been here to-night I should have said to him little more, I think, than I have said to you. I should have said that the old, unneeded hatred had died from within me, and that I asked his forgiveness.”
He took his hat from the chair beside him. “I’ll ride to town and sleep there to-night. In the morning I’ll turn toward the Rapidan—”
Margaret rose. “It is late. You have been riding all day. You are tired and thin and pale—you have been in prison.” Suddenly as she looked at him the tears came. “Oh, the world, the world that it is! Oh, the divided heart of it, the twisted soul, the bitter and the sweet and the dark and the light—” She dashed the tears away and came over to him with her hand held out. “See! it is all over now. It is far to town, and late. Stay at Three Oaks to-night.—Tullius shall put your horse up, and I will call Mahalah to see to your room—”
CHAPTER XIX
THE COLONEL OF THE SIXTY-FIFTH
Through the cool October sunlight three grey regiments and a battery of horse artillery were marching upon a road that led from the Rapidan to the Rappahannock. They were coming up from Orange Court-House and their destination was the main army now encamped below Kelly’s Ford.
The air was like wine and the troops were in spirits. There were huge jokes, laughter, singing, and when at noon the column halted in a coloured wood for dinner, the men frisked among the trees like young lambs or very fauns of Pan. They were ragged, and they didn’t have much for dinner, but gaiety was in their gift and a quite superb “make the best of it.” They were filled with quips and cranks; they guffawed with laughter. They lay upon the earth, hands beneath their heads, one knee crossed above the other, and sang to the red oak leaves on the topmost branch.
“I dreamed a dream the other night,