The Long Roll

by Mary Johnston

Judith looked at her with a twisted smile. "This morning, very early, we went with Aunt Lucy over the storeroom and the smoke-house, and then we went down to the quarter and got them all together, and told them how careful now we would all have to be with meal and bacon. And Susan's baby had died in the night, and we had to comfort Susan, and this afternoon we buried the baby. After breakfast we scraped almost the last of the tablecloths into lint, and Molly made envelopes, and Daddy Ben and I talked about shoes and how we could make them at home. Then Aunt Lucy and I went into town to the hospitals. There is a rumour of smallpox, but I am sure it is only a rumour. It has been a hard day. A number of sick were brought in from Fredericksburg. So much pneumonia! An old man and woman came up from North Carolina looking for their son. I took them through the wards. Oh, it was pitiful! No, he was not there. Probably he was killed. And Unity went to the sewing-rooms, and has been there sewing hard all day. And then we came home, and found Julius almost in tears, and Molly triumphant with the parlour carpet all up and ready to be cut into squares—soldiers sleeping in the snowy winter under tulips and roses. And then we read father's letter, and that was a comfort, a comfort! And then we took Susan's little baby and buried it, and did what we could for Susan; and then we walked down to the gate and stopped to gather chrysanthemums. And now we are going back to the house, and I dare say there'll be some work to do between now and bedtime. We're doing something pretty nearly all the time, Unity."

Unity lifted with strength the mass of bloom above her head. "I know, I know! But it's in me to want a brass band to do it by! I want to see the flag waving! I want to hear the sound of our work. Oh, I know I am talking foolishness!" She took Judith by the hands, and lifted her to her feet. "Anyhow, you're brave enough, Judith, Judith darling! Come, let us race to the house."

The three were country-bred, fleet of foot. They ran, swiftly, lightly, up the long drive. Twilight was around them, the leaves drifting down, the leaves crisp under foot. The tall white pillars gleamed before them; through the curtainless windows showed, jewel-like, the flame of a wood fire. They reached the steps almost together, soberly mounted them, and entered the hall. Miss Lucy called to them from the library. "The papers have come."

The old room, quiet, grave, book-lined, stored with records of old struggles, lent itself with fitness to the papers nowadays. The Greenwood Carys sat about the wood fire, Judith in an old armchair, Unity on an old embroidered stool, Molly in the corner of a great old sofa. Miss Lucy pushed her chair into the ring of the lamplight and read aloud in her quick, low, vibrant voice. The army at Fredericksburg—that was what they thought of now, day and night. She read first of the army at Fredericksburg—of Lee on the southern side of the Rappahannock, and Burnside on the northern, and the cannon all planted, and of the women and children beginning to leave. She read all the official statements, all the rumours, all the guesses, all the prophecies of victory and the record of suffering. Then she read the news of elsewhere in the vast, beleaguered fortress—of the fighting on the Mississippi, in Louisiana, in Arkansas, in the Carolinas; echoes from Cumberland Gap, echoes from Corinth. She read all the Richmond news—hot criticism, hot defence of the President, of the Secretary of War, of the Secretary of State; echoes from the House, from the Senate; determined optimism as to foreign intervention; disdain, as determined, of Burnside's "On to Richmond"; passionate devotion to the grey armies in the field—all the loud war song of the South, clear and defiant! She read everything in the paper. She read the market prices. Coffee $4 per lb. Tea $20 per lb. Wheat $5 per bushel. Corn $15 per barrel. Bacon $2 per lb. Sugar $50 per loaf. Chickens $10. Turkeys $50.

"Oh," cried Molly. "We have chickens yet, beside what we send to the hospitals! And we have eggs and milk and butter, and I was looking at the turkeys to-day. I feel wicked!"

"A lot of the turkeys will die," said Unity consolingly. "They always do. I spoke to Sam about the ducks and the guinea-hens the other day. I told him we were going to send them to Fredericksburg. He didn't like it. 'Miss Unity, what fer you gwine ter send all dem critturs away lak dat? You sen' 'em from Greenwood, dey gwine die ob homesickness!' And we don't use many eggs ourselves, honey, and we've no way to send the milk."

Miss Lucy having read the paper through, the Greenwood ladies went to supper. That frugal meal over, they came back to the library, the parlour looking somewhat desolate with the carpet up and rolled in one corner, waiting for the shears to-morrow. "The shepherds and shepherdesses look," said Unity, "as though they were shivering a little. I don't suppose they ever thought they'd live to see a Wilton carpet cut into blankets for Carys and other soldiers gone to war! It's impossible not to laugh when you think of Edward drawing one of those coverlets over him! Oh, me!"

"If Edward gets a furlough this winter," said Judith suddenly, "we must give him a party. With the two companies in town, and some of the surgeons, there will be men enough. Then Virginia and Nancy and Deb and Maria and Betty and Agatha and all the refugeeing girls—we could have a real party once more—"

"Just leaving out the things to eat," said Unity; "and wearing very old clothes. We'll do it, won't we, Aunt Lucy?"

Aunt Lucy thought it an excellent idea. "We mustn't get old before our time! We must keep brightness about the place. I have seen my mother laugh and look all the gayer out of her beautiful black eyes when other folk would have been weeping!—I hear company coming, now! It's Cousin William, I think."