“Is that Mrs. Grey?”
“Yes. What is the matter?”
“General Stuart sent me for his field-glasses. I am sorry to disturb you, but it couldn’t be helped.”
I tied a string around the glasses and lowered them.
“What’s the matter? Where is the cavalry going?”
“To Brandy Station. Reckon we’ll have some hot fighting soon,” and the orderly wheeled and rode away.
I stayed up and dressed, and thought of Dan, and wished I could know if he was to be in the coming engagement, and that I could see him first. But I didn’t see him all day.
CHAPTER XX
“WHOSE BUSINESS ’TIS TO DIE”
In forty-eight hours we knew that the surmise of the orderly was correct—there was enough fighting. The first cannon-ball which tore through the air at Brandy was only too grave assurance of the fact. All day men were hurrying past the house, deserters from both armies getting away from the scene of bloodshed and thunder as quickly as possible. Then came the procession of the dead and wounded, some in ambulances, some in carts, some on the shoulders of friends.
In the afternoon we began to hear rumors giving names of the killed and wounded. I listened with my heart in my throat for Dan’s name, but I did not hear it. I heard no news whatever of him all day—all day I could only hope that no news was good news, and all day that ghastly procession dragged heavily by. Among names of those killed I heard of Colonel Sol Williams. A day or two before the battle of Brandy he had returned from a furlough to Petersburg, where he had gone to marry a lovely woman, a friend of mine. The day before he was killed he had sat at table with me, chatting pleasantly of mutual friends at home from whom he had brought messages, brimful of happiness, and of the charming wife he had won! As the day waned I sat in my room, wretched and miserable, thinking of my friend who was at once a wife and a widow, and fearing for myself, whose husband even at that moment might be falling under his death wound. I was aroused by hearing the voices of men, subdued but excited, on the stairway leading to my room. I ran out and saw several men of rank and Mr. Bradford on the stairway talking excitedly, and I heard my name spoken.