“Do these women go?” he asked of the general.
“These ladies go. Obey my order, sir!”
Upon which the orderly went quickly about his business.
When the officer came to examine our baggage I was on thorns. I had come north intending to make certain purchases, and I had made them, and the fruit of my money and labors was in those two trunks of mother’s and mine. Mother’s trunk was quite a large one, and both of those honest-looking trunks to which I yielded the keys so freely were crammed with dishonest goods—that is, dishonest according to blockade law. I had paid good gold for them, and anxiety enough, Heaven knows, for them to be properly mine.
I had shoes in the bottom of those trunks, and on top of the shoes cloth made into the semblance of female wear and underwear; and, lastly, I had put in genuine every-day garments. There were handkerchiefs, pins, needles, gloves, thread, and all sorts of odds and ends between the folds of garments, here, there, and everywhere in those trunks. They were as contraband trunks as ever crossed into Dixie. But, again, my Yankee was a gentleman.
“This is an unpleasant duty, miss,” he said when I handed him my keys, “but I will disarrange your property as little as possible. It is only a form.”
The orderly lifted the trays and set them back again, scarcely glancing underneath. What a dear, nice Yankee, I thought! He locked the trunks and sealed them.
“Will those seals be broken anywhere, and my trunks examined again?” I asked in some trepidation—this examination was so satisfactory to me that I wanted it to do for one and all.
“I can not tell, miss. They may be at Harper’s Ferry. But I hardly think so. I think this seal will carry you through.”