When MacNeil joined them again he said, “Some of my neighbors want to have a look at you. I’ve decided to let them come. I want them to know that you aren’t wild beasts.” He fingered the butt of his pistol and said, as if to himself, “They’ll have to leave their firearms outside the door.”
MacNeil made small talk until the first knock sounded at the door. A man with gray hair came into the room with his wife.
MacNeil introduced them as Dr. and Mrs. Sellers. “Dr. Sellers is our family doctor.”
Soon five more people filed into the room, two women and three men, all well past middle age. They sat stiffly at first until the manner of their host made them feel at home.
The doctor turned his bright blue eyes on Tim and asked in a gentle drawl, “Do you know much about the progress of the war?”
“Very little, sir, I’m afraid,” Tim said. “We were in jail more than five months before we escaped.”
Their host nodded toward the man who had asked the question and turned to Tim. “Doctor Sellers is our only doctor—your father’s Southern counterpart.”
The doctor spoke softly. “In wartime we think of our enemies as unrelenting scoundrels. Of course we know in our hearts it isn’t so. But I can’t for the life of me see why the North must bring our long-established institutions down.” He shook his head. “Now I’m talking like a child. Slavery is already doomed.”
The doctor’s wife gasped. “Surely not if we win the War.”
The doctor said, “I’m sorry, Mary. Our lamp is burning mighty low.”