“Thank you,” and I gravely lifted my hat as I spoke. “You have saved me a most unpleasant duty. You may ride on, Sergeant; this lady and I will follow, as before.”
She scarcely changed her posture as I spurred forward, riding now so close to her side that I could feel the flap of her saddle rise and fall against my knee. Whatever of evil she may have thought of us, I felt that she was sorry enough now for her hasty action, and I forgave the pain that yet stung me, and longed, without well knowing how, to tell her so.
CHAPTER V. — A DISASTER ON THE ROAD
To me she was merely a woman whom it had become my duty to protect, and whatever of chivalrous feeling I may have held toward her was based upon nothing deeper than this knowledge. She had come to us undesired and in darkness, her form enveloped in a cavalry cloak, her face shrouded by the night. As to whether she was young or old I had scarce means of knowing, saving only that the tone of her voice and the graceful manner of her riding made me confident that she had not lost the agility of youth. But beyond this vague impression (it was little more), and a fleeting gleam of the starlight in her eyes as she faced me in anger, I was as totally unaware of how she really looked as though we had never met. Her very name was unknown to me. Who was this Major Brennan? Was he father, brother, or husband? and was her name Brennan also? For some reason this last possibility was repugnant to me. Yet I knew not why.
I turned these thoughts over in my mind, speculating idly upon them, not because I felt any interest in their solution, or in the woman riding at my side, but because they seemed to fall into order to the steady music of my horse's feet and the darkness of the night. “No,” I said to myself, “there is certainly no leaving her except in a disciplined camp; young or old, Yankee or what not, she is in our care, and we'll keep her out of the hands of those cut-throats between the lines.”
I glanced toward her, wondering what the morning light might reveal as to her appearance. She was sitting erect and easy in the saddle, yet seemed to ride with her face averted from me.
“You ride as though born to the saddle,” I said pleasantly; and although I spoke low, we were so close together that my voice carried distinctly to her ears. “We have been sufficiently conceited to suppose that to be an accomplishment peculiar to our Southern women.”
“I have been accustomed to ride since childhood,” she replied rather shortly, and I was conscious of a restraint in her manner far from pleasing. Yet I ventured upon one more effort at conversation.