The song was that beautiful one which has been rendered:
"The fight is done: and, far away,
The thundering noise of battle dies;
While homeward, glad, I wend my way,
To meet the sunlight of her eyes."
Edith was looking very lovely. The vines curtaining the end of the piazza where she sat shut her into a green nook to which only the finest sprinkle of sunshine could penetrate. The light, moving shadows flecked her white gown, and all the floor of the piazza about her,
"Making a quiet image of disquiet,"
and a flickering in her hair. Carl, who was always dressing her out in some fanciful way, had fastened a drooping bunch of white lilies in her braids, and the petals, lying against her neck and cheek, showed the difference between silver-white and rose-white. Her beaming face made a light in the place.
Mr. Griffeth, stooping to see the poem, laid his hand on the book she held, and she released it so suddenly that it had nearly fallen to the floor.
"It is beautiful," he said, reading it aloud. "Can you not fancy yourself that golden-haired lady, and that some warrior is coming home to lay his honors at your feet and claim his reward?"
Edith looked away quickly, and let the air take the brightness of her face. He gazed steadily at her, and wondered for whom the brightness was, or if it were only a girl's vague romance.
"I like soldiers," she said after a moment, and, though quiet, there seemed a slight stateliness in her manner. "My grandfather was a soldier all his life, and was as used to a sword as I am to a fan. Mamma said that one of his mottoes was, 'Never reckon the forces of an enemy till after the victory.' It was written in one of her letters to papa. If I were a man, I should wish to be a soldier."
"I also am a soldier; I fight the devil," the minister said, with a slight, bitter laugh.