The Crisis Part 58

"We shall see him to-day, Aunt Lillian," was the joyful answer. "The newspaper says that all the Camp Jackson prisoners are to be set free to-day, on parole. Oh, I knew they would not dare to hold them. The whole state would have risen to their rescue."

Mrs. Colfax did not receive these tidings with transports. She permitted her niece to come into her room, and then: sank into a chair before the mirror of her dressing-table, and scanned her face there.

"I could not sleep a wink, Jinny, all night long. I look wretchedly. I am afraid I am going to have another of my attacks. How it is raining!

What does the newspaper say?"

"I'll get it for you," said Virginia, used to her aunt's vagaries.

"No, no, tell me. I am much too nervous to read it."

"It says that they will be paroled to-day, and that they pa.s.sed a comfortable night."

"It must be a Yankee lie," said the lady. "Oh, what a night! I saw them torturing him in a thousand ways the barbarians! I know he had to sleep on a dirty floor with low-down trash."

"But we shall have him here to-night, Aunt Lillian!" cried Virginia.

"Mammy, tell Uncle Ben that Mr. Clarence will be here for tea. We must have a feast for him. Pa said that they could not hold them."

"Where is Comyn?" inquired Mrs. Colfax. "Has he gone down to see Clarence?"

"He went to Jefferson City last night," replied Virginia. "The Governor sent for him."

Mrs. Colfax exclaimed in horror at this news.

"Do you mean that he has deserted us?" she cried. "That he has left us here defenceless,--at the mercy of the Dutch, that they may wreak their vengeance upon us women? How can you sit still, Virginia? If I were your age and able to drag myself to the street, I should be at the a.r.s.enal now. I should be on my knees before that detestable Captain Lyon, even if he is a Yankee." Virginia kept her temper.

"I do not go on my knees to any man," she said. "Rosetta, tell Ned I wish the carriage at once."

Her aunt seized her convulsively by the arm.

"Where are you going, Jinny?" she demanded. "Your Pa would never forgive me if anything happened to you."

A smile, half pity, crossed the girl's anxious face.

"I am afraid that I must risk adding to your misfortune, Aunt Lillian,"

she said, and left the room.

Virginia drove to Mr. Brinsmade's. His was one of the Union houses which she might visit and not lose her self respect. Like many Southerners, when it became a question of go or stay, Mr. Brinsmade's unfaltering love for the Union had kept him in. He had voted for Mr. Bell, and later had presided at Crittenden Compromise meetings. In short, as a man of peace, he would have been willing to sacrifice much for peace. And now that it was to be war, and he had taken his stand uncompromisingly with the Union, the neighbors whom he had befriended for so many years could not bring themselves to regard him as an enemy. He never hurt their feelings; and almost as soon as the war began he set about that work which has been done by self-denying Christians of all ages,--the relief of suffering. He visited with comfort the widow and the fatherless, and many a night in the hospital he sat through beside the dying, Yankee and Rebel alike, and wrote their last letters home.

And Yankee and Rebel alike sought his help and counsel in time of perplexity or trouble, rather than hotheaded advice from their own leaders.

Mr. Brinsmade's own carriage was drawn up at his door; and that gentleman himself standing on the threshold. He came down his steps bareheaded in the wet to hand Virginia from her carriage.

Courteous and kind as ever, he asked for her father and her aunt as he led her into the house. However such men may try to hide their own trials under a cheerful mien, they do not succeed with spirits of a kindred nature. With the others, who are less generous, it matters not. Virginia was not so thoughtless nor so selfish that she could not perceive that a trouble had come to this good man. Absorbed as she was in her own affairs, she forgot some of them in his presence. The fire left her tongue, and to him she could not have spoken harshly even of an enemy. Such was her state of mind, when she was led into the drawing-room. From the corner of it Anne arose and came forward to throw her arms around her friend.

"Jinny, it was so good of you to come. You don't, hate me?"

"Hate you, Anne dear!"

"Because we are Union," said honest Anne, wis.h.i.+ng to have no shadow of doubt.

Virginia was touched. "Anne," she cried, "if you were German, I believe I should love you."

"How good of you to come. I should not have dared go to your house, because I know that you feel so deeply. You--you heard?"

"Heard what?" asked Virginia, alarmed.

"That Jack has run away--has gone South, we think. Perhaps," she cried, "perhaps he may be dead." And tears came into the girl's eyes.

It was then that Virginia forgot Clarence. She drew Anne to the sofa and kissed her.

"No, he is not dead," she said gently, but with a confidence in her voice of rare quality. "He is not dead, Anne dear, or you would have heard."

Had she glanced up, she would have seen Mr. Brinsmade's eye upon her. He looked kindly at all people, but this expression he reserved for those whom he honored. A life of service to others had made him guess that, in the absence of her father, this girl had come to him for help of some kind.

"Virginia is right, Anne," he said. "John has gone to fight for his principles, as every gentleman who is free should; we must remember that this is his home, and that we must not quarrel with him, because we think differently." He paused, and came over to Virginia. "There is something I can do for you, my dear?" said he.

She rose. "Oh, no, Mr. Brinsmade," she cried. And yet her honesty was as great as Anne's. She would not have it thought that she came for other reasons. "My aunt is in such a state of worry over Clarence that I came to ask you if you thought the news true, that the prisoners are to be paroled. She thinks it is a--" Virginia flushed, and bit a rebellious tongue. "She does not believe it."

Even good Mr. Brinsmade smiled at the slip she had nearly made. He understood the girl, and admired her. He also understood Mrs. Colfax.

"I'll drive to the a.r.s.enal with you, Jinny," he answered. "I know Captain Lyon, and we shall find out certainly."

"You will do nothing of the kind, sir," said Virginia, with emphasis.

"Had I known this--about John, I should not have come."

He checked her with a gesture. What a gentleman of the old school he was, with his white ruffled s.h.i.+rt and his black stock and his eye kindling with charity.

"My dear," he answered, "Nicodemus is waiting. I was just going myself to ask Captain Lyon about John." Virginia's further objections were cut short by the violent clanging of the door-bell, and the entrance of a tall, energetic gentleman, whom Virginia had introduced to her as Major Sherman, late of the army, and now president of the Fifth Street Railroad. The Major bowed and shook hands. He then proceeded, as was evidently his habit, directly to the business on which he was come.

"Mr. Brinsmade," he said, "I heard, accidentally, half an hour ago that you were seeking news of your son. I regret to say, sir, that the news I have will not lead to a knowledge of his whereabouts. But in justice to a young gentleman of this city I think I ought to tell you what happened at Camp Jackson."

"I shall be most grateful, Major. Sit down, sir."

But the Major did not sit down. He stood in the middle of the room. With some gesticulation which added greatly to the force of the story, he gave a most terse and vivid account of Mr. John's arrival at the embankment by the grove--of his charging a whole regiment of Union volunteers. Here was honesty again. Mr. Sherman did not believe in mincing matters even to a father and sister.

"And, sir," said he, "you may thank the young man who lives next door to you--Mr. Brice, I believe--for saving your son's life."

"Stephen Brice!" exclaimed Mr. Brinsmade, in astonishment.

Virginia felt Anne's hand tighten But her own was limp. A hot wave swept over her, Was she never to hear the end of this man.

"Yes, sir, Stephen Brice," answered Mr. Sherman. "And I never in my life saw a finer thing done, in the Mexican War or out of it."

Mr. Brinsmade grew a little excited. "Are you sure that you know him?"

"As sure as I know you," said the Major, with excessive conviction.

"But," said Mr. Brinsmade, "I was in there last night, I knew the young man had been at the camp. I asked him if he had seen Jack. He told me that he had, by the embankment. But he never mentioned a word about saving his life."