go out of my lines, Shannon, and you'll want to come
back, so I'll fix it up for you." He went into the next room and
dictated to an orderly, and presently brought me a paper signed with
his own name, and I have it yet.

Everything was ready for us to take our leave, and we did so. "You are
a different man from what I thought you," said Jane Ryder to General
Forrest, "and I have to thank you for your kindness and consideration."

"It ain't what people think of you--it's what you are that counts,"
replied General Forrest. I have thought of this homely saying hundreds
of times, and it rings truer every time I repeat it to myself. It
covers the whole ground of conscience and morals.

As I was going out, Jane Ryder being in advance, the General said to me
again, "Don't make no mistake about what I mean. You are responsible to
me for the safety of that young lady. I believe in you, but I may be
wrong. If I am wrong you'd just as well go out and hang yourself and
save me the trouble."

"You needn't worry about me, General. I can take care of myself,"
declared Jane Ryder. We went out of the house and came to where
Whistling Jim was holding the horses. I dismissed him then and there,
and told him to put his horse in the stable and have plenty of feed for
mine. But Jane Ryder, for reasons of her own, preferred to walk, so
that Whistling Jim went away with the two horses and we were left to
ourselves.

I remember that I said very little during that long walk, and all the
burden of the conversation fell on the young woman. She was not at all
elated over the narrow escape she had had, and preferred to make light
of it, but I knew that, under different circumstances, she would have
been put in prison in Richmond, and I think that her nature would have
succumbed to close confinement.

"You have had your way, after all, but I am not sure that I like it,"
she said. She waited for me to make some reply, but none was
forthcoming. "I hope you don't think you have won a great victory. If I
had been a man, perhaps the victory would have been the other way."

"I didn't compel you to come with me," I remarked.

"You mean I came of my own accord. If I did, it was to avoid a scene
before my mother--the lady you saw at the house. I didn't want her to
hear you bluster and threaten; and, besides, I wanted to tell you what
I think of you. We have both had our way. My mother thinks you are a
gentleman in a way, and I know what I know."

I