d them.

V

I have never spent a more disagreeable hour than that which passed
while I was engaged in following the two men for the purpose of
identifying them. The weather was cold and the night dark, and there
were peppery little showers of sleet. The two left the town proper and
turned into a by-way that I had travelled many times in my rambles in
the countryside. I knew that it led to a house that had been built for
a suburban home, but now, in the crowded condition of the town, was
used as a tavern. It had attracted the suspicion of General Forrest and
I knew that he had placed it under the surveillance of the
Independents. It was a very orderly public-house, however, and nothing
had ever occurred there to justify the suspicions of the General.

The two men I followed could have reached their destination in less
than twenty minutes if they had gone forward with the briskness that
the weather justified; but there was an argument of some kind between
them--I judged that the stuttering man had no stomach for the part he
was to play as a horse-thief. At any rate, there was a dispute of some
kind, and they stopped on the road at least half a dozen times to have
it out. One point settled, another would arise before they had gone
far, and then they would stop again; and at last, so dark did the wood
become, and so low their conversation grew, that I passed within three
feet of them and never knew it until it was too late to betray the
astonishment I naturally felt.

I simply jogged along the path and pretended that I had not seen them.
I went along briskly, and in a few minutes came to the tavern. The door
was shut, the weather being cold, but I knew by the lights shining
through the windows that a hospitable fire was burning on the hearth.
There was no need to knock at the door. I heard the jangling piano
playing an accompaniment to the flute-like whistling of Harry Herndon's
negro. Remembering his carelessness, I felt like going into the tavern
and giving him a frailing. The inclination was so strong that I held my
hand on the door-knob until the first flush of anger had subsided. It
was a very fortunate thing for me, as it turned out, that Whistling Jim
was present, but at the moment the turn of a hair would have caused me
to justify much that the people of the North have said in regard to the
cruelty of Southerners to the negro.

The guests and visitors--and there were quite a number--made room for
me at