dusky and motionless. But the fourth figure was kneeling on
his plank and Harry saw that it was Dalton, praying even as Stonewall
Jackson had prayed.

Then Harry shut his eyes. He was not devout himself, but in the darkness
of the night, with the rain beating a tattoo on the canvas walls of
the tent, he felt very solemn. This was war, red war, and he was in the
midst of it. War meant destruction, wounds, agony and death. He might
never again see Pendleton and his father and his aunt and his cousin,
Dick Mason, and Dr. Russell and all his boyhood and school friends. It
was no wonder that George Dalton prayed. He ought to be praying himself,
and lying there and not stirring he said under his breath a simple
prayer that his mother had taught him when he was yet a little child.

Then he fell asleep again, and awoke no more until the dawn. But while
Harry slept the full dangers of his situation became known to Banks far
after midnight at Strasburg. The regiment and the two guns that he
had sent down the turnpike to relieve Kenly had been fired upon so
incessantly by Southern pickets and riflemen that they were compelled
to turn back. Everywhere the Northern scouts and skirmishers were driven
in. Despite the darkness and rain they found a wary foe whom they could
not pass.

It was nearly two o'clock in the morning when Banks was aroused by a
staff officer who said that a man insisted upon seeing him. The man,
the officer said, claimed to have news that meant life or death, and he
carried on his person a letter from President Lincoln, empowering him to
go where he pleased. He had shown that letter, and his manner indicated
the most intense and overpowering anxiety.

Banks was surprised, and he ordered that the stranger be shown in at
once. A tall man, wrapped in a long coat of yellow oilcloth, dripping
rain, was brought into the room. He held a faded blue cap in his hand,
and the general noticed that the hand was sinewy and powerful. The front
of the coat was open a little at the top, disclosing a dingy blue coat.
His high boots were spattered to the tops with mud.

There was something in the man's stern demeanor and his intense, burning
gaze that daunted Banks, who was a brave man himself. Moreover, the
general was but half dressed and had risen from a warm couch, while
the man before him had come in on the storm, evidently from some great
danger, and his demeanor showed that he was ready for other and instant
dangers. F