rporals, long-limbed, rugged
giants of the color company, decorated with the narrow stripe and double
chevron.

A few minutes later the cavalry moved out past the pickets, then swung
due south.

Night had fallen--a clear, starlit, blossom-scented dimness freshening
the air.

The Special Messenger, head bent, was still riding with Captain Stanley,
evidently preferring his company so openly, so persistently, that the
other officers, a little amused, looked sideways at the youngster from
time to time.

After a while Stanley said pleasantly: "We haven't exchanged names yet,
and you haven't told me why a regular is riding with us to-night."

"On special service," she said in a low voice.

"And your name and regiment?"

She did not appear to hear him; he glanced at her askance.

"You seem to be very young," he said.

"The colonel of the Ninetieth Rhode Island fell at twenty-two."

He nodded gravely. "It is a war of young men. I think Baring himself is
only twenty-five. He's breveted brigadier, too."

"And you?" she asked timidly.

He laughed. "Thirty; and a thousand in experience."

"I, too," she said softly.

"You? Thirty?"

"No, only twenty-four; but your peer in experience."

"Your voice sounds Southern," he said in his pleasant voice, inviting
confidence.

"Yes; my home was at Sandy River."

Out of the corners of her eyes she saw him start and look around at
her--felt his stern gaze questioning her; and rode straight on before
her without response or apparent consciousness.

"Sandy River?" he repeated in a strained voice. "Did you say you lived
there?"

"Yes," indifferently.

The captain rode for a while in silence, then, carelessly: "There was, I
believe, a family living there before the war--the Westcotes."

"Yes." She could scarcely utter a word for the suffocating throb of her
heart.

"You knew them?"

"Yes."

"Do--do they still live at Sandy River?"

"The house still stands. Major Westcote is dead."

"Her--I mean their grandfather?"

She nodded, incapable of speech.

"And"--he hesitated--"and the boy? He used to ride a pony--the most
fascinating little fellow----"

"He is at school in the North."

There was a silence, then the captain turned in his saddle and looked
straight at her.

"Does Miss Westcote live there still?"

"Do you mean Celia Westcote?" asked the Messenger calmly.

"Yes--Celia--" His voice fell softly, making of her name a caressing
cadence. The Special