"

"Yes."

"The lying, the cheating, the false pretenses, the assumed name, the
trusting hearts you must betray, the men you must kill alone, sometimes
to save your own life and serve your country's?"

"It's war, mater dear. I hate its cruelty and its wrongs. I'll do my
best in these early days to make it impossible. But if it comes, I'll
play the game with my life in my hands, and if I had a hundred lives I'd
give them all to my country--my only regret is that I have but one--"

"How strange the ways of God!" the mother broke in. "He planted this
love in your soul. He taught it to me and I to you and now it ends in
darkness and blood and death--"

"But out of it, dear, must come the greater plan. You believe in
God--you must believe this, or else the Devil rules the universe, and
there is no God."

The mother drew the young lips down and kissed them tenderly.

"God's will be done, my Boy--it's the bitterness of death to me--but I
say it!"

CHAPTER VII

THE BEST MAN WINS

Before Socola could purchase his ticket for the South, Senator Barton
laid his heavy hand on his shoulder.

"I just ran down, sir, to ask you to wait and go in Senator Davis'
party. He has been threatened with arrest by the cowards who are at the
present moment in charge of the Government. He can't afford to leave
town while there's a chance that so fortunate an event may be pulled
off. I have decided to stay until Lincoln's inauguration. My wife and
daughter will make you welcome at Fairview. And you'll meet my three
boys. I'm sorry I can't be with you."

Socola's masked face showed no trace of disappointment. He merely asked
politely:

"And the party of Senator Davis will start?"

"A week from to-day, sir--and my wife and daughter will accompany
them--unless--of course--"

He laughed heartily.

"Unless the great Attorney General, Edwin M. Stanton, decides to arrest
him--if he'll only do it!"

Socola nodded carelessly.

"I understand, Senator. A week from to-day. The same hour--the same
train."

In a moment he had disappeared in the crowd and hurried to the office of
the Secretary of War.

Holt received his announcement with a smile about the corners of his
strong, crooked mouth.

"That's lucky. I'd rather you were with Davis ten to one. Amuse yourself
for the week by getting all the information possible of their junta
here--"

"Barton will stay until the inauguration--"

"Of course--a spy in the camp of the e