.

Nor did he depart the next night either. Instead, two or three days
passed, and he was still in the house dug in the hillside, a guest and
yet a captive. The bombardment had gone on, his food was still brought
to him by Miss Woodville, and once or twice Victor came, but Dick, as he
was in honor bound, asked him no question about the armies.

The waiting, the loneliness and the suspense were terrible to one so
young, and so ambitious. And yet he had fared better than he had a right
to expect, a fact, however, that did not relieve his situation.

Another night came, and he went to sleep in his lonely cell in the wall,
but he was awakened while it was yet intensely dark by a cannonade far
surpassing in violence any that had gone before. He rushed to the hole,
but he could see nothing in the ravine. Yet the whole plateau seemed to
shake with the violence of the concussions and the crash of exploding
shells.

The fire came from all sides, from the river as well as the land. The
boom of the huge mortars on the boats there sounded above everything.
Dick knew absolutely now that the message he was to carry had been
delivered by somebody else.

He heard under the continued thunder of the guns sharp commands, and the
tread of many troops moving. He knew that the Southern forces were going
into position, and he felt himself that the tremendous fire was the
prelude to a great attack. His excitement grew. He strained his eyes,
but he could see nothing in the dark ravine, or out there where the
cannon roared, save the rapid, red flashes under the dim horizon. He had
his watch and he had kept it running. Now he was able to make out that
it was only three o'clock in the morning. A long time until day and
he must wait until then to know what such a furious convulsion would
achieve.

The slow time passed, and there was no decrease of the fire. Once or
twice he came away from the window and listened at the entrance to his
little room, but he could hear nothing stirring in the larger chamber.
Yet it was incredible that Colonel Woodville and his daughter should not
be awake. They would certainly be listening with an anxiety and suspense
not less than his.

Dawn came after painful ages, and slowly the region out there where the
Union army lay rose into the light. But it was a red dawn, a dawn in
flame and smoke. Scores of guns crashed in front, and behind the heavy
booming of the mortars on the boats formed the overnote of the sto