.

"I have," she said slowly, controlling herself with a slight effort,
"found some one who will take my duty off my hands. She is a servant of
one of your neighbors,--who is an old friend of my uncle's. The woman is
familiar with the house, and our private property. I will give her full
instructions to act for me, and even an authorization in writing, if you
prefer it. She is already in the habit of coming here; but her visits
will give you very little trouble. And, as she is a slave, or, as you
call it, I believe, a chattel, she will be already quite accustomed
to the treatment which her class are in the habit of receiving from
Northern hands."

Without waiting to perceive the effect of her Parthian shot, she swept
proudly out of the room.

"I wonder what she means," mused Brant, as her quick step died away in
the passage. "One thing is certain,--a woman like that is altogether too
impulsive for a spy."

Later, in the twilight, he saw her walking in the garden. There was a
figure at her side. A little curious, he examined it more closely from
his window. It was already familiar to him,--the erect, shapely form
of his neighbor's servant. A thoughtful look passed over his face as he
muttered,--"So this is to be her deputy."

CHAPTER III.

Called to a general council of officers at divisional headquarters the
next day, Brant had little time for further speculation regarding
his strange guest, but a remark from the division commander, that he
preferred to commit the general plan of a movement then under discussion
to their memories rather than to written orders in the ordinary routine,
seemed to show that his chief still suspected the existence of a spy.
He, therefore, told him of his late interview with Miss Faulkner, and
her probable withdrawal in favor of a mulatto neighbor. The division
commander received the information with indifference.

"They're much too clever to employ a hussy like that, who shows her
hand at every turn, either as a spy or a messenger of spies,--and the
mulattoes are too stupid, to say nothing of their probable fidelity
to us. No, General, if we are watched, it is by an eagle, and not a
mocking-bird. Miss Faulkner has nothing worse about her than her tongue;
and there isn't the nigger blood in the whole South that would risk a
noose for her, or for any of their masters or mistresses!"

It was, therefore, perhaps, with some mitigation of his usual critical
severity that he saw h