nding. He looked about the room with vague longing. He had
spent many a swift hour of pain and joy in this room. The sight and
sound of her had grown into his very life--he couldn't realize how
intimately and how hopelessly until this moment of parting perhaps
forever.

The portrait of her mother hung over the mantel--a life-size oil
painting by a noted French artist, the same brilliant laughing eyes, the
same deep golden brown hair, its wayward ringlets playing loosely about
her fine forehead and shell-like ears.

Beyond a doubt this pretty mother with the sunshine of France in her
blood had known how to flirt in her day--and her beautiful daughter was
enough like that picture to have been her twin sister.

On the mantel beneath this portrait sat photographs in solid silver
frames, one of Wendell Phillips, one of William Lloyd Garrison and one
of John C. Fremont, the first Republican candidate for President.
Directly opposite on the wall hung an oil painting of John Brown. Ned
caught the flash of the fanatic in the old madman's eye and was startled
at the striking resemblance to Senator Winter. He had never thought of
it before. Gilbert Winter might have been his brother in the flesh as he
undoubtedly was in spirit.

The thought chilled. He looked out the window with a sigh and wondered
how far the old tyrant would carry his hatred of the South into his
daughter's life. His eye rested for a moment on the row of lilacs in
full bloom in the garden and caught the flash of the big new leaves of
the magnolia which shadowed the rear wall. The early honeysuckle had
begun to blossom on the south side, and the violet beds were a solid
mass of gorgeous blue. Through the open window came the rich odor of the
long rows of narcissus in full white glory where the jonquils had flamed
a month ago.

What a beautiful world to be beaten into a scarred battlefield!

For just a moment the thought wrung the heart of youth and love. It was
hard just when the tenderest and sweetest impulses that ever filled his
soul wore clamoring for speech, to turn his back on all, say good-bye
and go--to war--perhaps to kill his own brother.

And there could be no mistake, war had come. Overhead he caught the
steady tramp of Senator Winter's feet, a caged lion walking back and
forth with hungry eyes turned toward the South. He could feel his deadly
hostility through the very walls.

A battery of artillery suddenly roared through the streets, the d