next world.

But he did not wake, and the Colonel, too, slept on, those despairing
cries in his ears, as peacefully as if his great dream of peace had been
realized. Still those dreadful shrieks, mingled now with curses hot from
the bottomless pit, came up through the window. No time was to be
lost,--so, giving another and a desperate tug at Javins, I thrust my
hand under his pillow, drew out his revolver and the door-key, and,
three steps at a time, bounded down the stairways. At the outer entrance
a half-drunken barkeeper was rubbing his eyes, and asking, "What's the
row?"--but not another soul was stirring. Giving no heed to him, I
hurried into the street. I had not gone twenty paces, however, before a
gruff voice from the shadow of the building called out,--

"Halt! Who goes thar'?"

"A friend," I answered.

"Advance, friend, and give the countersign."

"I don't know it."

"Then ye carn't pass. Orders is strict."

"What is this disturbance? I heard a woman crying murder."

The stifled shrieks had died away, but low moans, and sounds like
hysterical weeping, still came up from around the corner.

"Oh! nothin',--jest some nigger fellers on a time. Thet's all."

"And you stood by and saw it done!" I exclaimed, with mingled contempt
and indignation.

"Sor it? How cud _I_ holp it? I hes my orders,--ter keep my eye on thet
'ar' door; 'sides, thar' war' nigh a dozen on 'em, and these Richmond
nigs, now thet the white folks is away, is more lawless nor old Bragg
himself. My life 'ou'dn't ha' been wuth a hill o' beans among 'em."

By this time I had gradually drawn the sentinel to the corner of the
building, and looking down the dimly lighted street whence the sounds
proceeded, I saw that it was empty.

"They are gone now," I said, "and the woman may be dying. Come, go down
there with me."

"Carn't, Cunnel. I 'ou'dn't do it fur all the women in Richmond."

"Was your mother a woman?"

"I reckon, and a right peart 'un,--ye mought bet yer pile on thet."

"I'll bet my pile she'd disown you, if she knew you turned your back on
a woman."

He gave me a wistful, undecided look, and then, muttering something
about "orders," which I did not stop to bear, followed me, as I hurried
down the street.

Not three hundred yards away, in a narrow recess between two buildings,
we found the woman. She lay at full length on the pavement, her neat
muslin gown torn to shreds, and her simple lace bonnet crushed into a
shape