r evenings when the great chimney was filled with light and the crane
was in its place above the hickory. The smell of newly baked bread floated
in his nostrils, and for a little while he believed himself to be lying
again upon the hearth as he thrilled at Aunt Rhody's stories. Then his
fancies would take other shapes, and warm colours would glow in red and
yellow circles before his eyes. When he thought of Betty now it was no
longer tenderly but with a despairing passion. He was haunted less by her
visible image than by broken dreams of her peculiar womanly beauties--of
her soft hands and the warmth of her girlish bosom.

But from the first day to the last he had no thought of yielding; and each
feeble step had sent him a step farther upon the road. He had often fallen,
but he had always struggled up again and laughed. Once he made a ghastly
joke about his dying in the snow, and Jack Powell turned upon him with an
oath and bade him to be silent.

"For God's sake don't," added the boy weakly, and fell to whimpering like
a child.

"Oh, go home to your mother," retorted Dan, with a kind of desperate
cruelty.

Jack sobbed outright.

"I wish I could," he answered, and dropped over upon the roadside.

Dan caught him up, and poured his last spoonful of brandy down his throat,
then he seized his arm and dragged him bodily along.

"Oh, I say don't be an ass," he implored. "Here comes old Stonewall."

The commanding General rode by, glanced quietly over them, and passed on,
his chest bowed, his cadet cap pulled down over his eyes. A moment later
Dan, looking over the hillside, at the winding road, saw him dismount and
put his shoulder to a sunken wheel. The sight suddenly nerved the younger
man, and he went on quickly, dragging Jack up with him.

That night they rested in a burned-out clearing where the pine trees had
been felled for fence rails. The rails went readily to fires, and Pinetop
fried strips of fat bacon in the skillet he had brought upon his musket.
Somebody produced a handful of coffee from his pocket, and a little later
Dan, dozing beside the flames, was awakened by the aroma.

"By George!" he burst out, and sat up speechless.

Pinetop was mixing thin cornmeal paste into the gravy, and he looked up as
he stirred busily with a small stick.

"Wall, I reckon these here slapjacks air about done," he remarked in a
moment, adding with a glance at Dan, "and if your stomach's near as empty
as your eyes, I rec