ons before her gaze. He was walking quickly, but noiselessly. He
passed the portico step without stopping, and though he wore a cap and
his coat was closely buttoned, Julia knew it was the one who had
promised to be there at that time. She shrank back and clutched the
shawl closely under her chin, but he looked in front of him only, and
passed on around the corner of the house in the direction of the
impromptu stable.

Julia arose and went in, carefully locking the front door. Then she
tipped up to her room, pausing at her father's door to listen. From the
regularity of his breathing, and the part of the room from whence the
sound proceeded, she knew he was asleep. She was glad of this, for she
had feared he would try to sit up. Passing into her own room she
undressed and prepared herself for the night, then knelt by the open
window, and with her elbows on the sill and her chin in her palms, gazed
up at the starry space above her, and prayed. This was her nightly
custom, to pray from her open casement. It seemed to her that a freer,
more perfect and more intimate communication was established thus. It
was only a fancy, of course, but it was one she always indulged in when
the weather would allow. This night a new name was added to her
petitions. She knelt there a long, long time after her prayers were
done, listening, dreading to hear. But only the soft night sounds she
had known always came to her. Then all at once a sweet drowsiness crept
over her, and soon she was in bed, asleep.

Glenning's approach to the smoke-house came very near resulting in a
tragedy. Preoccupied, he walked boldly to the door, and tried to open
it. Instantly a belligerent and threatening voice informed him if he
"teched dat do' ag'in he'd git a hole in 'im yo' c'd th'ow a dog thu!"
John stepped quickly aside and opened a parley with the defender of the
door. It was several minutes before Peter could be persuaded that it was
the new doctor come to relieve him, although this part of the program
had been dinned into him over and over again by Julia, and when at last
the door was grudgingly opened a few inches, the rusty barrel of an army
musket was the first thing to appear. But the exchange was then soon
effected, and the relief guard had to unceremoniously cut off a long
string of instructions from the departing Peter, by gently closing the
door in that worthy's face, and making it tight on the inside.

Alone with the colt, Glenning drew a sma