out there, but they were yet to her
beings of another order, and she remained cold--a spectator held by the
appalling character of the drama and not realizing that those who played
the part were human like herself.

"The battle is doubtful," said Harley.

"How do you know?"

"See how it veers to and fro--back and forth and back and forth it goes
again. If either side were winning it would all go one way. Do you know
how long we have been here watching?"

"I have no idea whatever."

He looked at his watch and then pointed upward at the heavens where in
the zenith a film of light appeared through the blur of cloud and smoke.

"There's the sun," he said; "it's noon. We've been sitting here for
hours. The time seems long and again it seems short. Ah, if I only knew
which way fortune inclined! Look how that fire in the forest is
growing!"

Over in the east the red spires and pillars and columns united into one
great sheet of flame that moved and leaped from tree to tree and shot
forth millions of sparks.

"That fire will not reach us," said Harley. "It will pass a half-mile to
the right."

But they felt its breath, far though hot, and again Helen drew her
handkerchief across her burning face. The deadly, sickening odour
increased. A light wind arose, and a fine dust of ashes, borne on its
breath, began to enter the window and sweep in at every possible crevice
and cranny of the old house. It powdered the three at the window and
hung a thin, gray and pallid veil over the floor and the scanty
furniture. The faint jarring of the wood, so monotonous and so
persistent, never ceased. And distinctly through the sounds they heard
the voice of the coloured woman, crying softly from her chest, always
the same, weird, unreal and chilling.

The struggle seemed to the three silent watchers to swing away a little,
the sounds of human voices died, the cries, the commands were heard no
more; but the volume of the battle grew, nevertheless. Harley knew that
new regiments, new brigades, new batteries were coming into action;
that the area of conflict was spreading, covering new fields and holding
the old. He knew by the rising din, ever swelling and beating upon the
ear, by the vast increase in the clouds of smoke, the leaping flashes of
flame and the dust of ashes, now thick and drifting, that two hundred
thousand men were eye to eye in battle amid the gloomy thickets and
shades of the Wilderness, but God alone knew which would