undred horsemen
appeared.

The mountaineer seemed to embrace the whole column in one comprehensive
look that was a smile of pleasure when it passed over the face of Helen
Harley, a glance of curiosity when it lingered on Lucia Catherwood, and
inquiry when it reached Talbot, who quickly explained his mission. All
surrounded Wood, eager for news.

"We're going to meet down here somewhere near a place they call
Spottsylvania," said the General succinctly. "It won't be many days--two
or three, I guess--and it will be as rough a meeting as that behind us
was. If I were you, Talbot, I'd keep straight on to the south."

Then the General turned with his troopers to go. It was not a time when
he could afford to tarry; but before starting he took Helen Harley's
hand in his with a grace worthy of better training:

"I'll bring you news of the coming battle, Miss Harley."

She thanked him with her eyes, and in a moment he was gone, he and his
troopers swallowed up by the black forest. The convoy resumed its way
through the Wilderness, passing on at a pace that was of necessity slow
owing to the wounded in the wagons and the rough and tangled nature of
the country, which lost nothing of its wild and somber character. The
dwarf cedars and oaks and pines still stretched away to the horizon.
Night began to come down in the east and there the Wilderness heaved up
in a black mass against the sullen sky. The low note of a cannon shot
came now and then like the faint rumble of dying thunder.

Lucia walked alone near the rear of the column. She had grown weary of
the wagons and her strong young frame craved exercise. She was seldom
afraid or awed, but now the sun sinking over the terrible Wilderness and
the smoke of battle around chilled her. The long column of the hurt,
winding its way so lonely and silent through the illimitable forest,
seemed like a wreck cast up from the battles, and her soul was full of
sympathy. In a nature of unusual strength her emotions were of like
quality, and though once she had been animated by a deep and passionate
anger against that South with which she now marched, at this moment she
found it all gone--slipped away while she was not noticing. She loved
her own cause none the less, but no longer hated the enemy. She had
received the sympathy and the friendship of a woman toward whom she had
once felt a sensation akin to dislike. She did not forget how she had
stood in the fringe of the crowd that day in