th her silence and
evident desire to be left alone.

As they were approaching Richmond a sudden jar of the train threw a
small package from her lap to the floor. Prescott sprang forward, picked
it up and handed it to her. She received it with a curt "Thanks," and
the noise of the train was so great that Prescott could tell nothing
about the quality of her voice. It might or might not be musical, but in
any event she was not polite and showed no gratitude. If he had thought
to use the incident as an opening for conversation, he dismissed the
idea, as she turned her face back to the window at once and resumed her
study of the gray fields.

"Probably old and plain," was Prescott's thought, and then he forgot her
in the approach to Richmond, the town where much of his youth had been
spent. The absence of his mother from the capital was the only regret in
this happy homecoming, but he had received a letter from her assuring
him of her arrival in the city in a day or two.

When they reached Richmond the woman in the brown cloak left the car
before him, but he saw her entering the office of the Provost-Marshal,
where all passes were examined with minute care, every one who came to
the capital in those times of war being considered an enemy until proved
a friend. Prescott saw then that she was not only tall, but very tall,
and that she walked with a strong, graceful step. "After all, her figure
may be good," he thought, revising his recent opinion.

Her pass was examined, found to be correct, and she left the office
before his own time came. He would have asked the name on her pass, but
aware that the officer would probably tell him to mind his own business,
he refrained, and then forgot her in the great event of his return home
after so long a time of terrible war. He took his way at once to
Franklin Street, where he saw outspread before him life as it was lived
in the capital of the Confederate States of America. It was to him a
spectacle, striking in its variety and refreshing in its brilliancy, as
he had come, though indirectly, from the Army of Northern Virginia,
where it was the custom to serve half-rations of food and double rations
of gunpowder. Therefore, being young, sound of heart and amply furnished
with hope, he looked about him and rejoiced.

Richmond was a snug little town, a capital of no great size even in a
region then lacking in city growth, but for the time more was said about
it and more eyes were turn