for Mrs. Kirby?"

"Mr. Kirby, Mrs. Kirby, and myself are all the same. You don't suppose
the cunnle would give my real name and address? Did you address yo'r
packet to HIS real name or to some one else. Did you let your husband
know who they were for?"

Oddly, a sickening sense of the meanness of all these deceits and
subterfuges suddenly came over Mrs. Bunker. Without replying she went
to her bedroom and returned with Colonel Marion's last letter, which she
tossed into her visitor's lap.

"Thank yo', Mrs. Bunker. I'll be sure to tell the cunnle how careful yo'
were not to give up his correspondence to everybody. It'll please him
mo' than to hear yo' are wearing his ring--which everybody knows--before
people."

"He gave it to me--he--he knew I wouldn't take money," said Mrs. Bunker
indignantly.

"He didn't have any to give," said the lady slowly, as she removed the
envelope from her letter and looked up with a dazzling but cruel smile.
"A So'th'n gentleman don't fill up his pockets when he goes out to
fight. He don't tuck his maw's Bible in his breast-pocket, clap his dear
auntie's locket big as a cheese plate over his heart, nor let his sole
leather cigyar case that his gyrl gave him lie round him in spots when
he goes out to take another gentleman's fire. He leaves that to Yanks!"

"Did you come here to insult my husband?" said Mrs. Bunker in the rage
of desperation.

"To insult yo' husband! Well--I came here to get a letter that his wife
received from his political and natural enemy and--perhaps I DID!" With
a side glance at Mrs. Bunker's crimson cheek she added carelessly, "I
have nothing against Captain Bunker; he's a straightforward man and
must go with his kind. He helped those hounds of Vigilantes because he
believes in them. We couldn't bribe him if we wanted to. And we don't."

If she only knew something of this woman's relations to Marion--which
she only instinctively suspected--and could retaliate upon her, Mrs.
Bunker felt she would have given up her life at that moment.

"Colonel Marion seems to find plenty that he can bribe," she said
roughly, "and I've yet to know who YOU are to sit in judgment on them.
You've got your letter, take it and go! When he wants to send you
another through me, somebody else must come for it, not you. That's
all!"

She drew back as if to let the intruder pass, but the lady, without
moving a muscle, finished the reading of her letter, then stood
up quietly and began