The colonel looked at her; a slight shudder passed over him.

"These orders suggest that I start before sunset," he said. "Meanwhile this tent is yours. My orderly will serve you. The regiment will move out about sunset with some six hundred sabres and Gray's Rhode Island flying battery."

He walked to the tent door; she followed.

"Is that your horse?" he asked.

"Yes, Colonel."

"Fit for the work?" turning to look at her.

"Yes, sir."

"And _you_?"

She smiled; through the open tent a misty bar of sunshine fell across her face, turning the smooth skin golden. Outside a dismounted trooper on guard presented his carbine as the tall, young colonel strode out. An orderly joined him; they stood a moment consulting in whispers, then the orderly ran for his saddled horse, mounted, and rode off through the lanes of the cavalry camp.

From the tent door the Special Messenger looked out into the camp. Under the base of a grassy hill hundreds of horses were being watered at a brook now discolored by the recent rains; beyond, on a second knoll, the guns of a flying battery stood parked. She could see the red trimmings on the gunners' jackets as they were lounging about in the grass.

The view from the tent door was extensive; a division, at least, lay encamped within range of the eye; two roads across the hills were full of wagons moving south and east; along another road, stretching far into the valley, masses of cavalry were riding--apparently an entire brigade--but too far away for her to hear the trample of the horses.

From where she stood, however, she could make out the course of a fourth road by the noise of an endless, moving column of horses. At times, above the hillside, she could see their heads, and the enormous canvas-covered muzzles of siege guns; and the racket of hoofs, the powerful crunching and grinding of wheels, the cries of teamsters united in a dull, steady uproar that never ceased.

From their camp, troopers of the Fourth Missouri were idly watching the artillery passing--hundreds of sunburned cavalrymen seated along the hillside, feet dangling, exchanging gibes and jests with the drivers of the siege train below. But from where she stood she could see nothing except horses' heads tossing, blue caps of mounted men, a crimson guidon flapping, or the sun glittering on the slender, curved blade of some officer's sabre as he signaled.

North, east, west, south--the whole land seemed to be covered with moving men and beasts and wagons; flags fluttered on every eminence; tents covered plowed fields, pastures, meadows; smoke hung over all, crowning the green woods with haze, veiling hollows, rolling along the railway in endless, yellow billows.

The rain had washed the sky clean, but again this vast, advancing host was soiling heaven and blighting earth as it passed over the land toward that beleaguered city in the South.

War! Everywhere the monotony of this awful panorama, covering her country day after day, month after month, year after year--war, always and everywhere and in every stage--hordes of horses, hordes of men, endless columns of deadly engines! Everywhere, always, death, or the preparation for death--every road and footpath crammed with it, every field trampled by it, every woodland shattered by it, every stream running thick with its pollution. The sour smell of marching men, the stale taint of unclean fires, the stench of beasts--the acrid, indescribable odor that hangs on the sweating flanks of armies seemed to infect sky and earth.

A trooper, munching an apple and carrying a truss of hay, passed, cap cocked rakishly, sabre banging at his heels; and she called to him and he came up, easily respectful under the grin of bodily well being.

"How long have you served in this regiment?" she asked.

He swallowed the bite of apple which crowded out his freckled cheeks: "Three years, sir."

[Illustration: "'We was there--I know that, yes, an' we had a fight.'"]

She drew involuntarily nearer the tent door.

"Then--you were at Sandy River--three years ago?"

"Yes, sir."

"Do you remember the battle there?"

The soldier looked doubtful. "We was there--I know that; yes, an' we had a fight----"

"Yes--near a big white house."

The soldier nodded. "I guess so; I don't seem to place no big white house----"

She asked calmly: "Your regiment had a mounted band once?"

He brightened.

"Yes, sir-ee! They played us in at Sandy River--and they got into it, too, and was cut all to pieces!"

She motioned assent wearily; then, with an effort: "You don't know, perhaps, where he--where their bandmaster was buried?"

"Sir?"

"The bandmaster of the Fourth Missouri? You remember him--that tall, thin young officer who led them with his sabre--who sat his horse like a colonel of regulars--and wore a cap of fur like--like a hussar of some militia State guard----"

"Well, you must mean Captain Stanley, who was at that time bandmaster of our regiment. He went in that day at Sandy River when our mounted band was cut to pieces. Orders was to play us in, an' he done it."

There was a silence.

"Where is he--buried?" she asked calmly.

"Buried? Why, _he_ ain't dead, is he?"

"He died at Sandy River--that day," she said gently. "Don't you remember?"

"No, sir; our bandmaster wasn't killed at Sandy River."

She looked at him amazed, almost frightened.

"What do you mean? He is dead. I--saw him die."

"It must have been some other bandmaster--not Captain Stanley."

"I saw the bandmaster of your regiment, the Fourth Missouri Cavalry, brought into that big white house and laid on my--on a bed----" She stared at the boy, caught him by the sleeve: "He is dead, isn't he? Do you know what you are telling me? Do you understand what I am saying?"

"Yes, sir. Captain Stanley was our bandmaster--he wasn't captain then, of course. He played us in at Sandy River--by God! I oughter know, because I got some cut up m'self."

"You--you tell me that he wasn't killed?" she repeated, steadying herself against the canvas flap.

"No, sir. I heard tell he was badly hurt--seems like I kinder remember--oh, yes!" The man's face lighted up. "Yes, sir; Captain Stanley, he had a close shave! It sorter comes back to me now, how the burial detail fetched him back saying they wasn't going to bury no man that twitched when they shut his coffin. Yes, sir--but it's three years and a man forgets, and I've seen--things--lots of such things in three years with Baring's dragoons. Yes, sir."

She closed her eyes; a dizziness swept over her and she swayed where she stood.

"Is he here?"

"Who? Captain Stanley? Yes, sir. Why, he's captain of the Black Horse troop--F, third squadron.... They're down that lane near the trees.

Shall I take you there?"