"Then the poet must be wrong."
"Don't you think poets may be wrong as well as other people,
Major Fairbairn?"
"I hope so! or I should wish to be a poet. And that would be a
vain wish for me."
"But in these war matters," I resumed, as we cantered on, "I
am very much interested; and I think all women ought to be -
must be."
"Getting to be serious earnest -" said the major, resignedly.
I was silenced for a while. The words, "serious earnest," rang
in my heart as we went through the streets.
"Is it getting to be such serious earnest?" I asked as lightly
as I could.
"We shall know more about it soon," the major answered. His
carelessness was real.
"How soon?"
"May be any day. Beauregard is making ready for us at Manassas
Junction."
"How many men do you suppose he has?"
"Can't tell," said the major. "There is no depending, I think
myself, on any accounts we have. The Southern people generally
are very much in earnest."
"And the North are," I said.
"It is just a question of who will hold out best."
I thought I knew who those would be; and a shiver for a moment
ran through my heart. Christian had said, that the success of
his suit with my father and mother might depend on how the war
went. And certainly, if the struggle should be at all
prolonged and issue in the triumph of the rebels, they would
have little favour for the enemies they would despise. How if
the war went for the North?
I believe I lost several sentences of my companion in the
depth of my musing; remembered this would not do; shook off my
thoughts and talked gayly, until we came to the place where he
said the drilling process was going on. I wondered if it were
the right place; then made sure that it was; and sat on my
horse looking and waiting, with my heart in a great flutter.
The artillery wagons were rushing about; I recognised them;
and a cloud of dust accompanied and swallowed up their
movements, a little too distant from me just now to give room
for close observation.
"Well, how do you like it, Miss Randolph?" my major began,
with a tone of some exultation at my supposed discomfiture.
"It is very confused -" I said. "I do not see what they are
doing."
"No more than you could if it was a battle," said the major.
"Won't they come nearer to us?"
"No doubt they will, if we give them time enough."
I would not take this hint. I had got my chance; I was not
going to fling it away. I had discerned besides in the distant
smoke and dust a dark figure on a gray horse, which I thought
I knew. Nothing would have drawn me from the spot then. I kept
up a scattering fire of talk with my companion, I do not know
how, to prevent the exhaustion of his patience; while my heart
went out at my eyes to follow the gray horse. I was rewarded
at last. The whole battery charged down upon the point where
we were standing, at full gallop, "as if we had been the
Secession army," Major Fairbairn remarked; adding, that
nothing but a good conscience could have kept me so quiet. And
in truth guns and horses and all were close upon us before the
order to halt was given, and the gunners flung themselves from
the wagons and proceeded to unlimber and get the battery in
working order, with the mouths of the cannon only a few yards
from our standing-place. I hardly heard the major now, for the
gray horse and dark rider were near enough to be seen,
stationed quietly a few paces in the rear of the line of guns.
I saw his eye going watchfully from one point to another of
his charge; his head making quick little turns to right and
left to see if all were doing properly; the horse a statue,
the man alive as quicksilver, though nothing of him moved but
his head. I was sure, very sure, that he would not see me. He
was intent on his duty; spectators or the whole world looking
on were nothing to him. He would not even perhaps be conscious
that anybody was in his neighbourhood. I don't know whether I
was most glad or sorry; though indeed, I desired nothing less
than that he should give any sign that he saw me. How well he
looked on horseback, I thought; how stately he sat there,
motionless, overseeing his command. There was a pause now;
they were all still, waiting for an order. I might have
expected what it would be; but I did not, till the words
suddenly came out "Battery - Fire!"