of a
Union spy was at stake in his affair with Jennie. Her life and happiness
were bound in his. He felt this by an unerring instinct.

If this proud, sensitive, embittered girl should stumble on even a
suspicion of the truth, she would tear her heart out of her body if
necessary to put him out of her life.

For a moment he was tempted to give up his work and return to the North.
It was the one sure way to avoid discovery when Richmond fell. The war
over, he would have his even chance with other men when its bitterness
had been softened. His work in Richmond was practically done. His men
could finish it. The number of soldiers in the Southern armies had been
accurately counted and reported to Washington. Why should he risk the
happiness of the woman he loved and his own happiness for life by
remaining another day?

The thought had no sooner taken shape than he put it out of his mind.

"Bah! I've set my hand to a great task. I'm not a quitter. I'll stand by
my guns. No true woman ever loved a coward!"

He would take his chances and tell her his love.

He lifted the old-fashioned brass knocker on Senator Barton's door and
banged it with such force he laughed at his own foolish eagerness:

"At least I needn't smash my way in!" he muttered.

"Yassah, des walk right in de parlor, sah," Jennie's maid said, with her
teeth shining in a knowing smile.

Senator Barton had recovered from his illness. There could be no doubt
about it. He was in the library holding forth in eloquent tones to a
group of Confederate Congressmen who made his house their rendezvous. He
was enjoying the martyrdom which the outrage on his home and the death
of his aged mother and father had brought. He was using it to inveigh
with new bitterness against the imbecility of Jefferson Davis and his
administration. He held Davis personally responsible for every defeat of
the South. He was the one man who had caused the fall of New Orleans,
the loss of Fort Donelson and the failure to reap the victory at Shiloh.

"But you must remember, Senator," one of his henchmen mildly protested,
"that Davis did save Albert Sidney Johnston to us and that alone made a
victory possible."

"And what of it, if he threw it away by appointing a fool second in
Command?"

There was a good answer to this--too good for the henchman to dare use
it. He had sent Beauregard west to join Albert Sidney Johnston's command
because Barton's junta, supporting Joseph E. Johnston a