ll came
back, like so many spectres of a past and gone happiness, and as, one by
one, they filed by in thought, the utter silence and solitude of the
place seemed to increase. The only sound was the faint whisper of the
breeze in the hemlocks, and as she listened and looked into the shadow
beyond where the trees grew thicker, a strange feeling of fear began to
assail her heart and a new and horrible dread crept into her thoughts.
She had not heard from the absent one for two weeks--what if the dreaded
fate had already come and he was at this very moment near her in spirit?
And as all the horror of this thought forced itself upon her, she
suddenly rose to her feet, and almost running, left the spot.

When she arrived home and looked into her mirror she saw a strange
expression on her face and her lips were pale. "I could not go there
again," she said to herself; "I should go mad if I did."

During the next few weeks the dread seemed to grow upon her day by day.
She did not dare tell her father of her trip to Blue Hill, but he
noticed that she was getting thin and that her eyes were growing hollow.
Then came the news of the battle of Peach Creek and that Company E were
engaged in it; but no names of the killed or wounded, if any, reached
her, and no letter from Manson.

Each day her father drove to the village and he was always met at the
gate upon his return by a sad-faced girl whose blue eyes wore a look of
piteous appeal. He tried to comfort her all he could; but it did no
good. She could not talk; she could scarcely eat or sleep, but went
about her daily work as if in a trance. Occasionally in the evening she
would give way to tears, and for three weeks she existed in a state of
wretchedness no pen can describe. Then one evening her father handed her
a letter in a strange handwriting and turned his face away, for he knew
its contents.

"Tell me the worst, father," she almost screamed, "tell me quick; is he
alive?"

"Yes, my child," he answered sadly, "but we must go to him to-morrow. He
is in the hospital at Washington and very low."

CHAPTER XIX.

AMONG THE WOUNDED.

At nearly noon the day after the battle of Peach Creek the searchers for
wounded came upon Manson, still alive, but delirious. Of that ghastly
battlefield, or the long agony of that wounded boy, I hesitate to speak.
No pen can describe, either, and to even faintly portray them is but to
add gloom to a narrative already replete with it.