ll upon his ear
again,--no longer the jaunty rataplan of Dixie's drums, but the heavy,
monotonous roar of the conqueror's at the head of his dark-blue
columns,--Richling could not leave his bed.

Dr. Sevier sat by him and bore the sound in silence. As it died away and
ceased, Richling said:--

"May I write to Mary?"

Then the Doctor had a hard task.

"I wrote for her yesterday," he said. "But, Richling, I--don't think
she'll get the letter."

"Do you think she has already started?" asked the sick man, with glad
eagerness.

"Richling, I did the best I knew how"--

"Whatever you did was all right, Doctor."

"I wrote to her months ago, by the hand of Ristofalo. He knows she got
the letter. I'm afraid she's somewhere in the Confederacy, trying to get
through. I meant it for the best, my dear boy."

"It's all right, Doctor," said the invalid; but the physician could see
the cruel fact slowly grind him.

"Doctor, may I ask one favor?"

"One or a hundred, Richling."

"I want you to let Madame Zenobie come and nurse me."

"Why, Richling, can't I nurse you well enough?"

The Doctor was jealous.

"Yes," answered the sick man. "But I'll need a good deal of attention.
She wants to do it. She was here yesterday, you knew. She wanted to ask
you, but was afraid."

His wish was granted.

CHAPTER LVII.

ALMOST IN SIGHT.

In St. Tammany Parish, on the northern border of Lake Ponchartrain,
about thirty miles from New Orleans, in a straight line across the
waters of the lake, stood in time of the war, and may stand yet, an old
house, of the Creole colonial fashion, all of cypress from sills to
shingles, standing on brick pillars ten feet from the ground, a wide
veranda in front, and a double flight of front steps running up to it
sidewise and meeting in a balustraded landing at its edge. Scarcely
anything short of a steamer's roof or a light-house window could have
offered a finer stand-point from which to sweep a glass round the
southern semi-circle of water and sky than did this stair-landing; and
here, a long ship's-glass in her hands, and the accustomed look of care
on her face, faintly frowning against the glare of noonday, stood Mary
Richling. She still had on the pine-straw hat, and the skirt--stirring
softly in a breeze that had to come around from the north side of the
house before it reached her--was the brown and olive homespun.

"No use," said an old, fat, and sun-tanned man from his willow c