with the question
that had no answer. Why should her lover-husband and her fine old daddy
fight each other?

She stood appalled before such a conflict. She had written to her father
a letter so gentle, so full of tender appeal, he could not resist its
call. She had asked that he come to see her babies and her husband and,
face to face, say the things that were in his heart.

Her own sympathies were with her husband. He had breathed his soul into
hers. She thought as he thought and felt as he felt. But her dear old
daddy must have deep reasons for refusing to follow Virginia, if she
should go with the South in Secession. She must hear these reasons.
Stuart must hear them. If he could convince them, they would go with
him.

In her girl's soul she didn't care which way they went, as long as they
did not fight each other. She had watched the shadow of this war deepen
with growing anguish. If her father should meet her husband in battle
and one should kill the other! How could she live? The thought was too
horrible to frame in, words, but it haunted her dreams. She couldn't
shake it off.

That her rollicking soldier man would come out alive she felt sure
somehow. No other thought was possible. To think that he might be killed
in the pride and glory of his youth was nonsense. Her mind refused now
to dwell on the idea. She dismissed it with a laugh. He was so vital.
He lived to his finger tips. His voice rang with the joy of living.
The spirit of eternal youth danced in his blue eyes. He was just
twenty-eight years old. He was the father of a darling boy who bore his
name and a baby that nestled in her arms to whom they had given hers.

Life in its morning of glory was his--wife, babies, love, youth, health,
strength, clean living and high thinking. No, it was the thought of harm
to her father that was eating her heart out. He has passed the noon-tide
of life. His slender, graceful form lacked the sturdy power of youth.
His chances were not so good.

The thing that sickened her was the certainty that both these men,
father and husband, would organize the cavalry service and fight on
horseback. They had spent their honeymoon on the plains. She had ridden
over them with her joyous lover.

He would be a cavalry commander. She knew that he would be a general.
Her father was a master of cavalry tactics and was at work on the Manuel
for the United States Army.

The two men were born under the same skies. Their tastes were