e man who had ended
himself for ever.

And Letty, silent in her comer, watched her without a word.

At the station, scarcely knowing what she did, Ailsa stopped at the
telegraph office and wrote a despatch to him, addressing it to his
old lodgings:

"I don't know whether this will ever reach you, but I can't go
without trying to let you know that I am leaving for Washington as
volunteer nurse. They have my address at the house.

"AILSA PAIGE."

Then the two gray-garbed women hurried to the train, but found no
seats together until a lank, sad-eyed lieutenant of artillery gave
up his place and doubled in with a sweating, red-necked contractor
from St. Louis, who sat in his shirt sleeves, fanning himself with
his straw hat.

The day was hot; the car dusty, ill-smelling, uncomfortable.

At Philadelphia their train was stalled for hours. Two long
trains, loaded with ammunition and a section of field-artillery,
had right of way; and then another train filled with jeering,
blue-clad infantry blocked them.

The soldiers, bare headed and in their undershirts, lolled and
yelled and hung from the car windows, chewing tobacco, smoking, or
gazing, jaws a-gape, at the crowds in the station.

Another train rolled by, trailing a suffocating stench of cattle
and hogs from its slatted stock-cars; and Ailsa was almost stifled
before her train at last moved heavily southward, saluted by
good-natured witticisms from the soldiers at the windows of the
stalled troop train.

Evening came, finding them somewhere in Delaware; the yellow stars
appeared, the air freshened a little. Letty had fallen asleep; her
dark lashes rested quietly on her cheeks, but the car jolted her
head cruelly, and Ailsa gently drew it to her own shoulder and put
one arm around her.

A major of heavy artillery turned toward her from his seat and said:

"Are you a volunteer nurse, ma'am?"

"Yes," motioned Ailsa with her lips, glancing cautiously at Letty.

"Can I do anything for you at Wilmington?"

She thanked him, smiling. He was disposed to be very friendly.

"You ladies arc the right stuff," he said. "I've seen you aboard
those abominable transports, behaving like angels to the poor
sea-sick devils. I saw you after Big Bethel, scraping the blood
and filth off of the wounded zouaves; I saw you in Washington after
Bull Run, doing acts of mercy that, by God, madam! would have
turned my stomach. . . . _Won't_ you let me do something for you.