LEDGE

Again Betty Winter found in her work relief from despair. She had hoped
for peace in the beauty and tenderness of Ned's chivalrous devotion. Yet
his one letter reporting the meeting had revealed her mistake. The
moment she had read his confession the impulse to scream her protest to
John was all but resistless. She had tried in vain to find a way of
writing to Ned to tell him that she had deceived him and herself, and
ask his forgiveness.

It was impossible to write to John under such conditions and she had
suffered in silence. And then the wounded began to pour into Washington
from Grant's front. The like of that procession of ambulances from the
landing on Sixth Street to the hospitals on the hills back of the city
had never been seen. The wounded men were brought on swift steamers from
Aquia Creek. Floors and decks were covered with mattresses on which they
lay as thickly as they could be placed. As the wounded died on the way
they were moved to the bow and their faces covered.

At the landing tender hands were lifting them into the ambulances which
slowly moved out in one line to the hospitals and back in a circle by
another. These ambulances stretched in tragic, unbroken procession for
three miles and never ceased to move on and on in an endless circle for
three days and nights.

In an agony of anxiety Betty asked to be transferred to the landing that
she might watch them fill the wagons. Her soul was oppressed with the
certainty that John Vaughan would be found in one of them.

On the morning of the third day they were still coming in never-ending
streams from the steamer decks. She wrung her hands in a moment of
despair:

"Merciful God! Are they bringing back Grant's whole army?"

The patience of these suffering men was sublime. Only a sigh from one
who would rise no more. Only a groan here and there from parched lips
that asked for water.

At last came the ominous news for which she had watched and waited with
sickening forebodings. The _Republican_ printed the name of Captain John
Vaughan among the wounded in the fight of Warren and Hancock's corps
over the Weldon Railroad. There were only two thousand wounded men sent
in on the steamers from the front after this battle, and they arrived at
night.

Betty hurried to the landing and found that the ambulances had begun to
move. She searched every face in vain, and when the last stretcher had
passed out walked with trembling steps and scanned ea