t last, girls!" exclaimed Frank, as he entered, laughing. "If it
hadn't been a gust of wind that caught him at the door, and carried
him clean away, our leave-taking might have lasted till morning. Poor
fellow! he had so many cautions to give me, such mountains of good
counsel; and see, here is a holy medal he made me accept. He told me the
'Swedes' would never harm me so long as I wore it; he still fancies
that we are in the Thirty Years' War."

In a hearty laugh over Hans Roeckle's political knowledge, they wished
each other an affectionate good-night, and separated. Frank was to have
his breakfast by daybreak, and each sister affected to leave the care of
that meal to the other, secretly resolving to be up and stirring first.

Save old Andy, there was not one disposed to sleep that night. All were
too full of their own cares. Even Dalton himself, blunted as were
his feelings by a long life of suffering, his mind was tortured by
anxieties; and one sad question arose again and again before him,
without an answer ever occurring: "What is to become of the girls when
I am gone? Without a home, they will soon be without a protector!"
The bright fancies, the hopeful visions in which the evening had been
passed, made the revulsion to these gloomy thoughts the darker. He lay
with his hands pressed upon his face, while the hot tears gushed from
eyes that never before knew weeping.

At moments he half resolved not to let Frank depart, but an instant's
thought showed him how futile would be the change. It would be but
leaving him to share the poverty, to depend upon the scanty pittance
already too little for themselves. "Would Count Stephen befriend the
poor girls?" he asked himself over and over; and in his difficulty he
turned to the strange epistle in which the old general announced Frank's
appointment as a cadet.

The paper, the square folding, the straight, stiff letters, well suited
a style which plainly proclaimed how many years his English had lain at
rest. The note ran thus:

GRABEN-WIEN, Octobre 9, 18--

WORTHY SIR AND NEPHEW, Your kindly greeting, but long-time
on-the-road-coming letter is in my hands. It is to me
pleasure that I announce the appointment of your son as a
Cadet in the seventh battalion of the Carl-Franz Infanterie.
So with, let him in all speed of time report himself here at
Wien, before the War's Minister, bringing his Tauf schein
Baptism's sign as proof