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IN THE DAYS OF THE WAR
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Jack's horse, foam-smeared from rude riding, panted sobbingly by the picket block. But its owner did not seem hurried. Tragedy is never out of breath — always dignified, terribly calm. He tapped his boots with his riding-whip as he looked intently at her and repeated slowly: "South Carolina has seceded, Marion. Do you realize what that means?"
The little girl in the high-waisted flower-frock and pantalets, peeping at her uncle shyly from the ambush of her mother's skirts, burst into a shrill wail of pleased terror, burrow
swear before. It awed her more than her brother's impassive calm or the stunning tidings themselves. Strange how, in great tragedy, it is the little pricks that sting ! This man 's dearest in the world lies dead in the next room, and a lost collar-button is a keen distress; that man's fortune is swept away, and he complains, querulously, that his breakfast eggs were boiled too long.
James Adams drew a long, hard breath. His eyes looked, prophet-like, into the distance, visioning. "It's a war of justice, a war of humanity —
SOUTH CAROLINA HAS SECEDED !
ing her corkscrewed hair into the protecting folds of crinoline.
"Hush, Betty!" Marion stroked the child's head with absent fingers. Suddenly the color drained from her face.
"Jack — it means — it means "
"War!" It was her husband's voice, exultant, behind her. She would have hidden her face against his breast, but he pushed her aside gently. Women are blessings of peace — war is a man-affair.
"It means war, then — and I'm glad of it; man alive, it's high time. War ! I 'm— d d— glad— of— it ! ' '
She had never heard her husband
God 's war ! " he cried buoyantly. ' ' I fight under the Northern flag. ' '
Like the embodied wills of the North and the South, the two faced each other in a deadlock of eyes. Sudden hate flashed, lightning-like, across John Chase's face. He turned to the door
"Wait!" James held out his hand. "This isn't our quarrel, brother. Let's shake hands like friends before our consciences force us to be enemies "
The other disdained the motion. When he spoke it was the voice of his ancestors, the composite defiance of generations, dust long ago.