CHAPTER III.
Called to a general council of officers at divisional headquarters the
next day, Brant had little time for further speculation regarding
his strange guest, but a remark from the division commander, that he
preferred to commit the general plan of a movement then under discussion
to their memories rather than to written orders in the ordinary routine,
seemed to show that his chief still suspected the existence of a spy.
He, therefore, told him of his late interview with Miss Faulkner, and
her probable withdrawal in favor of a mulatto neighbor. The division
commander received the information with indifference.
"They're much too clever to employ a hussy like that, who shows her
hand at every turn, either as a spy or a messenger of spies,--and the
mulattoes are too stupid, to say nothing of their probable fidelity
to us. No, General, if we are watched, it is by an eagle, and not a
mocking-bird. Miss Faulkner has nothing worse about her than her tongue;
and there isn't the nigger blood in the whole South that would risk a
noose for her, or for any of their masters or mistresses!"
It was, therefore, perhaps, with some mitigation of his usual critical
severity that he saw her walking before him alone in the lane as he
rode home to quarters. She was apparently lost in a half-impatient,
half-moody reverie, which even the trotting hoof-beats of his own and
his orderly's horse had not disturbed. From time to time she struck the
myrtle hedge beside her with the head of a large flower which hung
by its stalk from her listless hands, or held it to her face as if
to inhale its perfume. Dismissing his orderly by a side path, he rode
gently forward, but, to his surprise, without turning, or seeming to be
aware of his presence, she quickened her pace, and even appeared to look
from side to side for some avenue of escape. If only to mend matters, he
was obliged to ride quickly forward to her side, where he threw himself
from his horse, flung the reins on his arm, and began to walk beside
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