University of Virginia Library

37. CHAPTER XXXVII.
THE SECOND BATTLE OF BULL RUN.

The second disastrous battle of Bull Run was over,
and the shadow of a summer night wrapped the field of
carnage in darkness. Thickly upon the battle field lay
the dead and dying, the sharp, bitter cries of the latter
rising on the night wind, and adding tenfold to the horror
of the scene. In the woods, not very far away, more
than one brave soldier was weltering in his life-blood, just
where, in his rapid flight, he had fallen, the grass his pillow,
and the leafy branches of the forest trees his only
covering.

Near to a running brook one wounded man was supporting
another and trying to staunch the purple gore,
pouring darkly from a fearful bullet wound in the region
of the heart. The stronger of the two, he who wore a
major's uniform, had come accidentally upon the other,
writhing in agony, and muttering at intervals snatches of the
prayer with which he once had been familiar, and which
seemed to bring Lily back to him again, just as she was

when in the attic chamber she made him kneel by her, and
say “Our Father.” He tried to say it now, and the whispered
words caught the ear of Irving Stanley, arresting
his steps at once.

“Poor fellow! it's gone hard with you,” he said, kneeling
by the sufferer, whom he recognized as the deserter,
Dr. Richards, who had returned to his allegiance, had
craved forgiveness for his sins, and been restored to the
ranks, discharging his duties faithfully, and fighting that
day with a zeal and energy which did much in reinstating
him in the good opinion of those who witnessed his daring
bravery.

But the doctor's work was done, and never from his
lips would Lily know how well his promise had been
kept. Giddy with pain and weak from the loss of blood,
he had groped his way through the woods, fighting back
the horrid certainty that to-morrow's sun would not rise
for him, and sinking at length exhausted upon the grass,
whose freshness was now defaced by the blood which
poured so freely from his wound.

It was thus that Irving Stanley found him, starting at first
as from a hissing shell, and involuntarily clasping his
hand over the place where lay a little note, received a
few days before, a reply to the earnest declaration of love
he had at last written to his sister's governess. There
was but one alternative, and Adah met it resolutely, though
every fibre of her heart throbbed with keen agony as she
told to Irving Stanley the story of her life. She was a
wife, a mother, the sister of Hugh Worthington, they
said, the Adah for whom Dr. Richards had sought so long
in vain, and for whom Murdoch, the wicked father, was
seeking still for aught she knew to the contrary. Even
the story of the doctor's secretion in the barn at Sunnay-mead
was confessed. Nothing was withheld except the
fact that even as he professed to love her, so she in turn
loved him, or had done so before she knew it was a sin.

Surprise had, for a few moments stifled every other emotion,
and Irving Stanley sat like one suddenly bereft of
life, when he read who Adah was. Then came the bitter
thought that he had lost her, mingled with a deep feeling
of resentment towards the man who had so cruelly wronged
the gentle girl, and who alone stood between him and
happiness. For Irving Stanley could overlook all the
rest. His great warm heart, so full of kindly sympathy
and generous charity for all mankind could take to its
embrace the fair sweet woman he had learned to love
so much, and be a father to her little boy, as if it had
been his own. But this might not be. There was a
mighty obstacle in the way, and feeling that it mattered
little now whether he ever came from the field alive, Irving
Stanley, with a whispered prayer for strength to bear
and do right, had hidden the letter in his bosom, and then,
when the hour of conflict came, plunged into the thickest
of the fight with a fearlessness born of keen and recent
disappointment, which made life less valuable than it had
been before.

It is not strange, then, that he should start and stagger
backward when he came so suddenly upon the doctor, or
that the first impulse of weak human nature was to leave
the fallen man; but the second, the Christian impulse, bade
him stay, and forgetting his own slight but painful wound,
he bent over Adah's husband, and did what he could to
alleviate the anguish he saw was so hard to bear. At
the sound of his voice, a spasm of pain passed over the
doctor's pallid face, and the flash of a sudden fire gleamed
for a moment in his eye, as he, too, remembered Adah,
and thought of what might be when the grass was growing
over his untimely grave.

The doctor knew that he was dying, and yet his first
question was —

“Do you think I can live? Did any one ever recover
with such a wound as this?”

Eagerly the dim eyes sought the face above them, the
kind, good face of one who would not deceive him. Irving
shook his head as he felt the pulse, and answered frankly,

“I believe you will die.”

There was a bitter moan, as all his misspent life came
up before him, followed closely by the dark future, where
there shone no ray of hope, and then with the desperate
thought, “It's too late now for regrets. I'll meet it like
a man,” he said,

“It may as well be I as any one, though it's hard even
for me to die; harder than you imagine;” then, growing
excited as he talked, he raised himself upon his elbow,
and continued, “Major Stanley, tell me truly, do you love
the woman you know as Adah Gordon?”

“I did love her before I knew I must not — but now
— I — yes, Dr. Richards, my heart tells me that never
was she so dear to me as now when her husband lies dying
at my side.”

Irving Stanley hardly knew what he was saying, but
the doctor understood, and almost shrieked out the
words,

“You know then that she is Adah, a wife, a mother,
and that I am her lawful husband?”

“I know the whole,” was the reply, as with his hand
Irving dipped water from the brook and laved the feverish
brow of the dying man, who went on to speak of
Adah as she was when he first knew her, and of the few
happy months spent with her in those humble lodgings.

“You don't know my darling,” he whispered. “She's
an angel, and I might have been so happy with her. Oh,
if I could only live, but that can't be now, and it is well.
Come close to me, Major Stanley, and listen while I tell
you that Adah promised if I would do my duty to my
country faithfully, she would live with me again, and all
the while she promised, her heart was breaking, for she

did not love me. It had all died out for me. It had been
given to another; can you guess to whom?”

Irving made no reply, except to chafe the hands which
elasped his so tightly, and the doctor continued,

“I am surely dying — I shall never see her more, or my
beautiful boy. I was a brute in the cars; you remember
the time. That was Adah, and those little feet resting
on my lap were Willie's, baby Willie's, Adah's baby.”

The doctor's mind was wandering now, and he kept on
disconnectedly,

“She's been to Europe with him. She's changed from
the shy girl into a queenly woman. Even the Richards
line might be proud of her bearing, and when I'm gone,
tell her I said you might have Willie, and — and — it
grows very dark; the noise of the battle drowns my voice,
but come nearer to me, nearer — tell her — tell Adah, you
may have her. She needn't mourn, nor wait; but carry
me back to Snowdon. There's no soldier's grave there
yet. I never thought mine would be the first. Anna
will cry, and mother and Asenath and Eudora; but Adah,
oh Lily, darling. She's coming to me now. Don't you
hear that rustle in the grass?” and the doctor listened intently
to a sound which also caught Irving's ear, a sound
of a horse's neigh in the distance, followed by a tramp of
feet.”

“Hush-sh,” he whispered. “It may be the enemy,” but
his words were not regarded, or understood.

The doctor was in Lily's presence, and in fancy it was
her hand, not Irving's which wiped the death-sweat from
his brow, and he murmured words of love and fond endearment,
as to a living, breathing form. Fainter and
fainter grew the pulse, weaker and weaker grew the trembling
voice, until at last Irving could only comprehend
that some one was bidden to pray — to say “Our Father.”

Reverently, as for a departing brother, he prayed over

the dying man, asking that all the past might be forgiven,
and that the erring might rest at last in peace.

“Say Amen for me, I'm too weak,” the doctor whispered;
then, as reason asserted her sway again, he continued,
“I see it now; Lily's gone, and I am dying here in the
woods, in the dark, in the night, on the ground; cared for
by you who will be Lily's husband. You may, you may,
tell her I said so; tell her kiss my boy; love him, Major
Stanley; love him as your own, even though others shall
call you father. Tell her — I tried — to pray —”

He never spoke again; and when next the thick, black,
clotted blood oozed up from the gaping wound, it brought
with it all there was of life; and there in those Virginia
woods, in the darkness of the night, Irving Stanley sat
alone with the dead. And yet not alone, for away to his
right, and where the neigh of a horse had been heard,
another wounded soldier lay — his soft, brown locks moist
with dew, and his captain's uniform wet with the blood
which dripped from the terrible gash in the fleshy part of
the neck, where a murderous ball had been. One arm,
the right one, was broken, and lay disabled upon the
grass; while the hand of the other clutched occasionally
at the damp grass, and then lifting itself, stroked caressingly
the powerful limbs of the faithful creature standing
guard over the prostrate form of his master.

Hugh and Rocket! They had been in many battles,
and neither shot nor shell had harmed them until to-day,
when Hugh had received the charge which sent him reeling
from his horse, breaking his arm in the fall, and scarcely
conscious that two of his comrades were leading him
from the field. How or by what means he afterwards
reached the woods, he did not know, but reached them he
had, and unable to travel further, he had fallen to the
ground, where he lay, until Rocket came galloping near,
riderless, frightened, and looking for his master. With a
cry of joy the noble brute answered that master's faint

whistle, bounding at once to his side, and by many mute
but meaning signs, signifying his desire that Hugh should
mount as heretofore.

But Hugh was too weak for that, and after several
ineffectual efforts to rise, fell back half fainting on the turf;
while Rocket took his stand directly over him, a powerful
and efficient guard until help from some quarter should
arrive. Patiently, faithfully he stood, waiting as quietly
as if he knew that aid was coming, not far away, in the
form of an old man, whose hair was white as snow, and
whose steps were feeble with age, but who had the advantage
of knowing every inch of that ground, for he had
trodden it many a time, with a homesick heart which pined
for “old Kentuck,” whence he had been stolen.

Uncle Sam! He it was whose uncertain steps made
Rocket prick up his ears and listen, neighing at last a
neigh of welcome, by which he, too, was recognized.

“De dear Father be praised if that be'nt Rocket hisself.
I've found him, I've found my Massah Hugh. I tole Miss
Ellis I should, 'case I knows all de way. Dear Massah
Hugh, I'se Sam, I is,” and with a convulsive sob the old
negro knelt beside the white-faced man who, but for this
timely aid, could hardly have survived that fearful night.