University of Virginia Library

22. CHAPTER XXII.

A few hours later, Dora, having seen all her patients
comfortably disposed for their afternoon's rest or recreation,
seated herself by Merlin's bed, with some sewing,
and told him she was all ready to hear the rest of the
story he had begun in the morning.

“Well, Miss Dora, I think it's very kind of you to
care about it, but it's a great relief to me to tell it,” said
Merlin. “And as long as you're willing I'll keep right
on, and tell you the whole.

“After father and Sue got home, I told them, as careless
as I could, that Nelly and I had had a falling out,
and that I had advised her to marry Rob Judson if Sue
would give him up; and I reckoned they had pretty much
made up their minds to take my advice.

“Then there was a time. Father he stormed and
swore, and laid it all off on me for quarrelling with
Nelly, who was a great pet of his'n, and then he turned
right round and said Sue had a better right to her
own fellow than any other girl, and she shouldn't give
him up without she was a mind to. Then he turned to
speak to her, and there she was, fainted dead away in her

chair. We thought she was dead, and we didn't get any
life into her for more than an hour. When she come to,
she called me, and questioned me up so close, she got
pretty near the whole story out of me; and then she
kissed me, and asked me never to leave her while she
lived. She said it wouldn't be for long, and it wasn't;
but if it had been a lifetime I'd have stopped.

“She took to her bed that very day, and she never
got up again. Miss Dora, they tell about angels looking
all white and shiny, as if they give off light of themselves.
Well, that was the way that girl looked. It
seemed as if her soul was shining right through her
body; and I don't believe she'd need to look any different
in heaven from what she did them last weeks of her
life.

“She didn't seem unhappy, nor she didn't seem to
care any longer about Rob, or the things that had tried
her so when she was about. She never asked for Nelly,
nor spoke her name, no more than if there wasn't such a
person, nor I to her.

“A couple of days after the flare-up, Judson came and
took Nell to a justice's house, about five mile from ours,
and they was married. Father went with them to see
that all was done regular; and somehow or other Rob
and he patched up a sort of peace, and father used afterwards
to go there considerable.

“I didn't know much about his doings, however, being

mostly took up with Sue. It wasn't much that I could
do for the poor girl; but she liked having me with her,
and there was nothing I wouldn't have been glad to do
to please her.

“She didn't suffer much, and her thoughts seemed
mostly took up with the happiness she was going to, and
the hopes of being with mother again. She never said
nothing like complaining but once, and then it was, —

“`They've killed my body, Harry, but that will only
give me back to dear mother, and we shall live forever
with Christ and each other.'

“At last she died.”

Merlin paused, and hid his face a moment. Dora
softly placed her hand on his, but said nothing, and after
a few moments the Kentuckian resumed his story.

“When we'd buried Sue, I began to think about myself
again. As for settling down to the care of a farm,
with only father for a family, and Judson and his wife
living not a mile away, I couldn't do it nohow; and after
thinking the matter over every way that I could fix it, I
told the old gentleman that I was going into the army.
He was just as bitter about it as he was before, and finally
told me to give in to secession, or leave his house for
good and all.

“I took a night to think of it, and in the morning I
told him I was ready to go, and asked him to shake
hands, and say good by. The poor old man swore, and

then he cried, and said how his wife and his daughter
was dead, and now his only son was deserting him.

“I told him that was to be as he said; that if he
cared for my company, I'd stay as long as he wanted me,
if he wouldn't say anything about secession, for that I
should never join that party as long as I had the use of
my senses.

“That made him mad again; and he told me to begone,
and said he knew where to find a son and a
daughter, too, that would be better to him than his own
flesh and blood.

“I knew who he meant, but I didn't care for myself,
though I was kind of cut that he should talk about Nelly
taking the place of Sue to him; so I didn't stop for any
more talk, but went off that very morning.

“I knew there was a company mustering in Princeton,
pretty near twenty miles from where I lived, and I
went right away there to enlist.

“After a few weeks we were ready to join the regiment,
and I went over to take a last look at the old place,
and see if father and I couldn't part on better terms.

“I hadn't more than got into the village near where
our place was, when I met the old doctor that had always
been to our house, and he, looking at me mighty sharp,
asked where I come from, and if I'd heard the news. I
told him where I'd been, and what I'd been about, and
asked him what news he meant. Before he answered,

he made me get into his chaise, and drove off right out
of town. When we was well on the road, he told me
that only the night before a party of guerrillas had made
a sudden sweep on our place, and driven off the hogs and
cattle, seized the horses, and whatever provisions they
could find, and was off to the mountains before any force
could be got to resist them. But the heavy part of the
news was, that my poor old father had most likely been
shot, and his body burned in the house. All that could
be known was from the darkeys, and they was so scared
they didn't know what they saw and what they didn't.

“The most likely story, however, was, that father
locked the doors and fired out of his window at the fellows
when he heard them breaking into the barn, and
they fired back at him. Any way nothing more was
seen of him; and when the guerrillas had got their
plunder together, some of them set fire to the house
out of clear deviltry, and rode away by the light of it;
and before anything could be done to save it, the whole
place was no more than a heap of ashes, and most likely
my father's ashes mixed up with that of his home.”

“How dreadful!” exclaimed Dora.

“Yes, it was that,” said the Kentuckian, emphatically.
“But there's more a coming that's about as bad, as
far as deviltry goes. It was out of revenge, I suppose,
for my threatening to shoot him unless he married Nelly,
that Rob Judson undertook to say that it was me who

led them guerrillas, and shot my own father; and I think
it was about as mean a lie as Satan ever put into the
mouth of one of his children.”

“Did he say so?” asked Dora, in horror.

“Yes, he did, and swore that he recognized me, when
he met the troop riding away. He told all round that I
hadn't joined any regular troops, but was one of these
that fought either side or any side, when there was plunder
or mischief to be got, and that no doubt I had led
these men to my father's house partly to steal, and partly
because I was mad at being turned out of doors. Any
way, about half the village believed him; and my life
wouldn't have been safe if I'd been seen in town while
the excitement lasted. The doctor said, too, that he
didn't treat Nelly kind, nor as he'd ought to, and that
she was dreadful changed from what I'd known her.”

Merlin paused, and a black scowl settled on his face.
Dora looked at him timidly, and sought for the right
thing to say; but she could not, in her heart, wonder at
the resentment that his next words betrayed.

“There's my sister's broken heart, and my father's
life, and poor Nell's peace and comfort, and all the best
of my own hopes and happiness that fellow has stole
away from me. His miserable life wouldn't begin to
pay the debt; but it's all I could get, and when I left
town that morning, afraid to show my face in the village
where I had grown up, and all for no fault of my own,

I swore that if ever I had the chance I'd take that life
as I would that of a wild beast.

“I served out my time with the Kentucky regiment,
and then I entered this Ohio one, and I've fought through
pretty nigh all the battles that's been fought in this part
of the country; but though, ever since I heard that Judson
had enlisted, I've been on the lookout for him, I never
come acrost him, till, yesterday morning, I heard his voice
in the next room there, and knew it was him. Then you
got me the picture, and I knew Nelly as soon as I see
her, and my mind was made up in a minute. But I saw
you was on the lookout for me, and I kept quiet till you
should be abed and asleep.”

“How did you get that knife?” interposed Dora.

“I asked the nurse for it to look at to see if it was
rusted; then I put it out of sight, and he forgot it.”

“Merlin, are you sorry I stopped you?”

The young man hesitated.

“No, Miss Dora, I don't know as I am. Now that
I've told you all about it, I don't feel near so bitter as
when I had it all shut up in my own heart. It had got
to have some sort of let out, and if I had told you in the
first place, I don't believe I should have made up my
mind to do as I did last night. I don't feel like it now,
any way.”

“I'm so glad of that! and I'm glad you told me all
about it, for I don't feel now as I did about you,” said

Dora, simply. “But I want to tell Mr. Brown, and ask
him to talk with you, and, perhaps, with Judson. I know
you hadn't ought to feel the way you do to him; but I
don't know how to tell you so as to make you see it, and
Mr. Brown can. Will you let him talk with you?”

“Yes, if you say so,” said Merlin, rather reluctantly.
“But I wasn't never much of a hand for parsons. I'd
rather hear you talk.”

“But I can't talk as he can, and he isn't a bit like a
parson. I am going now to read to him, and I shall tell
him all about you. Perhaps he'll come in to-night.”

“Thank you, Miss Dora. You know better than me
about it,” said Merlin, wearily.

The little nurse's quick eye caught the symptom.

“You have talked too much,” said she; “you must go
right to sleep now, and get a good nap before supper.
Mind me, now. Good by.”

“Good by, miss. I wish your name was Sue.”