The Long Roll
windows. He raised his arm in an occasional gesture, and the sunbeams
showed the grey uniform beneath the robe, and made the bright buttons
brighter. _Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye
children of men. For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday
when it is past, and as a watch in the night._
The hour passed, and men and women left St. Paul's. The two beneath the
gallery waited until well-nigh all were gone, then they themselves
passed into the sunset street. "I will walk home with you," said Judith.
"How is Miriam?"
"She is beginning to learn," answered the other; "just beginning, poor,
darling child! It is fearful to be young, and to meet the beginning! But
she is rousing herself--she will be brave at last."
Judith softly took the hand beside her and lifted it to her lips. "I
don't see how your children could help being brave. You are well cared
for where you are?"
"Yes, indeed. Though if my old friend had not taken us in, I do not know
what we should have done. The city is fearfully crowded."
"I walked from the hospital with father. He says that the battle will be
very soon."
"I know. The cannon grow louder every night. I feel an assurance, too,
that the army is coming from the Valley."
"Sometimes," said Judith, "I say to myself, 'This is a dream--all but
one thing! Now it is time to wake up--only remembering that the one
thing is true.' But the dream goes on, and it gets heavier and more
painful."
"Yes," said Margaret. "But there are great flashes of light through it,
Judith."
They were walking beneath linden trees, fragrant, and filled with
murmurous sound. The street here was quiet; only a few passing people.
As the two approached the corner there turned it a slight figure, a girl
dressed in homespun with a blue sunbonnet. In her hands was a cheap
carpet-bag, covered with roses and pansies. She looked tired and
discouraged, and she set the carpet-bag down on the worn brick pavement
and waited until the two ladies came near. "Please, could you tell me--"
she began in a soft, drawling voice, which broke suddenly. "Oh, it's
Mrs. Cleave! it's Mrs. Cleave!--Oh! oh!"
"Christianna Maydew!--Why, Christianna!"
Christianna was crying, though evidently they were joyful tears. "I--I
was so frightened in this lonely place!--an'--an' Thunder Run's so far
away--an'--an' Billy an' Pap an' Dave aren't here, after all--an' I
never saw so many strange people--an' then I saw _you_--oh! oh!"
So brushed aside in this war city were all unnecessary conventions, that
the three sat down quite naturally upon a wide church step. An old and
wrinkled nurse, in a turban like a red tulip, made room for them, moving
aside a perambulator holding a sleeping babe. "F'om de mountains, ain'
she, ma'am? She oughter stayed up dar close ter Hebben!"
Christianna dried her eyes. Her sunbonnet had fallen back. She looked
like a wild rose dashed with dew. "I am such a fool to cry!" said
Christianna. "I ought to be laughin' an' clappin' my hands. I reckon
I'm tired. Streets are so hard an' straight, an' there's such a terrible
number of houses."
"How did you come, Christianna, and when, and why?"
"It was this a-way," began Christianna, with the long mountain day
before her. "It air so lonesome on Thunder Run, with Pap gone, an' Dave
gone, an' Billy gone, an'--an' Billy gone. An' the one next to me, she's
grown up quick this year, an' she helps mother a lot. She planted," said
Christianna, with soft pride, "she planted the steep hillside with corn
this spring--yes, Violetta did that!"
"And so you thought--"
"An' Pap has--had--a cousin in Richmond. Nanny Pine is her name. An' she
used to live on Thunder Run, long ago, an' she wasn't like the rest of
the Maydews, but had lots of sense, an' she up one mahnin', mother says,
an' took her foot in her hand, an' the people gave her lifts through the
country, an' she came to Richmond an' learned millinery--"
"Millinery!"
"Yes'm. To put roses an' ribbons on bonnets. An' she married here, a man
named Oak, an' she wrote back to Thunder Run, to mother, a real pretty
letter, an' mother took it to Mr. Cole at the tollgate (it was long ago,
before we children went to school) an' Mr. Cole read it to her, an' it
said that she had now a shop of her own, an' if ever any Thunder Run
people came to Richmond to come right straight to her. An' so--"
"And you couldn't find her?"
"An' so, last week, I was spinning. An' I walked up an' down, an' the
sun was shining, clear and steady, an' I could see out of the door, an'
there wasn't a sound, an' there wa'n't anything moved. An' it was as
though God Almighty had made a ball of gold with green trees on it and
had thrown it away, away! higher than the moon, an' had left it there
with nothin' on it but a dronin', dronin' wheel. An' it was like the
world was where the armies are. An' it was like I had to get there
somehow, an' see Pap again an' Dave an' Billy an'--an' see Billy. There
wa'n't no help for it; it was like I had to go. An' I stopped the wheel,
an' I said to mother, 'I am going where the armies are.' An' she says to
me, she says, 'You don't know where they are.' An' I says to her, I
says, 'I'll find out.' An' I took my sunbonnet, an' I went down the
mountain to the tollgate and asked Mr. Cole. An' he had a letter
from--from Mr. Gold--"
"Oh!" thought Margaret. "It is Allan Gold!"
"An' he read it to me, an' it said that not a man knew, but that he
thought the army was goin' to Richmond an' that there would be terrible
fightin' if it did. An' I went back up the mountain, an' I said to
mother, 'Violetta can do most as much as I can now, an' I am goin' to
Richmond where the army's goin'. I am goin' to see Pap an' Dave an'--an'
Billy, an' I am goin' to stay with Cousin Nanny Pine.' An' mother says,
says she, 'Her name is Oak now, but I reckon you'll know her house by
the bonnets in the window.' Mother was always like that," said
Christianna, again, with soft pride. "Always quick-minded! She sees the
squirrel in the tree quicker'n any of us--'ceptin' it's Billy. An' she
says, 'How're you goin' to get thar, Christianna--less'n you walk?' An'
I says, 'I'll walk.'"
"Oh, poor child!" cried Judith! "Did you?"
"No, ma'am; only a real little part of the way. It's a hundred and fifty
miles, an' we ain't trained to march, an' it would have taken me so
long. No, ma'am. Mrs. Cole heard about my goin' an' she sent a boy to
tell me to come see her, an' I went, an' she gave me a dollar (I surely
am goin' to pay it back, with interest) an' a lot of advice, an' she
couldn't tell me how to find Pap an' Dave an' Billy, but she said a deal
of people would know about Allan Gold, for he was a great scout, an' she
gave me messages for him; an' anyhow the name of the regiment was the
65th, an' the colonel was your son, ma'am, an' he would find the others
for me. An' she got a man to take me in his wagon, twenty miles toward
Lynchburg, for nothin'. An' I thanked him, an' asked him to have some of
the dinner mother an' Violetta had put in a bundle for me; but he said
no, he wasn't hungry. An' that night I slept at a farmhouse, an' they
wouldn't take any pay. An' the next day and the next I walked to
Lynchburg, an' there I took the train." Her voice gathered firmness. "I
had never seen one before, but I took it all right. I asked if it was
goin' to Richmond, an' I climbed on. An' a man came along an' asked me
for my ticket, an' I said that I didn't have one, but that I wanted to
pay if it wasn't more than a dollar. An' he asked me if it was a gold
dollar or a Confederate dollar. An' there were soldiers on the train,
an' one came up an' took off his hat an' asked me where I was goin', an'
I told him an' why, an' he said it didn't matter whether it was gold or
Confederate, and that the conductor didn't want it anyhow. An' the
conductor--that was what the first man was called--said he didn't
reckon I'd take up much room, an' that the road was so dog-goned tired
that one more couldn't make it any tireder, an' the soldier made me sit
down on one of the benches, an' the train started." She shut her eyes
tightly. "I don't like train travel. I like to go slower--"
"But it brought you to Richmond--"
Christianna opened her eyes. "Yes, ma'am, we ran an' ran all day, making
a lot of noise, an' it was so dirty; an' then last night we got
here--an' I slept on a bench in the house where we got out--only I
didn't sleep much, for soldiers an' men an' women were going in and out
all night long--an' then in the mahnin' a coloured woman there gave me a
glass of milk an' showed me where I could wash my face--an' then I came
out into the street an' began to look for Cousin Nanny Pine--"
"And you couldn't find her?"
"She isn't here, ma'am. I walked all mahnin', looking, but I couldn't
find her, an' nobody that I asked knew. An' they all said that the army
from the Valley hadn't come yet, an' they didn't even know if it was
coming. An' I was tired an' frightened, an' then at last I saw a window
with two bonnets in it, and I said, 'Oh, thank the Lord!' an' I went an'
knocked. An' it wasn't Cousin Nanny Pine. It was another milliner. 'Mrs.
Oak?' she says, says she. 'Mrs. Oak's in Williamsburg! Daniel Oak got
his leg cut off in the battle, an' she boarded up her windows an' went
to Williamsburg to nurse him--an' God knows I might as well board up
mine, for there's nothin' doin' in millinery!' An' she gave me my
dinner, an' she told me that the army hadn't come yet from the Valley,
an' she said she would let me stay there with her, only she had three
cousins' wives an' their children, refugeein' from Alexandria way an'
stayin' with her, an' there wasn't a morsel of room. An' so I rested for
an hour, an' then I came out to look for some place to stay. An' it's
mortal hard to find." Her soft voice died. She wiped her eyes with the
cape of her sunbonnet.
"She had best come with me," said Margaret to Judith. "Yes, there is
room--we will make room--and it will not be bad for Miriam to have some
one.... Are we not all looking for that army? And her people are in
Richard's regiment." She rose. "Christianna, child, neighbours must
help one another out! So come with me, and we shall manage somehow!"
Hospitality rode well forward in the Thunder Run creed. Christianna
accepted with simplicity what, had their places been changed, she would
as simply have given. She began to look fair and happy, a wild rose in
sunshine. She was in Richmond, and she had found a friend, and the army
was surely coming! As the three rose from the church step, there passed
a knot of mounted soldiers. It chanced to be the President's staff, with
several of Stuart's captains, and the plumage of these was yet bright.
The Confederate uniform was a handsome one; these who wore it were young
and handsome men. From spur to hat and plume they exercised a charm.
Somewhere, in the distance, a band was playing, and their noble, mettled
horses pranced to the music. As they passed they raised their hats. One,
who recognized Judith, swept his aside with a gesture appropriate to a
minuet. With sword and spur, with horses stepping to music, by they
went. Christianna looked after them with dazzled eyes. She drew a
fluttering breath. "I didn't know things like that were in the world!"
A little later the three reached the gate of the house which sheltered
Margaret and Miriam. "I won't go in," said Judith. "It is growing
late.... Margaret, I am going to the President's to-night. Father wishes
me to go with him. He says that we are on the eve of a great battle, and
that it is right--" Margaret smiled upon her. "It _is_ right. Of course
you must go, dear and darling child! Do not think that I shall ever
misunderstand you, Judith!"