The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1901-11-06

red orb of day, which to our fevered
imaginations seemed to be advancing
to strike the final blow.
A great change had come over us
during the night. Jack ~alternated be-
tween bursts of passion and a devil
may care spirit, sprinkled with humor-
GUS sallies between tears and smiles,
which served to tighten momentarily
the gloom for the others, but only rem
dered mt more wretched; Buck craved
food more than all the rest and after a
few vain efforts to appear unconcerned
took on n CHASTITY look that cut me to
the heart; Ginger spent a great deal of
his time In prayer; Helen seemed calm,
yet 1 L noticed q strange look in her eye.
Up to this terrible morning she had
been the mainstay Of the party. Un-
der the strain that smoldering fire
which burned within her fiared omi-
nously. Turning to me. she asked
harshly:
Are you a Confederate or are you a.
YankeeT
what matters 1t nowT"
81 came to saw you, understanding
I you to be a Confederate"
"Would you abandon me low if you
knew me to be a Union manT
h turned away, and 1 saw that she
was weeping. 1 put my arm about her
and drew her head down on my breast.
There she wept long and silently.
Whether she was unconscious of what
she did or whether her sufferings made
her careless ! did not know, but as l
felt her heart beating against mine 1
/ rr,a oD,,t~,, 30 kt@ ht,kl -
love.
AS the sun rose higher 1t beat down
upon us with all the enervatlng heat Of
an unreasonable day. The water drip
ping back of us alone sustained and
refreshed us. One by one we would go
to the cleft and, standing under the
cooling drops, receive them In our
mouths. We envied the birds the food
they bore to their nests and the free
dom Of those soaring far above in tho
limitless ocean Of air. Why could we
not be given wings to fly from our
rocky prison? The wrecked are prone
to dwell on Authorizations. So to us
came sounds denoting the approach OF
-escuers. One would hear the tramp Of
armed men. Another would see the
white covers Of a wagon train. All day
we were tortured by these fancies till
at last 1 ceased to pay any attention to
them.
81 hear horses hoofs," said Buck.
"Oh, no, you don't, Buck" I said, lay
ing my hand on his head.
II tell yo' 1 do"
"Listen," said Helen.
We all listened, but so far as I was
concerned there was M unusual sound.
81 hear them, too" said Jack.
It was singular that these two should
agree. I looked %anxiously at Helen.
My hearing was not especially acute.
If Helen had heard, 1 might have
thought there was something to hear.
She listened q long while, but no sound
came to her.
"It's gone" said Buck.
$50 1t is," said Jack. II heard 1t; I
know 1 did"
I turned away. 1t was plain to me
that they had been tortured by another
hallucination. Neither Buck O Jack
beard anything more, and the incident
was soon forgotten, at least by Helen
and by me, who had heard nothing.
We all relapsed into that dreadful wait
tng-waiting for the time when the
fear Of death would be overcome by
the pangs Of starvation. Helen. sud-
denly looked at me, that dangerous
light which 1 had seen before in her
eyes.
"Your enemy?" she asked.
What enemyT'
The one you came to Alabama to
kill"
II shall never kill him now"
d you mean that you abandon your
revenge?" She spoke contemptuously.
with death staring me, staring you
and the others in the face-you who
have wrecked yourselves in n vain at
tempt to save me-my private griefs
sink to nothingness."
"You must be revenged." She spoke
as If 1t were h and not I who was to
be the avenger.
II remember. You were to help me-"
II will help you"
There is no need. We are doomed"
1--WE shall live. and you Will meet
him."
"And them"
"You will kill him"
my poor girl, think no more of that.
Let us fix our minds on gentler things;
let us hope for some escape from this
dreadful fate"
She sat down on the bare rock, I be-
side her. We both looked out upon the
setting sun, tlnting the mountains with
ominous blood stains. like those I had
seen on the evening I reached the guer-
rilla band. Jack was sitting holding
her knees. rocking back and forth;
Buck was lying on his buck with his
eyes shut; Ginger had finished a pray
CIR and was rising from his knees. Sud.
denly the whole. command started Zip as
II touched by a current of vitality.
There rang out on the still mountain
air the clear tones Of a bugle.
There was no hallucination about this
sound. Each note cut the air with
scimiterlike sharpness. To our ears
whetted as they were for some tidings'
or relief. 1t was like trumpet tones
from heaven. 1t echoed and re-echoed
through the mountains, each echo faint
er than the last. dying softly in the far
distance.
Shading my eyes with my hand,
peerlng down toward the road, I saw
through a small opening in the trees
hles OF cavalry passing by tours. They
were too far for me to diatinonishl