Before the Dawn | Page 8

how hungry you used to be as a growing boy."
"And through all these days you have kept something hot on the fire for me, ready at a moment's notice!"
She looked at him and there was a faint suspicion of tears in her eyes.
"Yes, yes, Robert," she replied. "Now don't scold me."
He had no intention of scolding her, but his thought was: "Has any other man a mother like mine?" Then he corrected himself; he knew that there must be myriads of others.
He said nothing in reply, merely smiling at her, and permitted her to do as she would. She went about the room with light, easy step, intent on her little services.
She opened the window shutters and the rich sunlight came streaming in, throwing a golden glow across the brown face of him who had left her a boy and come back a man. She sighed a little as she noticed how great was the change, but she hid the sigh from her son.
"Mother," he asked presently, "was there not some one else in this room when I came in? The light was faint, but I thought I saw a shadowy figure disappear."
"Yes," she answered; "that was Helen Harley. She was with me when you came. She may have known your footstep, too, and if not, she guessed it from my face, so she went out at once. She did not wish to be a mere curious onlooker when a mother was greeting her son, come home after three years in the war."
"She must be a woman now."
"She is a woman full grown in all respects. Women have grown old fast in the last three years. She is nearly a head taller than I."
"You have been comfortable here, mother?" he asked.
"As much so as one can be in such times," she replied. "I do not lack for money, and whatever deprivations I endure are those of the common lot--and this community of ill makes them amusing rather than serious."
She rose and walked to a door leading into the garden.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"I shall return in a few moments."
When she came back she brought with her a tall young woman with eyes of dark blue and hair of brown shot with gold wherever the firelight fell upon it. This girl showed a sinuous grace when she walked and she seemed to Prescott singularly self-contained.
He sprang to his feet at once and took her hand in the usual Southern fashion, making a compliment upon her appearance, also in the usual Southern fashion. Then he realized that she had ceased to be a little girl in all other respects as well as in the physical.
"I have heard that gallantry in the face of the ladies as well as of the foe is part of a soldier's trade, Robert," she replied.
"And you do not know which requires the greater daring."
"But I know which your General ought to value the more."
After this she was serious. Neither of the younger people spoke much, but left the thread of the talk to Mrs. Prescott, who had a great deal to say. The elder woman, for all her gentleness and apparent timidity, had a bold spirit that stood in no awe of the high and mighty. She was full of curiosity about the war and plied her son with questions.
"We in Richmond know little that is definite of its progress," she said. "The Government announces victories and no defeats. But tell me, Robert, is it true, as I hear, that in the knapsacks of the slain Southern soldiers they find playing-cards, and in those of the North, Bibles?"
"If the Northern soldiers have Bibles, they do not use them," said Helen.
"And if the Southern soldiers have playing-cards, they do use them," said Mrs. Prescott.
Robert laughed.
"I daresay that both sides use their cards too much and their Bibles too little," he said.
"Do not be alarmed, Robert," said his mother; "such encounters between Helen and myself are of a daily occurrence."
"And have not yet resulted in bloodshed," added Miss Harley.
Prescott watched the girl while his mother talked, and he seemed to detect in her a certain aloofness as far as he was concerned, although he was not sure that the impression was not due to his absence so long from the society of women. It gave him a feeling of shyness which he found difficult to overcome, and which he contrasted in his own mind with her ease and indifference of manner.
When she asked him of her brother, Colonel Harley, the brilliant cavalry commander, whose exploits were recounted in Richmond like a romance, she showed enthusiasm, her eyes kindling with fire, and her whole face vivid. Her pride in her brother was large and she did not seek to conceal it.
"I hear that he is considered one of the