Before the Dawn Part 18

Prescott hesitated and flushed. Then he answered:

"I hope, Miss Grayson, that I shall never be able to overlook a woman in distress."

His eyes wandered involuntarily to the feeble fire, and then in its turn the thin face of Miss Grayson flushed. For a moment, in her embarra.s.sment, she looked almost beautiful.

"Miss Catherwood is still here, is she not?" repeated Prescott. "I a.s.sure you that I came in her interest."

Miss Grayson gave him a look of such keenness that Prescott saw again the strength and penetration underlying her timid and doubtful manner.

She seemed to be rea.s.sured and replied:

"Yes, she is here. I will call her."

She disappeared into the next room and presently Miss Catherwood came forth alone. She held her head as haughtily as ever, and regarded him with a look in which he saw much defiance, and he fancied, too, a little disdain.

"Captain Prescott," she said proudly, "I am not an object for military supervision."

"I am aware of that," he replied, "and I do not mean to be impolite, Miss Catherwood, when I say that I regret to find you still here."

She pointed through the window to the white and frozen world outside.

"I should be glad enough to escape," she said, "but that forbids."

"I know it, or at least I expected it," said Prescott, "and it is partly why I am here. I came to warn you."

"To warn me! Do I not know that I am in a hostile city?"

"But there is more. The search for those missing papers, and, above all, for the one who took them--a tall woman in a brown cloak, they say--has not ceased, nor will it; the matter is in the hands of a crafty, persistent man and he thinks he has a clue. He has learned, as I learned, that a woman dressed like you and looking like you was in the Government building on the day of the celebration. He believes that woman is still in the city, and he is sure that she is the one for whom he seeks."

Her face blanched; he saw for the first time a trace of feminine weakness, even fear. It was gone, however, like a mist before a wind, as her courage came back.

"But this man, whoever he may be, cannot find me," she said. "I am hidden unless some one chooses to betray me; not that I care for myself, but I cannot involve my generous cousin in such a trouble."

Prescott shook his head.

"Your trust I have not merited, Miss Catherwood," he said. "If I had chosen to give you up to the authorities I should have done so before this. And your confidence in your hiding place is misplaced, too.

Richmond is small. It is not a great city like New York or Philadelphia, and those who would conceal a Northern spy--I speak plainly--are but few. It is easy to search and find."

Prescott saw her tremble a little, although her face did not whiten again, nor did a tear rise to her eye. She went again to the window, staring there at the frozen world of winter, and Prescott saw that a purpose was forming in her mind. It was a purpose bold and desperate, but he knew that it would fail and so he spoke. He pointed out to her the lines of defenses around Richmond, and the wilderness beyond all, buried under a cold that chained sentinels even to their fires; she would surely perish, even if she pa.s.sed the watch.

"But if I were taken," she said, "I should be taken alone and they would know nothing of Miss Grayson."

"But I should never give up hope," he said. "After all, the hunted may hide, if warned, when the hunter is coming."

She gave him a glance, luminous, grateful, so like a shaft of light pa.s.sing from one to another that it set Prescott's blood to leaping.

"Captain Prescott," she said, "I really owe you thanks."

Prescott felt as if he had been repaid, and afterward in the coolness of his own exclusive company he was angry with himself for the feeling--but she stirred his curiosity; he was continually conscious of a desire to know what manner of woman she was--to penetrate this icy mist, as it were, in which she seemed to envelop herself.

There was now no pretext for him to stay longer, but he glanced at the fire which had burned lower than ever, only two coals hugging each other in the feeble effort to give forth heat. Prescott was standing beside a little table and unconsciously he rested his right hand upon it. But he slipped the hand into his pocket, and when he took it out and rested it upon the table again there was something between the closed fingers.

Miss Grayson returned at this moment to the room and looked inquiringly at the two.

"Miss Catherwood will tell you all that I have said to her," said Prescott, "and I bid you both adieu."

When he lifted his hand from the table he left upon it what the fingers had held, but neither of the women noticed the action.

Prescott slipped into the street, looking carefully to see that he was not observed, and annoyed because he had to do so; as always his heart revolted at hidden work. But Richmond was cold and desolate, and he went back to the heart of the city, un.o.bserved, meaning to find Winthrop, who always knew the gossip, and to learn if any further steps had been taken in the matter of the stolen doc.u.ments.

He found the editor with plenty of time on his hands and an abundant inclination to talk. Yes, there was something. Mr. Sefton, so he heard, meant to make the matter one of vital importance, and the higher officers of the Government were content to leave it to him, confident of his ability and pertinacity and glad enough to be relieved of such a task.

Prescott, when he heard this, gazed thoughtfully at the cobwebbed ceiling. There was yet no call for him to go to the front, and he would stay to match his wits against those of the great Mr. Sefton; he had been drawn unconsciously into a conflict--a conflict of which he was perhaps unconscious--and every impulse in him told him to fight.

When he went to his supper that evening he found a very small package wrapped in brown paper lying unopened beside his plate. He knew it in an instant, and despite himself his face flooded with colour.

"It was left here for you an hour ago," said his mother, who in that moment achieved a triumph permitted to few mothers, burying a mighty curiosity under seeming indifference.

"Who left it, mother?" asked Prescott, involuntarily.

"I do not know," she replied. "There was a heavy knock upon the door while I was busy, and when I went there after a moment's delay I found this lying upon the sill, but the bringer was gone."

Prescott put the package in his pocket and ate his supper uneasily.

When he was alone in his room he drew the tiny parcel from his pocket and took off the paper, disclosing two twenty-dollar gold pieces, which he returned to his pocket with a sigh.

"At least I meant well," he said to himself.

A persistent nature feeds on opposition, and the failure of his first attempt merely prepared Prescott for a second. The affair, too, began to absorb his mind to such an extent that his friends noticed his lack of interest in the society and amus.e.m.e.nts of Richmond. He had been well received there, his own connections, his new friends, and above all his pleasing personality, exercising a powerful influence; and, coming from the rough fields of war, he had enjoyed his stay very keenly.

But he had a preoccupation now, and he was bent upon doing what he wished to do. Talbot and the two editors rallied him upon his absence of mind, and even Helen, despite her new interest in Wood, looked a little surprised and perhaps a little aggrieved at his inattention; but none of these things had any effect upon him. His mind was now thrown for the time being into one channel, and he could not turn it into another if he wished.

On the next morning after his failure he pa.s.sed again near the little wooden house, the day being as cold as ever and the smoke of many chimneys lying in black lines against the perfect blue-and-white heavens. He looked at the chimney of the little wooden cottage, and there, too, was smoke coming forth; but it was a thin and feeble stream, scarcely making even a pale blur against the transparent skies. The house itself appeared to be as cold and chilly as the frozen snow outside.

Prescott glanced up and down the street. An old man, driving a small wagon drawn by a single horse, was about to pa.s.s him. Prescott looked into the body of the wagon and saw that it contained coal.

"For sale?" he asked.

The man nodded.

"How much for the lot?"

"Twenty dollars."

"Gold or Confederate money?"

The old man blew his breath on his red woolen comforter and thoughtfully watched it freeze there, then he looked Prescott squarely in the face and asked:

"Stranger, have you just escaped from a lunatic asylum?"