The Iron Game Part 32

"Ah! friends, we are teaching each other how to die--let us not forget that," Mrs. Gannat murmured, gently, and there was a sudden hush in the exchange of vivacities. Before the strain could he renewed, Mrs.

Atterbury entered hastily, crying:

"The gentlemen are all distracted. We are going to have an old-time minuet, such as my mother used to dance with Justice Marshall and Tom Mayo. The President is going to lead with Mistress Wendolph, and all the rest of you are a.s.signed, by command of the Executive."

"Humph! a military despotism?" asked Mrs. Renfrew, a young bride of the Executive Mansion, whose husband was confidential adviser of the President. "I don't think I shall obey. I shall show the honesty of my rebel blood by selecting my own partner, unless some one asks me very humbly."

"Shall I go on my knees, Mrs. Renfrew?--I know no humbler att.i.tude,"

Jack said, hastily presenting himself.

"Oh, yes, sir; there is something humbler than the knees."

"Yes? What, pray?"

"Repentance. Deny your name; no longer be a Montague--that is, a Yankee.

Give me the hand of a rebel. Then I shall believe you."

"I am a rebel."

"Ah! you have been converted?"

"I never was perverted."

"You have been with us all the time?"

"I have been here a long time!"

"And you are a rebel. Oh, I must tell Mr. Davis!"

"He knows it, I think."

"Oh, no, he can not; for it was only a few moments since that he said to Mrs. Atterbury that the son of Senator Sprague, the friend of Calhoun and the comrade of Hayne, should be in the ranks of the young n.o.bility upholding our sacred cause."

"I am, however, a rebel--a rebel to all these fascinations I see about me, a rebel to your beauty, a rebel to all you desire."

"Pah! you odious Yankee; I felt certain that you had not come to your senses."

"I don't think I ever lost them--though I never had enough to make such a spirit as yours lament their loss." The rest of the ladies had pa.s.sed out; and, as this repartee went on. Jack led his petulant companion into the large drawing-room, where he instantly recognized the President with Mrs. Wendolph on his arm. He towered above the ma.s.s of the dancers, eying the admiring groups with attentive scrutiny. He was in evening dress, but, unlike the larger number of the eminent partisans in the rooms, had no insignia, military or otherwise, to denote exalted rank.

As the President was to lead off, to keep up the character of a court minuet, the middle of the large room was left uncrowded. The music began what Jack thought at first was a funeral march, but with the first bars the tall, slender figure of the President bent almost double, while the lady seemed fairly seated on the floor, she bent down and back so far.

She had adjusted a prodigious silken train, which swept and swirled in many bewildering folds as she slowly turned, courtesied, tripped forward and retreated, with such bending and twisting as would turn a ballet-master mad with envy. In all the movement of the overture the two dancers merely touched the tips of each other's fingers, and when the solemn measure came to a close the President slid across the floor in one graceful, immense pirouette, handing the lady who confronted him, bent nearly to the ground, into her seat. There was an outburst of applause, and then the a.s.sembly took places, repeating, in as far as the ma.s.s would permit, the stately evolutions of the leader.

Later, a Virginia reel followed, danced with old-time _verve_, some of the more accomplished dancers bounding over the floor in pigeon-wings, such as were cut by the nimble a hundred years ago, when Richmond danced in honor of Was.h.i.+ngton and Lafayette. There was no end of drinking among the men, and as soon as the dancing seemed at its height the matrons began to gather into groups and send out signals to the younger ladies.

The feast ended in drinking-bouts between dispersed bodies, who seemed to know the names of all the servants, and ordered as liberally as if in their own houses. In the _melee_ of separation, Jack felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Remember, every moment is precious. Many lives, perhaps a great campaign, depend upon your discretion, prompt.i.tude, and loyalty. Be ready when the signal reaches you, and remember you do not know me beyond the civility of a presentation, and do not like me."

Jack had hardly turned as these words were whispered in his ear, and he gave the kind lady's hand a warm pressure, as she moved away unremarked in the throng.

Jack, confiding Mrs. Gannat's disclosures to Olympia, was elated by his sister's enthusiasm, and was strengthened in his conviction that he was doing right by her approval.

"But you know, Polly, that--I--I, too, must be of the party? I must fly to the Union lines."

"Of course you will! I should be ashamed of you were you to let such a chance pa.s.s. It is the only thing to do; it is your duty as a soldier to be with your flag; any means to get to it is justified. The Atterburys will feel hurt, perhaps outraged, but I can soon convince them that you have only done what Vincent would do, and whatever he would do they will soon see is right for you to do, even though it may bring them into temporary disgrace with the authorities. Of late I have begun to suspect that the Atterburys are to blame for your detention."

"What do you mean to blame? Surely they can not hasten the slow business of negotiation?"

"No; but I'm convinced that they have given out hopes that you can be seduced into a soldier of secession. It is common talk in the drawing-rooms I have visited, where I was not always recognized as your sister. The silly tale has angered me, but for prudence sake I kept silent. I have heard in a score of places that the Atterburys were detaining you until another reverse to the Union arms should convince you of the uselessness of remaining in the service of the abolitionists."

"O Polly, it must be a joke! They little know me, who could suspect me of such dishonor! Surely the Atterburys can't think me so base as that.

What have I ever done to justify such a stigma?"

"You wrong them there. They hold that you are wanting in loyalty to our father's memory in espousing the cause of men who were his enemies--men who strove to ruin his political life. It is in being a soldier of the Union that they look upon you as recreant to the traditions of your family and your party."

"Well, I shall make a hard struggle for escape. If I fail, they will at least see that I am in earnest--that I put country before family or party, or anything else that men hold dear. Heavens! to think of being held in such bondage! I could stand it with more patience if I were in prison sharing the hard lines of the fellows. But to be here; to be hand in glove with these boasting, audacious c.o.xcombs, and forced to listen to their callow banter of us and our army, it makes me feel like a sneak and a traitor, and I'm glad that I see the end."

"But do you see the end? Prudence is one of the wisest counselors in war. You are very rash, and you must take all your measures carefully.

It won't do to rush into a trap, as you did at Mana.s.sas; and, O Jack, what is to become of d.i.c.k? He is not in the lists. He has no standing here, and is at the mercy of any one who chooses to accuse him of being a spy."

"By George, you're right! I hadn't thought of that. He must go with me.

I had thought it better to leave him. He is so happy with Rosa that I fancied he would remain contentedly until the war ends. But he is in constant danger. He is forever tantalizing the people that visit the house, who make slighting allusions to the Northern armies, and very likely some rebel patriot will take the trouble to inquire about him."

"But even if this were not a peril, he would never consent to remain here if you were gone. I think he would give up Rosa rather than be separated from you."

"Yes, the impulsive little beggar, I believe he would," Jack said, his eyes glistening. "That will compel us to take him into the secret. In fact, I don't see how it can be managed without him; and then his testimony would convict the prisoners. I hadn't thought of that. But now, Polly, about yourself. What's to become of you?"

"I have my plans laid. Mrs. Myrason, the wife of one of Johnston's generals, is going to the front next week. I shall insist to-night on accompanying her, as some of our physicians are going to be sent through the lines at the same time. There is really no reason for my remaining here, now that you are well. I have already broached the subject to Mrs.

Atterbury, and I shall inform her at once that I am decided. She will not suspect anything, as she knew I was half-tempted to go North when mamma went. The important thing for you, now, is to give your whole mind to the rescue, and have no fears for me. If you can convince d.i.c.k to go with you, all will be well. If he proves obstinate, hand him over to me." Jack laughed.

"Polly, you should have been the first-born of the house of Sprague; you have twice the sense that I have."

"It isn't sense that wins in war; it is daring and resolution, and you have all that."

When Jack had cautiously laid the situation before his young Patroclus, that precocious warrior at once justified the confidence reposed in him.

"Rosa has promised to marry me as soon as the war is over. She can't expect me to hang around here like a peg-top on a string. Besides, I wouldn't stay where you are not, Jacko, even if I lost my sweetheart for good and all."

There was a piteous quaver in the treble voice, and, forgetting that he was no longer a school-boy, he brushed his eyes furtively with his coat-sleeve, as Jack pretended preoccupation with his shoe-string.

"You're a brick, d.i.c.k. I think I have confided that to you before--but you are a brick, made of the best straw in the field of life, and you shall be a general one of these days--your shrill voice shall let slip the dogs of war and cry havoc to the enemy. You shall return to Acredale--proud Acredale--your brows bound with victorious wreaths, and all the small boys perched on the spreading oaks to salute you."

"I think I have heard something like that before, my blarneying Plantagenet. You shall be the Percy of the North, and command the great battle. You shall meet and vanquish fifty Harrys, and cry, 'G.o.d for Union, liberty, and the laws.'"

"Bravo! You know your Shakespeare if you don't know prudence. However, we're plotters now, and you must take on your wisest humor. You must not breathe a word to Rosa. Love is a freebooter in confidences. It has no conscience, as it has no law. It is an immense friction on the sober relations of life. It is cousin to the G.o.d of lies--Mercury. So be warned that while your heart is Rosa's your reason's your country's, your friends', and you have a chance now to employ it to the profit of both! You must be ready to evade Rosa's infinite questioning with innocent plausibilities, for you must bear in mind that, however much she may love you, she, like you, loves her cause, her people--more, in fact, for you have seen that these pa.s.sionate Southerners have made a religion of the war, and, like all enthusiasts, they will go any lengths, deny all ties; glory, faith, in personal sacrifices and heart-wrenchings, to make the South triumph. So, without being false to your love, you must deceive, to be true to your country; for to lull love's suspicions a man must regulate the two currents of his life, the heart and brain. Keep the heart in check and let the brain rule in such affairs as we have on hand."

"Phew Jack! you talk like a college professor. You're deeper than a well; and what was the other thing Mercutio said?"

"Ah! Mercutio said so much that Shakespeare got frightened and let Tybalt kill him. So beware of saying too much. That's your great danger, d.i.c.k; your tongue is terrible--mostly to your friends."

"Is it, indeed? I have a friend who doesn't think so."