Chapter 6

And now that he _had_ asked her if there were no other reason, there was something in his placid tone she did not like. A month agone she wanted him to know of Mr. Hollins's evident attentions to Genevieve because it would probably, or possibly, spur him into some exertion on his own account. Now that she felt sure he had heard of it, and it had not spurred him, she was as anxious to conceal the fact that, both to Mrs. Winthrop and herself, these attentions were becoming alarming. If he did _not_ care for Viva, the chances were that so soon as he found that public attention had been drawn to her acceptance of such devotions, Paul would drop the matter entirely, and that would be a calamity. Knowing perfectly well, therefore, what was in his mind when he asked the question, Mrs. Abbot parried the thrust. Though she flushed, and her voice quivered a little, she looked him straight in the face.

"There is, Paul. I--think she has a right to expect it of you; that--that she does expect it."

Abbot looked with undisguised perplexity into his mother's face.

"You surprise me very much, mother; I cannot, see how Viva would betray such an idea, even if she had it; it is not like her."

"Women see these things where men cannot," was the somewhat sententious reply. "Besides, Paul--"

"Well, mother, besides--?"

"Mrs. Winthrop has told me as much."

That evening, before returning to camp, Lieutenant Abbot went round the square--or what is the Bostonian equivalent therefor--and surprised Miss Winthrop with a call. He told her what he had not told his mother, that Colonel Raymond that morning received a telegram from Washington saying that on the following Tuesday they must be in readiness to start.

"We have been good friends always, Viva," he said; "but you have been something more to me than that. I did not mean to make so sudden an avowal, but soldiers have no time to call their own just now, and every hour has been given up to duty with the regiment. Now this sharp summons comes and I must go. If I return, shall we--" (he had almost said, "shall we fulfil our manifest destiny, and make our parents happy?" but had sense enough to realize that she was entitled to a far more personal proposition). He broke off nervously.

"You have always been so dear to me, Viva. Will you be my wife?"

She was sitting on the sofa, nervously twisting the cords of a fan in and out among her slender white fingers. Her eyes were downcast and her cheeks suffused. For an instant she looked up and a question seemed trembling on her lips. She was a truthful woman and no coward. There was something she was entitled to know, something the heart within her craved to know, yet she knew not how to ask, or, if she did, was too proud to frame the words, to plead for that thing of all others which a woman prizes and glories in, yet will never knowingly beg of any man--his honest and outspoken love. She looked down again, silent.

His tone softened and his voice quivered a little as he bent over her.

"Has any one else won away the heart of my little girl-love?" he asked. "We were sweethearts so long, Viva; but have you learned to care for some other?"

"No. It--it is not that."

"Then cannot you find a little love for me left over from the childish days? You were so loyal to me then, Viva--and it would make our home people so happy."

"I suppose it might--them."

"Then promise me, dear; I go so soon, and--"

She interrupted him now, impetuously. Looking straight up into his eyes, she spoke in low, vehement tone, rapidly, almost angrily.

"On this condition, Paul; on this condition. You ask me to be your wife and--and I suppose it is what is expected of us--what you have expected all along, and are entitled to an answer now. Promise me this, if ever you have a thought for another woman, if ever you feel in your heart that perhaps another girl would make you happier, or if--if you feel the faintest growing fancy for another, that you will tell me."

He smiled gravely as he encircled her in his arm. She drew back, but he held her.

"Why, Viva, I have never had a thought for any other girl. I simply thought you might care for some one more than you did for me. It is settled, then--I promise," and he bent and softly kissed her.

They met again--twice--before the regiment took the cars. It had been settled that no announcement of the engagement should be made, but there are some secrets mothers cannot keep, and there were not lacking men and women to obtrude premature "congratulations" even on the day she came with mothers, sisters, cousins, and sweethearts by the score to witness the presentation of colors and say adieu. That afternoon the regimental quartermaster returned from the city after a stay of thirty-six hours, thirty of which were unauthorized, and it was rumored that Colonel Raymond was very angry and had threatened extreme measures. It was this prospect, possibly, that shrouded Mr. Hollins's face in gloom, but most people were disposed to think that he had taken the engagement very much to heart. There were many who considered that, despite the fact of his lack of fortune, birth, and "position," Mr. Hollins had been treated very shabbily by the heiress. There were a few who said that but for his "lacks" she would have married him. What she herself said was something that caused Mr. Abbot a good deal of wonderment and reflection.

"Paul, I want you to promise me another thing. Mr. Hollins has very few friends in the regiment. He is poor, sensitive, and he feels it keenly. He is our kinsman, though distant, and he placed me under obligations abroad by his devotion to mother, and his courtesy to me when we needed attention. He thinks you dislike him, as well as many of the others. Remember what he is to us, and how hard a struggle he has had, and be kind to him--for me."

And though his college remembrances of Mr. Hollins were not tinged with romance, Paul Abbot was too glad and proud in the thought of going to the front--too happy and prosperous, perhaps, to feel anything but pity for the quartermaster's isolation. He made the promise, and found its fulfilment, before they had been away a fortnight, a very irksome thing. Hollins fairly lived at his tent and better men kept away. Gradually they had drifted apart. Gradually the feeling of coldness and aversion had become so marked that he could not conceal it; and finally, after one of the frequent lapses of which the quartermaster was guilty, there had come rupture of all social relations, and the only associate left to Mr. Hollins was the strange character whom he had foisted upon the regiment at its organization--the quondam quartermaster-sergeant, Rix.

But in all the marching and fighting of the battle summer of '62, these things were of less account than they had been during the inaction of the winter and early spring, until, at the Monocacy, Mr. Abbot's curiosity was excited by the singular language used by Rix when ordered under guard. What could such a man as he have to do with the affairs, personal or professional, of the officers of the regiment? It was rabid nonsense--idle boasting, no doubt; and yet the new-made major found that melodramatic threat recurring to his mind time and again.

Another thing that perplexed him was the fact already alluded to, that during the winter Viva's letters, never too frequent or long, had begun to grow longer as to interval and shorter as to contents. He made occasional reference to the fact, but was referred to the singular circumstance that "he began it." Matters were mended for a while, then drifted into the old channel again. Then came the stirring incidents of June; the sharp, hard marches of July and August; the thrilling battles of Cedar Mountain and Second Bull Run; and he felt that his letters were hardly missed. Then came the dash at Turner's Gap; his wounds, rest, recovery, and promotion. But there was silence at home. He had not missed _her_ letters before. Now he felt that they ought to come, and had written more than once to say so.

And now, alone in his room, he is trying to keep cool and clear-headed; to fathom the mystery of his predicament before going to his father and telling him that between Genevieve Winthrop and himself there has arisen a cloud which at any moment may burst in storm.

Her letter--the first received since Antietam--he has read over time and again. It must be confessed that there is a good deal therein to anger an honest man, and Abbot believes he is entitled to that distinction:

"You demand the reason for my silence, and shall have it. I did not wish to endanger your recovery, and so have kept my trouble to myself, but now I write to tell you that the farce is ended. You have utterly broken your promise; I am absolved from mine. The fact that you could find time to write day after day to Miss Warren, and neglect me for weeks, would in itself be justification for demanding my release from an engagement you have held so lightly. But that you should have sought and won another's love even while your honor was pledged to me, is _more_ than enough. I do not ask release. I break the bond--once and for all.

"You will have no place to receive your letters at the front. They, with your ring, and certain gifts with which you have honored me from time to time, will be found in a packet which is this day forwarded to your mother.

"GENEVIEVE WINTHROP."

Abbot is seated with his head buried in his hands. That name again! the girl who fainted at sight of him! the old man who was prostrate at his denial on the Monocacy! the picture of himself in _her_ desk! and now, this bitter, insulting letter from the woman who was to have been his wife! Rix's words at the field hospital!--what in Heaven's name can it all mean? What network of crime and mystery is this that is thrown around him?

There is a sudden knock at the door--a negro waiter with a telegram:

"POINT OF ROCKS, MD., _Oct._ --, 1862.

"Major PAUL R. ABBOT, Willard's Hotel, Washington:

"Hollins still missing; believed to have followed you to Washington. Use every effort to secure arrest.

"PUTNAM."

VII.

There is an air of unusual excitement about the War Department this bright October day. It is only a month since the whole army seemed tramping through the streets on its way to the field of the Antietam; only three weeks since the news was received that Lee was beaten back across the Potomac, and every one expected that McClellan would be hot on his trail, eager to pursue and punish before the daring Southerners could receive accessions. But though two corps managed to reoccupy Harper's Ferry and there go into camp, the bulk of the army has remained where Lee left it when he slipped from its grasp, and McClellan's cry is for reinforcements. Three weeks of precious time slip by, and then--back come those daredevils of Stuart's, riding with laugh and taunt and jeer all around the Union forces; and there is the mischief to pay here in Washington, for if he should take a notion to pay the capital a visit on his homeward trip, what would the consequences be? Of course there are troops--lots of them--all around in the fortifications. The trouble is, that we have so few cavalry, and, after all, the greatest trouble is the old one--those fellows, Stuart and Jackson, have such a consummate faculty of making a very little go a great way. All that is known of Stuart's present move is, that he is somewhere up the Cumberland Valley; that telegraphic communication beyond McClellan's headquarters is broken, and that it is more than likely he will come hitherwards when he chooses to make his next start.

Going to the War Department to make inquiries for the provost-marshal, and show him Putnam's telegram, Major Abbot finds that official too busy to see him, "unless it be something urgent," says the subaltern, who seems to be an aide-de-camp of some kind.

"I have come to show him a despatch received last night--late--from Point of Rocks."

"You are Major Abbot, formerly--th Massachusetts, I believe, and your despatch is about the missing quartermaster, is it not?"

"Yes," replies Abbot, in surprise.

"We have the duplicate of the despatch here," says the young officer, smiling. "You would know Hollins at once, would you not?"

"Yes, anywhere, I think."

"One of the secret-service men will come in to see you this morning if you will kindly remain at your room until eleven or twelve o'clock. Pardon me, major, you saw this Doctor Warren at Frederick, did you not?"

"Yes. The evening he came out to the field hospital."

"Did he impress you as a man who told a perfectly straight story, and properly accounted for himself?"

"Why--You put it in a way that never occurred to me before," says the major, in bewilderment. "Do you mean that there was anything wrong about him?"

"Strictly _entre nous_, major--something damnably wrong. He was all mixed up on meeting you, we are told. He claimed to have known and been in correspondence with you, did he not?"

"Yes; he did. But--"

"That is only one of several trips he made. There are extraordinary rumors coming in about spies around Frederick, and there seems to be an organized gang. It is this very matter the general is overhauling now, and he gave orders that he should be uninterrupted until he had finished the correspondence. Will you wait?"

"Thank you, no. I believed it my duty to show him this despatch, but he knows as much as, or more than, I do. May I ask if you have any inkling of Hollins's whereabouts."

"Not even a suspicion. He simply dropped out of sight, and no man in the army appears to have set eyes on him since the night before Antietam. Colonel Putnam is investigating his accounts at Point of Hocks, and is most eager to get him."

Major Abbot turns away with a heavy weight at heart. All of a sudden there has burst upon him a complication of injustice and mystery, of annoyance and perplexity that is hard to bear. In some way he feels that the disappearance of the quartermaster is a connecting link in the chain of circumstance. He associates him, vaguely, with each and every one of the incidents which have puzzled him within the month past--with Rix, with Doctor Warren's coming, with that cold and bitter letter from Miss Winthrop, and finally with the shock and faintness that overcame this fair young girl at sight of him.

To his father he has shown Miss Winthrop's letter, and briefly sketched the visit of Doctor Warren, and the sudden meeting with his daughter the evening previous. Mr. Abbot is in a whirl of indignation over the letter, which he considers an insult, but is all aflame with curiosity about the doctor and the young lady. He has been preparing to return to Boston this very week, but is now determined to wait until he can see these mysterious people, who are so oddly mixed up in his son's affairs. It is with some difficulty that the major prevails upon him not to write to Miss Winthrop, and overwhelm her with reproaches. That letter must be answered only by the man to whom it was written, says Abbot, and it is evident that he does not mean to be precipitate. He has much to think of, and so drives back to Willard's and betakes himself to his room, where his father awaits him, and where they are speedily joined by an official of the secret service, who has a host of singular questions to ask about Hollins. Some of them have a tendency to make the young major wonder if he really has been the possessor of eyes and ears, or powers of discernment, during the past winter. Then come some inquiries about Rix. Abbot is forced to confess that he knows nothing of his antecedents, and that he was made quartermaster-sergeant at Hollins's request, at a time when nobody had a very adequate idea of what his duties might be.

"Who had charge of the distribution of the regimental mail all winter and spring?" asks the secret-service man, after looking over some memoranda.

"The quartermaster, ordinarily. The mail-bag was carried to and from the railway about thrice a week, while we were at Edward's Ferry in the fall. Rix looked after it then, and when we came down in front of Washington the matter still remained in his hands. There was never any complaint, that I can remember."

"Did any of your officers besides Mr. Hollins have civilian dress or disguise of any kind?"

"I did not know that he did--much less any of the others."

"He wore his uniform coming to the city, but would soon turn out in 'cits,' and in that way avoided all question from patrols. As he gambled and drank a good deal then, we thought, perhaps, it was a rule in the regiment that officers must not wear their uniforms when on a lark of any kind; but he was always alone, and seemed to have no associates among the officers. What use could he have had for false beard and wig?"

"None whatever that I know of."

"He bought them here, as we know, and, presumably, took them down to camp with him. If he has deserted, he is probably masquerading in that rig now. I tell you this knowing you will say nothing of it, Major Abbot, and because I feel that you have had no idea of the real character of this man, and it is time you had."

Abbot bows silently. If the detective only knew what was going on at home, how much the more would he deem the missing quartermaster a suspicious character.

Then there comes a knock at the door, and, opening it, Major Abbot finds himself face to face with the nurse whom he had seen the previous afternoon in Doctor Warren's room. She looks up into his face with a smile that betokens a new and lively interest.

"The doctor left us but a few minutes ago," she says, "and he tells me my patient is on the mend. Of course, we have said nothing to him as yet about Miss Bessie's fainting yesterday, but--I thought you might be anxious to know how they are."

"I am indeed," says Abbot, cordially, "and thank you for coming. How is Miss Warren to-day?"

"She keeps her room, as is natural after one has been so agitated, and, of course, she does not like to speak of the matter, and has forbidden my telling the doctor--her father, I mean. But he will be sitting up to-morrow, probably, and--I thought you might like to see them. He is sleeping quietly now."

"Yes, I want very much to see him, as soon as he is well enough to talk, and, if the young lady should be well enough to come out into the parlor this afternoon or take the air on the piazza, will you let me know?"

The nurse's smiles of assent are beaming. Whether she, too, has seen that photograph Abbot cannot tell. That she has had the feminine keenness of vision in sighting a possible romance is beyond question. The secret-service official is at Abbot's side as he turns back from the door.

"I shall see you again, perhaps to-morrow," he says; "meantime there is a good deal for us to do," and before the nurse has reached the sick man's door, she is politely accosted by the same urbane young man, and is by no means sorry to stop and talk with somebody about her sad-faced old patient and his wonderfully pretty daughter.

It was Abbot's purpose to devote a little time that afternoon to answering the letter received but yesterday from Miss Winthrop. It needs no telling--the fact that there had never been a love-affair in their engagement; and no one can greatly blame a woman who is dissatisfied with a loveless match. Viva Winthrop was not so unattractive as to be destitute of all possibility of winning adorers. Indeed, there was strong ground for believing that she fully realized the bliss of having at least one man's entire devotion. Whatsoever evil traits may have cropped out in Mr. Hollins's army career, _she_ had seen nothing of them, and knew only his thoughtful and lover-like attentions while they were abroad, and his assiduous wooing on his return. Paul Abbot had never asked for her love--indeed, he had hardly mentioned the word as incidental to their engagement. Nevertheless, yielding to what she had long been taught to consider her fate, she had accepted the family arrangement--and him--and was the subject of incessant and enthusiastic congratulation. Abbot's gallant service and distinguished character as an officer had won the hearty admiration of all the circle in which she lived and moved and had her being, and she was thought an enviable girl to have won the love of so brave and so promising a man. A little more reserved and cold than ever had Miss Winthrop become, and the smile with which she thanked these many well-wishers was something wintry and weary in the last degree. If he had only loved her, there might have bloomed in her heart an answering passion that would have filled her nature, and made her proudly happy in her choice. But that he had never had for her anything more than a brother-and-sister, boy-and-girl sort of affection--a kind, careless, yet courteous tenderness--was something she had to tell herself time and again, and to hear as well from the letters of a man whose letters she should have forbidden.

Even in his astonishment at the charge brought against him, and in his indignation at the accusation of deceit, Paul Abbot cannot but feel that allowances must be made for Viva Winthrop. He meant to marry her, to be a loyal and affectionate husband; but he had not loved her as women love to be loved, and she was conscious of the lacking chord. That she had been deceived and swindled, too, by some shameless scoundrel, and made to believe in her _fiancé's_ guilt, was another thing that was plain to him. She had probably been told some very strong story of his interest in this other girl. Very probably, too, Hollins was the informer and, presumably, the designer of the plot. Who can tell how deep and damnable it was, since it had been carried so far as to induce the Warrens to believe that he was the writer of scores of letters from the front? Then again, ever since he had raised that fainting girl in his arms, especially ever since the moment when her lovely eyes were lifted to his face and her sweet lips murmured his name, Paul Abbot has been conscious of a longing to see her again. Not an instant has he been able to forget her face, her beauty, her soft touch; the wave of color that rushed to her brow as he met her at her father's door when the nurse brought her, still trembling, back to the old man's bedside. He had murmured some hardly articulate words, some promise of coming to inquire for her on the morrow, and bowed his adieu. But now--now, he feels that not only Genevieve, but that Bessie Warren, too, has been made a victim of this scoundrel's plottings, and, though longing to see her and hear her speak again, he knows not what to say. It was hard enough to have to deny himself to the poor old doctor when he came out to the Monocacy. _Could_ he look in her face and tell her it was all a fraud; that some one had stolen and sent her his picture? some one had stolen and used his name, and, whatsoever were the letters, all were forgeries? No! He must wait and see Doctor Warren, and let her think him come back to life--let her think they _were_ his letters--rather than face her, and say it was all a lie. Yet he longs to see her once again.