"Martin, did John Barclay make you invite that woman to your house--that Bemis woman ?" The colonel got his breath slowly after climbing the stair, and he did not reply at once.

But he smiled, and stood with his arms akimbo a few seconds before he spoke.

"Well now, General--since you ask it, I may as well confess it pointedly--I am ashamed to say he did!" Ward motioned the colonel to a seat and asked impatiently, "Ashamed ?" "Well," responded Culpepper, as he put his feet in the window ledge, "she's as good as I am--if you come down to that! Why shouldn't I, who pretend to be a gentleman,--a Virginia gentleman, I may say, sir,--why shouldn't I be ashamed, disgraced, sir, disgraced in point of fact, that I had to be forced to invite any person in all God's beautiful world to my home ?" Ward looked at the colonel coldly a moment and then blurted out: "Ah, shucks, sir--stuff and nonsense! You know what she was before the war--Happy Hally! My gracious, Martin, how could you ?" Martin Culpepper brought his chair down with a bang and turned squarely to Ward.

"General, the war's over now.

I knew Happy Hally--and I knew the Red Legs she trained with.