But the wounded man felt instinctively that it was not the effect of his physical condition, and a sense of shame came suddenly over him, which was not dissipated by his superior's words.

For, motioning the others aside, the major-general leaned over his cot, and said,-- "Until a few moments ago, the report was that you had been captured in the first rush of the rear-guard which we were rolling up for your attack, and when you were picked up, just now, in plain clothes on the slope, you were not recognized.

The one thing seemed to be as improbable as the other," he added significantly.
The miserable truth flashed across Brant's mind.

Hooker must have been captured in his clothes--perhaps in some extravagant sally--and had not been recognized in the confusion by his own officers.

Nevertheless, he raised his eyes to his superior.
"You got my note ?" The general's brow darkened.
"Yes," he said slowly, "but finding you thus unprepared--I had been thinking just now that you had been deceived by that woman--or by others--and that it was a clumsy forgery." He stopped, and seeing the hopeless bewilderment in the face of the wounded man, added more kindly: "But we will not talk of that in your present condition.