The voice of her inquisitor took on a sterner tone: 

“Is he here?—­hiding somewhere?  Tell me!”

Her little heart was pounding, horribly, and the hot blood came into her cheeks; but she looked him squarely in the face, and lied—­for General Lee: 

“No, sir.  Daddy was here—­but he’s gone away.”

The enemy was looking at her, intently, and his handsome, piercing eyes, grew most uncomfortable.  She hung for an instant between success and sobbing failure, till a bubble from Mother Eve rose up in her youthful blood and burst into a spray of perfect feminine deceit.  She did not try to add to her simple statement, but began to eat her berries, calmly, as though the subject were completely closed.

“Which way did he go?” the officer demanded, and she pointed with her spoon.

“Down by the spring—­through the blackberry patch.”

The soldier was half-convinced.  He stood for a moment, looking at the floor, then asked her sharply, suddenly: 

“If your father had gone, then why did you lock that door?”

She faltered, but only for an instant.

“’Cause I thought you might be—­niggers.”

The man before her clenched his hands, as he thought of that new-born, hideous danger menacing the South.

“I see,” he answered gently; “yes, I see.”  He turned away, but, even as he turned, his eye was caught by the double-doored cupboard against the wall.  “What do you keep in there?” he asked; and the child smiled faintly, a trifle sadly, in reply: 

“We used to keep things to eat—­when we had any.”

He noted her mild evasion, and pushed the point.

“What is in it now?”

“Tin pans.”

“Anything else?”

“Er—­yes, sir.”

He caught his breath and stepped a little nearer, bending till his face was close to hers.

“What?”

“Colonel Mosby,” declared the mite, with a most emphatic nod; “an’ you better look out, too!”

The officer laughed as he turned to his grinning squad.

“Bright little youngster!  Still, I think we’ll have a look.”  He dropped his air of amusement, growing stern again.  “Now, men!  Ready!”

They swung into line and faced the cupboard, the muzzles of their carbines trained upon it, while their leader advanced, swung open the doors, and quickly stepped aside.

On the bottom shelf, as Virgie had declared, were a few disconsolate tin pans; yet tacked to the door was a picture print of Mosby—­that dreaded guerrilla whose very name was a bugaboo in the Union lines.

The littlest rebel flung back her head and laughed.

“My, but you looked funny!” she cried to the somewhat disconcerted officer, pointing at him with her spoon.  “If a mouse had jumped out, I reckon it would have scared you mos’ to death.”

The officer’s cheeks flushed red, in spite of his every effort at control; nor was he assisted by the knowledge that his men were tittering behind his back.  He turned upon them sharply.