“Do you see?—­Captain Falconer is not here!”

“Well, what of that?” quoth I.  “Ten to one, he finds these companies plaguey tiresome.”

“Or finds other company more agreeable,” replied Tom, with a very dark look in his eyes.

He left me, with no more words upon the subject.  When it was time to go home, and Mrs. Faringfield and Fanny and I sought about the rooms for him, we found he had already taken his leave.  So we three had the chariot to ourselves, and as we rode I kept my own thoughts upon Tom’s previous departure, and my own vague dread of what might happen.

But when Noah let us in, all seemed well in the Faringfield house.  Margaret was in the parlour, reading; and she laid down her book to ask us pleasantly what kind of an evening we had had.  She was the only one of the family up to receive us, Mr. Faringfield having retired hours ago, and Tom having come in and gone to bed without an explanation.  The absence of light in Captain Falconer’s windows signified that he too had sought his couch, for had he been still out, his servant would have kept candles lighted for him.

The next day, as we rode out Northward to our posts, Tom suddenly broke the silence: 

“Curse it!” said he.  “There are more mysteries than one.  Do you know what I found when I got home last night?”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Well, I first looked into the parlour, but no one was there.  Instead of going on to the library, I went up-stairs and knocked at Margaret’s door.  I—­I wanted to see her a moment.  It happened to be unlatched, and as I knocked rather hard, it swung open.  No one was in that room, either, but I thought she might be in the bedchamber beyond, and so I crossed to knock at that.  But I chanced to look at her writing-table as I passed; there was a candle burning on it, and devil take me if I didn’t see a letter in a big schoolboy’s hand that I couldn’t help knowing at a glance—­the hand of my brother Ned!”

“Then I’ll engage the letter wasn’t to Margaret.  You know how much love is lost between those two.”

“But it was to her, though!  ‘Dear M.,’ it began—­there’s no one else whose name begins with M in the family.  And the writing was fresh—­not the least faded.  I saw that much before I thought of what I was doing.  But when I remembered ’twasn’t my letter, I looked no more.”

“But how could he send a letter from the rebel camp to her in New York?"[5]

“Why, that’s not the strangest part of it.  There’s no doubt Washington has spies in the town, and ways of communicating with the rebel sympathisers here; I’ve sometimes thought my father—­but no matter for that.  The fact is, there the letter was, as certainly from Ned as I’m looking at you; and we know he’s in the rebel army.  But the wonder, the incredible thing, is that he should write to Margaret.”

“’Tis a mystery, in truth.”

“Well, ’tis none of ours, after all, and of course this will go no further—­but let me tell you, the devil’s in it when those two are in correspondence.  There’s crookedness of some kind afoot, when such haters combine together!”