But Dick shook his head.  He knew now that he had seen reality, and he reported it to Colonel Winchester.

“Are you sure it was the girl you saw at the big house?” asked Colonel Winchester.  “It might have been some farmer’s wife galloping home from an errand late in the evening.”

“It was the girl.  I am sure of it,” said Dick confidently.

Just at that moment Sergeant Whitley came up and saluted.

“What is it, sergeant?” asked the Colonel.

“I have been up the road some distance, sir, and I came to another road that crossed it.  The second road has been cut by hoofs of eight or nine hundred horses, and I am sure, sir, that the tracks are not a day old.”

Colonel Winchester looked grave.  He knew that he was deep in the country of the enemy and he began to put together what Dick had seen and what the sergeant had seen.  But the thought of withdrawing did not occur to his brave soul.  He had been sent on an errand by General Grant and he meant to do it.  But he changed his plans for the night.  He had intended to keep only one man in ten on watch.  Instead, he kept half, and Sergeant Whitley, veteran of Indian wars, murmured words of approval under his breath.

Whitley and Pennington were in the early watch.  Dick and Warner were to come on later.  The colonel spoke as if he would keep watch all night.  All the horses were tethered carefully inside the ring of pickets.

“It doesn’t need any mathematical calculation,” said Warner, “to tell that the colonel expects trouble of some kind tonight.  What its nature is, I don’t know, but I mean to go to sleep, nevertheless.  I have already seen so much of hardship and war that the mere thought of danger does not trouble me.  I took a fort on the Tennessee, I took a much larger one on the Cumberland, first defeating the enemy’s army in a big battle, and now I am preparing to march on Nashville.  Hence, I will not have my slumbers disturbed by a mere belief that danger may come.”

“It’s a good resolution, George,” said Dick, “but unlike you, I am subject to impulses, emotions, thrills and anxieties.”

“Better cure yourself,” said the Vermonter, as he rolled himself in the blankets and put his head on his arm.  In two minutes he was asleep, but Dick, despite his weariness, had disturbed nerves which refused to let him sleep for a long time.  He closed his eyes repeatedly, and then opened them again, merely to see the tethered horses, and beyond them the circle of sentinels, a clear moonlight falling on their rifle barrels.  But it was very warm and cosy in the blankets, and he would soon fall asleep again.

He was awakened about an hour after midnight to take his turn at the watch, and he noticed that Colonel Winchester was still standing beside one of the fires, but looking very anxious.  Dick felt himself on good enough terms, despite his youth, to urge him to take rest.