“The chances of war bring about strange situations, or at least I have heard so,” said Warner.  “Now, Dick, if you were to meet your cousin face to face on the battlefield with a loaded gun in your hand what would you do?”

“I’d raise that gun, take deliberate aim at a square foot of air about thirty feet over his head and pull the trigger.”

“But your duty to your country tells you to do otherwise.  Before you is a foe trying to destroy the Union.  You have come out armed to save that Union, consequently you must fire straight at him and not at the air, in order to reduce the number of our enemies.”

“One enemy where there are so many would not count for anything in the total.  Your arithmetic will show you that Harry’s percentage in the Southern army is so small that it reaches the vanishing point.  If I can borrow from you, George, x equals Harry’s percentage, which is nothing, y equals the value of my hypothetical opportunity, which is nothing, then x plus y equals nothing, which represents the whole affair, which is nothing, that is, worth nothing to the Union.  Hence I have no more obligation to shoot Harry if I meet him than he has to shoot me.”

“Well spoken, Dick,” said Sergeant Whitley.  “Some people, I reckon, can take duty too hard.  If you have one duty an’ another an’ bigger one comes along right to the same place you ought to ’tend to the bigger one.  I’d never shoot anybody that was a heap to me just because he was one of three or four hundred thousand who was on the other side.  I’ve never thought much of that old Roman father—­I forget his name—­who had his son executed just because he wasn’t doin’ exactly right.  There was never a rule that oughtn’t to have exceptions under extraordinary circumstances.”

“If you can establish the principle of exceptions,” replied the young Vermonter very gravely, “I will allow Dick to shoot in the air when he meets his cousin in the height of battle, but it is a difficult task to establish it, and if it fails Dick, according to all rules of logic and duty, must shoot straight at his cousin’s heart.”

The other two looked at Warner and saw his left eyelid droop slightly.  A faint twinkle appeared in either eye and then they laughed.

“I reckon that Dick shoots high in the air,” said the sergeant.

Dick, after a pleasant hour with his friends, went back to Colonel Newcomb’s quarters, where he spent the entire evening writing despatches at dictation.  He was hopeful that all this writing portended something, but more days passed, and despite the impatience of both army and public, there was no movement.  Stories of confused and uncertain fighting still came out of the west, but between Washington and Bull Run there was perfect peace.