“He didn’t,” cried the Major.  “By glory, but he’s even better than I thought him, Did you see a black powder mark on his face?”

“Why, yes, sir, I saw a bad burn of some kind on his forehead.”

“Well, sir, if one of the Dutchmen who shot at Jack had known enough to put a ball in his musket, he would have killed Mr. Brice, who was only ten feet away, standing before your son.”

Anne gave a little cry—­Virginia was silent—­Her lips were parted.  Though she realized it not, she was thirsting %a hear the whole of the story.

The Major told it, soldier fashion, but well.  How John rushed up to the line.  How he (Mr. Sherman) had seen Brice throw the woman down and had cried to him to lie down himself how the fire was darting down the regiment, and how men and women were falling all about them; and how Stephen had flung Jack and covered him with his body.

It was all vividly before Virginia’s eyes.  Had she any right to treat such a man with contempt?  She remembered hour he had looked, at her when he stood on the corner by the Catherwoods’ house.  And, worst of all, she remembered many spiteful remarks she had made, even to Anne, the gist of which had been that Mr. Brice was better at preaching than at fighting.  She knew now—­and she had known in her heart before—­that this was the greatest injustice she could have done him.

“But Jack?  What did Jack do?”

It was Anne who tremblingly asked the Major.  But Mr. Sherman, apparently, was not the man to say that Jack would have shot Stephen had he not interfered.  That was the ugly part of the story.  John would have shot the man who saved his life.  To the day of his death neither Mr. Brinsmade nor his wife knew this.  But while Mr. Brinsmade and Anne had gone upstairs to the sickbed, these were the tidings the Major told Virginia, who kept it in her heart.  The reason he told her was because she had guessed a part of it.

Nevertheless Mr. Brinsmade drove to the Arsenal with her that Saturday, in his own carriage.  Forgetful of his own grief, long habit came to him to talk cheerily with her.  He told her many little anecdotes of his travel, but not one of them did she hear.  Again, at the moment when she thought her belief in Clarence and her love for him at last secure, she found herself drawing searching comparisons between him and the quieter young Bostonian.  In spite of herself she had to admit that Stephen’s deed was splendid.  Was this disloyal?  She flushed at the thought.  Clarence had been capable of the deed,—­even to the rescue of an enemy.  But—­alas, that she should carry it out to a remorseless end—­would Clarence have been equal to keeping silence when Mr. Brinsmade came to him?  Stephen Brice had not even told his mother, so Mr. Brinsmade believed.

As if to aggravate her torture, Mr. Brinsmade’s talk drifted to the subject of young Mr. Brice.  This was but natural.  He told her of the brave struggle Stephen had made, and how he had earned luxuries, and often necessities, for his mother by writing for the newspapers.