VI.

When Tom Adams next called at the Judge’s, he found the atmosphere much cooler within the house than it was outside. He had been waiting alone in the drawing-room for some time when Nancy Pansy entered. She came in very slowly, and instead of running immediately up to him and greeting him as she usually did, she seated herself on the edge of a chair and looked at him with manifest suspicion. He stretched out his hand to her.

“Come over, Nancy Pansy, and sit on my knee.”

Nancy Pansy shook her head.

“My sister don’t like you,” she said slowly, eying him askance.

“Ah!” He let his hand fall on the arm of the chair.

“No; and I don’t, either,” said Nancy Pansy, more confidently.

“Why doesn’t she like me?” asked Tom Adams.

“Because you are so mean. She says you are just like all the rest of ’em;” and, pleased at her visitor’s interest, Nancy Pansy wriggled herself higher up on her chair, prepared to give him further details.

“We don’t like you at all,” said the child, half confidentially and half defiantly. “We like our side; we like _Confederates_.” Tom Adams smiled. “We like Harry; we don’t like you.”

She looked as defiant as possible, and just then a step was heard in the hall, approaching very slowly, and Nancy Pansy’s sister appeared in the doorway. She was dressed in white, and she carried her head even higher than usual.

The visitor rose. He thought he had never seen her look so pretty.

“Good-evening,” he said.

She bowed “Good-evening,” very slowly, and took a seat on a straight-backed chair in a corner of the room, ignoring the chair which Adams offered her.

“I have not seen you for some time,” he began.

“No; I suppose you have been busy searching people’s houses,” she said.

Tom Adams flushed a little.

“I carry out my orders,” he said. “These I must enforce.”

“Ah!”

Nancy Pansy did not just understand it all, but she saw there was a battle going on, and she at once aligned herself with her side, and going over, stood by her sister’s chair, and looked defiance at the enemy.

“Well, we shall hardly agree about this, so we won’t discuss it,” said Tom Adams. “I did not come to talk about this, but to see you, and to get you to sing for me.” Refusal spoke so plainly in her face that he added: “Or, if you won’t sing, to get Nancy Pansy to sing for me.”

“_I_ won’t sing for you,” declared Nancy Pansy, promptly and decisively.

“What incorrigible rebels all of you are!” said Tom Adams, smiling. He was once more at his ease, and he pulled his chair up nearer Nancy Pansy’s sister, and caught Nancy Pansy by the hand. She was just trying to pull away, when there were steps on the walk outside--the regular tramp, tramp of soldiers marching in some numbers. They came up to the house, and some order was given in a low tone. Both Adams and Nancy Pansy’s sister sprang to their feet.

“What can it mean?” asked Nancy Pansy’s sister, more to herself than to Adams.

He went into the hall just as there was a loud rap at the front door.

“What is it?” he asked the lieutenant who stood there.

“Some one has slipped through the lines, and is in this house,” he said.

Nancy Pansy’s sister stepped out into the hall.

“There is no one here,” she said. She looked at Tom Adams. “I give my word there is no one in the house except my mother, ourselves, and the servants.” She met Tom Adams’s gaze frankly as he looked into her eyes.

“There is no one here, Hector,” he said, turning to the officer.

“This is a serious matter,” began the other, hesitatingly. “We have good grounds to believe----”

“I will be responsible,” said Tom Adams, firmly. “I have been here some time, and there is no one here.” He took the officer aside and talked to him a moment.

“All right,” said he, as he went down the steps, “as you are so positive.”

“I am,” said Tom.

The soldiers marched down the walk, out of the gate, and around the corner. Just as the sound of their footsteps died away on the soft road, Tom Adams turned and faced Nancy Pansy’s sister. She was leaning against a pillar, looking down, and a little moonlight sifted through the rose-bushes and fell on her neck. Nancy Pansy had gone into the house. “I am sorry I said what I did in the parlor just now.” She looked up at him.

“Oh!” said Tom Adams, and moved his hand a little. “I--” he began; but just then there was a sudden scamper in the hall, and Nancy Pansy, with flying hair and dancing eyes, came rushing out on the portico.

“Oh, sister!” she panted. “Harry’s come; he’s in mamma’s room!”

Nancy Pansy’s sister turned deadly white. “Oh, Nancy Pansy!” she gasped, placing her hand over her mouth.

Nancy Pansy burst into tears, and buried her face in her sister’s dress. She had not seen Tom Adams; she thought he had gone.

“I did not know it,” said Nancy Pansy’s sister, turning and facing Tom Adams’s stern gaze.

“I believe you,” he said, slowly. He felt at his side; but he was in a fatigue suit, and had no arms. Without finishing his sentence he sprang over the railing, and with a long, swift stride went down the yard. She dimly saw him as he sprang over the fence, and heard him call, “Oh, Hector!”

As he did so, she rushed into the house. “Fly! they are coming!” she cried, bursting into her mother’s room. “Oh, Harry, they are coming!” she cried, rushing up to a handsome young fellow, who sprang to his feet as she entered, and went forward to meet her.

The young man took her hand and drew her to him. “Well,” he said, looking down into her eyes, and drawing a long breath.

Nancy Pansy’s sister put her face on his shoulder and began to cry, and Nancy Pansy rushed into her mother’s arms and cried too.

Ten minutes later soldiers came in both at the front and back doors. Mrs. Seddon met her visitors in the hall. Nancy Pansy’s sister was on one side, and Nancy Pansy on the other.

Tom Adams was in command. He removed his hat, but said, gravely: “I must arrest the young rebel officer who is here.”

Nancy Pansy made a movement; but her mother tightened her clasp of her hand.

“Yes,” she said, bowing. That was all.

Guards were left at the doors, and soldiers went through the house. The search was thorough, but the game had escaped. They were coming down the steps when some one said:

“We must search the shrubbery; he will be there.”

“No; he is at his father’s--the old doctor’s,” said Adams.

It was said in an undertone, but Mrs. Seddon’s face whitened; Nancy Pansy caught it, too. She clutched her mother’s gown.

“Oh, mamma! you hear what he says?”

Her mother stooped and whispered to her.

“Yes, yes,” nodded Nancy Pansy. She ran to the door, and poking her little head out, looked up and down the portico, calling, “Kitty, kitty!”

The sentry who was standing there holding his gun moved a little, and, leaning out, peered into the dusk.

“’Tain’t out here,” he said, in a friendly tone.

Nancy Pansy slipped past him, and went down the steps and around the portico, still calling, “Kitty! Kitty! Kitty!”

“Who goes there?” called a soldier, as he saw something move over near the old doctor’s fence; but when he heard a childish voice call, “Kitty! Kitty!” he dropped his gun again with a laugh. “’Tain’t nobody but that little gal, Nancy Pansy; blest if I wa’n’t about to shoot her!”

The next instant Nancy Pansy had slipped through her little hole in the fence, through which she had so often gone, and was in the old doctor’s yard; and when, five minutes afterward, Tom Adams marched his men up the walk and surrounded and entered the house, Nancy Pansy, her broken doll in her arms, was sitting demurely on the edge of a large chair, looking at him with great, wide-open, dancing eyes. A little princess could not have been grander, and if she had hidden Harry Hunter behind her chair, she could not have shown more plainly that she had given him warning.