Chapter IX: Part 9

"Ai-ee! Eagle Eye dead?" The Indian's sharp face clouded. "Heap good man." Then suddenly, "You know 'bout Red Snake?"

"No," Joe turned on him sharply. "What about him? We have been awful uneasy ever since we knew that Eagle Eye got the box. We have been afraid he would come to take vengeance on us for it."

"He no come now," said Pashepaho gravely. Then with a tone of surprise, "You no hear?"

"No, we have heard nothing. We have been shut off there at the homestead with big snows all winter. What do you mean?"

"Red Snake dead."

Joe started, and leaned forward staring into his face.

"_Dead_? Red Snake dead? How? When? Where?"

"Eagle Eye keel heem."

"Eagle Eye killed him? When?"

"Many sleep ago. Shoot heem with arrow."

Joe stood as if transfixed, staring into his face.

"Eagle Eye heap white man friend," Pashepaho went on.

"I know he was, I know he was, he was our friend, our good, loyal friend; we felt awfully bad when we found him. But--how did it happen? How did he get the box, I wonder?"

In his halting, broken English Pashepaho told him the story as he had heard it from the men of his own tribe. Joe was deeply affected.

"Then he must have got the dispatch-box after Red Snake was dead, and was bringing it to us when the blizzard overtook him. Good, faithful Eagle Eye! We thought he was not grateful for all the folks had done in nursing him back to life, but look how mistaken we were! He was a faithful friend."

As Pashepaho shook his hand and rode away Joe stood still in a profound reverie. A relief so great that it was almost like the falling of a great load from his shoulders, came over him.

_Red Snake was dead!_

The danger that had hung so darkly and fearsomely over them was now removed, the menacing figure that had shadowed all their days and filled their nights with terror was gone forever!

He could scarcely wait to get back home and tell the glad news to the family. As he hurriedly began to load the provisions into the wagon two men in earnest conversation passed him.

"We shall have war," one of them was saying, "there is no escaping it. The South is bound to secede."

The South is bound to secede!

The two lads turned and looked at one another, and into the consciousness of both some strange prescience seemed to fall.

"War!" said Herbert in an awed tone.

"_War!_" repeated Joe; "I wonder what it would mean to me?"

*CHAPTER XXVII*

*WAR*

The news that Joe brought back from his trip to Omaha that Red Snake was dead and the dark menace so long hanging over them was removed forever, brought great relief to the whole Peniman family. To Nina especially did it seem to bring a sense of security she had never known since the day she had been kidnapped. She had recovered in a measure from the bitter disappointment of the violated dispatch-box, though many nights, and often when she was alone she felt deeply unhappy over her situation, and the unsolved mystery that seemed to cut her off from her own.

As the summer advanced the young people of the two families were much together, and Hannah Peniman noticed with a smile--and yet a sigh--that the boys no longer went off by themselves on hunting or fishing or exploring expeditions, but that wherever they went the girls were usually with them, and that as the party came home, strolling across the prairies or along the river bank in the moonlight, that Nina and Joe were always together, that Herbert walked with Ruth, and that Lige larked and sang and frolicked with pretty, gay little Beatrice.

Joe found little time for reading during the summer, but the law books which Judge North had lent him were his constant companions in the evening, and while he plowed and harrowed the fields in which their first crops were to be planted he propped the Blackstone up at one end of the furrow, and while he traveled its length he recited over and over again a paragraph he had read at the start. When he reached the end of the furrow that paragraph was usually committed to memory, and he took another, reciting it over and over all down the long black furrow and back. In this way he read Blackstone through, acquiring so perfect a knowledge of its contents that he knew it almost by heart, and could quote from it verbatim to the very end of his life.

His mind and thoughts were much occupied with the ominous news that continually reached them. Everywhere trouble seemed to be in the air. The violence and disorder in Kansas, where a state of civil war practically existed, as the result of the pro-slavery demonstration at Lawrence, communicated itself across the border to the sister territory of Nebraska, and bitter arguments and controversy were heard wherever two or three people were gathered together.

Such papers as they were able to obtain were full of menace. A seething current of excitement and unrest seemed permeating the whole nation. The North bitterly accusing the South of trying by trickery and treachery to force slavery upon the nation, the South maintaining that the North was fostering abolition, and that the real intent and purpose of the abolitionists was to arouse a slave insurrection and bring devastation to the whole South.

The decision in the Dred Scott case and the framing of the Lecompton Constitution in Kansas increased the agitation of the slavery question to a burning issue; and Joe and Herbert, sometimes accompanied by Arthur and Lige, fell into the habit of riding over to the little cross-road store at Milford evenings, to hear the latest news and listen to the discussion they always found going on there.

Joshua Peniman made few comments on the situation, but he seized upon the papers with an eagerness that showed his interest, and read them with set lips and frowning brow.

In October that year the little settlement of which the Peniman family had been the pioneers was increased by six families, who homesteaded upon the West Blue and Middle Creek.

A demand soon rose among them for a school which the children of the community could attend during the cold weather, and as there were no funds to provide such a school or pay a teacher the settlers all came together at the Peniman homestead to discuss the matter and see what could be done.

After much discussion it was agreed that they should build a little sod schoolhouse, large enough to accommodate the children of the neighborhood, and as Joshua Peniman was a natural leader among them and the best equipped for the purpose, that the men of the settlement should take upon themselves his work for certain hours of each day, while he in exchange should teach the school.

He was the more willing to accede to this proposal because he had never entirely recovered from the effects of the exposure he had suffered in the blizzard, and was subject to rheumatism and bronchitis, and was not sorry to have the heavy outdoor work done by some of the younger and stronger men during the severity of the winter.

A location was chosen on the prairies about midway between the different homesteads, and on a cold, bright morning in October the sod was broken for the schoolhouse.

There were men and teams enough to accomplish its construction quickly, and within a few days a solid little structure, about thirty feet square, was erected.

The question of heating and seating had arisen at the meeting, and it had been decided that each settler should furnish one desk or chair, and that each settler who had timber should cut a load of cord wood and those who had no timber should contribute their share by hauling it to the nearest market and selling it, buying a stove with the proceeds.

This program was carried out, two of the settlers who had no timber driving forty miles to Nebraska City, where they bought a good second-hand stove, which was set up in the schoolhouse.

The new schoolhouse was ready for occupation the first of November, and from that time on throughout the long, cold winter the little sod schoolhouse accommodated about twenty children, of all grades and sizes, of whom Joshua Peniman was the teacher.

Within a short time after the opening of the school a general feeling arose in the settlement that the Sabbath should be observed, and at the general request of the settlers Joshua Peniman consented to act as leader, holding services every Sunday in the sod schoolhouse. As the settlers were of all creeds and denominations the services were necessarily non-sectarian. The services were very simple, consisting of the reading of the Bible, prayers by members of the congregation, responsive reading from the Psalms, and hymns led by the clear, sweet voice of Hannah Peniman.

In the fall of that year another great boon came to the pioneers. A stage-coach line was established, the terminal of which was the Big Sandy station on the Little Blue. This line carried mail and passengers, thus doing away with the long, lonely, dangerous ride across the prairies to get mail, and bringing a postoffice, with mail and newspapers within about six miles of the Peniman homestead. After that it was possible to get papers not more than a day or two old, and to send and receive letters without the perilous journey hitherto necessary.

Joshua Peniman had proved up on his claim, and was holding fast to the claims he had staked out next his own for Joe and Lige, with two other 160-acre tracts which he hoped to hold for Ruth and Nina as soon as they should be old enough to take them. The harvest of that year was rich and plentiful, and the winter of 1858-9 saw the family comfortably established in a home that was beginning to have the appearance of a real farm, with hay, grain and corn stored in their granaries, a cow-house and chicken-house added to the buildings, and many substantial improvements added to their dwelling.

During the winter whenever Joe could snatch time from his other duties he and Herbert James trapped beaver, mink, and otter in the river. In Beaver Creek, where a beautiful little town was springing up, they got many fine beavers, the skins of which sold for from two to three dollars a pound, many of the beavers weighing from two to three pounds apiece. With the money he made by the sale of the skins he bought law books, adding one at a time to his precious collection, and studying them so industriously that when he went to Omaha to return the books he had borrowed from Judge North he rendered to the lawyer so good an account of his reading that the Judge called him a prodigy.

"You are the kind of a boy I like," he said genially, patting Joe on the shoulder. "I'd like to take you into my office to study law. You are highly gifted, and I believe will make a great success of the profession."

Joe glowed under his praise. Nothing would have given him greater happiness than to enter Judge North's fine offices as a student. It was a great temptation. But there was much work to be done at home, his father was no longer strong, and his work much interrupted by his teaching and ministerial duties, and much of the responsibility of the farm work had fallen upon him and Lige, who was now a tall, handsome, well-set-up lad of seventeen, while Joe had grown to the full stature of a man, and was approaching his nineteenth birthday.

"I can't come into your office now, Judge North," he answered regretfully, "but I would like to come and talk with you whenever I can, and have you advise and help me. I want to be a lawyer, and even though I cannot be spared from home now I can go on preparing myself until the younger boys get old enough to take my place on the farm."

"Good lad," said Judge North; "I like you none the less for your faithfulness to your duty."

As he smiled at him again that strange sense of familiarity came over the boy. Where had he seen that man before? Who was it of whom he so reminded him?

There was something about him that was not like a stranger, that carried a subtle sense of warmth, affection, to his heart. In the gleam of his deep blue eyes there came and went an expression that eluded him like an evanescent perfume. For some reason that he could not account for to himself the lad's heart warmed to him strangely. In the long, friendly talk that followed Joe told him of his ambitions, and of how that ambition had been roused in his breast by hearing a lawyer, a man by the name of Lincoln, make a Fourth of July speech in Illinois.

"Lincoln?" said Judge North, much interested. "Do you mean Abraham Lincoln? Well, well! So you heard one of those great speeches, did you? I wish it had been my privilege. Have you followed his debates with Douglas? He has a grip on this slavery question that no other man in the country can equal. Did you know that he is being talked of as a candidate of the new Republican party to succeed Buchanan as President?"

"No," cried Joe, much astonished. "_That_ Mr. Lincoln? Why, he was only a country lawyer, a member of the legislature from Sangamon County, when I heard him!"

"He is the greatest man in this country to-day. A great lawyer. A great statesman. I hope that he may be elected."

Joe went home more eager and encouraged in his study of the law than ever before. He felt that if in so short a time a country lawyer like Mr. Lincoln should have become the nominee for President that there was hope for him in the years that lay before him.

A few evenings after his return there was a citizens' meeting at Milford, and he and Herbert rode over. His father, who had automatically become the leader of the settlement, had been asked to preside. Joe had had no intention of speaking, his purpose was to attend the meeting simply as a spectator. But before he was aware of it his blood was up and he was on his feet making a fiery anti-slavery speech.

He scarcely knew what he was saying. But with the first words he uttered all the long, deep thoughts that had been growing up within him while he worked in the fields in the vast silence of the prairies burst forth in a torrent, and he only came to himself when the little hall rocked with shouts and applause.

After that he was often asked to speak at meetings, and no one was more astonished than he when he was asked to accept the presidency of the Young Men's Republican Club, that was being organized in the county.

Feeling was running hot and high everywhere. And in the fall (1859) the torch was set to the smouldering powder of public opinion by John Brown's seizure of the national arsenal at Harper's Ferry.

Instantly the war-spirit of the country sprang to life.

Troops were hurried to the spot and the little band of hot-headed abolitionists seized. But though they paid the penalty of their well-meant but misdirected enthusiasm with their lives, the blaze was started. Nothing could stop it now.

War was inevitable.

The song,

"John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave,
But his soul goes marching on,"

was born in a night and swept the country like wildfire, old men and young singing and cheering it.

The Republican party, born of the slavery agitation, grew apace, and "denied the authority of Congress, of a Territorial Legislature, or any individual to give existence to slavery in the Territories." It repudiated the doctrine of State sovereignty and the Dred Scott decision, and nominated Abraham Lincoln for President.

The nomination of the man whose anti-slavery speeches were read and quoted from ocean to ocean was a challenge thrown down to the slave-holding States, which responded to it with haughty defiance and the nomination of John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky. The Northern Democrats, unable to endorse the attitude of their Southern brothers, split from their own party and nominated Stephen A. Douglas.

The nomination of Lincoln--his inspiration and guide--left no doubt in Joe's mind as to his course of action. He accepted the nomination of president of the Young Men's Republican Club, stripped off his coat and plunged into the campaign with the same energy, the same efficiency, the same unbounded enthusiasm that he had always brought to every task before him.

He spoke in sod houses, dugouts, schoolhouses, stores, churches, and halls, extolling the Republican candidate for President, and praising the man who seemed to him the very embodiment of the spirit of the freedom and democracy of America.

At many of these meetings Joshua Peniman presided. And as he heard the fiery utterances of his son his heart grew cold within his breast.

The campaign was a fierce and bitter one, but Lincoln was elected.

The South, angry, defiant, outraged by the election of a "nigger-lover," a plebeian, a country lawyer and rail-splitter, and the defeat of their own aristocratic candidate, Mr. Breckinridge, was incensed to fury. Many times they had threatened that the Southern States would no longer remain in the Union if the Republican party was successful, and on December 20, 1860, they made good their threat. A popular convention at Charleston passed an order of secession.

Throughout the intense excitement that followed Joe and his father had many discussions, in some of which Lige joined.

That war was inevitable they now knew. But how it was to be met by them--Quakers--was a thing upon which they could come to no agreement.

"We cannot take up arms," Joshua Peniman said firmly. "We are Quakers. Our religion, the Bible, the Word of God Himself forbids it."

"But it is our duty, Father," Joe urged passionately. "If we have to go to war with the South they will have all the advantage. They are ready for war. The Federal arsenals in the Southern States have fallen into their hands and furnished their soldiers with equipment. You know that we are not prepared. A great army will have to be raised and furnished with the munitions of war. Should we, whom you have always taught to love and honor the flag, sit still and see that flag torn down, our country divided, and left a prey to foreign nations?"'

Joshua Peniman blanched. "God forbid," he cried quickly. "But if it comes to that terrible pass there are others--not Quakers--who have not been reared in the faith that makes it impossible for them to fight. Let them go. Let them protect the country."

"It will take us all, Father," put in Lige. "This war is going to be no light matter. The South has the men, the money, the military training. It is going to take all the men the North can raise to hold the nation together if war comes."

And war did come.

Early in the spring Fort Sumter was fired upon.

This roused the North to the highest pitch of excitement. In April President Lincoln called for volunteers to suppress the rebellion.

The hour had come that Joshua Peniman and his sons had so long prayed might be spared them.

On the morning of June tenth Joe came and stood before him in the living-room of the little soddy.

Neither had slept. Joe's face was pale and his lips close set as he stood looking at his father.

"I enlisted last night, Father." He spoke in a hoarse, shaken voice, and his lips moved stiffly as if he could with difficulty frame the words.

Joshua Peniman started. He knew that it must come, yet the dart passed no less cruelly through his heart because it had been anticipated.

"Already?"

He looked grey and worn. Lines that had not been there a few months before had written themselves in his forehead and creased his cheeks. As the lad looked at him his heart rose up and choked him.

"Oh, Father," he cried, "I _had_ to do it! It breaks my heart to go against your will. But I had no choice. I must go. Why, think what a skulker I would be if after all I have done and said I were to--to stay at home!"

"You were already under orders," Joshua Peniman said slowly. "You are a member of the Quaker Church. By your covenant with that body you have forsworn war. Your church and your God forbid you to fight. God Himself has commanded that 'Thou shalt not kill.'"

"Oh, but, Father, that means a different kind of killing. War is not _murder_!"

"War is always murder. The coldest, bloodiest, most terrible murder. Murder of the soul as well as the body."

"Oh no, Father, no, that isn't so!" cried out the boy. "Think of the men who have engaged in war! Think of Washington--his soul was not killed by war. This is a thing that must be done. It is a duty. We must fight for the Union--liberty--freedom--for our own homes and firesides."

"This issue need not have been met by war. It would not have been if war-crazy hot-heads had not forced it upon us. There is a better way for countries and nations to settle their difficulties than by war. Sometime men will come to realize its brutality and nations will combine to adjust their controversies by reason, not might."

"I don't believe that such a time will ever come. But if it does it is not here _now_. This issue is upon us. What are we going to do?--sit passive and let the South secede and break up the Union? Why, even Jesus did not suffer evil passively. He drove the money-changers from the Temple. And He Himself said 'Think not that I come to send peace on earth; I came not to send peace, but a sword.'"

"But the 'sword' that the Master speaks of in that passage of Scripture is not the literal sword, the sword used in war, but the sharp sword of conscience. Better that the Union be dissolved than that the hands of men should be stained with the blood of their brethren."

"Oh, Father," cried Joe, "how can you say so! Do you care nothing for the preservation of your country?"

Joshua Peniman flinched, and a hot flush passed over his face.

"God knows that I love my country as well as any man," he answered sadly. "But dearly as I love my country I love my God, my religion and the commands that He has given more."

"But remember what the Lord said to His disciples, in the twenty-second chapter of St. Luke: 'But now he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.' The time has come, Father, when it is our duty to go to war, when the man who tries to escape that duty is dishonoring his God as well as his country. The time has come, when, as Jesus told His disciples, 'He that hath no sword should sell his very garment and buy one' and go forth to battle for the right."

Joshua Peniman gazed into the face of his son with sorrowful eyes. "Thee knows thy Scripture, Joe," he said in an unsteady voice. "I have striven mightily for thee. I thought I had brought thee up in the faith of our fathers----"

Hot tears sprang into Joe's eyes. "You have, you have, Father! As God hears me I would not take up arms against my fellow-man for anything less sacred than the preservation of our nation. I have studied deeply into this question. I have searched the Scriptures. And I feel that it is my sacred duty to go. Remember what the Lord said to Ezekiel, 'Son of man, speak to the children of thy people, and say unto them, When I bring the sword upon a land, if the people of that land take a man of their coasts, and set him for their watchman: If when he seeth the sword come upon the land, he blow the trumpet, and warn the people; Then whosoever heareth the trumpet and taketh not warning; if the sword come, and take him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet and took not warning; his blood shall be upon him. But he that taketh warning shall deliver his soul. But if the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood shall I require at the watchman's hand!'"

As the lad finished the long quotation from the book of Ezekiel, over which he had pored through many nights before, he fixed his gaze upon his father's face and said in a solemn voice:

"We are the watchmen, Father. If we rise not now, if we do not blow the trumpet, then should our nation perish, should the youth of our land be cut down, the Lord, according to His word will require their blood at the watchmen's hand."

Joshua Peniman gazed long and earnestly into his son's face. Then laid his hand on his shoulder.

"Thee has read thy Scripture carefully, son. I must confess that I have never read it in that light before. Perhaps thee is right. God knows. I am sure that it would grieve thee to go against the teachings of thy father, thy church and thy people. But I believe that thou art following what thou believest to be thy duty. It is breaking my heart, my son. But every man must settle an action of this kind for himself, according to his own conscience and his own God. If thou believest that the Lord sanctions thee, that it is thy duty to go, I will say no more; go, and may God go with thee."

The fire of youth and patriotism burned hotly in Joe's breast, but it was with bowed head and wet eyes that he left his father's presence.

All his life he had carried every pain, every grief and trouble to his mother, and he sought her now, kneeling beside her and burying his head in her lap.

She, too, had passed a sleepless night. Many hours of it she had spent upon her knees, praying for strength and wisdom in the trial that was to come upon her. She showed the strain of anxiety and labor of the past five years, and the suffering of the present had left her wan and pale, with heavy shadows in her eyes.

She clasped the boy to her and bowed her face upon his.

"Oh, Mother," he cried, "_you_ don't blame me, do you? _You_ don't think that I am doing wrong? I'm not deserting God, Mother, or the Friends' religion, or you! I love the old faith. I believe in it. I'll live and die in it. But oh, Mother, I _have_ to go! No man who loves his country and is a man can hold back now!"

She held him close, tears streaming down her face.

Presently he raised his head. "I'll have to go, dear. They are waiting for me. I"--he hesitated, then said brokenly,--"I enlisted last night."

She gave a little gasping cry.

"You have enlisted--already? Oh, Joe, Joe!"

"Lige enlisted, too, Mother," he forced himself to tell her, "and Herbert. In the First Regiment of Nebraska Volunteers."

"Lige--Lige, too?"

Her cry stabbed him like a knife.

"Yes, Mother, he asked me to tell you. You know how soft he is. He said he--he couldn't."

"Lige--Lige, too!" she repeated in a stricken whisper. "Both my boys! My two eldest--my sons--my little boys! We came to this far country to save you this. We thought to keep you free from warfare and slaughter! And now it has come--even here! You--the descendants of old Quaker stock--you are going away to war!"

He caught her in his arms and held her close, whispering to her, consoling her, explaining over and over again the convictions and principles that actuated himself and his brother in this, the most difficult and momentous decision of their lives.

At length she was calmer, and withdrawing herself from his arms, said, "Send Lige to me."

As he was leaving the room she stopped him.

"Joe, dear," she said, "thee must not feel hardly toward thy father. He is not a fanatic. His belief in the wickedness and futility of war is as deep and strong as his belief in God. He could not change it now--even for thee."

When Joe left the room his heart felt ready to burst with pain. He knew that the call of his country was a sacred one. He felt in every fibre of his being that he was doing his plain duty as a man and an American. Yet the habit and training of years, the principles inculcated in him from babyhood, were not easily overcome. Even with a mind clear and positive upon his duty doubts and fears and questionings rose to torture him.

Blinded by the tears that would come in spite of all his efforts he walked toward the river.

So harassed and broken was he that he did not hear the murmur of voices in the little arbor they had built under the willow trees until he was very near it. Then he looked up suddenly, and stood still.

On the rough bench they had made on the river bank he saw Nina sitting, and Lige, with arms tightly clasped about her and his face close to hers, was gazing into her eyes.

He could not hear the words that were spoken, his heart was beating too loud and fast, but he saw that her arms were about his neck, that her face was wet with tears, and that her eyes gazed into his with a look of love and sorrow.

Up to this moment Joe had always thought of Nina as his sister. He knew that he had loved her devotedly from the first moment he had seen her; but it was only now, when the wild plunge of his heart, the wild fury in his breast, the hot, fierce current of blood that surged up to his brain brought the revelation to him, that he knew that the love he felt for her was not that of a brother.

For an instant a wild, mad rage against Lige filled him; made him want to strike him, to hurl him headlong from the arbor and down the bank of the river. Then the sense of fairness and justice that had always been a leading trait of his character asserted itself.

Why, he asked himself, should Lige not love her, as well as he? She was not their sister. He had the right. Handsome Lige. Merry, sparkling, generous Lige! No wonder she loved him!

He stole away unobserved. Then when he had reached the house he called out loudly, "Lige, oh, Lige, Mother wants you!"

When he saw Lige coming he turned away.

He hoped he was not selfish, but he could not speak to him then.

He made no effort to see Nina alone, but bade her good-bye the next day with the same grave, sad, brotherly kiss that he gave to Mary and Sara and Ruth.

*CHAPTER XXVIII*

*IN FIELD AND CAMP*

When the First Nebraska Volunteers embarked at Omaha under the command of Colonel John M. Thayer, on July twenty-first, Joe and Elijah Peniman and Herbert James went with it.

The troops were raw and undisciplined, the equipment poor, food scanty and hard to get.

The Peniman boys, neither of whom had ever been away from home before, were desperately homesick, and seeing the sordidness of war, its meanness, its dirtiness and its horrors at close range, and losing some of their high vision in the daily muck and grind, came gradually almost to believe that their father was right, and that they had gone against his will, violated the faith of their childhood, and broken their mother's heart to follow a chimera that could only end in utter defeat.

For weeks they got no nearer to war than a hot, dirty, disorderly, unsanitary camp, where they were drilled from morning till night with aching shoulders and blistered feet, marched and countermarched under a broiling sun, eating hard-tack and sow-belly, and drinking water from foul ponds and muddy streams, and sleeping in fever-ridden swamps under rain that poured down upon them continually.

For a long time Joe avoided his brother. The sight of Lige, so big and handsome in his uniform, with his bright brown eyes, his rich color, the dark curly hair that fell over his forehead under the vizor of his soldier-cap, roused in him a bitterness that he could not overcome.

The knowledge that had come upon him so suddenly was a well-established fact in his mind now. He knew that he loved Nina. Knew that he loved her with all the power and strength and passion of his young manhood. Not as a brother loves a sister, but as a man loves the one woman in all the world for him.

He could not banish her from his mind. In camp, in field, on march, standing guard in the rain at night, waiting for the signal to go into battle, her face was always before him.

It angered him to see that Lige was not suffering as he suffered. He did not appear to be eating out his heart for her. He larked and sang with the other boys (for they were boys--mere boys--these defenders of the nation's integrity), and before many weeks had passed had become one of the most popular men in the regiment.

Joe could not tell his trouble to Herbert--of whom he had grown very fond. That there had come an estrangement in his heart toward Lige, that brother who had always been almost like another self, was a thing of which he could not speak.

But Lige did not seem to notice. So far as Joe could see he treated him as he always had, with his jolly, careless affection. As soon as their drilling days were over and they were moved forward into action he seemed to become possessed with the spirit of war. The excitement, the danger, the fighting, the constant sense of adventure appealed to his spirited, adventuresome nature, and he threw himself into action with an ardor that raised him from a private to a corporal in a short time. Whatever his thoughts, whatever his emotions, Joe could see that he found no time to put them on paper or to dwell much upon them in his own mind.

Transportation was poor and the distance great, and they heard from home only at rare intervals. They had been gone two months when Joe received a small package one day, which, when he tore it open eagerly, he found to contain a daguerreotype of Nina.

Poor as was the early effort at photography, the face that smiled up at him from the shiny glass was so lovely that it caught his heart like a vise and left him gasping.

She was eighteen now--a woman! And in the proudly poised little head, the small oval face, the great violet eyes and the shining nimbus of golden hair there was that distinction that had always marked her as different from all others.

He was curious to know if she had sent a picture to Lige, but could not bring himself to ask. The letter, which reached him at the same time, was like all her letters, clever, witty, affectionate, sisterly letters, such as Ruth or Sara might have written, and did write on occasion.

The daguerreotype was in a little hinged case, which he carried in the pocket of his tunic over his heart for the remainder of the war.

Throughout the years of '61 and '62 the cause of the Union suffered many disasters. The defeat and rout of the battle of Bull Run had a most demoralizing effect on the Federal army. It demonstrated the fact that the soldiers needed more drilling and the army better organization before success on the field of battle was possible. General McClellan, in charge of the Grand Army of the Potomac, dallied and delayed, while the South pushed on winning victory after victory. In spite of the victories which the Northern arms had gained in the West the winter was a gloomy one. But the campaign of 1863 brought new hope to the nation. The battle of Shiloh was fought and won, Lee was beaten back at Antietam, and the news of the proclamation of emancipation went flashing over the world.

At the beginning of 1863 the army in the West under General Rosecrans was near Chattanooga. Vicksburg and the whole Southwest was in danger, and the whole Union army was being pushed vigorously forward. The division of which Joe and Elijah Peniman and Herbert James were a part were rushed north to check Lee, who, after victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, was pushing north, even as far as southern Pennsylvania. The opposing forces met at Gettysburg, and the three boys were hurled into one of the most stubborn and bloody battles of the war. The battalion with which they were connected had to cross a valley several hundred yards in width. On the left rose a hill which was being riddled with shot and shell. Joe, who was now a sergeant, was on the extreme left of the advance, his platoon being the supporting platoon of the left assault company. Along the steep slope of the hill facing them not thirty yards away was a cannon. They swung their guns around and opened a fusillade on the attackers. Joe, who was commanding the platoon, was ordered to advance with his men and cover the left flank. Suddenly as they pushed forward the valley became a shrieking Bedlam. A company of Confederates on a hill far to the rear of the Union men sensed a new menace in the advance and opened up wildly against their position. The air was filled with howling bullets and shrieking shells. Some of the men dropped flat on their stomachs, many of them were killed. It was a clear day. There had been mists in the valley in the morning which shrouded the hills, but as the sun rose they lifted so that the movements of the Union men were perfectly visible to the enemy along the ridges. They went stumbling upward through the leafy jungle, bullets whipping and snipping off the leaves and branches about them.

Finally they debouched upon a path veering to the left in order to get behind the enemy. Joe's detachment made preparations to charge. But before they could move it seemed to them that all hell broke loose. Joe caught a glimpse of Lige, who was now a corporal, leading his men, his cap gone, his hair blown back from his forehead, his eyes filled with the lust of battle. The next moment he saw him fall.

In that one second all the love that he had ever had for his brother came sweeping back in a great overwhelming flood. He rushed toward him, but the demands upon him were too great, his responsibility too terrible for him to stop even for his brother. Officer after officer was falling around him. Colonel Baker went down with a shot through the lungs, Captain Young was shot in the stomach, Sergeant Ellton had three bullets through his left arm, Private James, who fought beside him, had a wound in his shoulder. He caught a wild glimpse of him, fighting with his left arm, while a huge Confederate with clubbed musket rushed at him. Then Joe was swept on and saw him no more.

They fought madly, blindly, desperately. At last but seven of his platoon were left; yet he must cover his position. The little band drew grimly together, and the strain was so great, the excitement so terrible, that Joe had no time to feel even a thrill of surprise or joy when he found Lige fighting beside him. As in a dream he saw him crouch in the grass. Then he became aware that his rifle was cracking as regularly as the crack of a whip. For a brief instant he turned and looked down. Crouched low in the tall grass, with his rifle at his shoulder, Lige sighting as carefully as he was wont to do at home when he shot the heads off wild turkeys, he was potting the Confederates who manned the gun, dropping them one by one with the regularity and precision of clockwork.

Suddenly an officer rose up near one of the guns, and with perhaps a dozen men behind him came charging down the hill. The young sergeant had no time to count his men, to see how many were left of that platoon that started out so gayly. Fixing his bayonet, he dashed at them. When the skirmish that ensued was over and he had time to look about him he and Lige stood alone on the hill. The lieutenant with all his men lay scattered about them.

It was not until the mad hell that raged about them was over and the battle won that the two boys realized that they had done anything out of the ordinary. Then they learned that they had cleaned out a position, routed the enemy, and left open the channel through which the Union troops rushed in and saved the day.

It was a desperate battle, desperately fought and gallantly won. The Confederate army was defeated and beaten back, and Lee never tried the invasion of the Northern States again. That battle, bloody and terrific as it was, was really the turning-point of the war. From that time the Confederate army began to languish. The end of slavery was at hand.

Then came victories, victories, and more victories for the North. Grant was made Lieutenant-General and entered upon his "hammering campaign" at Vicksburg. Sheridan was in the Shenandoah Valley; Sherman was marching through Georgia. His telegram, "Atlanta is ours and fairly won," gave a new courage to the whole country. Lincoln was reelected by a large majority.

Through it all Joe fought his battle with himself as silently and bravely as he fought the battle with his country's foes.

When a moment of leisure came and the two brothers could be together for a few uninterrupted moments he sought Lige's society, talked with him of home and parents and brothers and sisters, spoke lovingly and tenderly of Nina, and gave him every opportunity and encouragement to tell his secret. But Lige did not speak. After many trials Joe, hurt to the quick, gave up the attempt and kept his own counsel.

Sharper and fiercer grew the fighting. Lige was captured, made a brilliant and spectacular escape, was wounded once in the leg and twice in the shoulder, and came out a Colonel, the most adored man in the regiment.

At last it was over. The long, bitter, bloody struggle was ended. The South, impoverished, exhausted, beaten, was obliged to surrender, and Lee handed his sword to Grant at Appomattox, on a day which the United States will never forget.

When the troops were mustered out the Peniman boys, men now, with the stain and smirch of battle upon them, laid down their arms and returned to the homestead on the prairies, where anxious hearts, loving and weary hearts, were waiting to welcome them home.

*CHAPTER XXIX*

*HOME AGAIN*

Those terrible four years of war had been an anxious, sorrowful time for the pioneers on the Nebraska prairies.

Rumors reached even to the homestead of the unsanitary condition of the camps, of the thousands of deaths from fever, and the hearts of the parents were rent with anxiety for their two brave lads, lest even should they escape shot and shell they might fall a victim to disease.

With the two older boys, upon whom he had depended so much, away at war, Joshua Peniman found the labor thrown upon him almost more than he could bear. Sam, who was now a fine, well-grown lad of seventeen, full of fun and energy, had done his best to take Joe's place, and Paul, whom the family had previously looked upon as "one of the little ones" was now a big boy of fourteen, strong and agile, intelligent beyond his years, and able to do a large part of the work that Lige had always attended to.

As the years of the struggle went on Hannah Peniman's shining brown hair turned grey, and the deep blue eyes that gazed out over the lonely prairies came to have in them the look of those who wait and fear.

Nina and Ruth clung together as if some deep, unspoken bond of sympathy lay between them, and day after day pored over the newspapers, read the few letters that came together, and lingered over them with clasped hands and tearful eyes.

Mrs. Peniman noticed that many of these letters that Ruth watched and waited for so eagerly were addressed in a different hand from those of her brothers. Seeing that the postmark on them was the same as those on the letters of Lige and Joe she asked who they were from. Ruth blushed deeply and said they were from Herbert.

She was seventeen now, dark and slender, graceful as a young fawn, with soft, tender brown eyes and a color like a prairie rose. Between her and Nina there seemed to be an affection that was deeper and closer than that of sisters. Nina had not seemed cheerful or well of late. The horrors of war seemed to weigh upon her with crushing sorrow. She grew thin and pale, read the news of every battle with feverish intensity, and often went away alone, wandering by herself for hours over the loneliness of the prairies.

Mr. Peniman had long since set inquiries on foot both in New York and St. Louis in regard to the property the deeds to which had been found in the violated dispatch-box. But as yet nothing had come of them, and the girl was as much in the dark as ever in regard to her past and future.

Beatrice James came to the homestead often, and the three girls seemed to have much to talk about together, frequently banishing Sara and Mary, whom they considered too young to share their confidences.

"All they talk about is the soldiers, Mother," indignantly protested Sara, who was now thirteen and resented the indignity of being shut out; "and they cry and snivel and get as sentimental as mush."

Mrs. Peniman smiled. "Don't mind, Sara, they're at the sentimental age," she comforted. "You and Mary and I have more sense, haven't we?"

Mary, who was now ten, glanced up from her task of dressing Spotty in a gingham apron.

"They all want to be _nurses_," she commented scornfully. "Huh! I'd like to see Beatrice--or Nina either--put on a bandage! They'd faint away, both of 'em. Ruth is the only one who would make a good nurse. I guess"--with a wise little nod of her curly head--"I guess they'd only want to take care of _certain_ patients, don't you think so, Mother?"

Mrs. Peniman laughed, though a bit sadly, her heart quailing at the mention of wounds. "You're a wise little owl, Mary," she said, thinking to herself that Mary was probably right.

There were periods of fearful anxiety, bitter disappointment and deep depression as the first year of the war went by, and times when the issue looked doubtful and the hearts of loyal Unionists grew sick with fear.

In the early spring of 1864: a terrible day dawned upon them. The Sioux, Cheyennes and other hostile Indian tribes united to exterminate the white settlers, and a great Indian outbreak ensued, during which the entire frontier was paralyzed with terror.

With the aid of Mr. James and Arthur a stockade about twelve feet high was erected about the house and dugout, made from the young timbers along the creek, which were driven into the ground so close together that no living creature could pass through them.

For days and many weary nights they feared to sleep, but with the whole James family as well as their own crowded into the house, watched and waited, fearing momentarily to hear the war-whoops that would mean their destruction. Dozens of settlers in the western part of the Territory were murdered, their homes laid waste and their women carried away by the savages, and the settlers from the Blue Valley, the Platte Valley, and Salt Creek left their homes and fled to more protected counties.

Many of their neighbors abandoned their newly located homesteads and fled for protection to the agencies or towns, but this Joshua Peniman refused to do.

"We have worked too hard and sacrificed too much to get what we have here, to abandon it," he said. "If thee and the little ones think best to go into the town with the others, thee must do so, Hannah, but the boys and I, with Mr. James and Arthur, will stay here and protect our homes and property."

"Then I will stay with thee, Joshua," answered his wife. "I have never yet deserted thee in danger or trouble, and I will not do so now. The stockade is high and strong and will act as some protection, and we will trust in the One who never forsakes us to keep us safe from harm."

For many days they lived in terror, with weapons ready to give battle at a moment's notice from inside the stockade.

The Governor of the Territory had called out troops, and the First Nebraska Volunteer Cavalry company was assigned duty in that locality.

The Indians were no match for the United States troops, and after burning, destroying and massacring the homes and families of many settlers were finally overcome, and sent flying across the border, while peace settled down over the distracted frontier.

With April of the next spring came the glad news of Lee's surrender, and then the letters which told them that the boys were coming home.

_The boys were coming home!_

The lads whom they had prayed for, wept for, feared for, agonized over all these weary four years, were safe--well--_coming home_!

The news ran like wildfire over the prairies. Every soddy, every dugout, every town and village and crossroads store was vibrant with it. In the Peniman household the joy was too great, too deep for words.

It was decided that the whole family should go to Omaha to meet the returning soldiers. And on a glad morning, when all Nature seemed to laugh with joy, when the very earth seemed to be rejoicing that the cruel war was over, they set out, Sam driving Kit and Billy, no longer young and skittish, but sobered by years and the exigencies of pioneer life on the plains.

The former trading-post had now developed into quite a city. Brick buildings were going up here and there, streets were laid out, and the "squatties" and shanties that had done service in the days of the trading-station for Indians and trappers were giving place to good shops and stores.

As the family passed through the little settlement on Salt Creek, at which Mr. Peniman and Sam had spent the night before the great blizzard, they were astonished to see its growth. It had developed from a straggling settlement into a town, was now called Lancaster, and not many years afterward was rechristened _Lincoln_, and made the capital of the State.

The troops were ferried across the Missouri, and as the Peniman family, with hundreds of others, stood watching the transports laden with the cheering, yelling, waving boys in blue, their emotions grew too strong to be controlled. The girls wept, the boys yelled, but Hannah Peniman could only gaze and gaze, her whole soul concentrated in her eyes.

They saw them at last. Lige, mounted on the railing of the ferry-boat, was waving his forage cap around his head and shouting himself red in the face, and Joe stood beside him. He was very thin, very white, and had a great scar across his cheek. Leaning against the railing his eyes were fixed intently on the shore.

When the eyes of the long-parted ones met there was a great shout, a tremulous, half-sobbing cheer, and discipline was utterly forgotten as mothers and sons, sisters and brothers, sweethearts and lovers rushed into each other's arms.