“It will be in your way and increase your danger,” he said. “Confederate notes will get you to the Potomac. From there you need a little gold to take you to Baltimore. After you are there I will contrive any sum you want to your trustees in Norfolk. They, being inside the Yankee lines, can send it to Baltimore.” Our next objective point was Mrs. Rixey’s in Culpeper. Blockade-runners were continually setting out from there, and we thought we would have no difficulty in attaching ourselves to a party. After a rest in Petersburg of a day and a half, we started for Culpeper, reaching Mrs. Rixey’s at nightfall. We told her husband that we wanted to join a party of blockade-runners. “Mrs. Otis and her two daughters start north to-morrow; perhaps you can go with them,” he said, and went out to see about it. Unfortunately--or fortunately--the Otis party was complete--there was no vacant seat in their wagon. “I will be on the lookout for you,” Mr. Rixey said. “Somebody else will be along soon.” Before breakfast he knocked at our door. “There are two gentlemen downstairs who are going north,” he said, when Millie stuck her head out. “They give their names as Captain Locke and Mr. Holliway, and they seem to be gentlemen. That is all I know about them. You might see them and talk the matter over.” We finished dressing hurriedly and went down to the parlor, where we met Captain Locke and Mr. Holliway, and after a brief talk decided to go with them. The best vehicle we could get was a wagon without springs, and instead of a body four planks laid across the axles, one plank set up on each side, and no ends at all. Over the rude floor we had a quantity of straw piled, and two chairs were set up for Milicent and me. The gentlemen seated themselves on our baggage, which consisted of two small trunks into which we had crowded a few articles for each of them. The wagoner, a rough mountaineer, sat on a plank which had been laid across the two uprights at the sides. It was a bitterly cold day. Milicent and I wore thick cloaks, and the wagoner supplied a blanket which we wrapped about our feet. In addition, the gentlemen contributed a large blanket shawl which they insisted upon folding about our shoulders, declaring that their overcoats protected them sufficiently. Now and then they got out of the wagon and walked and stamped to keep their legs from getting stiff with cold, and at last Milicent and I were reduced to the same device for keeping up our circulation. We got so stiff we couldn’t move, and the gentlemen had to lift us out of the wagon, pull us about, and drag us into a walk and a run. It was dark when we reached the house at which it had been suggested we should stop. Lights were in every window and we could see much moving about. Mr. Holliway went in to ask for lodgings. He returned quickly and jumped into the wagon, saying to the wagoner: “Drive on.” Milicent and I were almost freezing.