“He’s missing--somebody said he was shot,” answered Coomber. “Who are you?” Andy told him. “I’ve heard him mention you--and heard Mr. Rockford speak about your father’s place. Strange we should meet here. Ah, here come some fellows with a stretcher, to take me to the hospital tent, I expect,” concluded Coomber. No more could be said, and soon the Union soldier was carried off, and five minutes later Andy’s comrade followed. The wounded men had lain between the picket lines of both armies and a truce had been established while the dead and wounded belonging to each side were removed. What he had heard concerning Louis made Andy feel much downcast. To fight the enemy was one thing; to have his chum killed or wounded was quite another. “I trust the report is false and he is safe,” he thought. “War isn’t such a glorious thing after all, when a fellow comes to look at it.” CHAPTER XXVI AN ADVENTURE IN THE CONFEDERATE CAPITAL After the battle of Fair Oaks, the Union army moved forward from a quarter to three-quarters of a mile and there entrenched itself in the position it occupied very nearly during the whole of the siege of Richmond. The army was divided into five corps, three upon the Richmond side of the Chickahominy River and two upon the other--one of the latter afterwards crossing to join the other three. The entrenchments were very strong, the nearest being within five miles of the heart of the Confederate capital, and the line of the besiegers was about four miles long, with guards at either end reaching out still farther. But if the entrenchments of the Union army were strong, so were those of the Southerners, who had gathered nearly a hundred and fifty thousand men to prevent their principal city from being taken. For many months the Confederates had been afraid of an attack upon Richmond, and they had spent all the time to be spared in building fortification after fortification, reaching from the city itself to from three to six miles in all directions. A Richmond newspaper of that time enumerates twenty-eight of these strongholds, each well manned and each with its guns placed in the most commanding positions. Small wonder was it, therefore, that General McClellan sent out his calls for extra troops, troops which he never received, for reasons which have never to this day been satisfactorily explained.