"Aren't you afraid that there biscuit'll p'isen you?" he asked. "Seems to me if I was a woman and could bake, I couldn't swallow that biscuit. You wouldn't bake me a real biscuit, I suppose?" "No," answered Emmeline with decision, "I wouldn't." "Well," drawled the quiet voice, "you don't have to." Emmeline, standing with one foot on the step of the porch, considered. She had taken one bite of the biscuit. Although she was wretchedly hungry, she could eat no more. "Will you let me go if I bake you some?" Emmeline asked. "I'll see," answered Private Christy. The cook had left his stove, and Emmeline went to work with the familiar utensils--the yellow bowl, the wooden spoon. When the biscuits were in the oven, she looked up to find the doorway crowded with soldiers; some of them were bandaged like Private Christy; all of them were thin and deeply tanned. "Are you going to give we-all some of them real biscuit?" asked an eager voice. Emmeline's face flushed crimson; the position of almsgiver to her enemy was not altogether unhappy. "I'll see," she answered. When one pan was taken from the oven, Emmeline had another ready and then another and another. Emmeline grew warmer and warmer and her cheeks rosier and rosier. "Now," said Emmeline, "you can watch that last pan. I am going home." "But I haven't had any!" cried Private Christy. "Nobody here knows anything about watching and turning 'em! Oh, please, sissy, bake me a pan!" Private Christy brought in fresh fuel for the fire. A half-hour passed, another half-hour. "Now," said Emmeline, "I am going." Private Christy made no answer. The hungry crowd in the yard had faded away; the very atmosphere seemed charged with suspense. Emmeline looked out of the door. Was the army still here? The army was still here; but the army was formed, massed. It was like a great animal, alive, awake, crouching for a spring. Then Emmeline screamed, and whirled round on the step. Near at hand--almost, it seemed to her, in the very house itself--the cannon roared. CHAPTER IV THE SECOND DAY OF BATTLE At the sound of the cannon shot, Private Christy, still sitting calmly on the step, looked up. "No call to be--" Another roar cut short Private Christy's speech. Emmeline fled into the kitchen, and Christy rose and followed her. "No call to be skeered, sissy," he said, speaking loudly into her ear. "The shooting ain't _here_." Emmeline covered her ears with her hands. Another fearful detonation shook the old farmhouse to its foundations. The windows trembled in their frames, the floor seemed to rock. Emmeline sank into a chair by the kitchen table, hid her face in her arms, and screamed hysterically.