“I was always with my husband; he had an independent command, and was what _you_ call a guerrilla chief; ours was a hunted life, a Cain’s life; our hand was against every one, and every one’s hand against us! Our home was the wildwood or the ruined farm-house; our occupation war, rapine, plunder. We were far enough from the comforts of civilized life, as you may judge!” “Oh, Alberta! what a fate for you, delicately reared as you have been! But it is all over now, love; you have come in to us and all will be well!” said Erminie. “But you have not heard my story yet,” murmured Alberta. “I will hear it very soon; and no matter what it is, or has been, now that you are with us, Alberta, I will hold you to my heart of hearts,” said Erminie. They finished drinking tea and arose from the table. And still Britomarte did not make her appearance. “She will not be here to-night! It is now too late to expect her,” said Erminie, as she rang for a servant to come and remove the tea service. “Now, Alberta, dear, I will show you to our room, and—would you like a bath?” “Oh yes! very much, indeed! that, too, is a luxury I have not enjoyed lately.” “Then I will order one got ready. Come, dear,” she said, leading the way from the library followed by her guest. In a moment, as from the impulse of an after thought, Erminie stepped back to speak to her guest. “Elfie, dear, you are my sister; and so much at home here that I know you will kindly excuse my absence this evening.” “Yes, certainly! But listen to me! You are going to have a tête-à-tête with the wife of Vittorio Corsoni, the Guerrilla Chief! Hear her story, since you must! But give as little credence to it as you can! And—give her no confidences in return; for, mark me, Erminie, she is a spy!” An hour later Erminie and Alberta sat together beside the fire in the bed chamber of the former. And there the minister’s daughter heard the terrible story of the guerrilla’s wife—a story that need not be told in detail here. It is sufficient to say, that Alberta Goldsborough, the delicately nurtured daughter of the South had suffered some of the most horrible evils of the civil war. Her parents had just become reconciled to her marriage when her father was killed in battle, his house burned to the ground, and her mother turned out to die of exposure and privation. Alberta, maddened by these sufferings, joined her husband in his wild guerrilla life and incited him to the very worst of those depredations that made his name a terror to all the Unionists of the valley. In one of his encounters with the Union troops he had been taken prisoner and conveyed to Fort W., where he had been tried and condemned to death, and where he was then waiting the execution of his sentence. It was in the desperate hope of gaining a pardon for her husband, that the guerrilla’s wife had come to Washington. Erminie, with tears of pity, told Alberta that she would accompany her to the President, to sue for this pardon.