“Yes, that is a Yankee blanket. Why, my child, the Yankee manufacturers work for us now, just as they did before the war, only now we don’t pay them for it. Why, Elfie, if it were not for dashing and successful raids upon Yankee encampments, our soldiers would go into battle as bare-backed as the Berserkers of old.” Elfie stepped down upon the floor and began to make her toilet, while Alberta carefully spread up the bed and opened the window behind it. “It is not what either of us were brought up to, Elfie, this breakfasting in our bed-room; but I have endured much greater hardships than this.” Elfie shrugged her shoulders in silence, and went on dressing. And by the time she was ready for breakfast, breakfast was ready for her. Haddycraff came to the door and rapped, and Alberta went and received from him a large dish of fried chicken and a pitcher of milk, which was all that was wanted to complete the preparations for the morning meal. Alberta set them on the table and then put up the teapot and the plate of toast. “We have no butter to-day, Elfie, but Abershaw has got a dairyman, and with all these cows, I dare say we shall have some for to-morrow,” said Alberta. “To-morrow. I hope a great many things will happen before to-morrow,” said Elfie. And they both sat down to the table. Alberta poured out a cup of tea, and set it before her guest and said: “Try some of that fried chicken, Elfie. Haddycraff is a very good cook.” “And I suppose some Union farmer’s hen-roost has been robbed to supply his larder,” replied Elfie rather ungratefully, as she stuck her broken fork into the crisply fried breast of chicken, and transferred it to her cracked plate. “Of course; how else should we be fed?” laughed Alberta. Elfie had a healthy young appetite, and notwithstanding her captivity and her conscience, she made a hearty meal. Not so did Alberta. Every movement and expression of this unhappy woman betrayed the anxious and habitual vigilance of the fighting and flying guerrilla life. Forgetting her companion, she would turn her head and stare through the open window, straining her eyes to see what might be going on at a distant point of the encampment in the line of her vision, or else holding her cup of tea suspended between her saucer and her lips, while she listened to the sounds outside the house. “For goodness sake, Alberta, make a breakfast. You have scarcely eaten a morsel of food or drank a drop of tea. What ails you? What are you watching and listening for? You cannot fear an attack from the Union troops this morning. You said yourself the river would be too high for days to admit of their crossing,” said Elfie, impatiently. “It is not of them I am thinking,” answered Alberta, making an effort to sip her tea. “Of what then? I declare you look like a fugitive from justice fearing an arrest. Something ails you.” “Something _always_ does. Elfie, did you notice the boy that waited on us at supper last night?”