Thus Jimmie fretted about Rose, and the Massachusetts woman, who, in spite of her big pin and paste-board bonnet, brought him many a nice dish of tea or bowl of soup, until the order came for him to go home, when, with an alacrity which almost belied the languor and weakness he had complained of so bitterly, he packed his valise and started again for Rockland. This time he wore the “army blue;” but the suit which at first had been so fresh and clean, was soiled, and worn, and hateful to the fastidious young man, who only endured it because he fancied it might in some way commend him to Annie Graham. Rose had written that she worshiped the very name of a soldier, especially if he were a _poor private_, her sympathies being specially enlisted for that class of people. And Jimmie was a poor private, and a wounded one at that, with his arm in a sling, and a cane in his hand, and his curly hair cut short, and his coat all wrinkled and soiled, and his knapsack on his back; and he was going home to Annie, who surely would welcome him now, and hold his hand a moment, and possibly dress his wound. That _would_ be delightful; and Jimmie’s blood went tingling through his veins as he felt in fancy the soft touch of Annie’s fingers upon his flesh, and saw her head crowned with the pale brown hair bending over him. He felt a little disappointment that she was not at the depot to meet him, while his chagrin increased at the tardiness of her appearance after his arrival home, but she was coming at last, and Jimmie’s quick ear caught the rustle of her garments as she came down the stairs and into the room, smiling and blushing, as she took his offered hand, and begged him not to rise for her. “You are lame yet, I see. I had hoped your ankle might be well,” she said, glancing at his cane, which he carried more from habit, and because it had been given him by an officer, than from any real necessity. His sprained ankle _was_ almost well, and only troubled him at times; but after Annie’s look of commiseration at the cane, and her evident intention to pity him for his ankle rather than his arm, he found it vastly easy to be lame again, and even made some excuse to cross the room in order to show off the _limp_ which had not been very perceptible when he first came in. And Annie was very sorry for him, and inquired with a great deal of interest into the particulars of his being wounded, and kindly sat where he could look directly at her, and thought, alas! how much he was changed from the fashionably-dressed, saucy-faced young man who went from them only a few months before. Short hair was not becoming to him,—neither was his thin, burnt face,—neither was that soiled blue coat; and he looked as little as possible like a hero whom maidens could worship. Some such thought passed through Annie’s mind, while Rose, too, felt the change in her handsome brother, and, with a puzzled expression on her face, said to him, as she stood by his side: