“How queer you do look, with your hair so short, and the hollows in your cheeks! Does _war_ change all the boys so much? Are Tom and Will such frights?” “Rose!” Mrs. Carleton said, reprovingly, while Annie looked up in surprise, pitying Jimmie, whose chin quivered even more than his voice, as he said: “Tom and Will have not been sick like me; and then,—there’s no denying it,—officers have easier times, as a general thing, than privates. I do not mean, by that, that I regret my position, for I do not. Somebody must take a private’s place, and it would better be I than a great many others; but, Rose, I shall regret it, perhaps, if by the means my looks become obnoxious to my sister and friends.” There was a marked emphasis on the word _friends_, and Jimmie’s eyes went over appealingly to Annie, who remembered how proud the boy Dick Lee used to be of his beauty, and guessed how Rose’s remarks must have wounded him. Rose suspected it, too, and winding her arms around his neck she tried to apologize. “Forgive me, Jimmie,” she said; “I did not mean anything; only your hair _is_ so short,—just like the convicts at Charlestown,—and your coat is so tumbled and dirty; but Hannah can wash that, or I can buy you a new one,” and Rose stumbled on, making matters ten times worse, until Mrs. Carleton succeeded in turning the conversation upon something besides her son’s personal appearance. Annie was very sorry for him, and her sympathy expressed itself in the soft light of her blue eyes which rested so kindly upon him, and in the low, gentle cadence of her voice when she addressed him, and her eager haste to bring him whatever she thought he wanted, and so save him the pain of walking! Mrs. Carleton saw through that _ruse_ at once. She had noticed no limp when Jimmie first came in, and she readily suspected why it was put on. But it was not for her to expose her son. From a lady who had spent a few days at the Mather House, and who once lived near Hartford, Mrs. Carleton had learned that the Dr. Howard, who had died of cholera in ‘49, was highly respected, both as a gentleman and a practising physician, and this had helped to reconcile her in a great measure to whatever might result from her son’s evident liking for Annie Graham, _née_ Annie Howard, and as she more than half suspected, the heroine of Jimmie’s boyish fancy. How very beautiful Jimmie thought Annie was, after he had had time to recover himself a little and look at her closely. She was in better health, and certainly in better spirits than when he saw her last. Her cheeks were rounder, her eyes were brighter, and her hair more luxuriant, and worn more in accordance with the prevailing style. This was Rose’s doings, as was also the increased length of Annie’s dress, which swept the floor with so long a trail that the Widow Simms had made it the subject of sundry invidious remarks.