“Oh, Annie, was it a lie Bill Baker told me, or did you really send me your _love_, and say that you meant it? He told me such a story, and I grew better in a moment. Have you relented, and if I could ask you again the question I asked a year ago, when we sat together beneath the moonlight, would you tell me _yes_? Darling Annie, Andersonville is not so terrible since I am kept up by that hope. I do not mind now if my shoes and stockings are all gone, and my trowsers nearly so, and I watch for that star so eagerly, and make believe that it is you, and when the dark clouds obscure it, and the rain is falling upon my unsheltered head, I say that it is Annie’s tears, and do not mind that either. I pray, too, Annie,—pray with my heart, I hope, though my prayers have more to do with you than myself. “Bill Baker said he should write and tell you about his taking the oath, which I believe he did almost solely for my sake, and greatly have I been benefited by it. Rough as he is, and disgusting at times, he seems to have gained friends outside, and he does us many a kindness, confining his attentions mostly to me, who am his especial care. It is a strange Providence that he who took me a prisoner at Bull Run and annoyed me so terribly, should now be caring for me here at Andersonville, and literally keeping the life within me, for I should die without him. “I have not written half I want to say, but my paper is nearly used up, and not one word have I said to mother or Rose. Tell them they would not know me now, and tell them, too, that in my dreams, when I am not with you, I am with them, and mother’s face is like an angel’s, while Rose’s sparkling beauty makes my heart beat just as it used to beat when I first began to realize what a darling sister I had. Dear Annie, you _did_ send that message by Bill Baker, I _will_ believe, and thus believing, shall gain strength maybe to bear up until the day of release. “Good-bye, my darling. From my crowded, filthy, terrible prison I send you a loving good-bye.” Notwithstanding the sickening details of this letter the day succeeding its receipt was a brighter one at the Mather house than the inmates had known for a long time. Jimmie was still alive, and with Bill Baker’s care he might survive the horrors of Andersonville and come back to them again. Annie showed both letters to Mrs. Carleton, who, when she read them, wound her arms around Annie’s neck and whispered, “Is it wrong for me to be glad that Bill Baker told that lie, when by the means our prisoner boy is so greatly benefited.”