“He’s lame,” Isaac cried, the hot tears raining over his face, while he begged of them to stop, or at least to _carry_ poor Capt. Carleton, if they must go on. “I won’t run away,” he said, imploringly to his own captor, feeling intuitively that his was the kinder nature. “Don’t be afraid of me. I’ll help you carry him if necessary. Do have some pity. He’s fainting, see!” and Isaac almost shrieked as poor Tom sunk upon the grass, utterly unable to move another step. They must carry him now or leave him there, and anxious for the honor a captured officer of Tom Carleton’s evident rank in life would confer upon them, the Rebels availed themselves of Isaac’s proffered aid, and the three, bearing their heavy burden, moved slowly on until far beyond the bushes by the stream, where the other soldier sat upon the ground, his laughing black eyes heavy with tears, and his heart throbbing with a keener pain than he had ever known before. “I was wrong to let him go,” he said aloud. “Three against two would surely have carried the day, and that boy at his side was brave, I know. But it cannot now be helped. He is their prisoner, and all that remains for me to do is to see that the best of treatment comes to him until he is released. But what! are the dead coming back to life?” and the soldier started up as he caught a sound of bending twigs near by. CHAPTER IX. THE REBEL AND THE YANKEE. Bill Baker was awake at last, and from his hiding-place had seen Capt. Carleton and Isaac disappear beneath the trees in the distance. “They are goners,” he muttered to himself, “Won’t that snap dragon of a widow be mad, though, when she hears how they’ve got Ike. Poor Ike, I’d help him if I could, but ’taint no use interferin’ now,” and with this reflection, Bill turned his attention toward the stranger, watching him for several minutes, first to decide his politics, and second, to calculate his probable strength. The soldier was at least a head taller than Bill, who nevertheless far exceeded him in strength of muscle and power of endurance. “I can manage him,” was Bill’s contemptuous comment, and feeling in his pocket for the strong cord _Rose Mather_ had bound round his paper parcel of turnovers and cheese, he prepared to spring upon his foe in the rear and take him by surprise. The cracking twigs betrayed him, and changing his tactics he walked directly in front of the astonished young man, who, with heightened color, haughtily demanded “what he was doing there,—and whether he were a friend or foe.”