Overhead, tree swallows darted through a sky of pink and saffron, pulsating with the promise of the sun; the tinted peak of a mountain, jaggedly mirrored in the unquiet pool, suddenly glowed crimson, and the reflections ran crisscross through the rocking water, lacing it with fiery needles. She looked like some delicate dawn-sprite as she waded ashore--a slender, unreal shape in the rosy glow, while behind her, from the dim ravine, ghosts of the mountain mist floated, rising like a company of slim, white angels drifting to the sky. All around her now the sweet, bewildered murmur of purple martins grew into sustained melody; thrush and mocking bird, thrasher and cardinal, sang from every leafy slope; and through the rushing music of bird and pouring waterfall the fairy drumming of the cock-o'-the-pines rang out in endless, elfin reveille. While she was managing to dry herself and dress, her horse limped off into the grassy swale below to drink in the stream and feed among the tender grasses. Before she drew on the homespun gown she tucked her linen map into an inner skirt pocket, flat against her right thigh; then, fastening on the shabby skirt, she rolled up her riding habit, laid it with lantern, revolver, saddle, bridle, boots, and bags, in the hollow and covered all over with heaps of fragrant dead leaves and branches. It was the best she could do, and the time was short. Her horse raised his wise, gentle head, and looked across the stream at her as she hastened past, then limped stiffly toward her. "Oh, I can't stand it if you hobble after me!" she wailed under her breath. "Dearest--dearest--I will surely come back to you. Good-by--good-by!" On the crest of the ridge she cast one swift, tearful glance behind. The horse, evidently feeling better, was rolling in the grass, all four hoofs waving at the sky. And she laughed through the tears, and drew from her pockets a morsel of dry bread which she had saved from the saddlebags. This she nibbled as she walked, taking her bearings from the sun and the sweep of the southern mountain slopes; and listening, always listening, for the jingle and clank of the Confederate flying battery that was surely following along somewhere on that parallel road which she had missed, hidden from her view only by a curtain of forest, the width of which she had no time to investigate. Nor did she know for certain that she had outstripped the Confederate column in the race for the pass--a desperate race, although the men of that flying column, which was hastening to turn the pass into a pitfall for the North, had not the faintest suspicion that the famous Special Messenger was racing with them to forestall them, or even that their secret was no longer a secret.