"I did; but he had been unable to find the persons of whom he had been in search, and he could procure no such assistance as he wished. I walked back to his mansion with him. At first he was not inclined to say any thing to me; but when I told him that you were over here in the Leopard to look out for the steamer, he had more confidence in me." "Well, what did he say?" asked the major impatiently. "He would not say any thing till I had told him all I knew, including the manner in which the steamer had passed the forts. By this time we had reached his house, and we seated ourselves in the library." "You need not stop to describe the chairs or the sofa," interposed the excited commandant of the fort. "I will not; but, if I omit any thing, it will not be my fault," said the younger officer with a long gape. "He told me he and his brother had been discussing the great question, as he called it, for over six hours; and they understood each other perfectly in the end." "Six hours! It is a wonder they did not talk each other to death!" exclaimed the major. "At any rate, they talked enough to enable them to come to a perfect understanding. Colonel Passford is as true to the Confederacy as we all know him to be, but Captain Passford is a Yankee to the marrow of his bones; and the two brothers could not agree at all on the political question, though they profess still to be friends." "Then the owner of the Bellevite is on the other side?" "No doubt of that; and the steamer did not come down here to go into the service of the Confederacy," added the lieutenant. "But she will go into it, all the same," said the major, glancing at the new captain of the Leopard. Christy was quite as much excited over the conversation to which he could not help being a listener, even if he had wished not to be so. It was clear enough to him that the whole object of the voyage to Mobile Bay had come out, and the major needed no further information to enable him to act with promptness and decision. The fact that Miss Florry must be on board of the Bellevite was doubtless an additional incentive to make him do his entire duty to the Confederacy. "I think I have told you the whole story, Major Pierson," said Lieutenant Dallberg with another prodigious yawn. "Then Captain Passford and his daughter are now on board of the steamer," added the major; though he seemed to be musing on the fact, rather than saying it to his companion. "There can be no doubt of that," replied the other. "As Captain Passford is a Yankee at heart, of course he don't intend to remain in these waters much longer," continued the major, giving utterance to his reflections. "There is something more than that, which I forgot to tell you; for you hurried me so that I could not keep my thoughts about me," interposed the lieutenant. "What more is there? You said you had told me the whole," said the major, with a sneer on his lips.