When he was alone, and his dispatches had all been written, he sat musing for a time, as little disturbed by the glare and the thunder about him as if stillness were an unknown thing. His cogitations did not seem satisfactory, for he frowned more than once. "What's the matter with the fellow?" he muttered. "Something has gone wrong. I've seen an uneasiness for a long time. Now the blow has fallen. Poor fellow! he doesn't take life easy. The news is it, I wonder? or the letter?" He sat for a while carefully nursing his left knee, while his thoughts gradually went back to military matters, and worked there diligently. At last he straightened himself, clapped this same knee with vigor, put both feet to the ground and, rising, took up from his improvised table--a log turned endwise,--a paper upon which he made a note with a worn pencil from his pocket. "Yes," he cried, "I can do that. It's the only thing I can do. And I need it so much they will not mind." He finished by a smile. "Strange I hadn't thought of it before," he said. Then he threw himself down upon his bed of boughs and moss, and with the terrific din about him slept the sleep of weariness. At sunrise, according to his directions, an orderly roused him. Archdale had already gone with his reconnoitering party. His heart was bitter against the conditions of his life, and he felt that it would be no misfortune, perhaps quite the contrary, if Edmonson's plan were not interfered with. "It's beyond her comprehension," he said to himself. "How confident she was. What will she say when she knows?" In the morning, Elizabeth standing beside her father turned a tired face toward the shore as she watched General Pepperell's approach. Sleep had been impossible to her in the strangeness and terror of her surroundings. "You are very thoughtful to come to bid us good-bye," she said, giving him her hand as he stepped on board. He smiled, and still holding it, asked after a moment's hesitation, "Should you be very much disappointed if I begged you not to return this morning?" She certainly looked so for a moment, before she answered: "If it will help, if I can be of any use, I am ready to stay. Are there soldiers in the hospitals? Can we do anything for them, Nancy and I?"