"Now I reckon you knows dat he ain't. Ef he was, you ain't come here 'quirin' in dat honey voice." (Raising her own voice.) "You tink I dunno whaffor you come? You done come heah to rifle, an' to loot, an' to steal, an' to seize what ain't your'n. You come heah when young Marse ain't to home ter rob him." (Still louder.) "Ned, whaffor you hidin' yonder? Ef yo' ain't man to protect Marse Comyn's prop-ty, jes han' over Marse Comyn's gun." The marshal and his men had stood, half amused, more than half baffled by this unexpected resistance. Mammy Easter looked so dangerous that it was evident she was not to be passed without extreme bodily discomfort. "Is your mistress here?" This question was unfortunate in the extreme. "You--you white trash!" cried Mammy, bursting with indignation. "Who is you to come heah 'quiring fo' her! I ain't agwine--" "Mammy!" "Yas'm! Yas, Miss Jinny." Mammy backed out of the door and clutched at her bandanna. "Mammy, what is all this noise about?" The torrent was loosed once more. "These heah men, Miss Jinny, was gwine f'r t' carry away all yo' pa's blongin's. I jes' tol' 'em dey ain't comin' in ovah dis heah body." The deputy had his foot on the threshold. He caught sight of the face of Miss Carvel within, and stopped abruptly. "I have a warrant here from the Provost Marshal, ma'am, to seize personal property to satisfy a claim against Colonel Carvel." Virginia took the order, read it, and handed it back. "I do not see how I am to prevent you," she said. The deputy was plainly abashed. "I'm sorry, Miss. I--I can't tell you how sorry I am. But it's got to be done." Virginia nodded coldly. And still the man hesitated. "What are you waiting for?" she said. The deputy wiped his muddy feet. He made his men do likewise. Then he entered the chill drawing-room, threw open the blinds and glanced around him. "I expect all that we want is right here," he said. And at the sight of the great chandelier, with its cut-glass crystals, he whistled. Then he walked over to the big English Rothfield piano and lifted the lid. The man was a musician. Involuntarily he rested himself on the mahogany stool, and ran his fingers over the keys. They seemed to Virginia, standing motionless in the ball, to give out the very chords of agony. The piano, too, had been her mother's. It had once stood in the brick house of her grandfather Colfax at Halcyondale. The songs of Beatrice lay on the bottom shelf of the what-not near by. No more, of an evening when they were alone, would Virginia quietly take them out and play them over to the Colonel, as he sat dreaming in the window with his cigar, --dreaming of a field on the borders of a wood, of a young girl who held his hand, and sang them softly to herself as she walked by his side. And, when they reached the house in the October twilight, she had played them for him on this piano. Often he had told Virginia of those days, and walked with her over those paths.