When the morning came, and the ambulance with it, the blood-stains were gone and the feather was clean, though its texture was limp, its appearance bedraggled, and much of its original colour had been washed out. * * * * * Two or three days later, Agatha Ronald at her home received by mail a package containing a feather, once red but now badly faded. No note or message of any kind accompanied it, but Agatha understood. She had already learned through the newspapers that "Sergeant-Major Baillie Pegram, after a desperate encounter with the enemy on the outer lines, had been severely--perhaps mortally--wounded in the head;" and that "Sergeant-Major Baillie Pegram has been mentioned in General Orders for his gallant conduct on the field, with a recommendation for promotion, if he recovers from his wounds, as the surgeons give little hope that he will." She wrapped the faded feather in tissue-paper, deposited it in a jewelled glove-box which had come to her as an heirloom from her mother, and put it away in one of her most sacred depositories. A week or two later, she learned that Sergeant-Major Baillie Pegram had been removed from the general hospital at Richmond to his home at Warlock, and that he was now expected to recover from his wounds. XI _AT WARLOCK_ "It's jes' what I done tole you niggas fust off." That was Sam's comment upon the situation when his master was brought home to Warlock, stretched upon a litter. "I done tole yer what'd happen when Mas' Baillie go off to de wah in dat way, 'thout Sam to take k'yar of him. An' bar in min' what else I done tole yer, too. Ain't de chinch-bug done et up de wheat, jes' as I tole yer? Now, Mas' Baillie, he's a-gwine to die wid that hole in he haid. Den what's a-gwine to become o' you niggas?" Sam promptly installed himself as his master's nurse, sitting by him during the day, and sleeping on the floor by his bedside every night. For a time it seemed likely that the negro's dismal prophecy of Baillie's death would be fulfilled, but with rest and the bracing air of his own home, he slowly grew better, until he was able at last to sun himself in the porch or under the trees of the lawn. He chafed a good deal at first over the fact that he had not seen the major part of the fighting along Bull Run, and it annoyed him still more that he was likely to lose his share in a campaign which was expected to bring the war to a speedy and glorious end. It was Marshall Pollard who laughed him out of this latter regret. During the long waiting-time that followed the battle of Manassas, Marshall, who had gained a lieutenancy in his battery, secured several brief leaves of absence in order to visit the convalescent man at Warlock.