“All quiet,” he reported. “I’ve just come from a round of the sentinels and there’s nothing suspicious. I’m going back myself presently to watch in front of the house.” I knew Whitestone would ask no questions, so I told him the lieutenant was still very ill and I would return to him; I did not know how long I would stay in the house, I said. Whitestone, like the good, silent fellow he was, made no reply. I returned to the front door. I was now learning the way into the house very well. I had traveled it often enough. I stood for a moment in the little portico, which was as clean and white as if washed by the sea. The rain had nearly ceased to fall, and the blaze of the distant skirmishing suddenly flared up on the dark horizon like a forest fire. I wondered not that the two women in the house should be moved by all this; I wondered rather at their courage. In the yard stood Whitestone, his figure rising up as stiff and straight as a post. CHAPTER VI. BELT’S GHOST. I found Belt fast asleep. The two draughts of whisky, heavy and hot, had been a blanket to his senses, and he had gone off for a while to another world to think and to struggle still, for he muttered and squirmed in his restless slumber. His hand when I touched it was yet hot with fever. He might, most likely would, be better when he awoke in the morning, but he would be flat aback the remainder of the night. He could conduct no further search in that house before the next day. I was uncertain what to do, whether to remain there with Belt or go out and help Whitestone with the watch. Duty to our cause said the latter, but in truth other voices are sometimes as loud as that of duty. I listened to one of the other. I drew a chair near to Belt’s couch and sat down. He was still muttering in his hot, sweaty sleep like one with anger at things, and now and then threw out his long thin legs and arms. He looked like a man tied down trying to escape. The candle still burned on the table, but its light was feeble at best. Shadows filled the corners of the room. I like sick-bed watches but little, and least of all such as that. They make me feel as if I had lost my place in a healthy world. To such purpose was I thinking when Belt sat up with a suddenness that made me start, and cried in a voice cracked with fever: “Shelby, are you there?” “Yes, I’m here,” I replied with a cheeriness that I did not feel. “Lie down and go to sleep, lieutenant, or you’ll be a week getting well.” “I can’t go to sleep, and I haven’t been to sleep,” he said, raising his voice, which had a whistling note of illness in it. His eyes sparkled, and I could see that the machinery of his head was working badly. I took him by the shoulders with intent to force him down upon the couch; but he threw me off with sudden energy that took me by surprise. “Let me go,” he said, “till I say what I want to say.” “Well, what is it?” I asked, thinking to pacify him.