“Certainly, ma’am, but there hasn’t anybody seen him in so long that how could we be blamed for thinking him dead?” They had reached McArthur’s room. Everything was neatly in place. Suddenly Helen started. A glove with a little brown splotch on it hung over a daguerreotype portrait. “Whose—whose is that?” she faltered. “I don’t know, Miss; I don’t know at all.” “Did—did Mr. McArthur like—anybody?” Mrs. Adams looked at her sharply. “Mr. McArthur, Miss, didn’t ever let anybody know his secrets!” But Helen knew the woman knew, and said quietly: “You would not hurt my feelings, please tell me.” “Well, Miss, to be perfectly—that is candid—I think he did.” “And her name?” “I think—that is—her name is Helen.” The highland lassie’s face beamed with pleasure. “Do you know where she lived?” she asked, wishing to make very sure. “I—not exactly—her home was not here—I think it was in—” “Never mind,” said Helen, hurriedly, as if Dunvegan had already been pronounced. “I will go to the hospital—perhaps he is there.” CHAPTER XL “Oh, Tait!” she sobbed, “I did not know you were here. We all thought you were in Virginia. Oh, I am so glad you are here!” “Here, Sis, here in this hospital with a game leg?” “But, Tait, I am here, and you can tell me about Ervin. Is he, oh, brother, is he dead?” The last words sank to a terror’s whisper. “Dead!” exclaimed her brother. “Good gracious! No! He’s as ’live as a Wa-haw squirrel. He’s captured, that’s all. Cheer up, Sis, he’s all right.” “Oh, Tait, you are so sweet! Tell me over again, tell me he is just captured! But he—I know he is sick!” “Not much, I guess. You can’t make old Ervin sick.” “I know he is ill, Tait, very ill, and I am going to him. I am going to him now.” As she had left father, so she now left brother, and following his directions, passed out through the long rows of wounded, into the street. “Go to the Confederate post on James’ Island,” Tait had said, “and they will get a message through for you. Tell Captain Dillard who you are, Sis, and he’ll do all he can to help you.” The words rang hopefully in her ears. She returned to the _Chronicle_ office, bearing the good news to Colonel Masters, who immediately began arrangements for her conveyance to James’ Island. Joe and another trusty man were detailed as escort. “I regret exceedingly, my dear Miss Preston,” the gallant colonel declared, “that I am unable to accompany you myself, but Ervin’s d⸺ absence—” he corrected himself joyfully, “leaves me tied here. Joe, however, will do all that any one can do.” Joe dressed in an old broadcloth suit, Prince Albert coat, silk hat crushed into an Egyptian ruin, and hair almost white, made a striking picture. Little tufts of gray hair grew here and there on his scalp, like the scrubby bushes that dot a far Eastern landscape.