The greatest braggart in the county had died like a hero, cheering on his men; the softest spoken university-bred men had become hard swearers and iron disciplinarians; the most shiftless of idlers had made admirable soldiers; and all seemed to go according to the law of contrary. Angela herself was quite unconscious of the storm which raged against her in the county. She kept close to Harrowby and saw no one, even rarely George Charteris, who still came daily to study under Lyddon. Heretofore George had been content to pass Angela with a cold and negligent bow, after having for years before pestered her with his boyish lovemaking. Now he avoided as far as possible meeting her on his daily visits to Harrowby. But once, when it was inevitable, he passed her on the lawn without removing his hat. Angela stopped and looked after him with blazing eyes of wrath. Was it possible that this boy dared to insult her by not speaking to her? She said nothing of this, keeping it with many other bitter things in her own heart. But the next day when George came out of the study door Angela faced him in the path. He was forced to make her something in the nature of a bow and, after an unpleasant pause, said: “Do you wish anything of me?” “Nothing at all,” responded Angela sweetly, “only to find out whether you were a gentleman or not. Good morning.” She passed on leaving him consumed with inward rage. Colonel Tremaine went nowhere except to the post office for the semioccasional mail, and to church, and no one dared mention to him the grim suspicion against Angela. But deep in his heart he himself felt sometimes a sharp and piercing doubt of Angela. He dared not speak of it even to Mrs. Tremaine, and put it away from him with all his inborn chivalry and the parental affection for the girl which was a part of his nature. In spite of himself he could not forget the opened window, the answering signal, and the letter dropped on the lawn. He tried to assume that even if the worst were true and Angela were communicating with Federals, she did not understand her own wrongdoing, but this view was totally unconvincing even to himself. Angela was no fool, and never had been, and it was impossible to give her the credit of ignorance. When Colonel Tremaine looked at her going about her daily tasks with fiery energy and even a feverish gayety, when he saw how this young creature, so lately a child, had grown so self-controlled, so unshakably courageous, she was acquitted in his own mind. But when he waked in the night, or when he sat in the library writing up his diary, or read in the ill-printed Richmond newspapers of Federal raids and captures, a suspicion would rise in his mind that would not be strangled. No more Confederate officers came to Harrowby, which Colonel Tremaine reckoned a blessing.