The general put his hand to her forehead and smoothed back the moist hair. "Ain't you well, daughter?" he asked anxiously. "Would you like a toddy?" "It's nothing," said Miss Chris cheerfully. "She's walked too far, that's all. Eugie, you must go to bed early." "I had her out all the morning in the sun," put in Bernard, with an affectionate nod at Eugenia, "and she's such a trump she wouldn't give out." "You must learn to consider your sister," said his father testily. "Oh! I liked it, papa," declared Eugenia. "I'm well and--I'm hungry." Congo brought more waffles, and she ate one with grim determination. The alert affection which surrounded her--which proved sensitive to a change of colour or a tremor of voice, filled her with a swift sense of security. She felt a sudden impulse to draw nearer in the shelter of the race--to cling more closely to that unswerving instinct which had united individual to individual and generation to generation. As they rose from the table, she slipped her arm through her father's and went with him into the hall. "I'm tired," she said, stopping him on his way to the sitting-room, "so I'll go to bed." The general held her from him and looked into her face. "Anybody been troubling you, Eugie?" he asked. She shook her head. "You dear old goose--no!" He patted her shoulder reassuringly. "If anybody troubles you, you just let me hear of it," he said. "They'll find out Tom Battle wasn't at Appomattox. You've got an old father and he's got an old sword--" "And he's hungry for a fight," she gaily finished. Then she rubbed her cheek against his brown linen sleeve, which was redolent of tobacco. The firm physical contact inspired her with the courage of life; it seemed to make for her a bulwark against the world and its incoming tribulations. She threw back her head and looked up into the puffed and scarlet face where the coarse veins were congested, her eyes seeing only the love which transfigured it. She was his pet and his pride, and she would always be the final reward of his long life. As she mounted the stairs, he blew his nose and called cheerfully after her: "Just remember, if anybody begins plaguing you, that I'm ready for him--the rascal." Once in her room she threw open the window and sat looking out into the night, the chill autumn wind in her face. Far across the fields a pale moon was rising, bearing a cloudy circle that betokened rain. It flung long, ghostly shadows east and west, which flitted, lean and noiseless and black, before the wind. Overhead the stars shone dimly, piercing a fine mist. Eugenia leaned forward, her chin on her clasped hands. Beyond the gray blur of the pasture she could see, like benighted beacons, the lights in Amos Burr's windows, and she found herself vaguely wondering if Nicholas were at his books--those books that never failed him. He had that consolation at least--his books were more to him than she had been.