Nothing but a private! It was not the captain then, after all. He had hoped, and almost believed, it was. He had told his friend all about his experience in a chimney; and it seemed to him quite probable that the valiant hero of Magenta and Solferino had remembered the affair, and attempted to try his own luck in a similar manner. It was not the voice of the captain, nor were there any of his peculiarities of tone or manner. If the other character had only said Balaclava, Alma, or Palestro, it would have been entirely satisfactory in any tone or in any manner. "What are you doing here?" demanded Somers in the same low voice, with commendable desire to obtain further knowledge of the dark subject beneath him. "I don't want nothin' of you; so yer kin let me alone. If yer don't let me alone, I'll be dog derned if I don't ketch hold of yer legs, and pull yer down chimley." "Hush!" said Somers in warning tones. "They will hear you, if you speak so loud." The man was a rebel, or at least a Southerner; and it passed our hero's comprehension to determine what he was doing in such a place. "Hush yerself!" snarled the disconcerted rebel. "What yer want o' me? I ain't done nothin' to you." "I don't want anything of you; but, if you don't keep still, I'll drop a stone on your head," replied Somers, irritated by the fellow's stupidity. "Will yer?" "Not if you keep still. Don't you see we are in the same box? I don't want to be caught, any more than you do." "Who be yer?" asked the man, a little mollified by this conciliatory remark. "Never mind who I am now. The soldiers are in the house looking for us; and, if you make a noise, they will hear you." "What regiment do yer belong ter?" said the lower occupant of the chimney in a whisper. "Forty-first," replied Somers at a venture, willing to obtain the advantage of the fellow's silence. "Did yer run away?" "No. Did you?" "What yer in here fur, if yer didn't run away, then?" asked the deserter from the rebel army, which it was now sufficiently evident was his character. "Keep still!" replied Somers, regretting that he had not given a different answer. "I know yer!" exclaimed the rebel, making a movement farther down the chimney, thereby detaching sundry pieces of stone and mortar, which thundered down upon the hearth below with a din louder, as it seemed to Somers in his nervousness, than all the batteries of the Army of the Potomac. "Yer come to ketch me in a trap. Scotch me if I don't blow yer up so high 'twill take yer six months ter come down ag'in!" "Keep still!" pleaded Somers, in despair at the unreasonableness of the rebel. "The soldiers are after me; and, if they catch me, they will catch you. 1 don't want to hurt you. If you will only keep still, I will help you out of the scrape." "You go to Babylon! Yer can't fool me! What yer doin' in the chimley?"