"Will you promise to give it back to me?" "Certainly I will! You don't imagine I would be so mean as to confiscate it?" "I should not care much if you did, now that I have found out it does not look any more like you than it does like me," she answered, handing him the photograph. "Where did you get this picture, Sue?" "Where did I get it? Well, that is cool! Didn't you send it to me yourself?" And Sue began to exhibit some symptoms of amazement. "I am very sure I never sent you this picture," added Somers gravely. "You did not?" "Never." "Why, Allan Garland!" "This is not my picture." "I shouldn't think it was." Thereupon Mr. Raynes began to laugh in the most immoderate manner; opening his mouth wide enough to take in a very small load of hay, and shaking his sides in the most extraordinary style. "What are you laughing at, pa?" demanded Sue, blushing up to the eyes, as though she already felt the force of some keenly satirical remark which was struggling for expression in the mouth of the farmer. "To think you have been looking at that picture three times a day for a year, studying, gazing at it; kissing it, for aught I know; and then to find out that it is not Allan after all!" roared the Virginia farmer between the outbreaks of his mirth. "I haven't done anything but groan since the war began, and it does me good to laugh. I haven't had a jolly time before since the battle of Bull Run, as the Yankees call it." "You are the most absurd pa in Virginia. I didn't look at it three times a day, I never studied it, and I'm sure I never kissed it. No wonder Allan wants to get away, when he finds what an absurd girl you make me out to be. You think I'm a fool, don't you, Allan?" "I do not, by any means. I'm sure, if I had your picture, I shouldn't have been ashamed to look at it three times a day," replied Somers, gallantly coming to the rescue of the maiden. "But, really, my Virginia patriarch," he added, using an expression which he had found in the correspondence in his pocket, "I must tear myself away." "You seem to be glad enough to go," pouted Sue. "Sorry to go, but compelled by the duty I owe my country to leave you." "When will you come again?" "Of course, that question I cannot answer. I may never see you again. This is a terrible war, and we cannot tell what a day may bring forth," replied Somers solemnly; and the thought was all the more solemn when he thought of the cold corpse of the son and brother concealed in the mire of the swamp. He had seen the old man laugh as none but a happy man can; and he could not help feeling what a terrible revulsion a few words from him might cause. He had watched the playful manner of Sue, and had joined in the gay raillery of the moment. A word from him would crush her spirit, and bow that loving mother to the ground. The scene had not been one of his own choosing; and he would gladly escape the necessity of dissembling before those affectionate hearts.