Noel fancied he could detect an importance in the words just spoken which confirmed him in his belief that the man in the other room was a spy from Lee's army. His excitement increased as his conviction gained in power, and he almost groaned as he realized how helpless he was. Deprived of his uniform, without any weapon of defense, he was powerless to interfere with the man or his plans. "I reckon Little Mac will give a good account of himself befo' long," said Jim positively. "He'll have to make haste about it, then. He left Washin'ton with an army of nearly eighty-five thousand men. He ought to do something with such a body as that. Why, only last night, if he had made a night march, he mought have got in possession of both Gaps--" "What Gaps?" "Why, Crampton's Gap and Turner's. He's lost his chance, though." "You know a right sma't lot, don't you?" inquired Jim. "That's my business." "Well, I haven't any curiosity about this thing," said Jim, shaking his head slowly as he spoke. "I'm satisfied to stay right here and be true to the old flag. There comes Sairy Ann," he added, as Noel heard the sounds of the voices of women approaching from the stairway, which the night before he had seen was on the opposite side of the room. It was manifest now that Sairy Ann also had her visitor, and as the two women entered the room both men became silent. "I done tole yo' how it is," Sairy Ann was saying. "I've said to yo' many times, 'Liza, that I wouldn't stand for no sech foolishness. I don' like the secesh. I never did and I never shall, and if yo' 're determined to be secesh yourself, then yo' 'll have to take the consequences! I don't mind tellin' yo' all as how I hev made my will." "Hev ye?" inquired the other woman, the tones of her voice implying that she was at once deeply interested. "Yes, I hev, and instead of leaving yo' all the money I promised yo', I've willed yo' a pair o' my shoestrings." "I don' believe yo' hev done any sech thing, Sairy Ann!" protested the other woman. "I don't care whether yo' believe it or not. That's jest exactly what I hev done. I hev set it down pertic'lar,--'To my oldest sister, 'Liza, I give, bequeath and leave and likewise devise one pair of shoestrings.'" "Well, I'd rather hev a pair of shoestrings and be loyal to my State than I would to hev all your money and be a Yank." "Of course, _you_ would, 'Liza," snapped Sairy Ann. "That's because yo' don't know no mo'. If yo' knew mo', yo' wouldn't talk sech nonsense." Whether or not the woman's argument was deemed sufficient, at all events the conversation abruptly ceased when the visiting man said, "Now, I hev come fo' yo' yere, 'Liza, and I don't intend to stay very long. You hev got to make up your mind right sma't whether yo' 're goin' to come with me, or whether yo' 're going to stay here with your sister."