The hill-girl held out her hand. She looked up to Andrews and smiled as she shook hands. She looked down at Tom--she was half a head taller than he--and smiled again as she shook hands. Then suddenly she stooped and kissed the startled boy. Then she fled back along the lane by which she had come, leaving the placid cows and the thankful man and boy behind her. With a flutter of butternut skirt and a twinkle of bare, brown feet, she vanished from their sight. Thanks to her directions, they found Old Man Tomblin's settle_mint_ without difficulty. They duly stood at the corner of the sagging rail fence and there duly "hollered." Old Man Tomblin and Bud Tomblin came out of the cabin, each with a gun, and were proceeding to study the "furriners" before letting them come in, when Andrews repeated what Old Man Gernt's Sairey had told them to say. There was an instant welcome. Bud Tomblin was even more anxious than his father to do anything Sairey Gernt wanted done. The fugitives' story that they had been scouting near General Mitchell's line of march and had lost their guns and nearly lost themselves in a raid by Northern cavalry was accepted without demur. Old Mrs. Tomblin, decrepit with the early decrepitude of the hill-folk, whose hard living conditions make women old at forty and venerable at fifty, cackled a welcome to them from the corner of the fireplace where she sat "dipping" snuff. "Lidy" Tomblin, the eldest daughter, helped and hindered by the rest of a brood of children, took care of their comfort. They feasted on the best the humble household had to offer. They slept soundly, albeit eight other people, including Mr. and Mrs. Tomblin and Lidy, slept in the same room. In the morning they were given a bountiful breakfast and were bidden good-by as old friends. "I hate to deceive good people like the Tomblins," said Tom, when they were out of earshot. "Sometimes the truth is too precious to be told," laughed Andrews. But Tom continued to be troubled in mind as he tramped along. He made up his mind to fight for his country, the next time he had a chance, in some other way. Telling a lie and living a lie were hateful to him. The next morning found them at Big Shanty, a tiny Georgia village, which the war had made a great Confederate camp. It was the appointed day, Saturday, April 12, 1862. Of the twenty-two men who had started with Andrews, eighteen met that morning at Big Shanty. The train for Chattanooga stopped there for breakfast on those infrequent days when it did not arrive so late that its stop was for dinner. It was what is called a "mixed" train, both freight and passenger, with many freight cars following the engine and a tail of a couple of shabby passenger cars. On this particular morning it surprised everybody, including its own train-crew, by being on time. Passengers and crew swarmed in to breakfast. The train was deserted. The time for the great adventure had come.