SALLY. I’ll hear no more! (_Looking at watch._) Five seconds more! Now your hour has come! (_Points pistol. Both duck and dodge._) Die, cowards, die! (_Both dash up in L. U. E. Sally follows as if to shoot. Both put up their legs and hands as if to ward off. Sally breaks down laughing, and throws off her hat._) HEZEKIAH. (_Recognizing._) Jewniper hallelewyer! BARNEY. The blackguard? HEZEKIAH. Jerewserlim swipes! Where did you bile up from? BARNEY. (_Seizing his gun._) I shall bust with contimpt! (_Goes out L. U. E. in a rage._) HEZEKIAH. Gosh all Jewpiter! I thought you was old Hood. Come here and let me see if you hain’t a ghost! (_Dashes into Hez. arms._) All here, by beeswax! (_Kisses her._) SALLY. (_Pulling out note book._) Look er that! I’m war correspondent of the Pordunk Cultivater. HEZEKIAH. You git out! Where ye get them close? SALLY. Hez., after you went away, I couldn’t eat nor sleep for fourteen weeks. HEZEKIAH. You don’t? SALLY. Fact! Then my best hen and the old cat died, and I jest thought I should go crazy. Then Bill Larkins ’listed for a sutler, and I was mad all over. After you left, that scallawag was preachin’ treason all the time, till he found he could be a sutler. He’s bin _ravin’_ for rebel blood ever since. A man jest told me that Bill bought a bad barrel er vinnegar for half a dollar—made it into eighteen barrels er cider, and sold it all out to the regiment for ten cents a glass! HEZEKIAH. I thought I smelt vinegar awful strong when I was over there t’other day! SALLY. You jest wait for the next Pordunk Cultivater! If I don’t chaw him up! HEZEKIAH. You jest wait till I get home and light on him again! SALLY. Ye see when Bill Larkins done that, I said I would get some men’s clothes and ’list myself! When it come round ter bein’ examined by the doctor, I had ter back out. Then I jest went and hired out on the Perdunk Cultivater. HEZEKIAH. Sal, I never’s so proud on ye ’fore in my life. Yer jest handsum! SALLY. Now you get out, Hez. You’re soapin? HEZEKIAH. On’er bright? SALLY. Oh, yer ought ter see me in my new dress, Hez. I had it made after you left. Oh, my! It’s got a tail to it more’n four feet long! Pashe Milliken made it. She got the pattern of Butrick in Boston. It’s a stunner! Got a flummux all over the hind part of it. But Pashe beat me on one thing, though. HEZEKIAH. How’d she do that? SALLY. Ye see they have to put in somethin’ behind here, to make ’em swell. Pashe told me it was stuffin’. One day I heard a crumplin’, and I ripped open the linen to see what it was. Don’t yer think, that hump was swell’d up with old Pordunk Cultivators! HEZEKIAH. You git out! SALLY. When I get home, I’m jest goin’ ter lay fer her. HEZEKIAH. Say, Sal. I s’pose ye got that dress ter git married in, didn’t ye? SALLY. Ye don’t s’pose I’d spread like that jest for a go-ter-meetin’ dress, do ye? HEZEKIAH. Cost six dollars?