At Glasgow, his old home, Al had an opportunity to go ashore for a short time and he was astonished and grieved to note the changes which three short years had wrought in the familiar old town. The levee was deserted save by a few indolent loafers who, without recognizing him, stared at him suspiciously as he went past; for in that terror-haunted country, fear and suspicion of everybody and everything had become the habit of the people. Climbing the hill to the main part of town, he found grass growing in the once bustling business streets and many buildings locked and vacant. His father's old store was among them, closed as he had left it. He saw no familiar faces; most of the men and boys he had known were off in one of the armies, Confederate or Union, and the women were not often venturing from their houses in such times. In the residence section the scene was still worse. House after house stood deserted and going to decay. With slow steps Al went on to the place which had been the home of his family in the dear old days when they were happy and prosperous. The gate was fallen from the hinges, weeds were growing thickly over the gravel walks, several panes of glass were broken out of the windows, and a loose shutter creaked dolefully in the wind. He rested his hand on a weather-beaten fence picket and gazed out into the garden he remembered so well, where he and Tommy and Annie had played; and beyond that into the orchard, where the summer apples used to grow so large and red and juicy. The cords of his throat tightened and a mist swam before his eyes. Weeds and grass and broken limbs strewed the ground; silence and desolation were everywhere. He turned away abruptly and hastened back to the levee, never stopping until he was once more on the boiler deck of the _Island City_, where General Sully and several other officers were smoking and playing cards. It seemed to him as if a ghost were following him, the ghost of dead days, so tenderly remembered that the thought of them was unendurable, and for the time being he wanted only to plunge into the present and forget. CHAPTER VIII PRAIRIE MARCHING