Page:Palo'mine (1925).pdf/176

 Colonel Eaton got up slowly and went to the window where he stood looking out at the landscape for a long time. He was so quiet that Halsey almost wondered if he had heard him.

"I am sorry if you are disappointed, Uncle," said the boy, "I have got to do what seems right to me."

Colonel Eaton turned and faced his nephew. He was very pale, but his voice was quiet and possessed as he spoke.

"That is right, Halsey," he said. "We have all got to do what looks right to us. I shall probably join the Confederate army."

"Oh," cried Halsey, "will I have to fight against you, Uncle?"

"I am afraid so, and against a part of Kentucky. Our state will probably stay in the Union, but many of our Blue Grass sons will join the Confederate army."

"Uncle Hillery, I can never fight against you. That would be murder!"

"War is murder any way you look at it, son. But we will all have to obey the call