Page:Randall Parrish--My Lady of the South.djvu/95

NEWS FOR ROSECRANS him, yet still retaining my hand clasped tightly within his own.

"Very well; now, Sergeant King, we are prepared to listen to your story."

I told it swiftly, realizing the value of time, and inspired by the interest I immediately perceived depicted in the faces clustered about. I related merely what they needed to know from the military view-point, leaving out all reference to the girl, except to mention that she was the cause of Lieutenant Dunn’s night ride. At the end of my narrative both Rosecrans and the Major questioned me sharply, but I was able to answer most of their queries with convincing clearness.

"You report," pursued the questioning Major ﬁnally, "that the plan, as you understood it, was to double the Confederate right wing to the rear past their centre last night; then, that during to-day, and under protection of those bluffs yonder, the centre will also be moved to the left, thus massing their entire ﬁghting force just back of Minersville soon after dark, with the intention of hurling it in solid mass against our unprepared right ﬂank at daybreak to-morrow? Do I state this correctly?"

"That was my understanding, sir."

"Yet our pickets have reported no movement apparent in their front; camp-ﬁres were burning the full length of the Confederate lines from Minersville to Coulter's Landing all through the night."

"Then the most of them must have been dummy ﬁres, sir, for I rode from Denslow’s plantation to Coulter's without encountering a single man. I am positive that [ 85 ]