Above him was a clear sky, a quarter moon, an enveloping mist of stars,

and the very peace of heaven. But there was little sleep--and that

battle-haunted--for any: and for him none at all.

* * * * * And none at all during that night of agony for Judith, nor Phyllis, nor

the mother at Canewood, though there was a reaction of joy, next

morning, when the name of neither Crittenden was among the wounded or

the dead.

Nothing had been heard, so far, of the elder brother but, as they sat in

the porch, a negro boy brought the town paper, and Mrs. Crittenden found

a paragraph about a soldier springing into the sea in full uniform at

Siboney to rescue a drowning comrade, who had fallen into the surf while

trying to land, and had been sunk to the bottom by his arms and

ammunition. And the rescuer's name was Crittenden. The writer went on to

tell who he was, and how he had given up his commission to a younger

brother and had gone as a private in the regular army--how he had been

offered another after he reached Cuba, and had declined that,

too--having entered with his comrades, he would stay with them to the

end. Whereat the mother's face burned with a proud fire, as did

Phyllis's, when Mrs. Crittenden read on about this Crittenden's young

brother, who, while waiting for his commission, had gone as a Rough

Rider, and who, after gallant conduct during the first fight, had taken

his place on General Carter's staff. Phyllis clapped her hands, softly,

with a long sigh of pride--and relief.

"I can eat strawberries, now." And she blushed again. Phyllis had been

living on bacon and corn-bread, she confessed shamefacedly, because

Trooper Basil was living on bacon and hardtack--little dreaming that the

food she forced upon herself in this sacrificial way was being swallowed

by that hearty youngster with a relish that he would not have known at

home for fried chicken and hot rolls.

"Yes," laughed Mrs. Crittenden. "You can eat strawberries now. You can

balance them against his cocoanuts."

Phyllis picked up the paper then, with a cry of surprise--the name

signed to the article was Grafton, whom she had seen at the recruiting

camp. And then she read the last paragraph that the mother had not read

aloud, and she turned sharply away and stooped to a pink-bed, as though

she would pick one, and the mother saw her shoulders shaking with silent

sobs, and she took the child in her arms.

There was to be a decisive fight in a few days--the attack on

Santiago--that was what Phyllis had read. The Spaniard had a good

muster-roll of regulars and aid from Cervera's fleet; was well armed,

and had plenty of time to intrench and otherwise prepare himself for a

bloody fight in the last ditch.




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