At a Girl's Mercy, or, The Fortunes of War — page 96: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

AT A GIRL’S MERCY, 85 country, as their men were doing. She envied Helen so many times when the days passed like crawling things, and there was nothing for her to do but ‘watch the papers for any item of news regarding the boys—the boys, and one other of whom she thought, with quickened heart-beats, and warmer color in the tender face under its fluffy golden hair. He was brave, she knew, he could be nothing else than brave; it was his heart and soul and honor, and he would fight in the very midst of the worst perils, cheering on his men by his own bravery. The men must be cheered, he had told her so many times, and she knew he was the man to cheer them, though his own life might be at its end. The mere thought of this swept the sweet color from her face, leaving only the pathetic effort at bravery that made it al- most impossible for one loving her to see. “The devils are growing daily more desperate,” the squire said, one evening, in speaking of the rab- bles inthe city. ‘‘There is a subdued murmur of threat and vengeance in the air that bodes no good to the city. But there are men on the watch for some such outbreak, and they will have the mob in their power almost before it is born, when the time comes. You need have no fear for me, little girl. Why should they harm me?”’ He laughed that she might laugh, as she so many times had done for him, but there was no answer- ing parting of her sweet, quivering mouth, as her eyes searched his face for any evidence of more harm than he had told her. She was beginning to understand how dcuierals the men were who were forced into the fight against their will, and what a set of men they were also, and how thoroughly capable of wreaking their ven- GEomicboo eS} GC m