Rawson's, the leading man of the Ridge region, where the squire's
granddaughter, a fresh-faced girl of ten or twelve years, took care of
the little orphan and kept her interested.

The burial, in accordance with a wish expressed by General Huntington,
took place in a corner of the little burying-ground at Ridgely, which
lay on a sunny knoll overlooking the long slope to the northeastward.
The child walked after the bier, holding fast to Gordon's hand, while
Dr. Balsam and General Keith walked after them.

As soon as General Keith could hear from Miss Brooke he took the child
to her; but to the last Lois said that she wanted Gordon to come
with her.

Soon afterwards it appeared that General Huntington's property had
nearly all gone. His plantation was sold.

Several times Lois wrote Gordon quaint little letters scrawled in a
childish hand, asking about the calves and pigeons and chickens that had
been her friends. But after a while the letters ceased to come.

When Elphinstone was sold, the purchaser was a certain Mr. Aaron
Wickersham of New York, the father of Ferdy Wickersham, with whom Gordon
had had the rock-battle. Mr. Wickersham was a stout and good-humored
man of fifty, with a head like a billiard-bail, and a face that was both
shrewd and kindly. He had, during the war, made a fortune out of
contracts, and was now preparing to increase it in the South, where the
mountain region, filled with coal and iron, lay virgin for the first
comer with sufficient courage and astuteness to take it. He found the
new legislature of the State an instrument well fitted to his hands. It