continued, grinning. "We sorter reckoned as how we wanted ter see who
wus yere afore we come in. 'I'll listen till my fancy hears the clang
of swords, the crash of spears.' These yere is tough times, stranger,
in these parts, an' a man whut has ter pertect a lovely female hes got
ter keep his eye skinned."

Maria sniffed contemptuously.

"Ye're no great shakes at a pertectin' o' me, Jed Bungay. Now you sit
down thar an' begin ter fill up. I reckon as how ther Cap an' his gal
will kinder jine with us fer manners."

She seated Jed with such extreme vigor that I looked for the chair to
collapse beneath him as he came down, but the little man, not in the
least daunted, picked up his knife and fork with a sigh of relief.

"'O woman! in our hours of ease uncertain, coy, and hard to please,'"
he murmured. "Come, sit down, stranger; 'Sit down an' share a soldier's
couch, a soldier's fare.' Not as I'm a sojer," he hastened to explain,
"but thet's how it is in ther book. Say, old woman, kint ye kinder sker
up some coffee fer we uns--leastwise whut us Confeds call coffee?"

Without much difficulty I induced Mrs. Brennan to draw her chair once
more to the table, and I sat down beside her.

"You are Confederate, then?" I asked, curious to know upon which side
his sympathies were enlisted in the struggle.

He glanced warily at my gray jacket, then his shrewd, shifty eyes
wandered to the blue and yellow cavalry cloak lying on the floor.