of fingers upon his arms made him suddenly aware of the fact that he was a
prisoner, and he fell into step with the soldiers.

"So you were a-goin' to fight the Yanks, were you!" asked one of them.

"We'll talk about that later," answered Tom.

"'Pears to me that it ain't anything I'd want to talk about at any time if
I was you," answered the other soldier.

Tom, with his guards, was in the lead; then came Wilson, with Shadrack a
few paces behind him. The Sergeant was with Shadrack. Tom glanced back, and
his eyes met Wilson's. There was a flash of understanding between them;
then Wilson turned to look at Shadrack, as though cautioning silence. No
one spoke as they picked their way along through the ooze of mud in the
direction of the main road. To their left was another shanty, much like the
one in which they had spent the night, and before the door stood a man,
with his wife and child, gazing at them dumbly. The man was dressed, but
the woman and child had wrapped tattered blankets over them for protection
against the cold. Tom, as he watched them, reconstructed the drama of the
night before. They, he thought, were "poor whites," like the man in whose
shanty they had slept--Smith, the soldiers had called him--and their hearts
were with the Northern army. Smith, when he had left on the pretext of
attending to his chickens, had probably gone to them, routed them out of
bed to tell them of the rebels he was harboring. The man had dressed and
floundered through the mud until he came to the Union pickets, brought the
soldiers back with him to Smith's shanty. That was his service to the
Northern cause, and he must feel proud now, thought Tom. There, huddling
together on the doorstep of their miserable, rain-soaked hut, they had
visible proof of having helped the North, of having rendered their service.