Mark Rivers, is with them."
He slept none. It was early dawn when Rivers came in anxious and
troubled. For the first time in years of acquaintance he found Penhallow
depressed, and amazed because so small a wound made him weak and unable
to think clearly or to give orders. "And it was some stupid boy from our
line," he said.
His incapacity made Rivers uneasy, and although Penhallow broke out to
his surprise in angry remonstrance, he convinced him at last that he must
return to Grey Pine on sick leave. He asked no question about the army.
Insisting that he was too well to give up his command, nevertheless he
talked much of headache and lack of bodily power. He was, as Rivers saw,
no longer the good-humoured, quiet gentleman, with no thought of self. In
a week he was stronger, but as his watchful friend realized, there was
something mysteriously wrong with his mental and moral mechanism.
On the day after the battle Penhallow asked to have his wife telegraphed
that he was slightly wounded, and that she must not come to him. Rivers
wrote also a brief and guarded letter to Leila of their early return to
Grey Pine.
In a vain effort to interest the colonel, he told him of the surrender of
Vicksburg.--He asked where it was and wasn't John there, but somewhat
later became more clear-minded and eager to go home.
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