I found a shallow place in the river and crossed.  The sun was up; I kept it on my right.  What should I do and say when I should reach our men?  Our men! how odd the thought sounded!  I must get to them quickly.  The rebels were moving.  The whole of two corps of infantry were seeking to fall upon our rear.  I must hasten, or there would be a third Bull Run.

But what can I say?  How can I make them believe?  How can I avoid being captured, and brought before the officers as a rebel?  I will call for Dr. Khayme to bear out my words.  I will appeal to General Morell and to General Grover.  But all this will take time.  The loss of a day, half a day, an hour, means defeat.  Meade’s army ought to be falling back now.  To retreat at once may save it—­to delay means terrible disaster.

I hasten on, thinking always what I shall say, what I shall do, to make the generals believe.  Oh! if I can but cause a speedy retreat of the army, a safe retreat from the toils laid for its destruction, I shall be happy.  I will even say that my service as a Confederate was a small price to pay ... what had the Doctor said?  He had said that my infirmity was a power!  He had said that he could imagine cases in which my peculiar affliction would give great opportunity for serving the country.  What a mind that man has!  He is to be feared.  I wonder if he has had active part in what has befallen me.

I keep a straight north course over hill and hollow, through wood and field, crossing narrow roads that lead nowhere.  Farmhouses and fields and groves and streams and roads I pass in haste, knowing or feeling that I shall find no help here.  Here I shun nothing; here I seek nothing—­beyond this region are the people I want.  What can I say? what can I prove?  This is the question that troubles me.  If I say that I am a Union soldier, I must tell the whole truth, and that I cannot do; besides, it would not be believed.  If I say I am a deserter, my declarations as to Lee’s movement will not be taken without suspicion.  What shall I do?  If I could but get a horse; if I could but get Federal clothing; I might hope to find a horse, but to get a blue uniform seems impossible.  I must go as I am, and as I can.  If I could but find Dr. Khayme!  But I know not how to find him.  If he is yet with the army, he is somewhere in its rear.  Is he yet with the army?  Is he yet alive?  And Lydia?  My God, what might have happened to her in so many long months!  Yet, I have trust.  I shall find the Doctor, and I shall find Lydia, but I cannot go at once to them; I must lose no time; to seek the Doctor might be ruin.  I must go as fast as possible to the general headquarters.

To the southeast I hear the boom of a distant gun—­and another.  I hurry on.  What do they mean by fighting down there?

I keep looking out for a horse, but I see none—­none in the fields or roads or pastures or lots.  This war-stricken land is bare.  No smoke rises from the farmhouses.  The fields are untilled; the roads are untravelled.  There are no horses in such a land.