All the while I was wondering what could have become of the other family--if they had gone--and yet now and then I caught a tone in our visitor's voice as he talked to my Soldier, that sounded very similar to the tones of the man in trouble belonging to them, though I did not see how it would be possible for any one to drive, or wish to drive, him out of one's home. When, after awhile, I came in for the compliments of the season, my astonishment knew no bounds when I learned that he had been the sole occupant of that room since Sunday night.
The clock in the court struck seven. Rising hastily, and with many apologies, this strange-family man wrote something on his card, and handing it to my husband, said, "I am playing at the theater here to-night--come and see me," and was gone.
To this kind stranger, William Florence, I was indebted for my first taste of the pleasures of the theater. Almost every evening he joined us on the veranda, shared our play with baby, cheered and entertained the General, and kindly took us afterward to see the play. Yet, during the whole of his stay--four days--he never once, in the most remote way, intruded himself upon our confidence; and though he knew there was some mystery, in his innate delicacy he made no allusion to it.
On Saturday evening, when his engagement was over and he came to say good-bye, after lingering over the pleasant evenings we had passed together, and putting great stress upon the benefit they had been to him, he stopped abruptly, saying:
"Confound it all! Forgive me, if I put my foot in it--but here is something to buy a rattle for the youngster. I swear I absolutely have no use for it. In fact, I never had so much money at one time before in my whole life, and it belongs by rights to the young rascal; for, if it had not been for the 'cat's in the fiddle,' the 'cow jumping over the moon,' 'getting the poor dog a bone,' and 'Our Father who art in heaven,' I should have spent every red cent of it on the fellows. Please--I insist," he said, as my husband refused. "I know you have had more money than you seem to be bothered with now; take this."
Though we were both very much touched by the kind generosity of this stranger in a strange land, my Soldier was firm in his refusal.