He spent more and more of his time
in the woods or about the Cross-roads, the only store and post-office
near the district where the little tides of the quiet life around
used to meet. At length Mrs. Stanley considered it so serious
that she took it upon herself to go over and talk to her neighbor,
Mrs. Douwill, as she generally did on matters too intricate and grave
for the experience of the district. She found Mrs. Douwill,
as always, sympathetic and kind, and though she took back with her
not much enlightenment as to the cause of her son's trouble or its cure,
she went home in a measure comforted with the assurance of the sympathy of one
stronger than she. She had found out that her neighbor, powerful and rich
as she seemed to her to be, had her own troubles and sorrows;
she heard from her of the danger of war breaking out at any time,
and her husband would enlist among the first.
Little Darby did not say much when his mother told of her visit;
but his usually downcast eyes had a new light in them,
and he began to visit the Cross-roads oftener.
At last one day the news that came to the Cross-roads was that
there was to be war. It had been in the air for some time,
but now it was undoubted. It came in the presence of Mr. Douwill himself,
who had come the night before and was commissioned by the Governor
to raise a company.
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