Oblivious to the occurrences related in the preceding chapter, Stringtown slept. Extraordinary events were required in 1864, to waken her people. The tramp of cavalry had become a familiar sound. A nocturnal raid had ceased to be novel. Long trains of army wagons, the curses of mule-drivers, the crack of black-snake whips, the sound of blows belabouring the backs of the patient brutes, were constant day and night along the dusty pike. The beating of drums, and the music of bands, the singing of enthusiastic men in bright new uniforms, the mirth that always accompanied the recruit marching South to ?glory,? sounded in the ears of our people so often as to excite no further comment. The tramps of veterans when transfer of commands brought old soldiers back from the war, men with whom the lack of bluster and of mirthful singing was in marked contrast to the behaviour of the new-made soldier, did not disturb us. One looked forward to waving flags, valiant cavalry charges, and pictured battle scenes in which, amid cheers of comrades, the waving banner was proudly carried on to the ramparts of the enemy: the other had known war in its reality; war which meant burned dwellings, weeping mothers, children huddled into groups, lands devastated, homes destroyed, distress and famine, pain and suffering to the innocent; and these experienced no ecstacy in thinking of battle charges where blood flowed from friend and foe, no pleasure in reminiscences even of success where fire, smoke and death once prevailed. The places vacated by lost messmates, and the shrinking forms of suffering children and bereaved mothers, taught a sorrowful lesson to him who had taken part in war.
We of Stringtown slept during the passing of the squad of cavalry which Cupe saw tramping up the pike, and we also slept while the same raiding troop returned from a saddened household with a single prisoner, the rebel son of Mr. Nordman. And if Stringtown?s people knew nothing of this tramping of a hundred horses, how could they have been aware of the stealthy footsteps of the old slave who that night had twice encircled their outskirts? Why should they awaken, when from a distance the old hound raised his voice beside the negro who searched for the lost footsteps of the wandering child?
But when morning came, with unabated energy the search was resumed. Aid was solicited from the country about, dogs were employed, but either the trail had cooled or the strange dogs were not gifted as was George Washington, for they found no trace of the wanderer?s track. A party of seekers straggled to the cabin of Cupe, who sat as usual beside the cabin door, his old dog asleep at his side.
?Yo? doan p?tend t? say dat yo? hain?t foun? de chile yit??
?No signs of her. Lend us George; perhaps he can strike the trail.?
?Yo? am welcome t? de dawg, but he am no ?count. He am like his ma?se. He doan trail de ?possum an? de coon now, he hain?t got sense nuff in his ole head fo? huntin?. Go wid de gem?n, Dgawge; git up, yo? lazy houn?, an? go wid de gem?n!?
The visitors whistled to the dog, which listlessly and with drooping head followed them from the door.
?Ya, ya,? said Cupe, when the men had disappeared, ?yo? am buhn?n yoah candle at de wrong end when yo? walk ?way from dis cabin. Yo? might es well look fo? an eah ob cohn wid thirteen rows es t? look fo? de gearl wha? yo? am gwine.?
In a short time old George slunk back and resumed his former location. Cupe still rested beside the door; Dinah sat in the back doorway; no other person was to be seen.
Stringtown?s search continued until, after several days had passed, hope departed from every breast. The child was given up as lost. Rumours arose that could not be traced to any authentic source, and yet were passed from mouth to mouth, to the effect that Susie had straggled to the pike and was found by a band of Northern soldiers marching south, who carried the homeless waif away. This rumour grew into accepted fact when a soldier on furlough, returning from the front, stopped at one of the Stringtrown taverns and told of a child who, petted by her new-found friends, was now in the Army of the Cumberland.