Our Breakfast Had Been Very Early That Morning, On Account Of The Troops Marching, And I Was Tired And Fell

Asleep immediately, I think. After a while I was conscious of hearing some one walking about in the room corresponding

To mine in the next house, but I dozed on, thinking to myself that there was no occasion for feeling nervous, as the people next door were still up. But suddenly I remembered that the house was closed, and just then I distinctly heard some one go down the stairs. I kept very still and listened, but heard nothing more and soon went to sleep again, but again I was awakened - this time by queer noises - like some one walking on a roof. There were voices, too, as if some one was mumbling to himself.

I got the revolver and ran to the middle of the room, where I stood ready to shoot or run - it would probably have been run - in any direction. I finally got courage to look through a side window, feeling quite sure that Mrs. Norton was out with her Chinaman, looking after some choice little chickens left in her care by the doctor. But not one light was to be seen in any place, and the inky blackness was awful to look upon, so I turned away, and just as I did so, something cracked and rattled down over the shingles and then fell to the ground. But which roof those sounds came from was impossible to tell. With "goose flesh" on my arms, and each hair on my head trying to stand up, I went back to the middle of the room, and there I stood, every nerve quivering.

I had been standing there hours - or possibly it was only two short minutes - when there was one loud, piercing shriek, that made me almost scream, too. But after it was perfect silence, so I said to myself that probably it had been a cat - that I was nervous and silly. But there came another shriek, another, and still another, so expressive of terror that the blood almost froze in my veins. With teeth chattering and limbs shaking so I could hardly step, I went to a front window, and raising it I screamed, "Corporal of the guard!"

I saw the sentinel at the guardhouse stop, as though listening, in front of a window where there was a light, and seeing one of the guard gave strength to my voice, and I called again. That time the sentry took it up, and yelled, "Corporal of the guard, No. 1!" Instantly lanterns were seen coming in our direction - ever so many of the guard came, and to our gate as they saw me at a window. But I sent them on to the next house where they found poor Mrs. Norton in a white heap on the grass, quite unconscious.

The officer of the day was still up and came running to see what the commotion was about - and several other officers came. Colonel Gregory, a punctilious gentleman of the old school - who is in command just now - appeared in a striking costume, consisting of a skimpy evening gown of white, a dark military blouse over that, and a pair of military riding boots, and he carried an unsheathed saber. He is very tall and thin and his hair is very white, and I laugh now when I think of how funny he looked. But no one thought of laughing at that time. Mrs. Norton was carried in, and her house searched throughout. No one was found, but burned matches were on the floor of one or two rooms, which gave evidence that some one had been there.

In the yard back of the house a pair of heavy overshoes, also government socks, were found, so it was decided that the man had climbed up on the roof and entered the house through a dormer window that had not been fastened. No one would look for the piece of shingle that night, but in the morning I found it on the ground close to the house.

All the time the search was being made I had been in the window. Colonel Mills insisted that I should go to his house for the remainder of the night, but suggested that I put some clothes on first! It occurred to me then, for the first time, that my own costume was rather striking - not quite the proper thing for a balcony scene. Everyone was more than kind, but for a long time after Miss Mills and I had gone to her room my teeth chattered and big tears rolled down my face. Mrs. Norton declares that I was more frightened than she was, and I say, "Yes, probably, but you did not stop to listen to your own horrible screams, and then, after making us believe that you were being murdered, you quietly dropped into oblivion and forgot the whole thing."

Just as the entire garrison had become quiet once more - bang! went a gun, and then again we heard people running about to see what was the matter, and if the burglar had been caught. But it proved to have been the accidental going off of a rifle at the guardhouse. The instant that Colonel Gregory ascertained that a soldier had really been in Mrs. Norton's house, check roll-call was ordered - that is, the officer of the day went to the different barracks and ordered the first sergeants to get the men up and call the roll at once, without warning or preparation. In that way it was ascertained if the men were on their cots or out of quarters. But that night every man was "present or accounted for." At the hospital, roll-call was not necessary, but they found an attendant playing possum! A lantern held close to his face did not waken him, although it made his eyelids twitch, and they found that his heart was beating at a furious rate.

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