XV
_AGATHA'S VENTURE_
After a month or two of cautious correspondence with friends and otherswho were to aid her in carrying out her purpose, Agatha Ronald set outone day, and drove with Martha, her maid, to Winchester, where she hadfriends. After a week's stay there, she made her way to a little town onthe Potomac, again taking up quarters with friends.
From this point, she communicated through her friends with intimates oftheirs who lived in Maryland. Finally she had arrangements made by whicha succession of houses was open to her, all of them the homes of peoplestrongly in sympathy with the South. But she must first manage to getthrough the Federal lines unobserved, and in this a Federal commanderunwittingly aided her. He threw a small force one day into the littletown in which she was staying, meaning to hold possession of it as apart of the loosely drawn lines on the upper river. This left Agathawithin Federal domain--a young gentlewoman visiting friends, and in noway attracting attention to herself. Presently she moved on intoMaryland, and by short stages made her way to the house of a very ardentSouthern family, near the Pennsylvania border. From there it was easyfor her to go to Harrisburg, and thence by rail to Baltimore.
The chief purpose of her journey was now practically accomplished. Shehad established what she called her "underground railroad," with amultitude of stations, and a very roundabout route. But it would serveits purpose all the better for that, she thought, as the chief conditionof its successful operation was that its existence should at no time besuspected.
In Baltimore, proceeding with the utmost caution, she put herself intoindirect communication with a large number of "Dixie girls"--as youngwomen in that city whose hearts were with the South were called. Itwould not do for her to meet these young women personally. That mightexcite suspicion, especially as most of them had brothers in theSouthern army. But through others she succeeded in organising themsecretly into a band prepared to do her work.
That work was the purchase of medicines--chiefly morphine andquinine--and the smuggling of them through the lines into theConfederacy for the use of the armies there. For it is one of thebarbarisms of war which civilisation has not yet outgrown, thatmedicines, even those which are imperatively necessary for the saving oflife and the prevention of suffering, are held to be as strictlycontraband as gunpowder itself is.
Agatha's plan was to have her associates in Baltimore purchase medicinesand surgical appliances in that city and elsewhere--buying only in smallquantities in each case, in order to avoid suspicion, but buying largequantities in the aggregate--and forward them to her in Virginia by wayof her underground railroad; that is to say, passing them from hand tohand over the route by which she had herself reached Baltimore.
Having perfected these arrangements, her next task was herself to getback to her home, whither she did not mean to go empty-handed. She hadgowns made for herself and Martha, using two thicknesses of oiled silkas interlining. Between these she bestowed as much morphia as could beplaced there without attracting attention.
This done, she was ready for her return journey, which presentedextraordinary difficulty. She could not return by the way she had come,lest the purpose of her journey should be discovered, and her plans forthe future be thwarted. She must find some other way.
At first she thought of making her way southward to the lower reaches ofthe Potomac, and depending upon chance for means of getting across theriver there, but this was rendered impracticable by the news that theConfederates had retired from their advanced outposts to Manassas andCentreville, with the Fairfax Court-house line as their extreme advanceposition. This meant, of course, that they no longer held in anyconsiderable force the posts along the lower river. Moreover, Agathalearned that both the Potomac below Washington, and the navigable partof the Rappahannock were closely patrolled now, by night and by day, bya numerous fleet of big and little Federal war-ships. There seemed nocourse open to her but to try in some way to get through to Stuart'spickets, if in any way or at any risk she could manage that. That shedetermined to attempt.
Her first step was to visit friends on the Potomac above Washington.There she learned minutely what the situation was. With some difficultyshe secured permission to go as a guest to a house near Falls Church, inVirginia. She had hoped there to find Confederate picket-posts, and towork her way to some one of them by stealth or strategy, or by boldlytaking risks. She found instead that the nearest Confederate outpost wasat Fairfax Court-house, nine miles away, while the inner Federal lineslay on the route from Falls Church to Vienna, and stretched both waysfrom those points. Stuart was no longer at Mason's and Munson's Hills.With the approach of winter the Confederates had retired to theirfortified line, and Stuart, with the cavalry, had established himself atCamp Cooper and other camps, three or four miles in rear of the FairfaxCourt-house line, which now constituted his extreme advance.
Moreover, the Federal army, under McClellan's skilled and vigilantcommand, had been completely reorganised, drilled, disciplined, andconverted from the chaotic mass described in his report--quoted in aformer chapter--into an alert and trustworthy army, destined, duringlater campaigns, to cover itself with glory. At present, McClellan, whohad no thought of advancing upon Centreville and Manassas, where theConfederates were strongly fortified, was at any rate manifesting spiritby continually pressing the Confederate outposts, and now and thenmaking considerable demonstrations against them.
His inner picket-lines, as already explained, were drawn very near thehouse in which Agatha was sojourning. His advanced posts--where theskirmishing was frequent--were along the Fairfax Court-house line.Between these two lines lay eight or ten miles of thick and difficultcountry, held by the Federals, and scouted over every day, but notregularly picketed.
Thus, instead of a mile or two of difficulty, Agatha had before her tenmiles of trouble, with a prospect of worse at the end of it.
Time and extraordinary care were necessary to meet these newdifficulties. Agatha's first problem was to find out all she could offacts, to gather exact and trustworthy information. In this endeavourshe had a shrewdly intelligent co-adjutor in Martha.
By way of avoiding suspicion--for the family with whom she was stayingwere known to be strongly Southern in their sympathies, and the Federalofficers had begun to understand the devoted loyalty of the negroes tothe families that owned them--Agatha established Martha in a cabin ofher own a mile or more from the house. There Martha posed as a freenegro woman, who was disposed to make a living for herself by sellingfried chickens, biscuits, and pies to the Federal soldiers on theinterior picket-lines, and a little later to those posted farther inadvance.
Martha was a sagacious as well as a discreet person. At first she showeda timid reluctance to go farther toward the front than the inner linesfrom Falls Church to Vienna. While peddling her wares there, she tookpains to learn all the foot-paths, and the location of all thepicket-posts in that region. Then little by little she allowed herselfto be persuaded to go farther toward the outer lines, for the soldiersfound her fried chicken and her biscuits and her pies particularlyalluring.
It was only after she had mastered both the topography of the countrybetween, and the exact methods of its military occupation, that she sofar overcame her assumed timidity as to push on with her basket to thepicket-posts immediately in front of Fairfax Court-house itself. Sheraised her prices as she went, lest by selling out her stock in tradeshe should leave herself no excuse for going to the extreme front atall. For the same reason she came at last to pass by many posts whereshe had formerly had good customers, retaining her wares professedly forthe sake of the higher prices that the men at the front gladly paid forsomething better to eat than the contents of their haversacks.
Within a week or two Martha had learned and reported to her mistressquite all that any officer on either side knew of the country, itsroads, its foot-paths, its difficulties, and the opportunities itafforded. In the middle of every night, Martha made her way to hermistress, or her mistress made her way to Mar
tha, until at last, Agatha,who had directed her inquiries, was equipped with all necessaryinformation, and ready for her supreme endeavour. It involved much ofdanger and incredible difficulty. But the courageous young woman wasprepared to meet both danger and difficulty with an equable mind. Sheknew now whither she was going and how, but the journey through adifficult country must be made wholly on foot and wholly by night.
Agatha was ready for the ordeal. As for Martha, the earth to the veryends of it held no terrors that could cause even hesitation on her partin the service of her mistress.
The Master of Warlock: A Virginia War Story Page 15