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don't cry."
    A knock came on the front door then, thankfully, distracting Mama. Josie started forward to answer it, but David intercepted her. With his musket in hand.
    It was Nancy Burns.
    "Hello, Nancy." My brother let her in and my heart leaped inside me for a second, hoping she'd say nothing about our adventure yesterday. Then I becalmed myself. No, she wouldn't. She was more frightened of David than she'd likely be of God on Judgment Day.
    "You shouldn't be out and about," David admonished her gently. "The battle is starting."
    "Yessir, I know. But I just came to say that my grandpa ... he, well he's going off to fight. And my mama can't stop him!" She was starting to get tears in her eyes, and her voice broke as she looked up at David.
    "So he's really doing it, is he?" David asked. His own voice was husky, which meant he was allowing feelings to creep into it, something he rarely did.
    "Yessir, and he's going to get killed. And we don't know what to do."
    We all watched in fascination as David put his hands on Nancy's shoulders, then gently said in the softest of voices, "Listen to me, child. Did you ever think of this? That if your grandpa doesn't go off to fight today as he so desperately wants to, that if he stands by and lets others go, that act alone may kill him?"
    Nancy stood there round-eyed, considering the possibility of it. The thought had never occurred to her. Or to any of us.
    But it had to David.
    Slowly, Nancy ingested the thought and nodded her head. "I'll tell my mama that," she said. "Thank you, sir." She turned to go, but David restrained her.
    "I'll accompany you," he told her. "I'll see you safely home."
    ***
    W HEN HE RETURNED about ten minutes later, none of us said anything. But at breakfast when he didn't know I was looking at him, I stole glances at my brother. He'd gone right back to his surly, silent mood, and as I furtively studied him, I minded that the way he'd been with Nancy now, and with Marvelous and Mr. Cameron last night, was the way he used to be with me.
    But he was two people now. He had a bad side and a good side. And he reserved the bad side for me. It broke my heart, realizing that. But for his sake, I was glad there was some of the good side left in him, at least.
    After breakfast he took food down to Mr. Cameron, and made several trips up and down, attending to him. The man would not come above stairs. I even saw him taking him up the outside cellar stairs to the outhouse, then back down again, and instructing Josie to feed him about noon.
    Up until now, the sounds of fighting had been far off, and looking out the windows, it seemed to me as if people were going about their regular lives. Some had already climbed onto the roofs of their houses. I saw men and boys walk toward the west of town. Then I felt David standing behind me.
    "Where are they going?" I asked.
    "To the ridges, to see the action," he said.
    We heard bugle calls in the distance and then, about nine o'clock, a terrible, resounding boom.
    "Cannon," David said.
    Then more awful, awful noise that violated the soul.
    "Artillery," David told me. "The Confederates on Herr's Ridge must be firing at the Union men near McPherson's Ridge."
    How did he know so much? Then I remembered, he'd spent much of the day with the Union army yesterday.
    In a short time the civilians from town who'd gone to see the battle came running back, and soon stray shells and bullets were finding their way into town. People were coming down from the rooftops. David pulled me away from the window.
    "No telling where a stray missile will strike," he said.
    The last sight I saw was a Union general and his staff riding down our street. "Are they retreating?" I asked David ' But he was no longer communicating with me. He had gone inside of himself, and all he said was "Stay away from the windows."
    The crashing of shells increased steadily outside as the morning progressed. Mama took to baking bread with Josie. Soon the house was filled with the