"Faulconer! Major Galloway!" An imperious voice broke into Adam's reflections. At first neither he nor Major Galloway could see who had summoned them; then they saw a white-haired man waving vigorously from a window further up the train. "Wait there!" the man shouted. "Wait there!"

It was the Reverend Elial Starbuck, who, in deference to the oppressive heat, was wearing a linen jacket over his shirt and Geneva bands. Having attracted their attention, he worked his way out of the crowded passenger car and jumped down to the trackside, where he pulled on a ragged straw hat that had replaced his lost top hat. "You have news?" he demanded. "Good news, I trust? We need good news. You observe we are retreating again?" The preacher made this speech as he plunged toward the two cavalrymen, dividing the crowds with the aid of his ebony cane. "I fail to understand these things, I truly do. We have raised an army, the largest that God has seen fit to put upon the face of the earth, yet whenever a rebel scowls at us we scuttle backward like trespassing children fleeing a householder." The Reverend Elial Starbuck made this trenchant criticism despite the presence of a number of senior Federal officers who scowled at his words, but there was an authority in the Reverend Starbuck's presence that subdued any attempt to contradict his opinions. "No one is sure, anymore, if they can capture Richmond or whether they will simply defend the Rappahannock. There is confusion." The Reverend Starbuck made the accusation darkly. "If I administered a church the way this government runs an army, then I daresay Satan would turn Boston into an outpost of hell without so much as a bleat of opposition. It's too bad, too bad! I had hoped to return home with better news than this."

"To Boston? You're returning so soon?" Major Galloway asked politely.

"I undertook to be back in my pulpit by month's end. If I believed the capture of Richmond was imminent, then I would beg my congregation's indulgence and stay with the army, but I can no longer believe any such thing. I had hoped your horsemen might inspire the army. I recall some talk of making raids on Richmond?" This accusation was accompanied by a scowl from the preacher. "We shillyshally, Major. We linger. We tremble at the slightest sign of the enemy. We leave the Lord's work undone, preferring timidity to boldness. It grieves me, Major, it truly grieves me. But I am making notes, and I shall report my findings to the Northern people!"

Major Galloway tried to reassure the preacher that Pope's retreat was merely a temporary precaution intended to give the North time to build its army into an irresistible force, but the Reverend Starbuck would have none of such reasoning. He had learned from one of Pope's aides that the retreat behind the Rappahannock had been calculated to take advantage of the defensive capability of the river's steep northern bank. "We have gone on the defensive!" the Reverend Starbuck exclaimed in a disgusted voice. "Would there have been an Israel if Joshua had merely defended the river Jordan? Or a United States if George Washington had done nothing but dig ditches behind the Delaware? The Lord's work, Major, is not done by digging and tarrying, but by smiting the enemy! 'And it shall be, when thou shalt hear a sound of going in the tops of the mulberry trees, then shalt thou go out to battle: for God is gone forth before thee to smite the host of the Philistines.' Does not the First Book of Chronicles promise us as much? Then why are we not hearkening to the mulberries and going forth!" The Reverend Starbuck asked the question magisterially.

"I'm certain we shall be advancing soon," Galloway said, wondering what mulberries had to do with the prosecution of war.

"Then, alas, I must read about your advance in the Journal rather than witness it for myself. If, indeed, I ever reach Boston again." This last sentence was uttered in savage reproof of the chaos in Bealeton's small depot. The Reverend Starbuck had been waiting a full day to leave for Manassas Junction, but his train was trapped in the town by three supply trains that were being unloaded. No one knew how long that unloading would take, nor even if the offloaded supplies might not need to be reloaded in preparation for a further retreat. "Still, we are not without our comforts," the preacher said sarcastically, "so follow me," and he led the two cavalrymen to the end of the depot, where volunteer ladies from the Christian Sanitary Commission were serving reconstituted lemonade, buckwheat bread, and ginger cakes. The Reverend Starbuck wiped the sweat from his face with an enormous handkerchief, then used his cane to force a way to the trestle table, where he demanded three servings of the refreshments. One of the ladies timidly pointed to a hand-lettered sign proclaiming that the comestibles were for the consumption of uniformed men only, but one ferocious glance from the preacher quelled her small protest.

Once the ginger cakes and lemonade were secured and a suitable spot found for their consumption, Major Galloway gave the Reverend Starbuck the splendid news. John Pope's army might be retreating, but Galloway's Horse had stung the enemy. The Major forgivably exaggerated the damage his raiders had inflicted on the rebels, multiplying the wagons and ammunition destroyed at least fourfold, and while admitting to his own casualties, he claimed his men must have killed at least two score of rebels. "We left their camp smoking with fire, sir," Galloway said, "and reeking of blood."

The Reverend Starbuck put down his mug of lemonade so he could join his hands in a prayerful clasp. "'Bless the Lord,'" he said, "'who smote great nations and slew mighty kings!'"

"The news is better still, sir," Adam said, for while Kemp had been under the doctor's knife, Adam had found paper and string and made a parcel addressed to the Reverend Elial Starbuck on Walnut Street in Boston. He had been planning to send the parcel from the depot, but now he could deliver the prize personally.

It was obvious from the consistency of the package that it contained cloth, and the Reverend Starbuck, prodding with his finger, was scarce able to believe what he suspected. "It isn't. . ." he began, then without waiting to finish his question he tore the paper and string greedily away to reveal a bundle of folded scarlet silk slashed with white and blue. The preacher sighed as he held up a golden fringe of the rebel battle flag. "God bless you, my dear boy," he told Adam, "God bless you."

Adam intended to keep the Faulconer standard for himself, just as he intended to use his father's saber and revolver, but the battle flag, the red silk flag with the eleven white stars on the blue Saint Andrew's cross, was a gift for the Reverend Elial Starbuck: a trophy dragged from the filthy heart of secession that the preacher could use to show his subscribers that their donations were not being wasted. "I'm not sure if you want to know this, sir," Adam continued diffidently as the preacher gazed entranced at the beautiful silk, "but that flag comes from Nate's battalion."

But the mention of his son's name only enhanced the preacher's pleasure. "You took Nate's tawdry rag away, did you? Well done!"

"You'll take it to Boston, sir?" Major Galloway asked.

"I surely will. We shall put it on display, Major. We shall hang it for all to see, and maybe we shall invite people to throw mud at it on payment of a small sum toward the war effort. Then we shall burn it next July fourth." He gazed at the rich red silk, and a shudder mixed of lust and loathing racked his body. '"And your altars shall be desolate,'" he said in his marvelous voice, "'and your images shall be broken: and I will cast down your slain men before your idols. He that is far off shall die of the pestilence; and he that is near shall fall by the sword, and he that remaineth and is besieged shall die by the famine: thus will I accomplish my fury upon them. Then shall ye know that I am the Lord.'" There were a few seconds of awed silence from the dozens of people who had turned to listen to the preacher, who now, to show that his peroration was done, picked up his mug of lemonade. "The prophet Ezekiel," he added helpfully.