There's a distant connection at Bramant's Wharf, but that's almost at the mouth of the James."
Rosemary Roselle came up to them.
"Mr. Jim Haxall," she asked, direct and white, "is father dead?"
He studied her for a moment and then answered:
"Yes, Miss Rosemary."
She swayed. Indy, at her side, enveloped her in a sustaining arm.
"Indy," the girl said, her face on the woman's breast, "he, too!"
"I'm sending a few bales of leaf down the river," Haxall continued to Elim; "the sloop'll pass Bramant's Wharf; but the crew will be just anybody. Miss Rosemary couldn't go with only her nigger"
Elim Meikeljohn spoke mechanically:
"I'll be responsible for her." The war was over; he had been ordered from the column when his wound had broken afresh, and in a maze of fever he had been irresistibly impelled toward Linden Row. "I'll take her to Bramant's Wharf."
Haxall regarded suspiciously the disordered blue uniform; then his gaze shifted to Elim's somber lined countenance.
"Miss Rosemary's rubies and gold—" he said finally. "But I believe you're honest, I believe you're a good man."
