the lieutenant that it would perhaps be as well to return to the hotel instead of indulging in a promenade. My escort thought that I was disposed to be whimsical ; but I did not bother myself very greatly about his opinion of me one way or the other, being now only intent upon devising some means of obtaining an interview with the disguised Confederate.
On reaching the hotel I found that the man I was after had disappeared, and I was considerably perplexed to know what course to pursue. I was afraid to send him my card, for fear of compromising him in some way, as I thought it highly probable that he was stopping at the hotel under an assumed name. I was bent on securing an opportunity to converse with him, however, and hoped to be able to meet him, and to attract his attention before evening, but failing in this, I was resolved to find out what I could about him from some of the servants, and to send him a note requesting a private interview, giving him a sufficient hint as to who I was to induce him to think that he would be in no danger. Fortunately, however, I was not compelled to resort to any such expedient as this, for, on going in to dinner at five o'clock with the lieutenant, I saw him at one of the tables, having apparently just sat down.
A Strictly private Communication.
The lieutenant was conducting me to the seat which we usually occupied, but I said, as if seized with a sudden freak for a change of locality, "Suppose we go over to this table to-day. I think we will find it pleasanter;" and, before my Federal friend had time to object, I had walked him across the room and seated myself beside the Confederate, indicating for the lieutenant to take the seat on the other side of me. When the waiter came up to get our orders for dinner, I asked him to bring me a couple of cards.
All this time I took not the slightest notice of the Confederate, but chatted with the lieutenant in the liveliest and most animated manner possible; my object being to so engage his attention that he would not think of observing what I was doing for the purpose of letting the gentleman on the other side of me know that I was interested in him.
On one of the cards I wrote some nonsense, which I sent by the waiter, after having shown it to the lieutenant, to
