The Hidden Children / Chambers, Robert W. (Robert William), 1865-1933

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Title: The Hidden Children

Author: Robert W. Chambers

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                           The Hidden Children

by Robert W. Chambers, 1914


                             TO MY MOTHER

Whatever merit may lie in this book is due to her wisdom, her sympathy
                           and her teaching


                           AUTHOR'S PREFACE

No undue liberties with history have been attempted in this romance.
Few characters in the story are purely imaginary. Doubtless the
fastidious reader will distinguish these intruders at a glance, and
very properly ignore them. For they, and what they never were, and
what they never did, merely sugar-coat a dose disguised, and gild the
solid pill of fact with tinselled fiction.

But from the flames of Poundridge town ablaze, to the rolling smoke of
Catharines-town, Romance but limps along a trail hewed out for her
more dainty feet by History, and measured inch by inch across the
bloody archives of the nation.

The milestones that once marked that dark and dreadful trail were dead
men, red and white. Today a spider-web of highways spreads over that
Dark Empire of the League, enmeshing half a thousand towns now all
a-buzz by day and all a-glow by night.

Empire, League, forest, are vanished; of the nations which formed the
Confederacy only altered fragments now remain. But their memory and
their great traditions have not perished; cities, mountains, valleys,
rivers, lakes, and ponds are endowed with added beauty from the lovely
names they wear-- a tragic yet a charming legacy from Kanonsis and
Kanonsionni, the brave and mighty people of the Long House, and those
outside its walls who helped to prop or undermine it, Huron and
Algonquin.

Perhaps of all national alliances ever formed, the Great Peace, which
is called the League of the Iroquois, was as noble as any. For it was
a league formed solely to impose peace. Those who took up arms against
the Long House were received as allies when conquered-- save only the
treacherous Cat Nation, or Eries, who were utterly annihilated by the
knife and hatchet or by adoption and ultimate absorption in the Seneca
Nation.

As for the Lenni-Lenape, when they kept faith with the League they
remained undisturbed as one of the "props" of the Long House, and
their role in the Confederacy was embassadorial, diplomatic and
advisory-- in other words, the role of the Iroquois married women. And
in the Confederacy the position of women was one of importance and
dignity, and they exercised a franchise which no white nation has ever
yet accorded to its women.

But when the Delawares broke faith, then the lash fell and the term
"women" as applied to them carried a very different meaning when spat
out by Canienga lips or snarled by Senecas.

Yet, of the Lenape, certain tribes, offshoots, and clans remained
impassive either to Iroquois threats or proffered friendship. They,
like certain lithe, proud forest animals to whom restriction means
death, were untamable. Their necks could endure no yoke, political or
purely ornamental. And so they perished far from the Onondaga
firelight, far from the open doors of the Long House, self-exiled,
self-sufficient, irreconcilable, and foredoomed. And of these the
Mohicans were the noblest.

In the four romances-- of which, though written last of all, this is
the third, chronologically speaking-- the author is very conscious of
error and shortcoming. But the theme was surely worth attempting; and
if the failure to convince be only partial then is the writer grateful
to the Fates, and well content to leave it to the next and better man.

BROADALBIN,

                                                   Early Spring, 1913.
  _________________________________________________________________

                                 NOTE

During the serial publication of "The Hidden Children" the author
received the following interesting letters relating to the authorship
of the patriotic verses quoted in Chapter X., These letters are
published herewith for the general reader as well as for students of
American history.

                                                              R. W. C.


                    149 WEST EIGHTY-EIGHTH STREET,

                            NEW YORK CITY.

MRS. HELEN DODGE KNEELAND:

DEAR MADAM: Some time ago I accidentally came across the verses
written by Samuel Dodge and used by R. W. Chambers in story "Hidden
Children." I wrote to him, inviting him to come and look at the
original manuscript, which has come down to me from my mother, whose
maiden name was Helen Dodge Cocks, a great-granddaughter of Samuel
Dodge, of Poughkeepsie, the author of them.

So far Mr. Chambers has not come, but he answered my note, inclosing
your note to him. I have written to him, suggesting that he insert a
footnote giving the authorship of the verses, that it would gratify
the descendants of Samuel Dodge, as well as be a tribute to a
patriotic citizen.

These verses have been published a number of times. About three years
ago by chance I read them in the December National Magazine, p. 247
(Boston), entitled "A Revolutionary Puzzle," and stating that the
author was unknown. Considering it my duty to place the honor where it
belonged, I wrote to the editor, giving the facts, which he
courteously published in the September number, 1911, p. 876.

Should you be in New York any time, I will take pleasure in showing
you the original manuscripts.

                          Very truly yours,

                                                ROBERT S. MORRIS, M.D.


MR. ROBERT CHAMBERS,

                              New York.

DEAR SIR: I have not replied to your gracious letter, as I relied upon
Dr. Morris to prove to you the authorship of the verses you used in
your story of "The Hidden Children." I now inclose a letter from him,
hoping that you will carry out his suggestion. Is it asking too much
for you to insert a footnote in the next magazine or in the story when
it comes out in book form? I think with Dr. Morris that this should be
done as a "tribute to a patriotic citizen."

Trusting that you will appreciate the interest we have shown in this
matter, I am

                           Sincerely yours,

                                                 HELEN DODGE KNEELAND.

                           May 21st, 1914.

                         Ann Arbor, Michigan.

                       MRS. FRANK G. KNEELAND,

                      727 E. University Avenue.
  _________________________________________________________________

  THE LONG HOUSE


  "Onenh jatthondek sewarih-wisa-anongh-kwe kaya-renh-kowah!
   Onenh wa-karigh-wa-kayon-ne.
   Onenh ne okne joska-wayendon.
   Yetsi-siwan-enyadanion ne
   Sewari-wisa-anonqueh."


  "Now listen, ye who established the Great League!
   Now it has become old.
   Now there is nothing but wilderness.
   Ye are in your graves who established it."

  "At the Wood's Edge."
  _________________________________________________________________

  NENE KARENNA


  When the West kindles red and low,
  Across the sunset's sombre glow,
  The black crows fly-- the black crows fly!
  High pines are swaying to and fro
  In evil winds that blow and blow.
  The stealthy dusk draws nigh-- draws nigh,
  Till the sly sun at last goes down,
  And shadows fall on Catharines-town.


  Oswaya swaying to and fro.


  By the Dark Empire's Western gate
  Eight stately, painted Sachems wait
  For Amochol-- for Amochol!
  Hazel and samphire consecrate
  The magic blaze that burns like Hate,
  While the deep witch-drums roll-- and roll.
  Sorceress, shake thy dark hair down!
  The Red Priest comes from Catharines-town.


  Ha-ai! Karenna! Fate is Fate.


  Now let the Giants clothed in stone
  Stalk from Biskoonah; while, new grown,
  The Severed Heads fly high-- fly high!
  White-throat, White-throat, thy doom is known!
  O Blazing Soul that soars alone
  Like a Swift Arrow to the sky,
  High winging-- fling thy Wampum down,
  Lest the sky fall on Catharines-town.


  White-throat, White-throat, thy course is flown.

                                                             R. W. C.
  _________________________________________________________________

  CHAPTER I

 THE BEDFORD ROAD

In the middle of the Bedford Road we three drew bridle. Boyd lounged
in his reeking saddle, gazing at the tavern and at what remained of
the tavern sign, which seemed to have been a new one, yet now dangled
mournfully by one hinge, shot to splinters.

The freshly painted house itself, marred with buckshot, bore dignified
witness to the violence done it. A few glazed windows still remained
unbroken; the remainder had been filled with blue paper such as comes
wrapped about a sugar cone, so that the misused house seemed to be
watching us out of patched and battered eyes.

It was evident, too, that a fire had been wantonly set at the
northeast angle of the house, where sill and siding were deeply
charred from baseboard to eaves.

Nor had this same fire happened very long since, for under the eaves
white-faced hornets were still hard at work repairing their partly
scorched nest. And I silently pointed them out to Lieutenant Boyd.

"Also," he nodded, "I can still smell the smoky wood. The damage is
fresh enough. Look at your map."

He pushed his horse straight up to the closed door, continuing to
examine the dismantled sign which hung motionless, there being no wind
stirring.

"This should be Hays's Tavern," he said, "unless they lied to us at
Ossining. Can you make anything of the sign, Mr. Loskiel?"

"Nothing, sir. But we are on the highway to Poundridge, for behind us
lies the North Castle Church road. All is drawn on my map as we see it
here before us; and this should be the fine dwelling of that great
villain Holmes, now used as a tavern by Benjamin Hays."

"Rap on the door," said Boyd; and our rifleman escort rode forward and
drove his rifle-butt at the door, "There's a man hiding within and
peering at us behind the third window," I whispered.

"I see him," said Boyd coolly.

Through the heated silence around us we could hear the hornets buzzing
aloft under the smoke-stained eaves. There was no other sound in the
July sunshine.

The solemn tavern stared at us out of its injured eyes, and we three
men of the Northland gazed back as solemnly, sobered once more to
encounter the trail of the Red Beast so freshly printed here among the
pleasant Westchester hills.

And to us the silent house seemed to say: "Gentlemen, gentlemen! Look
at the plight I'm in-- you who come from the blackened North!" And
with never a word of lip our heavy thoughts responded: "We know, old
house! We know! But at least you still stand; and in the ashes of our
Northland not a roof or a spire remains aloft between the dwelling of
Deborah Glenn and the ford at the middle fort."

Boyd broke silence with an effort; and his voice was once more cool
and careless, if a little forced:

"So it's this way hereabouts, too," he said with a shrug and a sign to
me to dismount. Which I did stiffly; and our rifleman escort scrambled
from his sweatty saddle and gathered all three bridles in his mighty,
sunburnt fist.

"Either there is a man or a ghost within," I said again, "Whatever it
is has moved."

"A man," said Boyd, "or what the inhumanity of man has left of him."

And it was true, for now there came to the door and opened it a thin
fellow wearing horn spectacles, who stood silent and cringing before
us. Slowly rubbing his workworn hands, he made us a landlord's bow as
listless and as perfunctory as ever I have seen in any ordinary. But
his welcome was spoken in a whisper.

"God have mercy on this house," said Boyd loudly. "Now, what's amiss,
friend? Is there death within these honest walls, that you move about
on tiptoe?"

"There is death a-plenty in Westchester, sir," said the man, in a
voice as colorless as his drab smalls and faded hair. Yet what he said
showed us that he had noted our dress, too, and knew us for strangers.

"Cowboys and skinners, eh?" inquired Boyd, unbuckling his belt.

"And leather-cape, too, sir."

My lieutenant laughed, showing his white teeth; laid belt, hatchet,
and heavy knife on a wine-stained table, and placed his rifle against
it. Then, slipping cartridge sack, bullet pouch, and powder horn from
his shoulders, stood eased, yawning and stretching his fine, powerful
frame.

"I take it that you see few of our corps here below," he observed
indulgently.

The landlord's lack-lustre eyes rested on me for an instant, then on
Boyd:

"Few, sir."

"Do you know the uniform, landlord?"

"Rifles," he said indifferently.

"Yes, but whose, man? Whose?" insisted Boyd impatiently.

The other shook his head.

"Morgan's!" exclaimed Boyd loudly. "Damnation, sir! You should know
Morgan's! Sixth Company, sir; Major Parr! And a likelier regiment and
a better company never wore green thrums on frock or coon-tail on
cap!"

"Yes, sir," said the man vacantly.

Boyd laughed a little:

"And look that you hint as much to the idle young bucks hereabouts--
say it to some of your Westchester squirrel hunters----" He laid his
hand on the landlord's shoulder. "There's a good fellow," he added,
with that youthful and winning smile which so often carried home with
it his reckless will-- where women were concerned-- "we're down from
Albany and we wish the Bedford folk to know it. And if the gallant
fellows hereabout desire a taste of true glory-- the genuine article--
why, send them to me, landlord-- Thomas Boyd, of Derry, Pennsylvania,
lieutenant, 6th company of Morgan's-- or to my comrade here, Mr.
Loskiel, ensign in the same corps."

He clapped the man heartily on the shoulder and stood looking around
at the stripped and dishevelled room, his handsome head a little on
one side, as though in frankest admiration. And the worn and pallid
landlord gazed back at him with his faded, lack-lustre eyes-- eyes
that we both understood, alas-- eyes made dull with years of fear,
made old and hopeless with unshed tears, stupid from sleepless nights,
haunted with memories of all they had looked upon since His Excellency
marched out of the city to the south of us, where the red rag now
fluttered on fort and shipping from King's Bridge to the Hook.

Nothing more was said. Our landlord went away very quietly. An
hostler, presently appearing from somewhere, passed the broken
windows, and we saw our rifleman go away with him, leading the three
tired horses. We were still yawning and drowsing, stretched out in our
hickory chairs, and only kept awake by the flies, when our landlord
returned and set before us what food he had. The fare was scanty
enough, but we ate hungrily, and drank deeply of the fresh small beer
which he fetched in a Liverpool jug.

When we two were alone again, Boyd whispered:

"As well let them think we're here with no other object than
recruiting. And so we are, after a fashion; but neither this state nor
Pennsylvania is like to fill its quota here. Where is your map, once
more?"

I drew the coiled linen roll from the breast of my rifle shirt and
spread it out. We studied it, heads together.

"Here lies Poundridge," nodded Boyd, placing his finger on the spot so
marked. "Roads a-plenty, too. Well, it's odd, Loskiel, but in this
cursed, debatable land I feel more ill at ease than I have ever felt
in the Iroquois country."

"You are still thinking of our landlord's deathly face," I said.
"Lord! What a very shadow of true manhood crawls about this house!"

"Aye-- and I am mindful of every other face and countenance I have so
far seen in this strange, debatable land. All have in them something
of the same expression. And therein lies the horror of it all, Mr.
Loskiel God knows we expect to see deathly faces in the North, where
little children lie scalped in the ashes of our frontier-- where they
even scalp the family hound that guards the cradle. But here in this
sleepy, open countryside, with its gentle hills and fertile valleys,
broad fields and neat stone walls, its winding roads and orchards, and
every pretty farmhouse standing as though no war were in the land, all
seems so peaceful, so secure, that the faces of the people sicken me.
And ever I am asking myself, where lies this other hell on earth,
which only faces such as these could have looked upon?"

"It is sad," I said, under my breath. "Even when a lass smiles on us
it seems to start the tears in my throat."

"Sad! Yes, sir, it is. I supposed we had seen sufficient of human
degradation in the North not to come here to find the same cringing
expression stamped on every countenance. I'm sick of it, I tell you.
Why, the British are doing worse than merely filling their prisons
with us and scalping us with their savages! They are slowly but surely
marking our people, body and face and mind, with the cursed imprint of
slavery. They're stamping a nation's very features with the hopeless
lineaments of serfdom. It is the ineradicable scars of former slavery
that make the New Englander whine through his nose. We of the fighting
line bear no such marks, but the peaceful people are beginning to--
they who can do nothing except endure and suffer."

"It is not so everywhere," I said, "not yet, anyway."

"It is so in the North. And we have found it so since we entered the
'Neutral Ground.' Like our own people on the frontier, these
Westchester folk fear everybody. You yourself know how we have found
them. To every question they try to give an answer that may please; or
if they despair of pleasing they answer cautiously, in order not to
anger. The only sentiment left alive in them seems to be fear; all
else of human passion appears to be dead. Why, Loskiel, the very power
of will has deserted them; they are not civil to us, but obsequious;
not obliging but subservient. They yield with apathy and very quietly
what you ask, and what they apparently suppose is impossible for them
to retain. If you treat them kindly they receive it coldly, not
gratefully, but as though you were compensating them for evil done
them by you. Their countenances and motions have lost every trace of
animation. It is not serenity but apathy; every emotion, feeling,
thought, passion, which is not merely instinctive has fled their minds
forever. And this is the greatest crime that Britain has wrought upon
us." He struck the table lightly with doubled fist, "Mr. Loskiel," he
said, "I ask you-- can we find recruits for our regiment in such a
place as this? Damme, sir, but I think the entire land has lost its
manhood."

We sat staring out into the sunshine through a bullet-shattered
window.

"And all this country here seems so fair and peaceful," he murmured
half to himself, "so sweet and still and kindly to me after the
twilight of endless forests where men are done to death in the dusk.
But hell in broad sunshine is the more horrible."

"Look closer at this country," I said. "The highways are deserted and
silent, the very wagon ruts overgrown with grass. Not a scythe has
swung in those hay fields; the gardens that lie in the sun are but
tangles of weeds; no sheep stir on the hills, no cattle stand in these
deep meadows, no wagons pass, no wayfarers. It may be that the wild
birds are moulting, but save at dawn and for a few moments at sundown
they seem deathly silent to me."

He had relapsed again into his moody, brooding attitude, elbows on the
table, his handsome head supported by both hands. And it was not like
him to be downcast. After a while he smiled.

"Egad," he said, "it is too melancholy for me here in the open; and I
begin to long for the dusk of trees and for the honest scalp yell to
cheer me up. One knows what to expect in county Tryon-- but not here,
Loskiel-- not here."

"Our business here is like to be ended tomorrow," I remarked.

"Thank God for that," he said heartily, rising and buckling on his war
belt. He added: "As for any recruits we have been ordered to pick up
en passant, I see small chance of that accomplishment hereabout. Will
you summon the landlord, Mr. Loskiel?"

I discovered the man standing at the open door, his warn hands clasped
behind him, and staring stupidly at the cloudless sky. He followed me
back to the taproom, and we reckoned with him. Somehow, I thought he
had not expected to be paid a penny-- yet he did not thank us.

"Are you not Benjamin Hays?" inquired Boyd, carelessly retying his
purse.

The fellow seemed startled to hear his own name pronounced so loudly,
but answered very quietly that he was.

"This house belongs to a great villain, one James Holmes, does it
not?" demanded Boyd.

"Yes, sir," he whispered.

"How do you come to keep an ordinary here?"

"The town authorities required an ordinary. I took it in charge, as
they desired."

"Oh! Where is this rascal, Holmes?"

"Gone below, sir, some time since."

"I have heard so. Was he not formerly Colonel of the 4th regiment?"

"Yes, sir."

"And deserted his men, eh? And they made him Lieutenant-Colonel below,
did they not?"

"Yes, sir."

"Colonel-- of what?" snarled Boyd in disgust.

"Of the Westchester Refugee Irregulars."

"Oh! Well, look out for him and his refugees. He'll be back here one
of these days, I'm thinking."

"He has been back."

"What did he do?"

The man said listlessly: "It was like other visits. They robbed,
tortured, and killed. Some they burnt with hot ashes, some they hung,
cut down, and hung again when they revived. Most of the sheep, cattle,
and horses were driven off. Last year thousands of bushels of fruit
decayed in the orchards; the ripened grain lay rotting where wind and
rain had laid it; no hay was cut, no grain milled."

"Was this done by the banditti from the lower party?"

"Yes, sir; and by the leather-caps, too. The leather-caps stood guard
while the Tories plundered and killed. It is usually that way, sir.
And our own renegades are as bad. We in Westchester have to entertain
them all."

"But they burn no houses?"

"Not yet, sir. They have promised to do so next time."

"Are there no troops here?"

"Yes, sir."

"What troops?"

"Colonel Thomas's Regiment and Sheldon's Horse and the Minute Men."

"Well, what the devil are they about to permit this banditti to
terrify and ravage a peaceful land?" demanded Boyd.

"The country is of great extent," said the man mildly. "It would
require many troops to cover it. And His Excellency has very, very
few."

"Yes," said Boyd, "that is true. We know how it is in the North-- with
hundreds of miles to guard and but a handful of men. And it must be
that way." He made no effort to throw off his seriousness and nodded
toward me with a forced smile. "I am twenty-two years of age," he
said, "and Mr. Loskiel here is no older, and we fully expect that when
we both are past forty we will still be fighting in this same old war.
Meanwhile," he added laughing, "every patriot should find some lass to
wed and breed the soldiers we shall require some sixteen years hence."

The man's smile was painful; he smiled because he thought we expected
it; and I turned away disheartened, ashamed, burning with a fierce
resentment against the fate that in three years had turned us into
what we were-- we Americans who had never known the lash-- we who had
never learned to fear a master.

Boyd said: "There is a gentleman, one Major Ebenezer Lockwood,
hereabouts. Do you know him?"

"No, sir."

"What? Why, that seems strange!"

The man's face paled, and he remained silent for a few moments. Then,
furtively, his eyes began for the hundredth time to note the details
of our forest dress, stealing stealthily from the fringe on legging
and hunting shirt to the Indian beadwork on moccasin and baldrick,
devouring every detail as though to convince himself. I think our
pewter buttons did it for him.

Boyd said gravely: "You seem to doubt us, Mr. Hays," and read in the
man's unsteady eyes distrust of everything on earth-- and little faith
in God.

"I do not blame you," said I gently. "Three years of hell burn deep."

"Yes," he said, "three years. And, as you say, sir, there was fire."

He stood quietly silent for a space, then, looking timidly at me, he
rolled back his sleeves, first one, then the other, to the shoulders.
Then he undid the bandages.

"What is all that?" asked Boyd harshly.

"The seal of the marauders, sir."

"They burnt you? God, man, you are but one living sore! Did any white
man do that to you?"

"With hot horse-shoes. It will never quite heal, they say."

I saw the lieutenant shudder. The only thing he ever feared was fire--
if it could be said of him that he feared anything. And he had told me
that, were he taken by the Iroquois, he had a pistol always ready to
blow out his brains.

Boyd had begun to pace the room, doubling and undoubling his nervous
fingers. The landlord replaced the oil-soaked rags, rolled down his
sleeves again, and silently awaited our pleasure.

"Why do you hesitate to tell us where we may find Major Lockwood?" I
asked gently.

For the first time the man looked me full in the face. And after a
moment I saw his expression alter. as though some spark-- something
already half dead within him was faintly reviving.

"They have set a price on Major Lockwood's head," he said; and Boyd
halted to listen-- and the man looked him in the eyes for a moment.

My lieutenant carried his commission with him, though contrary to
advice and practice among men engaged on such a mission as were we. It
was folded in his beaded shot-pouch, and now he drew it out and
displayed it.

After a silence, Hays said:

"The old Lockwood Manor House stands on the south side of the village
of Poundridge. It is the headquarters and rendezvous of Sheldon's
Horse. The Major is there."

"Poundridge lies to the east of Bedford?"

"Yes, sir, about five miles."

"Where is the map, Loskiel?"

Again I drew it from my hunting shirt; we examined it, and Hays
pointed out the two routes.

Boyd looked up at Hays absently, and said: "Do you know Luther
Kinnicut?"

This time all the colour fled the man's face, and it was some moments
before the sudden, unreasoning rush of terror in that bruised mind had
subsided sufficiently for him to compose his thoughts. Little by
little, however, he came to himself again, dimly conscious that he
trusted us-- perhaps the first strangers or even neighbours whom he
had trusted in years.

"Yes, sir, I know him," he said in a low voice.

"Where is he?"

"Below-- on our service."

But it was Luther Kinnicut, the spy, whom we had come to interview, as
well as to see Major Lockwood, and Boyd frowned thoughtfully.

I said: "The Indians hereabout are Mohican, are they not, Mr. Hays?"

"They were," he replied; and his very apathy gave the answer a sadder
significance.

"Have they all gone off?" asked Boyd, misunderstanding.

"There were very few Mohicans to go. But they have gone."

"Below?"

"Oh, no, sir. They and the Stockbridge Indians, and the Siwanois are
friendly to our party."

"There was a Sagamore," I said, "of the Siwanois, named Mayaro. We
believe that Luther Kinnicut knows where this Sagamore is to be found.
But how are we to first find Kinnicut?"

"Sir," he said, "you must ask Major Lockwood that. I know not one
Indian from the next, only that the savages hereabout are said to be
favourable to our party."

Clearly there was nothing more to learn from this man. So we thanked
him and strapped on our accoutrements, while he went away to the barn
to bring up our horses. And presently our giant rifleman appeared
leading the horses, and still munching a bough-apple, scarce ripe,
which he dropped into the bosom of his hunting shirt when he
discovered us watching him.

Boyd laughed: "Munch away, Jack, and welcome," he said, "only mind thy
manners when we sight regular troops. I'll have nobody reproaching
Morgan's corps that the men lack proper respect-- though many people
seem to think us but a parcel of militia where officer and man herd
cheek by jowl."

On mounting, he turned in his saddle and asked Hays what we had to
fear on our road, if indeed we were to apprehend anything.

"There is some talk of the Legion Cavalry, sir-- Major Tarleton's
command."

"Anything definite?"

"No, sir-- only the talk when men of our party meet. And Major
Lockwood has a price on his head."

"Oh! Is that all?"

"That is all, sir."

Boyd nodded laughingly, wheeled his horse, and we rode slowly out into
the Bedford Road, the mounted rifleman dogging our heels.

From every house in Bedford we knew that we were watched as we rode;
and what they thought of us in our flaunting rifle dress, or what they
took us to be-- enemy or friend-- I cannot imagine, the uniform of our
corps being strange in these parts. However, they must have known us
for foresters and riflemen of one party or t'other; and, as we
advanced, and there being only three of us, and on a highway, too,
very near to the rendezvous of an American dragoon regiment, the good
folk not only peeped out at us from between partly closed shutters,
but even ventured to open their doors and stand gazing after we had
ridden by.

Every pretty maid he saw seemed to comfort Boyd prodigiously, which
was always the case; and as here and there a woman smiled faintly at
him the last vestige of sober humour left him and he was more like the
reckless, handsome young man I had come to care for a great deal, if
not wholly to esteem.

The difference in rank between us permitted him to relax if he chose;
and though His Excellency and our good Baron were ever dinning
discipline and careful respect for rank into the army's republican
ears, there was among us nothing like the aristocratic and rigid
sentiment which ruled the corps of officers in the British service.

Still, we were not as silly and ignorant as we were at Bunker Hill,
having learned something of authority and respect in these three
years, and how necessary to discipline was a proper maintenance of
rank. For once-- though it seems incredible-- men and officers were
practically on a footing of ignorant familiarity; and I have heard,
and fully believe, that the majority of our reverses and misfortunes
arose because no officer represented authority, nor knew how to
enforce discipline because lacking that military respect upon which
all real discipline must be founded.

Of all the officers in my corps and in my company, perhaps Lieutenant
Boyd was slowest to learn the lesson and most prone to relax, not
toward the rank and file-- yet, he was often a shade too easy there,
also-- but with other officers. Those ranking him were not always
pleased; those whom he ranked felt vaguely the mistake.

As for me, I liked him greatly; yet, somehow, never could bring myself
to a careless comradeship, even in the woods or on lonely scouts where
formality and circumstance seemed out of place, even absurd. He was so
much of a boy, too-- handsome, active, perfectly fearless, and almost
always gay-- that if at times he seemed a little selfish or ruthless
in his pleasures, not sufficiently mindful of others or of
consequences, I found it easy to forgive and overlook. Yet, fond as I
was of him, I never had become familiar with him-- why, I do not know.
Perhaps because he ranked me; and perhaps there was no particular
reason for that instinct of aloofness which I think was part of me at
that age, and, except in a single instance, still remains as the
slightest and almost impalpable barrier to a perfect familiarity with
any person in the world.

"Loskiel," he said in my ear, "did you see that little maid in the
orchard, how shyly she smiled on us?"

"On you," I nodded, laughing.

"Oh, you always say that," he retorted.

And I always did say that, and it always pleased him.

"On this accursed journey south," he complained, "the necessity for
speed has spoiled our chances for any roadside sweethearts. Lord! But
it's been a long, dull trail," he added frankly. "Why, look you,
Loskiel, even in the wilderness somehow I always have contrived to
discover a sweetheart of some sort or other-- yes, even in the
Iroquois country, cleared or bush, somehow or other, sooner or later,
I stumble on some pretty maid who flutters up in the very wilderness
like a partridge from under my feet!"

"That is your reputation," I remarked.

"Oh, damme, no!" he protested. "Don't say it is my reputation!"

But he had that reputation, whether he realised it or not; though as
far as I had seen there was no real harm in the man-- only a
willingness to make love to any petticoat, if its wearer were pretty.
But my own notions had ever inclined me toward quality. Which is not
strange, I myself being of unknown parentage and birth, high or low,
nobody knew; nor had anybody ever told me how I came by my strange
name, Euan Loskiel, save that they found the same stitched in silk
upon my shift.

For it is best, perhaps, that I say now how it was with me from the
beginning, which, until this memoir is read, only one man knew-- and
one other. For I was discovered sleeping beside a stranded St. Regis
canoe, where the Mohawk River washes Guy Park gardens. And my dead
mother lay beside me.

He who cared for me, reared me and educated me, was no other than Guy
Johnson of Guy Park. Why he did so I learned only after many days; and
at the proper time and place I will tell you who I am and why he was
kind to me. For his was not a warm and kindly character, nor a gentle
nature, nor was he an educated man himself, nor perhaps even a
gentleman, though of that landed gentry which Tryon County knew so
well, and also a nephew of the great Sir William, and became his
son-in-law.

I say he was not liked in Tryon County, though many feared him more
than they feared young Walter Butler later; yet he was always and
invariably kind to me. And when with the Butlers, and Sir John, and
Colonel Claus, and the other Tories he fled to Canada, there to hatch
most hellish reprisals upon the people of Tryon who had driven him
forth, he wrote to me where I was at Harvard College in Cambridge to
bid me farewell.

He said to me in that letter that he did not ask me to declare for the
King in the struggle already beginning; he merely requested, if I
could not conscientiously so declare, at least that I remain passive,
and attend quietly to my studies at Cambridge until the war blew over,
as it quickly must, and these insolent people were taught their
lesson.

The lesson, after three years and more, was still in progress; Guy
Park had fallen into the hands of the Committee of Sequestration and
was already sold; Guy Johnson roamed a refugee in Canada, and I, since
the first crack of a British musket, had learned how matters stood
between my heart and conscience, and had carried a rifle and at times
my regiment's standard ever since.

I had no home except my regiment, no friends except Guy Johnson's, and
those I had made at College and in the regiment; and the former would
likely now have greeted me with rifle or hatchet, whichever came
easier to hand.

So to me my rifle regiment and my company had become my only home; the
officers my parents; my comrades the only friends I had.

I wrote to Guy Johnson, acquainting him of my intention before I
enlisted, and the letter went to him with other correspondence under a
flag.

In time I had a reply from him, and he wrote as though something
stronger than hatred for the cause I had embraced was forcing him to
speak to me gently.

God knows it was a strange, sad letter, full of bitterness under which
smouldered something more terrible, which, as he wrote, he strangled.
And so he ended, saying that, through him, no harm should ever menace
me; and that in the fullness of time, when this vile rebellion had
been ended, he would vouch for the mercy of His Most Christian Majesty
as far as I was concerned, even though all others hung in chains.

Thus I had left it all-- not then knowing who I was or why Guy Johnson
had been kind to me; nor ever expecting to hear from him again.


Thinking of these things as I rode beside Lieutenant Boyd through the
calm Westchester sunshine, all that part of my life-- which indeed was
all of my life except these last three battle years-- seemed already
so far sway, so dim and unreal, that I could scarce realise I had not
been always in the army-- had not always lived from day to day, from
hour to hour, not knowing one night where I should pillow my head the
next.

For at nineteen I shouldered my rifle; and now, at Boyd's age, two and
twenty, my shoulder had become so accustomed to its not unpleasant
weight that, at moments, thinking, I realised that I would not know
what to do in the world had I not my officers, my company, and my
rifle to companion me through life.

And herein lies the real danger of all armies and of all soldiering.
Only the strong character and exceptional man is ever fitted for any
other life after the army becomes a closed career to him.

I now remarked as much to Boyd, who frowned, seeming to consider the
matter for the first time.

"Aye," he nodded, "it's true enough, Loskiel. And I for one don't know
what use I could make of the blessings of peace for which we are so
madly fighting, and which we all protest that we desire."

"The blessings of peace might permit you more leisure with the
ladies," I suggested smilingly. And he threw back his handsome head
and laughed.

"Lord!" he exclaimed. "What chance have I, a poor rifleman, who may
not even wear his hair clubbed and powdered."

Only field and staff now powdered in our corps. I said: "Heaven hasten
your advancement, sir."

"Not that I'd care a fig," he protested, "if I had your yellow, curly
head, you rogue. But with my dark hair unpowdered and uncurled, and no
side locks, I tell you, Loskiel, I earn every kiss that is given me--
or forgiven. Heigho! Peace would truly be a blessing if she brought
powder and pretty clothing to a crop-head, buck-skinned devil like
me."

We were now riding through a country which had become uneven and
somewhat higher. A vast wooded hill lay on our left; the Bedford
highway skirted it. On our right ran a stream, and there was some
swampy land which followed. Rock outcrops became more frequent, and
the hard-wood growth of oak, hickory and chestnut seemed heavier and
more extensive than in Bedford town. But there were orchards; the soil
seemed to be fertile and the farms thrifty, and it was a pleasant land
save for the ominous stillness over all and the grass-grown highway.
Roads and lanes, paths and pastures remained utterly deserted of man
and beast.

This, if our map misled us not, should be the edges of the town of
Poundridge; and within a mile or so more we began to see a house here
and there. These farms became more frequent as we advanced. After a
few moments' riding we saw the first cattle that we had seen in many
days. And now we began to find this part of the Westchester country
very different, as we drew nearer to the village, for here and there
we saw sheep feeding in the distance, and men mowing who leaned on
their scythes to see us pass, and even saluted us from afar.

It seemed as though a sense of security reigned here, though nobody
failed to mark our passing or even to anticipate it from far off. But
nobody appeared to be afraid of us, and we concluded that the near
vicinity of Colonel Sheldon's Horse accounted for what we saw.

It was pleasant to see women spinning beside windows in which flowers
bloomed, and children gazing shyly at us from behind stone walls and
palings. Also, in barnyards we saw fowls, which was more than we had
seen West of us-- and now and again a family cat dozing on some
doorstep freshly swept.

"I had forgotten there was such calm and peace in the world," said
Boyd. "And the women look not unkindly on us-- do you think, Loskiel?"

But I was intent on watching a parcel of white ducks leaving a little
pond, all walking a-row and quacking, and wriggling their fat tails.
How absurd a thing to suddenly close my throat so that I could not
find my voice to answer Boyd; for ever before me grew the almost
forgotten vision of Guy Park, and of our white waterfowl on the river
behind the house, where I had seen them so often from my chamber
window leaving the water's edge at sundown.

A mile outside the town a leather-helmeted dragoon barred our way, but
we soon satisfied him.

We passed by the Northwest road, crossed the Stamford highway, and,
consulting our map, turned back and entered it, riding south through
the village.

Here a few village folk were abroad; half a dozen of Sheldon's
dragoons lounged outside the tavern, to the rail of which their horses
were tied; and we saw other men with guns, doubtless militia, though
few wore any fragment of uniform, save as their hats were cocked or
sprigged with green.

Nobody hailed us, not even the soldiers; there was no levity, no jest
directed toward our giant rifleman, only a courteous but sober salute
as we rode through Poundridge town and out along the New Canaan
highway where houses soon became fewer and soldiers both afoot and
ahorse more frequent.

We crossed a stream and two roads, then came into a street with many
houses which ran south, then, at four corners, turned sharp to the
east. And there, across a little brook, we saw a handsome manor house
around which some three score cavalry horses were picketed,

Yard, lawn, stables and barns were swarming with people-- dragoons of
Sheldon's Regiment, men of Colonel Thomas's foot regiment, militia
officers, village gentlemen whose carriages stood waiting; and some of
these same carriages must have come from a distance, perhaps even from
Ridgefield, to judge by the mud and dust that clotted them.

Beyond the house, on a road which I afterward learned ran toward
Lewisboro, between the Three Lakes, Cross Pond, and Bouton's, a
military convoy was passing, raising a prodigious cloud of dust. I
could see, and faintly hear, sheep and cattle; there was a far crack
of whips, a shouting of drovers and teamsters, and, through the dust,
we caught the sparkle of a bayonet here and there.

Somewhere, doubtless, some half starved brigade of ours was gnawing
its nails and awaiting this same convoy; and I silently prayed God to
lead it safely to its destination.

"Pretty women everywhere!" whispered Boyd in my ear. "Our friend the
Major seems to have a houseful. The devil take me if I leave this town
tomorrow!"

As we rode into the yard and dismounted, and our rifleman took the
bridles, across the crowded roadway we could see a noble house with
its front doors wide open and a group of ladies and children there and
many gentlemen saluting them as they entered or left the house.

"A respectable company," I heard Boyd mutter to himself, as he stood
slapping the dust from hunting-shirt and leggings and smoothing the
fringe. And, "Damme, Loskiel," he said, "we're like to cut a most
contemptible figure among such grand folk-- what with our leather
breeches, and saddle-reek for the only musk we wear. Lord! But yonder
stands a handsome girl-- and my condition mortifies me so that I could
slink off to the mews for shame and lie on straw with the hostlers."

There was, I knew, something genuine in his pretense of hurt vanity,
even under the merry mask he wore; but I only laughed.

A great many people moved about, many, I could see, having arrived
from the distant country; and there was a great noise of hammering,
too, from a meadow below, where, a soldier told us, they were erecting
barracks for Sheldon's and for other troops shortly expected.

"There is even talk of a fort for the ridge yonder," he said. "One may
see the Sound from there."

We glanced up at the ridge, then gazed curiously around, and finally
walked down along the stone wall to a pasture. Here, where they were
building the barracks, there had been a camp; and the place was still
smelling stale enough. Tents were now being loaded on ox wagons; and a
company of Colonel Thomas's regiment was filing out along the road
after the convoy which we had seen moving through the dust toward
Lewisboro.

People stood about looking on; some poked at the embers of the smoky
fires, some moused and prowled about to see what scrap they might pick
up.

Boyd's roving gaze had been arrested by a little scene enacting just
around the corner of the partly-erected barracks, where half a dozen
soldiers had gathered around some camp-women, whose sullen attitude
discouraged their gallantries. She was dressed in shabby finery. On
her hair, which was powdered, she wore a jaunty chip hat tied under
her chin with soiled blue ribbons, and a kerchief of ragged lace hid
her bosom, pinned with a withered rose. The scene was sordid enough;
and, indifferent, I gazed elsewhere.

"A shilling to a penny they kiss her yet!" he said to me presently,
and for the second time I noticed the comedy-- if you choose to call
it so-- for the wench was now struggling fiercely amid the laughing
men.

"A pound to a penny!" repeated Boyd; "Do you take me, Loskiel?"

The next moment I had pushed in among them, forcing the hilarious
circle to open; and I heard her quick, uneven breathing as I elbowed
my way to her, and turned on the men good-humoredly.

"Come, boys, be off!" I said. "Leave rough sport to the lower party.
She's sobbing." I glanced at her. "Why, she's but a child, after all!
Can't you see, boys? Now, off with you all in a hurry!"

There had evidently been some discipline drilled into Colonel Thomas's
regiments the men seemed instantly to know me for an officer, whether
by my dress or voice I know not, yet Morgan's rifle frock could be
scarcely familiar to them,

A mischievous sergeant saluted me, grinning, saying it was but idle
sport and no harm meant; and so, some laughing, others seeming to be
ashamed, they made haste to clear out. I followed them, with a nod of
reassurance to the wench, who might have been their drab for aught I
knew, all camps being full of such poultry.

"Gallantly done!" exclaimed Boyd derisively, as I came slowly back to
where he stood. "But had I been fortunate enough to think of
intervening, egad, I believe I would have claimed what she refused the
rest, Loskiel!"

"From a ruddied camp drab?" I asked scornfully.

"Her cheeks and lips are not painted. I've discovered that," he
insisted, staring back at her.

"Lord!" said I. "Would you linger here making sheep's eyes at yonder
ragged baggage? Come, sir, if you please."

"I tell you, I would give a half year's pay to see her washed and
clothed becomingly!"

"You never will," said I impatiently, and jogged his elbow to make him
move. For he was ever a prey to strange and wayward fancies which
hitherto I had only smiled at. But now, somehow-- perhaps because
there might have been some excuse for this one-- perhaps because what
a man rescues he will not willingly leave to another-- even such a
poor young thing as this plaything of the camp-- for either of these
reasons, or for none at all, this ogling of her did not please me.

Most unwillingly he yielded to the steady pressure of my elbow; and we
moved on, he turning his handsome head continually. After a while he
laughed.

"Nevertheless," said he, "there stands the rarest essence of real
beauty I have ever seen, in lady born or beggar; and I am an ass to go
my way and leave it for the next who passes."

I said nothing.

He grumbled for a while below his breath, then:

"Yes, sir! Sheer beauty-- by the roadside yonder-- in ragged ribbons
and a withered rose. Only-- such Puritans as you perceive it not."

After a silence, and as we entered the gateway to the manor house:

"I swear she wore no paint, Loskiel-- whatever she is like enough to
be."

"Good heavens!" said I. "Are you brooding on her still?"

Yet, I myself was thinking of her, too; and because of it a strange,
slow anger was possessing me.

"Thank God," thought I to myself, "no woman of the common class could
win a second glance from me. In which," I added with satisfaction, "I
am unlike most other men."

A Philistine thought the same, one day-- if I remember right.

  CHAPTER II

 POUNDRIDGE

We now approached the door of the manor house, where we named
ourselves to the sentry, who presently fetched an officer of Minute
Men, who looked us over somewhat coldly.

"You wish to see Major Lockwood?" he asked.

"Yes," said Boyd, "and you may say to him that we are come from
headquarters express to speak with him on private business."

"From whom in Albany do you come, sir?"

"Well, sir, if you must have it, from General Clinton," returned Boyd
in a lower voice. "But we would not wish it gossipped aloud."

The man seemed to be perplexed, but he went away again, leaving us
standing in the crowded hall where officers, ladies of the family, and
black servants were continually passing and repassing.

Very soon a door opened on our left, and we caught a glimpse of a
handsome room full of officers and civilians, where maps were
scattered in confusion over tables, chairs, and even on the floor. An
officer in buff and blue came out of the room, glanced keenly at us,
made a slight though courteous inclination, but instead of coming
forward to greet us turned into another room on the right, which was a
parlour.

Then the minute officer returned, directed us where to place our
rifles, insisted firmly that we also leave under his care our war axes
and the pistol which Boyd carried, and then ushered us into the
parlour. And it occurred to me that the gentleman on whose head the
British had set a price was very considerably inclined toward
prudence.

Now this same gentleman, Major Lockwood, who had been seated behind a
table when we entered the parlour, rose and received us most blandly,
although I noted that he kept the table between himself and us, and
also that the table drawer was open, where I could have sworn that the
papers so carelessly heaped about covered a brace of pistols.

For to this sorry pass the Westchester folk had come, that they
trusted no stranger, nor were like to for many a weary day to come.
Nor could I blame this gentleman with a heavy price on his head, and,
as I heard later, already the object of numerous and violent attempts
in which, at times, entire regiments had been employed to take him.

But after he had carefully read the letter which Boyd bore from our
General of Brigade, he asked us to be seated, and shut the table
drawer, and came over to the silk-covered sofa on which we had seated
ourselves.

"Do you know the contents of this letter?" he asked Boyd bluntly.

"Yes, Major Lockwood."

"And does Mr. Loskiel know, also?"

"Yes, sir," I answered.

The Major sat musing, turning over and over the letter between thumb
and forefinger.

He was a man, I should say, of forty or a trifle more, with brown eyes
which sometimes twinkled as though secretly amused, even when his face
was gravest and most composed; a gentleman of middle height, of good
figure and straight, and of manners so simple that the charm of them
struck one afterward as a pleasant memory.

"Gentlemen," he said, looking up at us from his momentary abstraction,
"for the first part of General Clinton's letter I must be brief with
you and very frank. There are no recruits to be had in this vicinity
for Colonel Morgan's Rifles. Riflemen are of the elite; and our best
characters and best shots are all enlisted-- or dead or in prison----"
He made a significant gesture toward the south. And we thought of the
Prison Ships and the Provost, and sat silent.

"There is," he added, "but one way, and that is to pick riflemen from
our regiments here; and I am not sure that the law permits it in the
infantry. It would be our loss, if we lose our best shots to your
distinguished corps; but of course that is not to be considered if the
interests of the land demand it. However, if I am not mistaken, a
recruiting party is to follow you."

"Yes, Major."

"Then, sir, you may report accordingly. And now for the other matters.
General Clinton, in this letter, recommends that we speak very freely
together. So I will be quite frank, gentlemen. The man you seek,
Luther Kinnicut, is a spy whom our Committee of Safety maintains
within the lines of the lower party. If it be necessary I can
communicate with him, but it may take a week. Might I ask why you
desire to question him so particularly?"

Boyd said: "There is a Siwanois Indian, one Mayaro, a Sagamore, with
whom we have need to speak. General Clinton believes that this man
Kinnicut knows his whereabouts."

"I believe so, too," said the Major smiling. "But I ask your pardon,
gentlemen; the Sagamore, Mayaro, although a Siwanois, was adopted by
the Mohicans, and should be rated one."

"Do you know him, sir?"

"Very well indeed. May I inquire what it is you desire of Mayaro?"

"This," said Boyd slowly; "and this is the real secret with which I am
charged-- a secret not to be entrusted to paper-- a secret which you,
sir, and even my comrade, Mr. Loskiel, now learn for the first time.
May I speak with safety in this room, Major?"

The Major rose, opened the door into the hall, dismissed the sentry,
closed and locked the door, and returned to us.

"I am," he said smiling, "almost ashamed to make so much circumstance
over a small matter of which you have doubtless heard. I mean that the
lower party has seen fit to distinguish me by placing a price upon my
very humble head; and as I am not only Major in Colonel Thomas's
regiment, but also a magistrate, and also, with my friend Lewis
Morris, a member of the Provincial Assembly, and of the Committee of
Safety, I could not humour the lower party by permitting them to
capture so many important persons in one net," he added, laughing.
"Now, sir, pray proceed. I am honoured by General Clinton's
confidence."

"Then, sir," said Boyd very gravely, "this is the present matter as it
stands. His Excellency has decided on a daring stroke to be delivered
immediately; General Sullivan has been selected to deal it, General
Clinton is to assist. A powerful army is gathering at Albany, and
another at Easton and Tioga. The enemy know well enough that we are
concentrating, and they have guessed where the blow is to be struck.
But, sir, they have guessed wrong!"

"Not Canada, then?" inquired the Major quietly.

"No, sir. We demonstrate northward; that is all. Then we wheel west by
south and plunge straight into the wilderness, swift as an arrow
files, directly at the heart of the Long House!"

"Sir!" he exclaimed, astonished.

"Straight at the heart o! the Iroquois Confederacy, Major! That is
what is to be done-- clean out, scour out, crush, annihilate those
hell-born nations which have so long been terrorizing the Northland.
Major Lockwood, you have read in the New England and Pennsylvania
papers how we have been threatened, how we have been struck, how we
have fought and suffered. But you, sir, have only heard; you have not
seen. So I must tell you now that it is far worse with us than we have
admitted. The frontier of New York State is already in ashes; the
scalp yell rings in our forests day and night; and the red
destructives under Brant, and the painted Tories under Walter Butler,
spare neither age nor sex-- for I myself have seen scalps taken from
the tender heads of cradled infants-- nay, I have seen them scalp the
very hound on guard at the cabin door! And that is how it goes with
us, sir. God save you, here, from the blue-eyed Indians!"

He stopped, hesitated, then, softly smiting one fist within the other:

"But now I think their doom is sounding-- Seneca, lying Cayuga,
traitorous Onondaga, Mohawk, painted renegade-- all are to go down
into utter annihilation. Nor is that all. We mean to sweep their
empire from end to end, burn every town, every castle, every orchard,
every grain field-- lay waste, blacken, ravage, leave nothing save
wind-blown ashes of that great Confederacy, and of the vast granary
which has fed the British northern armies so long. Nothing must remain
of the Long House; the Senecas shall die at the Western door; the
Keepers of the Eastern door shall die. Only the Oneida may be spared--
as many as have remained neutral or loyal to us-- they and such of the
Tuscaroras and Lenni-Lenape as have not struck us; and the Stockbridge
and White Plains tribes, and the remnants of the Mohicans.

"And that is why we have come here for riflemen, and that is why we
are here to find the Sagamore, Mayaro. For our Oneidas have told us
that he knows where the castles of the Long House lie, and that he can
guide our army unerringly to that dark, obscure and fearsome
Catharines-town where the hag, Montour, reigns in her shaggy
wilderness."

There was a long silence; and I for one, amazed at what I had heard--
for I had made certain that we were to have struck at Canada-- was
striving to reconcile this astounding news with all my preconceived
ideas. Yet, that is ever the way with us in the regiments; we march,
not knowing whither; we camp at night not knowing why. Unseen
authority moves us, halts us; unseen powers watch us, waking and
sleeping, think for us, direct our rising and our lying down, our
going forth and our return-- nay, the invisible empire envelops us
utterly in sickness and in health, ruling when and how much we eat and
sleep, controlling every hour and prescribing our occupation for every
minute. Only our thoughts remain free; and these, as we are not dumb,
unthinking beasts, must rove afield to seek for the why and wherefore,
garnering conclusions which seldom if ever are corroborated.

So I; for I had for months now made sure that our two armies in the
North were to be flung pell mell on Quebec and on Niagara. Only
regarding the latter place had I nearly hit the mark; for it seemed
reasonable that our army, having once swept the Long House, could
scarcely halt ere we had cleaned out that rat's nest of Indians and
painted Tories which is known as Fort Niagara, and from which every
dreadful raid of the destructives into Tryon County had been planned
and executed.

Thinking of these things, my deep abstraction was broken by the
pleasant voice of Major Lockwood.

"Mr. Boyd," he said, "I realise now how great is your need of riflemen
to fill the State's quota. If there is anything I or my associates can
do, under the law, it shall be done; and when we are able to
concentrate, and when your recruiting party arrives, I will do what I
can, if permitted, to select from the dragoons of Sheldon and Moylan,
and from my own regiment such men as may, by marksmanship and
character, qualify for the corps d'élite."

He rose and began to pace the handsome parlour, evidently worried and
perplexed; and presently he halted before us, who had of course risen
in respect.

"Gentlemen," he said, "I must lay bare to you our military necessity,
embarrassment, and mortification in this country of Westchester, so
that you may clearly understand the difficulty of furnishing the
recruits you ask for.

"South of us, from New York to North Castle, our enemy is in
possession. We are attempting to hold this line; but it is a vast
country. We can count on very few Continental troops; our militia has
its various rendezvous, and it turns out at every call. The few
companies of my regiment of foot are widely scattered; one company
left here as escort to the military train an hour ago. Sheldon's 2nd
Light Dragoons are scattered all over the country. Two troops and
headquarters remain now here at my house."

He waved his hand westward: "So desperate is our condition, gentlemen,
that Colonel Moylan's Dragoons have been ordered here, and are at this
moment, I suppose, on the march to join us. And-- I ask you,
gentlemen-- considering that in New York City, just below us, there
are ten thousand British regulars, not counting the partizan corps,
the irregulars, the Tory militia, the numberless companies of
marauders-- I ask you how you can expect to draw recruits from the
handful of men who have been holding-- or striving to hold-- this line
for the last three years!"

Boyd shook his head in silence. As for me, it was not my place to
speak, nor had I anything to suggest.

After a moment the Major said, more cheerfully:

"Well, well, gentlemen, who knows after all? We may find ways and
means. And now, one other matter remains to be settled, and I think I
may aid you."

He went to the door and opened it. The sentry who stood across the
hall came to him instantly and took his orders; and in a few moments
there entered the room four gentlemen to whom we were made known by
Major Lockwood. One of these was our Captain of Minute Men. They were,
in order, Colonel Sheldon, a fretful gentleman with a face which
seemed to me weak, almost stupid; Colonel Thomas, an iron-grey, silent
officer, stern but civil; Captain William Fancher, a Justice of the
Peace, Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, and holding his commission
as Captain of Minute Men; and a Mr. Alsop Hunt, a Quaker, son-in-law
of Major Lockwood, and a most quiet and courteous gentleman.

With one accord we drew chairs around the handsome centre table, where
silver candlesticks glimmered and a few books lay in their fine,
gilded bindings.

It was very evident to us that in the hands of these five gentlemen
lay the present safety of Westchester County, military and civil. And
to them Major Lockwood made known our needs-- not, however, disturbing
them in their preconceived notion, so common everywhere, that the blow
to be struck from the North was to be aimed at the Canadas.

Colonel Sheldon's weak features turned red and he said almost
peevishly that no recruits could be picked up in Westchester, and that
we had had our journey for our pains. Anyway, he'd be damned if he'd
permit recruiting for riflemen among his dragoons, it being contrary
to law and common sense.

"I've a dozen young fellows who might qualify," said Colonel Thomas
bluntly, "but if the law permits Mr. Boyd to take them my regiment's
volleys wouldn't stop a charge of chipmunks!"

We all laughed a little, and Captain Fancher said:

"Minute Men are Minute Men, Mr. Boyd. You are welcome to any you can
enlist from my company."

Alsop Hunt, being a Quaker, and personally opposed to physical
violence, offered no suggestion until the second object of our visit
was made known. Then he said, very quietly:

"Mayaro, the Mohican Sagamore, is in this vicinity."

"How do you know that, Alsop?" asked Major Lockwood quickly.

"I saw him yesterday."

"Here in Poundridge?"

Mr. Hunt glanced at Colonel Thomas, then with a slight colour mounting
to his temples:

"The Sagamore was talking to one of the camp-women last evening--
toward sundown on the Rock Hills. We were walking abroad for the air,
my wife and I----" he turned to Major Lockwood: "Betsy whispered to
me, 'There is a handsome wench talking to an Indian!' And I saw the
Sagamore standing in the sunset light, conversing with one of the
camp-women who hang about Colonel Thomas's regiment.".

"Would you know the slattern again?" asked Colonel Thomas, scowling.

"I think so, Colonel. And to tell the truth she was scarce a slattern,
whatever else she may be-- a young thing-- and it seemed sad to us--
to my wife and me."

"And handsome?" inquired Boyd, smiling at me.

"I may not deny it, sir," said Mr. Hunt primly. "The child possessed
considerable comeliness."

"Why," said Boyd to me, laughingly, "she may be the wench you so
gallantly rescued an hour since." And he told the story gayly enough,
and with no harm meant; but it embarrassed and annoyed me.

"If the wench knows where the Sagamore may be found," said Major
Lockwood, "it might be well for Mr. Loskiel to look about and try to
find her."

"Would you know her again?" inquired Colonel Thomas.

"No, sir, I----" And I stopped short, because what I was about to say
was not true. For, when I had sent the soldiers about their business
and had rejoined Boyd-- and when Boyd had bidden me turn again because
the girl was handsome, there had been no need to turn. I had seen her;
and I knew that when he said she was beautiful he said what was true.
And the reason I did not turn, to look again was because beauty in
such a woman should inspire no interest in me.

I now corrected myself, saying coolly enough:

"Yes, Colonel Thomas, on second thought I think I might know her if I
see her."

"Perhaps," suggested Captain Fancher, "the wench has gone a-gypsying
after the convoy."

"These drabs change lovers over night," observed Colonel Thomas
grimly. "Doubtless Sheldon's troopers are already consoling her."

Colonel Sheldon, who had been fiddling uneasily with his sword-knot,
exclaimed peevishly:

"Good God, sir! Am I also to play chaplain to my command?"

There was a curious look in Colonel Thomas's eyes which seemed to say:
"You might play it as well as you play the Colonel;" but Sheldon was
too stupid and too vain, I think, to perceive any affront.

And, "Where do you lodge, gentlemen?" inquired our Major, addressing
us both; and when he learned that we were roofless he insisted that we
remain under his roof, nor would he hear of any excuses touching the
present unsuitability of our condition and attire.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen! I will not accept a refusal," he said. "We are
plain folk and live plainly, and both bed and board are at your
disposal. Lord, sir! And what would Clinton think were I to send two
officers of his corps d'élite to a village ordinary!"

We had all risen and were moving toward the door. A black servant came
when the Major pulled the bell card, and showed Boyd and myself to two
pretty chambers, small, but very neat, where the linen on the beds
smelled fresh and sweet, and the westering sun struck golden through
chintz curtains drawn aside.

"Gad!" said Boyd, eying the bed. "It's long since my person has been
intimately acquainted with sheet and pillow. What a pretty nest,
Loskiel. Lord! And here's a vase of posies, too! The touch feminine--
who could mistake it in the sweet, fresh whiteness of this little
roam!"

Presently came our rifleman, Jack Mount, bearing our saddle-bags; and
we stripped and washed us clean, and put on fresh linen and our best
uniforms of soft doeskin, which differed from the others only in that
they were clean and new, and that the thrums were gayer and the
Iroquois beadwork more flamboyant.

"If I but had my hair in a snug club, and well powdered," sighed Boyd,
lacing his shirt. "And I tell you, Loskiel, though I would not boast,
this accursed rifle-shirt and these gaudy leggings conceal a supple
body and a leg as neatly turned as any figure more fortunately clothed
in silken coat and stockings!"

I began to laugh, and he laughed, too, vowing he envied me my hair,
which was yellow and which curled of itself so that it needed no
powder.

I can see him yet, standing there in the sunshine, both hands gripping
his dark hair in pretense of grief, and vowing that he had a mind to
scalp himself for very vexation. Alas! That I remember now such idle
words, spoken in the pride and strength and gayety of youth! And
always when I think of him I remember his dread of fire-- the only
fear he ever knew. These things-- his brown eyes and quick, gay
smile-- his lithe and supple person-- and his love of women-- these I
remember always, even while already much that concerned this man and
me begins to fade with the stealthy years.

While the sun still hung high in the west, and ere any hint of evening
was heard either in the robin's note or from the high-soaring martins,
we had dressed. Boyd went away first, saying carelessly that he meant
to look to the horses before paying his respects to the ladies. A
little later I descended, a black servant conducting me to the family
sitting room.

Here our gallant Major made me known to his lady and to his numerous
family-- six young children, and still a seventh, the pretty maid whom
we had seen on approaching the house, who proved to be a married
daughter. Betsy, they called her-- and she was only seventeen, but had
been two years the wife of Alsop Hunt.

As for the Major's lady, who seemed scarce thirty and was six years
older, she so charmed me with her grace, and with the bright courage
she so sweetly maintained in a home which every hour of the day and
night menaced, that even Mrs. Hunt, with her gay spirits, imperious
beauty, and more youthful attractions, no more than shared my
admiration for her mother.

In half an hour Lieutenant Boyd came in, was presented, and paid his
homage gayly, as he always did. Yet, I thought a slight cloud rested
on his brow, but this soon passed, and I forgot it.

So we talked of this and that as lightly as though no danger
threatened this house; and Boyd was quickly at his best with the
ladies. As for me, I courted the children. And I remember there were
two little maids of fourteen and eleven, Ruhannah and Hannah, sweet
and fresh as wild June roses, who showed me the tow cloth for our army
which they were spinning, and blushed at my praise of their industry.
And there was Mary, ten, and Clarissa, eight, and two little boys, one
a baby-- all save the last two children carding or spinning flax and
tow.

It was not easy to understand that this blooming matron could be
mother of all of these, so youthful she seemed in her Quaker-cut gown
of dove-colour-- though it was her handsome, high-spirited daughter
who should have worn the sober garb.

"Not I," said she, laughing at Boyd. "I'd sooner don jack-boots and be
a dragoon-- and we would completely represent a holy cause, my husband
with his broad-brim and I with my sword. What do you say, Mr. Boyd?"

"I beg of you first to consider the rifle-frock if you must enlist!"
urged Boyd, with such fervour that we all laughed at his gallant
effort to recruit such beauty for our corps; for even a mental picture
of Betsy Hunt in rifle-frock seemed too adorable. Mr. Hunt, entering,
smiled in his quiet, embarrassed way; and I thought that this wise and
gentle-mannered man must have more than a handful in his spirited
young wife, whose dress was anything but plain.

I had taken the tiny maid, Clarissa, upon my knees and was telling her
of the beauty of our Northland, and of that great, dusky green ocean
of giant pines, vast as the sea and as silent and uncharted, when
Major Lockwood bent over me saying in a quiet voice that it might be
well for me to look about in the town for the wench who knew the
whereabouts of Mayaro.

"While there is still daylight," he added, as I set Clarissa on the
floor and stood up, "and if she be yet here you should find her before
supper time. We sup at six, Mr. Loskiel."

I bowed, took leave of the ladies, exchanged an irritated glance for
Boyd's significant grin, and went out to the porch, putting on my
light round cap of moleskin. I liked neither my present errand, nor
Boyd's smile either.

Now, I had not thought to take with me my side-arms, but a slave
waited at the door with my belt. And as I buckled it and hung war-axe
and heavy hunting blade, I began to comprehend something of the
imminent danger which so apparently lurked about this country. For all
military men hereabouts went armed; and even in the house I had
noticed that Major Lockwood wore his sword, as did the other
officers-- some even carrying their pistols.

The considerable throng of people whom we had first seen in the
neighborhood of the house had scattered or gone off when the infantry
had left. Carpenters were still sawing and hammering on the flimsy new
barracks down in the meadow, and there seemed to be a few people
there. But on strolling thither I saw nothing of the wench; so turned
on my heel and walked briskly up the road.

About the village itself there was nothing to be seen of the girl, nor
did I know how to make inquiries-- perhaps dreading to do so lest my
quest be misunderstood or made a jest of by some impertinent fellow.

In the west a wide bank of cloud had pushed up over the horizon and
was already halving the low-hanging sun, which presently it entirely
swallowed; and the countryside grew luminously grey and that intense
green tinged the grass, which is with us the forerunner of an
approaching storm.

But I thought it far off, not then knowing the Hudson's midsummer
habits, nor the rapid violence of the July storms it hatches and
drives roaring among the eastern hills and across the silvery Sound.

So, with a careless glance aloft, I pursued my errand, strolling
hither and thither through the pleasant streets and lanes of old
Poundridge, always approaching any groups of soldiers that I saw
because I thought it likely that the wench might haunt her kind.

I did not find her; and presently I began to believe it likely that
she had indeed gone off a-gypsying after the escort companies toward
Lewisboro.

There is a road which, skirting the Stone Hills, runs east by north
between Cross Pond and the Three Lakes; and, pursuing it, I came on a
vidette of Sheldon's regiment, most carelessly set where he could see
nothing, and yet be seen a mile away.

Supposing he would halt me, I walked up to him; and he continued to
munch the green bough-apple he was eating, making me a most slovenly
salute.

Under his leather helmet I saw that my dragoon was but a child of
fifteen-- scarce strong enough to swing the heavy sabre at his pommel
or manage the sawed-off musket which he bore, the butt resting wearily
on his thigh. And it made me sober indeed to see to what a pass our
country had come, that we enlisted boys and were obliged to trust to
their ignorance for our protection.

"It will rain before sundown," he said, munching on his apple; "best
seek shelter, sir. When it comes it will come hard."

"Where runs this road?" I asked.

"To Boutonville."

"And what is Boutonville?"

"It's where the Boutons live-- a mile or two north, sir. They're a
wild parcel."

"Are they of our party?"

"Oh, yes, sir. But they hunt the leather-caps as we hunt quail-- scare
up a company, fire, and then track down the scattered."

"Oh; irregulars."

"No, sir, not skinners. They farm it until the British plague them
beyond endurance. Then," he added significantly, "they go a-hunting
with their dogs."

I had already turned to retrace my steps when it occurred to me that
perhaps an inquiry of this lad might not be misunderstood.

So I walked up to his horse and stood caressing the sorry animal while
I described to him the wench I was seeking.

"Yes, sir," he said seriously, "that's the one the boys are ever
plaguing to make her rage."

"Do you know her?"

"By sight, yes, sir."

"She is one of the camp followers, I take it," said I carelessly.

"I don't know. The boys are ever plaguing her. She came from the North
they say. All I know is that in April she was first seen here,
loitering about the camp where the White Plains Indians were embodied.
But she did not go off with the Continentals."

"She was loitering this afternoon by the camp of Colonel Thomas's
men," I said.

"Very like, sir. Did the men plague her?"

"Yes."

He bit into his apple, unconcerned:

"They are all after her. But I never saw her kind to any man--
whatever she may be."

Why, I did not know, but what he said gave me satisfaction.

"You do not know which way she went?" I asked.

"No, sir. I have been here but the half hour. She knows the Bouton
boys yonder. I have seen her coming and going on this road, sometimes
with an Indian----"

"With a Sagamore?"

He continued his munching. Having swallowed what he chewed, he said:

"I know nothing of savages or Sagamores. The Indian may have been a
Sagamore."

"Do you know where he is to be found?"

"No, sir, I do not."

"Perhaps this young girl knows?"

"Doubtless she does, seeing she journeys about with him on the ridge
yonder, which we call the Rock Hills."

"Do you know her name, soldier?"

"They call her Lois, I believe."

And that was all the news I could get of her; and I thanked the boy
and slowly started to retrace my steps toward the village.

Already in the air there was something of that stillness which heralds
storms; no leaves on bush and tree were now stirring; land and sky had
grown sombre all around me; and the grass glimmered intensely green.

Where the road skirted the Stone Hills were no houses, nothing, in
fact, of human habitation to be seen save low on the flank of the
rocky rampart a ruined sugar house on the edge of a maple ridge, I do
not know what made me raise my head to give it a second glance, but I
did; and saw among the rocks near it a woman moving.

Nor do I know, even now, how at that distance and in the dusk of a
coming storm I could perceive that it was she whom I was now seeking.
But so certain was I of this that, without even taking thought to
consider, I left the highway, turned to the right, and began to mount
the hillside where traces of a path or sheep-walk were faintly visible
under foot among the brambles. Once or twice I glanced upward to see
whether she observed me, but the scrubby foliage now hid her as well
as the sap-house, and I hastened because the light was growing very
dim now, and once or twice, far away, I thought I heard the muttering
of thunder.

It was not long before I perceived the ramshackle sap-house ahead of
me among the maples. Then I caught sight of her whom I was seeking.

It was plain that she had not yet discovered me, though she heard me
moving in the thicket. She stood in a half-crouching, listening
attitude, then slowly began to retreat, not cowering, but sullenly and
with a certain defiance in her lithe movement, like some disturbed and
graceful animal which is capable of defending itself but prefers to
get away peaceably if permitted.

I stepped out into the clearing and called to her through the
increasing gloom; and for a moment thought she had gone. Then I saw
her, dimly, watching me from the obscurity of the dark doorway.

"You need have no fear of me," I called to her pleasantly. "You know
me now, do you not?"

She made no answer; and I approached the doorway and stood peering
into her face through the falling twilight. And for a moment I thought
I had been mistaken; but it was she after all.

Yet now she wore neither the shabby chip hat with its soiled blue
ribbon tied beneath her chin, nor any trace of hair powder, nor dotted
kerchief cross-fastened at her breast and pinned with the withered
rose.

And she seemed younger and slimmer and more childish than I had
thought her, her bosom without its kerchief meagre or unformed, and
her cheeks not painted either, but much burned by the July sun. Nor
were her eyes black, as I had supposed, but a dark, clear grey with
black lashes; and her unpowdered hair seemed to be a reddish-chestnut
and scarce longer than my own, but more curly.

"Child," I said, smiling at her, I know not why, "I have been
searching for you ever since I first saw you----"

And: "What do you want of me?" said she, scarce moving her lips.

"A favour."

"Best mount your cobbler's mare and go a-jogging back, my pretty lad."

The calm venom in her voice and her insolent grey eyes took me aback
more than her saucy words.

"Doubtless," I said. "you have not recognized in me the officer who
was at some slight pains to be of service----"

"What is it you desire?" said she, so rudely that I felt my face burn
hot.

"See here, my lass," said I sharply, "you seem to misunderstand my
errand here."

"And am like to," said she, "unless you make your errand short and
plainer-- though I have learned that the errands which bring such men
as you to me are not too easily misunderstood."

"Such men as I----"

"You and your friend with the bold, black eyes. Ask him how much
change he had of me when he came back."

"I did not know he had seen you again," said I, still redder. And saw
that she believed me not.

"Birds sing; men lie," said she. "So if----"

"Be silent! Do you hear!" I cut her short with such contempt that I
saw the painful colour whip her cheeks and her eyes quiver.

Small doubt that what she had learned of men had not sweetened her nor
taught her confidence. But whatever she had been, and whatever she
was, after all concerned not me that I should take pains to silence
her so brutally.

"I am sorry I spoke as I did," said I, "-- however mistaken you are
concerning my seeking you here."

She said nothing.

"Also," I added, with a sudden resurgance of bitterness that surprised
myself, "my conduct earlier in your behalf might have led you to a
wiser judgment."

"I am wise enough-- after my own fashion," she said indifferently.

"Does a man save and then return to destroy?"

"Many a hunter has saved many a spotted fawn from wolf and fox-- so he
might kill it himself, one day."

"You do yourself much flattery, young woman," I said, so unpleasantly
that again the hot colour touched her throat and brow.

"I reason as I have been taught," she said defiantly. "Doubtless you
are self-instructed."

"No; men have taught me. You witnessed, I believe, one lesson. And
your comrade gave me still another."

"I care to witness nothing," I said, furious; "far less desire to
attempt your education. Is all plain now?"

"Your words are," she said, with quiet contempt.

"My words are one with my intention," said I, angrily; far in spite of
my own indifference and contempt, hers was somehow arousing me with
its separate sting hidden in every word she uttered. "And now," I
continued, "all being plain and open between us, let me acquaint you
with the sole object of my visit here to you."

She shrugged her shabby shoulders and waited, her eyes, her
expression, her very attitude indifferent, yet dully watchful.

"You know the Sagamore, Mayaro?" I asked.

"You say so."

"Where is he to be found?" I continued patiently.

"Why do you desire to know?"

The drab was exasperating me, and I think I looked it, for the
slightest curl of her sullen lips hinted a scornful smile.

"Come, come, my lass," said I, with all the patience I could still
command, "there is a storm approaching, and I do not wish to get wet.
Answer my civil question and I'll thank you and be off about my
business. Where is this Sagamore to be found?"

"Why do you wish to know?"

"Because I desire to consult him concerning certain matters."

"What matters?"

"Matters which do not concern you!" I snapped out.

"Are you sure of that, pretty boy?"

"Am I sure?" I repeated, furious. "What do you mean? Will you answer
an honest question or not?"

"Why do you desire to see this Sagamore?" she repeated so obstinately
that I fairly clenched my teeth.

"Answer me," I said. "Or had you rather I fetched a file of men up
here?"

"Fetch a regiment, and I shall tell you nothing unless I choose."

"Good God, what folly!" I exclaimed. "For whom and for what do you
take me, then, that you refuse to answer the polite and harmless
question of an American officer!"

"You had not so named yourself."

"Very well, then; I am Euan Loskiel, Ensign in Morgan's rifle
regiment!"

"You say so."

"Do you doubt it?"

"Birds sing," she said. Suddenly she stepped from the dark doorway,
came to where I stood, bent forward and looked me very earnestly in
the eyes-- so closely that something-- her nearness-- I know not
what-- seemed to stop my heart and breath for a second.

Then, far on the western hills lightning glimmered; and after a long
while it thundered.

"Do you wish me to find this Sagamore for you?" she asked very
quietly.

"Will you do so?"

A drop of rain fell; another, which struck her just where the cheek
curved under the long black lashes, fringing them with brilliancy like
tears.

"Where do you lodge?" she asked, after a silent scrutiny of me.

"This night I am a guest at Major Lockwood's. Tomorrow I travel north
again with my comrade, Lieutenant Boyd."

She was looking steadily at me all the time; finally she said:

"Somehow, I believe you to be a friend to liberty. I know it--
somehow."

"It is very likely, in this rifle dress I wear," said I smiling.

"Yet a man may dress as he pleases."

"You mistrust me for a spy?"

"If you are, why, you are but one more among many hereabouts. I think
you have not been in Westchester very long. It does not matter. No boy
with the face you wear was born to betray anything more important than
a woman."

I turned hot and scarlet with chagrin at her cool presumption-- and
would not for worlds have had her see how the impudence stung and
shamed me.

For a full minute she stood there watching me; then:

"I ask pardon," she said very gravely.

And somehow, when she said it I seemed to experience a sense of
inferiority-- which was absurd and monstrous, considering what she
doubtless was.

It had now begun to rain in very earnest; and was like to rain harder
ere the storm passed. My clothes being my best, I instinctively
stepped into the doorway; and, of a sudden, she was there too, barring
my entry, flushed and dangerous, demanding the reason of my intrusion.

"Why," said I astonished, "may I not seek shelter from a storm in a
ruined sugar-house, without asking by your leave?"

"This sap-house is my own dwelling!" she said hotly. "It is where I
live!"

"Oh, Lord," said I, bewildered, "-- if you are like to take offense at
everything I say, or look, or do, I'll find a hospitable tree
somewhere----"

"One moment, sir----"

"Well?"

She stood looking at me in the doorway, then slowly dropped her eyes,
and in the same law voice I had heard once before:

"I ask your pardon once again," she said. "Please to come inside-- and
close the door. An open door draws lightning."

It was already drawing the rain in violent gusts.

The thunder began to bang with that metallic and fizzling tone which
it takes on when the bolts fall very near; flash after flash of violet
light illuminated the shack at intervals, and the rafters trembled as
the black shadows buried us.

"Have you a light hereabout?" I asked.

"No,"

For ten minutes or more the noise of the storm made it difficult to
hear or speak. I could scarce see her now in the gloom. And so we
waited there in silence until the roar of the rain began to die away,
and it slowly grew lighter outside and the thunder grew more distant.

I went to the door, looked out into the dripping woods, and turned to
her.

"When will you bring the Sagamore to me?" I demanded.

"I have not promised."

"But you will?"

She waited a while, then:

"Yes, I will bring him."

"When?"

"Tonight."

"You promise?"

"Yes."

"And if it rains again''

"It will rain all night, but I shall send you the Sagamore. Best go,
sir. The real tempest is yet to break. It hangs yonder above the
Hudson. But you have time to gain the Lockwood House."

I said to her, with a slight but reassuring smile, most kindly
intended:

"Now that I am no longer misunderstood by you, I may inform you that
in what you do for me you serve our common country." It did not seem a
pompous speech to me.

"If I doubted that," she said, "I had rather pass the knife you wear
around my throat than trouble myself to oblige you."

Her words, and the quiet, almost childish voice, seemed so oddly at
variance that I almost laughed; but changed my mind.

"I should never ask a service of you for myself alone," I said so
curtly that the next moment I was afraid I had angered her, and
fearing she might not keep her word to me, smiled and frankly offered
her my hand.

Very slowly she put forth her own-- a hand stained and roughened, but
slim and small. And so I went away through the dripping bush, and down
the rocky hill. A slight sense of fatigue invaded me; and I did not
then understand that it came from my steady and sustained efforts to
ignore what any eyes could not choose but see-- this young girl's
beauty-- yes, despite her sorry mien and her rags-- a beauty that was
fashioned to trouble men; and which was steadily invading my senses
whether I would or no.

Walking along the road and springing over the puddles, I thought to
myself that it was small wonder such a wench was pestered in a common
soldier's camp. For she had about her everything to allure the grosser
class-- a something-- indescribable perhaps-- but which even such a
man as I had become unwillingly aware of. And I must have been very
conscious of it, for it made me restless and vaguely ashamed that I
should condescend so far as even to notice it. More than that, it
annoyed me not a little that I should bestow any thought upon this
creature at all; but what irritated me most was that Boyd had so
demeaned himself as to seek her out behind my back.

When I came to the manor house, it had already begun to rain again;
and even as I entered the house, a tempest of rain and wind burst once
more over the hills with a violence I had scarcely expected.

Encountering Major Lockwood and Lieutenant Boyd in the hall, I scowled
at the latter askance, but remembered my manners, and smoothed my face
and told them of my success.

"Rain or no," said I, "she has promised me to send this Sagamore here
tonight. And I am confident she will keep her word."

"Which means," said Boyd, with an unfeigned sigh, that we travel north
tomorrow. Lord! How sick am I of saddle and nag and the open road.
Your kindly hospitality, Major, has already softened me so that I
scarce know how to face the wilderness again."

And at supper, that evening, Boyd frankly bemoaned his lot, and Mrs.
Lockwood condoled with him; but Betsy Hunt turned up her pretty nose,
declaring that young men were best off in the woods, which kept them
out o' mischief. She did not know the woods.

And after supper, as she and my deceitful but handsome lieutenant
lingered by the stairs, I heard her repeat it again, utterly refusing
to say she was sorry or that she commiserated his desperate lot. But
on her lips hovered a slight and provoking smile, and her eyes were
very brilliant under her powdered hair.

All women liked Boyd; none was insensible to his charm. Handsome, gay,
amusing-- and tender, alas!-- too often-- few remained indifferent to
this young man, and many there were who found him difficult to forget
after he had gone his careless way. But I was damning him most
heartily for the prank he played me.

I sat in the parlour talking to Mrs. Lockwood. The babies were long
since in bed; the elder children now came to make their reverences to
their mother and father, and so very dutifully to every guest. A fat
black woman in turban and gold ear-hoops fetched them away; and the
house seemed to lose a trifle of its brightness with the children's
going.

Major Lockwood sat writing letters on a card-table, a cluster of tall
candles at his elbow; Mr. Hunt was reading; his wife and Boyd still
lingered on the stairs, and their light, quick laughter sounded
prettily at moments.

Mrs. Lockwood, I remember, had been sewing while she and I conversed
together. The French alliance was our topic; and she was still
speaking of the pleasure it had given all when Lewis Morris brought to
her house young Lafayette. Then, of a sudden, she turned her head
sharply, as though listening.

Through the roar of the storm I thought I heard the gallop of a horse.
Major Lockwood lifted his eyes from his letters, fixing them on the
rain-washed window.

Certainly a horseman had now pulled up at our very porch; Mr. Hunt
laid aside his book very deliberately and walked to the parlour door,
and a moment later the noise of the metal knocker outside rang loudly
through the house.

We were now all rising and moving out into the hall, as though a
common instinct of coming trouble impelled us. The black servant
opened; a drenched messenger stood there, blinking in the candle
light.

Major Lockwood went to him instantly, and drew him in the door; and
they spoke together in low and rapid tones.

Mrs. Lockwood murmured in my ear:

"It's one of Luther's men. There is bad news for us from below, I
warrant you."

We heard the Major say:

"You will instantly acquaint Colonels Thomas and Sheldon with this
news. Tell Captain Fancher, too, in passing."

The messenger turned away into the storm, and Major Lockwood called
after him:

"Is there no news of Moylan's regiment?"

"None, sir," came the panting answer; there ensued a second's silence,
a clatter of slippery hoofs, then only the loud, dull roar of the rain
filled the silence.

The Major, who still stood at the door, turned around and glanced at
his wife.

"What is it, dear-- if we may know?" asked she, quite calmly.

"Yes," he said, "you should know, Hannah. And it may not be true,
but-- somehow, I think it is. Tarleton is out."

"Is he headed this way, Ebenezer?" asked Mr. Hunt, after a shocked
silence.

"Why-- yes, so they say. Luther Kinnicut sends the warning. It seems
to be true."

"Tarleton has heard, no doubt, that Sheldon's Horse is concentrating
here," said Mr. Hunt. "But I think it better for thee to leave,
Ebenezer."

Mrs. Lockwood went over to her husband and laid her hand on his sleeve
lightly. The act, and her expression, were heart-breaking, and not to
be mistaken. She knew; and we also now surmised that if the Legion
Cavalry was out, it was for the purpose of taking the man who stood
there before our eyes. Doubtless he was quite aware of it, too, but
made no mention of it.

"Alsop," he said, turning to his son-in-law, "best take the more
damaging of the papers and conceal them as usual. I shall presently be
busied with Thomas and Sheldon, and may have no time for such
details."

"Will they make a stand, do you think?" I whispered to Boyd, " or
shall we be sent a-packing?"

"If there be not too many of them I make a guess that Sheldon's Horse
will stand."

"And what is to be our attitude?"

"Stand with them," said he, laughing, though he knew well that we had
been cautioned to do our errand and keep clear of all brawls.

  CHAPTER III

 VIEW HALLOO!

It rained, rained, rained, and the darkness and wind combined with the
uproar of the storm to make venturing abroad well nigh impossible.
Yet, an orderly, riding at hazard, managed to come up with a hundred
of the Continental foot, convoying the train, and, turning them in
their slopping tracks, start back with them through a road running
shin-high in mud and water.

Messengers, also, were dispatched to call out the district militia,
and they plodded all night with their lanterns, over field and path
and lonely country road.

As for Colonel Sheldon, booted, sashed, and helmeted, he sat apathetic
and inert in the hall, obstinately refusing to mount his men.

"For," says he, "it will only soak their powder and their skins, and
nobody but a fool would ride hither in such a storm. And Tarleton is
no fool, nor am I, either; and that's flat!" It was not as flat as his
own forehead.

"Do you mean that I am a fool to march my men back here from
Lewisboro?" demanded Colonel Thomas sharply, making to rise from his
seat by the empty fireplace.

Duels had sprung from less provocation than had been given by Colonel
Sheldon. Mr. Hunt very mildly interposed; and a painful scene was
narrowly averted because of Colonel Thomas's cold contempt for
Sheldon, which I think Captain Fancher shared.

Major Lockwood, coming in at the moment, flung aside his dripping
riding cloak.

"Sir," said he to Sheldon, "the rumour that the Legion is abroad has
reached your men, and they are saddling in my barns."

"What damned nonsense!" exclaimed Sheldon, in a pet; and, rising,
strode heavily to the door, but met there his Major, one Benjamin
Tallmadge, coming in, all over mud.

This fiery young dragoon's plume, helmet, and cloak were dripping, and
he impatiently dashed the water from feathers and folds.

"Sir!" began Colonel Sheldon loudly, "I have as yet given no order to
saddle!"

And, "By God, sir," says Tallmadge, "the orders must have come from
somebody, for they're doing it!"

"Sir-- sir!" stammered Sheldon, "What d'ye mean by that?"

"Ah!" says Tallmadge coolly, "I mean what I say. Orders must have been
given by somebody."

No doubt; for the orders came from himself, the clever trooper that he
was-- and so he left Sheldon a-fuming and Major Lockwood and Mr. Hunt
most earnestly persuading him to sanction this common and simple
precaution.

Why he conducted so stupidly I never knew. It required all the gentle
composure of Mr. Hunt and all the vigorous logic of Major Lockwood to
prevent him from ordering his men to off-saddle and retire to the
straw above the mangers.

Major Tallmadge and a cornet passed through the hall with their
regimental standard, but Sheldon pettishly bade them to place it in
the parlour and await further orders-- for no reason whatever,
apparently, save to exhibit a petty tyranny.

And all the while a very forest of candles remained lighted throughout
the house; only the little children were asleep; the family servants
and slaves remained awake, not daring to go to bed or even to close
their eyes to all these rumours and uncertainties.

Colonel Thomas, his iron-grey head sunk on his breast, paced the hall,
awaiting the arrival of the two escort companies of his command, yet
scarcely hoping for such good fortune, I think, for his keen eyes
encountered mine from time to time, and he made me gestures expressive
of angry resignation.

As for Sheldon, he pouted and sulked on a sofa, and drank mulled wine,
peevishly assuring everybody who cared to listen that no attack was to
be apprehended in such a storm, and that Colonel Tarleton and his men
now lay snug abed in New York town, a-grinning in their dreams.

A few drenched and woe-begone militia men, the pans of their muskets
wrapped in rags, reported, and were taken in charge by Captain Fancher
as a cattle guard for Major Lockwood's herd.

None of Major Lockwood's messengers were yet returned. Our rifleman
had saddled our own horses, and had brought them up under one of a row
of sheds which had recently been erected near the house. A pair of
smoky lanterns hung under the dripping rafters; and by their light I
perceived the fine horses of Major Lockwood, and of Colonels Sheldon
and Thomas also, standing near ours, bridled and saddled and held by
slaves.

Mrs. Lockwood sat near the parlour door, quietly sewing, but from time
to time I saw her raise her eyes and watch her husband. Doubtless she
was thinking of those forty golden guineas which were to be paid for
the delivery of his head-- perhaps she was thinking of Bloody
Cunningham, and the Provost, and the noose that dangled in a painted
pagoda betwixt the almshouse and the jail in that accursed British
city south of us.

Mrs. Hunt had far less to fear for her quiet lord and master, who
combatted the lower party only with his brains. So she found more
leisure to listen to Boyd's whispered fooleries, and to caution him
with lifted finger, glancing at him sideways; and I saw her bite her
lips at times to hide the smile, and tap her slender foot, and bend
closer over her tabouret while her needle flew the faster.

As for me, my Sagamore had not arrived; and I finally cast a cloak
about me and went out to the horse-sheds, where our rifleman lolled,
chewing a lump of spruce and holding our three horses.

"Well, Jack," said I, "this is rare weather for Colonel Tarleton's fox
hunting."

"They say he hunts an ass, sir, too," said Jack Mount under his
breath. "And I think it must be so, for there be five score of Colonel
Sheldon's dragoons in yonder barns, drawing at jack-straws or conning
their thumbs-- and not a vidette out-- not so much as a militia
picket, save for the minute men which Colonel Thomas and Major
Lockwood have sent out afoot."

There was a certain freedom in our corps, but it never warranted such
impudent presumption as this; and I sharply rebuked the huge fellow
for his implied disrespect toward Colonel Sheldon.

"Very well, sir. I will bite off this unmilitary tongue o' mine and
feed it to your horse. Then, sir, if you but ask him, he will tell you
very plainly that none of his four-footed comrades in the barn have
carried a single vidette on their backs even as far as Poundridge
village, let alone Mile-Square."

I could scarcely avoid smiling.

"Do you then, for one, believe that Colonel Tarleton will venture
abroad on such a night?"

"I believe as you do," said the rifleman coolly, "-- being some three
years or more a soldier of my country."

"Oh! And what do I believe, Jack?"

"Being an officer who commands as good a soldier as I am, you, sir,
believe as I do."

I was obliged to laugh.

"Well, Jack-- so you agree with me that the Legion Cavalry is out?"

"It is as sure that nested snake's eggs never hatched out rattlers as
it is certain that this wild night will hatch out Tarleton!"

"And why is it so certain in your mind, Jack Mount?"

"Lord, Mr. Loskiel," he said with a lazy laugh, "you know how Mr. Boyd
would conduct were he this same Major Tarleton! You know what Major
Parr would do-- and what you and I and every officer and every man of
Morgan's corps would do on such a night to men of Sheldon's kidney!"

"You mean the unexpected."

"Yes, sir. And this red fox on horseback, Tarleton, has ever done the
same, and will continue till we stop his loping with a bit o' lead."

I nodded and looked out into the rain-swept darkness. And I knew that
our videttes should long since have been set far out on every road
twixt here and Bedford village.

Captain Fancher passed with a lantern, and I ventured to accost him
and mention very modestly my present misgivings concerning our present
situation.

"Sir," said the Captain, dryly, "I am more concerned in this matter
than are you; and I have taken it upon myself to protest to Major
Tallmadge, who is at this moment gone once more to Colonel Sheldon
with very serious representations."

"Lieutenant Boyd and I have volunteered as a scout of three," I said,
"but Colonel Sheldon has declined our services with scant politeness."

Fancher stood far a moment, his rain-smeared lantern hanging
motionless at his side.

"Tarleton may not ride tonight," he said, and moved off a step or two;
then, turning: "But, damn him, I think he will," said he. And walked
away, swinging his light as furiously as a panther thrashes his tail.

By the pointers of my watch it now approached three o'clock in the
morning, and the storm was nothing abating. I had entirely despaired
of the Sagamore's coming, and was beginning to consider the sorry
pickle which this alarm must leave us in if Tarleton's Legion came
upon us now; and that with our widely scattered handfuls we could only
pull foot and await another day to find our Sagamore; when, of a
sudden there came a-creeping through the darkness, out o' the very maw
of the storm, a slender shape, wrapped to the eyes in a ragged scarlet
cape. I knew her; but I do not know how I knew her.

"It is you!" I exclaimed, hastening forward to draw her under shelter.

She came obediently with me, slipping in between the lanterns and
among the horses, moving silently at my elbow to the farther shed,
which was empty.

"You use me very kindly," I said, "to venture abroad tonight on my
behalf."

"I am abroad," she said, "on behalf of my country."

Only her eyes I could see over the edge of the scarlet cloak, and they
regarded me very coldly.

"I meant it so," I said hastily, "What of the Sagamore? Will he come?"

"He will come as I promised you."

"Here?" I said, delighted. "This very night?"

"Yes, here, this night."

"How good-- how generous you have been!" I exclaimed with a warmth and
sincerity that invaded every fibre of me. "And have you come through
this wild storm all the long way afoot?"

"Yes," she said, calmly, "afoot. Since when, sir, have beggars ridden
to a tryst except in pretty fables?"

"Had I known it, I would have taken horse and gone for you and brought
you here riding pillion behind me."

"Had I desired you to come for me, Mr. Loskiel, I should not have
troubled you here."

She loosened the shabby scarlet cloak so that it dropped from below
her eyes and left the features exposed. Enough of lantern light from
the other shed fell on her face for me to see her smooth, cool cheeks
all dewy with the rain, as I had seen them once before in the gloom of
the coming storm.

She turned her head, glancing back at the other shed where men and
horses stood in grotesque shadow shapes under the windy lantern light;
then she looked cautiously around the shed where we stood.

"Come nearer," she motioned.

And once again, as before, my nearness to her seemed for a moment to
meddle with my heart and check it; then, as though to gain the beats
they lost, every little pulse began to hurry faster.

She said in a low voice:

"The Sagamore is now closeted with Major Lockwood. I left him at the
porch and came out here to warn you. Best go to him now, sir. And I
will bid you a-- good night."

"Has he business also with Major Lockwood?"

"He has indeed. You will learn presently that the Sagamore came by
North Castle, and that the roads south of the church are full of
riders-- hundreds of them-- in jack-boots and helmets."

"Were their jackets red?"

"He could not tell. They were too closely cloaked,"

"Colonel Moylan's dragoons?" I said anxiously. "Do you think so?"

"The Sagamore did not think so, and dared not ask, but started
instantly cross-country with the information. I had been waiting to
intercept him and bring him here to you, as I promised you, but missed
him on the Bedford road, where he should have passed. Therefore, I
hastened hither to confess to you my failure, and chanced to overtake
him but a moment since, as he crossed the dooryard yonder."

Even in my growing anxiety, I was conscious of the faithfulness that
this poor girl had displayed-- this ragged child who had stood in the
storm all night long on the Bedford road to intercept the Indian.
Faithful, indeed! For, having missed him, she had made her way here on
foot merely to tell me that she could not keep her word to me.

"Has the Sagamore spoken with Colonel Sheldon?" I asked gently.

"I do not know."

"Will you tarry here till I return?"

"Have you further use of me, Mr. Loskiel'"

Her direct simplicity checked me. After all, now that she had done her
errand, what further use had I for her? I did not even know why I had
asked her to tarry here until my return; and searched my mind seeking
the reason. For it must have been that I had some good reason in my
mind.

"Why, yes," I said, scarce knowing why, "I have further use for you.
Tarry for a moment and I shall return. And," I added mentally, "by
that time I shall have discovered the reason."

She said nothing; I hastened back to the house, where even from the
outside I could hear the loud voice of Sheldon vowing that if what
this Indian said were true, the cavalry he had discovered at North
Castle must be Moylan's and no other.

I entered and listened a moment to Major Lockwood, urging this
obstinate man to send out his patrols; then I walked over to the
window where Boyd stood in whispered consultation with an Indian.

The savage towered at least six feet in his soaking moccasins; he wore
neither lock nor plume, nor paint of any kind that I could see,
carried neither gun nor blanket, nor even a hatchet. There was only a
heavy knife at the beaded girdle, which belted his hunting shirt and
breeches of muddy tow-cloth.

As I approached them, the Mohican turned his head and shot a searching
glance at me. Boyd said:

"This is the great Sagamore, Mayaro, Mr. Loskiel; and I have attempted
to persuade him to come north with us tomorrow. Perhaps your eloquence
will succeed where my plain speech has failed." And to the tall
Sagamore he said: "My brother, this is Ensign Loskiel, of Colonel
Morgan's command-- my comrade and good friend. What this man's lips
tell you has first been taught them by his heart. Squirrels chatter,
brooks babble, and the tongues of the Iroquois are split. But this is
a man, Sagamore, such as are few among men. For he lies not even to
women." And though his countenance was very grave, I saw his eyes
laughing at me.

The Indian made no movement until I held out my hand. Then his sinewy
fingers touched mine, warily at first, like the exploring antennae of
a nervous butterfly. And presently his steady gaze began to disturb
me.

"Does my brother the Sagamore believe he has seen me somewhere
heretofore?" I asked, smilingly. "Perhaps it may have been so-- at
Johnson Hall-- or at Guy Park, perhaps, where came many chiefs and
sachems and Sagamores in the great days of the great Sir William-- the
days that are no more, O Sagamore!"

And: "My brother's given name?" inquired the savage bluntly.

"Euan-- Euan Loskiel, once of the family of Guy Johnson, but now, for
these three long battle years, officer in Colonel Morgan's regiment,"
I said. "Has the wise Sagamore ever seen me before this moment?"

The savage's eyes wavered, then sought the floor.

"Mayaro has forgotten," he replied very quietly, using the Delaware
phrase-- a tongue of which I scarcely understood a word. But I knew he
had seen me somewhere, and preferred not to admit it. Indian caution,
thought I, and I said:

"Is my brother Siwanois or Mohican?"

A cunning expression came into his features:

"If a Siwanois marries a Mohican woman, of what nation are the
children, my new brother, Loskiel?"

"Mohican," I said in surprise,-- "or so it is among the Iroquois," and
the next moment could have bitten off my tongue for vexation that I
should have so clumsily reminded a Sagamore of a subject nation of his
servitude, by assuming that the Lenni-Lenape had conformed even to the
racial customs of their conquerors.

The hot flush now staining my face did not escape him, and what he
thought of my stupid answer to him or of my embarrassment, I did not
know. His calm countenance had not altered-- not even had his eyes
changed, which features are quickest to alter when Indians betray
emotion.

I said in a mortified voice:

"The Siwanois Sagamore will believe that his new brother, Loskiel,
meant no offense." And I saw that the compliment had told.

"Mayaro has heard," he said, without the slightest emphasis of
resentment. Then, proudly and delicately yielding me reason, and
drawing his superb figure to its full and stately height: "When a
Mohican Sagamore listens, all Algonquins listen, and the Siwanois clan
grow silent in the still places. When a real man speaks, real men
listen with respect. Only the Canienga continue to chirp and chatter;
only the Long House is full of squirrel sounds and the noise of jays."
His lip curled contemptuously. "Let the echoes of the Long House
answer the Kanonsis. Mayaro's ears are open."

Boyd, with a triumphant glance at me, said eagerly:

"Is not this hour the hour for the great Siwanois clan of the
Lenni-Lenape to bid defiance to the Iroquois? Is it not time that the
Mohawks listen to the reading of those ancient belts, and count their
dishonoured dead with brookside pebbles from the headwaters of the
Sacandaga to the Delaware Capes?"

"Can squirrels count?" retorted Mayaro disdainfully. "Does my white
brother understand what the blue-jays say one to another in the
yellowing October woods? Not in the Kanonsis, nor yet in the
Kanonsionni may the Mohicans read to the Mohawks the ancient wampum
records. The Lenni-Lenape are Algonquin, not Huron-Iroquois. Let those
degraded Delawares who still sit in the Long House count their white
belts while, from both doors of the Confederacy, Seneca and Mohawk
belt-bearers hurl their red wampum to the four corners of the world."

"The Mohicans, while they wait, may read of glory and great deeds," I
said, "but the belts in their hands are not white. How can this be, my
brother?"

The Sagamore's eyes flashed:

"The belts we remember are red!" he said. "We Mohicans have never
understood Iroquois wampum. Let the Lenape of the Kansonsionni bear
Iroquois belts!"

"In the Long House," said I, "the light is dim. Perhaps the Canienga's
ambassadors can no longer perceive the red belts in the archives of
the Lenape."

It had so far been a careful and cautious exchange of subtlest
metaphor between this proud and sensitive Mohican and me; I striving
to win him to our cause by recalling the ancient greatness and the
proud freedom of his tribe, yet most carefully avoiding undue pressure
or any direct appeal for an immediate answer to Boyd's request. But
already I had so thoroughly prepared the ground; and the Sagamore's
responses had been so encouraging, that the time seemed to have come
to put the direct and final question. And now, to avoid the
traditional twenty-four hours' delay which an Indian invariably
believes is due his own dignity before replying to a vitally important
demand, I boldly cast precedent and custom to the four winds, and once
more seized on allegory to aid me in this hour of instant need.

I began by saluting him with the most insidious and stately compliment
I could possibly offer to a Sagamore of a conquered race-- a race
which already was nearly extinct-- investing this Mohican Sagamore
with the prerogatives of his very conquerors by the subtlety of my
opening phrase:

"O Sagamore! Roya-neh! Noble of the three free clans of a free Mohican
people! Our people have need of you. The path is dark to
Catharines-town. Terror haunts those frightful shades. Roya-nef! We
need you!

"Brother! Is there occasion for belts between us to confirm a
brother's words, when this leathern girth I wear around my body
carries a red wampum which all may see and read-- my war axe and my
knife?"

I raised my right arm slowly, and drew with my forefinger a great
circle in the air around us:

"Brother! Listen attentively! Since a Sagamore has read the belt I
yesterday delivered, the day-sun has circled us where we now stand. It
is another day, O Roya-neh! In yonder fireplace new ashes whiten, new
embers redden. We have slept (touching my eyelids and then laying my
right hand lightly over his); we have eaten (again touching his lips
and then my own); and now-- now here-- now, in this place and on this
day, I have returned to the Mohican fire -- the Fire of Tamanund! Now
I am seated (touching both knees). Now my ears are open. Let the
Sagamore of the Mohicans answer my belt delivered! I have spoken, O
Roya-neh!"

For a full five minutes of intense silence I knew that my bold appeal
was being balanced in the scales by one of a people to whom tradition
is a religion. One scale was weighted with the immemorial customs and
usages of a great and proud people; the other with a white man's
subtle and flattering recognition of these customs, conveyed in
metaphor, which all Indians adore, and appealing to imagination-- an
appeal to which no Huron, no Iroquois, no Algonquin, is ever deaf.

In the breathless silence of suspense the irritable, high-pitched
voice of Colonel Sheldon came to my ears. It seemed that after all he
had sent out a few troopers and that one had just returned to report a
large body of horsemen which had passed the Bedford road at a gallop,
apparently headed for Ridgefield. But I scarcely noted what was being
discussed in the further end of the hall, so intent was I on the
Sagamore's reply-- if, indeed, he meant to answer me at all. I could
even feel Boyd's body quivering with suppressed excitement as our
elbows chanced to come in contact; as for me, I scarce made out to
control myself at all, and any nether lip was nearly bitten through
ere the Mohican lifted his symmetrical head and looked me full and
honestly in the eyes.

"Brother," he said, in a curiously hushed voice, "on this day I come
to you here, at this fire, to acquaint you with my answer; answering
my brother's words of yesterday."

I could hear Boyd's deep breath of profound relief. "Thank God!" I
thought.

The Sagamore spoke again, very quietly:

"Brother, the road is dark to Catharines-town. There are no stars
there, no moon, no sun-- only a bloody mist in the forest. For to that
dreadful empire of the Iroquois only blind trails lead. And from them
ghosts of the Long House arise and stand. Only a thick darkness is
there-- an endless gloom to which the Mohican hatchets long, long ago
dispatched the severed souls they struck! In every trail they stand,
these ghosts of the Kanonsi, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga-- ghosts of the
Tuscarora. The Mohawk beasts who wear the guise of men are there.
Mayaro spits upon them! And upon their League! And upon their Atotarho
the Siwanois spit!"

Suddenly his arm shot out and he grasped the hilt of my knife, drew it
from my belt, and then slowly returned it. I drew his knife and
rendered it again.

"Brother," he said, "I have this day heard your voice coming to me out
of the Northland! I have read the message on the belt you bore and
wear; your voice has not lied to my ears; your message is clear as
running springs to my eyes. I can see through to their pleasant
depths. No snake lies hidden under them. So now-- now, I say-- if my
brother's sight is dimmed on the trail to Catharines-town, Mayaro will
teach him how to see under the night-sun as owls see, so that behind
us, the steps of many men shall not stumble, and the darkness of the
Long House shall become redder than dawn, lighted by the flames of a
thousand rifles!

"Brother! A Sagamore never lies. I have drawn my brother's knife!
Brother, I have spoken!"

And so it was done in that house and in the dark of dawn. Boyd
silently gave him his hands, and so did I; then Boyd led him aside
with a slight motion of dismissal to me.

As I walked toward the front door, which was now striding open, I saw
Major Tallmadge go out ahead of me, run to the mounting-block, and
climb into his saddle. Colonel Sheldon followed him to the doorway,
and called after him:

"Take a dozen men with you, and meet Colonel Moylan! A dozen will be
sufficient, Major!"

Then he turned back into the house, saying to Major Lockwood and Mr.
Hunt he was positive that the large body of dragoons in rapid motion,
which had been seen and reported by one of our videttes a few minutes
since, could be no other than Moylan's expected regiment; and that he
would mount his own men presently and draw them up in front of the
Meeting House.

The rain had now nearly ceased; a cloudy, greyish horizon became
visible, and the dim light spreading from a watery sky made objects
dimly discernible out of doors.

I hastened back to the shed where I had left the strange maid swathed
in her scarlet cape; and found her there, slowly pacing the trampled
sod before it.

As I came up with her, she said:

"Why are the light dragoons riding on the Bedford road? Is aught
amiss?"

"A very large body of horse has passed our videttes, making toward
Ridgefield. Colonel Sheldon thinks it must be Moylan's regiment."

"Do you?"

"It may be so."

"And if it be the leather-caps?"

"Then we must find ourselves in a sorry pickle."

As I spoke, the little bugle-horn of Sheldon's Horse blew boots and
saddles, and four score dragoons scrambled into their saddles down by
the barns, and came riding up the sloppy road, their horses slipping
badly and floundering through the puddles and across the stream,
where, led by a captain, the whole troop took the Meeting House road
at a stiff canter.

We watched them out of sight, then she said:

"I have awaited your pleasure, Mr. Loskiel. Pray, in what further
manner can I be of service to-- my country?"

"I have come back to tell you," said I, "that you can be of no further
use. Our errand to the Sagamore has now ended, and most happily. You
have served your country better than you can ever understand. I have
come to say so, and to thank you with-- with a heart-- very full."

"Have I then done well?" she asked slowly.

"Indeed you have!" I replied, with such a warmth of feeling that it
surprised myself.

"Then why may I not understand this thing that I have done-- for my
country?"

"I wish I might tell you."

"May you not?"

"No, I dare not."

She bit her lip, gazing at nothing over the ragged collar of her cape,
and stood so, musing. And after a while she seemed to come to herself,
wearily, and she cast a tragic upward glance at me. Then, dropping her
eyes, and with the slightest inclination of her head, not looking at
me at all, she started across the trampled grass.

"Wait----" I was by her side again in the same breath.

"Well, sir?" And she confronted me with cool mien and lifted brows.
Under them her grey eyes hinted. of a disdain which I had seen in them
more than once.

"May I not suitably express my gratitude to you?" I said.

"You have already done so."

"I have tried to do so properly, but it is not easy for me to say how
grateful to you we men of the Northland are-- how deeply we must ever
remain in your debt. Yet-- I will attempt to express our thanks-- if
you care to listen."

After a pause: "Then-- if there is nothing more to say --"

"There is, I tell you. Will you not listen?"

"I have been thanked-- suitably.... I will say adieu, sir."

"Would you-- would you so far favour me as to make known to me your
name?" I said, stammering a little.

"Lois is my name," she said indifferently.

"No more than that?"

"No more than that."

How it was now going with me I did not clearly understand, but it
appeared to be my instinct not to let her slip away into the world
without something more friendly said-- some truer gratitude
expressed-- some warmth.

"Lois," I said very gravely, "what we Americans give to our country
demands no ignoble reward. Therefore, I offer none of any sort. Yet,
because you have been a good comrade to me-- and because now we are
about to go our different ways into the world before us-- I ask of you
two things. May I do so?"

After a moment, looking away from me across the meadow:

"Ask," she said.

"Then the first is-- will you take my hand in adieu-- and let us part
as good soldiers part?"

Still gazing absently across the meadow, she extended her hand. I
retained it for a moment, then released it. Her arm fell inert by her
side, but mine tingled to the shoulder.

"And one more thing," I said, while this strange and curious
reluctance to let her go was now steadily invading me.

"Yes?"

"Will you wear a comrade's token-- in memory of an hour or two with
him?"

"What!"

She spoke with a quick intake of breath and her grey eyes were on me
now, piercing me to the roots of speech and motive.

I wore a heavy ring beaten out of gold; Guy Johnson gave it. This I
took from my trembling finger, scarce knowing why I was doing it at
all, and stooping and lifting her little, wind-roughened hand, put it
on the first finger I encountered-- blindly, now, and clumsily past
all belief, my hand was shaking so absurdly.

If my face were now as red as it was hot, hers, on the contrary, had
become very strange and still and white. For a moment I seemed to read
distrust, scorn, even hatred, in her level stare, and something of
fear, too, in every quickening breath that moved the scarlet mantle on
her breast. Then, in a flash, she had turned her back on me and was
standing there in the grey dawn, with both hands over her face,
straight and still as a young pine. But my ring was shining on her
finger.

Emotion of a nature to which I was an utter stranger was meddling with
my breath and pulses, now checking, now speeding both so that I stood
with mind disconcerted in a silly sort of daze.

At length I gathered sufficient composure to step to her side again.

"Once more, little comrade, good-bye," I said. "This ends it all."

Again she turned her shoulder to me, but I heard her low reply:

"Good-bye-- Mr. Loskiel."

And so it ended.

A moment later I found myself walking aimlessly across the grass in no
particular direction. Three times I turned in my tracks to watch her.
Then she disappeared beyond the brookside willows.

I remember now that I had turned and was walking slowly back to where
our horses stood, moving listlessly through the freshly mowed meadow
between drenched haystacks-- the first I had seen that year-- and God
alone knows where were my thoughts a-gypsying, when, very far away, I
heard a gun-shot.

At first I could perceive nothing, then on the distant Bedford road I
saw one of our dragoons running his horse and bending low in his
saddle.

Another dragoon appeared, riding a diable-- and a dozen more behind
these; and on their heels a-galloping, a great body of red-jacketed
horsemen-- hundreds of them-- the foremost shooting from their
saddles, the great mass of them swinging their heavy cutlasses and
spurring furiously after our flying men.

I had seen far more than was necessary, and I ran for my horse. Other
officers came running, too-- Sheldon, Thomas, Lockwood, and my
Lieutenant Boyd.

As we clutched bridle and stirrup and popped upward into out saddles,
it seemed that the red-coats must cut us off, but we spurred out of
the meadow into the Meeting House road, and Boyd cried furiously in my
ear:

"See what this damned Sheldon has done for us now! God! What disgrace
is ours!"

I saw Colonel Sheldon presently, pale as death, and heard him exclaim:

"Oh, Christ! I shall be broke for this! I shall be broke!"

I made out to say to Boyd:

"The enemy are coming in hundreds, sir, and we have scarce four score
men mounted by the Meeting House."

"They'll never stand, either," he panted. "But if they do we'll see
this matter to an end."

"Our orders?" I asked.

"Damn our orders," said he. "We'll see this matter to an end."

We rode hard, but already some of Tallmadge's terror-stricken patrol
were overhauling us, and the clangor of the British cava