At a motion of the indicating finger of the hostess, the tempting dish was brought forward, and carefully placed on the table before the many-titled carver, amid a shower of compliments to the distinguished artificer of so fine an edible structure, from him and many others of the admiring company. The general now rose, and, intent only on a dexterous performance of the duties of his new vocation, gave a preliminary flourish of knife and fork, and dashed into the middle of the pie; when lo! through the rent thus made in the imprisoning crust, out flew half a score of live blackbirds, which, fluttering up and scattering over the dodging heads of the astonished guests, made for the open windows, and escaped, with loud chirping cries, to their native meadows! At first, a slight exclamation from the gentlemen, a half shriek from the ladies, then a momentary pause, and then one universal burst of uproarious laughter, followed this strange denouement of the little plot of the playful countess. She, it appeared, had engaged a fowler to bring her a couple of dozens of blackbirds, which, by a net, he had taken, and brought to her alive; when, keeping part as they were, she contrived up the scheme to amuse and surprise her guests here described, and, slaying the rest, made of them a veritable pie, that was now brought forward, and partaken, with great gusto, by the delighted company.
At length the cloth was removed, and the table replenished with bottles and glasses. Then followed the usual round of toasts—“the health of the king,”—“the invincibility of British arms,”—“success to the present expedition,”—and, with many a deriding epithet, “confusion to the rebels and their ragged army.”
“Fill, gentlemen,” said Burgoyne, after the subjects above named had been sufficiently exhausted—“fill up your glasses once more; for, in descanting on the public responsibilities and glory of the soldier, let us not be unmindful of those private felicities which are to reward his prowess. I give you,” he added, with a significant glance at our heroine—“I give you, ladies and gentlemen, the health and happiness of our two loyal American officers, Colonel Peters and Captain Jones, the prospective bridegrooms of the double wedding of to-morrow, extremely regretting that both of the fair participants of the happy occasion, instead of one, are not here to give the beautiful response of their blushes to the sentiment.”
As the lively applause with which this toast was received and drank was subsiding, the ladies, to the great relief of the astonished and confused Miss Haviland, now rose and retired to another apartment. Here, pleading some excuse for an immediate departure, Sabrey hurried out through a back way, and escaped unperceived to her father's quarters, a small adjoining cottage, where she had lodged since his arrival in camp, and where she now secluded herself, to endeavour to fathom the plot which the unexpected and unwarranted announcement just indirectly made, together with some other circumstances of recent occurrence, plainly told was in progress to in snare her.
But it may here be necessary, for a clear understanding of some things which have preceded, and others which may follow, to revert briefly to the experience of the luckless maiden since placed in her present uncongenial and embarrassing position.
When Miss Haviland, on the termination of her compulsory journey, arrived at the outposts of the British army, she was conducted, by the order of some one evidently apprised of her coming immediately to her father's quarters. The old gentleman, at the somewhat awkward meeting that now took place between them, seemed both surprised and gratified at seeing her there; and though his manner betrayed a sort of guilty embarrassment arising, perhaps, from the consciousness of his former harshness to her, he yet at once, and pointedly, disclaimed having had any agency in her abduction, which he laid to the chances of war; to which, he contended, her perverse and unadvised conduct had been the means of exposing her. Peters, also, who soon made his appearance, joined in the disclaimer; and tendering some empty apologies for what had happened, which, he said, grew out of the mistake of a subordinate officer in construing an order in relation to taking hostages from the enemy, in certain cases, offered to convey her back, if she chose it, as soon as found consistent with her safety. The offer, however, was never repeated; and his own conduct very soon belied his assertions, and convinced her of the truth of her suspicions from the first, that he was the sole instigator of the outrage she had received, and that it was still his purpose to detain her and keep her in a position which would enable him the more effectually to prosecute his designs; for although in the few formal calls he continued to make at the house, he never pressed his suit, but seemed rather to avoid the subject, as if determined to afford her no opportunity to repeat her former refusals, she yet quickly perceived that he was busy at his intrigues to bring about, by the agency of others and by secret management, what by himself, or by any open and honorable means, he despaired of accomplishing. All this, from day to day, unfolded itself in the renewed importunities and reproaches of her father, the added entreaties of Jones, the lover of Miss McRea, then soon expected in the British camp to be married, in the reports which had been put in circulation to place her in a false light,—that of a perverse and coquettish girl,—in the efforts made to force her into social parties, where the opinions of all were obviously forestalled, and especially in the contrived introductions she was compelled to undergo to those who had evidently been enlisted as intercessors, among whom were some whose ambiguous conduct often greatly annoyed, and, at times, even filled her bosom with perplexity and alarm.
Such was the position of the unhappy girl at the time of her reluctant attendance as one of the guests of the merry party we have described. Although annoyed, sickened, and disgusted at what she had daily witnessed, and vexed and indignant at the contemptible artifices and intrigues of Peters, which, however intended, were beginning to be the means of exposing her to new trials, yet, till what took place at that party, she had entertained no serious apprehension that any attempt would be made to coerce her into a marriage which she had so decidedly repudiated.
But the announcement which had just been so strangely made coming as it did from so powerful a personage, and one, at the same time, whose equivocal behavior, when she had casually met him, had excited her deepest aversion, now gave her to understand that such an attempt was indeed about to be made by the assumed arbiters of her fate, and that her resistance to the contemplated scheme, should she be able to make one against the overawing influence that was about to be brought to bear upon her, and even her acquiescence, she feared, was to be followed by persecutions, from the thought of which she shrunk with dismay. She might have taken that announcement, perhaps, as a mere ruse, as in part it really was, got up to place her in a predicament in which most females would yield rather than become the principal actor in the scene that would follow further resistance; or she might have viewed the whole as a contemptible fabrication, but for a circumstance of that morning's occurrence. Captain Jones had called and apprised her that he was about sending an escort to Fort Edward for his betrothed, informed her that the next morning was appointed for his wedding, and concluded by making his last appeal to induce her to consent to be united to Peters at the same time.
And it was this occurrence, in connection with the former, that had so thoroughly alarmed her.
While pondering on the means and chances of escaping the threatened destiny, she perceived from her window that the company at Reidesel's had broken up, and were scattering to their respective quarters. And presently her father entered her room, and after announcing that he had been honored by the commander-in-chief with a mission to Skenesboro', from which he should not be able to return till late at night, presented her a sealed billet, and immediately departed. With a trembling hand she opened the suspected missive and read,—