“The man,” said Bart, glancing up to his wondering companion, with an odd air of shyness, as he provokingly persisted in his evasions—“the man is one of Warner's sergeants, and a sort of relation to somebody that I thought likely would be visiting at his house by this time. And—and I guess we'll venture there, considering,” he added, suddenly dashing some distance ahead, under pretence of pointing out the way After winding their course a while among the variously grouped little thickets that studded the old pasture, they at length entered a tall forest of maple, which the incisions in the trees, together with the marks of an old boiling-place, that they soon reached, proclaimed to be the sugar orchard, belonging, probably, to the establishment they were seeking. And, now falling into a beaten path, they soon perceived, by the glimpses of an opening which they occasionally caught through the trees, that they were drawing near to the object of their search. The serpentine course of the path, however, and the undergrowth, so thick as to be nearly impervious to the sight, prevented any direct view of the opening; and they passed on without any very exact notions of propinquity till a sudden turn of the path brought them unexpectedly to the edge of the wood, and in full view of the house, not a hundred yards distant; when, to their astonishment and dismay, they beheld the place in possession of a large party of the enemy. Bart instantly caught the bridle, and was turning the horse for the purpose of fleeing back into the forest, when five or six armed men sprang out from the bushes behind and around them, cutting off their retreat in every direction. And the next moment they were prisoners to the minions of the vindictive Peters.
Bart's quick eye had told him, at a glance, that there was no chance for him to escape; and, before his natural looks could be noted, he had become transformed into a lout of so stolid and inoffensive an appearance, that his captors seemed greatly disappointed, and evidently entertained doubts whether he could be the one they supposed they were about to secure. And it was not till his pale and trembling fellow-prisoner had been conducted off on her horse some rods, that they could make him seem to comprehend that he was a prisoner, and must go with them. He then burst out into a piteous fit of weeping, and, passively receiving the kicks and cuffs of his keepers to get him in motion, went bawling along, like a whipped schoolboy, towards the house.
“I thought 'twould be jes so!” he exclaimed, between his sobs and outcries. “I most knowed when that man hired father to have me go to show the woman the way—I most knowed she was running away, and would get me into some scrape. Then the man, like enough, had done something, so he darsent go any furder with her. And now they'll lay it at to me—boo-hoo! oo-oo-oo!”
“Conduct the lady into the house!” said the officer in command, as the prisoners were led into the yard—“conduct her into the house, and set a guard round it, till orders can be got from the colonel. And as to this bawling devil,” he continued, turning with a scrutinizing, but somewhat staggered look, to the blubbering Bart, “take him to the barn, where I just noticed some good cords, bind him hand and foot, and guard him closely, he will make less noise within an hour from now, I fancy.”
“But, your honor,” began one of the scouts who had brought in the prisoners—
“Yes, yes,” interrupted the other, “I have just been informed of his pretences; but there's an even chance that he is shamming, and the fellow we want, after all. Do as I have ordered.”
Bart was now led into the open barn, which stood facing the yard, and projecting in the rear over a steep bank, making from the floor, on the back side, that was also open, a perpendicular fall of nearly a dozen feet. He was then ordered to sit down in the middle of the floor, when two of the half dozen keepers who had him in charge, with many a half taunting, half pitying joke at his doleful whimpering, carelessly proceeded to prepare the cords for binding him, while the rest laid aside their guns, and went searching about the barn for eggs, all, notwithstanding the caution of their commander, being evidently so much impressed with the idea of his innocence as to disarm them of the vigilance usually exercised on such occasions. At this juncture, just as the two men, one standing before and the other behind him, were in the act of stooping to take his legs and arms, Bart started to his feet with the suddenness of thought, and giving the one in his rear a paralyzing kick in the pit of his stomach, grappled round the legs of the other, and, bearing him, in spite of all his struggles, across the floor, leaped with him from the verge to the earth below. Managing to keep uppermost in the descent, Bart, as the man struck heavily on the ground, leaped unhurt from the senseless body, and, with the speed of a wild deer, made his way to the nearest point of woods, which he fortunately reached just in time to avoid the volley of bullets that was sent after him by the rallying guard from whom he had so strangely escaped. While the balked tories, in the general commotion that now ensued, were giving vent to their rage and mortification, in cursing one another and the more particular object of their wrath, whom they concluded it was useless to pursue, a long, shrill whistle was heard issuing from another point of the forest, to which it was thought the escaped prisoner could not have had time to pass round. Scarcely had the sound died away, when a movement, accompanied by a low snorting, was heard in the high-fenced cow-yard, into which Lightfoot had been turned for safe keeping. The whistle was soon repeated, and the next moment the sagacious animal was seen rearing herself nearly upright in the air, and then, with a prodigious leap, throwing herself over the fence into the field beyond. Although the tories, for a while, as little comprehended this movement of the pony, as they did, at first, that of her master, yet they raised the alarm that the horse had broken away; and a dozen men threw down their guns, and ran out into the field to head her, but, dashing at and through them, like a mad Fury, she bounded off at full speed, and soon disappeared in the woods in the direction in which the whistling had been heard, leaving the baffled pursuers and their associates now fully to perceive how completely they had all been outwitted and outdone by both horse and master.
Much of our happiness is the result of contrast. A slight alleviation, unexpectedly springing out of a disheartening misfortune, not unfrequently affords a comparative pleasure more keenly appreciated than unalloyed blessings arising out of the ordinary circumstances of life. The pleasure of Miss Haviland was equalled only by her surprise, when, on entering the house, she found her former fellow-prisoner, the sprightly and fearless Vine Howard, a transient but favored inmate, whose presence here now fully explained the enigmatical language of Bart, on the way, while it soon raised a shrewd suspicion of the cause of the awkward shyness he had exhibited in making his partial and roundabout revelations. Their mutual salutations, inquiries, and explanations, had scarcely been exchanged, before they were called to the window by an outcry and commotion among the tories without; when they had the unspeakable satisfaction of witnessing the escape of Bart, for whose situation and fate they had both, from different causes, felt the deepest commiseration and the most gloomy apprehensions.
“Now,” said the animated Vine, as she turned exultingly away from the gratifying scene that had opened by the escape of Bart, and closed by that of his pony—“now, Sabrey, if they will let you remain here till dark, I will see what I can do towards effecting your escape, which, to be candid about it, I mainly came here to favor. But whether you escape, remain, or are dragged back to the British camp, I will not this time be separated from you.”
The proffered assistance of the spirited girl, however, at least so far as related to the contemplated attempt to escape by night, was not destined to be called in requisition. In a short time, a messenger was seen to arrive; upon which the whole party of tories commenced preparations for an immediate departure. Presently a closely covered vehicle, drawn by one horse, appeared coming from the main road, and approaching the door. The next moment, the officer, whom we have already noted, entered the house, and told Miss Haviland she was required to depart.