“If the ladies were all—but I don't know about letting this old fellow off so easily,” said one, exchanging doubtful glances with those around him. “He is both tory and Yorker to the eyes.”
“Yes,” urged another, “and who knows but he was among the murderers last night?”
“I have ascertained that he was not among the actors of last night's outrage,” replied Woodburn.
“Well,” rejoined the former, “I know the other was—that upper-crust tory by his side there, who was always too proud to wear an old coat and hat, till he thought they might help him in skulking away out of the reach of punishment.”
“I know Peters was there, to my cost; and I had no notion of asking any exemption for him,” returned Woodburn, with bitterness. “But this old gentleman, whatever may be his feelings, has committed none of those acts of violence, for which, only, I understand, our leaders intend to institute trials. Shall we not, then, let him and his ladies proceed, as I proposed?”
Receiving no direct answer to his appeal, the speaker now took two or three of the leading opposers aside, and, after conversing with them a few moments, returned, and announced to Haviland that he was at liberty to depart.
How well and wisely had he read the human heart, who penned the scriptural apothegm, “If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink; for, in so doing, thou shall heap coals of fire on his head”! Haviland, though by nature an honorable man, had yet suffered himself to enter deeply into the personal animosities of Peters towards Woodburn, which, with his political and aristocratic prejudices, had caused him to think of the young man only with feelings of contempt and bitterness. And when he witnessed the noble conduct of the latter, first in rescuing his daughter from the flood, and now so generously interposing in his behalf, it produced that struggle between pride and conscience, whose operation is so forcibly expressed by the sacred writer just quoted. And, although he could bring himself to acknowledge his obligations only by a formal and constrained bow, yet the conflicting and painful expressions that were seen flitting over his disturbed countenance, as he now returned to the sleigh, plainly told how effectually, and with what punished feelings, his enmity had been silenced. But not so with his single-minded and quickly and justly appreciating daughter. She had no prejudices to combat, no pride to conquer; and she, therefore, witnessed each new act of her deliverer with as much pleasure as gratitude—feelings which sought expression in no parade of words, it is true, but in the more meaning and eloquent language of the kindly tone and sweetly-beaming countenance. And, in her low-murmured, “Thank you—thank you for all,” as Woodburn handed her to her seat in the vehicle, he felt a thousand fold repaid for all he had ventured for her sake; while the speaking smile, with which she the next moment turned to him, and nodded her adieu, left an impress on his heart destined never to be effaced.
While this was transpiring, Peters, who had been standing apart from the rest of his company, sullenly looking on, without uttering a word, except to bid Haviland go on without him, contrived, without exciting any suspicion of his design, to work himself by degrees to the outer edge of the crowd, in the direction in which the team was about to pass. And, as the sleigh, which was now put in motion, approached him, he made a sudden feint of running the opposite way; when, as the crowd were confusedly springing forward to head him, he quickly tacked about, leaped into the sleigh, and, snatching the reins and whip from Haviland's hands, applied the lash so furiously, that the frantic horses bounded forward with a speed which carried the receding vehicle more than fifty yards on its course, before the balked and confused throng could recover themselves, and fairly comprehend what had happened. But the sharp, bitter shout of execrations, mingled with cries for immediate pursuit, which now rose from the agitated multitude, proclaimed at once their hatred of the haughty loyalist, and their determination not to suffer him to escape from justice And the next instant, a half dozen swift runners, led on by Dunning, shot out from the crowd, in the eager chase, like so many arrows speeding to the mark. And, notwithstanding the supposed advantages of horses over men in a race, and notwithstanding the increased speed with which the fugitive team thundered along over the half-bare and uneven ground, the pursued had scarcely reached the end of a furlong, before the fleet and determined hunter, still in advance of his companions, gained the side of the sleigh, leaped up, pounced upon his cringing victim, and brought him headlong to the ground, leaving Haviland to seize the relinquished reins, check the horses as he best could, and proceed on his way unmolested.
“There! you ditter sneak of a runaway tory. You will now go, I der rather calculate, where there's no ditter petticoats to shelter you,” said Dunning, raising the chapfallen Peters by the collar, and drawing him along back, amidst the exulting shouts of the revolutionists, by whom he and his friend Brush were then forced away, in no very gentle manner, to join their fellow-prisoners, in the same dungeon where the victims of their last night's outrage were so unfeelingly and so unwisely immured.
A detailed description of the various scenes which here succeeded, in the winding up of this local revolution, as it may justly be denominated, would occupy too much space for the limits of our tale, without evolving any further incident, having much bearing on the destinies of those of its personages whose fortunes we design to follow. We will now, therefore, sum up, in a few words, the doings of the triumphant party, and, with a comment or two of our own, dismiss the subject.